The Ron Paul that Ron Paul does not want you to know
- Thread starter blackascoal
- Start date
FUCK THE POLICE
911 EVERY DAY
Cool.
Adam Weinberg
Goldwater Republican
Ron Paul did not write these newsletter entries.
They were written by ghostwriters who attributed the statements to him.
They were written by ghostwriters who attributed the statements to him.
This is what I have been finding. I find no reference to the original work, only to quotes taken from the supposed works.
Happy Birthday, BTW.
Adam Weinberg
Goldwater Republican
Thanks!
The fact is, there are some very nutty people who ally themselves with the libertarian movement, and these writers who sent these letters out in his name were some of them.
This bigoted presence is true of all movements, but it is more apparent to outside observers because the libertarian community is drastically smaller than the liberal and conservative camps.
This is a huge part of the reason I've distanced myself from the philosophical side of this movement and gave up being a Big L some time ago. There's no sense in marginalizing the ideas you really care about by dealing with that sort of baggage.
I'm much more comfortable back where I began political life...as a kinda sorta left-libertarian with flirtations for the Democratic Party, while free to support a Republican like Ron Paul who stands for something that divergent and profound in his party.
The fact is, there are some very nutty people who ally themselves with the libertarian movement, and these writers who sent these letters out in his name were some of them.
This bigoted presence is true of all movements, but it is more apparent to outside observers because the libertarian community is drastically smaller than the liberal and conservative camps.
This is a huge part of the reason I've distanced myself from the philosophical side of this movement and gave up being a Big L some time ago. There's no sense in marginalizing the ideas you really care about by dealing with that sort of baggage.
I'm much more comfortable back where I began political life...as a kinda sorta left-libertarian with flirtations for the Democratic Party, while free to support a Republican like Ron Paul who stands for something that divergent and profound in his party.
And I hang as a right-libertarian inside the R Party working to bring the party back to the principle of individual freedom and back to a more confined government as per the Constitution.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
I apologize for not attending to the thread I created, but I been seriously busy lately.
For those that refuse to believe these are his words, "he didn't write them", "he didn't say this" .. yes he did, and he and his spokesman have said so.
Here is the one newsletter available where he calls blacks "barbarians" and "terrorists that can be identified by the color of their skin." You'll have to copy/paste the entire link to work and add thw "www.". Can't seem to get the link function to work here.
nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/people/g/ftp.py?people/g/gannon.dan/1992/gannon.0793
Taken from the Ron Paul Political Report, 1120 NASA Blvd., Suite 104, Houston, TX 77058 for $50 per year. Call 1-800-766-7285.
That is not the total of the racist comments as there were many newsletters, but here is what has been said about them ...
These quotations became an issue during Paul's 1996 campaign for Congress. During the campaign, he declined to distance himself from the statements. But in a 2001 interview with Texas Monthly, he said he had never written or approved those words for his own newsletter. He said he failed to disavow the words during the campaign on the advice of his political advisors. "They just weren't my words," he tells me. "They got in because I wasn't always there. I didn't have total control. And I would be on vacations and things got in there that shouldn't have been."
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/06/02/ron_paul/index1.html
Vile and racist comments, like "these terrorists can be identified by the color of their skin" .. and he declines to distance himself from them??? ... But five years later during a campaign when the opposition exposes these comments he says that "these were not my words".
Five years later .. with comments that imply calling for a race war.
A campaign spokesman for Paul said statements about the fear of black males mirror pronouncements by black leaders such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who has decried the spread of urban crime.
http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/aol-metropolitan/96/05/23/paul.html
Exactly what "statements" was his own spokesman talking about?
I can guarantee you that Jackson has never uttered anything remotely like what has been said in these newsletters, and Paul's his own spokesman does not deny, in fact he confirms that these are his remarks.
In spite of calls from Gary Bledsoe, the president of the Texas State Conference of the NAACP,, and other civil rights leaders for an apology for such obvious racial typecasting, Paul stood his ground. He said only that his remarks about Barbara Jordan related to her stands on affirmative action and that his written comments about blacks were in the context of "current events and statistical reports of the time." He denied any racist intent.
The operative word here is "his".
He stood his ground, and in fact, has said his comments were "too confusing to explain".
One would think he would want to clear this up by releasing copies of all of his past newsletters, the Ron Paul Survival Report to the media, going back to the newsletter's origin in 1986. He promised to do so, but never did.. When asked why he won't release them, Paul says voters may not understand his "tongue-in-cheek, academic" writings.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/vol16/issue9/pols.paul.side.html
He has blamed the comments on an "aide", but according to Eric Dondero, his former Senior Aide and Campaign Coordinator, that aide was a ghostwriter, and that ghostwriter was Lew Rockwell, who wrote what Paul wanted. Which explains, "too confusing to explain", "stood his ground", "tongue in-cheek", "these aren't my words", why he "failed to disavow the comments", and the variety of excuses and flip-flops Paul has offered.
A sort of convoluted truth, or non-truth.
He is the darling of white supremest hate groups
Stormfront White Nationalist Community - Is Ron Paul the One
http://www.stormfront.org/forum/showthread.php/ron-paul-one-388512.html
Lake Jackson News: Clear Media Conspiracy Against Ron Paul
http://lakejacksonnews.blogspot.com/2007/05/clear-media-conspiracy-against-ron-paul.html
Heritage Front
http://www.heritagefront.com/updates/lobbyhf.html#9
Vanguard News Network, The Political Cesspool, Council on Conservative Citizens, David Duke, and others.
He has denounced civil rights organizations that "interfere", but I have never read a single word of him denouncing, repudiating, or distancing himself from hate groups such as these. ... Have you? ... Anybody?
He voted against the Civil Rights Act, one of the most successful, bi-partisan, and heralded pieces of legislation in American history. He claims that it did not work. While it may not have worked for him, it most certainly worked for a people who endured more than 350 years of oppression. It was not designed to solve every problem of race in America. African-Americans have only been relatively free for 42 years out of 400 years of existence in America and the terrorism of Jim Crow and Jim Crow Laws did not end until the signing of civil rights legislation. But he claims the act did not work. He continues to vote against any and every measure to ensure equality.
Couple his outrageous statements, with his voting record, with his affiliations that he refuses to distance himself from, and what you have is information that Americans, especially people of conscience, need to know so they can make an informed decision for themselves.
Is Paul a racist? I don't know, I can't read his mind, but he sure smells like one. The more important questions are whether this man should be President and whether people of conscience should be falling all over him, seeing him as the coming of the messiah.
There are also very serious matter of policy that need addressing as well.
"Why do we need the federal government? There's no Cold War and no Communist threat. Many other nations are breaking into smaller and smaller pieces. The centralization of power in Washington occurred in a different time. Why not think about getting rid of the federal government, returning to the system of our Founders, and breaking up the United States into smaller government units?" ..
Do you believe that? .. I don't.
Paul is pro-life thinks a fetus is a human,
espouses Goldwater economics and thinking,
thinks Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare are unconstitutional,
doesn't believe in the minimum wage,
against any and all civil rights legislation,
against any and all federal programs designed to help the poor and disadvantaged,
against nationalized health care,
believes in strict adherence to the Constitution,
wants to get rid of the Dept. of Education, FEMA, Dept. of Energy, IRS, CIA, EPA,
doesn't like environmental restrictions and protection and has an anti-environment voting record,
doesn't think the government should assist looking for missing children,
thinks foreign aid is harmful,
doesn't like campaign finance reform,
strong advocate of guns, guns and more guns,
supports intelligence gathering without oversight,
doesn't like unions,
doesn't like OSHA requirements,
has an anti-senior voting record according to Alliance for Retired Americans,
supports a constitutional amendment for school prayer,
strongly anti-UN,
and doesn't believe our military and influence should be used for humanitarian purposes.
Many of these issues are at the very core of liberal/progressive/independent values. With 64% of Americans calling for universal healthcare and 42 million Americans with no coverage at all, and with an aging baby-boom population, do you realistically believe that America wants to eliminate Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. What do we tell seniors? Pull yourself up by your bootstraps?
Now if you are libertarian or on the Right you may indeed be applauding these positions .. but should liberals and progressives .. who actually make up a large part of his support because of his antiwar stance?
Republicans don't like him, which explains his 1% showing among republican voters. People on the internet like him, he's collected a lot of money there and lots of people have visited his website .. but he should ask Howard Dean how far that gets you.
With all the anger and horror about the disaster of Katrina and Rita, Ron Paul would leave that horror and lives that hang precariously in the balance to "charity", and eliminate FEMA. As bad as FEMA was during that disaster, without it the horror would have been exponentially worse.
After Paul triumphantly took credit for helping to pass disaster relief legislation in a press release .. he then turned around and voted AGAINST it .. here is what he had to say ..."Is bailing out people that chose to live on the coastline a proper function of the federal government? Why do people in Arizona have to be robbed in order to support the people on the coast?"
Robbed? ... His own district has more than a hundred miles of coastline, but instead of voting to help the constituents who sent him to office, he chose to vote his libertarian principles.
Outside of his antiwar views, there are serious issues of good policy versus his narrow ideology that must be addressed, including on his interpretive view of the Constitution. He has problems with parts of it that doesn't fit his view, like Articles III, VI, and the XVI Amendment. He has re-introduced his anti-UN bill, HR 1146, in every session of congress he's been in, and it, like most of his legislation, is nowhere near passage.
His Protection of Marriage Act pretty much says the Constitution is unconstitutional and seeks to remove Supreme Court oversight of legislation for constitutionality. It would essentially allow lobbyist to write the law of the land.
Unfortunately, one of the reasons why Americans get so little from our politics is because we choose politicians like they're contestants on American Idol. Just sing me a tune that sounds pleasing and you get my vote.
After this nation has suffered severely from the worst president and the worst military blunder in American history, can we afford not to make an INFORMED decision?
For those that refuse to believe these are his words, "he didn't write them", "he didn't say this" .. yes he did, and he and his spokesman have said so.
Here is the one newsletter available where he calls blacks "barbarians" and "terrorists that can be identified by the color of their skin." You'll have to copy/paste the entire link to work and add thw "www.". Can't seem to get the link function to work here.
nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/people/g/ftp.py?people/g/gannon.dan/1992/gannon.0793
Taken from the Ron Paul Political Report, 1120 NASA Blvd., Suite 104, Houston, TX 77058 for $50 per year. Call 1-800-766-7285.
That is not the total of the racist comments as there were many newsletters, but here is what has been said about them ...
These quotations became an issue during Paul's 1996 campaign for Congress. During the campaign, he declined to distance himself from the statements. But in a 2001 interview with Texas Monthly, he said he had never written or approved those words for his own newsletter. He said he failed to disavow the words during the campaign on the advice of his political advisors. "They just weren't my words," he tells me. "They got in because I wasn't always there. I didn't have total control. And I would be on vacations and things got in there that shouldn't have been."
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/06/02/ron_paul/index1.html
Vile and racist comments, like "these terrorists can be identified by the color of their skin" .. and he declines to distance himself from them??? ... But five years later during a campaign when the opposition exposes these comments he says that "these were not my words".
Five years later .. with comments that imply calling for a race war.
A campaign spokesman for Paul said statements about the fear of black males mirror pronouncements by black leaders such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who has decried the spread of urban crime.
http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/aol-metropolitan/96/05/23/paul.html
Exactly what "statements" was his own spokesman talking about?
I can guarantee you that Jackson has never uttered anything remotely like what has been said in these newsletters, and Paul's his own spokesman does not deny, in fact he confirms that these are his remarks.
In spite of calls from Gary Bledsoe, the president of the Texas State Conference of the NAACP,, and other civil rights leaders for an apology for such obvious racial typecasting, Paul stood his ground. He said only that his remarks about Barbara Jordan related to her stands on affirmative action and that his written comments about blacks were in the context of "current events and statistical reports of the time." He denied any racist intent.
The operative word here is "his".
He stood his ground, and in fact, has said his comments were "too confusing to explain".
One would think he would want to clear this up by releasing copies of all of his past newsletters, the Ron Paul Survival Report to the media, going back to the newsletter's origin in 1986. He promised to do so, but never did.. When asked why he won't release them, Paul says voters may not understand his "tongue-in-cheek, academic" writings.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/vol16/issue9/pols.paul.side.html
He has blamed the comments on an "aide", but according to Eric Dondero, his former Senior Aide and Campaign Coordinator, that aide was a ghostwriter, and that ghostwriter was Lew Rockwell, who wrote what Paul wanted. Which explains, "too confusing to explain", "stood his ground", "tongue in-cheek", "these aren't my words", why he "failed to disavow the comments", and the variety of excuses and flip-flops Paul has offered.
A sort of convoluted truth, or non-truth.
He is the darling of white supremest hate groups
Stormfront White Nationalist Community - Is Ron Paul the One
http://www.stormfront.org/forum/showthread.php/ron-paul-one-388512.html
Lake Jackson News: Clear Media Conspiracy Against Ron Paul
http://lakejacksonnews.blogspot.com/2007/05/clear-media-conspiracy-against-ron-paul.html
Heritage Front
http://www.heritagefront.com/updates/lobbyhf.html#9
Vanguard News Network, The Political Cesspool, Council on Conservative Citizens, David Duke, and others.
He has denounced civil rights organizations that "interfere", but I have never read a single word of him denouncing, repudiating, or distancing himself from hate groups such as these. ... Have you? ... Anybody?
He voted against the Civil Rights Act, one of the most successful, bi-partisan, and heralded pieces of legislation in American history. He claims that it did not work. While it may not have worked for him, it most certainly worked for a people who endured more than 350 years of oppression. It was not designed to solve every problem of race in America. African-Americans have only been relatively free for 42 years out of 400 years of existence in America and the terrorism of Jim Crow and Jim Crow Laws did not end until the signing of civil rights legislation. But he claims the act did not work. He continues to vote against any and every measure to ensure equality.
Couple his outrageous statements, with his voting record, with his affiliations that he refuses to distance himself from, and what you have is information that Americans, especially people of conscience, need to know so they can make an informed decision for themselves.
Is Paul a racist? I don't know, I can't read his mind, but he sure smells like one. The more important questions are whether this man should be President and whether people of conscience should be falling all over him, seeing him as the coming of the messiah.
There are also very serious matter of policy that need addressing as well.
"Why do we need the federal government? There's no Cold War and no Communist threat. Many other nations are breaking into smaller and smaller pieces. The centralization of power in Washington occurred in a different time. Why not think about getting rid of the federal government, returning to the system of our Founders, and breaking up the United States into smaller government units?" ..
Do you believe that? .. I don't.
Paul is pro-life thinks a fetus is a human,
espouses Goldwater economics and thinking,
thinks Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare are unconstitutional,
doesn't believe in the minimum wage,
against any and all civil rights legislation,
against any and all federal programs designed to help the poor and disadvantaged,
against nationalized health care,
believes in strict adherence to the Constitution,
wants to get rid of the Dept. of Education, FEMA, Dept. of Energy, IRS, CIA, EPA,
doesn't like environmental restrictions and protection and has an anti-environment voting record,
doesn't think the government should assist looking for missing children,
thinks foreign aid is harmful,
doesn't like campaign finance reform,
strong advocate of guns, guns and more guns,
supports intelligence gathering without oversight,
doesn't like unions,
doesn't like OSHA requirements,
has an anti-senior voting record according to Alliance for Retired Americans,
supports a constitutional amendment for school prayer,
strongly anti-UN,
and doesn't believe our military and influence should be used for humanitarian purposes.
Many of these issues are at the very core of liberal/progressive/independent values. With 64% of Americans calling for universal healthcare and 42 million Americans with no coverage at all, and with an aging baby-boom population, do you realistically believe that America wants to eliminate Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. What do we tell seniors? Pull yourself up by your bootstraps?
Now if you are libertarian or on the Right you may indeed be applauding these positions .. but should liberals and progressives .. who actually make up a large part of his support because of his antiwar stance?
Republicans don't like him, which explains his 1% showing among republican voters. People on the internet like him, he's collected a lot of money there and lots of people have visited his website .. but he should ask Howard Dean how far that gets you.
With all the anger and horror about the disaster of Katrina and Rita, Ron Paul would leave that horror and lives that hang precariously in the balance to "charity", and eliminate FEMA. As bad as FEMA was during that disaster, without it the horror would have been exponentially worse.
After Paul triumphantly took credit for helping to pass disaster relief legislation in a press release .. he then turned around and voted AGAINST it .. here is what he had to say ..."Is bailing out people that chose to live on the coastline a proper function of the federal government? Why do people in Arizona have to be robbed in order to support the people on the coast?"
Robbed? ... His own district has more than a hundred miles of coastline, but instead of voting to help the constituents who sent him to office, he chose to vote his libertarian principles.
Outside of his antiwar views, there are serious issues of good policy versus his narrow ideology that must be addressed, including on his interpretive view of the Constitution. He has problems with parts of it that doesn't fit his view, like Articles III, VI, and the XVI Amendment. He has re-introduced his anti-UN bill, HR 1146, in every session of congress he's been in, and it, like most of his legislation, is nowhere near passage.
His Protection of Marriage Act pretty much says the Constitution is unconstitutional and seeks to remove Supreme Court oversight of legislation for constitutionality. It would essentially allow lobbyist to write the law of the land.
Unfortunately, one of the reasons why Americans get so little from our politics is because we choose politicians like they're contestants on American Idol. Just sing me a tune that sounds pleasing and you get my vote.
After this nation has suffered severely from the worst president and the worst military blunder in American history, can we afford not to make an INFORMED decision?
Kamala Trump
Verified User
I like goldwater thinking and economics too!
And I still like Ron Paul.
And I still like Ron Paul.
Adam Weinberg
Goldwater Republican
If you understand the views of this man, his attitude to his constituents and his status as a respected Congressman, it is plain to see that this controversy was a rookie political error made early in his service, by trusting the wrong people.
Also, I wouldn't listen too closely to Eric Dondero, who is only a former staffer trying to run against him for his Congressional seat he's had tightly locked up for many, many years in a district that is 40% Hispanic.
Also, I wouldn't listen too closely to Eric Dondero, who is only a former staffer trying to run against him for his Congressional seat he's had tightly locked up for many, many years in a district that is 40% Hispanic.
evince
Truthmatters
I can believe it Adam, the man is too damn smart to be thinking like these statements read.
I am giving him a pass on them but at some point he may have to deal with them.
I hope he has to because it will mean he has reached a level in which his opponents are digging deep to fight him.
I think he could deal with them and survive if he confronts it straight on.
I am giving him a pass on them but at some point he may have to deal with them.
I hope he has to because it will mean he has reached a level in which his opponents are digging deep to fight him.
I think he could deal with them and survive if he confronts it straight on.
"His Protection of Marriage Act pretty much says the Constitution is unconstitutional and seeks to remove Supreme Court oversight of legislation for constitutionality. It would essentially allow lobbyist to write the law of the land."
LOL. It does no such thing. The constitution gives the legislature the authority to regulate the jurisdiction of the courts. It works within contitutional authority to ensure that the States hold the power of marriages that they wish to recognize rather than be forced by Federal Judges to recognize marriages that their constituencies disagree should be recognized.
It is actually an attempt to keep away the FMA (Federal Marriage Amendment) which would attempt to constitutionalize a definition of marriage and be a huge powergrab of the Feds from the States.
LOL. It does no such thing. The constitution gives the legislature the authority to regulate the jurisdiction of the courts. It works within contitutional authority to ensure that the States hold the power of marriages that they wish to recognize rather than be forced by Federal Judges to recognize marriages that their constituencies disagree should be recognized.
It is actually an attempt to keep away the FMA (Federal Marriage Amendment) which would attempt to constitutionalize a definition of marriage and be a huge powergrab of the Feds from the States.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
I have no problem with that .. especially given the fact that he has no chance at all of getting anywhere near the White House .. except as a guest.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
I have no problem with that opinion, however, republicans don't like him and Dondero may not run against him given that a popular city councilman has already declared. Without question a ton of republican money will pour into CD14 for any republican who runs against him.
"Respected Congressman" .. he can't get legislation passed and has been one of the most irrelevent people in Congress for years.
After he's dismissed from the presidential race, he'll have a tough time keeping his own seat.
Adam Weinberg
Goldwater Republican
If you go to Washington and talk to people who live on the inside, you'll find that many people know and respect Ron Paul, even if they disagree with him.
It's only in mainstream, normal, non-political America that he's an unknown. Ron Paul has been sustained for years by a district that likes him all-in-all, and a nationwide constituency of people who have been inspired enough by him to grant him strong financial support. And we'll see if the rumors of this outpouring of cash extending to the Presidential race are true soon enough.
And while there's no doubt his anti-war views may attract again more Republican support for his Congressional ouster in the future (not that the pro-war views of his previous Democratic opponent helped him win any), it may also coincide with mainstream America coming much closer in contact with this man.
His performance shown on CSPAN today with New Hampshire public radio illustrates that Ron Paul is not any mere sound-bite friendly politician, but an exceptionally thoughtful human being who certainly stands a strong chance to make many new friends and win some new hearts and minds on the campaign trail.
It's only in mainstream, normal, non-political America that he's an unknown. Ron Paul has been sustained for years by a district that likes him all-in-all, and a nationwide constituency of people who have been inspired enough by him to grant him strong financial support. And we'll see if the rumors of this outpouring of cash extending to the Presidential race are true soon enough.
And while there's no doubt his anti-war views may attract again more Republican support for his Congressional ouster in the future (not that the pro-war views of his previous Democratic opponent helped him win any), it may also coincide with mainstream America coming much closer in contact with this man.
His performance shown on CSPAN today with New Hampshire public radio illustrates that Ron Paul is not any mere sound-bite friendly politician, but an exceptionally thoughtful human being who certainly stands a strong chance to make many new friends and win some new hearts and minds on the campaign trail.
FUCK THE POLICE
911 EVERY DAY
Ron Paul's going to get screwed on the campaign trail should he become any bigger at all because of these comments (whether or not fairly attributed to him) in any case.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
Unfortunately, this is not true. He's known as Dr. No and many politicians on the left and right don't pay him much attention .. which is why he can't get legislation passed. He is basically ineffectual and not a leader by any stretch of the imagination.
93% of his campaign money comes from outside his district. Tom Delay did him a favor by taking a more democratic portion of the district into his own leaving Paul with a district that's split between republicans and hispanics who make up 40%. It's a relatively small district with him winning the '96 runoff where only 20,000 voters went to the polls. But it's still Texas, as Texans are too keen on his "we brought it on ourselves" comment .. even though in some ways he's right.
I agree with you .. but he's a man caught in the middle. Most of his support is coming from the Center and certain segments on the Left. He's still more libertarian than he is anything else, and libertarian views have limited support on the Left. He's actually benefitting from his celebrity more than his core views of politics.
I wouldn't call him thoughtful but I get your point.
The problem is that he's 72 years old with a limited future in politics. He's running in a republican race and republicans don't like him. He can't drop out and run as a libertarian because they already have a declared candidate. He could run with the Constitution Party but they don't have much ballot access. When he's out of the republican presidential race and if he loses in his own district, there won't be much of a political career left for him.
Adam Weinberg
Goldwater Republican
Ronald Reagan was 70 when he took office.
If John McCain took office, he'll be nearing 72 himself.
And the fact is that Ron Paul, for a man of 72, is in quite good health.
If John McCain took office, he'll be nearing 72 himself.
And the fact is that Ron Paul, for a man of 72, is in quite good health.
uscitizen
Villified User
And ronnie could not remember anything in his second term.
He of course made the promise that if his health become an issue he would resign, but then with altzheimers he could not remember the promise....
But of course we all believe the BS that it just struck him after he left office
He of course made the promise that if his health become an issue he would resign, but then with altzheimers he could not remember the promise....
But of course we all believe the BS that it just struck him after he left office
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
And ronnie could not remember anything in his second term.
He of course made the promise that if his health become an issue he would resign, but then with altzheimers he could not remember the promise....
But of course we all believe the BS that it just struck him after he left office
Quite true.
In Reagan's second term he was nothing more than a talking dummy with a nice haircut. The very same neocons who are destroying America today were pulling his strings.
Additionally, I smell something KarlRoveian about Paul. On many issues, he actually makes the right-wing look moderate. I wonder if he's been planted to do just that? It wouldn't be the first time Rove has taken Americans for a ride.
he's still a racist. I haven't seen anything over the last week to dispell what BAC has put forth in this original thread. The part about a 13 y/o being tried as an adult really put me off. Yes. I do believe he's principled however, I don't think a lot of his 'principles' are congruent with what this country needs right now.