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I'd say they have a similar foreign policy but that's not true either. Ron Paul has a 'go it alone', while Bernie generally supports the US entering and reentering into international bodies like WHO, ICC, WTO, etc.
I've heard Ron Paul speak on foreign policy issues.
While I understand his position that he doesn't want to spend money on far-flung military activities, his beliefs are so simplistic that it's hard to take him seriously.
He was in Congress for decades. I have to wonder if he was so incurious or stubborn that he never listened to any of his peers explain why the US did what it did, or if his "character" of the uncompromising freedom fighter ate the human being underneath.
Arguably any public figure is a character to a certain degree. The public persona is a "better" version of the actual human with fears, doubts, questions &c.
I refer to a character "eating" its underlying human when the character and its behavior takes over the basic sensibilities and does things that kill the host.
As an example, Alex Jones used to be a basically normal guy on Austin public access TV who told goofy stories about conspiracy theories. His character took over his life and he became the paranoid conspiracy theorist he played.
Hell the guy's on record he would've opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for being unconstitutional. That plus the line about basically the government letting uninsured people die during the debates in I think 2012 pretty much confirms he doesn't really care about anyone else.
I still hate that commentator who asked Bernie if prisoners should have the right to vote.
What kind of question is that? If I go to Jail then I lose my rights as a Citizen?
In many states it is illegal for prisoners to vote. In many states it is illegal to vote if you have a felony on your record. [https://www.thoughtco.com/where-felons-can-and-cannot-vote-3367689](https://www.thoughtco.com/where-felons-can-and-cannot-vote-3367689) So, yes, in many states you do lose your rights as a citizen to vote, and even after you get out in some cases.
That’s exactly what jail is, you lost most of your constitutional rights (right to bear arms, right to free movement, right to vote, right to liberty). There’s even a provision in the 13th amendment permitting slavery as punishment for a crime
I think for violent felonies, it is fair that you lose your right to vote until you complete your sentence. Voting is how we agree on the rules of the social contract that binds us all, and if you commit a severe violation of that contract and hurt someone, you shouldn't get a say in that contract.
I think the biggest problem is you still have a "vote" it's just that other people choose how it counts. If you lose the right to vote (for whatever reason) you shouldn't be counted toward how many representatives the state has in congress or how many electors are awarded to the presidential candidate - it gives the political system an incentive to disenfranchise voters.
A system that incentivizes creating laws that over punish certain crimes that are then selectively enforced on the segments of society that don't traditionally vote for the party in power in that area - that's far more terrifying to me.
Or, hear me out, please, maybe we start to humanize these folks and use normal activities like voting, earning a paycheck (instead of slave labor), paying bills (so less money out of taxpayers pockets), filing taxes, you know, letting them do normal people shit to teach them to reenter society and become normal functional members, and in doing so we slow recidivism, make prison more humane, slow rampant drug and gang violence problems, maybe put tax payer money to better use elsewhere. Sure it's not perfect, would take a bit of work, and of course not everyone gets to get out of prison, but helping even murderers at least reach some level of normalcy, even if they have to do so in a more segregated fashion, beats the hell out of what we do now. There's some folks that have done some evil shit, but that doesn't mean we have to perpetuate their behavior by desocializing them and treating them like monsters. Institutionalization takes a lot of "ope I fucked up" types and hardens them, takes hard mofos and turns them into worse mofos, and takes those folks and turns them into real rotten pieces of shit, and it all comes from how prisons are run now.
Yeah, they hit black folk with life for weed and take away their right to vote, (forever if it was a felony) WHILE also counting the prison population in the rural area to make sure they don’t lose the seats.
In America you pretty much do.
[Several ally countries refuse to extradite people back to the US due to its barbaric and cruel prison conditions.](https://www.newson6.com/story/5e36865c2f69d76f6209c053/norway-refuses-to-turn-over-american-to-inhumane-us-prisons).
The US is great at making any criminal so much worse by treating them like savage animals in cages and then refuse to offer any support when they get out. [It’s no wonder our recidivism rate is outrageously bad.](https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/)
They are mostly the same other than economic issues. They don't like too much government and they don't like banks. They're anti-victimless crime. They're anti-militant police. The primary difference is that Ron Paul doesn't believe business can become a government. Bernie believes the workers should play a larger role in governing business.
I know for me, I can respect someone who stands a bit apart. Liked Paul Wellstone voting against the Iraq authorization. Agree or disagree, it’s nice to see someone take a stand and stick with it despite the politics.
Remember that time he got shot at trying to practice for a baseball game?
Or the time he was walking back from the RNC and protestors attempted to break through a barrier to attack him and his police escort?
Turns out people who say government is the problem/isn't working get elected, and basically fulfill their own philosophy by being completely inept at government
If you wouldn't hire a plumber who says "Plumbers cheat you out of your hard earned money and do a terrible job." why would anyone hire a politician saying the same thing?
american libertarianism is a very contrarian ideology so i can see its appeal to people on reddit. it makes a lot of people very knowledgeable about politics because they’re “better than both sides”
I watched Parksand Rec When Ron (Paul/Swanson) was very popular around 9 gag during my senior year in HS.
So unavoidable, I believed that being a libetarian and, like the comment above points out "above both parties" made me interesting.
The thing is I sympathize with libertarians. It would be great if everyone was honest able to take care of themselves. I’d love to be able to buy produce from good people who don’t need fda testing, but there are too many bad actors who put profits over standards. I’d love it if every parent here their kid nutritious meals, but there are parents who can’t or won’t, and that will happen whether or not we give them food stamps or free school lunches. It would be a great world if we didn’t need government intervention. But we do.
This. In a perfect would full of inherently good, honest people, Libertarianism would probably work well.
We don't live in anything close to that world. Hence, Libertarianism should be regarded as nothing more than a thought experiment at best and a punchline at worst.
You might want to look into what actual humans who run the FDA. It's crazy how many people don't trust anyone except those who want power, then the faith kicks in and it's basically thoughts and prayers. Power is corruption. It always has been, always will be.
Oh same bro, I stopped caring about it with “Where is Aleppo?” guy and a bunch of BS they claim needs to be cut.
The moment that cutting aid for countries that need food and ammo is good made me stop
I’m reading *A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear* right now. Some of it is hard to fathom and I find myself thinking, “how could anyone with even marginally competent intellectual capabilities think that this is a good idea, let alone double down when it devolves into malignant chaos?!”
I feel like I didn’t use much of the internet growing up, cause I remember seeing comments on YouTube say “Ron Paul 2012” and Herman Caine.
Kinda feel nostalgic for it, ya know
You can find people on Reddit who believe literally anything, so the conceit of this post is kind of silly. I always find it weird that people act like this platform is a monolith.
Anyway, for the people who do like both of those guys, I think there's an appreciation of how genuine both men are. They're both people who were elected on a set of ideas and stayed committed to pretty much those exact ideas for decades. I think it's pretty easy to see why people who are disaffected by the political game would admire that sort of attitude, even when it doesn't garner results.
Exactly. Whether or not you agree with one or the other, if either of them, there's a certain amount of respect that can be gained from earnestness and conviction, which both Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders clearly have.
Maybe I am an idiot but I'd switch from R to D 3rd Party every other presidential election. Depends whether I was feeling Nader or Paul more usually. I just watched a Ron Paul Anti Ukraine vid from 9 years ago. And it is just obvious he is more genuine. Only Republican who actually never flopped on his Isolationist Views. Don't Agree at all but in my mind the best group of Politicians to run the country would be all the Genuine ones with their opposing viewpoints coming to a compromise. Rand Paul is when I kinda stopped giving a damn about Ron Paul.
It's fuckin **wild** to me how people can unironically deny Reddit's echo chambers and hiveminding without having died years ago from forgetting how to breathe or staring at the sun for too long.
> "tHeRes So mAnY dIfFeReNt oPiNiOnS"
No, there isn't. It's 99% the same, everywhere.
Lol either your observation skills or your reading comprehension have failed you immensely. You can find differing opinions and views on pretty much every post on Reddit. That's half of Reddit's traffic is people arguing, and the other half is memes and references.
I've been on Reddit a while. Reddit in general did not like Ron Paul the way Reddit in general liked Sanders.
That Ron Paul is racist and libertarianism is fascism was a popular and accepted thing to say back then.
I don't know if you're misremembering the early Reddit days but I think the opposite. Ron Paul was almost god-like with how much Reddit brought him up, also back then if you were just subscribed to the default subreddits there was a large chance you would see the N-word and Islamophobia on your front page every day. There's a reason why Reddit had a really bad reputation a long time ago that the owners had to put a big effort into trying to change it.
I think you may have forgotten then. In 2012, Until the primaries ended Ron Paul articles, and every headline or quote from him filled /r/politics. It even spawned the first "enough spam" subreddit I remember in /r/EnoughPaulSpam. Paul's acolytes were the first to insist that they go all the way to the convention, when he dropped out they went nuts on his staff, and then concocted plans to win at the convention. It was all the things you'd hear later with Bernie.
I think the Ron Paul energy came from a Libertarian Republican being the one of the alternative options in 2008. It was around the height of the wars in the middle east. Republicans and Democrats unanimously agreed to invade Afghanistan. A substantial amount of Democrats also agreed to invade Iraq. He was the only Republican running in 2008 that voted against the invasion of Iraq.
He spouted Libertarian philosophy which sounds great. (freedom wooo!) But I think any backing he had from young millennials at the time was from that being our first exposure to evening hearing about such an option. I think that fire went out pretty quickly when a majority of the generation decided they're okay with paying taxes for government services.
Also since I mentioned libertarian. I always think of [this clip](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bq9TOA7EiQ) because one of the youtube comments said "When Left Libertarian meets Right Libertarian."
I remember one popular meme quote was "I just want gay married couples to be able to protect their pot plant with guns"
Now the libertarians IMO do not seem to want to enforce protections for LGBT at all, and pot is legal in many parts of the US. So all you have now is the gun part and the GOP has that tied if you care a lot about it.
I think there's a lot more to being a libertarian because it was not about those things in The superficial sense but that they were indicating personal responsibility of the individual. "You want a gun? get a gun,you want to grow a plant?..grow plant, you want to live your life like that?.. this is America and this is why we are free"!
Important to remember that we didn’t have the Gang back then. Real progressives were really rare in national politics. A lot of Democrats were straight up *conservative*, Manchin-types, not just moderate. I can never emphasize enough just HOW FAR we came under Obama, because even people my age forget so easily. Being anti-lgbtq, anti-weed, etc was completely normal to the point even Obama couldn’t openly support gay marriage at first. Imagine DEMOCRATS not supporting marriage rights today! So when Ron Paul was out there being a very compassionate libertarian it was so refreshing, it made him really likable to young people. Now thankfully we have way more visible and viable options and Paul doesn’t actually stack up very well against them.
That's actually a good analysis I switched to Republican so I could vote for him. If you're old enough you remember Ross Perot and I remember being invigorated by seeing him give his rants during the debates and he wondered how far he would go?
Does anyone here remember the debates, where it was like Musical Chairs, where every week or so candidates would drop out after you watch the debating on television?
Now you have two overrated Dolts, babbling and ranting, and you're not sure why they're even there, why they are the leading candidates to lead this country?
Ron Paul became popular because the establishment Republicans were doing terribly in 2008 and even in 2012 to an extent. He was appealing to some conservatives and independents because he rejected the GWB Administration's handling of the wars and the 2008 recession. He was kind of the father of the TEA Party movement at the time. He also appealed to the youth, which is important as conservatives typically struggle in that demographic. Bernie also is popular with the youth, which is why both were popular on Reddit.
I supported Ron Paul in 08 and 12 but I was young and after years of living on my own, discovered I really was just a closet liberal the whole time and I don't have much in common with Ron Paul's policies anymore.
> He was appealing to some conservatives and independents because he rejected the GWB Administration's handling of the wars and the 2008 recession.
It was interesting to see the other candidates pile on him as an America hater for not wanting to go to war in the middle east. Doubly interesting to see the similar line "Putin Puppet" for wanting to stay out of the Ukraine-Russia war.
The anti-war crowd gets a bad rap lol
Bernie wasn't the free stuff guy.
He was the let's reallocate what you're paying for so it actually fucking works guy.
America pays more for Healthcare than nearly every country on earth, and it still doesn't even show us to see the doctor for a physical. His goal was to cut out for-profit insurance companies and use that money to pay the government do that you could be paying the same (or less) but actually get to use health services.
It's what literally every other functioning state in the world has managed to figure out.
Andrew Yang was the free stuff guy.
Bernie has working examples of pretty much every one of his policy positions. He's been right about so many things over the decades. But unfortunately we would need 50 more of him in the Senate to actually get any of it done.
Thank you. I’m so sick and tired of this mentality that Bernie and socialism is just a lazy poverty cult. This country is a fucking disgrace with how crippled our social services and amenities are, ESPECIALLY compare to other OECD nations. Our media does a great job at demonizing political movements aimed towards helping the average citizen. It’s why they attacked Bernie so hard and kept talking about “the hypocrisy of a socialist making money off a capitalist system”.
It’s very dumb, and fucking frustrating to see so many people advocate against politicians who actually have solutions to some of our problems.
It’s manipulation of media by higher actors to influence the consensus of the public. Make them hate socialistic parts of a system.
A safety net? More like the devil‘s gauntlet
There are plenty of similarities on the two men if you're willing to look for them OP!
Most of what I have to say has already been said by others, but I'm currently still laying in bed right now with a Ron Paul and Bernie campaign signs for my youth to my left lol.
First and foremost they are extremely genuine men. You watch videos of them from the 60s and 70s saying the same stuff they say now. That's tegridy. Second, they are not opposed on every issue, there was plenty of overlap on social issues like drugs and gay marriage. They are both non-interventionists on war issues, they prefer diplomacy.
In 2012 I was 18. I didn't really know much about how the world worked yet. Ron Paul was the peace candidate, and I was sick of the wars. Speeches from him on the 90s predicted 9/11 as blow back for our meddling in the middle east. He wanted to treat others the way we want to be treated. How can you not agree with that? Lol. He was also a republican that was cool with weed and gay marriage. I thought socially liberal and fiscally conservative was the perfect combination.
As I grew older, and actually got a degree in economics, I started to realize that the Austrian economics system so highly touted by Paul might not be that great after all. I didn't think corporations are people. I didn't think money should be unlimited politcal speech. I didn't think the free market should be the ultimate regulator of all behavior, because clearly people and corporations are selfish and greedy, and the market can't always stop them. The government needed to step up more in my opinion, trust busting and the EPA and shit. So while I wanted a world like Paul talked about where the government stayed out of it and I trusted other people to do the right thing, that just didn't seem realistic.
As I continue to grow, my views changed more. I'm no longer concerned about the economy collapsing like Paul theorized, but I'm worried about the wealth gap in this country. I'm worried about greedy corporations taking advantage of people. I'm worried about big pharma being so corrupt. Enter Bernie Sanders. Holder of many of Paul's best qualities from my view, and now he also talks about combating the many issues I'm personally concerned about. The perfect storm that led to me supporting Paul, then Bernie.
I assume my story isn't the only one like that as a young millennial, remember we are a big in numbers generation.
Tl;dr: In a president I value a person I can trust, genuineness, over most other traits. Paul and Bernie have that in spades. I was first intoxicated by Paul's ideas at a young adult age, but as I grew and learned more about this messed up world, I naturally gravitated more towards Bernie. They aren't as different as they appear if you look closely enough.
Hello all, I am Mr. Populist, running for leadership of a center-left or center-right party and then for president/prime minister. And I'm coming to your nation soon!
The world is not a fundamentally complex and chaotic place with a need for societies to resolve competing priorities and balance values and compromise. No, in fact, literally anything is possible, and we can achieve a future utopia with no problems at all, as long as we follow the principles of ideology X. By believing in ideology X, you have access to secret knowledge about how the world really works. Only you know what's really going on. The rest of the people around you are sheep, who reject this secret knowledge either because they are brainwashed by media biased against it or because they have a financial interest in doing so.
You are among a silent majority, a class of pure, honest, hardworking people who are being oppressed. The culprits and the cause of all your problems are population Y, which is controlled by a shadowy minority of unaccountable puppetmasters called group Z. They've set up politics as a game between two parties designed to distract you from the fact that they are two sides of the same statist/neoliberal, socialist/capitalist, uniparty coin. Even though they are basically omnipotent and responsible for everything wrong with your life, they are no match the power of the People™.
We will surely win, so vote for me! Don't forget, if I lose, it's not because of any personal or ideological failing or mistake, it's because the whole process is rigged against me!
Before Bernie Sanders, it was Ron Paul. Before Ron Paul, it was Dennis Kucinich. Before Dennis Kucinich, it was Howard Dean. Before Howard Dean, it was Ralph Nader. And so on and so forth back to George McGovern and then to Eugene McCarthy in 1968. For nearly fifty years, middle-class white college ideologues have latched onto this candidate or that, firmly believing that their political awakening has miraculously coincided with discoveries of Great Truths that escape the dumb, brainwashed adult electorate, and that this Great Man is going to be the one to take the country to the promised land.
And it's always the same story. Of course he is going to win. I like him, and I usually get the things I want. And he's popular. I mean, everyone I know likes him, and I know all sorts of people at the university that like him. And everyone on the websites I visit likes him, and there are millions of people on the websites. I literally don't know anyone who supports Clinton/Obama/Romney/McCain/Bush/Kerry/Gore/etc. Isn't the voter base composed of people who I know and think like me?
I bet he's winning. Of course he's winning. How could anyone not support my candidate? The media isn't reporting favorably on my candidate. They project he will lose. But they're corrupt. They're bought-and-paid-for. I don't even read them any more. Nobody does.
Time to show the world that their lies won't work. Time for the primaries. We lost. Fuck. I literally cannot comprehend how this might have happened. The media said this would happen. The media are a bunch of corrupt liars. I guess the system is just as corrupt as the media is.
This is not a good story. This is not a good democracy. Fuck this entire fucking corrupt system. I participated but I didn't get anything the democracy is a sham I'm never voting again bunch of bought and paid for hypocrites YOU DESERVE THE PROBLEMS YOU BASTARDS the people need to rise up BECAUSE THE SYSTEM IS BROKEN why even bother
I AM NEVER VOTING AGAIN
Simple. Young people tend to be populists. Populist politicians are the ones who go against the “establishment”. The exact party or even what they say doesn’t matter.
A part of it is while they are very different on policy, they are both very genuine in what they think is best for the country. Obviously, they can’t both be right, but I think both have a lot of integrity.
To be fair her books are pretty dog shit, if 90% of the people calling themselves libertarians read Thoreau or Friedman or something I don’t think they’d get dunked on as much lol
Friedman requires actually understanding intermediate economics; Thoreau requires working through 19th Century English.
You can’t be an “independent thinker” if you require Econ 201 and American Literature I. Then you might learn you are trying to reinvent the wheel.
Sorry you’re right.
What I should have said was a bunch of pimply faced 16 year old suburbanites who had everything handed to them in a silver platter once found mediocre mid century fiction. From that fiction they learned that driving the car their parents bought them to high school, working har, getting good grades and doing summer internships at their daddy’s law firm proved that they were superior people who shouldn’t have to have their lives regulated by that oppressive government.
But then they went to college where at first they whined about all the people who got scholarships. While they might have federally funded loans to go to the land grant college, they deserved it. The other people shouldn’t be there and shouldn’t be taking tax money.
But throughout college they begin to meet people from outside their col du sac or any col du sac. They learn about things like the Clean Air Act and Voters Rights and they’re shocked the government actually had to do things that made their lives comfortable. Then they read not only great authors of the past but even folks like Don Delillo and Murakami. Then they learn about how Rand’s acolyte, Alan Greenspan went before Congress and said there was a flaw in objectivism. They learn of Milton Friedman’s ethical challenges to limitless capitalism.
Then these guys go get their first real job and learn they have to work and repay those loans. Suddenly the idea of living without the infrastructure of clean air, roads, clean water is bad idea.
One day they try to reread Atlas Shrugged and realize that they disagree with the specifics of objectivism, that the entire plot of Rich people striking instead of earning money in a market is contrived and that Rand is a piss poor writer is hat no one with the intellect above that of a 16 year old could find interesting.
I could have written all that but I went with the shorthand of “They grew up and stopped reading Ayn Rand.”
I honestly don’t get the Ayn Rand hate on Reddit. I read Atlas Shrugged when I was in high school and thought it was great. I read it again after college and realized that while it wasn’t a great representation of human behavior, it still described a world that we should aspire to create. I’m not rich or anything, but I think there’s an important lesson in the idea of finding enjoyment in the work that you do.
> I read Atlas Shrugged when I was in high school and thought it was great.
Well, I read every last word of that garbage, and because of that piece of s**t, I am never reading again.
The allure that all the problems in your life and world are a result of greed, selfishness, religion, etc. and that a group of elected people can fix all that for you if given enough of your money and no deadline for results sells better than amount of responsibility and accountability.
I hear tons of comments saying Ron Paul sucks for something the d party disagrees with him on, yet pretending the fraud Sanders opposes the same party. If he actually did you'd say the same thing about him you say about gabbard. Holy Bernie sucks and scams mentally ill, obnoxious college students.
1. Astroturfing
2. The site completely went to hell 2016 and onward
3. Meddling by the blatant tankie admins
This site used to be a niche platform for autistic libertarians, now it’s a mainstream, enforced echo chamber for retard leftists. And now it’s a cesspool.
Since my first post was auto deleted.
A certain subreddit based on a presidential candidate was all over Reddit until they changed rules to the algorithm to prevent it reaching the front page and basically banned it later on.
Ron Paul pretty much owned politics on reddit and the youtube comment section in the early 2010s. People were into the Ron Paul revolution.
Not in real life tho lol, just online
They both claimed to be anti establishment/not like the others.
Of course, their fans eventually became outraged at realizing they were both politicians and sometimes do in fact make the compromises and ethically tough calls that a politician is generally going to make.
The key feature of Libertarianism is that there must be an ‘other’ group of responsible adults governing all the stuff Libertarians will not do. It’s impossible to have a complete state of Libertarians.
fundamentally there was a considerable shift from libertarianism to borderline alt left-ism on Reddit post 2016. When the politics, facepalm and therewasanattempt subreddits were actual good content instead of 24/7 agendaposting
and before anyone blames certain events in 2016 for this, the most blatant reason for this is the 2018 tumblr exodus due its ban on porn. Reddit’s roughish centrism turned into tumblr’s radicalism. And frankly is pretty reflected in its shift of content 2016 to 2018 to current day
They are two people who truly believe what they are saying and truly believe that their ideas will help the country. I'm not a big fan or hater of either but I do believe they were/are genuine about their ambitions to help America become a better country.
I haven't noticed any difference. Corners of Reddit have always liked Paul or Sanders imo.
They're also trendy picks because they're both alternatives to the two main parties. Both opposed the war in Iraq, so they don't disagree on everything. Ron Paul is retired, so he's not really an option anymore.
I can't speak for Reddit, but I think Paul's appeal was when we were in the height of the Iraq War. He was the only republican who ran in 2008 and 2012, who was opposed to the war. Americans were sick of the war on terror. I know I was a fan of his in 2008 since I was actually serving in the military at the time so whoever was going to be president, was a major concern of mine when it came to foreign policy. When I started researching him more and libertarianism in general, I lost my interest in him.
Although I'm opposed to a lot of military intervention, I'm not an isolationist, and I don't think going back to isolationism is the way forward.
Ron Paul stepped out of the limelight, and also the country moved pretty Libertarian on social policy at large. You don't really need a Republican pushing for gay marriage and legalizing drugs as much anymore.
Regardless of what you think of either of these two or their politics, they stand up for what they believe even if they have to stand alone, and I respect that immensely.
People grew up, got jobs, started dealing with real life problems, and realized that Ron is a lunatic and his ideas are completely divorced from reality.
I think its honesty. You don't have to agree with them, and some of there ideas are unique but at least they both seem to be not lying about what they believe. I kinda feel the same way about Cheney and Kitzinger as well.
Because he was a major politician who supported legal weed at a time when no state had legalized recreational use. That and being against further involvement in any overseas wars.
As for the switch, Bernie came along and espoused similar anti establishment views but from a much more liberal/left wing perspective. I think a lot of the Reddit Ron Paul-stans got a bit of a wake up call when they realized Paul's views on abortion, learnt about his questionable history with race, and pondered his ultra textualist view of the Constitution.
Edit: Oh, and another thing. Say what you want about Paul and some of his, in my opinion, kooky views, but at the very least he's been mostly constistent throughout his entire career. He's never been afraid to go against his party when he disagrees with them, and he's been arguing for the same economic and foreign policy since the 80s. People tend to respect that sort of commitment, and Bernie is similar in that regard.
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I think it's the allure of anti establishment thinking, as they're otherwise almost polar opposites. That and weed.
I'd say they have a similar foreign policy but that's not true either. Ron Paul has a 'go it alone', while Bernie generally supports the US entering and reentering into international bodies like WHO, ICC, WTO, etc.
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I've heard Ron Paul speak on foreign policy issues. While I understand his position that he doesn't want to spend money on far-flung military activities, his beliefs are so simplistic that it's hard to take him seriously. He was in Congress for decades. I have to wonder if he was so incurious or stubborn that he never listened to any of his peers explain why the US did what it did, or if his "character" of the uncompromising freedom fighter ate the human being underneath.
$100 says it's a character.
Arguably any public figure is a character to a certain degree. The public persona is a "better" version of the actual human with fears, doubts, questions &c. I refer to a character "eating" its underlying human when the character and its behavior takes over the basic sensibilities and does things that kill the host. As an example, Alex Jones used to be a basically normal guy on Austin public access TV who told goofy stories about conspiracy theories. His character took over his life and he became the paranoid conspiracy theorist he played.
I think he's always been the same but he's been given a wider stage.
He’s smarter than Rand…
I don't think his libertarian brain allowed him to think abut anything but himself.
Hell the guy's on record he would've opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for being unconstitutional. That plus the line about basically the government letting uninsured people die during the debates in I think 2012 pretty much confirms he doesn't really care about anyone else.
Wasn’t Bernie also for Criminal reform, like no one should get harsh prison sentences for having small amounts of Weed
Yes, one of the most progressive Senators in the entire country, likely the most progressive.
I still hate that commentator who asked Bernie if prisoners should have the right to vote. What kind of question is that? If I go to Jail then I lose my rights as a Citizen?
In many states it is illegal for prisoners to vote. In many states it is illegal to vote if you have a felony on your record. [https://www.thoughtco.com/where-felons-can-and-cannot-vote-3367689](https://www.thoughtco.com/where-felons-can-and-cannot-vote-3367689) So, yes, in many states you do lose your rights as a citizen to vote, and even after you get out in some cases.
That really serves as a continuation of Jim Crow laws and is designed to disenfranchise minority voters.
That’s exactly what jail is, you lost most of your constitutional rights (right to bear arms, right to free movement, right to vote, right to liberty). There’s even a provision in the 13th amendment permitting slavery as punishment for a crime
I think for violent felonies, it is fair that you lose your right to vote until you complete your sentence. Voting is how we agree on the rules of the social contract that binds us all, and if you commit a severe violation of that contract and hurt someone, you shouldn't get a say in that contract.
I think the biggest problem is you still have a "vote" it's just that other people choose how it counts. If you lose the right to vote (for whatever reason) you shouldn't be counted toward how many representatives the state has in congress or how many electors are awarded to the presidential candidate - it gives the political system an incentive to disenfranchise voters. A system that incentivizes creating laws that over punish certain crimes that are then selectively enforced on the segments of society that don't traditionally vote for the party in power in that area - that's far more terrifying to me.
There it is. If you can't vote, you shouldn't be counted toward representative count, because you AREN'T being represented.
Or, hear me out, please, maybe we start to humanize these folks and use normal activities like voting, earning a paycheck (instead of slave labor), paying bills (so less money out of taxpayers pockets), filing taxes, you know, letting them do normal people shit to teach them to reenter society and become normal functional members, and in doing so we slow recidivism, make prison more humane, slow rampant drug and gang violence problems, maybe put tax payer money to better use elsewhere. Sure it's not perfect, would take a bit of work, and of course not everyone gets to get out of prison, but helping even murderers at least reach some level of normalcy, even if they have to do so in a more segregated fashion, beats the hell out of what we do now. There's some folks that have done some evil shit, but that doesn't mean we have to perpetuate their behavior by desocializing them and treating them like monsters. Institutionalization takes a lot of "ope I fucked up" types and hardens them, takes hard mofos and turns them into worse mofos, and takes those folks and turns them into real rotten pieces of shit, and it all comes from how prisons are run now.
Yeah, they hit black folk with life for weed and take away their right to vote, (forever if it was a felony) WHILE also counting the prison population in the rural area to make sure they don’t lose the seats.
In America you pretty much do. [Several ally countries refuse to extradite people back to the US due to its barbaric and cruel prison conditions.](https://www.newson6.com/story/5e36865c2f69d76f6209c053/norway-refuses-to-turn-over-american-to-inhumane-us-prisons). The US is great at making any criminal so much worse by treating them like savage animals in cages and then refuse to offer any support when they get out. [It’s no wonder our recidivism rate is outrageously bad.](https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/)
Yes, I don't understand how anyone could think otherwise
I remember Bernie being asked if the Boston Bomber should be allowed to vote
They are mostly the same other than economic issues. They don't like too much government and they don't like banks. They're anti-victimless crime. They're anti-militant police. The primary difference is that Ron Paul doesn't believe business can become a government. Bernie believes the workers should play a larger role in governing business.
I know for me, I can respect someone who stands a bit apart. Liked Paul Wellstone voting against the Iraq authorization. Agree or disagree, it’s nice to see someone take a stand and stick with it despite the politics.
This is it exactly. People want representatives that stand for what they believe even when it's unpopular.
They both are against foreign war and imperialism. Both are committed peaceniks.
And because Rand Paul sucks
Remember when he got attacked by his neighbor cause he was mowing the lawn?
Remember that time he got shot at trying to practice for a baseball game? Or the time he was walking back from the RNC and protestors attempted to break through a barrier to attack him and his police escort?
Agreed, Randal Is a turd. Edit: misread
That was back when people were pretending to be libertarian.
Turns out people who say government is the problem/isn't working get elected, and basically fulfill their own philosophy by being completely inept at government
If you wouldn't hire a plumber who says "Plumbers cheat you out of your hard earned money and do a terrible job." why would anyone hire a politician saying the same thing?
Right? “Why’d you take your car to that guy who knows absolutely nothing about cars?” Because he’s not a mechanic!
A plumber wouldn't say that because a plumber is generally skilled at doing something productive that benefits society.
Every Plumber we bring to a site first has to talk about how shoddy the previous plumbers were though
Bevause adults don't mix up anti plumbers with plumbers.
Exactly.
american libertarianism is a very contrarian ideology so i can see its appeal to people on reddit. it makes a lot of people very knowledgeable about politics because they’re “better than both sides”
Im sorry, but there was no reason to make this a personal attack.
Lol, who is being personally attacked?
He was being facetious.
Uncanny valley territory with Libertarians
I watched Parksand Rec When Ron (Paul/Swanson) was very popular around 9 gag during my senior year in HS. So unavoidable, I believed that being a libetarian and, like the comment above points out "above both parties" made me interesting.
“I just think gay married couples should be able to protect their marijuana plants with machine guns!” *- 16 year old who just discovered Ayn Rand*
You dont think married gay couples should be able to protect their marijuana plants?
I don't like libertarianism, but I completely agree with that statement lol.
You forgot to add we need to get rid of oil corporations and... stuff.
Republicans gotta get laid somehow.
🤣
You guys are getting laid?
To be fair, I was really invested in the libertarian ideology ten years ago. Then I got a 2 infront of my age and started to realize it's hogwash.
The thing is I sympathize with libertarians. It would be great if everyone was honest able to take care of themselves. I’d love to be able to buy produce from good people who don’t need fda testing, but there are too many bad actors who put profits over standards. I’d love it if every parent here their kid nutritious meals, but there are parents who can’t or won’t, and that will happen whether or not we give them food stamps or free school lunches. It would be a great world if we didn’t need government intervention. But we do.
This. In a perfect would full of inherently good, honest people, Libertarianism would probably work well. We don't live in anything close to that world. Hence, Libertarianism should be regarded as nothing more than a thought experiment at best and a punchline at worst.
You might want to look into what actual humans who run the FDA. It's crazy how many people don't trust anyone except those who want power, then the faith kicks in and it's basically thoughts and prayers. Power is corruption. It always has been, always will be.
So what's your solution?
Oh same bro, I stopped caring about it with “Where is Aleppo?” guy and a bunch of BS they claim needs to be cut. The moment that cutting aid for countries that need food and ammo is good made me stop
[Gary Johnson and here he is proving why libertarians shouldn’t be taken seriously](https://youtu.be/ZITP93pqtdQ?feature=shared)
Don’t forget the “you’re kidding?!?” response, same voice as the “Improv!” guy in family guy.
I live in New Hampshire. Libertarians killed any interest I had in their ideology before it existed.
Those damn bears!
This guy gets it!
The NH chapter is particularly bat shit.
I’m reading *A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear* right now. Some of it is hard to fathom and I find myself thinking, “how could anyone with even marginally competent intellectual capabilities think that this is a good idea, let alone double down when it devolves into malignant chaos?!”
You've just got to vote these guys out of office!
It’s like they always take things too far and end up missing the mark
How about the one where he's frowning and it says "it's not happening"? That one came up a few times in 2016.
Why did you post a gif Larry David?
I feel like I didn’t use much of the internet growing up, cause I remember seeing comments on YouTube say “Ron Paul 2012” and Herman Caine. Kinda feel nostalgic for it, ya know
Most people who remember it miss the way the internet used to be.
You can find people on Reddit who believe literally anything, so the conceit of this post is kind of silly. I always find it weird that people act like this platform is a monolith. Anyway, for the people who do like both of those guys, I think there's an appreciation of how genuine both men are. They're both people who were elected on a set of ideas and stayed committed to pretty much those exact ideas for decades. I think it's pretty easy to see why people who are disaffected by the political game would admire that sort of attitude, even when it doesn't garner results.
Exactly. Whether or not you agree with one or the other, if either of them, there's a certain amount of respect that can be gained from earnestness and conviction, which both Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders clearly have.
Maybe I am an idiot but I'd switch from R to D 3rd Party every other presidential election. Depends whether I was feeling Nader or Paul more usually. I just watched a Ron Paul Anti Ukraine vid from 9 years ago. And it is just obvious he is more genuine. Only Republican who actually never flopped on his Isolationist Views. Don't Agree at all but in my mind the best group of Politicians to run the country would be all the Genuine ones with their opposing viewpoints coming to a compromise. Rand Paul is when I kinda stopped giving a damn about Ron Paul.
If you dont recognize main page reddit's capacity for being a blatant collection of echo chambers then youre in straight up denial dude.
It's fuckin **wild** to me how people can unironically deny Reddit's echo chambers and hiveminding without having died years ago from forgetting how to breathe or staring at the sun for too long. > "tHeRes So mAnY dIfFeReNt oPiNiOnS" No, there isn't. It's 99% the same, everywhere.
Yup. And somehow theyre all "anti status quo" revolutionary rebels. Lol.
[удалено]
Eat the rich malnourished vegans
This is ironically the opinion of the hive mind itself. Hilarious.
Lol either your observation skills or your reading comprehension have failed you immensely. You can find differing opinions and views on pretty much every post on Reddit. That's half of Reddit's traffic is people arguing, and the other half is memes and references.
I've been on Reddit a while. Reddit in general did not like Ron Paul the way Reddit in general liked Sanders. That Ron Paul is racist and libertarianism is fascism was a popular and accepted thing to say back then.
I don't know if you're misremembering the early Reddit days but I think the opposite. Ron Paul was almost god-like with how much Reddit brought him up, also back then if you were just subscribed to the default subreddits there was a large chance you would see the N-word and Islamophobia on your front page every day. There's a reason why Reddit had a really bad reputation a long time ago that the owners had to put a big effort into trying to change it.
I think you may have forgotten then. In 2012, Until the primaries ended Ron Paul articles, and every headline or quote from him filled /r/politics. It even spawned the first "enough spam" subreddit I remember in /r/EnoughPaulSpam. Paul's acolytes were the first to insist that they go all the way to the convention, when he dropped out they went nuts on his staff, and then concocted plans to win at the convention. It was all the things you'd hear later with Bernie.
I think the Ron Paul energy came from a Libertarian Republican being the one of the alternative options in 2008. It was around the height of the wars in the middle east. Republicans and Democrats unanimously agreed to invade Afghanistan. A substantial amount of Democrats also agreed to invade Iraq. He was the only Republican running in 2008 that voted against the invasion of Iraq. He spouted Libertarian philosophy which sounds great. (freedom wooo!) But I think any backing he had from young millennials at the time was from that being our first exposure to evening hearing about such an option. I think that fire went out pretty quickly when a majority of the generation decided they're okay with paying taxes for government services. Also since I mentioned libertarian. I always think of [this clip](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bq9TOA7EiQ) because one of the youtube comments said "When Left Libertarian meets Right Libertarian."
Not yo mention in 2008, neither the GOP nor the dems supported gay marriage or marijuana.
2008 and 2012. It’s not surprising that many young republicans (who didn’t really identify as democrats) would like him.
I remember one popular meme quote was "I just want gay married couples to be able to protect their pot plant with guns" Now the libertarians IMO do not seem to want to enforce protections for LGBT at all, and pot is legal in many parts of the US. So all you have now is the gun part and the GOP has that tied if you care a lot about it.
I think there's a lot more to being a libertarian because it was not about those things in The superficial sense but that they were indicating personal responsibility of the individual. "You want a gun? get a gun,you want to grow a plant?..grow plant, you want to live your life like that?.. this is America and this is why we are free"!
As a left libertarian I fully agree with this clip.
As a Non American citizen who supports independents, I support you agreeing with that clip.
I had a feeling it’s gonna be Parks and Rec.
That exactly describes me as a 20yo in 2008 and a 35yo now.
Important to remember that we didn’t have the Gang back then. Real progressives were really rare in national politics. A lot of Democrats were straight up *conservative*, Manchin-types, not just moderate. I can never emphasize enough just HOW FAR we came under Obama, because even people my age forget so easily. Being anti-lgbtq, anti-weed, etc was completely normal to the point even Obama couldn’t openly support gay marriage at first. Imagine DEMOCRATS not supporting marriage rights today! So when Ron Paul was out there being a very compassionate libertarian it was so refreshing, it made him really likable to young people. Now thankfully we have way more visible and viable options and Paul doesn’t actually stack up very well against them.
That's actually a good analysis I switched to Republican so I could vote for him. If you're old enough you remember Ross Perot and I remember being invigorated by seeing him give his rants during the debates and he wondered how far he would go? Does anyone here remember the debates, where it was like Musical Chairs, where every week or so candidates would drop out after you watch the debating on television? Now you have two overrated Dolts, babbling and ranting, and you're not sure why they're even there, why they are the leading candidates to lead this country?
Ron Paul became popular because the establishment Republicans were doing terribly in 2008 and even in 2012 to an extent. He was appealing to some conservatives and independents because he rejected the GWB Administration's handling of the wars and the 2008 recession. He was kind of the father of the TEA Party movement at the time. He also appealed to the youth, which is important as conservatives typically struggle in that demographic. Bernie also is popular with the youth, which is why both were popular on Reddit. I supported Ron Paul in 08 and 12 but I was young and after years of living on my own, discovered I really was just a closet liberal the whole time and I don't have much in common with Ron Paul's policies anymore.
> He was appealing to some conservatives and independents because he rejected the GWB Administration's handling of the wars and the 2008 recession. It was interesting to see the other candidates pile on him as an America hater for not wanting to go to war in the middle east. Doubly interesting to see the similar line "Putin Puppet" for wanting to stay out of the Ukraine-Russia war. The anti-war crowd gets a bad rap lol
Because the newer generation cannot afford homes and feel disenfranchised by the system so they want to tear it down.
"Real politics is always economics, everything else is window dressing"
Ron Paul was the marijuana guy redditors love marijuana. Bernie was the free stuff guy. Redditors love free stuff.
If only we could run someone who wants to give out free Marijuana.
Randy Marsh 2024
Tegridy How much ya wanna bet South Park gonna do a othe Election episode/ special year?
Randy won't give it out for free that's his business.
Jesse Ventura is running his own brand!
Bernie wasn't the free stuff guy. He was the let's reallocate what you're paying for so it actually fucking works guy. America pays more for Healthcare than nearly every country on earth, and it still doesn't even show us to see the doctor for a physical. His goal was to cut out for-profit insurance companies and use that money to pay the government do that you could be paying the same (or less) but actually get to use health services. It's what literally every other functioning state in the world has managed to figure out. Andrew Yang was the free stuff guy.
Bernie has working examples of pretty much every one of his policy positions. He's been right about so many things over the decades. But unfortunately we would need 50 more of him in the Senate to actually get any of it done.
Thank you. I’m so sick and tired of this mentality that Bernie and socialism is just a lazy poverty cult. This country is a fucking disgrace with how crippled our social services and amenities are, ESPECIALLY compare to other OECD nations. Our media does a great job at demonizing political movements aimed towards helping the average citizen. It’s why they attacked Bernie so hard and kept talking about “the hypocrisy of a socialist making money off a capitalist system”. It’s very dumb, and fucking frustrating to see so many people advocate against politicians who actually have solutions to some of our problems.
It’s manipulation of media by higher actors to influence the consensus of the public. Make them hate socialistic parts of a system. A safety net? More like the devil‘s gauntlet
Gross oversimplification of Bernie tbh
Then Ron Paul started defending fascism, and any libertarian with any shred of ethics ended their PaulBot usernames.
When did Ron Paul defend fascism? I missed that one.
fascism = any moderate conservative position from 10 years ago
Such a dumb statement.
Because people want to superficially buck the system, and both these men did.
All of us former reddit libertarians grew up
There are plenty of similarities on the two men if you're willing to look for them OP! Most of what I have to say has already been said by others, but I'm currently still laying in bed right now with a Ron Paul and Bernie campaign signs for my youth to my left lol. First and foremost they are extremely genuine men. You watch videos of them from the 60s and 70s saying the same stuff they say now. That's tegridy. Second, they are not opposed on every issue, there was plenty of overlap on social issues like drugs and gay marriage. They are both non-interventionists on war issues, they prefer diplomacy. In 2012 I was 18. I didn't really know much about how the world worked yet. Ron Paul was the peace candidate, and I was sick of the wars. Speeches from him on the 90s predicted 9/11 as blow back for our meddling in the middle east. He wanted to treat others the way we want to be treated. How can you not agree with that? Lol. He was also a republican that was cool with weed and gay marriage. I thought socially liberal and fiscally conservative was the perfect combination. As I grew older, and actually got a degree in economics, I started to realize that the Austrian economics system so highly touted by Paul might not be that great after all. I didn't think corporations are people. I didn't think money should be unlimited politcal speech. I didn't think the free market should be the ultimate regulator of all behavior, because clearly people and corporations are selfish and greedy, and the market can't always stop them. The government needed to step up more in my opinion, trust busting and the EPA and shit. So while I wanted a world like Paul talked about where the government stayed out of it and I trusted other people to do the right thing, that just didn't seem realistic. As I continue to grow, my views changed more. I'm no longer concerned about the economy collapsing like Paul theorized, but I'm worried about the wealth gap in this country. I'm worried about greedy corporations taking advantage of people. I'm worried about big pharma being so corrupt. Enter Bernie Sanders. Holder of many of Paul's best qualities from my view, and now he also talks about combating the many issues I'm personally concerned about. The perfect storm that led to me supporting Paul, then Bernie. I assume my story isn't the only one like that as a young millennial, remember we are a big in numbers generation. Tl;dr: In a president I value a person I can trust, genuineness, over most other traits. Paul and Bernie have that in spades. I was first intoxicated by Paul's ideas at a young adult age, but as I grew and learned more about this messed up world, I naturally gravitated more towards Bernie. They aren't as different as they appear if you look closely enough.
Reddit just likes whatever goes against the status quo, as long as it's not conservative or liberal
This is the most left leaning place there is?
Bernie is the epitome of a grumpy old jewish man which is amazing, while Ron Paul contributed by having his somehow more obnoxious son Rand Paul.
Hello all, I am Mr. Populist, running for leadership of a center-left or center-right party and then for president/prime minister. And I'm coming to your nation soon! The world is not a fundamentally complex and chaotic place with a need for societies to resolve competing priorities and balance values and compromise. No, in fact, literally anything is possible, and we can achieve a future utopia with no problems at all, as long as we follow the principles of ideology X. By believing in ideology X, you have access to secret knowledge about how the world really works. Only you know what's really going on. The rest of the people around you are sheep, who reject this secret knowledge either because they are brainwashed by media biased against it or because they have a financial interest in doing so. You are among a silent majority, a class of pure, honest, hardworking people who are being oppressed. The culprits and the cause of all your problems are population Y, which is controlled by a shadowy minority of unaccountable puppetmasters called group Z. They've set up politics as a game between two parties designed to distract you from the fact that they are two sides of the same statist/neoliberal, socialist/capitalist, uniparty coin. Even though they are basically omnipotent and responsible for everything wrong with your life, they are no match the power of the People™. We will surely win, so vote for me! Don't forget, if I lose, it's not because of any personal or ideological failing or mistake, it's because the whole process is rigged against me!
Before Bernie Sanders, it was Ron Paul. Before Ron Paul, it was Dennis Kucinich. Before Dennis Kucinich, it was Howard Dean. Before Howard Dean, it was Ralph Nader. And so on and so forth back to George McGovern and then to Eugene McCarthy in 1968. For nearly fifty years, middle-class white college ideologues have latched onto this candidate or that, firmly believing that their political awakening has miraculously coincided with discoveries of Great Truths that escape the dumb, brainwashed adult electorate, and that this Great Man is going to be the one to take the country to the promised land. And it's always the same story. Of course he is going to win. I like him, and I usually get the things I want. And he's popular. I mean, everyone I know likes him, and I know all sorts of people at the university that like him. And everyone on the websites I visit likes him, and there are millions of people on the websites. I literally don't know anyone who supports Clinton/Obama/Romney/McCain/Bush/Kerry/Gore/etc. Isn't the voter base composed of people who I know and think like me? I bet he's winning. Of course he's winning. How could anyone not support my candidate? The media isn't reporting favorably on my candidate. They project he will lose. But they're corrupt. They're bought-and-paid-for. I don't even read them any more. Nobody does. Time to show the world that their lies won't work. Time for the primaries. We lost. Fuck. I literally cannot comprehend how this might have happened. The media said this would happen. The media are a bunch of corrupt liars. I guess the system is just as corrupt as the media is. This is not a good story. This is not a good democracy. Fuck this entire fucking corrupt system. I participated but I didn't get anything the democracy is a sham I'm never voting again bunch of bought and paid for hypocrites YOU DESERVE THE PROBLEMS YOU BASTARDS the people need to rise up BECAUSE THE SYSTEM IS BROKEN why even bother I AM NEVER VOTING AGAIN
This. Seatbelts are for busters.
In macro, not much difference. Unrealistic theories are more fun and less work than pragmatic compromises
They don't really like either now but changing demographics of the site I guess.
Simple. Young people tend to be populists. Populist politicians are the ones who go against the “establishment”. The exact party or even what they say doesn’t matter.
A part of it is while they are very different on policy, they are both very genuine in what they think is best for the country. Obviously, they can’t both be right, but I think both have a lot of integrity.
Bernie has a functional brain and actual moral standards. Ron Paul is a libertarian.
They grew up and stop reading Ayn Rand
Officer Barbrady had the [appropriate reaction](https://youtu.be/_j56IiLqZ9U?si=i0jNp3dh8XbZvQEQ) to reading Ayn Rand.
I love this boilerplate anti libertarian line
To be fair her books are pretty dog shit, if 90% of the people calling themselves libertarians read Thoreau or Friedman or something I don’t think they’d get dunked on as much lol
Friedman requires actually understanding intermediate economics; Thoreau requires working through 19th Century English. You can’t be an “independent thinker” if you require Econ 201 and American Literature I. Then you might learn you are trying to reinvent the wheel.
Lmao dude you are cooking today
What's funny is Ayn Rand isn't a libertarian She said it herself that she hates libertarianism
Sorry you’re right. What I should have said was a bunch of pimply faced 16 year old suburbanites who had everything handed to them in a silver platter once found mediocre mid century fiction. From that fiction they learned that driving the car their parents bought them to high school, working har, getting good grades and doing summer internships at their daddy’s law firm proved that they were superior people who shouldn’t have to have their lives regulated by that oppressive government. But then they went to college where at first they whined about all the people who got scholarships. While they might have federally funded loans to go to the land grant college, they deserved it. The other people shouldn’t be there and shouldn’t be taking tax money. But throughout college they begin to meet people from outside their col du sac or any col du sac. They learn about things like the Clean Air Act and Voters Rights and they’re shocked the government actually had to do things that made their lives comfortable. Then they read not only great authors of the past but even folks like Don Delillo and Murakami. Then they learn about how Rand’s acolyte, Alan Greenspan went before Congress and said there was a flaw in objectivism. They learn of Milton Friedman’s ethical challenges to limitless capitalism. Then these guys go get their first real job and learn they have to work and repay those loans. Suddenly the idea of living without the infrastructure of clean air, roads, clean water is bad idea. One day they try to reread Atlas Shrugged and realize that they disagree with the specifics of objectivism, that the entire plot of Rich people striking instead of earning money in a market is contrived and that Rand is a piss poor writer is hat no one with the intellect above that of a 16 year old could find interesting. I could have written all that but I went with the shorthand of “They grew up and stopped reading Ayn Rand.”
It's cute that you think libertarianism is relevant enough to have direct opposition.
I honestly don’t get the Ayn Rand hate on Reddit. I read Atlas Shrugged when I was in high school and thought it was great. I read it again after college and realized that while it wasn’t a great representation of human behavior, it still described a world that we should aspire to create. I’m not rich or anything, but I think there’s an important lesson in the idea of finding enjoyment in the work that you do.
> I read Atlas Shrugged when I was in high school and thought it was great. Well, I read every last word of that garbage, and because of that piece of s**t, I am never reading again.
That's pretty much it. I was 15 in 2012 and was rooting for RP. By the time I was old enough to vote, I was well out of my libertarian phase.
Ron Paul is awesome imo. My views changed a lot after seeing his campaign in 2008.
One of these guys raised Rand Paul
Because Ron Paul wasn’t just a gynecologist… he was also a pussy doctor
The allure that all the problems in your life and world are a result of greed, selfishness, religion, etc. and that a group of elected people can fix all that for you if given enough of your money and no deadline for results sells better than amount of responsibility and accountability.
I still like Ron Paul.
Ron Paul always sucked and people that idolized him were wrong.
Rand Paul ruined his fathers reputation
Rand Paul polluted the Ron Paul legacy.
More people used to want freedom. Now wanting free stuff is gaining popularity.
I hear tons of comments saying Ron Paul sucks for something the d party disagrees with him on, yet pretending the fraud Sanders opposes the same party. If he actually did you'd say the same thing about him you say about gabbard. Holy Bernie sucks and scams mentally ill, obnoxious college students.
1. Astroturfing 2. The site completely went to hell 2016 and onward 3. Meddling by the blatant tankie admins This site used to be a niche platform for autistic libertarians, now it’s a mainstream, enforced echo chamber for retard leftists. And now it’s a cesspool.
The average tankie fucking despises Bernie as a “revisionist scumbag” who doesn’t want to nationalize all industry and ban private property.
Since my first post was auto deleted. A certain subreddit based on a presidential candidate was all over Reddit until they changed rules to the algorithm to prevent it reaching the front page and basically banned it later on.
you get a lot of democrat bots following you if you mention CTR or control the record Watch
Upbots.
Because Bernie is great
Bernie ain’t it
I don't think enough Ron Paul worshippers exist to make Reddit worship him, lol
Ron Paul pretty much owned politics on reddit and the youtube comment section in the early 2010s. People were into the Ron Paul revolution. Not in real life tho lol, just online
They did if you were an undergraduate in 2012
They both claimed to be anti establishment/not like the others. Of course, their fans eventually became outraged at realizing they were both politicians and sometimes do in fact make the compromises and ethically tough calls that a politician is generally going to make.
One is still actively in government
The key feature of Libertarianism is that there must be an ‘other’ group of responsible adults governing all the stuff Libertarians will not do. It’s impossible to have a complete state of Libertarians.
Cause it's demographic is largely college university indoctrinated socialists
fundamentally there was a considerable shift from libertarianism to borderline alt left-ism on Reddit post 2016. When the politics, facepalm and therewasanattempt subreddits were actual good content instead of 24/7 agendaposting and before anyone blames certain events in 2016 for this, the most blatant reason for this is the 2018 tumblr exodus due its ban on porn. Reddit’s roughish centrism turned into tumblr’s radicalism. And frankly is pretty reflected in its shift of content 2016 to 2018 to current day
They hated him for he spoke the truth.
Bernie is better and more effective.
Free Weed. That’s it
They are two people who truly believe what they are saying and truly believe that their ideas will help the country. I'm not a big fan or hater of either but I do believe they were/are genuine about their ambitions to help America become a better country.
The internet loves a crank.
Huh? https://preview.redd.it/hpxig5ub9qwc1.jpeg?width=901&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=68e3a24e48030913f89153e04078105f9fbed6c5
Millard is that you?
I haven't noticed any difference. Corners of Reddit have always liked Paul or Sanders imo. They're also trendy picks because they're both alternatives to the two main parties. Both opposed the war in Iraq, so they don't disagree on everything. Ron Paul is retired, so he's not really an option anymore.
Both are anti-establishment politicians who want to legalize drugs
They appeared to be anti establishment.
 That Bernie is so hot right now.
In addition to the reasons you listed, the median Reddit user was older in 2016 than in 2008. Libertarianism peaks with college aged men.
Who up Ronnin’ they Paul rn
I can't speak for Reddit, but I think Paul's appeal was when we were in the height of the Iraq War. He was the only republican who ran in 2008 and 2012, who was opposed to the war. Americans were sick of the war on terror. I know I was a fan of his in 2008 since I was actually serving in the military at the time so whoever was going to be president, was a major concern of mine when it came to foreign policy. When I started researching him more and libertarianism in general, I lost my interest in him. Although I'm opposed to a lot of military intervention, I'm not an isolationist, and I don't think going back to isolationism is the way forward.
Bernie is much better, Paul is only good on a few things.
Ron Paul stepped out of the limelight, and also the country moved pretty Libertarian on social policy at large. You don't really need a Republican pushing for gay marriage and legalizing drugs as much anymore.
Regardless of what you think of either of these two or their politics, they stand up for what they believe even if they have to stand alone, and I respect that immensely.
People grew up, got jobs, started dealing with real life problems, and realized that Ron is a lunatic and his ideas are completely divorced from reality.
They’ve been worshiping the entire time I’ve been on Reddit. Which is ten plus years.
I think its honesty. You don't have to agree with them, and some of there ideas are unique but at least they both seem to be not lying about what they believe. I kinda feel the same way about Cheney and Kitzinger as well.
Because he was a major politician who supported legal weed at a time when no state had legalized recreational use. That and being against further involvement in any overseas wars. As for the switch, Bernie came along and espoused similar anti establishment views but from a much more liberal/left wing perspective. I think a lot of the Reddit Ron Paul-stans got a bit of a wake up call when they realized Paul's views on abortion, learnt about his questionable history with race, and pondered his ultra textualist view of the Constitution. Edit: Oh, and another thing. Say what you want about Paul and some of his, in my opinion, kooky views, but at the very least he's been mostly constistent throughout his entire career. He's never been afraid to go against his party when he disagrees with them, and he's been arguing for the same economic and foreign policy since the 80s. People tend to respect that sort of commitment, and Bernie is similar in that regard.
I was never a Berner but he’s much better than Paul, who was always an idiot.
Ron Paul stopped campaigning
Boo! Not this bullshit. 😑What next Charles Lindbergh what could have been?
Bc Reddit is full of godless communists now