Ron Paul Blog

I recently spoke at the 2010 Maryland Tax Day Tea Party in Stevensville. Here are the links and the text of the speech:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Text of Speech:

You know, theres a Chinese proverb that says that there are three curses, each one worse than the previous. The first of these curses is: “May you live in interesting times.” Well, the times we live in are certainly interesting.

We stand here today at a transformative moment in American history at the front lines of what can only be called a revolution in thought. We are here today, like hundreds of thousands of our fellow Americans in cities all across the country to exercise our basic right as citizens, as a free people in a democratic republic. We stand here today, peaceably assembled, petitioning our government for redress of our grievances. And we are here to tell our government one thing: STOP.

We stand here today with a crisis of creativity in our country. We look around and see problem after problem: Poverty. Millions unable to get health care. People out of work. Its easy for all of us, no matter what our political views may be, to agree on what the problems are.

But though we all see these problems, for too long, we have seen just one solution let the government do it. Its their job. Its their responsibility.

Well, the second Chinese curse is this: May you come to the attention of those in authority.

Well, let me tell you, weve definitely been getting attention from those in power.

We are citizens today living under a government that doesn’t represent us its people. And we have made the decision, together, that we can no longer refuse to take action. And for that, we are drawing much attention.

But when I say people, I should be clear, because I don’t just mean us here today, or our friends across the country. I mean all Americans, regardless of whether or not theyre a part of the tea party movement. For years, no matter the Administration, no matter which party controlled Congress, no matter who we elected, none of us has been represented by our government.

And why should anyone care? Why should anyone have bothered to pay attention to what we wanted? Why pay attention when we largely refused to take action when we continued to let elected officials get away with whatever they wanted? We have congressional approval ratings in the teens and twenties, and yet re-election rates are in the 90s, and thats unacceptable.

You know, thirty-two years ago, something remarkable happened in the state of California. In 1978, Californians stood up passed Proposition 13 overwhelmingly a law hated so strongly by the political class, because it of all things made it more difficult for politicians to raise taxes.

But thats not why Prop 13 was important. No, it was important for what it started for what it signified. 43 states followed by passing some form of a tax limitation. In the late 70s, Americans realized that theyd been taxed too much for too long, and that it was time to do something about it.

But today the problem we face the problem that is drawing us attention is not our dislike of taxes. It is our solemn and firm rejection of completely out-of-control spending by politicians.

You know, to go off on a tangent for a second, Rodney Dangerfield once had a great line in Back to School that said, Youve always got to look out for #1, because if you dont, youll end up stepping in #2.

Well, pardon the analogy, but for too long, our elected officials have not been looking out for us for the citizens who should be #1. And worst of all, they havent just mistakenly stepped in some #2 theyve thrown us into a $16 trillion dollar pile of it.

And that brings me to the third Chinese curse: May you find what you are looking for.

For too long, those who wanted big runaway government have gotten what they wanted.

We have a Democratically-controlled Congress this year that passed a new trillion dollar health care entitlement, all the while ignoring overwhelming public opposition.

But why should we be shocked when just 7 years ago, a Republican-controlled Congress passed a new half-trillion prescription drug plan that nobody wanted?

We have a Congress today that raises the federal debt ceiling whenever it bumps up against that ceiling.

But why should we be taken aback considering that Republicans raised that ceiling again and again when it was politically convenient to do so?

Its pretty sad when those in Congress dont even know what the word ceiling means, isnt it?

We have President Obama borrowing, printing and spending more than any president in history, in the supposed name of job creation.

But why should we be surprised when his Republican predecessor did the exact same thing?

We have a president now who wastes trillions of dollars overseas in multiple endless wars, sacrificing American lives, destroying our civil liberties at home, and shredding our Constitution into millions of tiny bits.

But why should we be surprised to see him merely continuing and expanding the policies initiated by George Bush?

And then, of course, we have the worst example of all an example of government so out of control an example so galling that it deserves special scorn, all its own.

And this time Im talking about the bailouts.

A tag-team effort, foisted upon us by our last two presidents, a scheme that took hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, ignored the public outcry of those taxpayers, and then handed that money to the well-connected friends of unelected treasury secretaries and government officials, so that Wall Street millionaire bankers could keep making campaign contributions to both parties.

The truth is, we only really have one party with two competing factions: the spend money over here party, and the spend money over there party.

But what we realize today is that low taxes are not enough. Low taxes mean nothing if we don’t reduce spending as well. And fortunately for our future generations, more and more Americans are realizing this as well.

Theyre realizing that the reckless spending of taxpayer money our money is just the beginning. Our government hasnt just been eroding away our pocketbooks, but also the basic liberties that have for so long characterized our free society.

But we cannot we must not — let lawmakers keep grabbing this power the power to solve problems that they themselves created.

This may come as a surprise to some in Washington, but you know, you cant run massive government programs like Medicare and Medicaid and the FDA and the medical boards, and many, many others and then say the free market doesn’t work in health care, so we’ll run it, instead.

You can’t put up roadblocks to interstate competition between insurance companies and then say we need a government option because insurers don’t have enough competition.

You can’t have the Fed and the Treasury and the SEC and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the FDIC and then say we need to regulate financial instruments because the free market is failing.

No. We live in a world where the easiest way for a federal agency to get more funding is to fail at what it does, and the easiest way for Congress and the President to grab more power is to create a problem. This has got to stop, and its got to stop now.

Because if it doesnt stop, then as the Chinese curse suggests, well find what were looking for.

So the next time theres a Democrat who wants to spend money on a new health insurance bureaucracy, or a Republican who wants to spend on a new prescription drug entitlement, or a Democrat who wants to spend money on a supposed peace-keeping mission in Somalia, or a Republican who wants to spend money on war in Iraq no matter what it is, and no matter how much you think it might be a good idea you, me, all of us need to ask the question: Where is this money coming from?

Do I want to be taxed more to pay for this? Do I want the national debt to explode from more borrowing to pay for this? Do I want the Treasury and Federal Reserve to print more money to pay for this?

Or do I want to live my life, with as small a government as possible a government that doesnt threaten to bankrupt our finances or crush our currency. A government that doesnt have the power to run roughshod over the freedoms that we value so much.

We cannot let these bad policies be ignored anymore. Every time we let the government reach into yet another part of our lives, there’s only less freedom left for us.

So do not let public debate be drowned out by those who shout obstructionist! every time someone opposes your ideas. Those of us opposed to bad laws arent obstructionists. We are citizens, with ideas we care passionately about.

And we demand to be free and responsible for ourselves. We don’t want handouts; we don’t want special advantages, whether those are farm subsidies or social safety nets.

We want a government that acts in accordance with the people, not in defiance of them. A government that does not trod about on our basic liberties, the economy, or our livelihood.

We must make runaway government spending a political curse on those who support it, before it becomes a curse on us financially. We must make our will known; we must ensure that our demand for a government of the people, by the people, for the people remains forever a reality and not just an idea.

This video comes to us from Citizens in Charge Foundation, a Virginia-based group that defends citizens’ right to petition their government.

Also check out this rousing speech given by Paul Jacob, long-time libertarian activist and Citizens in Charge Foundation president, when he recently accepted the Charlton Heston “Courage Under Fire” Award.

Wikipedia has information regarding Paul’s resistance of the draft and his friendship with Ron Paul. Ron Paul’s endorsement of Citizens in Charge Foundation can be found here.

Some of our readers might take interest in this new website, PoliticsGoneViral.com, started by Ron Paul supporter Dan Endsley.  Billed as a “politics site for people who don’t like politics” — which let’s face it, at its core is pretty much all of us — the site has some great T-shirts and bumper stickers for sale.

Here’s my personal favorite:

Over on DiscoverScholars.org blog, we discuss how government interference has undermined market forces and led to a lower quality of teaching than students would otherwise receive.  Here’s a snippet:

Though Gwartney focuses on government subsidies, the same basic principles apply to private donations: when made directly to colleges, they enable administrations to fund projects of little benefit to students. These projects include:

• bloated bureaucracies that directly benefit the administrators,
• research projects that directly benefit the faculty, with only questionable benefits to most students, and
• ever more luxurious student amenities, in what Richard Vedder calls the countryclubization of universities.

These measures increase costs without improving education, and are especially damaging when a college experiences a decline in donations and has to make up budget shortfalls with tuition increases.

Gwartney’s suggested solution for government spending mirrors the concept of DiscoverScholars.org: donors, including the government, should subsidize students directly. By giving students the power to vote for the best teachers with their tuition checks, incentives would again be properly aligned.

Administrators and professors would devote resources to improving education and lowering costs, rather than spending on their pet projects or cozy amenities. (There would still be room for such institutions, of course – some students want a college experience that includes luxuries and networking). Donors wishing to support research would similarly focus on research laboratories and think tanks, instead of conflating research with teaching at universities.

Most importantly, as we discussed in a recent post, students would be able to choose schools based on the education they would receive there – education that would become cheaper as such colleges begin competing over discriminating students armed with donor money.

Read the whole post here.

Below is the video that played at Kent’s memorial service last week:

And just for the heck of it,  figured I’d share a couple of my favorite pictures… During the Yankee swap at our staff Christmas party, Kent (appropriately) got a Magic 8 ball… so for those of you who were wondering how all those important campaign decisions were made, the secret’s out

Came across this column by Dave Barry (courtesy of A Second Hand Conjecture)… It probably does a better job explaining the stupidity of farm subsidies than just about anything else I’ve ever read:

Farm Security: The mohair of the dog that bites you

If you’re like most American taxpayers, you often wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and ask yourself: “Am I doing enough to support mohair producers?”

I am pleased to report that you are, thanks to bold action taken recently by the United States Congress (motto: “Hey, It’s not OUR money!”). I am referring to the 2002 Farm Security Act, which recently emerged from the legislative process very much the way a steaming wad of processed vegetation emerges from the digestive tract of a cow.

The purpose of the Farm Security act is to provide farmers with ”price stability.” What do we mean by ”price stability?” We mean: your money. You have already been very generous about this: Last year alone, you gave more than $20 billion worth of price stability to farmers. Since 1996, you’ve given more than a million dollars apiece to more than 1,000 lucky recipients, many of which are actually big agribusinesses. Some of the ”farmers” you’ve sent your money to are billionaires, such as Ted Turner and Charles Schwab, as well as major corporations, such as Chevron, DuPont and John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance.

But that is NOTHING compared with how generous you’re about to get, taxpayers! Thanks to the Farm Security Act, over the next 10 years, you’ll be providing farmers with 70 percent MORE stability, for a total of $180 billion. At this rate, in a few years farmers will be so stable that they’ll have to huddle in their root cellars for fear of being struck by bales of taxpayer-supplied cash raining down on the Heartland states from Air Force bombers.

Perhaps you are asking yourself: “Wait a minute>! Isn’t this kind of like, I don’t know . . . welfare?”

No, it is not. Welfare is when the government gives money to people who produce nothing. Whereas the farm-money recipients produce something that is critical to our nation: votes. Powerful congresspersons from both parties, as well as President Bush, believe that if they dump enough of your money on farm states, the farm states will re-elect them, thus enabling them to continue the vital work of dumping your money on the farm states. So as we see, it’s not welfare at all! It’s bribery.

But let us not forget the element of National Security. This is where your mohair comes in. As you know, ”mohair” is the hair of any animal whose name begins with ”mo,” such as moose, mouse, mongoose or moray eel.

No, wait, sorry. ”Mohair” is actually wool made from the hair of a goat. During WWII, mohair was used to make military uniforms, so it was considered to be a strategic material, and Congress decided that you, the taxpayer, should pay people to produce it. But of course today mohair has no vital military purpose, and so . . . you are STILL paying people to produce it! And thanks to the Farm Security Act, you will continue to pay millions and millions of dollars, every year, to mohair producers!

As I say, this is for National Security. If terrorists, God forbid, ever manage to construct a giant time machine and transport the United States back to 1941, and we have fight World War II again, WE WILL BE READY.

You will also be thrilled, as a taxpayer, to learn that the Farm Security Act provides new subsidies for producers of lentils and chickpeas. And not a moment too soon. This nation has become far too dependent on imported lentils and chickpeas. Try to picture the horror of living in a world in which foreigners, in foreign countries, suddenly cut off our lentil and chickpea supply. Imagine how you would feel if you had to look your small child in the eye and say, “I’m sorry, little Billy or Suzy as the case may be, but there will be no lentils or chickpeas tonight, and all because we taxpayers were too shortsighted to fork over millions of dollars in support for domestic lentil and chickpea producers, who thus were forced to compete in the market like everybody else, and . . . HEY, COME BACK HERE!”

Yes, that would be a horrible world, all right. And that is why I totally support the Farm Security Act. I hope you agree with me, though I realize that some of you may not; in fact, some of you may be so angry about this column that you’ve decided to never read anything by me again.

Well, guess what: I don’t care! Thanks to the Humor Security Act recently passed by Congress, I’ll be getting huge sums of money from the federal government to
continue grinding out these columns, year after year, even if nobody wants to read them!

No, that would be stupid.

Over on DiscoverScholars.org blog, I discuss a novel idea for keeping education costs low and improving the quality of higher education.

Just like the need to decouple health insurance from employers, I propose separating students’ available financial aid from the schools at which they’re enrolled.

No, it’s not being a blogger.  It’s working on cell phone towers.

Here’s are my favorite lines from the article:

Oddly, a loophole in OSHA rules may make it difficult for changes to happen quickly: Towers are often constructed by small contractors instead of the carriers or the owners of the towers. Since the carrier isn’t on site during the construction of the tower, the contractor receives the fine and the carrier and owner face no sanctions.

Is it really that ironic that a regulation could have an unintended side effect?

Addendum: As my colleague Andrew Ward put it, “maybe OSHA should cover full-body, inflatable, padded suits.”