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Ron Paul message resonates with people because he is talking about something none of the other candidates are talking about: returning freedoms and sanity to Am

Ron Paul message resonates with people because he is talking about something none of the other candidates are talking about: returning freedoms and sanity to America. It would be hard to rollback all the damage done by the likes of Obama and his predecessors but I think it can be achieved gradually and with some culture changes in America. This is a great country and I hope to see its freedoms preserved and reinstated otherwise we will head down the road to god knows what and never come back. Freedom begets greatness and innovation. The media needs to stop its blackout of Paul and the smear campaign and cover the issues he is highlighting which are of the utmost importance.

davidw 15y ago
"sanity" being "what you agree with". That's why we should flag political articles and leave them to other sites.
- microarchitect 15y ago
  I don't understand why davidw has been downvoted. Ron Paul maybe a principled politician, but his views/past actions on the issues of racism, homosexuality and science and technology policy don't stand up to scrutiny. While some of his policies may be laudable, he also has plenty of stuff that can be categorized as insane. I don't want to start a political flamewar on HN, so all I'm trying to say is that there are valid reasons to believe what davidw believes and he shouldn't at least be downvoted for it.
  - davidw 15y ago
    I didn't make any comments about Ron Paul; I just pointed out the use of "sane" to mean "things I agree with", which is indicative of a debate that's not headed anywhere good.
    - llambda 15y ago
      I absolutely agree: things have gone in that direction and this simply isn't the forum for it, as such I've flagged the submission.
    - stcredzero 15y ago
      I don't understand how you can attribute "sane = I agree with" to that poster. What evidence do you have for that? I think it would also be reasonable to attribute "insane = courting disaster by inviting unintended consequences". I would posit that "insane" and "broken" are problematic in civil discourse, as these words tend to evoke strong emotions. However, if one ascribes to, "insane = courting disaster by inviting unintended consequences," and also to, "broken = fails to filter insanity," then SOPA/Protect-IP are clear indicators that something in the system is broken. In a way, this is much worse than the "Indiana Pi Bill" since that bill wouldn't have had any impact on practitioners who understood math. On the other hand, SOPA/Protect-IP has a huge impact on practitioners of computation and programming on the Internet. In Indiana they were lucky to have a mathematician in the legislature, and a legislature humble enough to listen to him. The US House of Representatives and the Senate apparently don't meet this standard.
      - davidw 15y ago
        > I don't understand how you can attribute "sane = I agree with" to that poster. What evidence do you have for that? His original sentence: > he is talking about something none of the other candidates are talking about: returning freedoms and sanity to America It's a cheap rhetorical trick. "Sanity" is defined as what his favored candidate wants to do, no? > I would posit that "insane" and "broken" are problematic in civil discourse, as these words tend to evoke strong emotions. Exactly.
        stcredzero 15y ago
        It's a cheap rhetorical trick. "Sanity" is defined as what his favored candidate wants to do, no? It depends. If Ron Paul were to reverse his views on positions where individual rights and freedom are the foundation, do you think the original poster would still support Ron Paul? If your answer is no, then he's clearly not defining "Sanity = What favorite candidate wants." If the answer is no, then the original poster is guilty of ineloquence and inadvisable word choice. By the same token your position is misattribution of the other poster's motivations.
        15y ago
- x3c 15y ago
  (Disclaimer: I'm not from US). That's why we should flag political articles and leave them to other sites. Except that at other sites, politics equals name callings and rhetoric. I understand that that is the primary reason you want politics to stay out of HN. But if all scientists, techies and reasonable people stay out of politics and common people are distracted by media, how can we expect things to change? If readers of HN cannot discuss political beliefs in a rational manner, I wonder who can. No wonder legislation like SOPA has reached to the doorsteps of congress in US.
  - davidw 15y ago
    I don't understand how you can equate keeping politics off of this site to not being involved in politics.
    - x3c 15y ago
      I'm not. I'm saying signal to noise ratio of political discussions on political sites is so low that any rational discussion drowns out in the noise. Plus, most political sites have a clear and strong bias, such that opposing ideas are rarely discussed based on their merits. Also, many techies who otherwise would not engage in political discussions (due to aforementioned reasons), can bounce off ideas here. I'm not claiming that HN becomes a political discussion forum, I'm saying downvoting legitimate political discussions for being political is taking it too far. [Edit: missed a word and it bothered me enough to edit the post.]
      - davidw 15y ago
        > I'm saying signal to noise ratio of political discussions on political sites so low that any rational discussion drowns out in the noise. And you'd like to bring that here?
        x3c 15y ago
        I'm not trying to be rude or condescending here, but if you read my reply in its entirety, you'll find the answer to your question.
- rosariom 15y ago
  when I said sanity maybe I should have been more clear: political sanity against tyrannical crap like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_... .. this bill silently passed without any substantial media coverage and grants the president unprecedented powers the kings of old would envy.. I know no politician or anyone for that matter is "perfect" (really no such thing exists) but I like a lot of what he is saying not everything. I would leave it at that to avoid any diatribe that may arise on HN over political discussions. Maybe this should be a tech-only forum to avoid getting people charged up and polarized.
  - davidw 15y ago
    > Maybe this should be a tech-only forum to avoid getting people charged up and polarized. Well, technically, it is supposed to be limited to tech, startups, and 'things hackers might find interesting'. Politics is generally considered off topic. SOPA is directly relevant to many of us, so it's gotten a pass, but this discussion doesn't seem to be much about SOPA, but about Ron Paul.
- danenania 15y ago
  "sanity" being "what you agree with" is generally a truism in any context. HN is in a unique position to offer high quality discussion on topics that have become extremely important to hackers, much more important than some nostalgic ideas on what HN is 'supposed' to be. This is no time to stick our heads in the sand. We have a powerful platform and a powerful community here and it would be very foolish to waste them given the seriousness of what we face.
  - davidw 15y ago
    > it would be very foolish to waste them Which is why many of us do not want politics here.
knz 15y ago
My understanding is that Ron Paul's idea of freedom is to limit the role of the Federal Government by moving the legislative burden to each State. I can relate to the frustration that most Americans seem to have towards “Washington”, but would this really be in the best interest of the country? It's 2011, not 1787. The US is a vastly different country than it was when the idea of States Rights was created. Would the level of innovation that you describe be possible in a country that does not have a strong central government? Could an individual State put someone on the moon? Would sectors of the economy that are closely associated with a specific area (Technology – CA etc) still be as prosperous without a central government? I am skeptical. Abandoning the Federal Government because it is dysfunctional seems short sighted. Personally I do not see how the US can prosper in the modern world without a central government. We need more political compromise and a more consistent government agenda, not a shift towards one political agenda. Government should represent everyone, not just the 51% of constituents that elected them this term. Also, suggesting that human rights should be legislated at a State level is absurd. It astounds me that a Libertarian such as Paul can so proudly proclaim that government intrusion is wrong, but then defer to the State on issues such as gay marriage and abortion. Legislating religious views at a State level is no different than doing it at the Federal level. Rob Paul style libertarianism only brings “freedom” for some.
- rosariom 15y ago
  I do not think people or Ron Paul are talking about dismantling the federal government just limiting its powers. As the old saying goes, "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely". It is extremely dangerous to give power over to a few in central government and not distribute the power evenly to all of its participants as history has shown us. I fear governments that want more power in the name of providing for my welfare and giving me security. I will do most of that on my own no thank you. Innovation coming from a strong central government? What happened to the Soviet Union's innovation? They had a strong central government and collapsed... almost zero innovation came from them. What about China? Largely a beneficiary of treaties like NAFTA and GATT which gives them a great opportunity to ship in products made with substandard wages or as some would argue, slave labor wages. They also appear to be manipulating their currency and have a copy-and-paste business model. I see little innovation here as well. I do agree that states and the fed can collaborate on issues of national interest that apply to all parties but I am totally against shredding the constitution or increasing the size of the fed because we are not in 1787. This country got to where it got because of freedom and allowing the people, like hackers, to tinker, fail, experiment, succeed, and do whatever they wanted as long as they did not infringe on the rights of others. SOPA and the NDAA are acts of central government that are appalling. Centralize government did not get us here, free people did.

davidw 15y ago

"sanity" being "what you agree with". That's why we should flag political articles and leave them to other sites.

microarchitect 15y ago
I don't understand why davidw has been downvoted. Ron Paul maybe a principled politician, but his views/past actions on the issues of racism, homosexuality and science and technology policy don't stand up to scrutiny. While some of his policies may be laudable, he also has plenty of stuff that can be categorized as insane. I don't want to start a political flamewar on HN, so all I'm trying to say is that there are valid reasons to believe what davidw believes and he shouldn't at least be downvoted for it.
- davidw 15y ago
  I didn't make any comments about Ron Paul; I just pointed out the use of "sane" to mean "things I agree with", which is indicative of a debate that's not headed anywhere good.
  - llambda 15y ago
    I absolutely agree: things have gone in that direction and this simply isn't the forum for it, as such I've flagged the submission.
  - stcredzero 15y ago
    I don't understand how you can attribute "sane = I agree with" to that poster. What evidence do you have for that? I think it would also be reasonable to attribute "insane = courting disaster by inviting unintended consequences". I would posit that "insane" and "broken" are problematic in civil discourse, as these words tend to evoke strong emotions. However, if one ascribes to, "insane = courting disaster by inviting unintended consequences," and also to, "broken = fails to filter insanity," then SOPA/Protect-IP are clear indicators that something in the system is broken. In a way, this is much worse than the "Indiana Pi Bill" since that bill wouldn't have had any impact on practitioners who understood math. On the other hand, SOPA/Protect-IP has a huge impact on practitioners of computation and programming on the Internet. In Indiana they were lucky to have a mathematician in the legislature, and a legislature humble enough to listen to him. The US House of Representatives and the Senate apparently don't meet this standard.
    - davidw 15y ago
      > I don't understand how you can attribute "sane = I agree with" to that poster. What evidence do you have for that? His original sentence: > he is talking about something none of the other candidates are talking about: returning freedoms and sanity to America It's a cheap rhetorical trick. "Sanity" is defined as what his favored candidate wants to do, no? > I would posit that "insane" and "broken" are problematic in civil discourse, as these words tend to evoke strong emotions. Exactly.
      - stcredzero 15y ago
        It's a cheap rhetorical trick. "Sanity" is defined as what his favored candidate wants to do, no? It depends. If Ron Paul were to reverse his views on positions where individual rights and freedom are the foundation, do you think the original poster would still support Ron Paul? If your answer is no, then he's clearly not defining "Sanity = What favorite candidate wants." If the answer is no, then the original poster is guilty of ineloquence and inadvisable word choice. By the same token your position is misattribution of the other poster's motivations.
        15y ago
x3c 15y ago
(Disclaimer: I'm not from US). That's why we should flag political articles and leave them to other sites. Except that at other sites, politics equals name callings and rhetoric. I understand that that is the primary reason you want politics to stay out of HN. But if all scientists, techies and reasonable people stay out of politics and common people are distracted by media, how can we expect things to change? If readers of HN cannot discuss political beliefs in a rational manner, I wonder who can. No wonder legislation like SOPA has reached to the doorsteps of congress in US.
- davidw 15y ago
  I don't understand how you can equate keeping politics off of this site to not being involved in politics.
  - x3c 15y ago
    I'm not. I'm saying signal to noise ratio of political discussions on political sites is so low that any rational discussion drowns out in the noise. Plus, most political sites have a clear and strong bias, such that opposing ideas are rarely discussed based on their merits. Also, many techies who otherwise would not engage in political discussions (due to aforementioned reasons), can bounce off ideas here. I'm not claiming that HN becomes a political discussion forum, I'm saying downvoting legitimate political discussions for being political is taking it too far. [Edit: missed a word and it bothered me enough to edit the post.]
    - davidw 15y ago
      > I'm saying signal to noise ratio of political discussions on political sites so low that any rational discussion drowns out in the noise. And you'd like to bring that here?
      - x3c 15y ago
        I'm not trying to be rude or condescending here, but if you read my reply in its entirety, you'll find the answer to your question.
rosariom 15y ago
when I said sanity maybe I should have been more clear: political sanity against tyrannical crap like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_... .. this bill silently passed without any substantial media coverage and grants the president unprecedented powers the kings of old would envy.. I know no politician or anyone for that matter is "perfect" (really no such thing exists) but I like a lot of what he is saying not everything. I would leave it at that to avoid any diatribe that may arise on HN over political discussions. Maybe this should be a tech-only forum to avoid getting people charged up and polarized.
- davidw 15y ago
  > Maybe this should be a tech-only forum to avoid getting people charged up and polarized. Well, technically, it is supposed to be limited to tech, startups, and 'things hackers might find interesting'. Politics is generally considered off topic. SOPA is directly relevant to many of us, so it's gotten a pass, but this discussion doesn't seem to be much about SOPA, but about Ron Paul.
danenania 15y ago
"sanity" being "what you agree with" is generally a truism in any context. HN is in a unique position to offer high quality discussion on topics that have become extremely important to hackers, much more important than some nostalgic ideas on what HN is 'supposed' to be. This is no time to stick our heads in the sand. We have a powerful platform and a powerful community here and it would be very foolish to waste them given the seriousness of what we face.
- davidw 15y ago
  > it would be very foolish to waste them Which is why many of us do not want politics here.

knz 15y ago

My understanding is that Ron Paul's idea of freedom is to limit the role of the Federal Government by moving the legislative burden to each State. I can relate to the frustration that most Americans seem to have towards “Washington”, but would this really be in the best interest of the country? It's 2011, not 1787. The US is a vastly different country than it was when the idea of States Rights was created. Would the level of innovation that you describe be possible in a country that does not have a strong central government? Could an individual State put someone on the moon? Would sectors of the economy that are closely associated with a specific area (Technology – CA etc) still be as prosperous without a central government? I am skeptical. Abandoning the Federal Government because it is dysfunctional seems short sighted. Personally I do not see how the US can prosper in the modern world without a central government. We need more political compromise and a more consistent government agenda, not a shift towards one political agenda. Government should represent everyone, not just the 51% of constituents that elected them this term. Also, suggesting that human rights should be legislated at a State level is absurd. It astounds me that a Libertarian such as Paul can so proudly proclaim that government intrusion is wrong, but then defer to the State on issues such as gay marriage and abortion. Legislating religious views at a State level is no different than doing it at the Federal level. Rob Paul style libertarianism only brings “freedom” for some.

rosariom 15y ago
I do not think people or Ron Paul are talking about dismantling the federal government just limiting its powers. As the old saying goes, "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely". It is extremely dangerous to give power over to a few in central government and not distribute the power evenly to all of its participants as history has shown us. I fear governments that want more power in the name of providing for my welfare and giving me security. I will do most of that on my own no thank you. Innovation coming from a strong central government? What happened to the Soviet Union's innovation? They had a strong central government and collapsed... almost zero innovation came from them. What about China? Largely a beneficiary of treaties like NAFTA and GATT which gives them a great opportunity to ship in products made with substandard wages or as some would argue, slave labor wages. They also appear to be manipulating their currency and have a copy-and-paste business model. I see little innovation here as well. I do agree that states and the fed can collaborate on issues of national interest that apply to all parties but I am totally against shredding the constitution or increasing the size of the fed because we are not in 1787. This country got to where it got because of freedom and allowing the people, like hackers, to tinker, fail, experiment, succeed, and do whatever they wanted as long as they did not infringe on the rights of others. SOPA and the NDAA are acts of central government that are appalling. Centralize government did not get us here, free people did.