The Glade 4.0

I don't support the OWS protests by any means, but I find the vilification of them in this thread very disturbing. Of course Lex's trolling isn't helping out, but even ignoring that it's kind of scary.

It seems to me that any protest is going to have a few bad apples giving the rest a bad name. I'm even open to the idea that the OWS protests have a higher proportion than average. But posting every little highlight where someone says something dumb or a protester acts violently or whatever and then circle-jerking about how they're all a bunch of lazy hippies is... well, I don't know. It just disturbs me.

I can see it now. In the not-too-distant future, the government will overstep some boundary and give us a very good reason to protest in defense of our rights. Then, the main stream media, being in the pocket of the government, will start running a bunch of stories about protesters assaulting little old ladies and how the movement is just an excuse for a bunch of low-life thugs to loot and cause mayhem. And the average American will eat it up.

I don't know if I'm making much sense, I'm having a hard time putting my feelings into words. I think I just wish people were a little more skeptical about what they hear on the news. No one cares about reporting on the thousands of ordinary people protesting peacefully for legitimate reasons every day. That's not an interesting story. Of course it works both ways too, with supporters of the OWS movement jumping on every little piece of evidence of police brutality. But I haven't seen much concern about that in this thread.

The media loves to embarass the government conservatives. It sells.

FTFY

There are actual conservatives in government? Aside from Ron Paul? Where?

I would love to. Got a desk for me?

He's a conservative like Mormons are Christian.

19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. 20 There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.

Conservatism means a preference for keeping things as they are or going back to the way things used to be. Ron Paul definitely doesn't qualify under that definition.

Conservatism means a preference for keeping things as they are or going back to the way things used to be. Ron Paul definitely doesn't qualify under that definition.

definitions

Ron Paul has voted 'no' on bills 65% of the time, seems pretty conservative by your definition.

By contrast, I see Obama voted 'no' only 41% of the time.

Regardless of what change Ron Paul ideally wants, you have to look at his voting record which makes him seem like a stick in the mud.

http://www.issues2000.org/Ron_Paul.htm
http://www.issues2000.org/Barack_Obama.htm

I'm baffled as to how you equate no votes to conservatism. Ron Paul's isolationism is counter to pretty much all of American history. He's not a conservative.

Right. So I guess we leapt immediately into both World Wars. Oh, wait. We didn't? I wonder why that was.

Look up some history. Jefferson, Monroe, Seward, Wilson.. in fact, FDR was the guy who broke over a century of non-interventionist policy (minus the Spanish-American War and arguably a few of Teddy's actions).

So you're saying that Ron Paul is against us holding the continent?

35 Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens,) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove, that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of Republican Government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defence against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike of another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests.
36 The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connexion as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.
37 Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.

No, I'm saying that the United States favored aggressive territorial expansion and colonization for most of the 19th century, which is pretty much the opposite of isolationism. Then you had the associated Monroe Doctrine, which was a policy that stated the US would see it as an act of aggression if anybody else tried to start a colony anywhere in the entire Western Hemisphere. These philosophies are about as diametrically opposed to isolationism as you can possibly get.

Not at all. Territorial expansion on our own continent is hardly incompatible with isolationism in regard to the rest of the world. Seeing it as an act of aggression to start new colonies in our part of the world contributes ot isolationsim; it's not the opposite of it.

This country was mostly isolationist from the end of the War of 1812 until the Spanish American War and WWI.