I haven't been around much lately, guys. Mostly the reason is because I died. Yes, I died. I have COPD, and I was feeling sickly one particular Sunday. I had to take my portable oxygen just to get to the bathroom and back, which is rare for me. Suddenly, after brushing my teeth that Sunday night, I sat in my recliner and found myself unable to catch my breath. I felt a great deal of congestion in my chest and tried to cough it up, but since I couldn't catch my breath I wasn't able to get a deep enough breath to cough properly. So I sat there, red-faced, heart pounding in my chest, gunk rumbling with every quick, gasping breath, and I felt the world waver in front of me.
My son heard me and ran into the living room. I could hear him cry "Dad!"
The next thing I knew, I was in a hospital room at the ICU and it was three days later. I was told that I had been on a respirator for the past two days and nights because I had been unable to breathe due to pneumonia..
"You are a lucky son of a bitch," my doctor told me. "Your son was there.'
Turns out my heart had been overworked during my episode and my poor tired body had given it up for a total of a minute and a half.
I've been wrestling with this reality for the last few months, so please forgive me if I haven't been that interested in politics lately.
So what brings me here tonight?
Ron. Fucking. Paul.
Really liberals?
Really?
Get your asses over the jump.
"Ron Paul is irrelevant, though!"
The fuck he is! He may never be president, but there have been many people with no chance of winning the presidency that have influenced popular opinion.
This Ron Paul bullshit ends here. And no, it doesn't end if we ignore him. No, it doesn't end if we laugh him away. No it doesn't end when he loses the nomination this year. His bullshit racist, crazy, heartless ideas live within the hearts of many college kids that have no idea what its like to be breathless and in need of intensive care. His ideas live in on in the thoughts of hateful racist white males in their fifties that were taught since birth that the problem with America was blacks that have a free ride, living off their hard earned tax dollars.
And now, with this "civil liberties" bullshit, Ron Paul seems to have fooled even some liberals that think he's somehow more "progressive" than other liberals in positions of leadership.
Really?
So you don't give a fuck that Ron Paul is against the insurance system--Medicare--that saved my life?
Really?
So you don't care that he's racist?
Really?
So you don't care that he's a goddamned truther?
Really?
So you don't care that he's against everything from the FDA to building codes to the EPA to every safety net that exists in this country?
Really?
So you don't care that he's so against the drug war that he wants to create a state-based system that could potentially create fifty different drug enforcement laws?
Really?
So you don't care that he is against civil rights?
Really?
So you don't care that he is such a nut that he's in favor of bringing back the gold standard?
Look, you may laugh at me. And that's okay. Laugh at me, while I'm still here. Laugh away. But Mitt Romney espouses many of the same views, only less intensely crazy.
So I'm all in for Obama in 2012. I can't do much, but I'll do what I can.
And don't bother listing Obama's failures as I listed Paul's. If you think Paul is in any way better than Obama on any issue you have problems that nobody can solve. So save your lists, because I can come up with hefty lists of my own of Obama's accomplishments.
We have to be all in in 2012.
If not for Obama, for down ballot Dems,
If not for down ballot dems, then for the recall of Scott Walker. Or any other republican governor.
Because whatever your particular problem is, republicans aren't interested in solving them. They are interested in kicking you in the teeth. Ron Paul more than most.