bobbyw24
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http://www.nolanchart.com/article3144.html
No, Ron Paul has Not Dropped Out!
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This is not the end of the Ron Paul REVOLution. Nor is it the end of Hope for America.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
by George Dance
(Libertarian)
When something like Wonkette (a blog for attempted "satire and things the author makes up") runs a story titled, "Ron Paul Quits Again," one can shrug that off as attempted satire - or something the author made up. When a newspaper like the Washington Post headlines a story the same day (Mar. 7) "Ron Paul Ends His Campaign," one can dismiss that as a reporter spending too much time on Wonkette. However, when articles with titles like "Yes, Ron Paul has Dropped Out" begin appearing on Nolan Chart, it's time for a debunking.
Fortunately, most of that debunking has already occurred. The day after this latest "Paul Quits" story broke, Paul's son Rand sent out a release reassuring supporters that "The campaign continues, albeit at a different pace." The next day he clarified on WBKO: ""He has made an announcement, basically, that he cannot get the nomination at the same time saying, we will continue to have our name on the ballot. We will continue to contest the remaining primaries." The day after that (today) Ron Paul himself was interviewed on CNN, where he repeated what he has been saying since the campaign's beginning: "I'll stay in as long as my supporters want me to.... As long as they want me to be involved, I'll be involved."
So: No, Ron Paul has not dropped out. That was not what this video, which sparked the whole story, was saying.
Then what was it saying? To understand that, one has to understand that there actually have been two Ron Paul campaigns in play this year, and that Paul was saying different things about both of them. First, there's the official campaign, Hope for America (HFA): Paul, his paid staff, a national office, some TV and radio ads, an itinerary, and a webpage. Underneath that, and supporting it, is a vast grassroots campaign - a 'street team' - the Ron Paul REVOLution (RPR).
RPR is huge - in the video, Paul estimates its membership at 350,000 - and its election impact dwarfs that of HFA. RPR is what turned Ron Paul into an internet phenomenon - got and kept him in the GOP debates - raised over $10 million for him on line - and supplies the volunteers that have given him his caucus successes. Visualize RPR as a tsunami, with Ron Paul riding the crest on a tiny surfboard labelled "HFA."
HFA is coming to a close: it ends with the St. Paul Convention. It will continue until then, so long as the support is there. Ron Paul will visit the states yet to hold primaries - he mentioned Pennsylvania and North Carolina, while Rand Paul confirmed that events have been scheduled as far ahead as the Kentucky primary in May. As well, Paul is encouraging the caucus process that has involved so many REVOLutionaries in the delegate process. HFA's goal is the same as always: to take as many delegates as possible to the Convention.
However, the "pace is changing" - things are "winding down." For one thing, the days of big-bucks media advertising are over. The frontrunner, John McCain, is broke: with $5 million on hand, and a $5 million campaign debt. While he can now raise lots more money, it's doubtful whether he can spend it: The federal matching fund program limits him to spending only $57 million, just $2 million than he has spent to date. (McCain applied for matching funds last fall but never took any (though he apparently used them as collateral on bank loans), and is trying to opt out.)
Paul's finances are brighter, but not much more so. He began the year with no debt, and $8 million on hand; but spent $6 million of that in January alone. That plus the $6 million he raised in 2008 to date, minus what he spent on Feb.5 and Mar. 4, gives him at best $5 million left, which has to be budgeted to last until September.
HFA cannot depend on any more big money bombs courtesy of RPR, for there are just too many worthier places for a revolutionary to invest. As Dr. Paul admits, it is now a "mathematical certainty" that HFA cannot win "in the conventional sense" - even if Paul received every vote and delegate in every remaining primary state, that still would not be enough to nominate him.
So HFA is winding down, and will soon be over. RPR, on the other hand, is being urged to grow and continue; it is still in its "early stages." "We must remember," Paul says: "Elections are short-term efforts. Revolutions are long-term projects," RPREVOLutionaries are still being urged to support HFA, as caucus delegates and precinct workers, but are also being asked to look at making their campaign "more than a Ron Paul REVOLution."
To help with that, Dr. Paul offers two tools of his own. The first is the Liberty PAC, "a political action committee dedicated to electing pro-Free Enterprise, pro-Liberty, and pro-Constitutional candidates to federal and state offices." That is immediately valuable, as the RPR begins to focus on electing Ron Paul Republican congressmen, senators, and state legislators.
However, LibertyPAC, which has been around since 2004, needs some updating. It needs a method for supporters to donate on line; and it needs links to relevant sites like Paul's, endorsed candidates like Murray Sabrin and Jim Forsythe , and RPR sites like Paul Congress.
Dr. Paul's other proffered tool is his think tank, FREE (The Foundation for Rational Economic Education). FREE, with its emphasis on the ideas of liberty, can be even more valuable for the REVOLution; it is, after all, not a campaign to gain power but (as Paul stressed in his CNN interview) "a campaign to influence ideas and the future of the country."
FREE offers some of Ron Paul's books plus his newsletter, The Freedom Report (which is not at all like what you may have heard; check it online for yourself). subsidiary, the National Endowment for Liberty, has produced a television series on liberty, At Issue.
There is much unfulfilled potential here. The TV series needs to be available on line, if not as a download, then as a product that can be ordered by and shown to Paul Meetup Groups (the REVOLution's backbone). The site itself needs links to RPR intellectual sites like the Ron Paul Library. And like the LibertyPAC site, it needs a method for donating online.
Ron Paul will continue to work with the REVOLution through those two organizations. He will continue to represent its ideas over the next two years in Congress. As well, he is offering to host strategy and training sessions for Meetup Groups and other RPR affiliates. But he will not be the REVOLution's babysitter. It has to grow up, and make its own way with or without him. "It has to be more than a Ron Paul REVOLution."
To that end, Paul challenged the REVOLutionaries in his video, saying (roughly): You like the idea of a March on Washington? Great, then show you're capable of organizing it (which I know you are). But by giving up responsibility that way, he has also given up control: it is no longer his decision, but the REVOLution;s whether there will be a march or not.
Finally (just so there is no mistake), Ron Paul will continue to be the REVOLution's presidential candidate through the Convention. He will campaign both in the remaining primaries, and at state conventions in the caucus states. As long as the financial and volunteer support is there, HFA will continue.
The race is not over yet. Paul's delegate count continues to grow - for instance, the very day CNN reported him as dropping out, it also awarded him five more delegates (from Washington). He will certainly receive many more than the 10 votes Barry Goldwater received in 1960. He may also get to address the Convention like Goldwater (whose speech to the 1960 Convention is credited by many with single-handedly reviving Republican conservatism).
There is a long way to go, and it is too early to predict what will happen to HFA and RPR six months down the road. But two things are certain: This is not the end of the Ron Paul REVOLution. Nor is it the end of Hope for America.
No, Ron Paul has Not Dropped Out!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is not the end of the Ron Paul REVOLution. Nor is it the end of Hope for America.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
by George Dance
(Libertarian)
When something like Wonkette (a blog for attempted "satire and things the author makes up") runs a story titled, "Ron Paul Quits Again," one can shrug that off as attempted satire - or something the author made up. When a newspaper like the Washington Post headlines a story the same day (Mar. 7) "Ron Paul Ends His Campaign," one can dismiss that as a reporter spending too much time on Wonkette. However, when articles with titles like "Yes, Ron Paul has Dropped Out" begin appearing on Nolan Chart, it's time for a debunking.
Fortunately, most of that debunking has already occurred. The day after this latest "Paul Quits" story broke, Paul's son Rand sent out a release reassuring supporters that "The campaign continues, albeit at a different pace." The next day he clarified on WBKO: ""He has made an announcement, basically, that he cannot get the nomination at the same time saying, we will continue to have our name on the ballot. We will continue to contest the remaining primaries." The day after that (today) Ron Paul himself was interviewed on CNN, where he repeated what he has been saying since the campaign's beginning: "I'll stay in as long as my supporters want me to.... As long as they want me to be involved, I'll be involved."
So: No, Ron Paul has not dropped out. That was not what this video, which sparked the whole story, was saying.
Then what was it saying? To understand that, one has to understand that there actually have been two Ron Paul campaigns in play this year, and that Paul was saying different things about both of them. First, there's the official campaign, Hope for America (HFA): Paul, his paid staff, a national office, some TV and radio ads, an itinerary, and a webpage. Underneath that, and supporting it, is a vast grassroots campaign - a 'street team' - the Ron Paul REVOLution (RPR).
RPR is huge - in the video, Paul estimates its membership at 350,000 - and its election impact dwarfs that of HFA. RPR is what turned Ron Paul into an internet phenomenon - got and kept him in the GOP debates - raised over $10 million for him on line - and supplies the volunteers that have given him his caucus successes. Visualize RPR as a tsunami, with Ron Paul riding the crest on a tiny surfboard labelled "HFA."
HFA is coming to a close: it ends with the St. Paul Convention. It will continue until then, so long as the support is there. Ron Paul will visit the states yet to hold primaries - he mentioned Pennsylvania and North Carolina, while Rand Paul confirmed that events have been scheduled as far ahead as the Kentucky primary in May. As well, Paul is encouraging the caucus process that has involved so many REVOLutionaries in the delegate process. HFA's goal is the same as always: to take as many delegates as possible to the Convention.
However, the "pace is changing" - things are "winding down." For one thing, the days of big-bucks media advertising are over. The frontrunner, John McCain, is broke: with $5 million on hand, and a $5 million campaign debt. While he can now raise lots more money, it's doubtful whether he can spend it: The federal matching fund program limits him to spending only $57 million, just $2 million than he has spent to date. (McCain applied for matching funds last fall but never took any (though he apparently used them as collateral on bank loans), and is trying to opt out.)
Paul's finances are brighter, but not much more so. He began the year with no debt, and $8 million on hand; but spent $6 million of that in January alone. That plus the $6 million he raised in 2008 to date, minus what he spent on Feb.5 and Mar. 4, gives him at best $5 million left, which has to be budgeted to last until September.
HFA cannot depend on any more big money bombs courtesy of RPR, for there are just too many worthier places for a revolutionary to invest. As Dr. Paul admits, it is now a "mathematical certainty" that HFA cannot win "in the conventional sense" - even if Paul received every vote and delegate in every remaining primary state, that still would not be enough to nominate him.
So HFA is winding down, and will soon be over. RPR, on the other hand, is being urged to grow and continue; it is still in its "early stages." "We must remember," Paul says: "Elections are short-term efforts. Revolutions are long-term projects," RPREVOLutionaries are still being urged to support HFA, as caucus delegates and precinct workers, but are also being asked to look at making their campaign "more than a Ron Paul REVOLution."
To help with that, Dr. Paul offers two tools of his own. The first is the Liberty PAC, "a political action committee dedicated to electing pro-Free Enterprise, pro-Liberty, and pro-Constitutional candidates to federal and state offices." That is immediately valuable, as the RPR begins to focus on electing Ron Paul Republican congressmen, senators, and state legislators.
However, LibertyPAC, which has been around since 2004, needs some updating. It needs a method for supporters to donate on line; and it needs links to relevant sites like Paul's, endorsed candidates like Murray Sabrin and Jim Forsythe , and RPR sites like Paul Congress.
Dr. Paul's other proffered tool is his think tank, FREE (The Foundation for Rational Economic Education). FREE, with its emphasis on the ideas of liberty, can be even more valuable for the REVOLution; it is, after all, not a campaign to gain power but (as Paul stressed in his CNN interview) "a campaign to influence ideas and the future of the country."
FREE offers some of Ron Paul's books plus his newsletter, The Freedom Report (which is not at all like what you may have heard; check it online for yourself). subsidiary, the National Endowment for Liberty, has produced a television series on liberty, At Issue.
There is much unfulfilled potential here. The TV series needs to be available on line, if not as a download, then as a product that can be ordered by and shown to Paul Meetup Groups (the REVOLution's backbone). The site itself needs links to RPR intellectual sites like the Ron Paul Library. And like the LibertyPAC site, it needs a method for donating online.
Ron Paul will continue to work with the REVOLution through those two organizations. He will continue to represent its ideas over the next two years in Congress. As well, he is offering to host strategy and training sessions for Meetup Groups and other RPR affiliates. But he will not be the REVOLution's babysitter. It has to grow up, and make its own way with or without him. "It has to be more than a Ron Paul REVOLution."
To that end, Paul challenged the REVOLutionaries in his video, saying (roughly): You like the idea of a March on Washington? Great, then show you're capable of organizing it (which I know you are). But by giving up responsibility that way, he has also given up control: it is no longer his decision, but the REVOLution;s whether there will be a march or not.
Finally (just so there is no mistake), Ron Paul will continue to be the REVOLution's presidential candidate through the Convention. He will campaign both in the remaining primaries, and at state conventions in the caucus states. As long as the financial and volunteer support is there, HFA will continue.
The race is not over yet. Paul's delegate count continues to grow - for instance, the very day CNN reported him as dropping out, it also awarded him five more delegates (from Washington). He will certainly receive many more than the 10 votes Barry Goldwater received in 1960. He may also get to address the Convention like Goldwater (whose speech to the 1960 Convention is credited by many with single-handedly reviving Republican conservatism).
There is a long way to go, and it is too early to predict what will happen to HFA and RPR six months down the road. But two things are certain: This is not the end of the Ron Paul REVOLution. Nor is it the end of Hope for America.
