Quotes from Ron Paul

These manipulations are not evidence that evil is a result of religious beliefs. Instead, they show how evil men usurp the authority of religion to promote war. That this tactic can succeed reflects that too much complacency among people is preventing resistance against the thugs who coopt religion and use it for evil ends.

Secrecy is paramount for the government and privacy is lost for the citizens during wars as well. Everyone is a suspect and liberty protections are ignored by the empire. The excuse is always that restricting liberty is required to make the people safe from enemies, seldom seen and identified but ever-present and demonized.

In addition to Eisenhower identifying the military-industrial complex, we now have the police-industrial complex, the medical-industrial complex, the surveillance-industrial complex, and the media-industrial complex.

A free society acknowledges that authority over education begins with the family. I am not saying that a free society grants that authority. I do not believe that such authority is delegated by society.

Public opinion is a powerful tool, if not the ultimate tool, for changing policies of the seemingly omnipotent political leaders. The greatest danger is an apathy that allows for evil to thrive when bad people rule over us and provoke nationalistic and patriotic fervor that intimidates many into compliance.

And the irony is that the war purchases are recorded as a positive for economic growth and the GDP. Though the war spending is an economic negative and provides no improvement in the people's standard of living, the government statisticians brag about an upward blip in the GDP. Besides, these bills are paid for by borrowing and printing money, thus increasing future debt obligations and causing higher prices for the next generation.

Government is wasteful, fraudulent, and abusive by its very nature. To get rid of waste, fraud, and abuse, government power has to be dealt with. Government's legitimacy has to be challenged. Its claims of success must be refuted. The people who desire peace and prosperity must accept the fact that government and the politicians never deliver peace or prosperity.

It still amazes me how complicit the media are in propagandizing for war. This is true whether it's a Republican or Democratic-leaning entity. Both sides spout the lies delivered by government officials to encourage public support for wars. Whether the president is a Republican or a Democrat, the media will be supportive. It just may be that the owners of the large media entities are closely connected to the military-industrial complex.

is tragic to see the wounded being used as political props. This must be done to satisfy the subconscious guilt of those who supported the war and are morally responsible for all the suffering. Without this, the promoters and instigators of aggressive wars would experience the guilt that would come with facing the truth. Few ever admit their errors in judgment nor lament their actions that brought death, destruction, and heartache.

Once a war is underway the process of deceit continues with regard to the troops who return with broken bodies and broken minds, especially when the wars were never justified. Admitting that the wars are senseless and in vain is too much to bear.

only liberty can truly ward off tyranny, the great and eternal foe of mankind.

Setting a good example is a far better way to spread ideals than through the force of arms

In the end, there is no substitute for clear thinking, logic, and common sense.... A better path to enlightenment involves reading and thinking for yourself.

Though all dictators endorse the same principle of government aggression to suppress people's liberty, some dictators are harder to detect than others. A slick neocon can seem virtuous compared to a Hitler, yet still endorse invasion and the slaughter of innocent people.

Some people charge that Obama is a socialist. He isn't a socialist in the precise sense of the word. He supports corporate medicine, central banking and international banking elites, the military-industrial complex, and, with great exuberance, the surveillance-industrial complex.

Equal justice is forgotten in our current judicial system. Wealth, power, and prestige protect the ruling class. The counterfeiters, the warmongers, and the thieves who steal from the treasury go free. Our prisons are filled will nonviolent drug users and disproportionately by minorities and the poor.

Today, however, it is often not so much that one Christian nation is fighting another as that hatred has developed between factions of Christianity and factions of Islam. I believe this is a distortion of both religions. Yet the individuals who advocate for war are adamant about the evil of the other side.

Ideas are very important for the shaping of society. In fact, they are far more powerful than bombs or armies or guns. And this is because ideas are capable of spreading without limit. They are behind all the choices we make. They can transform the world in a way that governments and armies cannot. Fighting for liberty with ideas makes much more sense to me than fighting with guns or politics or political power. With ideas, we can make real change that lasts

Intellectually and compassionately explaining the reason freedom works is required for credibility.

De Tocqueville admired "the extreme skill with which the inhabitants of the United States succeed in proposing a common object to the exertions of a great many men, and in getting them voluntarily to pursue it.

As Mises wrote in 1919, "one can say without exaggeration that inflation is an indispensable means of militarism. Without it, the repercussions of war on welfare become obvious much more quickly and penetratingly; war weariness would set in much earlier.

The system that existed in Germany at that time tragically prevented the people from protecting themselves from tyrannical government. This is a system many people vehemently want to impose in America.

Ideas are very important to the shaping of society. In fact, they are far more powerful than bombs or armies or guns. And this is because ideas are capable of spreading without limit. They are behind all the choices we make. They can transform the world in a way that governments and armies cannot. Fighting for liberty with ideas makes much more sense to me than fighting with guns or politics or political power. With ideas, we can make real change that lasts.

There is one argument against evolution that deserves consideration. If man is evolving and progressing, why is man's involvement in mass killings of one another getting worse and the struggle for peace more difficult? Government wars and exterminations in the twentieth century reached 262 million people killed by their own governments and 44 million people killed in wars. I fear that doesn't say much for the evolutionary process.