History: Did Ron Paul '08 + '12 give us Trump '16

Did Ron Paul revolution lead to Trump nomination

  • Yes

    Votes: 8 24.2%

  • No

    Votes: 12 36.4%

  • Thats crazy talk!

    Votes: 13 39.4%
  • Total voters
    33
S

spudea

Member
Joined
Nov 29, 2007
Messages
3,271
The anti-establishment sentiment and distrust of corporate media is quite pervasive this election. Whether you believe Trump to be the real deal or a Hillary plant, he was able to capitalize on these themes perfectly.

"there is no future for a system where they laugh at Ron Paul"

"theres other ways to fix the country but Ron Paul is a big part of it"

"Even if you don't totally agree with his policies, we need someone whos bonefide, someone who is real someone who can be trusted. The system is coming after him, that is a massive endorsement of Ron Paul."

"To see Ron Paul like a lion in winter, standing up to those hyenas, those jackels"

 
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spudea said:
The anti-establishment sentiment and distrust of corporate media is quite pervasive this election. Whether you believe Trump to be the real deal or a Hillary plant, he was able to capitalize on these themes perfectly.
Click to expand...

unlike his son :D
 
What it gets is opposition . Most americans are commie dirtbags , so , you got Obama for 8 years and now you have Hillary looking for the same .
 
The short answer is no, Ron didn't give us Trump; idiocy among the electorate gave us Trump.

...the idea that they're both "anti-establishment" is based on a definition of "anti-establishment" so vague as to be meaningless.

...one which ignores everything that actually matters, like principles or specific policy positions.

The long answer is this:

People recognize that the status quo is not good, but don't have the foggiest idea how to make things better. There's been a growing desire for "change"; but this desire is totally inarticulate, not driven by any particular principles. Ron rode this wave in 08/12 and, in the process, he converted some "changers" into libertarians - made them appreciate that it was libertarian change in particular that we need. But most of the changers who supported Ron did not become libertarians; most retained their vague, inarticulate desire for change in general. Enter Trump. He's attracted many of those same people, who supported Ron without understanding him. Did Ron give us Trump? Only in the sense that, had Ron successfully converted more of the "changers" to libertarianism, they're wouldn't have been as many remaining to support Trump. But on no way whatsoever can Trump's movement be considered a continuation of Ron's movement; they are diametrically opposed in terms of principles and policies. Ron offered change by way of smaller government, Trump offers change by way of larger government (which he pinky swears will work much better with him in charge, becuz dealz...).
 
Some people here have gotten into some bad drugs if they really think there is a "yes" answer to the poll question.
 
I think without the exposure of the issues that Ron Paul gave us the dialogue in this country would be completely different. I voted yes because of the simple fact that so many people that I know who are voting Trump are trying to get me to vote for him using some of the same arguments I used with them the last 2 cycles.

I laugh because, while the ideas Ron Paul put out their are 100% legit and I agree with the arguments, what doesn't seem to float is the idea of integrity and sound moral character.

That will take some more work. But yes, Ron Paul education campaigns have given the general public the ammo and angle attack needed to bring down the corrupt establishment.

Too bad Rand tried to moderate the message. That was a severe miscalculation of the impact and influence Ron had in 2008 and 2012 to bring light to the issues.
 
newbitech said:
I think without the exposure of the issues that Ron Paul gave us the dialogue in this country would be completely different. I voted yes because of the simple fact that so many people that I know who are voting Trump are trying to get me to vote for him using some of the same arguments I used with them the last 2 cycles.

I laugh because, while the ideas Ron Paul put out their are 100% legit and I agree with the arguments, what doesn't seem to float is the idea of integrity and sound moral character.

That will take some more work. But yes, Ron Paul education campaigns have given the general public the ammo and angle attack needed to bring down the corrupt establishment.

Too bad Rand tried to moderate the message. That was a severe miscalculation of the impact and influence Ron had in 2008 and 2012 to bring light to the issues.
Click to expand...

Ron Paul is a gentleman.
 
No, it is true that both Ron Paul and Donald Trump have tapped into anti establishment sentiment fueled by voter anger but to say that Ron Paul's campaigns lead directly to the campaign of Donald Trump is classic correlation=causation fallacy. Many of the same issues did lead to their respective campaigns and there are some former Ron Paul supporters who are currently supporting Donald Trump, but these are both related to a third variable being a series of similar factors as well as a few differing ones which lead to both phenomenons.

We also need to take into account that many people are voting for Donald Trump as more of a protest vote against Hilary Clinton while nearly everyone who voted for Ron Paul did so out of legitimate support for him. This is not to say that Donald Trump dosen't have hard core fans who vote for him because they believe he would make a good president, they are out there and they outnumber the actual Hilary fans by a large margin.
 
I actually think Ron Paul's rise did enable the election of Trump. I know this forum has a lot of old school libertarians, but Ron Paul exposed me to a lot of ideas I already believed in but didn't know could be intellectually defended at the ripe age of 22-23.
- Drugs should be legal, it's your life and live it the way you like to
- Government spending and social programs are inherently ineffective and wasteful, taking away your money violates your rights.
- We should not go to war, war only enables rights to be violated here and abroad.
- Government deficits hurt the economy and shirt term stimuli are only band-aids to a large wound
- Guns help ensure your rights are not taken away
- and so on.

I remember my brother (a member banned here like 100 times) would be the only person at the dinner table saying this shit, and was frequently mocked and called a crackpot. After all, Iraq and Afghanistan were real threats to us and only George W could save us.

Then Obama got elected and everything started to change, probably for the wrong reasons honestly. A lot of people lost their jobs and finally had the time to be angry and protest. I remember many "Tea Party" rallies where these fringe ideas were starting to espoused by people who were regular Republicans. Of course there was the side effect of the trashy Confederate Flags and Don't Tread On Me but at least the ideas were getting out there.

Of course Rightards compromise like sheep at primary time, and Mitt Romneycare won the primaries, because after all getting Obama out of office became the only thing important to these people. Of course Ron went out there again and fought the good fight, and my brother was not mocked at the dinner table, but told, "You're right but we have to get Obama out of office first."

Of course Romney was a shitty candidate and Obama won handidly, despite this setback people jumped back on the crazy train. Simply put, Rand tried to sanitize the message, which I thought was wise, but Trump was willing to harness the power of the waking giant. Trump did dumb fucking stunts like Obama wasn't born here, I'm sure he didn't believe it himself and only did it to relish in the attention and relish in the spotlight but Trump had this fact right: Revolution comes from the middle class. The Pauls require you to have brain cells, Trump doesn't. And Americans are idiots, sadly that's why a real libertarian will never win.

But hey, in 2016 the man and woman on the street gave up on mainstream media en masse. You could say "New World Order" and "Elections are fixed" at the dinner table now and have people agree with you.

The world has gone completely crazy, I mean I think we hit a peak in people waking up. But the news is bad, mainstream moderates, not just Libtards have embraced notions of free college, universal health care, perpetual war.

This post is as ambivalent as Trump himself, so my message is, even if Americans took a step ahead the country is already hijacked. If it weren't for Ron Paul, there would be no dialogue to combat the inevitable fascist-Socialist dystopia the world has already become.
 
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Paul showed that the establishment can indeed be challenged. The actual message, however, did not transfer over very well to the Trump supporters.
 
I'd say Ron played a small role in it. Many of his supporters went to Trump, but Trump is not part of Ron's movement because Trump is contradictory to libertarian ideology for the most part. And it's a tiny movement that has been shedding support. It's a shame Ron wasn't 20 years younger when he started the '08 campaign so he could have ran another time. There's no real leader of the liberty movement anymore. It's just an idea with no plan of implementing.
 
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