When a man makes promises he can't keep, he is a liar, it's that simple to my mind.

Just because politics is full of them does not make it correct, ethical or proper...nor does it excuse him. He's not promising to work with people towards things, he's promising to do things that literally hinge on other people. I don't know about you, but I find that it's pretty hard to promise what someone else will or won't do (especially when their actions are dictated by financial gain).

You can call this a negative attitude; I'd suggest it's realistic. If you would counter this claim by saying that finding something better is unrealistic in this system, then I would reply that such a statement is irrefutable evidence that we're past due for a new system. Imo, a new system will not emerge by indulging the most "liberal" or "libertarian" or "free thinking" members of the current system; being a lenient despot or a liberal fascist is unacceptable. Imo, you don't ask for humane slavery, you demand abolition.

You allude to the "great men" the "founding fathers"...the same men who talked of freedom and equality whilst oppressing African slaves, supporting the slaughter of millions of indigenous Americans and denying equality to women. These men have numerous quotes on record about how "We the people" are not smart enough to lead ourselves; how the "stampeding herd" and "ignorant masses" have no place in politics. What's more is that they also have numerous quotes on record alluding to the mercantile interests (the 18th century equivalent of the corporate interests that are paraded around today's news media as "American interests" ) and Washington himself discusses, in some length, America's status as the "young empire."

Ron Paul, imo, doesn't offer the hope of "informing and leading people to take actions towards preserving their liberties" any more than Sarah Palin offers a populist movement through the tea party. In fact, Ron Paul is more disenchanted illusion, offering the masses hope on the backs of promises he can't make good. At least Obama had the option to deny (and gave some "harsh" rhetoric towards) the wall street bailouts; granted he didn't actually do anything for the people. He proved to be chickenshit when it was time to put up or shut up (read: get kicked to the curb by wall street, or continue suckling their teat). Paul is making empty promises out of the gate; to my mind this is far from encouraging and indicates his reverential status to some is based on pure mythology.



I think that's a tad restricted...if not outright cynical

Technically, sure I agree...but democracy; in the sense of true democracy of free association yadda yadda, I think offers more than just the lesser of two evils. There are cases of direct democracy working with great efficacy to create stable, self sufficient communities/societies. I would posit that the nature of these political systems is greater (freer? ) than a lesser of two evils model.

I think the best way to solve alot of these issues is to just stop paying our taxes. If 10+ million of us decided to stop paying our taxes and refuse to cooperate with the system, we would start a revolution.

Yeah, That's brilliant.
Personally, I like having decent roads to drive on, or should we just make our own? I like having environmental controls in place to at least keep the worst despoilers of the planet somewhat restrained. I like having laws that protect me and my personal property so that when a crime is committed someone will have to pay the consequences. I don't mind giving a tiny portion of my paycheck so a poor single mother can feed her kid. Or paying for public schools so that kid can get an education.

The list goes on and on and on. It costs money, much of it ineffectively, not to mention that everybody will always have different priorities. It ain't perfect but it beats trying to make a living in a third world country where there is no government or one that is so oppressive that if you speak out you'll find your head on the end of a pole.

Taxes are the price of living in a civilized society. Lots of things could be better, but one thing is for sure, if you aren't interested in being involved in your own self governance then nothing at all will change for the better. It wasn't that long ago that a woman or a black person couldn't even vote in this country, so believe it or not some things actually do get better. The truth is, we all end up with the government we deserve.

Yes, i completely agree, i'm not about anarchy or total chaos filling the streets with a civil war type revolution. I would be willing to pay 1 or 2% of my income to help pay for roads, schools, programs, etc. Besides that, though, they don't deserve another penny and we should stand up for ourselves and do something about this.

OK, I thought maybe you were heading off down the anarchy road and maybe you reminded me of myself a little when I was younger. Except I did think anarchy was a viable solution. Well, it's funny what time does to a person and besides I'm too old and weak to ever survive something that extreme nowadays . You do realize though that you're going to have to pay just a bit more than one or two percent of your income in taxes. And for all the fuss that's made, you may be interested to know that percentage wise, we pay less in taxes now than we paid 30 or 40 years ago.

As for the video, I hope there's a special place in hell for those pi..er..policemen.