Is Ron Paul making the right decision with his “next phase” in spreading the “message” and moving the revolution forward? My criticism and recommendations for Ron Paul and all of us to consider as we continue the fight for Individual Liberty, Free Markets, Private Property, Sound Money, and A Non-interventionist Foreign Policy!
Sure revolutions take time. The American Revolution lasted eight and a half years, while the French Revolution went on for ten years.
Unfortunately, America doesn’t have that much time and if we want to make a difference in her future, NOW is the time to act. Like any great revolution, you need a great leader, and we have one in Ron Paul.
But I don’t believe that even Ron Paul understands how he can best take this movement forward. According to the latest message to his supporters, he said that “elections are short term efforts and revolutions are long term projects.” He then goes on to say he wants to “plan for the next phase” and that this phase would be “grassroots, not top down.”
His solution seems to be twofold at present (I’m not including an analysis of his book as it hasn’t been released yet and will address the “march” later in this article).
First, he wants to get people elected who share the “Liberty” vision as outlined in the Liberty Political Action Committee whose mission is “to help fund and elect conservative, pro-Constitution, pro-liberty, pro-American sovereignty candidates who share Congressman Ron Paul’s commitment to the values and principles our nation was founded upon.”
That’s fine, and of course needed for the revolution to succeed.
Secondly, he directs us to the F.R.E.E. Foundation which according to their website; “is a non-profit, non-partisan, educational foundation dedicated to public education on the principles of free-market economics, sound money and limited government.”
Again, sounds like it fits right in with the revolution.
But when you look further at this site, you see that it’s not well organized. For example, the National Endowment for Liberty (NEFL), a separate project of FREE, “was established in 1989 to develop programs that take advantage of the enormous potential of electronic media to pursue the mission of FREE. We believe that through mass communication we can attract public interest and significantly strengthen awareness of the moral, cultural and institutional foundations of the American political system.”
When you go to the page describing this project here, you find that NEFL “developed and produced the “At Issue” television series that was seen on the Discovery Network and CNBC national cable television networks. “At Issue” examines American public policy and how political, economic and social institutions interact with the principles of American constitutional government, and does so in an entertaining and fast-paced, commercial-television format, while remaining commercial-free and entirely educational.” These videos are great titles! The problem is that you can’t find any of the videos available on the site.
This group has been around since 1989 and there is no access to their work on their own site?
This leads me to the conclusion that Ron Paul isn’t ready for the revolution to continue via his “next phase” quite yet and also leads me to the conclusion that he needs to continue the first phase and that is continue his run for the presidency!
Before I address that, I’d like to discuss the proposed “march” on Washington D.C. tentatively planned for June 21st.
Many of you may not know, but there was already a rally across America by the truckers as they were opposed to the “NAU (North American Union) and NAFTA’s demand for us to allow tens of thousands of Mexican truckers and their trucking companies into America.” I monitored the media after their first event in April of last year and didn’t see or hear anything about it. Evidently there was another rally in June of last year that I didn’t even hear about anywhere.
If we are to use the time of the weekend of June 21st to march on Washington D.C., what guarantee will there be of media coverage? Hasn’t the media already proven to us that they won’t give Ron Paul or his supporters any press time (unless it is negative of course).
What happens if a whacked out Ron Paul supporter (or neocon infiltrator disguised as a neo-nazi Ron Paul supporter) did something unthinkable during the march and opened fire on the Whitehouse? What would this do for the revolution and the message?
Wouldn’t the time spent traveling to, the day of the march, and traveling home after the march be better spent talking to 1000 people in our own backyard? Imagine if all of us would just go talk to more people what an impact that would have where media would be a non-factor! Isn’t word of mouth how many of us first heard about Ron Paul to begin with? We need to turn ignorance into enlightenment!
Even with all of our current efforts in getting the message out, the results were about a 5% nationwide vote for Ron Paul. This clearly shows that the revolution will take time, but to expect it to continue based on this “new phase,” is hopeful at best. Ron Paul needs to run as a 3rd party candidate and garner eight more months of attention from the grassroots efforts of all the Paulites going door to door or calling the lists provided by the campaign.
Phase one is still alive and we must market the message of “Individual Liberty, Free Markets, Private Property, Sound Money, and A Non-interventionist Foreign Policy, ” all the way to November!
Ron Paul can run as the candidate for the Libertarian Party or Constitution Party, it matters not. The way the system is set up with delegates, he more than likely won’t stand a chance of being elected, but he could very well win the popular vote if enough of us go out and do our job! This would result in having to bring about a change in our electoral college farce of a system where only a few really decide who gets elected. And we still do have some hidden delegates that can show support….AND eight more months….so you never know!
Call me a dreamer, but the marketing of the rEVOLution couldn’t have a better time frame in which to get “the message” out to the masses. Americans are “Fed Up” and only “You Can Make A Difference!”
Time is of the essence! Don’t give up the ship!
JMHO and open to support, ridicule, praise or abuse by all as we still live in a Free America! Tomorrow we might not be able to speak our minds!
Doug Eberhardt
