Bob Barr Sounding Like Ron Paul On The Federal Reserve

May 31st, 2008 1:31 pm | by Marc Gallagher | Published in Bob Barr, Debt, Economics, Election, Federal Reserve, Free Market, Libertarianism, Liberty, Maven Commentary, Media, Politics, Ron Paul | 1123Comments2008-05-31+18%3A31%3A36Marc+Gallagher

Prior to the Libertarian Party Convention Bob Barr was interviewed on the Glenn Beck radio program and he talked about many topics, including the Fed.

GLENN: Tell me about the role of the Fed and the depreciation of the dollar and what you would do about all of this.

BARR: If I could wave a magic wand and the Federal Reserve Bank would disappear tomorrow, I would do so. It’s a group of unelected governors that are not answerable to or accountable to the people of this country and yet they wield considerable influence over the economy by basically setting rates at which banks and other financial institutions can loan money. And they have built up, you know, huge reserves themselves that they can then dole out as they’re doing — as they did recently with Bear Stearns to prop up as failing, what they see as failing investment houses, for example.

What we’re on the verge of right now, Glenn, through this federal government monkeying around with the mortgage business, both directly and indirectly, is to have the federal government now set a “One size fits all” mortgage criteria for the country. That would be disastrous. It would stifle risk-taking, it would stifle the independence of small mortgage houses and mortgage banks and would simply create further problems down the road. What we need to be doing is tackling government spending. That is the root of all evil, so to speak. We need to get a handle on federal spending, we need to start reducing the economic footprint and, you know, all the other footprints of the federal government if we want to talk about them, and get the federal government out of running our economy. It was never intended to be the job of the federal government to run the economy.

While these aren’t Ron Paul’s exact words they represent softer rhetoric than people are used to from Ron Paul. They frame the argument in a fashion acceptable to the general populace. This is something many were critical of Ron Paul for not doing during his campaign. Saying, “abolish the fed” scares a lot of people. Saying it the way Barr has done here shows he has the potential to be a main stream version of Ron Paul. It is true Barr doesn’t have the historic libertarian bloodlines of Ron Paul, but this kind of thing is only going to spread the liberty message to more people.

Read the full interview transcript here.

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wrdalton says:

May 31st, 2008 at 1:55 pm (#)

I agree with you, Marc. Bob Barr has the potential of outdoing Ron Paul using his own platform, modified for general consumption. He doesn’t have to commit to the gold standard, which scares a lot of people. Simply talk about the danger of the Fed increasing the money supply in order to accommodate unlimited federal spending. When people figure out that high gas prices has more to do with the devalued dollar and Bush’s saber rattling against Iran than it does actual scarcity of oil, the revolution will commence.

Unlike Paul, Barr also served in the Congressional leadership, and can’t be dismissed as a kook. Although they will try. Here’s a good idea – why not sign up Scott McClellan to Bob Barr’s campaign? Two fallen angels of the GOP combine to challenge the credibility of the machine that would challenge theirs.

djcoe says:

May 31st, 2008 at 4:53 pm (#)

Hello Marc…After several unsuccessful tires, I have not been able to post to your site. Are you having technical issues, or are you blocking my comments?

Please advise?

Donna

Marc Gallagher says:

May 31st, 2008 at 5:17 pm (#)

Donna,

I found your attempted comment post in the comment spam area for the blog. I marked it as not spam just now. It’s now visible on the Barr on Beck article.

-Marc

nick says:

June 1st, 2008 at 3:27 am (#)

I think it is important tho understand that the same people who runs the fed etc and who are the clandestine controllers of the country and most of the world are not sitting on their hands whilst Paul is doing his thing.

One of their top priorities just might be to block Ron Paul.

Now, how can this be accomplished?

Rule and divide.

I think an investigative journalist should take a really close look at who Bob Barr really is and where his funding comes from.

Jimm says:

June 2nd, 2008 at 5:21 pm (#)

This is in response the comment from “nick, ” above. He speculates that Barr or whoever is funding him may be trying to “rule and divide” the Ron Paul movement. That makes no sense whatsoever. Barr is not running against Paul. Dr. Paul will not be running in the general election. So what is there to divide?

Ron Paul vs. Bob Barr On The Issues :: Liberty Maven says:

June 13th, 2008 at 8:17 am (#)

[...] Bob Barr: “If I could wave a magic wand and the Federal Reserve Bank would disappear tomorrow, I would do so. It’s a group of unelected governors that are not answerable to or accountable to the people of this country and yet they wield considerable influence over the economy by basically setting rates at which banks and other financial institutions can loan money. And they have built up, you know, huge reserves themselves that they can then dole out as they’re doing – as they did recently with Bear Stearns to prop up as failing, what they see as failing investment houses, for example.” – source [...]