I would simply argue that it’s this broad-based appeal that may be the Republican Party’s only hope at winning in ’08. The Republican Party’s reputation is in the toilet. Why? I’d submit that it’s a result of the Republican Party’s abuse of power, spending, and continuing support of the war in Iraq. Who is the only Republican candidate to advocate a smaller federal government, and immediate withdrawal from Iraq?

Should conservative and libertarian people rally to the platform of the Republican Party, whether they agree with it or not? Or should the Republican Party reflect the interests of its members?

Does any other Republican candidate have anywhere near the broad-based support that Ron Paul could deliver if his own party also backed him? What was the effect of Reagan Democrats in 1980 and 1984?

That’s pretty damned insulting to Republicans, if you ask me. It’s not a very team-oriented viewpoint. If I was a GOP leader I’d be real wary of inviting Paul people to participate in GOP events, polls and such.

It’d be better if Ron Paul supporters said, we like Ron, but if he loses the nomination to Thompson or Giuliani, we’ll still back the GOP nominee against Hillary Clinton.

Anyone else see any contradictions there?

Claims without evidence won’t sway the thoughtful. But they may well convince audience members who don’t (or can’t) pay attention. This works with UFO’s, 9/11 conspiracies, and Ron Paul polls alike.

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/91/91sbelvedere.phtml

I did a quick search and look at what one pollster has to say:

“They aren’t “cheating,” as in voting multiple times, but they have sent out emails and posted the link to our poll at several spots on the web, urging people to go vote for Paul. The end result is the same—the poll results are skewed, and it’s not an accurate measure.

Internet polls are not scientific anyway, but when the gaming is this obvious I’m not going to let it slide, or to let our poll be misused by supporters of a man who, in my opinion, is nuts.”

By the way, this poll “gave up” and put Paul back on their site. See http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=25504_Ron_Paul_Supporters_Spamming_Our_Poll_Again&only

The truth is, they think he’s nuts and there can’t possibly be that much support for Paul out there. Hmmmm….Dewey beats Truman syndrome? The answer to all of this is that the Internet community is far different and a minority of folks. Society isn’t representative of that community. However, it is a significant minority and I think Ron Paul has it locked up for now. He’ll need a lot more to become president.

Matt Margolis sounds like one of these conspiracy theorists akin to a Holocaust Denier. I looked at the other news sites.

FoxNews claimed it after their poll. However, it couldn’t happen since this poll was by text message. You’d have to have a lot of different phones so that’s false. But even if his supporters moved en masse, so are the other candidates as well.

ABC claims the polls were skewed but in the same breath claims they were “flooded” with Ron Paul messages from his supporters begging ABC to put Paul’s name on the poll–he was initially absent from the poll. To boot, they deleted 90 posts by different people. Plus, one could not repeat the poll because the IP address is registered. I suppose one could change their IP address–such as dial up customers who would have to redial a connection every time. So there’s no way that one could know Ron Paul’s campaign was doing that.

Also, why did the NRSC leave Ron Paul off the printed survey? Because a secret but highly coordinated effort of Paul people stole the GOP survey envelopes?

For me, the proof of his presence is the $2.4 million dollars in Q2 from individual donors. He’s actually pretty close to Romney if you subtract Romney’s campaign debts.

This is such bovine scatology.