Until this year, I have never sent a mass e-mail about a
political candidate before. Then, there has never been such a candidate, with the ability to win, running for President of the USA
since I have been old enough to vote.
This is
"Super Tuesday", and many of you can vote in the Presidential Primary. If you have
not heard of Ron Paul, do not be surprised. The American media, beholden to big business and big government, gives him very little
coverage. Yet he received 10% of the Republican first primary vote in Iowa-more than twice the votes received by Rudy Giuliani-the
"leading Republican" touted by the media for months. This message is not about becoming a Republican. It is about honest, limited
government, and the issues before us today. In previous years, I have been a member of the Constitution Party (called the Taxpayer's
Party in Michigan). When I first learned about Ron Paul running as a Republican, I wondered whether I should support him or the Constitution
party with which I agreed so much. I was pleasantly surprised to find the Constitution Party actively working to help Ron Paul win
the nomination. This is about what is right for all of the people-not about power for a party.
Ron Paul appeals to people of all parties and especially to people who have
not voted in decades. In many of the past elections, there was almost no difference between the major candidates. Now, there are some
major differences!
The other candidates debate what level of troops we should maintain in Iraq and other foreign countries.
Ron
Paul says we should pull them all out as quickly as possible and defend our own borders. We battled the North Vietnamese Communists
on their own soil for 10 years, 3 to 6 million people died, and the Communists only grew stronger in an effort to protect their own
country. Sure, the country was in chaos for 11 years after we left, but during the last 22 years, they stopped blaming us for their
problems and Vietnam is now one of the fastest growing economies in the world-not at all dangerous to us. It is morally wrong and
ineffective to try to impose the leaders we want in other nations-especially when they can see that our control of their resources
is a big part of our reason for being there.
The other candidates argue about taxing some things and creating tax breaks for
others.
Ron Paul is committed to ending the IRS and its partner, the Federal Reserve. He has already introduced bills to eliminate
income taxes on service (restaurants, etc.) tips, military paychecks and social security benefits. Virtually nobody with this type
of income is wealthy and the cost of collecting these taxes consumes a significant part of the revenue. The lost revenue will be offset
by cutting our massive spending on failing domestic programs, benefits to illegal aliens, foreign military bases and foreign aid (remember
that millions of our tax dollars once flowed to Fidel Castro and Osama bin Laden, whom said they were our friends at the time).
Other
candidates have all kinds of ideas of what to do about the 10-20 million illegal aliens in our country-from granting them amnesty
to allowing them social security benefits while they are still "illegal". They cite the poor circumstances that these often ambitious,
hard-working people would face if they had to return home.
Ron Paul says that we should send these ambitious hard-working people back
home so that they can change their own country. Many of their corrupt governments rely on the income stream that these illegal aliens
send home. Those governments do not deserve it-they need to work for prosperity in their own nations, rather than taking a slice of
the American pie. Ron Paul shows that there is a major danger that Social Security will not be able to support the USA citizens that
paid into it, so we should certainly not give benefits to those here illegally. We need to secure the boarders and expel people who
have no visas or expired visas (several of the "9/11 terrorists" were reported here on expired visas). Finally, we need to change
the laws to prevent any local benefits being provided to illegals and to remove the automatic citizenship that is now granted to their
children born in this country. We cannot reward those who break the laws. If we need more immigrants here, we should change our immigration
laws to permit that.
Other candidates talk about various "free trade" arrangements and how they hope to change them.
Ron Paul exposes
these treaties and organizations: They are not about "free trade", but about massively regulated trade- primarily for the benefit
of multi-national corporations and banks. He is for removing the USA from the International Criminal Court (ICC), NAFTA, GATT, WTO,
and CAFTA. These have frequently caused our jobs going oversees and more regulation and higher prices for us.
Other candidates
frequently discuss the degree to which they are
"pro choice". When it comes to abortion, Ron Paul recognizes the constitutional right
of the unborn to "life liberty and the pursuit of happiness". There are many dependant people of all ages today that are inconvenient
and expensive to care for-but we would be horrified if a government proposed a service to execute them. We should be equally horrified
that our nation permits the killing of unborn, defenseless human beings. The federal government should not fund or condone abortions,
but let the 50 states handle the issue, as they do other similar crimes.
Ron Paul is also in favor of restoring and maintaining
many basic rights that our governments have eroded.
He supports the right to privacy: ending the
Real-ID Act, which amounts to
a national identity card to begin in 2008. He is against many recent unreasonable search and seizure laws. He is in favor of privacy
of medical records.
He supports private property rights: they must not be defeated by
"eminent domain" or unproven environmental
ideas. He supports the right for parents to have local control of their schools and their curricula. Control of schools by State and
Federal governments was implemented with the promise of bringing poorer schools up to higher standards. The result has been that nearly
all of the schools have descended to lower standards. Ron Paul supports home schooling and will do all he can to make sure that home
school graduates have equal access to public colleges and jobs.
He supports second amendment rights.
Ron Paul believes in
extensive health care reform that will give control back to individuals to determine which medical treatments they receive, and which
they reject. He is opposed to mandatory vaccines. He believes that many current FDA regulations, HMO practices, insurance company
practices, etc. were implemented primarily to increase the income of drug companies, insurance companies and big medical firms. A
high percentage of our health care dollars are now consumed by these bureaucracies and their lawyers monitoring and combating each
other.
Ron Paul wants to reduce these costs and then also reduce the real costs of healthcare by allowing nurses, pharmacists and
other health care professionals to perform many basic functions for which they are trained, but which now legally require doctors.Dr. Paul should know-he has been an M.D. since 1961.
The states have many different rules as to who can vote in the primary and
for what party. I realize that the primary is already past for some recipients of this message, but I think it is worth sending. However,
many states have open primaries and even if you are not registered as a
Republican, you can still vote for Ron Paul. You can check
with your local county or township (or many newspapers this time of year) to determine the rules for your state. In states with late
primaries, there still may be time to register to vote for Ron Paul.
I reject the idea that "our government is corrupt and nothing
we do will make it different". I believe that God holds those in authority accountable for what they do, just as both the Jewish leaders
and Pilate were held accountable for putting Jesus to death (John 19:11).
Romans 13:1-3 states: "Let every soul be subject to
the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore,
whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are
not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from
the same."
In our country, whether we like it or not, the citizens still officially have authority over the public servants that
they elect-so this authority must be appointed by God. To the extent that our government allows us, God holds us citizens accountable
for choosing good leaders and passing just laws. If our leaders manage to rig elections or take away our right to vote, then they
have taken the authority, with God watching and permitting it, and judgment would be on their head. But as long as we have some authority,
we must acknowledge it is from God and that we are accountable for using it well.
"For we must all appear before the judgment
seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad" (2Cor 5:10).
