Well it appear Justin is only superfically knowledgable about the Dean loss. Dean would have won Iowa and the nomination. The Clinton run DLC had Dick Gephardt use murder-suicide tactics on Dean in the last month before the Iowa caucus with the understanding Gephardt would become Kerry’s VP choice. However they never intended for Kerry to beat Bush. It was so Hillary could run now, which she couldn’t if Bush lost.

First off Vicky, that’s a really nice conspriacy theory you’ve got going there, but I was in Iowa. I was at the scream speech. I know what went down, and it wasn’t the Clintons. Dean imploded under the weight of his own popularity promising a revolution and then not being able to deliver the shrewd organization and marketing that his campaign needed to keep that revolution going. Joe Trippi ran a hell of an online organization, but an amateurish ground ops. And so Dean lost.

To everybody else, thanks for the comments.

RP supporters: go to your county’s next GOP meeting. You will probably be surprised and a little alarmed at how “staunch” most of the regulars are. But be polite. The important thing is not to win, them over, or turn them into signwaving revolutionaries. Just get Dr. Paul into the conversation.

When they realize that the party’s numbers will grow dramatically if they just keep an open mind, they’ll start to look at Paul’s actual positions and philosophy. It’s all downhill from there.

Wow! What a trusting soul. Hey, I got this bridge you might be interested in…

First, Dean was a one trick pony, anti-war with a little appreciation for his political courage and independence sprinkled on top. Paul’s positions are touching different folks. He has a comprehensive philosophical approach that has been missing for decades…its absence has isolated many citizens if not the majority of Americans from the political process.

Second, Dean was built up by the media and overplayed because his message was refreshing and from the left. This produced some initial enthusiasm to the reporters on the beat and show producers. The echo chamber amplified and he was hyped too far too fast.

Then, the media like the proverbial scorpion who stings his rescuer…they just couldn’t help themselves and they tore him down. This build up and tear down cycle gets played out all of the time. (Its not conspiracy theory– this is just an institutional characteristic.)

To that end, Paul supporters should be somewhat grateful that he is continuing to enjoy an underestimated status. Although the treatment is jaw dropping at times, it is probably helping the long term campaign.

Primaries are about activism and motivation. His pro-life stance gives refuge for the base after the remaining right wingers drop off and they are left with J. Edgar Hoover and a Mormon John Kerry. (No offense to Mormons of course). If Paul is a credible contender by December, he has a shot to score a victory or two in some early primaries.

But the activists must deliver feet to the booth.

From Wikipedia:

“(Dick Gephardt) announced his second run for President on January 5, 2003, dropping out a year later after his fourth-place finish in the Iowa caucus. Gephardt was seen by many as too old fashioned and unelectable, and his support of the Iraq War resolution hurt him among liberal activists. Gephardt promoted a form of universal health care, and was supported by a dozen labor unions, but did not have enough support to receive the endorsement of the AFL-CIO. Although Gephardt was ahead in Iowa throughout early 2003, Vermont Governor Howard Dean pulled ahead in the polls by August, his campaign fueled by anti-war activists. The Gephardt campaign was embarrassed by an early August St Louis Post-Dispatch article that revealed that 11 of 33 “Gephardt team leaders” listed on his Iowa campaign’s web site were actually supporting other candidates or neutral. The race between Gephardt and Dean became negative, and took an ugly turn in October when a Gephardt staffer reportedley pushed a Dean staffer out of a meeting while calling him a “faggot”. Dean chairman Joe Trippi (who worked for Gephardt in 1988) and Gephardt chairman Steve Murphy became involved in a war of words over that incident. In the final days of the campaign, both Dean and Gephardt faded and finished third and fourth, respectively.

Although he dropped out of the Presidential race, Gephardt was mentioned as a possible running mate for John Kerry. On March 7, 2004, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, seen as a strong possibility for the position himself, endorsed Gephardt for the Vice Presidency. “I think he’s the best candidate,” Richardson said of Gephardt in an interview with the Associated Press. “There’s a good regional balance with Kerry and Gephardt.” Nevertheless, Kerry announced that he had chosen John Edwards as his running mate on July 6, 2004. (Interestingly, on that same day, the New York Post published an incorrect headline stating that Gephardt had become Kerry’s running mate.) Shortly after this false story broke, the headline was compared to the 1948 “Dewey defeats Truman” front page of the Chicago Tribune, which falsely reported the presidential election results of that year.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Gephardt

That is why Justin talks about “polls” and such. He really has no clue what is going on behind the scene. That’s also why he says dumb things like:

“Also, I hear a lot in this comments section about the “media” and how corrupt they are. I’d drop this immediately if I were you. The media simply reports and echoes. Drudge was the one who broke the scream story, and because it was funny and really weird the rest of the media picked up on it. You can call them corrupt all you want, but you need the media to get elected. You may not think so, but you do, and you’d do well to figure out ways to make it work for you instead of saying, “It’s the media’s fault!””

The media isn’t reporting or echoing ANYTHING. They go out of their way not to report on Ron Paul or echo what their own audience is YELLING at them. Don’t cha think at least one of them would recognize the popularity Ron Paul has generated and talk about him more? Nahhhhh…. That would be jounalism, and journalism isn’t profitable. They get paid to spread propaganda. You don’t pay their bills. Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and the rest of them do.

He seems incapable of lying- I love him- He can save us from the Corporate Slave State!

It is not the medias right to dictate who is/isn’t elected. This is a matter that agrivates many, because the media is doing exactly that. Rather than accept it, why not fix the situation? The power of voting was meant to reside with the people, not with groups, be they special interest or corporate. Personally, I have lost much of my former trust (not that Fox hasn’t been killing it slowly anyway with propoganda programming.) of MSM.

Should the discontent spread enough, media outlets will loose sponsors once enough people turn to the net for their news needs. I have seen much blatant manipulation of facts, through omission and other means. Let us not forget how news coverage of Iowa’s stroll poll omited Ron Paul in fifth place, while listing all the other canidates. Or how major news agencys have denounced their own online polls when the results didn’t support the supposed top tier canidates.

I disagree with this statement in the STRONGEST way. I have seen the marginalization of a presidential campaign with my own eyes. I have seen poll votes rolled back, switched to another candidate, and erased.

I will never trust any corporate owned media outlet again.

“The media simply reports and echoes.”

GOOGLE +”Ron Paul” +”Censorship”, and learn for yourself how impartial our media is.

GO TO YOUTUBE AND WATCH THE CENSORSHIP IN ACTION.

That is pretty naive thinking. The media does not simply report or echo. They generally follow trends *after* they become trends. They only report what sells papers, gets clicks, or brings in viewers. Very few media outlets conduct investigative journalism.

And most of the TV media is biased towards establishment candidates because the owners of the TV networks have an invested interest in keeping the status quo.

Ron Paul is benefiting passively from the internet - he and his staff do not claim credit for the nternet firestorm surrounding him.

I await the MSM’s attacks to rid themselves of his presense. So far, they are still trying to pretend he does not exist. When they can’t do that anymore, they will trash him for something as inane as Dean’s innocent shout.

The government-licensed and corporate-funded MSM isn’t about to have honest elections or honest information. The MSM and the government will have to be brought down together. Viva la internet! Viva Ron Paul.

Dean didn’t have anything to say about rent seeking.

Paul doesn’t have anything to say about private choice rent seeking via network externalities but he _does_ have much to say about rent seeking via public choice. The only other person out there with nearly as much mind share saying anything about public choice rent seeking is Charles Murray of the AEI with what he calls “The Plan”.

So, no, Dean didn’t really have a message.

Of course no one, not democrat or republican, has anything to say about private choice economic rent seeking and history shows us that as soon as they do, they’re either assassinated, as was Huey Long with his wealth tax, or coopted, as was Norm Thomas whose socialist platform was adopted except the one plank that mattered — the wealth tax — which FDR proceeded to “adopt” by titling his highly progressive income tax system a “wealth tax”. I’m not going to say that Henry George was assassinated but it sure is a coincidence that he died just as he was about to be elected to public office.

I’m pretty well convinced that the only solution to this kind of hyper-corrupt rent seeking is destruction of civilization as we know it. Civilization seems to be something of a public health menace.

I think you are really helping the Revolution with your blogs and the fact that you are imploring us to think outside the box and try to imagine worse case scenarios.

I believe you are trying to get us more organized, disciplined and dedicated to winning the nomination first.

I applaud you Mr Gardner…

Keep asking us tough questions and being a realist. We need to be grounded and focused on the task at hand.

Register as a republican, Try to become a delegate in your state’s GOP and join a meet up in order that we nominate Ron Paul this winter.

DONATE $$$ and time - Cash is still king here in America.

America needs us, even though many Americans only care about Lindsey Lohan or Football.

God Bless,
Brettrix,
Phoenix AZ

The media LOVED Dean and Perot, neither who were starved for headlines. Had either of those candidates the majority of support from troops campaign contributions as the Federal Election Commission quarterly reported on Dr. Paul, that would have been headlines for them, buried for Dr. Paul.

I brought up Nader in my response because Nader had an anti-war platform, as Dean claimed he had, yet when Dean did not try to work with Nader, but bashed Nader, it proved then (As Dean is now chair of the Democrat Party and gets fewer headlines than Terry McAufflie, the DP chair the last election), Dean was a fake who was what we call a “gatekeeper” his job being to keep voters in the DP, and time bore this out to be the whole truth.

YOU BET there are suspicions that Ron Paul is merely a gatekeeper for the GOP, whose job is to keep GOP voters from switching and converting anti-war votes to GOP. Dr. Paul would not be the first man of integrity to go down in flames, as Nader did. But like Dean, Nader did not have a REVOLUTION on his hands.

Several respondees to your question #5 pointed out, Dr. Paul is not a Democrat or claimed by the DP (as Nader was) and this is an important difference, especially where “revolution” is concerned. “Revolution” is a liberal term, that has been adopted by the rightwing of the campaign and sweeping the internet, which is shaking the main stream media up, exposing them on their lies, their Orwellian propeganda, and they are losing subscriptions while the internet is now booming. I’m new to YouTube and Myspace and what have you, and I believe many of us are, and we spend far more time watching home spun tapes and TV is background noise (that is getting worse with every repeated commercial). Newsprint is becoming hostile, I have had my Letters to the Editor about Ron Paul, to the Press Democrat, a major paper here in NoCAL, refused so many times, in trying to break in, I was told by a person at their office when I enquired about my letters, “THIS IS HILLARY COUNTRY!”. They might as well have told me “THIS IS WAR”, and their mistake is thinking they are on top, because the bigger they are, the harder the fall, and they will FALL, not by Dr. Paul, but THE REVOLUTION which has begun. Dr Dean did not have a revolution, he had a scream, a recuse, and now a job working for the Wizards of OZ. Ron Paul supporters have HAD ENOUGH. Dean supporters didn’t have a clue.