My own little survey - why so many military support Ron Paul

[Rentiers]

Being an Army veteran of the Reagan years, I think I know the answer to this question, but I thought I'd ask anyway. Please do not answer unless you are currently IN the military, whether Active, Reserve, National Guard or State Guard AND supporting Ron Paul for President in 2008.

If you are supporting Dr. Ron Paul for President, and are willing to discuss your reasons, please tell us why?

I am not running this as a 'traditional poll' where you must choose only one of the answers I give you. I want you to feel free to give your own explanation in your own words.

Thanks!

Bill Rentiers

[pioneer461]

Well, I'm not presently serving in the military, but I am a Veteran of the Vietnam War. Do you have data that a lot of military personnel are supporting Ron Paul? It would be interesting to see that.

I wonder if a lack of response to your question indicates anything?

Last I heard, the majority of the military are supporting McCain, but then that was information presented by media polls (Fox).

http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb294/pioneer461/Flags%20and%20Icons/zap-001b.gif

[DMorrison]

Before I start, I would like a to have a little disclaimer, these statesments are my views and mine only, they do not effect my work, nor should they reflect upon any element of command....yeah i think that covers it.

Ron Paul wants us out of Iraq, soldiers hate Iraq. Do not take the president's or any other high ranking officials word on the state of Iraq. I have just returned from Iraq, I am an infantry man, and I spent all of time on the front lines, working with Iraqi's, fighting them, and supporting them. The mentality of that country is damaged beyond immediate repair. Every single Iraqi Army and Iraqi police force I worked with showed an amazingly cowardly and unproductive approach to their work, and they all showed signs of corruption. You have to remember that in a poor country, the first priority for most of those people is money. So many of the law enforcement are only there for money and status. A power struggle if you will. The academy classes largely have to segregated between sunni and shiite in order to maintain order. The idea of law enforcement as we see in the US and the western world does not exist in Iraq, it is very much Anarchy because there is no active enforcement, only reactive. The majority of the IA and IP are content to sit in their bunkers and collect a paycheck. Only venturing out to conduct nightime "raids" which mostly amount to pilaging. They don't work the streets.

The people themselves have been oppressed and controlled for so long that they expect to be, thus often refuse to take their future in their own hands. I spent 7 months in an Outpost in iraq, a town outside of fallujah labeled an alqaeda stronghold. We were sent to "clean it up" which we did fairly well. But I ask you, if any of us, as parents, would stand for our childrens school being used as mounting point for hostile attacks. If we would allow people to place bombs on the streets where our children walk? They did, and do, as a majority. They treated it as our problem, rather then taking the saftey of their community in their own hands, and posting gaurds, and running out the insurgents. And if their property was damaged in a military operation, be it insurgent or US they came to us for damage pay. And more often then not we payed out. Our hard earned tax dollars went to repairing windows for foreigners that allowed this happen on their own street. It is my personal opinion that we would have to literally raise a generation in that country in order to change the mentality....that's at least 15 more years.

Secondly it's war, that is treated like a peace keeping operation. If you sent me to fight an enemy, I'd prefer to do it without the constant fear of inprisonement. It is so ingrained in our soldiers heads that a mistake will lead to judicial consequences your biggest fear isn't death or disfigurement it's imprisonement and havin your good name smeared as a war criminal in the attempt to appease citizens of a foreign country and international politics. I was trained and volunteered to kill for my country. Maybe one day i'll be a cop, but I am not now. That's why the military supports Ron Paul, because the men and women who have actually seen Iraq and it's people in their true state, the soldiers that aren't handing out candy and paying a local official to mount a PR campaign on our account know the truth about Iraq. It doesn't matter if we pull out tommorrow or in 5 years, the result will be the same.

[fiddlin1]

Hello-
Ron Paul is the ONLY candidate for President-
All the others want to finish the War-
He will "Bring our Military Home"
ending the war is not the answer-
that could take 100 years-
We cant afford it-
92 Billion Dollars in 2008-
we will go broke fighting other countries wars-
it is pure BS-
and-
we must end the federal reserve-- the federal Reserve is printing money
and making our money worthless-
Ron Paul has the answers---
sadly--- nobody is listening-
except me-and some of my friends
You probably got more than you ask for-
I get excited about Ron Paul for President
Mark

[Rentiers]

Well, the stats on Ron Paul's fund raising are available everywhere online, but you'll probably have better luck finding them on his website, along with all the polls where he came in first or second. Odd that the media doesn't seem to trumpet ANY Ron Paul victory... One only has to do a quick web search to discover that Paul has gotten more donations from the military than ANY other candidate running. Money donated is an even better predictor of votes than media polling.

The "lack of response to my question" probably indicates one or all of the following: A) How few members CarryConcealed.Net has (so far), though its a great site and is sure to grow, B) How few members of the military are on CarryConcealed.Net (so far).

Being a veteran myself, I know of NOBODY in the whole state of South Carolina who is voting for McCain. Odd, isn't it? Since our state supposedly went to John McCain. Then again, we use electronic voting machines and do not get a paper receipt which verifies our votes were not monkeyed with.

Personally, there is no way in hell I'd vote for someone like McCain. He's too lefty-lib RINO for me. But then, much of the Republican party is too lefty lib for me. As far as I'm concerned he'd be just as bad as Hillary or Obama (if not worse), because all the damage that will be done to our gun rights won't be able to be hung around the necks of the Dem's party.

If you asked me (and you didn't), I'd say most military are supporting Ron Paul because of his recurring mantra, which I call "Its the Constitution, STUPID!" The military can support a guy who refuses to do things his party wants if they are unconstitutional. We haven't had a president willing to toe that line since before 1860.

But that's just my own personal opinion...

Well, I'm not presently serving in the military, but I am a Veteran of the Vietnam War. Do you have data that a lot of military personnel are supporting Ron Paul? It would be interesting to see that.

I wonder if a lack of response to your question indicates anything?

Last I heard, the majority of the military are supporting McCain, but then that was information presented by media polls (Fox).

Bill Rentiers

[pioneer461]

Bill,
Well, at least we agree on our dislike / distrust of McCain and so many other Republi-crats. I quit the Republi-crat party when President Bush signed McCain / Feingold and then ignored illegal immigration. No, I didn't go over to the dark side, but I'm now registered as "none of the above." To paraphrase President Reagan; I didn't leave the Republican Party, they left me.

I tend to lean a bit toward the Libertarian side, but I really can't get behind Ron Paul. We didn't ask to be drawn into the war on terror, but we got here by ignoring terrorism, beginning with (I hate to say this) the barracks bombing in Lebenon during the Reagan administration. We can not afford to ignore the threat any longer.

Our enemy does not recognize any rules of engagement, and in order to defeat them, we must be at least as ruthless as they are. Trouble is, if everytime a terrorist is water-boarded congress holds a hearing, we are doomed.

When the Constitution was debated and ratified, we didn't have intercontenintal jet travel, nor nuclear weapons that can vaporize American cities in the blink of an eye. Dr. Paul is very strong on many conservative issues, but I'm afraid his desire to ignore foreign affairs could cause us greater harm. Like it or not, we are in a global economy and we can no longer rely upon the Atlantic Ocean to keep us from harm.

If Rep. Paul were to be elected as President, where would his support in congress come from? A president can do nothing on his own, and as long as the senators and representatives have their hands out for whomever to pay them off, President Paul would be a lame duck beginning on his inaguration day.

There't the way it ought to be, and there's the way it is.