In short, Republicans need to be taught a lesson, one they will never forget. By disdaining the substantial and growing libertarian wing of the GOP, and ignoring the desire for peace on the part of the larger public, they have earned nothing but defeat. You have said you are trying to save the Republican party, but it’s too late for that: what’s needed now is for someone to save the country from the GOP.
Yes, the Democrats also pose a major threat to liberty and peace, but the Republicans, I would argue, pose a much deadlier menace because their leaders and much of their base are unabashed militarists and dogged opponents of the Constitution. When it comes to foreign policy and civil liberties, the Obama administration is just as bad if not worse, but the difference is rhetorical: the Republicans openly proclaim their intent to continue and escalate our policy of permanent warfare, and take great pride in their willingness to throw the Bill of Rights overboard in the name of an endless "war on terrorism." Obama, on the other hand, is careful to sugar-coat his authoritarianism and belligerent foreign policy in terms of "liberal" bromides and appeals to "pragmatism."
The best thing that could happen would be for the GOP to split, with your supporters hiving off, leaving the GOP remnant to become a primarily southern-based regional party. This is their future, in any event, in spite of your energetic efforts to "save" them. Unfortunately – for them and for us – they don’t want to be saved.
In looking at the Ron Paul web sites, of which there are several, and speaking with a number of activists, I’ve encountered the following argument against taking the third party route: the Paulians, they say, are in this for the very long term. They mean to take over the GOP at the local level, and eventually dominate it at the national level. One blog entry estimated it would take them 20 years or so to accomplish this goal.
Twenty years? By that time, if we aren’t dead we’ll be wishing we were. If this country doesn’t change course soon, in 20 years we’ll be bankrupt and well into our senescence as a nation — a declining empire beset on every front, with the last tattered remnants of our Constitution thrown to the four winds. Indeed, we are almost at that point right now.
Dr. Paul, I know I speak for many of my readers when I say you have accomplished what none of us thought was possible: you opened up the political debate in this country, not only in the GOP but more generally. Now you have the chance to take that achievement and build on it: not by telling your supporters they have to wait 20 years or more before they can hope to effect real change, but by forging ahead and taking the next logical step in our long, harrowing, and yet energizing journey to reclaim our country and our old republic.
BATR 2020 Election News
