by
Patrick
J. Buchanan

Recently
by Patrick J. Buchanan: GOP
War of All Against All?

Last May, Ron
Paul filed his financial disclosure form, and The Wall Street
Journal enlisted financial analyst William Bernstein to scrutinize
his investments.

“Paul’s portfolio
isn’t merely different,” said an astonished Journal, “it’s
shockingly different.”

Twenty-one
percent of his $2.4 to $5.5 million was in real estate, 14 percent
in cash. He owns no bonds. Only 0.1 percent is invested in stocks,
and Paul bought these “short,” betting the price will plunge. Every
other nickel is sunk into gold and silver mining companies.

Bernstein “had
never seen such an extreme bet on economic catastrophe,” said the
Journal.

“This portfolio,”
said Bernstein, “is a half step away from a cellar-full of canned
goods and 9-millimeter rounds.”

“You can say
this for Ron Paul,” conceded the Journal. “In investing as
in politics, (Paul) has the courage of his convictions.”

Indeed, he
does. Paul’s investments mirror his belief that the empire of debt
is coming down and Western governments will never repay – in dollars
of the same value – what they have borrowed.

And here we
come to the reason Paul ran a strong third in Iowa and a clear second
in New Hampshire. He is a conviction politician and, like Barry
Goldwater and George McGovern, the candidate of a cause.

Aware it is
unlikely he will ever be president, the 76-year-old soldiers on
in the belief that this cause will one day triumph in a party where
he was, not long ago, seen as an odd duck, but a party where today
he speaks for a national constituency.

It is easy
to understand why the young are attracted to him. There is a consistency
here no other candidate can match.

Republicans
may deplore the GOP Great Society of Bush 43. Paul stood almost
alone in voting against every Bush measure. By two-to-one, Americans
now believe the Iraq War was a mistake. Paul, alone among the candidates,
opposed the war.

And because
his campaign is about a cause larger than himself, it is a safe
bet he will not quit this race until the last caucuses have met
and the last primary has been held.

Prediction:
Paul will go into the Tampa, Fla., convention with more delegates
than any other candidate save the nominee of the party.

There is a
gnawing fear in the GOP that Paul will quit the party when the primaries
are over and run as a third-party candidate on the Libertarian or
some other line in the November election.

Not going to
happen. Such a decision would sunder the movement Paul has pulled
together, bring about his own and his party’s certain defeat in
November, and re-elect Barack Obama.

Paul would
become a pariah in his party, while his son, Sen. Rand Paul, who
would be forced to endorse his father over the GOP nominee, would
be ruined as a future Republican leader.

Why would Dr.
Paul do this, when the future inside the GOP looks bright not only
for him but for his son?

The course
Ron Paul will likely take, then, is this.

Commit to this
nomination battle all the way to Tampa, contest every primary and
caucus, amass a maximum of delegates.

If Jon Huntsman,
Rick Perry, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich lose in South Carolina,
they will lose in Florida, and begin to peel off and drop out, for
none is a cause candidate and each will soon come to realize that
his presidential aspirations are done for now if not for good.

Their departure
will leave the Republican contest a Romney-Paul race, giving Paul
half a year on the campaign trail to increase his visibility, enlarge
his following, grow his mailing lists and broaden his donor base.

In return for
a commitment to campaign for the ticket, Paul should demand a prime-time
speaking slot at the convention and use the speech to emulate Barry
Goldwater in 1960 when he admonished conservatives at the convention
to “grow up,” so that “we can take this party back.”

Assuming the
nominee is Mitt Romney, should he win in the fall and Paul has campaigned
for him, Paul will not only have a friend in the White House, but
be a respected figure in the party with a constituency all his own.

Most
important to Paul are the issues he has campaigned on: a new transparency
and accountability for the Federal Reserve, a downsizing of the
American empire, and an end to U.S. interventions in foreign quarrels
and wars that are none of our business.

Whether Paul
goes home to Texas when his last term in Congress is over in January
2013, or whether he remains in Washington in a policy institute
to advance the causes he believes in, his views will be sought out
by the major media on all the issues he cares about.

Moreover, his
fears of a coming collapse, manifest in his portfolio, could come
to pass, making of Ron Paul a prophet in his own time.

January
13, 2012

Patrick
J. Buchanan [send
him mail] is co-founder and editor of The
American Conservative. He is also the author of seven books,
including Where
the Right Went Wrong, and Churchill,
Hitler, and the Unnecessary War. His latest book is Suicide
of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025? See his
website.

Copyright
© 2012 Creators Syndicate

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