Ron Paul Bumpersticker Gets Man Kicked Out of National Park

The Rutherford Institute
May 24, 2011

BLACKSBURG, S.C. — The Rutherford Institute has come to the defense of a 73-year-old Virginia resident who was allegedly ordered by a park ranger to remove his car from a national military park in South Carolina because of political messages attached to his vehicle. Jack Faw, whose ancestors fought in the historic battle memorialized at Kings Mountain National Military Park, contacted The Rutherford Institute after being told by a park ranger that the decal promoting a political organization associated with Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), which was displayed on the back window of Faw’s car, was not allowed in the park. In a legal letter to Park officials, constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead warned that the ranger’s directive, which resulted in Faw being forced to leave the park, violated Faw’s First Amendment rights, as well as National Park Service regulations. Whitehead also demanded assurances that Park employees will be properly instructed in how to respect the constitutional rights of visitors to the Park so that Faw and others will not face similar restrictions in the future.

Whitehead’s letter to officials at Kings Mountain National Military Park is available here.

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“The display of political messages from a vehicle is unquestionably expression protected by the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of speech,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. “This type of censorship is what you would expect in some foreign regime, not a public park in America.”

Jack Faw is a frequent visitor to Kings Mountain National Military Park in Blacksburg, S.C., which marks the site where three of his ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War. Faw visited the park on May 6, 2011, en route to his home in Virginia. Soon after arriving and in the midst of his tour through the exhibits, Faw was approached by a park ranger who asked Faw to come into the ranger’s office. The ranger informed Faw that he must remove his car from the parking lot because it displayed a political decal that is not allowed in National Parks. On the rear window of Faw’s passenger vehicle is a translucent decal promoting “Ron Paul’s Campaign for Liberty,” an organization dedicated to reestablishing and furthering the principles embodied in the United States Constitution. Although Faw protested that he had a right to display the decal and asserted it was not causing any disturbance, the ranger insisted that the car be removed from the park, at which point Mr. Faw felt compelled to comply with the order and left the Park.

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Insisting that National Park employees be properly educated about basic constitutional precepts in order to ensure that this incident is not repeated, attorney John Whitehead reminded Park officials that visitors to National Parks do not forfeit their First Amendment rights to speech and expression. Indeed, noted Whitehead, Faw’s political messages on his vehicle appear to be wholly consistent with and allowable under regulations promulgated last October by the National Park Service concerning expressive activities by the public within National Parks. Furthermore, not only is the display of a political message on a vehicle unquestionably expression protected by the First Amendment, but a federal appeals court recently ruled that the right of citizens to freedom of speech applies within the confines of National Parks.

Deception at the Fed

Deception at the Fed

 

Ron Paul
Infowars.com
February 18, 2011

For the past three decades, the Federal Reserve has been given a dual mandate: keeping prices stable and maximizing employment. This policy relies not only on the fatal conceit of believing in the wisdom of supposed experts, but also on numerical chicanery.

Rather than understanding inflation in the classical sense as a monetary phenomenon– an increase in the money supply- it has been redefined as an increase in the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The CPI is calculated based on a weighted basket of goods which is constantly fluctuating, allowing for manipulation of the index to keep inflation expectations low. Employment figures are much the same, relying on survey data, seasonal adjustments, and birth/death models, while the major focus remains on the unemployment rate. Of course, the unemployment rate can fall as discouraged workers drop out of the labor market altogether, leading to the phenomenon of a falling unemployment rate with no job growth.

In terms of keeping stable prices, the Fed has failed miserably. According to the government’s own CPI calculators, it takes $2.65 today to purchase what cost one dollar in 1980. And since its creation in 1913, the Federal Reserve has presided over a 98% decline in the dollar’s purchasing power. The average American family sees the price of milk, eggs, and meat increasing, while packaged household goods decrease in size rather than price.

Loose fiscal policy has failed to create jobs also. Consider that we had a $700 billion TARP program, nearly $1 trillion in stimulus spending, a government takeover of General Motors, and hundreds of billions of dollars of guarantees to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, HUD, FDIC, etc. On top of those programs the Federal Reserve has provided over $4 trillion worth of assistance over the past few years through its credit facilities, purchases of mortgage-backed securities, and now its second round of quantitative easing. Yet even after all these trillions of dollars of spending and bailouts, total nonfarm payroll employment is still seven million jobs lower than it was before this crisis began.

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In this same period of time, the total U.S. population has increased by nine million people. We would expect that roughly four million of these people should have been employed, so we are really dealing with eleven million fewer employed people than would otherwise be expected.

It should not be surprising that monetary policy is ineffective at creating actual jobs. It is the effects of monetary policy itself that cause the boom and bust of the business cycle that leads to swings in the unemployment rate. By lowering interest rates through its loose monetary policy, the Fed spurs investment in long-term projects that would not be profitable at market-determined interest rates. Everything seems to go well for awhile until businesses realize that they cannot sell their newly-built houses, their inventories of iron ore, or their new cars. Until these resources are redirected, often with great economic pain for all involved, true economic recovery cannot begin.

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Over $4 trillion in bailout facilities and outright debt monetization, combined with interest rates near zero for over two years, have not and will not contribute to increased employment. What is needed is liquidation of debt and malinvested resources. Pumping money into the same sectors that have just crashed merely prolongs the crisis. Until we learn the lesson that jobs are produced through real savings and investment and not through the creation of new money, we are doomed to repeat this boom and bust cycle.

Read more at Rep. Ron Paul’s House web page.

Ron Paul: I Can Beat “Warmongering” Obama

Ron Paul: I Can Beat “Warmongering” Obama

Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
February 15, 2011

During an appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Congressman Ron Paul dropped perhaps the biggest hint yet that he is preparing to announce his campaign for the presidency, affirming he has the ability to unite Republicans, independents and progressive to defeat the “warmongering” Barack Obama.

Asked if he could beat Obama, Paul responded, “The reality is it would be very, very difficult, but if you look at the polls, and there aren’t that many, my appeal is to a lot of independents and a lot of progressive Democrats who are sick and tired of Obama for opting out of cutting back on some of this militarism,” adding that his numbers would be even bigger when stacked up against Obama than they would be in a Republican primary.

“He’s a war monger,” Rep. Paul added. “He’s expanding the war. My numbers would be much bigger running against Obama than they will be running against some conservative in the Republican primary.”

Indeed, an April 2010 Rasmussen poll showed that Paul was almost level with Obama if the two were to go head to head for the presidency. Following a 15 point bounce in the aftermath of the Tucson shootings, Obama has pulled away from all potential Republican candidates, but given the momentum Paul could build with his energetic grass roots base, beating Obama would be a distinct possibility.

Despite the fact that a Rasmussen poll released last week showed that Paul was ahead of Sarah Palin in terms of having the ability to beat Obama, a Fox News poll released yesterday, which showed all of the establishment Republican candidates trailing Obama by some margin, did not even include Paul in the survey.

Exemplifying again how the establishment consistently tries to derail Paul’s momentum by ignoring his very existence, obscure names like John Thune and Jon Huntsman were included in the Fox poll and yet Paul was omitted entirely.

During the MSNBC segment, the Congressman pointed out that the debate over military spending was a matter of semantics, arguing that the issue had little to do with “defense” and more to do with propping up the US military-industrial complex and occupying foreign countries.

“I think the problem we have is with the semantics,” said Paul. “They have conditioned us all to use the word defense spending. Who wants to cut defense? I don’t want to cut defense. I want a stronger defense.”

“I want to cut the militarism, the interventionism, the stuff that hurts us, that makes us more vulnerable,” he added. “If we separate defense from militarism, maybe more people would be willing to accept it. Who wants to be on record who says I just voted against the defense budget.”

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“I think it’s a perception and a semantics problem that we have to try to reeducate the people to understand what we’re talking about.”

Paul’s ostracization by the self-proclaimed “conservative” Young Americans for Freedom organization, a group that vehemently supported the Democrat-led war in Vietnam, for his refusal to support the interventionist and neo-liberal expansion of the US military-industrial complex, should be worn as a badge of honor.

“It is a sad day in American history when a one-time conservative-libertarian stalwart has fallen more out of touch with America’s needs for national security than the current feeble and appeasing administration,” YAF’s Senior National Director Jordan Marks said in a statement.

By lumping Ron Paul in with the “feeble and appeasing” Obama administration, Marks attempts to make a distinction between Obama and his predecessor George W. Bush, by portraying Obama as weak on “defense,” when in reality, the Obama war chest has been bigger than anything ever passed under Bush year upon year. Obama’s 2011 war chest swelled to more than 700 billion dollars – that’s more than Bush ever got.

Indeed, as soon as Obama took office his first action was to send 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan and to expand the Bush-era bombings in Pakistan, as well as opening up a new front in Yemen. There are more US troops deployed globally under Obama than there ever were under Bush.

Bush and Obama have both followed identical interventionist foreign policies that mainly revolve around carpet bombing goat herders in broken-backed third world countries, something that Paul rightly points out has nothing to do with the “defense” of the United States.

The fact that Obama has a bigger military budget than Bush ever did gives a pretty clear indication that occupying and invading foreign countries has nothing to do with true conservatism – it comes from the foundational beliefs of those whom the Young Americans for Freedom organization would undoubtedly champion – neo-cons who are nothing more than Trotskyites – they believe wholeheartedly in the welfare-warfare state.

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Ron Paul should be honored to be kicked out of this pitiful little group – because it only crystallizes his character as a real conservative, while the Young Americans for Freedom are nothing more than a mouthpiece for neo-cons who have more in common with historical Marxists than they do the founding fathers of America.

Ron Paul is a true icon of genuine conservatism – every policy he embraces would have a ringing endorsement from the founding fathers – who staunchly advocated a non-interventionist foreign policy.

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Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show. Watson has been interviewed by many publications and radio shows, including Vanity Fair and Coast to Coast AM, America’s most listened to late night talk show.

Trump: Ron Paul Has “Zero Chance” Of Beating Obama

Trump: Ron Paul Has “Zero Chance” Of Beating Obama

Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
February 11, 2011

Prospective presidential candidate Donald Trump caused a sensation at the start of yesterday’s CPAC event when he dismissed Ron Paul’s chances of beating Obama in 2012, saying the Texas Congressman had “zero chance” of winning the election.

“By the way, Ron Paul cannot get elected, I’m sorry to tell you,” Trump told the CPAC crowd, to a chorus of both boos and applause.

“I like Ron Paul, I think he’s a good guy, but honestly I think he has zero chance of getting elected, you have to win an election,” the billionaire socialite added.

In actual fact, the Texas Congressman has a greater chance of beating Obama in 2012 than someone who the Republican establishment is likely to throw their weight behind next year – Sarah Palin.

A Rasmussen poll released Monday showed that Paul leads Palin in being able to build a campaign that would prevent Obama from securing a second term. The poll shows that in these early stages, Ron Paul would poll 35% of votes to Obama’s 44%, where as Sarah Palin would attract 38% to an Obama count of 49%.

The figures mean that at this time the Texas Congressman would score 2% more of the overall vote than the former governor of Alaska.

Those numbers are also based on the fact that Obama is still riding high on a recent 15 point bounce in the aftermath of the Tucson shootings, a lead that is sure to subside as the election nears. Once Paul is able to mobilize his hugely effective grass roots base, which outstrips anything the likes of Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich or Mike Huckabee can call upon, a 9 point deficit is far from insurmountable.

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Indeed, before the Tucson shootings when Obama was at one of the lowest ebbs of his popular approval, a YouGov/Polimetrix study found that establishment Republican candidates like Palin, Gingrich and Romney were all losing popularity at a similar pace to the president. Only Ron Paul has bucked this trend.

In addition, an April 2010 Rasmussen survey found that a hypothetical 2012 election race between president Obama and Texas Congressman Ron Paul would result in an almost dead heat, with Obama just one per cent ahead.

Democrats who voted for Obama in 2008 will only be motivated to do so again if Republicans put forward a compromised candidate who can easily be characterized as George W. Bush 2.0. If Ron Paul runs against Obama, huge numbers of Democrats will take a back seat, and some may even switch allegiances, such is the profound sense of betrayal many liberals now feel towards Obama’s completely unfulfilled promises of hope and change.

Donald Trump is completely wrong in his assertion that Paul has “zero chance” of beating Obama. Indeed, once the establishment media gets its teeth into the likes of Palin, Romney, Gingrich and indeed Trump himself, their compromised backgrounds will almost guarantee Obama the victory, whereas Paul’s squeaky clean track record cannot be as easily distorted.

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By the time the campaign season is in full swing, and the mud begins to stick to the names of establishment Republican candidates, Ron Paul may be the only contender who can beat Obama in 2012.

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Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show. Watson has been interviewed by many publications and radio shows, including Vanity Fair and Coast to Coast AM, America’s most listened to late night talk show.