Eric Garner died at the hands of a government tax enforcer.
Seymour M. Hersh · The Red Line and the Rat Line: Erdoğan and the Syrian rebels
Also you will notice when Secretary Clinton was directly questioned by Paul on this matter, she awkwardly avoided answering the question. Something conspiracy theorists like Jake Tapper have pointed out.
They were not enforcing tax law, they were enforcing criminal law.
Perhaps you didn’t read what you bolded. Garner died at the hands of a government tax enforcer. Your reply was a non sequitur.
Quite frankly, the government exists to tax, and it taxes to exist. The method by which government maintains its monopoly of taxation and coercion is armed men with badges. Garner was a threat to his murderer’s paycheck.
No, because the police don’t enforce tax law. What do you think would have happened if he had offered to write a check for the taxes due?
He was engaged in a criminal activity for which he already had numerous arrests.
It’s the same as selling drugs, besides the crime of selling, there’s other crimes committed in it’s support.
Now, you can argue that selling cigarettes in that manner shouldn’t be illegal but that’s another matter.
Do you really believe the officer was thinking about his paycheck at the time?
Why would any subterfuge be necessary to ship arms to a fellow NATO member?
False.
True, and a truism, hardly worth mentioning.
Something like this:
*In an interview, with the Louisville Courier-Journal’s Editorial Board, Paul said:
“I don’t like the idea of telling private business owners — I abhor racism, I think it’s a bad business decision to ever exclude anybody from your restaurant, but at the same time I do believe in private ownership… In a free society, we will tolerate boorish people who have abhorrent behavior.”*
This seems to be the latest back door way for some to justify discriminating against whatever group they hate. All wrapped up in a shiny “liberty” package.
That’s part of the problem. That’s not his view anymore, but it’s just too soon and he’s still figuring out what he thinks about a variety of issues. Paul should be building a reputation in the Senate or running for governor of Kentucky, not using his first term in the Senate where he’s still learning pretty basic things to try to run for President.
Unless he’s just doing what I suspect Rubio is doing, not running to win. The GOP way of doing things is funny, you usually have to run and lose before you can run and win, so sometimes it makes sense to just do it before you’re really ready and make a respectable showing.
Because they were arming the jihadists in Syria at a time when the U.S. was ostensibly not providing lethal aid. It’s one of those stories that has been covered but establishment figures still pretend did not happen. It is similar to the Nuland call when the U.S. was caught fomenting the overthrow of an elected head of state, but everyone pretends it was about not-very-nice language.
So is there a list somewhere with his current views? I understand people change their opinions as they gather more facts on issues but it’s hard to get a grip on Paul as he has said many dumb things in the past. Which ones are still his views and which ones has he changed?
Not publicly, no, not anymore now that he’s running. Remarkable how that works.
It’s, um, *interesting *to see you give him credit for “evolving” his views rather than simply lying. 
That must be it, yeah.
You seem to make that excuse for every single one of your guys, don’t you? Is any of them actually within shouting distance of ready, even in *your *view?
Then it’s Santorum’s turn, having come in second last time. Why do you suppose he’s out of it this time?
Bush is ready right now. As is Walker and Christie and Huck. The others are young and fairly new to politics. Plus a couple, like Perry and Santorum, just aren’t too bright.
Jindal isn’t even on your list anymore? What happened?
He’s on double secret nomination.
Jindal’s tenure in Louisiana is ending badly. I like governors as Presidents, but they have to have a record of success. Governors tend to be as good at the Presidency as they were at being governors.
Paul is losing whatever goodwill I had for him. I’m absolutely fine with candidates telling reporters to shut up or stop asking biased questions and so forth–but Paul only seems to do that to women reporters. That’s a problem for me.
The talk show host Hugh Hewitt is a fabulous interviewer–when Justice Bryer’s book came out, Hewitt had an hour+ interview with Bryer which was cordial, funny and incredibly educational. (It’s actually worth seeking out the transcript. Who knew Bryer had a sense of humor? I always thought he was the stuffiest Justice ever)
Anyway Hewitt is interviewing each of the Republican candidates and his interviews are all pretty much worthwhile*. Paul couldn’t answer a straight question with a direct answer to save his ass. And then bailed like a little bitch over a commercial break. (Hewitt asks roughly the same questions–ones for issues that interest Hewitt–to each candidate. Hewitt asked Paul something about “Colorado and Oregon have legalized pot in contravention of federal law. If you’re elected president, what would you tell the Justice Department to do?” There are all sorts of answers to that–“We’ve got higher priorities for the Justice Department than pot” or “Presidents enforce the law, I’d say shut the illegal dispensaries down until/unless congress passes a law to allow it.” Literally hundreds of ways to answer. Paul just dodged, stammered and left at the commercial break.) So, I’m not impressed. And I wanted to be. I like some of Paul’s positions.
*He pretty much sank Carson’s chances when Carson came on. That was the interview where Carson said something like “All our troubles with Muslim unrest come from about 2500 years ago.” Hewitt pointed out that Islam’s only been around since about 800 AD. Carson doubled down and stammered something about Jacob and Esau. And that wasn’t the worst gaffe.
Ron Paul is painting his son Rand Paul and other anti-Iran deal Senators as warmongers:
According to this article, Paul’s organization is actually quite impressive and seems to understand the delegate math better than his competitors’ teams. In a crowded race, that kind of advantage could be critical.
Sadly, when he can’t even handle a neutral-tending-towards-friendly interviewer; when he can’t even answer an easy (for him) “knock it out of the ballpark” question like “If you’re president, what do you do about states like Colorado and Oregon who are ignoring federal pot laws?” without wetting his pants and running away like a terrified little kid, he has no hope whatsoever.
What’s going to happen if he gets the nomination, is in a real debate and he’s got someone hostile “moderating” by giving debate points to the other side*. He can’t pout and just slink out.
*Candy Crowley, for example. It’s not a debate moderator’s job to answer questions to help a candidate. Her correctness is irrelevant: that’s not what a moderator does. She should have let Obama knock it out of the ballpark, not blatantly give Obama help.
THe GOP field features a lot of unready candidates. Now they have to at least look ready by the fall. As I said in the Carson thread, if any of these guys go from bumbling and unready to polished and articulate in the next few months, the media might finally bring attention to the process and how success in politics is more a function of the skill of handlers than the quality of the actual candidate. Of course, they will only focus on this criticism of the process on the REpublican side.