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<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 2:03 AM, Stuart Levy <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:slevy@ncsa.uiuc.edu">slevy@ncsa.uiuc.edu</a>></span> wrote:</div>
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<blockquote style="BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; PADDING-LEFT: 1ex" class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 08:17:45AM +0800, E.Wayne Johnson wrote:<br>> interesting video clip with some joker from Indiana and disturbing message and response,<br>
> followed by Ron Paul.<br>><br>> <a href="http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/04/ron-paul-we-can-do-better-with-peace.html" target="_blank">http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/04/ron-paul-we-can-do-better-with-peace.html</a><br>
<br>Yes. "We stand with Israel", says Rep. Mike Pence of Muncie, IN,<br>to resounding cheers. Ron Paul, talking about military bases around the<br>world and other good stuff, got cheers too though not so resounding.<br>
<br><br>Definitely not all, but a fair part of Mike Shedlock's written commentary<br>on the above page could have been heard at an AWARE meeting --<br>"The US cannot afford to waste trillions of dollars keeping<br>
troops in 140 countries around the world." or "The reason '95% of the<br> Political Class support Obama' over Ron Paul is the political class<br> in both parties are mostly war mongers. Enough already!" or<br>
"[T]he military complex has a vested interest in perpetual war."<br>Encouraging to see.<br><br>Also very interesting is the Rasmussen poll linked-to from that page:<br> <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2012/election_2012_barack_obama_42_ron_paul_41" target="_blank">http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2012/election_2012_barack_obama_42_ron_paul_41</a><br>
Don't just read the headline.<br><br>We read, for example, that *almost a quarter* of likely US voters now<br>consider themselves part of the Tea Party movement. That's a lot.<br><br>Of those, almost all believe that Americans are overtaxed, and trust<br>
the opinions of the American people more than their political leaders.<br>(Gary Trudeau said it: "We want to take our country back! -- From who?<br>-- From the people we elected to lead us! Will you join us?")<br>
<br>When Tea-Party-identified voters were asked about a<br>hypothetical Republican-vs-Democrat (two-way) race for President,<br>most said they'd vote Republican.<br><br>But if the Tea Party were a party and ran in a hypothetical three-way<br>
Tea-Democrat-Republican presidential race, and asking *all* (not just TP)<br>voters this time, the Democrat would win, but a Tea Party candidate would<br>draw almost a fifth of (hypothetical) votes.<br><br>Just over half of Republican voters say the average Republican congressman<br>
is *more liberal* than they are. Just 20% believe the average Republican<br>congressman is more conservative than the average Republican voter.<br>That's a frightening thought.<br><br>Of Republican voters, most (59%) think Sarah Palin shares the values<br>
of most Republican voters. 19% of all voters think that Ron Paul<br>shares the values of most Republican voters (but about half of all<br>voters weren't sure whether he did or not).<br><br><br>So: if the Tea Party were a party and did run a candidate,<br>
would it prefer a Palin (or a Pence), or a Paul?<br><br><br>Some questions would be easy. Little need for social spending.<br>Equalizing inequality isn't something the government should have<br>a role in, I expect they'd comfortably agree.<br>
<br>No "amnesty" for "illegal" immigrants -- even though, as one<br>immigration rights activist has pointed out, the history of this<br>country is *all about* amnesty, about escaping the shackles of the<br>
past and heading freely into someplace new.<br><br>But, what portion of the Tea Party's soul is anti-war and anti-imperialist?<br><br>At last fall's Liberty Fest (thanks, Wayne!) I talked briefly with<br>the manager for IVAW member Adam Kokesh's run for US Congress,<br>
hoping to gauge how important the anti-war message was for his campaign.<br>Even though I spoke admiringly of his IVAW connection, and mentioned<br>being happy about our Tim Johnson's turn against the war, it sounded as though<br>
Kokesh's opposition to war was something they felt the New Mexico campaign<br>had to downplay.<br><br>Altogether I heard very little at that meeting about opposition to war<br>(though I did miss the gubernatorial debate on the first day).<br>
Some did raise it, and not only the Green-party candidates,<br>but war and US empire seemed low on the lists of most speakers I heard.<br><br>This despite the fact that the $trillion we've spent, and trillions<br>we've committed, in Iraq and Afghanistan, are at least comparable to the<br>
total cost (additional $1T over 10 years) of the health insurance bill<br>that's been the object of so much of the Tea Partiers' fury.<br><br>Where's the fury over our violent pursuit of power around the world?<br>
Was it there in the Tax Day tea parties, above the level of whispers?<br><br> Stuart<br></blockquote>
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<div>In a word, we're a nation of death. Americans don't understand the first thing about life.</div>
<br />--
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