Hey, why not?
The Ohio Democrat and the Texas Republican have a significant bond: They're antiwar activists detested by their party establishment who, on a bipartisan or third-party ticket, could command significant grass-roots support.
During Monday's debate among the Democratic presidential hopefuls, Dennis Kucinich used his time extensively and expertly, detailing his anti-war credentials. His finest moment came in response to a questioner who cited the flags that "covered the coffins of my grandfather, my father, and my oldest son," and asked, "By what date after January 21st, 2009, will all U.S. troops be out of Iraq?" Kucinich replied, "The underlying assumption here is that we're going to be in Iraq until the next president takes office, and I reject that totally. People can send a message to Congress right now -- and this is in a convention of this appearance -- they can text peace, and text 73223, text peace. Send a message to Congress right now, you want out."
If Kucinich really wants the U.S. out of Iraq, he should transcend party politics and connect with Republican candidate Ron Paul.
Describing a past Republican presidential debate, Pat Buchanan wrote, "Of the 10 candidates on stage in South Carolina, Dr. Paul alone opposed the war. He alone voted against the war. Have not the last five years vindicated him, when two-thirds of the nation now agrees with him that the war was a mistake, and journalists and politicians left and right are babbling in confession, 'If I had only known then what I know now ...'"
As PJB implied, antiwar voices have more support than the establishments of both major parties would think. One-issue candidates, from Ross Perot to Steve Forbes, don't do too well in elections. But the Iraq war is one of the biggest foreign-policy issues of our time, and two determined candidates could stun the know-it-alls with a surprise run.
Reader Comments ( Page 1 of 2)
1. i think ur very right. but lets not forget about the fact that we should have someone in power who follows the constitution and stop all the corruption in the gov't. nomore funding from the corporations and high powered figure, which will stop the corruption that when these electies get into office. there are candidates who raise as much as 36million dollars for campaign funding. now how did they get so much and who did it come from?? wen and how will u pay them back???
kenranda at 5:18PM on Jul 24th 2007
2. ??
kenisthaman2005 at 5:16PM on Jul 24th 2007
3. I Don't think kucinich can do, because frankly I Can't stand him due to my moderate/conserative issues and I Think Ron Paul should get a new vice president.
Afi K. James at 5:43PM on Jul 24th 2007
4. Ron Paul doesn't need to and should not hang his hopes on any other candidate, R or D.
dp at 6:09PM on Jul 24th 2007
5. The writer needs to remember that the general election is 14 months away and a lot can change by then.
We could see another 911-style event, probably on the West coast, which will bring in martial law, prolong the Cheney/Bush Imperium and end any chance of elections. From there, it would be a short step to the North American Union and the end of our America.
Am I a doomsayer? I hope not! But I have no trust--as in zero--in Dick Cheney, who is insane, and who is running the show behind the scenes. Bush is the puppet here, and a frequently drunk one.
About all any of us can do is to pray for the country, for the continued safety of Dr. Paul and that there are no disasters to warrant the end of our Republic.
zenpiper at 6:22PM on Jul 24th 2007
6. a Paul-Kucinich ticket wouldnt make much sense because the only issue they agree on is foreign policy and they have different reasons for holding the veiwpoint that we shouldnt attack unless another nation starts the war with us.
James Fetner at 6:25PM on Jul 24th 2007
7. Kucinich-Paul in '08? What's wrong with it?
Well, one's a collectivist and the other's a libertarian. One stands for the kinder, gentler form of the disease we already have, and the other wants to cut the cancer out. Besides that, not a lot.
What's the frequency, Kenneth? at 6:45PM on Jul 24th 2007
8. Hit piece alert! More sludge coming out of these aol blogs.
brody at 6:56PM on Jul 24th 2007
9. Ron Paul and Pizza
Whenever the government creates a new organization like the Department of Homeland Security or raises taxes, it interferes with your liberty. We wouldn’t make our neighbors pay for our haircut or our next meal. So why does the government do it? The answer is that the government does it because we accept the tyranny of the majority at the expense of the minority.
Think about it this way: You are with your friends and you want to order a pizza. Well, eight of your friends do. Your last two friends have been eating pizza for the last week and will absolutely not pay for your pizza. In most situations you wouldn’t force them to pay for your pizza; if you did you might not have very many friends, soon. So your two friends abstain and instead choose to go separately to a Chinese restaurant. The rest of your eight friends are divided between Papa John’s and Domino’s, most don’t really care, because they just want pizza. So you flip a coin and Domino’s it is. Six of you want pepperoni and three of you want anchovies. You could force the three to eat your pepperoni pizza, but that’s not a fair solution. Instead, you order two large pepperoni pizzas and one large anchovy pizza. Furthermore, three of you want onions and mushrooms and the other three don’t care. So you end up with one large pepperoni, one large anchovy pizza, and one large pepperoni pizza with mushrooms and onions. And Chinese take out.
Seems like a very good solution. But what if we created a fictitious U.S. Department of Eating Out? What would the order look like? Well, they’d ask you for each individual’s social security number, look through their records, and determine that they will send you two medium anchovy pizzas for everyone in your eleven-person party. You argue with them on the phone and you tell them that most of you don’t like anchovies, but it turns out that three of your friends didn’t register with the the department of Eating Out. That’s why you are only getting two medium pizzas. And that’s why they made with anchovies. But don’t worry… Your pizzas will arrive in 40-70 minutes and they are free. That is until you look at how much the government is paying for your two pizzas: each pizza is costs 15 dollars, but the total isn’t 30 dollars. The total is 570 dollars because the government pays minimum wage and it was just raised to 13.00. The person who made your pizza dropped a bucket of tomato sauce on the floor and his friend slipped and had to be sent to the emergency room.
But who cares right? If it wasn’t for the goverment, we wouldn’t have pizzas. Everyone would have to buy their own pizza, and who would deliver it? Does anybody outside the government even know how to make a pizza? No thanks. We’ll eat our cold and tiny anchovy pizzas and pay 570 dollars for them. We are scared of the consequences of abolishing the Department of Eating Out.
As you can see, the only happy people in your party are the three anchovy aficionados. Eight of you are completely unsatisfied. This is an example where the tyranny of the “majority” affects the “minority”. Except it wasn’t the majority because the government had incomplete records and no incentive to please you.
Now apply this scenario to Health Care or the Department of Education, or Homeland Security. These organizations are inefficient and have no incentive to please you. On the other hand, Papa John’s and Domino’s Pizza make money by pleasing you. Their greed is an incentive to make your pizza better, faster and keep you coming back for more. When you were ordering the pizzas from Domino’s your friends figured out exactly how to order without government interference. Your friends who didn’t want to eat pizza got their Chinese food and were happy. Everyone else got a share of the pizza they wanted and were happy as well. And it was done through unanimous consent, not majority rule. This is the way libertarians envision an ideal society.
But if the government doesn’t make our pizza who will?
If Papa John’s and Domino’s didn’t exist, someone would learn to make it and make a living off it. The first company to sell pizzas might sell at relatively high prices. But if this is the case, someone else will take advantage of those high prices to sell pizza at lower ones. As long as the government stays out of the pizza industry, pizza will get better and cheaper. So there is no need for the government to make our pizzas. As long as there is demand for pizza, the free-market will provide it.
But what about the poor people? They can’t all afford pizza.
No. Pizza isn’t free. Someone has to make it. To give pizza away for free would be to devalue the work of Someone. When we start giving free pizza away or raise minimum wage, we trigger a domino effect that reduces the value of our currency and the value of our work. Then other people can’t afford pizza either. But it’s free right? So they don’t need to be able to afford pizza… Well, wrong. Because nothing is free. In order to make pizzas, the government has to raise taxes.
But the rich can have all the pizza they want. It’s wrong for them not to share. What have they done for us anyway?
Well, the rich create jobs. When you raise their taxes and raise minimum wage they can’t afford to hire as many people. That means next time they need to reduce spending, the might have to fire you, because maybe you are not worth the new minimum wage.
But in an ideal world everyone would have pizza.
Not everybody likes pizza. If your neighbor doesn’t like pizza why should they pay for it? Think back to the example at your party. Everyone got what they wanted and nobody paid for anything they didn’t want, through unanimous consent.
Stop being a good Democrat. Stop being a good Republican. Start being a good American.
Do your OWN homework.
NOBODY explains Ron Paul
BETTER than Ron Paul himself!
Here is an interactive audio archive of
Ron Paul speeches and interviews as a resource in chronological
order.
http://www.ronpaulaudio.com
goldenequity at 7:43PM on Jul 24th 2007
10. "What's the frequency, Kenneth"
Brother you have it right. They are diametric opposites.
Ron Paul is about liberty and freedom. Limited govern and individual rights. Personal accountability and property rights.
Dennis Kucinich wants to abolish the second amendment and create a big government subsidies for welfare, health care and any other free love cause he can find
Rubes at 7:45PM on Jul 24th 2007
11. Kucinich is a gun-grabber. Ron Paul is tremendous!
Anthony Grear at 2:22PM on Jul 25th 2007
12. I am writing in Karen Kwiatkowski as VP with Ron Paul. Not only does she have the brains to do the job, she has the personality and manner (like Ron Paul). And if gender is an issue, I think she is beautiful, unlike Hellory.
John Howard at 9:54PM on Jul 24th 2007
13. Kucinich is a big government proponent. His utopian socialist positions on the issues are inconsistent with freedom and it's silly to think that these two are a good match. Anyone who thinks this is a good idea doesn't truly understand where Ron Paul is coming from.
Dirk at 12:58AM on Jul 25th 2007
14. I would like to see Ron Paul sign on as a cosponsor to the Cheney impeachment resolution right away. Unless this resolution is adopted in the House, we may face another government-engineered 9/11 attack, a war with Iran and martial law, which means the 2008 election would be cancelled.
Assuming these things are prevented by impeachment, I would support a Kucinich-Paul ticket. Paul is by far the best Republican runningn and the only one who is NOT a brainwashed warmonger. Kucinich has the best and most innovative platform that is also FISCALLY RESPONSIBLE--only the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy would be repealed to finance his agenda.
gordon kobayashi at 2:44AM on Jul 25th 2007
15. Look, as much as I admire Dr. Paul he is too far out of touch with mainstream America when it comes to universal healthcare whereas Dennis is spot on! Yes, they agree on ending NAFTA, disbanding the Patriot Act, ending the phony "War on Drugs", and withdrawing from Iraq. Health care is what separates them and makes Dennis the better candidate. I wonder why so many of you aren't complaining about the "socialist" police departments, fire departments, libraries, and post office?? Why is it such a big issue when it comes to healthcare? Why should the U.S. be the only industrialized nation left in the world who does not have a universal healthcare system in place? So your taxes may go up a little, sure beats the premiums, cop-pays, prescription costs, and denials anyday! This will not equate to government run medicine, it will equate to the government replacing the private HMO's as the payer.
Brian at 3:23AM on Jul 25th 2007