Assignment 5

My interest in Ron Paul's campaign has always been novelty at best. After these few weeks of reading his new and archived speeches though, it's impossible to ignore that he's been generating the same meandering rhetoric since the 1970's. The fact alone that I ever heralded his bravery as a politician puts me in the same gullible category as every college toolbag who was convinced four years ago that Ralph Nader could be a revolution.

And to be fair, I have stated my disinterest with politics before; politics exist without any semblance of reason or practicality. I went down to see Chelsea Clinton speak in Spart’s Den and, before the rally could even start, it took twenty-five minutes for eight people to hang one banner. Literally eight people standing in the spotlight waiting for the work to do itself. That was case and point as far as I'm concerned.

And really no candidate is ever going to truly interest me. The issues that concern me most are the banning of: crying in public, sandals, southern pride, and religious bumper stickers. I can accept all the other stuff. No Child Left Behind is awful, but where was this surplus of smart public school kids before George Bush? Our chemical emissions are beyond irresponsible, but when was the last time anyone’s met a satisfied environmentalist? The war in Iraq is a quagmire deathtrap, but Canada’s only a roadtrip away. The Patriot Act is offensively invasive, but then again Republicans have never been big Orwell fans. And our Healthcare System may leave sick patients in waiting rooms for over 24 hours, but at least we’re weeding out the fakers.

So that’s what it’s come to: apathy. Ron Paul isn’t going to save the world, Ralph Nader isn’t going to save the world, none of us will ever see an Independent president in our lifetime, and no government official will ever be elected by the hair of a single popular vote. Isn’t anyone’s time valuable to them anymore? Go outside. Read a book. Paint the shed. Just because we live in a democracy doesn’t mean the work should be done for us. Half the stuff people get worked up over, they could solve for themselves on a domestic level. Gas prices too high? Pump up the tires on the old bicycle. Don’t like abortion? Have some kids. Think the war is an atrocity? Don’t enlist. Where did this self-importance come from that dictates we know what’s best for anyone else? (although I really do wish we’d do away with sandals)

Anyway, so now that I have completely run this rhetorical analysis into the ground, my sterling introduction actually does tie in with a Ron Paul speech.

On April 2, 2008, Ron Paul weighed in on new regulations on the private sector, imposed by the Joint Economic Committee. Try to guess what he said? Even if you knew nothing about the regulations, nothing about private vs. public sector, and nothing about the Joint Economic Committee, anyone who knows a thing about Ron Paul could guess what he speech was about. Ready for a shocker? Ron Paul doesn’t like the regulations; and he’s not afraid to throw in a sharp retort to boot: “I have never been opposed to regulation, although my idea of regulation differs from that of many people in Washington.” Yes, Dr. Paul. You’re that sassy livewire from Texas, we remember.

Ron Paul, in just about every one of his speeches, uses the same format: Spiteful opening line, example of slightly-parallel historical injustice, short diatribe about why the government hates America, short diatribe about why any new policy is the worst thing to ever happen in the history of the world, alternate solution that only makes sense to Libertarians, and then a short manifesto about what it really means to be an American.

The speech he gave on April 2 has all the parts, except one. For his speech, Ron Paul completely left out an alternate solution. Even though he usually proposes the most ludicrously unrealistic solutions, at least it shows that he’s trying. In this speech he doesn’t even give his audience that. He has his historical example (“Back in the 1970s, government-caused inflation reached levels high enough that the Nixon administration decided to implement wage and price controls”), he has his diatribes (“The Federal Reserve's actions got us into at least one depression in the last century…”), and then his standard proud-to-be-an-American finish (“It is about time that we recognize the failure of government intervention, get our hands out of the private sector, and for once allow the market to function”); but he totally overlooks providing a solution.

The rule of thumb for any complaint: a solution must follow a criticism; otherwise it’s just whining. I may be apathetic, but Ron Paul is just a Debbie Downer.

Ron Paul suffers, and has suffered, intrinsically from not knowing when to pick his battles. The man hates everything. He runs for office just so he can lambaste any proposal that hits the Senate floor. Sure Clinton, Obama, and McCain voice oppositions, but they occasionally support some things. Ron Paul is like a student who signs up for Spanish class, then spends the entire semester whining about what a stupid language Spanish is (that analogy works even better when you look at Ron Paul’s proposal for dealing with Mexicans).

I realize my ethos as a political writer suffers tremendously with each new blog I write, but certainly I haven’t rendered myself completely untrustworthy yet. And while not much can be said about my voice as a commentator, at least when I provide a grievance, I provide a solution. My solutions may not be universal, they may not be respectable, and they may not even be reasonable, but the fact that I at least include a suggestion shows that I am trying. Ron Paul, through years of uphill battles and blind disregard, has forgotten that as a politician, even a radical one, the goal is not whistleblowing; the goal is improvement.