This really is a question. I do not have any answers, but I do have concerns. We kow that Ron Paul raised some serious money. We know that he confused many well minded anti-war activists into thinking he served their useful purpose.
Those of us who were awake for the past 30 years, or had read some history of the American Right, or read Orcinus, knew better all along.
We know Paul has longtime ties to, is part of, has been backed by, and supports, the traditional racist, pre-paleo-old-right and neo-confederate movements. Is that where the money is really going, to fund his real movement, oldtime racist anti-government movements and organizations?
Inquiring minds want to know where his money is, what that money is doing AFTER November 4, 2008?
There has been no serious public campaign expenditures such as major TV ad buys to match the levle of his fund raising. He is not actually getting serious levels of votes beyond what he would be getting anyway. I would suggest the appropriate comparison would be to the low-funded, free publicity, paleoconservative movement outside of the officially approved of Republican mainstream, would be to Pat Buchanan (like Buchanan, Lew Rockwell himself is from a post-Father Coughlin hard right wing Catholic politicial culture background).
Paul has minimal paid staff, and regardless of his enthusiasts, no real statwide comprehensive, yet down to the precinct level, campaign organization. In other words, no real campaign.
Now, one answer has been that he is going to run as an indepdent. Maybe. But still: Where is the money really actually going? What remains after election day November 4, 2008?
So, since it is not being spend on an actual campaign:
Where is all that money really going?
Where to, to what groups, to what purpose, is the money going to for after the "campaign"?
Who profits?
What is being built?
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P.S. Along similar lines... there is a funny piece in Huffington Post on Rudy Giuliani as the Max Bialystock of Politics. Max Bialystok is the character from Mel Brooks' The Producers, who collects money to put on a Broadway show designed to be a flop (so nobody cares afterwards where the money really went, thinking it went into a show that flopped). The idea is that he takes in the money. Spends little on the producing the actual show, and pockets the money for personal profit. In Rudy's case, the money went to months of fun in the sun Florida, while the real candidates were in the snows of Iowa and New Hampshire. It would be interesting to know who all -- consultants, candidates, wives, foundations and firms -- made a fine profit from the Giuliani campaign.
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P.P.S.: Despite the name "Ludwig von Mises Institute" and von Mises being of Jewish origins, yes, the movement really is among, it other racisms, anti-semitic. The von Mises family and his more real and academic independent followers have repeatedly disowned the appropriation of his name by Lew Rockwell and his American organization. There are other "Ludwig von Mises Institute" in other countries that are, at least supposedly, independent of the Amrican Rockwellians.