NEVER FORGET (Ron Paul ‘08?)

(The sole point of this blog is to get you to read a series of articles published soon after 9/11. It quickly devolves to me whining about Republicans.)

I’ve been using this phrase more and more frequently, to refer to increasingly mundane situations. Chicken salad for lunch, 12-18-07: Never Forget. Not sure if I forgot what we weren’t supposed to forget, or if I never knew. I think some airplanes were intentionally crashed into a couple buildings, but nobody was going to forget that. Don’t forget to blame Arabs? Don’t forget irrational fear and lust for vengeance? It never made sense to me, always sounded like propaganda, and the further removed we are the more ridiculous “Never Forget” becomes.

Recently I’ve tried to understand why Ron Paul is getting so much support from the internet crowd. First, I had to delve back into my own political history. I grew up rather conservative, went through a libertarian phase in my teenage years, and grew increasingly liberal from there. Currently I’m torn on many issues, and can’t honestly say where I’ll end up on the political spectrum. There’s the patronizing, bullshit “quote” that if you aren’t liberal at 20, you have no heart, and if you aren’t conservative at 30, you’re stupid. The general quote, and it’s variations, have been attributed to Winston Churchill, “George Bernard Shaw, Benjamin Disraeli, Otto von Bismarck, and others.“

I would argue the stupid ones are those who use that line without realizing the words “liberal” and “conservative” would have had a wholly different meaning to the various people they attribute it to than they do today. It’s patronizing because it’s a way for older conservatives, and younger ones who consider themselves enlightened to say “Oh, you’re just young. You don’t understand how the world works yet.” It’s commonly believed that people become more conservative as they age, but a brief Googling only showed evidence to the contrary. Regardless, the quote puts me in a precarious situation at the age of 26.

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Ron Paul has an impressive bio in terms of sticking to his guns. He can be trusted to continue to do so. Not that it needs to be said, but true honesty is rare in politics. I understand why a lot of people are disillusioned with our political leaders. Two terms of Bush and the potential for another Clinton to make it 24 or 28 years of dynastic political control of our free country where anybody can grow up to be president is enough to make anyone want to break with tradition.

The internet is full of IT professionals who believe themselves to be self-made men. They’re generally bright and make a great living due to their understanding of what is currently the culmination of the whole history of human technological development. Yup, they’re self-made. Did it all by yourself. Nothing to do with middle class parents who were into technology and bought that C64, Amiga, Tandy, etc. Nope, they aren’t riding on the back of every researcher who has contributed to math, computer science, manufacturing processes, and the multitude of fields that resulted in the PC. Certainly no reliance on the billions of people who do all the other jobs necessary for modern society to function. I got here all by myself, and so can you!

Of course, the counter to that needless attack on internet nerds is that libertarianism simply makes sense intuitively. Hell, I agree with the vast majority of Ron Paul’s platform. He even champions some pet issues of my own that makes it so tempting… so very tempting. The fact that it makes so much sense is what grabbed me as a teenager. There are valid counterarguments to numerous tenets of libertarianism, but they can’t be condensed into a soundbite. It would take me a series of blogs that nobody would read to come to inconclusive results, which sounds like a great use of my time.

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While going over my political history, I couldn’t immediately remember the LP presidential candidate from 1996, which is around the time I became aware of libertarianism. It was Harry Browne. I read over his bio on Wikipedia and ended up reading this article he posted on September 12th, 2001. I read the 4 part series with tears in my eyes, because it all just made so much sense. I have no love for WorldNetDaily, but props to them for hosting that article.

Why can’t people just… understand? So I click some recent posts on WND and what do I find. Ann Coulter spreading hatred and lies. Some woman praising the Heritage Foundation. Come to a conference and hear G. Gordon Liddy speak! (Yippee) Why the U.S. must remain a Christian Nation. Why Christians are oppressed in the U.S. Goddamnit. These people are responsible for Bush being in power. Responsible for the war in Iraq. So intent on protecting one idea of America that they’re willing to tear down the rest of the world. So full of the belief that they are special simply because of where they fell out of a vagina.

It doesn’t matter that Harry Browne made sense. The government is not our savior, I know. But for right now, and the foreseeable future, this is a continuing battle between the lesser of two evils. Both sides corrupted by power, controlled by monied interests. Fine, accepted. I choose to buy into the liberal fantasy that a well-run government is possible and can make life better. Why? You will rarely catch me using the word “sheeple”, unless it’s for ironic purposes. Too arrogant for my tastes, but… what’s the alternative to my fantasy?

Warmongers who whore the message of a man who preached love for your brother. People who play on racist fears and promote dangerous nationalism. They claim to be the party of fiscal conservatism, then overspend OUR money while giving tons back to the rich. (If we’re going to oversimplify things, did I get that one right?) No, I don’t want anything to do with the party that engenders hatred and intolerance. I can understand supporting candidates on a local level, but what word do we have other than the inflammatory sheeple to describe people who still support this group of people on any national level?

I’m fully aware that this comes off as teenage angst, and I accept the criticism. The Republican party is not beyond redemption, but the current incarnation needs to die off. Maybe there are plenty of Republican politicians who are wonderful people, simply doing the best they can. I don’t know… I don’t get invited to hang out with Congress often. But look at their base, look at the venomous shit they spew on any website that gets a Drudge link to it. Listen to their hateful talk show hosts. Maybe they don’t reflect the party mainstream, but nobody seems to have an issue with pandering to these jackasses. Almost all politicians are religious, but at the end of the day we know which party is the “party of the Christian God.” I’d rather get taxed at a 70% clip than associate with righteous hypocrites committing atrocious acts of immorality for the sake of my protection.

Prove me wrong, children… proooove me wrong.