MSNBC. Dec. 23: Ron Paul Representative Ron Paul (R-TX), John Harwood and Chuck Todd updated 12:51 p.m. ET, Sun., Dec. 23, 2007 MR. TIM RUSSERT: Our issues this Sunday: Our Meet the Candidates 2008 series continues, an exclusive interview with Republican Ron Paul. He has served in the U.S. House ...
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12-23-2007, 05:33 PM
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| America Fuck Yea Election Moderator  Republican In Name Only 
| Ron Paul apperance on Meet the Press and my partial analysis MSNBC. Dec. 23: Ron Paul Representative Ron Paul (R-TX), John Harwood and Chuck Todd updated 12:51 p.m. ET, Sun., Dec. 23, 2007 MR. TIM RUSSERT: Our issues this Sunday: Our Meet the Candidates 2008 series continues, an exclusive interview with Republican Ron Paul. He has served in the U.S. House of Representatives for 18 years. In 1988 he was the Libertarian Party candidate for president. Since October he has raised nearly $19 million. That is more than any other Republican candidate for president. Our guest, Dr. Ron Paul. Then, only 11 days to the Iowa caucuses, the candidates unveil special holiday political commercials. (Videotape) FMR. GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: What really matters is a celebration of the birth of Christ. (End videotape) (Videotape) SEN. HILLARY CLINTON: Where did I put universal pre-K? (End videotape) (Videotape) FMR. MAYOR RUDY GIULIANI: It'll be a really nice fruitcake with a big, red bow on it. (End videotape) (Videotape) Barack Obama's Daughter: Merry Christmas. (End videotape) MR. RUSSERT: The very latest polls and strategies with John Harwood of CNBC and The New York Times, and Chuck Todd, political director for NBC News. But first we're joined by Dr. Ron Paul, Republican candidate for president. Dr. Paul, welcome to MEET THE PRESS. REP. RON PAUL (R-TX): Thank you. Nice to be here. MR. RUSSERT: Let's start right at the very top, the issues. This is what you have been saying on the campaign stump, "I'd like to get rid of the IRS. I want to get rid of the income tax." Abolish it. REP. PAUL: That's a good idea. I like that idea. MR. RUSSERT: What would happen to all those lost revenues? How would we fund our government? REP. PAUL: We have to cut spending. You can't get rid of the income tax if you don't get rid of some spending. But, you know, if you got rid of the income tax today you'd have about as much revenue as, as we had 10 years ago, and the size of government wasn't all that bad 10 years ago. So there're sources of revenues other than the income tax. You know, you have, you have tariff, excise taxes, user fees, highway fees. So, so there's still a lot of money. But the real problem is spending. But, you know, we lived a long time in this country without an income tax. Up until 1913 we didn't have it. MR. RUSSERT: But, but you eliminate the income tax, do you know how much lost revenue that would be? REP. PAUL: A lot. But... A lot, that is a really good answer. You would have thought RP would have thought this idea through. MR. RUSSERT: Over a trillion dollars. REP. PAUL: That's good. I mean, we--but we could save hundreds of billions of dollars if we had a sensible foreign policy. 1 trillion - hundreds of billions = deficit MR. RUSSERT: Well... REP. PAUL: And if you go--if you're going to be the policeman of the world, you need that. You need the income tax to police the world and run the welfare state. I want a constitutional-size government. MR. RUSSERT: Would you replace the income tax with anything else? REP. PAUL: Not if I could help it. You know, there are some proposals where probably almost anything would be better than income tax. But there's a lot of shortcomings with the, with the sales tax. But it would probably be slightly better than the income tax--it would be an improvement. But the goal is to cut the spending, get back to a sensible-size government. MR. RUSSERT: But if you had a flat tax, 30 percent consumption tax, that would be very, very punishing to the poor and middle class. REP. PAUL: Well, I know. That's why I don't want it. MR. RUSSERT: So you have nothing? REP. PAUL: I want to cut spending. I want to get a--use the Constitution as our guide, and you wouldn't need the income tax. MR. RUSSERT: Let's talk about some of the ways you recommend. "I'd start bringing our troops home, not only from the Middle East but from Korea, Japan and Europe and save enough money to slash the deficit." How much money would that save? REP. PAUL: To operate our total foreign policy, when you add up everything, there's been a good study on this, it's nearly a trillion dollars a year. So I would think if you brought our troops home, you could save hundreds of billions of dollars. It's, you know, it's six months or one year or two year, but you can start saving immediately by changing the foreign policy and not be the policeman over the world. We should have the foreign policy that George Bush ran on. You know, no nation building, no policing of the world, a humble foreign policy. We don't need to be starting wars. That's my argument. Ok, you admit that idea won't balance the budget with your tax cuts, so what are your other plans? Keep on bringing up Iraq because it is relatively unpopular but it is still going to leave 'hundreds of billions' that will need to be cut to balance the budget. MR. RUSSERT: How many troops do we have overseas right now? REP. PAUL: I don't know the exact number, but more than we need. We don't need any. MR. RUSSERT: It's 572,000. And you'd bring them all home? You would think that if this is a key piece of your platform you would have a general idea. Any acceptable answer would include over half a million. But hey continue with your talking points that are all sizzle and no steak. ... REP. PAUL: You go to the Congress and find out if they want a war, do the people want the war. But it's totally unnecessary. I mean, that, that, to me, is an impossible situation... MR. RUSSERT: If... REP. PAUL: ...for the Iranians to invade Israel. MR. RUSSERT: This is what you said about Israel. "Israel's dependent on us, you know, for economic means. We send them" "billions of dollars and they," then they "depend on us. They say, `Well, you know, we don't like Iran. You go fight our battles. You bomb Iran for us.' And they become dependent on us." Who in Israel is saying "Go bomb Iran for us"? REP. PAUL: Well, I don't know the individuals, but we know that their leaderships--you read it in the papers on a daily--a daily, you know, about Israel, the government of Israel encourages Americans to go into Iran, and the people--I don't think that's a--I don't think that's top secret that the government of Israel... MR. RUSSERT: That the government of Israel wants us to bomb Iran? REP. PAUL: I, I don't think there's a doubt about that, that they've encouraged us to do that. And of course the neoconservatives have been anxious to do that for a long time. that's quite a statement to make you would think he 'probably' would have a quote to back it up MR. RUSSERT: So under your doctrine, if we had--did not have troops in the Middle East, they would leave us alone. REP. PAUL: Not, not immediately, because they'd have to believe us. So we would have to weather just a couple of terrorist attacks that we won't be able to respond to, not that big of a deal. We have to understand how we would react if some country did to us exactly what we do to them, and then we might have a better understanding of their motivation, why somebody would join the al-Qaeda. Since we've been over there al-Qaeda has more members now than they did before 9/11. They probably had a couple hundred before 9/11. Besides the fact that you are 'probably' pulling that number out of your ass, it only took 19 to terrorize our country MR. RUSSERT: You mentioned September 11th, a former aide of yours, Eric Dondero said this. "When September 11th happened, he just completely changed," talking about you. "One of the first things he said was not how awful the tragedy was, it was, `Now we're going to get big government.'" Was that your reaction? REP. PAUL: Well, I'm, I'm surprised somebody like that who's a disgruntled former employee who literally was put out. But, yes, thought... MR. RUSSERT: He said he quit because he disagreed with you. REP. PAUL: Yeah, no. The point is, Randolph Bourne says war is a helpless state. I believe that statement. When you have war, whether it's a war against drugs, war against terrorism, war, war overseas, war--the mentality of the people change and they're more willing to sacrifice their liberties in order to be safe and secure. So, yes, right after 9/11 my reaction was, you know, it's going to be a lot tougher selling liberty. But I'm pleasantly surprised that I'm still in the business of selling liberty and the Constitution and there's still a lot of enthusiasm for it. So all the American people don't agree that we have to have the nanny state and have the government taking care of us. So I have been encouraged. I might have been too pessimistic immediately after 9/11 because, in a way, it has caused this reaction and this uprising in this country to say, "Enough is enough. We don't need more Patriot Acts, we don't need more surveillance of our people. We don't need national ID cards. We don't need the suspension of habeas corpus. What we need is more freedom." So in one way I was pessimistic, but in another way, now, I'm more encouraged with the reception I'm getting with this message. helluva of a spinning job, but lets review what you said. 1. one of the first things you said after 9/11 was that big bad evil government was coming. You try to spin it first by saying that it was a disgruntled employee that was cited but later you admit to saying it. And then you spew some more talking points that your disclipines will jerk off too. However, do we really want an executive to react to an act of war by first warning that government will become too large? I do not, I want an executive that will keep this country safe when we are attacked. MR. RUSSERT: And you actually go further. You said this. "Abolish the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency and dismantle every other agency except the Justice and Defense Departments." And then you went on. "If elected president, Paul says he would abolish public schools, welfare, Social Security and farm subsidies." REP. PAUL: OK, you may have picked that up 20 or 30 years ago, it's not part of my platform. As a matter of fact, I'm the only one that really has an interim program. Technically, a lot of those functions aren't constitutional. But the point is I'm not against the FBI investigation in doing a proper role, but I'm against the FBI spying on people like Martin Luther King. I'm against the CIA fighting secret wars and overthrowing government and interfering... MR. RUSSERT: Would you abolish them? REP. PAUL: I would, I would not abolish all their functions, but I--the, the, the... MR. RUSSERT: What about public schools? Are you still... REP. PAUL: OK, but let's go, let's go with the CIA. They're, they're involved in, in, in torture. I would abolish that, yes. But I wouldn't abolish their right and our, our requirement to accumulate intelligence for national defense purposes. MR. RUSSERT: But if you... REP. PAUL: That's quite different. besides being a flip-flop, if they are unconstitutional why would you support those agencies now? MR. RUSSERT: But if you eliminate the income tax, you take away half the revenues for the federal government. What you're left with is the Defense Department, Social Security, Medicare and pensions. Everything else is gone. So you have to start making choices if you're going to keep... REP. PAUL: All right. We can. The big one is overseas expenditure. You have to develop a transition. You have to start paying down the deficit, balance the budget. But you have to say I believe the most reasonable place to save is in foreign policy, hundreds of billions of dollars. Because it gets us into trouble, it ruins our national--our defense is poor now. Then the Department of Education, who--we elect conservatives to get rid of the Department of Education. We used to campaign on that. And what did we do? We doubled the size. I want to reverse that trend. again no concrete plans, just a lot of talking points. MR. RUSSERT: And Social Security? You're OK with Social Security now? REP. PAUL: I think we need to get--give--offer the kids the chance to get ut. But right now, if I don't--if we don't save the money, we can't take care of the other. For instance, Social Security, I never voted to spend one penny of Social Security money. So I'm the one that has saved it. Now, if I save the money in this military operation overseas, I say take that money--and, and I say this constantly--don't turn anybody out on the streets. People we have conditioned--yes, technically we shouldn't have them, and it'd be nice to get rid of them, but I would say take care of the people that are dependent on us. Let them--and the only way you can do that is cut spending. If we don't, they're all going to be out in the street. Because right now Social Security beneficiaries are getting 2 percent raises, their cost of living is going up 10 percent. A dollar crisis is going to wipe them all out. That's my point. so we can't put people on the street but we have to balance the budget. Where is all this money going to come from during this transition? MR. RUSSERT: When I looked at your record, you talked about big government and how opposed you are to it, but you seem to have a different attitude about your own congressional district. For example, "Congress decided to send billions of dollars to victims of Hurricane Katrina. Guess how Ron Paul voted. `Is bailing out people" that choose--"that chose to live on the coastline a proper function of the federal government?' he asks." And you said no. And yet, this: "Paul's current district, which includes Galveston and reaches into" the "Brazoria County, draws a substantial amount of federal flood insurance payments." For your own congressional district. This is the Houston Chronicle: "Representative Ron Paul has long crusaded against a big central government. But he also" "represented a congressional district that's consistently among the top in Texas in its reliance on dollars from Washington. In the first nine months of the federal government's" fiscal "2006 fiscal year," "it received more than $4 billion." And they report, The Wall Street Journal, 65 earmark-targeted projects, $400 million that you have put into congressional bills for your district, which leads us to the Congressional Quarterly. "The Earmark Dossier of `Dr. No.' There isn't much that" Ron--Dr. "Ron Paul thinks the federal government should do. Apparently, though, earmarks" for his district "are OK. Paul is the sponsor of no fewer than 10 earmarks in the water resources bill," all benefiting his district. The Gulf Intercoastal Waterway: $32 million. The sunken ship you want to be moved from Freeport Harbor. The Bayou Navigation Channel. They talk about $8 million for shrimp fishermen. REP. PAUL: You, you know... MR. RUSSERT: Why, why would you load up... REP. PAUL: You got it completely wrong. I've never voted for an earmark in my life. MR. RUSSERT: No, but you put them in the bill. REP. PAUL: I put it in because I represent people who are asking for some of their money back. But it doesn't cut any spending to vote against an earmark. And the Congress has the responsibility to spend the money. Why leave the money in the executive branch and let them spend the money? MR. RUSSERT: Well, that's like, that's like saying you voted for it before you voted against it. REP. PAUL: Nah! Come on, Tim. That has nothing to do with that. MR. RUSSERT: If, if, if you put it in the bill and get the headlight back home... REP. PAUL: No, I, I make the request. They're not in the bills. MR. RUSSERT: ...and then you, then you know it's going to pass Congress and so you, you don't refuse the money. REP. PAUL: Well, no, of course not. It's like taking a tax credit. If you have a tax credit, I'm against the taxes but I take all my tax credits. I want to get... MR. RUSSERT: But if you were true... REP. PAUL: ...the money back for the people. MR. RUSSERT: If you were true to your philosophy, you would say no pork spending in my district. REP. PAUL: No, no, that's not it. They steal our money, that's like saying that people shouldn't take Social Security money. MR. RUSSERT: For... REP. PAUL: I don't advocate that. MR. RUSSERT: All right, let me ask you this... REP. PAUL: I'm trying to save the system, make the system work. MR. RUSSERT: Let me ask you this... REP. PAUL: But no, I think you have it all mixed up. Now, you're confused. MR. RUSSERT: All right. It's all facts. REP. PAUL: You're confused. MR. RUSSERT: This is The Wall Street Journal. You load up the bills with special projects... REP. PAUL: I--no, no, no. No, you don't. MR. RUSSERT: You do. You do. You deny that you have, you have... REP. PAUL: How many of them ever got passed? But the whole point is, we have a right and an... MR. RUSSERT: They pass. You vote against them, but you take the money. REP. PAUL: You don't quite understand. MR. RUSSERT: OK. REP. PAUL: They take our money from us, and the Congress has the authority to appropriate, not the executive branch. And I'm saying that I represent my people. They have a request, it's like taking a tax credit, and I put it in--the whole process is corrupt so that I vote against everything. MR. RUSSERT: All right, let me ask you this. But if... REP. PAUL: I vote against it, so I don't endorse the system. MR. RUSSERT: But when it passes overwhelmingly, you take the money back home. REP. PAUL: I don't take it. That's the system. MR. RUSSERT: The system. REP. PAUL: I'm trying to change that system. To turn it around and say I'm supporting this system, I find it... MR. RUSSERT: Well. Well... REP. PAUL: ...rather ironic and entertaining. MR. RUSSERT: Well, when you stop taking earmarks or putting earmarks in the, in the spending bills, then I think you'll be consistent. what a fucking hypocrite, spews Constitution this, Consitution that but then inserts 8 million fucking dollars for a shrimp fisherman. This is everything he is supposed to be against but he is part of the system. It isn't a tax credit, he created it. Ron Paul inserted into the bill but to appear as a fiscal conservative he then votes no for it, so he cherry picks bills that will not need his vote to pass. That way he can have it both ways and its complete bullshit. I could go on and on, but this was a good start. I was considering writing in RP for the popular election but not anymore. McCain all the way | ||||
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12-23-2007, 06:11 PM
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| ipsa Scientia Potestas est  Pragmatist Greensboro, NC
| I don't think his answer was that far off, if his people are being taxed despite him not wanting them to be, why shouldn't he ensure their tax money is brought back home to his district through the bills Congress passes? Why would he want that money being spent in other parts of the country, or left to the executive?  I don't think that means he endorses the system, or likes earmarks, and if his philosophy was in place, there wouldn't really be a need for it since the people (and state government) would have their money to put into local projects instead of the federal government. It hardly means he doesn't want to change the system to work the way he professes, and his position on the stuff hasn't changed, unlike some other candidates.. And speaking of that, I really have to  at the idea that you'd call him a hypocrite while touting 'ol 180 Degree McCain as your choice.. He's flip flopped on every important issue and every core moral belief he professed in 2000 in order to appease the evangelical neocon base of the Republican party in a sad attempt to get the nomination.So, before you use hypocrisy as a reason to attack Paul, you might want to take a closer look at your candidate. | ||||
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12-23-2007, 10:52 PM
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| Banned  Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| everyone on this board should hate Ron Paul because he put in billions of dollars and dozens of items of pork into Congress, and we all know how evil that is, right? Pork = evil, no matter what On his debate, everyone was saying he did so horrible, the debate certainly didn't make him look any better, but he dodged the bullets in a way I think would make his followers happy problem is, the 5-9% of indepedents and republicans in NH who are his followers need to be expanded significantly if he is to even place respectably...when someone is checking out a candidate for the first time, they don't want to hear they've been supporting a corrupt and failed ideology for the past 27 years Also, Russert gave him a full interview, he was able to take the questions anyway he wanted...everything stuck to the facts the same way Russert does with people including the POTUS when he was getting beat red taking the hard questions from Russert | ||||
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12-23-2007, 10:58 PM
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| Banned  Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by Thorgrim Despite the fact that my number 1 pick is not Paul, I've noticed that much of your criticisms of him have focused on not him, but the little support (according to the polls) he has in the campaign. 
Isn't that a bit short-sighted and ridiculous to criticize him on that? What difference does that make? Criticisize him for his policies, his person, his whatever-that-makes-him-not-a-good-candidate. The ridicule for low poll numbers is quite pathetic. | ||||
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12-24-2007, 01:04 AM
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| Banned Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| Originally Posted by ballz2wallz It's not ridicule, it's something Paul supporters will talk about...how they need to get their IA numbers up, et al...
Anyway, I'm a registered Democrat, so my views on their policy differences mean nothing to me as they can't possibly get my primary vote...so while i actually have talked about their policies in the past, there's no reason for me to go on about them ad nauseam | ||||
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12-24-2007, 09:57 AM
| #6 | ||||
| America Fuck Yea Election Moderator Republican In Name Only
| Originally Posted by motivez one word, principle. He has a reputation for being "Dr. No" but that isn't the case at all.
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12-24-2007, 09:58 AM
| #7 | ||||
| Banned Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by Thorgrim Isn't that something every candidate (and supporters) talks about? Why is that unique to Paul supporters?
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12-24-2007, 12:13 PM
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| ipsa Scientia Potestas est Pragmatist Greensboro, NC
| Originally Posted by kinggovernor The reasons his positions have changed is because he's no better than Hillary - a huge panderer who'll change positions as often as the wind in order to appease whatever constituency he needs to..
You're the one who brought up another candidate, not me. I'm just responding to your statement by saying I find it incredibly ironic that you'd criticize Paul for something McCain is far worse on. As far as principle, like I said in my original post, I don't think what he's done is out of line with his beliefs, and I think his tax credit analogy is pretty spot on.. They pay federal taxes, why should he not work to get them their money back if it HAS to be spent on federal programs? Why let it go to another area of the country or be used in some project he doesn't approve of? He's stated as far back as the early 80's that it makes more sense to spend domestically than abroad.. this is just a microcosm of that view really, instead of talking about the American taxpayer subsidizing foreign governments, and thinking that if we have to spend all that money, at least spend it on Americans.. he's talking about the people in his district who pay taxes, but instead of subsidizing stuff in other states and elsewhere, it makes more sense to spend their money on stuff in their district if it has to be spent by the federal government. I'm hardly a 'Paulite' who thinks he's the second coming of Jesus, but I think your reasoning here is a little off base and you're giving 1 candidate the benefit of the doubt when he doesn't deserve it, and not giving it to someone who does. | ||||
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12-24-2007, 02:45 PM
| #9 | ||||
| Braccae tuae aperiuntur.  Reform Party NJ
| I think this was an excellent interview by Russert just from reading the transcript. He asked a lot of tough questions that I wanted to hear. This statement by Paul should be alarming to his followers:
Tough interview for Paul. I also find it interesting that McCain was brought up in this thread. I always thought McCain's support and dislike in politics was an interesting subject. When he changed his values to be pro-liberal on many issues I was saying he was a phony and didn't like him. The liberals at DIAC went apeshit and defended him to no end. When he changed his views back all of a sudden he is hated again like most pro-Iraq politicians, moreso now actually because he made them look silly. I wouldn't support McCain, it's no secret he's flipped on many issues. But, it seems apparent here that Paul also has a problem practicing what he preaches. That makes me nervous. | ||||
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12-24-2007, 02:55 PM
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| Braccae tuae aperiuntur. Reform Party NJ
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Yea he was asking what the definition of fascism was... To me it looked like he was playing stupid. He said something stupid, gave a nice sound byte and it bit him in the ass. I like how he changed the topic to the military industrial complex. I like what Ron Paul stands for, but he's starting to sound like 9uil1ann1. Last edited by JaJae; 12-24-2007 at 03:04 PM. | |||||||
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12-24-2007, 03:09 PM
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| laissez-faire  Capitalist
| mccain? really? | ||||
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12-24-2007, 03:17 PM
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| Banned Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| Originally Posted by JaJae
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12-24-2007, 03:29 PM
| #13 | ||||
| Banned Conservative Government is another way to say Better Than You
| As Red State observes, strange things happen when Tim Russert meets Ron Paul. On MTP this morning, Russert asked Paul a number of questions, from how and what government stuff would Paul pay for once he’s done away with the income tax, to whether America should defend its allies like South Korea (he thinks we shouldn’t, and double ditto that for Israel, and don’t even get him started on any other problem area anywhere in the world — his answer is always to blame America).
In the video above it reveals that deep in his libertarian heart Ron Paul may actually be a bigot. Tim Russert asks Paul if he would like to revise the remark he made on Fox the other day when he reacted to the Huckabee “floating cross” ad by leaping to denounce fascism. The clear inference Paul was making was that Huckabee was engaging in a little fascism when he wished Americans a Merry Christmas in a TV ad. Check out Paul’s answer: He was unprepared for that question, heard about a cross in an ad, and thought immediately of fascism. Not the Christmas season, that being this very time of year. Not church or anything like that. Fascism. That’s the mind of a bigot at work, imho. Or a paranoiac. Take your pick, Ronulans. | ||||
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12-24-2007, 03:31 PM
| #14 | ||||
| Banned Progressive Philadelphia, PA
| Originally Posted by JaJae He does pork, he's evil? right
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12-24-2007, 03:33 PM
| #15 |
| Braccae tuae aperiuntur. Reform Party NJ |
