Ron Paul to End Campaign, Launches New Effort

Breaking News - Ron Paul to End Campaign, Launches New Effort
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/Story?id=5056019&page=1

"The new phase of the revolution officially begins with a speech tonight in Houston and a Web video to be posted on his site, officially ending Paul's presidential campaign and freeing up the more than $4.7 million in campaign cash for investment in a new advocacy group, The Campaign for Liberty.

The new entity will be used to push a slate of libertarian-minded Republican candidates for public office in local districts nationwide."

Watch the live video broadcast of Dr. Paul's rally tonight (justin.tv/ronpaul2008), June 12th, @ 9PM CDT in Houston, TX. Dr. Paul will be making a major announcement, and we would like you to be a part of it.


Here are some things you can do very easily to help jump start the campaign:

JOIN THE CAMPAIGN:
http://www.campaignforliberty.com/

DONATE TO THE CAMPAIGN:
https://www.campaignforliberty.com/donate/

FACEBOOK PAGE:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Campaign-for-Liberty/15271979613

FACEBOOK GROUP:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=48410945326

DIGG THE CAMPAIGN:
http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/Ron_Paul_s_Campaign_For_Liberty_The_Revolution_Continues

1:51 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

1 on The New York Times Bestseller list!

For those who haven't heard the news, Ron Paul's The Revolution: A Manifesto will have the 1 spot on the New York Times Bestsellers list after debuting at 7 - http://www.ronpaul2008.com/

This is a great book and I highly recommend getting it for yourself or others if you haven't yet. Let's keep it at the top.

Buy it here.

6:23 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Wasted Vote Myth

As a libertarian, I am constantly being told that I shouldn't "waste" my vote on Libertarian candidates. I am so sick of this wasted vote nonsense and would like to dispel the myth here. Hopefully you will see that the only wasted vote is a vote for somebody you don't believe in. I for one will never go against my beliefs and vote for whichever Republican or Democrat is the "lesser of two evils" at the moment. I will continue to vote for the candidate with views that most closely align with my own (and if there isn't one, I will write in a candidate or abstain).

Mathematically, you would have to vote for approximately 230 million years for your vote to decide an election, so if you are going to vote, why vote for somebody who you don't agree with if your vote is so insignificant in the first place?1 By voting for a lesser evil, you are in effect giving a mandate to the person who receives your vote. They have no idea that you do not like much of their platform and thus the candidate and the future candidates of that party will continue to offer largely the same platform. By voting for the person who you most agree with, you are showing everybody what policies you are truly in favor of. When you vote for somebody just because they are more likely to be a winner, you lose when the person gets elected.

Here is an article that I like that pretty thoroughly explains why there is no such thing as a "wasted vote":

"What is a Wasted Vote?

An unprincipled vote is the only wasted vote. Voting for a third party, contrary to popular belief, is not a wasted vote. What is voting? It's a chance to tell the country — and perhaps even the world — what your vision of government and society really is. But how do most of us vote? Do the majority of those who believe Harry Browne or Ralph Nader are the best candidates — most in tune with our own feelings — actually vote for them? No. Instead, most of us vote the "lesser of two evils" — a defensive vote, rather than an offensive one. The lesser of two evils is still evil.

So what happens after you vote the defensive vote? Well, then you have sold out your personal beliefs. You have become a political prostitute. You aren't standing up for what you believe in by voting the lesser of two evils.

I don't know about you, but I'm tired of being a political prostitute — voting for the people who don't care if I vote for them or not. If you think the Republican or the Democrat candidate really does best mirror your beliefs, by all means, vote for that candidate. But if you don't, and you still vote for them, you're helping to preserve the status quo you probably despise.

Remember, You Never Decide the Winner

On statewide races (larger than city council races), there is a single important point to remember: You as an individual will never cast the deciding ballot! Hence there is no reason to vote for the lesser evil. Most of the time we hear the wasted vote argument most in precisely the races where it applies least. For instance, the Presidency of the United States. A Presidential race will never be decided by one vote. And if by some mathematical chance it got that close, it would be decided through the Courts and through lawsuits (as the 2000 election was decided). If you go to the polls for the purpose of casting the deciding ballot in major races, you are making an irrational decision. The chances of dying en route in a car, plane, or meteor accident are far greater than the chance of casting the deciding ballot.

What's the Point of Voting?

We as individuals don't vote to select the winner. As a practical matter, we vote to tell everyone else which choice best represents the direction which we want the country to go. When you vote, you gain a certain power that a non-voter doesn't have; the power to change America through the political process.

Therefore voting for the lesser evil sends the wrong message; it's sending a message of compromise. In effect, a defensive vote says: "I will settle for a good America, not the best America possible." I urge you not to settle.

Remember: If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten. The only constant in the world is that change never stops. In other words, if you want change, create change.

Even if once in your life you missed the chance to cast that mythical deciding ballot, the harm from selecting the wrong person in one election is more than offset by a lifetime of giving voter support to the lesser of two evils rather than standing up for what you believe.

The history of third parties in America is that they serve as the vanguard for new ideas. It is these ideas that make the world go round. If a Third Party begins to draw votes, one or both of the two big parties steal their ideas."

Link

1Lew Rockwell – Another great article that goes into the mathematics behind voting and examines more reasons why you shouldn't waste your vote on candidates you don't agree with.

"If you voted Republican and expected smaller government or lower taxes, you wasted your vote. If you voted Democrat expecting greater civil liberties, you wasted your vote." - Link

"If you were in prison and faced a 50% chance of death by lethal injection, a 45% chance of the electric chair, and had a 5% chance of escape, would you vote for lethal injection because it was the most likely outcome, or would you try for escape? Voting Libertarian is our only chance for political survival. Choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil." – Michael Badnarik, 2004 LP Presidential Candidate

11:51 PM - 3 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

"Change"

With all the talk recently of "change" by the Presidential candidates and the media, I wanted to take the time to remind everybody to take a look beyond the flowery rhetoric that politicians use so well and actually examine what "change" the candidates are proposing. While I agree we desperately need "change," let's remember that change can be for the worse. In my experience talking with people while campaigning for politicians, I have found that a large number of them support certain candidates without really knowing where they stand on the issues. It seems like many of these people have been swept up by political rhetoric and media hype. The fact that a lot of people will go out and vote without being reasonably informed is very troubling. These uninformed decisions have an impact on all of us and it is extremely irresponsible to not put careful consideration into them. I don't think we would be in the situation we are in today if people would actually take the time to inform themselves. Instead of campaigns telling us to "vote or die," we should be trying to ensure that people are educated about the issues and all of the candidates beliefs. We should encourage those who don't get informed to do us all a favor and stay home on election day.

Here is a column from Thomas Sowell, one of my favorite economists, on the issue:

"Most people have too much of a sense of decency and too much common sense to have gone along with those horrors unless someone found a way to turn off their thinking and turn on their emotions.

That is how Jim Jones led hundreds of people to their deaths at Jonestown. On a much larger scale, that is how Lenin created a regime of mass murder in Russia, how Hitler did the same thing in Germany and Mao in China.

Yet we seem to be no more aware of a need to be on guard against demagoguery today, in the 21st century, than those people who looked up with open-mouthed adulation at Adolf Hitler in the 1930s and at numerous other demagogues, large and small, around the world throughout the turbulent 20th century. Many people find it thrilling that the mantra of "change" is ringing out across the land during this election year. But let's do what the politicians hope that we will never do — stop and think.

It is doubtful whether there is a single human being in this entire country who is 100 percent satisfied with everything that is going on. In other words, everybody is for change.

The real difference between liberals and conservatives is in which specific things they want to change, and in what way.

Milton Friedman was the leading conservative thinker of his time but he wanted to radically change the Federal Reserve, the school system, and the tax system, among other things.

Everybody is for change. They differ on the specifics. Uniting people behind the thoughtless mantra of "change" means asking for a blank check in exchange for rhetoric. That deal has been made many times in many places — and millions of people have lived to regret it.

It is not too much to ask politicians to talk specifics, instead of trying to sweep us along, turning off our minds and turning on our emotions, with soaring rhetoric.

Optimists might even hope for some logical consistency and hard facts.

Barack Obama says that he wants to "heal America and repair the world." One wonders what he will do for an encore and whether he will rest on the seventh day.

That we have so many people who are ready to be swept along by such rhetoric is a huge danger, for it means that the fate of this great nation is at risk from any skilled demagogue who comes along.

Barack Obama says that he wants to "heal" the country while at the same time promoting the idea that all sorts of people are victims for whom he will fight.

Being divisive while proclaiming unity is something you can do only in the world of rhetoric.

Senator Obama has no monopoly on demagoguery, however. Former Senator John Edwards has been playing this game longer, even if not as effectively in the political arena.

John Edwards built his own fortune in the courtroom, depicting babies with birth defects as victims of the doctors who delivered them. The cost of such demagoguery has gone far beyond the tens of millions of dollars that Edwards pocketed for himself from gullible juries.

Such lawsuits based on junk science have driven up the cost of medical care, not only directly but even more so indirectly, by leading to an increase in Caesarean births and other costly "defensive medicine" to protect doctors rather than patients.

The world of John Edwards, like the world of Barack Obama, is a world of victims, whose savior he claims to be.

What is scary is how little interest the public and the media have in the actual track record of political saviors and the cry of generic "change."

America is not czarist Russia or Iran under the shah, so that people might think that any change was bound to be for the better. Yet even in those despotic countries the changes — to communism and to the ayatollahs — made them far worse.

The time is long overdue for voters to demand specifics instead of rhetoric that turns their emotions on and their minds off."

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/01/22/dangerous_demagoguery?page=1

Part II: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/01/23/dangerous_demagoguery_part_ii

4:58 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Tomorrow Is The Big Day!

Tomorrow WE will make history! We will wake up the world to the message of liberty! Pledge your donation now: http://www.teaparty07.com


From john_anderson_ii at RonPaulForums.com. Really powerful:

"Dr. Paul doesn't even know me...

He has never met me, nor my sons and daughters, nor my wife. Though nearly every visible object I own bears his name, he wouldn't recognize me by my face, or hair and eye color. He hasn't the faintest clue that I exist. Yet how many times has Dr. Paul stood alone on the House floor, and adamantly refused to give once inch of ground where my rights are concerned? When I was playing XBox and generally living my life, who was being singled out and ridiculed for defending my American Dream? Who among our political representatives has held my interests at heart while I simply lived in the moment?

No more. No more.

This December 16th, Ron's frail 72 year old form will no longer stand alone. He will no longer need to shoulder the burden of one man, against a well entrenched but flawed philosophy. He will no longer have to bear the burden of ridicule and dismissal. I for one, will share it with him. On this upcoming day, its time for all us who benefited from his diligence in the past years to make good. The debts are due, and it's time to literally pay the piper.

My children will suffer a slimmer Christmas and I may not have the funds to give a Christmas as I would like. However, after the hardship, I will know that I have done the right thing. I, and my family, will know that we stood on the side of liberty, and helped to carry it's burden. It may turn out to be the best Christmas I can offer my children.

Give on the 16th, and give until it hurts. Don't think for a moment that Ron's reputation was easily won. He did it for you. Stand with him."

Please repost and spread the word. Time is running out!

11:55 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Important Grassroots Effort!

These AMAZING commercials will air in rotation over 700 times in Central Iowa on cable T.V. The spots cost a total of $30,000 and they're raising more to purchase additional spots in this critical early primary state.

Everybody please donate to get as much exposure for these incredible ads as possible: http://www.operationnh.com/

Please repost!

4:32 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Reach 500 People With $10! 1,250 with $25!

This is a very effective way to get Ron Paul's name to the masses, and I mean 'targeted' voters in the 100,000's ! We also will enable listeners to 'press 1' and get transferred to a Ron Paul Supporter for further info.

Please consider donating as this is huge. The payoff could be massive in some early primary states that are not really focused on right now from other candidates.

CHIPIN:
http://call4paul.chipin.com/operation-call-4-paul

*****************************************
OPERATION CALL 4 PAUL


Lets tip the scales in our favor. Spread the Liberty Message!

Lets reach 100,000's of Targeted Registered Voters for the early 2008 Primaries. We will be targeting the following states:

Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Michigan & Nevada.

Each Call will be 30-40 seconds in length and will give pertinent contact information on Ron Paul, and how to learn more about him. These calls are automated with a pre-recorded message. There will also be 2-3 issue points made, customized for maximum effectiveness for each state. Where applicable, users can have the option to speak with a Ron Paul supporter for additional information, by clicking on their phonepad and being directly transferred. So, the automated pre-recorded message tells the listener, that to learn more (in addition to 2-3 poignent issue points, depending on state), they can "Please press 1 to speak to Ron Paul grassroots supporter for additional information". At this point, the listener can request materials sent to them, or touch briefly on some points. The goal is to get 'information' to the user, NOT get in discussions on issue points or 'try to convert'.

Here is how it breaks down in terms of how your money is spent. You can see the significance of the potential impact of reaching so many targeted voters.

Remember, the motif here is 'information, information, name recognition, information'. To give out Campaign web address, phone number and to talk with a grassroots supporter (who is trained) to take the call and answer simple questions and get info to send out a 'kit/information' to the person. The goal is touch lightly on issue points if the caller wants information - the goal is to 'get information to the caller' and 'direct them to Ron Paul's campaign site, and phone numbers'.


$10 C.. 500 Messages
$25 C.. 1,250 Messages
$50 C.. 2,500 Messages
$100 C.. 5,000 Messages
$250 C.. 12,500 Messages
$500 C.. 25,000 Messages
$1000 C.. 50,000 Messages
$2000 C.. 100,000 Messages
$2500 C.. 125,000 Messages
$4000 C.. 200,000 Messages
$5000 C.. 250,000 Messages

CHIPIN:
http://call4paul.chipin.com/operation-call-4-paul

10:45 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Pledge Your Vote For Paul!

Sign up at http://www.pledgeforpaul.com/ and spread this site around!

We need to make sure that this gets spread far and wide in the Ron Paul community because it will send out reminders to people to vote right before their state's primaries. This could be HUGE if we are able to get a lot of extra votes just from people that would have forgotten.

Digg it as well: http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/Pledge_for_Paul

10:51 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Tea Party ’07

If you thought Ron Paul's $4.2 million dollar day on November 5th was huge, just wait until December 16th! Pledge your support now and spread the word. Let's make $10 million in 24 hours!

"On December 16th, 1773, American colonists dumped tea into the Boston Harbor to protest an oppressive tax. This December 16th, American citizens will dump millions of dollars into the Ron Paul presidential campaign to protest the oppressive and unconstitutional inflation tax - which has enabled a flawed foreign policy, a costly war and the sacrificing of our liberties here at home.

Please join us this December 16th 2007 for the largest one-day political donation event in history. Our goal is to bring together 100,000 people to donate $100 each, creating a one day donation total of $10,000,000.

Please pledge via feedburner below to confirm your commitment to donate. Each day you'll receive an email with our total number of subscribers. In this way we will know exactly where we stand in our efforts. Our goal is 100,000 subscribers.

Please pledge now. Please spread the word. Thank you."

http://www.teaparty07.com/

5:38 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Remember the 5th of November ($10 Million for Ron Paul)

There's a very cool grassroots effort under way (with its own website here, http://thisnovember5th.com/) to get 100,000 Paul supporters to contribute $100 each on Nov. 5, Guy Fawkes Day. It would really propel Paul into the top ranks of fundraising and create quite a media splash, putting Paul in great shape for the New Hampshire primary (which might even get moved to December).

$100 might be steep for some people, but it's worth the sacrifice and there will be many people who will put up more than $100 to pick up some of the slack. 6,000 have already signed up, lets make this a historic day!

10:58 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment