Ron Paul is talking. CNN has video over here, if you want to count how many giggles Ron Paul lets out.
"President Paul," the crowd chants. Ron Paul introduces his family. He mistakenly introduces Linda as Lisa. He's been onstage for less than two minutes and already giggled three times. He said "I want to thank the Union Leader for not endorsing me." Paul says he called Romney, who had "a clear-cut victory, though we're nibbling at his heels. [Giggle!]"
Paul thanks the crowd. He says "I sort of have to chuckle when they describe you and me as 'dangerous' [evil titter]." The crowd chants "President Paul!" in response to that. "We will remain a danger to the Federal Reserve system as well." The crowd chants "end the Fed!" and Paul responds, "that's right! End the Fed! Yeagh!" We get a lecture about the history of the American monetary system according to Ron Paul, followed by a rant against sending our young people "around the world, hither and yon," which he says other people have "tokenly talked about," but it is the "liberty movement" that says "we have had enough of us sending our kids and our money around the world."
(Continued after the jump.)
Ron Paul says he will bring the troops home without causing an "economic crisis." Ron Paul clearly thinks the military is an economic issue, not a human issue, though he does a good job of couching it as a human concern in order to rope in the kids. He promises again to cut at least one trillion dollars from the budget.
Paul whines about people who are too dependent on the government. He's basically saying we need to wean people on Social Security and Medicare off the government teat. Government's role, he says, should be "the protection of liberty." The crowd chants "Ron Paul Revolution/Give us back our Constitution." Paul smiles, "Wonderful, wonderful! [titter.]" Liberty, he says, means you have a right to privacy and you have the right to "keep and spend your money as you want to...freedom is popular, don't you know that? [Hyungh.]"
He's really kind of spacing out, now. He argues against anonymous people who call Paul supporters "selfish." He says "the bleeding hearts" have good intentions. "The humanitarian instincts are there across the board," but if you are a "true humanitarian," you have to argue for the free market and isolationist foreign policies. "I didn't know you were out there," he says to his audience, and then he closes to more chants of "President Paul."
Jesus Christ, don't any of these Republicans use a teleprompter any more? Or has President Obama made teleprompters completely verboten? Paul's speech was totally incoherent, rambling, and it wasn't doing Paul any favors so far as picking up new or interested voters.