Wow. I'm speechless: Ron Paul's consistent, principled, and career-long fight for liberty and prosperity

I'm relatively new to politics, and the 2008 election sparked my interest. Sadly, I did not support Ron Paul during this election. It was because I was naive, but more importantly, because I did not understand Ron Paul's positions. I have since wised up, and I sure hope he runs again.

The recent financial crisis flung me into many articles and books that I otherwise would not have read. As is obvious, the Austrian view is the only one that explains the 2008 financial crisis, let alone makes any sense. I starting reading articles on LRC, Mises and books such as Meltdown and Economics in One Lesson. After learning the truth about the Federal Reserve, I opted to read my first Ron Paul book: End the Fed. It was a brilliant and concise argument for sound money. I had never heard of free market money or the values of commodity-based money. Truth tends to ring true, but why didn't I learn these things earlier? Why didn't my own school at least MENTION this free-market view of money? Why, with all the attention I paid to the '08 campaign, did I not know more about Ron Paul's history and positions? I dug deeper. I then read The Revolution: A Manifesto. Admittedly, there were some facts I was hesitant to accept, mostly regarding foreign policy. It took a bit longer, but Ron Paul has fully convinced me.

This book contains statements and positions of Ron Paul's since the late 1970's. It's stunning that a "politician" is so consistent and principled. Especially in light of what all of these government interventions of done to country and economy, it's amazing to see how RIGHT Ron Paul has been for so long. He's warned us for decades about what would happen and nobody seems to listen. This book will convince you more then ever that peace and prosperity come through liberty. I was shocked at how prescient Ron Paul has been, whether it's on the economy, our welfare state, or our warfare state.

Read this book if you want to know the truth about Ron Paul's positions... straight from the source. Read this book if you want to understand why America is in the mess it's in. Read this book if you care about freedom and prosperity. It's quite exciting what Ron Paul has done for the liberty movement, and I can't wait to see this movement to continue to grow stronger.

Ron Paul For President!

Finally, a man I would love to see as the president of the United States - the world would certainly be a more safer, peaceful, wealthy, prosperous and free! I would also be very glad if my country (Portugal) would take him as prime-minister!

Ron Paul is a strong constitutionalist and advocate for the free market, individual liberty, sound money, small government and small taxation. How the US Founding Fathers would feel ashamed today to observe what the government has become and how the constitution has been systematically violated and corrupted.

It's quite remarkable to see how Ron Paul has managed to stay so consistent, so perseverant, so determined to stand for the ideals of freedom against all the deficitary, inflationary, big spending, big meddling, highly interventionist, highly corrupt, highly corporatism form of US government.

The only downside of the book is that it's rather long, and it repeats itself several times (a proof of consistency :)).

Ron Paul Quoted from Pillars of Prosperity

"I decided to run for Congress because of the disaster of wage and price controls imposed by the Nixon administration in 1971. When the stock market responded euphorically to the imposition of these controls and the closing of the gold window, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and many other big business groups gave enthusiastic support, I decided that someone in politics had to condemn the controls, and offer the alternative that could explain the past and give hope for the future: the Austrian economists' defense of the free market. At the time I was convinced, like Ludwig von Mises, that no one could succeed in politics without serving the special interests of some politically powerful pressure group.

Although I was eventually elected, in terms of a conventional political career with real Washington impact, he was absolutely right. I have not developed legislative influence with the leader- ship of the Congress or the administration. Monies are deliberately deleted from routine water works bills for my district because I do not condone the system, nor vote for any of the appropriations.
My influence, such as it is, comes only by educating others about the rightness of the free market.


The bipartisanship of the last 50 years has allowed our government to gain control over half of the income of most Americans. Being enslaved half the time is hardly a good compromise. But supporters of the political status quopoint out that, in spite of the loss of personal freedom, the country continues to thrive in many ways.

But there are some serious questions that we as a people must answer:
Is this prosperity real?
Will it be long-lasting?
What is the cost in economic terms?
Have we sacrificed our liberties for government security?
Have we undermined the very system that has allowed productive effort to provide a high standard of living for so many?
Has this system in recent years excluded some from the benefits that Wall Street and others have enjoyed?
Has it led to needless and dangerous U.S. intervention overseas and reated problems that we are not yet fully aware of?
Is it morally permissible in a country that professes to respect individual liberty to routinely give handouts to the poor, and provide benefits to the privileged and rich by stealing the fruits of labor from hard-working Americans?

As we move into the next Congress, some worry that gridlock will make it impossible to get needed legislation passed. This seems highly unlikely. If big government supporters found ways to enlarge the government in the past, the current evenly split Congress will hardly impede this trend and may even accelerate it. With a recession on the horizon, both sides will be more eager than ever to cooperate on expanding federal spending to stimulate the economy, whether the fictitious budget surplus shrinks or not."

Ron Paul Quoted from Pillars of Prosperity

If you liked this book you will like:
The Revolution: A Manifesto
Human Action: A Treatise on Economics
The Prince (AD Classic)

A Clear, Concise, and Consistent Idealogical Individual

During the past presidential election, and the race leading up to it, Ron Paul seemed to be quite a controversial figure. Whether you agreed with him or not, his name was making headlines. Admitting this for the first time publicly myself, even I was highly skeptical of this man and his ideology. After some careful, and truly thoughtful reflection, I believe I am coming to a quite different conclusion. Ron Paul represents classical liberalism. This form of liberalism is quite different from the liberalism society seems to embrace today. This form of liberalism believes in private property, free markets, and sound money, hence the subtitle of this book. I'm not sure I would be called a classical liberal for one reason, foreign policy. Dr. Ron Paul believes as classical liberalism teaches that America has no business interfering in the affairs of other nations. This would encompass foreign commodities, as well as military operations. This is where I still need some more reflection. As a conservative I believe that the quicker we strike the enemy the less chance there is of any kind of retalliation. Cripple the enemy in their homeland before they strike us here. Thanks to some colossal mistakes from the Jimmy Carter administration and then followed up quite nicely by the Clinton administration, America was struck quite hard on September 11. This has led to a whole host of problems from a hit on our fincancial sector as well as an invasion of our individual rights. How you interpret this means everything. Conservatives would hold that radical Islam is imperialistic in nature and therefore whether we were over seas or not Al Qaeda would have attempted an attack on America. Thus holding to ancient Rome's anthem "we expand or we die." Ron Paul on the other hand believes that Al Qaeda attacked America because America was meddling in their affairs. Constitutionaly speaking, Ron Paul is absolutely correct in his arguments within this book. For those of us who still believe that the Constitution is still the law of the land, this book is encouraging. Therefore I would give this book a 4 star rating not because of anything DR. Ron Paul has argued here but because of my own struggle with the foreign policy argument.

Pillar of Salt?

I read this book as a participant of [...]

The message that resounds throughout this collection of speeches is that the federal government of the United States ought not to intervene in true free market capitalism. It was a very consistent book. A key theme of this book is how the Federal Reserve supports the federal government's deficit spending by printing more and more money (backed by nothing but the threat of nuclear annihilation [that's what I say, not Ron Paul]), which is, by definition, INFLATION. This has been the way out of many a financial crisis, as is cited in the book. When more and more "dollars" are chasing the same amount of consumer goods (like bread, gasoline, or any number of commodities) PRICE inflation occurs. Inflation is a hidden tax, which hurts mostly the middle class, and decimates those already having trouble making ends meet.

There were a few words that sent me to the dictionary to gain a clearer understanding. Words like fungibilty (p. 425), profligate, and sop (p. 443). So not only did it underscore my understanding of the way a free market (if allowed to) will operate, it illustrated the unintended consequences of government intervention in the marketplace.

In general I found this book easy to understand, except for in Part 7: International Affairs, in a speech entitled "Reaffirming Committment of United States to Principles of the Marshall Plan." That left me scratching my head. But maybe I shouldn't read this stuff so late at night.

In summation: A bit long, excellent content, big words make you smart.