Liberty Maven

I’m usually a pragmatist and borderline cynic, but there’s something these days that has devoured me with an idealistic sense of overwhelming hope. This something has taken my apathy out back and shot it, putting me out of my own misery. This something is the Ron Paul grassroots movement.

Recently I’ve been pondering what my old cynical self deems impossible: A Ron Paul Presidency. In a way the Ron Paul support movement itself gives us a plausible answer as to what America would be like in the Constitutional hands of Ron Paul. Could the self-determination and activism of Ron Paul support be a microcosm of the future America?

I think an examination of this is in order. So how does the support movement work? I contend that it works like a free market. A supporter gets an idea, utilizes the support communication medium (The Internet) to bring others in to assist, they respond, the idea becomes reality. This is precisely how the beautiful full page advertisement in the Saturday morning Ames Tribune was born. All of this was accomplished without any involvement of the official Ron Paul campaign.

It doesn’t stop there. The “idea -> call for assistance -> collaborate -> finished product” cycle has been repeated many times. This cycle is akin to the free market at work and as any Paul supporter knows he is a champion of free markets.

Another example is the massive growth of the Meetup groups. These are groups based on location dedicated to promote Ron Paul’s candidacy. Right now there are 698 Ron Paul meetup groups. The candidate in 2nd place has 72. I think of the meetup groups as individual states managing themselves, making their own rules, bringing their own advocacy ideas to fruition without the assistance of the campaign.

Bringing this analogy to the actual states under a Ron Paul Presidency shows how competition amongst states would benefit all. When a particular meetup group does something like what the Memphis group did and the word gets out, then other groups get energized to do similar things. This is a great example of the market working for the betterment of all. Ron Paul is a staunch supporter of state sovereignty; therefore, we can expect a similar effect under a Paul administration.

By now you probably have figured out that the campaign is equivalent to the federal government in this future America dream land. The official Paul campaign is being run as he would run the government: with fiscal responsibility. In the Iowa Straw poll campaign he spent $200 per vote while Mitt Romney spent $2000 per vote.

Yet another comparison can be made between the integrity of the Paul campaign and the non-interventionist foreign policy of his potential future administration. He has never and likely will never do any type of pre-emptive attack on an opposing candidate. His attacks have been limited to self-defense as in his response to Rudy Giuliani’s attack during the debate when Paul stated that the reason we were attacked on 9-11 was due to a long foreign policy of intervention. He would take the same non-interventionist approach to foreign policy under his administration. This also demonstrates his libertarian and objectivist view that the only time it is acceptable to attack, is in self-defense.

If we take indications of the Ron Paul campaign along with his grassroots support we can foresee a country prospering under the principles of the Constitution. And I’m speaking of the actual Constitution, not the bastardized version the neo-conservatives “say” they champion.