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Journalist criticises Ron Paul campaign staff: Update & NEW Ron Paul Official Blog

Submitted by bankfish on Fri, 01/11/2008 - 23:28
in
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http://blog.nj.com/njv_paul_mulshine/2008/01/this_rons_no_re...

Thoughts?

I posted this earlier by the article's title but someone wanted to flag it. I think because of the title. I would like to know what people think pro and con of the article.

If it is the case that this post is flagged for wanting to discuss an article that seriously addresses why we aren't doing better in votes then I guess I'll look for a new forum where the members don't mind an ostrich sticking it's head out of the sand once in a while to see what the lay of the land really is.

Update: the campaign now has an official blog:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/018547.html
http://people.ronpaul2008.com/campaign-updates

»

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True on the staff: false on the issues

Submitted by antboy on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:31.

The author of that piece endorsed Paul publicly, and should be read. As much as I agree with the author (and the meetup group to which the author linked), I hate to just vent about the campaign staff, as I don't see Paul making a change. At this point, the best we can hope for is to have him continue to speak and advance some of the themes of liberty that kickstarted his support in the first place. Giving his staff any more money is throwing good money after bad: give it to the support groups locally.

The author is wrong about the issues: Paul's campaign exploded because of his strong opposition to the war in Iraq, an end to military intervention in other countries, restoration of civil liberties lost in the "war on terror", and strict respect for the constitution. It has stalled because of an abandonment of his core issues (his ads and the campaign home page don't even mention the war in Iraq), and a new approach focusing on "national sovereignty" rather than liberty. In particular, he took up Tom Tancredo's mantle on immigration, and has done as well with it as Tancredo did.

The Intrade odds suggest it is too late to get him elected president. There is still hope that the ideas of liberty may get a better airing thanks to the campaign, and help this country in the long run, if not in November 2008. But it means returning to the peace and non-intervention focus that attracted his broad support in the first place.

This is a good column

Submitted by thamnosma on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:17.

and I believe insightful. It explains the failure to turn money and emotional support into success with voters.

The story of the press conference was telling.

If Dr. Paul would get as fired up with running HQ as he did on that debate the other night, we'd have a very different campaign. I doubt he permitted this sort of ineptness in the delivery room.

One reason why I had hoped

Submitted by WRellim on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:48.

He would bring someone like Mark Sanford on as a VP candidate -- as I felt he would shake out the "loyal but incompetent" people VERY fast.

But alas, you have to actually at least WIN several states and be widely considered a TOP CONTENDER before you can be so arrogant as to pick and announce a VP candidate (much less get them to publicly agree).

However, I *do* also think that Ron's failure to "clean house" and hold people accountable is also very telling concerning what his administration would be like: In other words, it would probably resemble something like GW Bush, or Ron Reagan, or even Warren G. Harding -- all of them tainted by scandals, corruption, incompetence, etc. and for the same reasons, a form of "friend-nepotism" and an unwillingness to get rid of bad, incompetent, or corrupt people; never a good thing in an executive.

BUMP

Submitted by DonnaMatrix on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:05.

I'm voting for Ron Paul come hell or high water.

Just flagged you for spreading disention. Tired of you trolls

Submitted by Sapphira on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:59.

Go watch "Mr.Smith Goes To Washington" and THEN come back!

"Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly." Mae West

—

"This used to be a government of checks and balances. Now it's all checks and no balances." (Gracie Allen for President 1940)

To quote Ron Paul's January 10th email

Submitted by bankfish on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:17.

"If you have suggestions for me to do better, I want to hear them."

Where in any of the articles or posts mentioned do you see anyone that doesn't want Ron to get more votes?

Fifth place is not good enough for me and I am really encouraged by these other posts that there are other people that care about votes out there too.

Go watch a movie? come on.

I want Paul to win, because I think our foreign policy is costing lives of foreigners and of our serviceman. My cousin was killed by an IED and I care deeply about this election and what happens to our country. I'll gladly accept criticisim but it has to be criticism that makes some kind of sense.

Flagged

Submitted by Knah Nedraer on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:05.

I just flagged you for being an asshat. grow up. we probably care more than you about RP. We want him to win. I am tired of this half assed game the campaign is playing. If Yuckabee can hire a former Reagan baller/retread so can we.

i dont see yuckabee having problems getting the media's attention. somthign is wrong here and it needs to be addressed.

This article and this post WREAK OF TROLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Submitted by Sapphira on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:59.

"Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly." Mae West

—

"This used to be a government of checks and balances. Now it's all checks and no balances." (Gracie Allen for President 1940)

trolling

Submitted by jlb148 on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:13.

whenever I troll, I have a beer in one hand and a fishing pole in the other.

This article in its entirety

Submitted by price_trend on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:53.

This article in its entirety should be posted on the front page. Mad props to this honest journalist.

I wish more folks here had the courage and intestinal fortitude to see things clearly and objectively to know that it is time to amputate the dead flesh to prevent gengreen from spreading any further.

These blind ignorant fools are no different from the legion of zombies who regularly tune in each day/evening for their 8 hours of NEO-con Hannity and Limbaugh.

I think Dr. Paul said it in a debate..."We rushed into campaign, er I mean war...if we made the wrong diagnosis, we should change the treatment!" Dr. Paul...it's time to bring the HQ staff home and deploy professionals. They did their best at the time and with the limited resources on hand, and they are to be commended for managing this goliath campaign for as long as they have, but it is time to hand it over to the BIG BOYS/GILRS who are professional campaign folks.

Somebody close to this campaign, WITH influence, I implore you to catch the Congressman's ear.

KENT SNYDER MAKES $30,000/MONTH!!!

Submitted by AmericanPatriot55 on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:49.

This is NOT NEGATIVE, this is FACTUAL!!!
And there are people in his paid campaign staff who are DELIBERATELY working against his campaign; such as Jesse Benton (google that name, very interesting!) and Kent Snyder and others.
THIS IS NOT A CONSPIRACY THEORY, this is KNOWLEDGEABLE FACTS from people I know personally who have witnessed this behavior and have been trying to persuade Rand Paul to at least investigate!
I don't think Dr. Paul really knows the scope of treachery among his own campaign! There are known plants from the Cato Institute who have no intention of allowing Ron Paul to succeed!
WHY has the official campaign been blatantly IGNORING his grassroots supporters who have done SO MUCH for Ron Paul, you would THINK they would be OVERJOYED at the level of committment by so many hard working truly passionate people, yet they treat them as the enemy?
They hardly even did ANY advertisement in NH where he had A LOT of supporters!
THANK you for posting this again, this is an IMPORTANT ISSUE, whether some wish to acknowledge that or not!
It is a WELL KNOWN fact that his official campaign workers turned away RP supporters at the Iowa Straw Poll who were trying to perform exit polls and stood with the corrupt Iowa GOP who threatened to have them ARRESTED! My brother was there and witnessed this to his horror! I don't remember who it was specifically, but the campaign staff member told the supporters that everything was being handled "in the open" and they need to be held accountable! We are essentially PAYING THEIR FAT SALARIES!!!!!!!

—

"If virtue and knowledge are diffused among the People, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great security."
-Samuel Adams-

well, I googled Jesse Benton

Submitted by thamnosma on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:07.

and the only results for him are for his role at communications director of the campaign, nothing else. I perused at least 6 pages of google results, so I don't know what you might have in mind. Still curious.

Do you really think it's treachery or incompetence?

Maybe

Submitted by Jaws of liberty on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:40.

It looks like either incompetence or laziness.

Treachery? Why are you so quick to jump to the stupidest and most vile conclusion (not you, thamnosma, the original commenter)?

And what do you know about the Cato Institute? Who do you know who works there? No one. I worked there for a Summer, and am close with several current and former employees. I love it, love them, and Paul.

If we don't stop exaggerating, jumping to outlandish conclusions without a shred of evidence, Paul will have to continue to apologize, rather than spread the message. Which is liberty.

I don't know enough about Snyder or Benton to think that they need to be replaced. I would need a mountain of evidence to judge that either of them are in any way attempting to do anything other than help Ron Paul. And so should everyone. People make mistakes, people are incompetent sometimes, and people are lazy. None of those things are "treachery" or evil or whatever other hyperbolic and intellectually lazy nonsense you want to spit out.

i googled too

Submitted by Knah Nedraer on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:24.

but went through a few of the pages. I am not sure what the poster was getting at but i did see a write up about Jesse hiring some goons to bad mouth huck in Iowa. I dont think that was such a bad thing. I dont see anything else out there that was suspect.

at a minimum the folks are the campaign are probably talented and considered over achievers. We called them strivers when i was in school. To be sure, they are nice people to know. I suspect the root of the problem is the youth. There is nothing wrong with being young. Heck it probably worked to our advantage in the beginning. But we have resources now you can't compete with experience. not at this level. I mean, do we really think for a second that Snyder is going to win going head to head with Rollins. Give me a break...this guy got Reagan elected.

I love this guy!

Submitted by Treg on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:11.

This is the second great essay on Ron Paul that I know of and both are excellent.

Good, make copies of this, print and send it to the Campaign via MAIL.

Everyone, Print and send it to the Campaign. Then write, this analysis has my AMEN.

I was in Philly, and he was dead on with that bungling of the press. (and those of us who paid $500 to have lunch, see and talk with him. No lunch, no talk, just smile and take a picture, then listen to Ron say the same things)

The campaign at this point needs to create a web page that lists Proposed Expenses and lets those be voted upon by the Grass Roots.

Treg

With all the money that has been donated why can't we hire the

Submitted by manwith4kids on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:23.

best advertising/ marketing firm in the counrty. It just makes sense to spend the money using the best. Not bashing current group, just trying to use money wisely.

—

IT IS NOT A WASTED VOTE!

They hired someone from lewrockwell.com

Submitted by bankfish on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:11.

Not a mainstream professional still.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/

"Official Ron Paul Blog With... Dan McCarthy!
Posted by Stephen Carson at 10:44 PM
The Ron Paul campaign has hired our own Dan McCarthy to work full-time on a new official blog as their Grassroots Communications Coordinator"

The more I think about it the more I agree with the Mulshine article. The Lewrockwell.com article says that Dan McCarthy is "deeply knowledgeable in libertarian and Old Right political thought". Is that really what the campaign needs? Or does it need to broaden it's message. Pragmatically speaking I would rather have votes than new libertarians at this point. I think every other contender is going to keep us on a disasterous foreign policy course, and we need Ron to at least come within shouting distance of winning so that people will pay attention to his foreign policy message.

This situation reminds me of Bob Dole. I liked Dole, but if he couldn't run a better campaign than he did, I thought he shouldn't run the country. I hope I don't end up with the same opinion of Ron.

Oh great... another LRC "soldier"

Submitted by WRellim on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:33.

This means essentially that the communication will be ONE-WAY, with Dan McCarthy essentially feeding us whatever Lew Rockwell's take is on things (and that of his paid "soldiers").

Expect the "Daily Dose" to be a subset of the LRC blog articles or similarly linked articles, just with surrounding "wrappers" written by this Dan guy.

Note already that though several entries have been made, not a single REAL update about anything actually concerning the Ron Paul campaign has been written, nor is it likely to. The only thing of substance is a the shortest entry, a link to a single article about Giuliani running out of money (which shows that McCarthy isn't much of a researcher either, as a quick Google News scan could have included additional links revealing that -- McCain is running on borrowed cash; Thompson is essentially stuck in SC because his truck is proverbially "out of gas"; and that even Romney is having money problems forcing him to focus solely on Michigan.)

Another day-late-dollar-short campaign staffing decision. Methinks this was done SOLELY as a "sop" to try to dampen down the (valid) criticisms that the campaign does not communicate properly. (And worse, they evidently just resurrected a previously abandoned blog mechanism.)

Sadly, I think the prime motivation is the donor and supporter attrition -- they really thought they could just ask for another $23M in donations and it would happen. Shows that not only did the MEDIA not understand November5th, but the campaign staff was entirely clueless as well.

They don't get it either.

There is nothing wrong with

Submitted by Kilpinen on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:48.

There is nothing wrong with the message. Liberty is appealing.

I agree with the author on the communication points.............

Submitted by wcasino on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:09.

although I cannot speak to the claims about the running of the campaign. Communication is key, folks. Other threads have been written on this and the concensus agrees. THe doc, you gotta love him, but he is communicationally challenged. What is so frustrating about this is that it is a problem which is SSSOOOOOOO easy to fix. I wish the campaign would get this done, if not anything else - a professional communication assisitant for the good doctor - NOW!

Liberty is not free, It must be earned!

—

Liberty is not free, It must be earned!

this author has written anti-paul articles in the past

Submitted by Ron Paul Films on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:04.

and you are spreading his stuff here as if it's fact?

that's like posting some hannity drivel and pretending it's substantiated truth.

the reason this got flagged the first time is because it is negative rumor-mongering. the author is a detractor.

it's also interesting that the same people keep bumping this thread up and reposting it.

you're paranoid

Submitted by Knah Nedraer on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:22.

yup, i just bumped it again by responding to your crazy rantings. Why don't you link to the meet up group rant that basically said the same if not worse. It's in the article...go back and take a look.

why did they not hire a pro like yuckabee did. We have the resources. It's just not adding up. Something is going on here?

Actually

Submitted by bankfish on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:23.

I am asking for comments on it and not spreading it as fact and my original post said I was reposting it. What is the point of your comments? If you want to call it rumor-mongering than say what the rumors in the article are.

What was that Ron Paul said about learning from our enemies? So what if the author is or is not a detractor, it doesn't mean we can't learn anything from him.

Sadly, I think the criticism is spot on.

Submitted by WRellim on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:01.

Look at Ron's "Events" calendar -- one event per day on Jan 13, 14, 15th.

Now the next big primary is in Michigan (on the 15th), so obviously all of the above events are ...in Nevada.

So, since the Nevada primary is on the 19th, where will Ron be on the 16-19?

And one event per day? Is this the Ron Paul campaign or the Fred Thompson campaign?

Seriously.

I am starting to wonder where that $20M will be spent.

This is why the Webcasting idea is so great. Dr. Paul can be in

Submitted by cactus1010 on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 00:11.

all the cities at townhall meetings all at one time. He can be in Nevada, Michigan, South Carolina, etc.

Why isn't the campaign utilizing this idea, instead of running Ron Paul all over the country? This is what makes me sick

With webcasting people can speak to him and he can answer them. The technology is out there, why isn't his campaign using it?

Although, even if they did... they would probably screw it up.

Yup... because they tried it and DID screw it up.

Submitted by WRellim on Sat, 01/12/2008 - 01:39.

They tried to do live web-casting from the Chicago Rally on September 22nd, 2007.

And yuppers, they screwed it up big time.

BTW, even still, voters want face-to-face meetings, but not for the reasons you think.

Believe it or not, the truly BIG deal is getting your photo taken with the candidate (and we are NOT talking the "snapshot" thing at the rallies) -- for big donors & party people & such, the goal is a very nice, framed & signed "portrait" of them standing and/or shaking hands with the candidate.

In essence, it is "just in case" the candidate gets elected President -- then that picture becomes important and is hung on the wall (I know several people who STILL have photos of them standing with Ron Reagan, it's one of their most cherished possessions... kind sick, really.)

Makes me sick but...

Submitted by billybernardo on Fri, 01/11/2008 - 23:55.

I have thought that a Dick Morris type would do wonders for thee campaign. Yeah yeah, i know. It makes me throw up in my mouth a little too but the guy is a genius when it comes to advising a campaign.

I agree Ron Paul probably never expected to get this far.

Submitted by cactus1010 on Fri, 01/11/2008 - 23:54.

Therefore, the campaign staff he had was adequate at the time.

However, if he seriously wants to go any further he will need a professional staff who will give him professional and campaign winning advise. A staff who is experienced in presidential National party races.

Huckabee was smart enough to realizes this the minute he started to get attention.

Ron Paul has been getting attention for months, but his current campaign have not taken advantage of that attention.

Although, he did get in the SC debate, Fox is editing out most of what Ron Paul had to say.

Someone on this forum had a great idea about using the Internet for webcasting. I wonder if Ron Paul current campaign has any idea how huge this could be, if it were utilized correctly... I doubt it.