Ron Paul, the Republican who has some local liberals swooning
because of his antiwar rhetoric and his strong support of individual
liberty, arrived in Seattle on September 14 for a bit of speechifying
and fundraising.
His midday event, a packed lecture at Seattle University, didn’t
offer any surprises or new rhetoric. But then again, a major reason
people tend to like Paul is that he doesn’t surprise. He’s had the same
libertarian positions forever, and knows that part of his cachet is his
consistency—and when your reputation is built on consistency, you
rarely need to change your talking points.
So the speech at Seattle University was full of classic Paul: He
held forth on the Constitution and tax policy (“The original intent, of
course, was never to have an income tax”); on the Constitution and
calls for the impeachment of Dick Cheney (“The restoration of respect
for the Constitution would do a lot more than attacking one single
individual”); and on the Constitution and federal endangered-species
protections (“I’ve been reading the Constitution now and then. I can’t
find endangered species written in the Constitution”).
That last point took on some added significance, however, given that
the overlap between antiwar lefties and endangered-species huggers in
this area is considerable. Paul quickly added that his comments
shouldn’t be interpreted as meaning he’s opposed to protecting
endangered species. “It’s the bureaucratic approach versus the
free-market approach,” he said—and he wants the job of protecting
endangered species to be left to the free market.
“Private property owners would do a better job than we would through
federal regulations,” Paul said.
I’m not sure that’s what the environmentally conscious liberals of
King County want to hear. But Jeff Jared, Paul’s special projects
coordinator, told me: “I’m hopeful he’s going to kick butt out here. A
lot of his message is attractive to liberals.” Perhaps, but the
question remains whether the parts of Paul’s message that are
unattractive to liberals—say, leaving the task of protecting
endangered species to the cold heart of the free market—will
cancel out the attractive parts.
The free market was kind to Paul, at least, on his visit. Jared told
me his candidate was on track to bring in $50,000 to $60,000 from his
one-day swing through Seattle, and on September 17, the Paul campaign
reported that its four-city tour through the West (Los Angeles, San
Francisco, Seattle, and Salt Lake City) had netted a total of
$350,000.
Which raises a question: What is Ron Paul, who according to OpenSecrets.org currently has more than
$2.3 million in his campaign fund and zero campaign debt, going to do
with any excess cash he might end up with in the (very likely) event
that he doesn’t ultimately win the Republican nomination?
I put the question to Paul’s spokesman, Jesse Benton, who replied
via e-mail: “It’s a moot point. We will spend every penny we raise
fighting for the GOP nomination.”
* * *
Speaking of possibly moot points: The publication on September 17 of
former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan’s new book, The Age
of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World, gave long-shot
Democratic hopeful Dennis Kucinich an opening he’s been waiting for. In
his book, Greenspan writes: “I am saddened that it is politically
inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: The Iraq war is
largely about oil.”
To which Kucinich, with his typical mix of credit claiming and
exasperation, quickly replied in a statement: “I’ve been saying that
for five years… Now, the former Fed chairman corroborates that I’ve
been right all along.”
Well, maybe not. Greenspan quickly clarified. “I was not saying that
that’s the administration’s motive,” Greenspan told the Washington
Post. “That would have been my motive.”
* * *
Continuing on the theme of people who might have been right at the
wrong time: Two tracking polls on The Stranger‘s blog, one
conducted in August and one conducted in September, showed noncandidate
Al Gore as the top pick of our blog readers when he was included as a
choice along with all the declared Democratic presidential
candidates.
However, Gore’s support has dropped by six points among our blog
readers from August to September. A sign that the fascination with a
Gore candidacy is wearing off? Could be. Or it could be that more
people are becoming satisfied with the current slate of
candidates—or that our poll findings (or our blog readers) are
unreliable.
Stranger science columnist, Jonathan Golob, asked to weigh
in on the matter, concluded that the poll was “statistically
significant and utterly meaningless.” Look for another significant yet
meaningless Stranger tracking poll next month. 
