TexasCHLforum.com

Lodge2004 wrote:

KBCraig wrote:All experts on the region point to blowback from our foreign policy being the primary reason for the WTC attacks (1993 and 2001), the USS Cole attack, the embassy bombings, etc. The idea that "they attacked us because we're free" is simply a political soundbite with no basis in fact.

Then I believe "experts on the region" are the ones who do not understand history.

They understand it exactly correctly, and your cite further confirms it.

In 1786 Jefferson and John Adams went to negotiate with Tripoli's envoy to London, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman or (Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). They asked him by what right he extorted money and took slaves. Jefferson reported to Secretary of State John Jay, and to the Congress:

The ambassador answered us that [the right] was founded on the Laws of the Prophet (Mohammed), that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have answered their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as prisoners, and that every Mussulman (or Muslim) who should be slain in battle was sure to go to heaven

Jefferson, coming from the perspective of the English concepts of "high seas" and "international waters", displayed an innocent type of arrogance that still continues today: that Americans should be able to go wherever and do whatever they want. Even the best of intentions ("We bring you free trade, and democracy!"), don't matter to someone whose traditions to the contrary are just as long, and whose convictions just as strong.

In short, they weren't seeking out our ships because we were infidels -- they were attacking our ships because we were in their waters. Sound familiar?

By the way, you should cite that link to the Wikipedia entry on the Barbary pirates, especially when copying and pasting.

Liberty wrote:They hate us because we aren't of their faith and we are infidels. Conversion at the end of a sword is part of the core to their beliefs and principles of Jihad

And this differs from GWB's foreign policy... how, exactly?

Lodge2004 wrote:I don't know the answers, but I do know one of them cannot be to cut and run. That just runs counter to everything I have ever learned about human nature.

Everything about the culture in that part of the world runs contrary to everything we think of as human nature. You simply can't apply our mores and expect anything they do to make sense.

Americans are myopic, with no sense of history. Your average American thinks all the current troubles started on 9/11/2001, and has no idea that we have been intruding on their internal affairs for over a century.

While our high school seniors can't correctly place the century, let alone decade, for the Revolution, Civil War, or even WWII, their teenagers can recite every war of the last 13 centuries. Americans are eager to accept apologies (no matter how insincere), and just move on, because "that's in the past". The Muslim world stays focused on every wrong done to them or their families, every perceived slight, for generations. Sometimes for centuries.

They might even "hate us because we're free", but it doesn't matter why they hate us. They attacked us because we have U.S. forces stationed on Arab land. U.S. bases in Saudi Arabia are just as offensive to them, as a strip club in the Alamo would be to us.

All experts on the region point to blowback from our foreign policy being the primary reason for the WTC attacks (1993 and 2001), the USS Cole attack, the embassy bombings, etc. The idea that "they attacked us because we're free" is simply a political soundbite with no basis in fact.

stroo wrote:KBCraig,

The stats you cited above actually show that probably Perot took more votes from Bush than from Clinton. Only 20% of Perot's votes came from liberals while 27% of Perot's votes came from conservatives. The moderates probably would have split between Clinton and Bush. So that leads to the conclusion that Perot took more votes from Bush than from Clinton.

The important figure is that 53% of Perot voters were self-described moderates.

I've never met a "self-described moderate" who, when pressed to take a position on various issues, didn't turn out to be a liberal who just didn't want to admit it.

Yes, 27% of Perot supporters were conservative, which means that 73% weren't conservative, and more likely to vote for Clinton.

frankie_the_yankee wrote:Just my opinion. I was around in '92, and most Perot people I talked to seemed to be Libertarians or Republicans who were attracted to some part of Perot's message. (And keep in mind I lived in RI at that time where there was no shortage of Democrats to encounter.)

I will keep that in mind. RI Democrats were very different from TX/AR/LA/OK/heartland Democrats of 1992, most of whom now call themselves Republicans, but would have voted unblinkingly Democrat in '92. Not until the Gingrich revolution of '94 did they start to change parties.

n fairness, I did note some people who were attracted to his anti-NAFTA protectionist statements ("..that giant sucking sound...") and some of these people were certainly labor union guys who leaned Democrat.

But I myself thought Perot was right about NAFTA and GATT (and still do) even though I consider myself to be a Libertarian-leaning Republican.

As do I. NAFTA/GATT are not free trade; they are managed trade. As Perot said, anything that is 10,000 pages long isn't free trade.

You see, I was attracted to Perot's candidacy myself to some degree. And most of his message did not strike me as appealing to people who would buy into the big government Eurosocialist redistributionist message that Bill Clinton was putting out.

So it seemed pretty obvious to me, and still does, that most of his support came from Bush. To change my mind on that would take a whole boatload of information and a solid argument.

I was also attracted to Perot, for several reasons. First, he cut to the truth about NAFTA/GATT. Second, he came from outside the political system, with a proven track record of getting things done. Next, we all have a vested interest in seeing the two party system smashed, and letting independent candidates become viable.

As I pointed out above, the heartland Democrats were not into, as you put it, the "big government Eurosocialist redistributionist message". Many of them weren't industrial unionists. But they were still Democrats, and wouldn't have voted for a Republican to save their lives. The veneer had not been cracked yet; they were Democrats because their daddies were Democrats, and grandaddies were Democrats, and great-grands were Democrats, because "Lincoln was a Republican, and FDR saved us all!"

This is very easy to illustrate. Just look at how solidly Democrat flyover country was until '94/'96. The same good ol' boys who are now afraid Democrats will take away their guns, were convinced in 1992 that George H.W. Bush would send their jobs to Mexico with NAFTA.

When Bill Clinton actually did so, it was he who made them into Republicans, not Ross Perot.

The same "Bubba from the heartland" demographic hasn't changed much, except in party affiliation. It was they who created the GOP majority from '94-'04, then became just as disaffected from the GOP as they had been from the Democrats.

They don't like gun control.
They don't like big spending and national debt.
They don't like federal meddling in local matters.
They cheer the troops, but they don't like sending them into foreign nations that didn't attack us any more than they liked it 40 years ago.
They are socially conservative, and don't want Washington --nor Austin-- dictating what constitutes a marriage or a family.

In short, the traditional middle America Blue Dog Democrats who voted for Perot are, ideologically speaking, closely aligned with traditional rock-ribbed Yankee Republicans (real Yankees from New England, not the "everyone northeast of here" Yankee. )

When the libertarians and Goldwater Republicans who are so enthusiastic about Ron Paul, are able to spread that message to those Heartland swing voters, Paul will have it in the bag.

Kevin

frankie_the_yankee wrote:I hear you but I just don't buy it.

Oh, okay. By all means, go with your assumptions, rather than the factual research source I cited.

Say, what happened to:

frankie_the_yankee wrote:Anyway, I'm done with this line of discussion.

Oh, and don't forget to donate Sunday, 11/11, if you're a veteran or wish to donate in honor of a veteran. If you're making a small donation, please do so as part of the "server stress test" from 7-8 p.m. Eastern (6-7 Central, 5-6 El Paso):

We need to help the campaign perform a $10 Donation Server STRESS TEST on November 11th from 7:00 to 8:00 PM eastern time.

Everyone needs to give just Ten Dollars on November 11th from 7:00 to 8:00 PM eastern time.


This server test has three purposes:

#1 To give RON PAUL the greatest number of small donations in a single hour (and thus more free media coverage).

#2 To lend an additional boost to the www.ThisNovember11th.com Veteran's Day fundraiser.

#3 To STRESS TEST the RON PAUL 2008 donation server leading up to the BOSTON TEA PARTY on November 16th.


Please schedule this $10 Dollar Donation event in your individual meetup groups.

The e-Campaign Director, Justine Lam, is aware of and supportive of this initative and has said that "Yes, I think we could handle it".

Now it is up to us to perform the $10 test to find out.

NcongruNt wrote:

lawrnk wrote:Perot got clinton in. You deny that?

I found your post reactionary and unfounded.

Not to mention unfactual. Perot drew more Democrat votes than Republican; if he'd stayed out of the race, Clinton would have won by an even larger margin.

See Politics: Who Cares by Peirce Lewis, Casey McCracken, and Roger Hunt (American Demographics, October 1994, vol. 16, no. 10) p. 23: Perot's support drew heavily from across the political spectrum, with 20% of his votes coming from self-described liberals, 27% from self-described conservatives, and 53% coming from self-described moderates. Economically, however, the majority of Perot voters (57%) were middle class, earning between $15,000 and $49,000 annually, with the bulk of the remainder drawing from the upper middle class (29% earning over $50,000 annually).

Perot only had 27% conservative support.

I am really tiring of answering the whole third party, Perot comparison. Some people are just so eager to pigeonhole, that they can only envision people in certain pre-established roles, no matter what the facts actually are.

Other upcoming "donation days": Sunday, 11/11, all veterans are urged to donate. The goal is another million, 10,000 veterans at $100 apiece. (I can't go another hundred so soon after 11/5, but I'll kick in $17.76.)

Friday, 11/23, "Buy nothing day". Instead of fighting the crowds on Black Friday, stay home and donate the money you save.

Sunday, 12/16, Boston Tea Party day. 'Nuff said.

Ron Paul Christmas: Donate $25 every Monday until Christmas.

There are others out there. Pick one, and donate.

The donation meter is currently above $7.7 million for the quarter. Looks like we'll easily be above $8 million before mid-week. In other words, two-thirds of the way to the $12 million quarterly goal, halfway through the quarter.

Good editorial from a major California news source, the very Republican Orange County Register:

http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/paul- ... raised-ron

Thursday, November 8, 2007
Editorial: $4.3 million reasons to believe in Ron Paul
The libertarian sets a one-day fundraising record for GOP presidential candidates
An Orange County Register editorial

If this doesn't get the attention of the mainstream media and the Republican establishment, it's difficult to figure out just what would – but it's likely that even more dramatic developments in Dr. Ron Paul's run for the presidency are yet to come.

The big news is that Ron Paul, the 10-term Republican congressman from Texas and longtime standard-bearer for libertarian and constitutionalist ideas, raised more money – by a considerable amount – in a 24-hour period than any other Republican candidate. Some 37,000 people, 21,000 of them new donors, contributed $4.3 million to Ron Paul's campaign Monday, Guy Fawkes Day.

Guy Fawkes Day? Go rent the DVD of "V for Vendetta" to gain an insight into the spirit that moves the Ron Paul revolution.

The previous single-day fundraising record for Republicans was held by Mitt Romney, who raised $3.14 million last January, when he held a "national call day." Barack Obama on the Democratic side has raised more money in a single day, and Hillary Clinton raised $6.2 million on June 30. But Paul is the single-day champion among Republicans.

Dr. Paul surprised the political world by raising more than $5 million in the third quarter, and his campaign set a goal of raising $12 million by the end of the year. As of Tuesday afternoon it had raised $7.396 million, so that goal, which seemed utopian a month ago, looks as if it will be surpassed easily.

"What was striking to me," Lew Rockwell of the Mises Institute in Auburn, Ala., who's a longtime friend and associate of Dr. Paul, told us, "is that this was entirely a volunteer event. It was conceived, designed and run entirely by volunteers. A normal campaign that tried a one-day fundraising event would have had weeks of top-down coordination and a huge staff manning the phones. This was an example of bottom-up spontaneous order."

So what does it mean? We believe it shows a considerable constituency not just for ending the war in Iraq, which Dr. Paul opposed from the beginning, but for an honest candidate who says what he thinks rather than what has been poll-tested, and for the kind of constitutionalist, limited-government philosophy that many Republicans and conservatives (as well as libertarians) used to think they supported.

In short, there's a hunger for liberty among young and old of all races and backgrounds, and many are willing to put their money where their mouth is. Ron Paul has been the catalyst, but he has awakened a growing group of Americans whom standard-issue politicians will no longer be able to ignore.

Back to the original subject, the final 24 hour total wasn't $2.5 million, wasn't $3 million, but was just barely under $4 million!


And Phase II begins: http://www.ronpaulchristmas.com/

Today was my fifth donation, and I have yet to be able to capture my name!

This finally put me over the $200 minimum to make the FEC's donor list. That's one government list I'm proud to be on!

I'm 44, and had never donated to any political campaign until Ron Paul decided to run.

The pace isn't slacking off at all:
http://ronpaulgraphs.com/nov_5_extended_total.html