Ron Paul R3VOLution has taken over Nevada GOP

An article in the Las Vegas Review-Journal is one of many encouraging signs. This revolution is not just a bunch of cranky students complaining about the government again. This time its for real, and its happening the right way--taking over and reshaping the party from the ground up.

NDAA ruled unconstitutional by New York court!

From Salon.com

Libertarian litigators: The Institute for Justice

Just laying some ground work here for what will be a more detailed post on IJ. They are a Virginia-based organization that litigates for liberty. A summary directly from their website suggests that they have been doing some good work since their founding in 1991.

• 149 cases litigated in four core mission areas: economic liberty, property rights, political and commercial speech, and school choice
• 5 U.S. Supreme Court cases since 2002 (four victories)
• 71 percent victory rate (through litigation, legislation, and settlement)
• In 2011 alone, filed 21 new cases, won 18, and litigated 10 other ongoing cases
• First favorable U.S. appeals court ruling for economic liberty since the New Deal
• 16,311 homes and businesses saved since U.S. Supreme Court loss in Kelo v. City of New London
• 46 states and eight supreme Courts have explicitly rejected the Kelo ruling
• More than 200,000 children nationwide benefiting from school choice
• 20 national awards for our media relations work, publications, and production
• Strategic research cited by U.S. Supreme Court (Freedom Club PAC) and Indiana Supreme Court; used in six IJ briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court, three successful cert. petitions (including the landmark Citizens United ruling and Freedom Club PAC), and 11 articles published in peer-reviewed scholarly journals; also cited in 37 articles by other authors in law, public policy, and scholarly journals
• Only law school clinic in the nation focusing exclusively on assisting low-income entrepreneurs start exclusively private-sector businesses

Youth for Ron Paul surpasses 110,000

According to Jack Hunter at the Daily Paulitical Ticker.

The big question is-- what will the kids do when Dr. Paul retires? Will they remain committed to his principles?

Jack correctly points out that many a revolution began with far fewer members. Paul supporters are famously passionate and committed as well. But an interesting quirk of human nature is the need for people to find a leader that embodies the ideals they feel passionately about. I can't think of any major political movements in western history that survived without a singular hero for its adherents to rally around. Ideas are just ideas. It takes a leader to rally people, even in a movement that favors decentralization and free thinking.

Conventional wisdom is saying at present that Rand Paul will assume his father's mantle as leader of the liberty movement. Assuredly others, such as Justin Amash, will fill in the talent gap in the coming years, as will many others heretofore unheard of. Time will tell.

These are exciting times to be a libertarian. The movement is still small and focused, still incredibly passionate and believes intensely in Dr. Paul's ideals. This sort of passion often doesn't last more than a decade, so we had better make enormous strides, and very soon.

States Ron Paul has won so far

According to the Rand Paul Review (above) and RT (below) as of May 9, 2012.

Liberty candidates take off across the United States

Thanks to Ron Paul. Check out this info graphic from Business Week:

And this website:
libertycandidates.com/

Ron's crowds

A sampling from Google of the estimated sizes of the crowds Ron is drawing across the states:

Chico State University- 3,000 (according to CNN it was 6,200)
Bonner County Fairgrounds- 1,200
Louisiana College- 1,100
University of Maryland- "nearly 2,000"
Springfield, Virginia- 2,000, with about another 500 turned away.
UCLA (record breaker)- estimates range from 7,000+ to 10,000, with hundreds more turned away. Around 8,000 seems most likely; estimates vary based on conflicting reports of capacity for the tennis court.
Texas A&M- 3,000
University of Wisconsin- 5,200
Berkeley- "more than 1,000" according to the Daily Cal.
Denver- "more than 1,150"
Philadelphia- 4,300
Austin- 6,000 at a town hall meeting according to Jack Hunter (Daily Paul), 4,000 according to local sources.
Houston, 4/27/12- 3,000 (according to Jack Hunter)
UCSD, 5/4/12- est. 3,500 

MSNBC video-- Ron Paul's burgeoning movement

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4SXIGYs-Ww

Interesting bit of info at the 4:20 mark:

"There are two dozen Ron Paul supporters running for House or Senate seats, and about 200 seeking local office."

Not a stat you see often. Apparently it came from this Politico article:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0412/74940.html

Jared Paine, who runs a site that tracks libertarian-minded candidates, is apparently responsible for this information. Have not been able to locate him or his site yet.

Interesting to see MSNBC pundits change their tune as well. They concede that Ron will be more of a force at the convention than Gingrich, and in a decent position to extract campaign promises from Romney. Benton mentions that auditing the Fed will be at the top of their list. Going forward, the punditry notes that Ron is the only "movement candidate" in this election, and his influence will continue to be a force on the GOP after the election is long over.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4SXIGYs-Ww

Ron Paul is winning delegates in MN, CO

From the Examiner



Ron Paul swept 3 district conventions in Minnesota, winning 9 of 9 delegates. In Colorado, a Santorum-Paul coalition won 20 delegates, with 12 delegates (and 13 alternates) going to Ron himself. Two Ron Paul supporters will serve on the Rules Committee and the Paul coalition dethroned known Romney supporter and Colorado State Party Chairman Ryan Call from his position as Delegation Chairman.

Inaugural Post

Welcome friends.

Nearly four years into the Ron Paul R3volution, it is eminently apparent to those of us who call ourselves libertarians, and this election season, to America at large, that something is amiss. What in 2008 might have been dismissed as a quirk of American politics--the loony, marginal fringe group we call libertarians--has become a force in the 2012 election cycle. What some of us call the "Liberty Movement," others know as the Ron Paul phenomenon... whatever it is, it is continuing to make an impact on the American political landscape.

We have witnessed, for the first time in its history, serious public scrutiny of the Federal Reserve system, once so mysterious that even most congressmen didn't understand it.For the first time in American history, 2012 saw two libertarians running for president, extolling the virtues of the young-- the belief that only deep, drastic change, the kind of change that drills down into our political and cultural foundations can shake things up enough to change the disastrous course that nearly everyone agrees our society is headed for. If the demographics of the Ron Paul movement that coalesced these past four years hold over the coming decades, we may witness a sea change in the American political landscape.

Whether we ever witness that sort of change in our lifetimes, or if the change we seek ever leads to the ends that we envision, remains to be seen. The purpose of this journal is to serve as a resource to both myself and other libertarians as a means of calculating the successes of our own movement, so that we have some idea of the improvements and accomplishments we can attribute to our own battles to increase awareness of the evils of statism, as well as legislative and judicial victories.

This blog is also for any people out there fighting for liberty who, like me, occasionally despair and need a pick me up-- just a quick read to remind you that, yes, what we are doing not just important, it is actually WORKING. I have studied revolutionary movements off and on over the past fourteen years and I can attest that incremental change can in fact pay off... and sometimes very quickly and unexpectedly as concatenating events move people to shape their destinies.

I honestly have no idea if I will find enough material to post with any regularity, so I welcome submissions. Send me links to articles, stats, whatever you find interesting. If something good happened, lets let people know!

Thanks,

J