Ron Paul an extremist?

Y'know, it's impossible for Ron Paul to win. He can't possibly do it. Never. That's why it's appropriate (totally TONGUE-IN-CHEEK!) for the media to continue to treat him like this:

Newspaper headline in September: "Poll: Romney leads New Hampshire, Huntsman in third, Perry in fourth."

Or as John Stewart so dramatically demonstrated in his excellent review of coverage to that point in the Republican race:



Actually, I get the feeling Paul may be like Tim Tebow: wholly under-appreciated, mocked, counted out before he begins. And the media's coverage certainly does make it tough for a candidate like Paul to make any progress. That's why I find his achievement yesterday ("Stunning" Second Place Victory, said one headline) all the more remarkable. He is not only fighting his political direct competitors for the office of president; he seems to have to take on the entire media.

That's why I think it is about time we finally have some skeptical commentary like this from December (start at 3:30 for the real "meat" of the argument):



Or this:



I "just" get this feeling that there are too many corporate fat-cats being bailed-out by Washington . . . and there's no other candidate besides Paul who is even willing to discuss the issues. So the corporations are willing for anyone . . . as long as it's not Paul.

And so we continue the downward spiral.

By the way, for a story from 150 years ago about corporate fat-cats sucking at the teat of big government, check out this story by Thomas DiLorenzo. It's about the government-subsidized transcontinental railroad . . . and that "other" railroad that no one has ever heard about.

For just a tiny juicy tidbit from the article:

Hill's Great Northern was . . . the "best constructed and most profitable of all the world's major railroads," as Michael P. Malone points out. The Great Northern's efficiency and profitability were legendary, whereas the government-subsidized railroads, managed by a group of political entrepreneurs who focused more on acquiring subsidies than on building sound railroads, were inefficiently built and operated. Jay Cooke was not the only one whose government-subsidized railroad ended up in bankruptcy. In fact, Hill's Great Northern was the only transcontinental railroad that never went bankrupt. . . .

Where James J. Hill would be obsessed with finding the shortest route for his railroad, [the] government-subsidized companies, knowing they were paid by the mile, "sometimes built winding, circuitous roads to collect for more mileage," as Burton Folsom recounts. Union Pacific vice president and general manager Thomas Durant "stressed speed, not workmanship," writes Folsom, which meant that he and his chief engineer, former Union Army genera1 Grenville Dodge, often used whatever kind of wood was available for railroad ties, including fragile cottonwood. This, of course, is in stark contrast to James J. Hill's insistence on using only the best-quality materials, even if they were more expensive. Durant paid so many lumberjacks to cut trees for rails that farmers were forced to use rifles to defend their land from the subsidized railroad builders; not for him was the Hill motto, "We have got to prosper with you or we have got to be poor with you."

Guess what? The Monsantos and Pfizers, not to mention Bank of Americas and Fannie Maes and Freddie Macs are just like the owners of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads. They are far more concerned about using the government to keep competition away than they are to do the best truly to serve their customers. . . .

Are you ready for four more years of this kind of abuse at the hands of these people?