06/08/16 – Ron Paul – The Scott Horton Show

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All right, y'all, introducing Dr. Ron Paul, former member of the House of Representatives.
Of course, ran for president in 08 and 12, author of Foreign Policy of Freedom, which is a great collection of speeches from the House of Representatives over the course of about, what, 30 years there of Dr. Paul's career in the U.S. House.
Also, The Revolution Manifesto, End the Fed, and Swords into Plowshares.
Of course, we rerun pretty much everything he writes at AntiWar.com every Monday.
Welcome back to the show.
Dr. Paul, how are you, sir?
Thank you, Scott.
Nice to you.
Doing fine.
Good.
Good.
Good.
Very happy to have you here, sir.
I got to tell you, I've really been missing you this year during all the presidential campaign.
We've got right authoritarianism and left authoritarianism pretty well represented, but I just don't hear that cry of freedom out there.
I was thinking back to what I like to call the greatest speaking tours on behalf of individual liberty ever, your previous presidential runs, especially the last two.
Obviously, 88 counts too, but 08 and 12, that was the real greatness.
That's where you really changed the world.
I don't know if people even remember anymore, but you used to go around telling people all the time, especially during those campaigns, hey, all we need is freedom and everything will be fine.
Everything will work itself out.
We don't need power to fix it.
I think, Dr. Paul, people just don't believe that.
Maybe they believed you then, but nobody's telling them that now.
They just don't know why that should be true when they look around them and everything seems so messed up.
I was wondering if you could remind them, make that case, especially in economic terms.
Everybody's so worried about the economy and how things are.
We see, especially on the right side this year, Donald Trump saying, I'm going to take control of this economy and I'm going to make it right.
I think what we're facing and why it's difficult is that we're fighting a culture of dependency.
The entitlement system is alive and well.
We were challenging and we were getting people to listen, but now you see that even the word socialism doesn't scare people off.
They sort of gravitate to that.
I think the fear has been built up, but the people don't quite understand what they're afraid of, and they have come to the conclusion that they think that this dependency on government can be fixed by having more dependency, and the fear can be removed by continuing to do the same things that have made people so fearful.
So if they've messed up the economy and it's the Federal Reserve, well, we just need more credit and take interest rates down to zero and all of this.
And of course, if it's entitlement, everything is free, and it's not just Sanders that says this.
You know, Hillary says it too, but then there's others from the right who say, I can fix everything.
Just turn it over to me.
I think the test that libertarians ought to look at when they're wondering about this, because I get people that will come in, if I say something reasonable about Bernie Sanders and I being against corporate welfare, they think, oh, well, this is a good deal.
We've got to work together.
And what I think people should think about along these lines is that if they decide that there is a problem with government, they should challenge this so-called bipartisanship that Republicans and Democrats are really enemies of each other.
They're really working for the same thing, and that is big government.
The real key question they ought to ask, if you come to this conclusion that philosophically the parties aren't that far apart, and that it's more freedom that you want, and you understand this, which individual that we've heard from so far, nobody since Rand left, and that is to, will any of these people now that's left, will they shrink the executive branch of government?
The executive branch of government, I think, is the biggest threat, and then the Supreme Court next.
And I think the Congress just sort of, you know, lackadaisical, and they don't do anything.
But I cannot see with either one of the two leaders actually even setting a goal, I'm going to shrink the power of the executive branch of government because they're out of control, because right now people are scared, and they're dependent, and therefore they don't want to hear that.
They want to be taken care of.
Yeah, I'm sure you've noticed.
Donald Trump doesn't talk about freedom or liberty.
Those are not part of his sales pitch whatsoever.
And when he talks about cutting government, he says, I'll waste fraud and abuse, which is the Al Gore line.
Yeah.
That's always a big fake, you know, about that.
It's the philosophy of government.
What should the role of government be?
Should the role of government try to make us better people individually, morally speaking, and teach us habits and how we get along with our fellow man?
They get out of control because they shouldn't even be doing this, and people should be left alone if they're not committing violence.
But the whole idea that we have been taught for many, many decades now, probably 100 years, is that you just can't let an economy run roughshod over the people.
And this sort of came out of the Depression, you know, that it was laissez-faire capitalism and the gold standard that ruined us and gave us the Depression.
So they really, really believe that government has to manage the economy.
And of course, they have this attitude that because we are such a great nation, we're exceptional, and nobody else is strong, and we have the military, we have a moral obligation.
They don't even see this in terms of preemptive war and aggression.
They see this as a higher ideal of moral obligation to bring about peace.
And they never look at the total failures, you know, of the foreign policy.
How many countries have we messed up in the last 15 years?
And it continues, and they're not backing off.
They're looking around for more fights, just like, you know, the NATO-U.S. buildup in Europe, the antagonistic toward Russia right now, and our idea that we have to go 8,000 miles in the other direction to see what we can do to provoke something with China.
So people have to wake up that the government can't be the solution if it's been the problem.
And of course, libertarians see the government as the problem.
We have a lot more confidence and faith in liberty, but people have to have an incentive.
People who have gotten benefits from the government because we've been very wealthy and we've had a fair amount of freedom, we have been prosperous, so they're very dependent on it.
That's one of the downsides of liberty.
You can get fat and happy, then think, well, all I have to do is go to the government to get my share.
And of course, what happens then?
The incentives are taken away, the productivity is demolished, and people, you know, get away with borrowing money, people and governments, for a lot longer until eventually the bubble bursts.
And I think we're in the midst of that occurring.
I think what we have to look forward to, unless we wake up and provide the opportunities for the people, that there's going to be a major, major economic calamity, and I think it's at our doorstep.
Well, and this is one of the areas where you really made such progress, too, is in spreading the understandings of Austrian school economics.
And if I have to boil it down to the one overriding, most important aspect of that, and that would be the way that the central bank, the government, central bank, backing the expansion of bank credit causes the artificial booms and the real busts.
And I think, you know, as you mentioned before, with the Great Depression, they always say, well, laissez-faire caused the depression, so government had to solve it.
Once people learned the truth that the Federal Reserve predated the depression by a generation or, well, not quite, but was really helped to cause it in the first place, you know, that really turned some light bulbs on, you know?
Right.
And if you had to narrow it down, we talk about the Fed and central banking, why it's not legal under the Constitution.
It's not moral when you think about it.
But if you had to narrow it down with the current system, what particular program do they mess around with that allows this to happen?
And that is the manipulation of interest rates below market rates.
And, of course, we've been doing that for a long time, especially since Bernanke's time, and that's why this bubble is so big, because we've destroyed the pricing structure of capital.
So this disturbs savings, disturbs productivity, and, of course, under these circumstances, as Mises predicted, that you can expect the middle class to be wiped out under these monetary conditions.
And that's where we are right now.
And I don't see this as a political struggle.
I see it as a philosophic struggle, and we should use, of course, the political system to bring these ideas to as many people as possible.
But ultimately, the people have to believe that liberty is successful, that we will thrive, that we will have a middle class, and it'll be more honest, and it will not serve the interest of the 1%.
When they come around to that, and I think we have the opportunity, once it's noticed that even this token effort of manipulation of the redistribution of wealth, you know, it will fail, and that's when the real challenge will be.
Are we going to look for a very, very much stronger executive branch that's going to take charge, or are we going to argue our case and win the argument that what we need is a greater incentive system with an honest monetary system and an honest tax system?
Well, and you know, it's hard for the average person usually to understand anything about central banking and boom and bust cycles, and we can't see the Fed from wherever we are.
It's far away.
But what we can see is Mexicans.
Why?
They're everywhere.
And I'm pretty sure that Lou Dobbs said that they're the reason that the economy sucks.
Maybe we should just round up 11 million Mexicans and get rid of them.
Dr. Paul, what do you think of that?
Yeah.
Well, you know, it's a tough argument to make, because, you know, the people are so resentful.
And the one thing that I have noticed, especially living in Texas and knowing who does the work in Texas, and, you know, one of the qualities of an American citizen has always been hard work and savings and self-reliance and take care of oneself.
But as I look around, when the hard work has to be done, they're usually not average American citizens who are not employed, because they're not lining up to do the work that others will volunteer to do if they can just get into this country.
So in many ways, I think the problem, I don't believe in illegal immigration, but I think there should be a much different system, because those who come are very appreciative of an opportunity to come and be able to work here.
And they have a great work ethic, and that used to be, you know, an American value.
But the welfare state and the entitlement system and the dependency has taught a lot of Americans, you know, to not really take any job they can get.
And I don't believe the cliches of those who want to change, and I don't fault the people who have some right and gripe, but they don't accept the...what they say is, well, if you allow one person to come here illegally, he's going to take the job away from somebody else.
And I just don't think that is true.
As a matter of fact, if we really had a free market, we would have a shortage of labor, and that would expand our markets, you know, and you can still do that legally, because there would be a need.
But right now, it's so out of balance, sort of like monetary policy being out of balance and savings, but the labor market's way out of balance too.
And it's very easy for the demagogue, and we find a few of those in politics, is to blame somebody else.
They don't ever look to our own policies and our politicians and say, well, you know, where we're at fault is that we've been following a philosophy on economics.
It's completely wrong, it's completely failed.
And the 20th century sort of solidified the idea that Nazism and fascism and communism didn't work, but here we are now being very tolerant of the whole idea of socialism.
And one thing that's helping us on the argument of socialism is people are pointing out, well, okay, why don't you look at Venezuela, and that's really the answer, rather than getting too academic.
Right.
Yeah, that's, there's, a libertarian can explain why Venezuela ain't working, but anybody can see that it's not working, that's definitely for sure right now.
All right, now, so what about trade?
Because, you know, of course, you're Ron Paul, I know that, and I think everybody knows, they should know, that you're not for NAFTA, you're not for GATT, you're not for the WTO, you're not for all these large international agreements, and yet you are for free trade in every single way.
And yet Donald Trump says that, you know, look, the Chinese, the Japanese, the Koreans, they're eating our lunch.
They have tariffs on our goods, but we don't have tariffs on their goods, and it's not fair and we need better deals.
And so where do you really come down on this?
Yeah, I don't want any tariffs, and especially punitive tariffs or competitive tariffs, they're wrong.
But if you just look at recent history, if you look at the tariffs on steel, we were the one that initiated that trade war going on with China right now.
And most people think, well, if you don't have an agreement, which is 100%, even Steven, then you're being cheated.
But people should relax a bit.
If you have this competitive economy and somebody's stupid enough to subsidize their exports, Milton Friedman, the one in this area, he was very good.
He says, take advantage of it, let them subsidize it.
Yes, you know, in the short run, people get very annoyed by that, but ultimately, it doesn't take away jobs.
It might make us adjust a little bit.
It might...
I remember when there was so much complaint about those dirty old Japanese cars coming into this country, but American cars were lousy, and because they couldn't ban all imports and the imports were better, all of a sudden, the American cars seem to get better and catch up a little bit.
Now, I believe in competition.
I believe strongly that the more you trade with people, the less likely you are to fight with people.
I've been always in favor of trade with Cuba, and I think we should be trading with Cuba.
And that's something people have to be confident about, that trade is a benefit, but they can see only the very short term, and then, once again, they're told, well, if you have trade, they're going to steal our jobs from us.
Well, how do we know that?
You know, maybe it'll give us an incentive to make something else.
And if we had the environment, I think we can compete with anybody.
The environment, to me, would be very, very low taxes, no income tax.
Regulations should not be done by thousands and thousands of pages, you know, in the Federal Register.
It would be a lot easier, and we wouldn't drain, you know, the resources by artificially pumping it into the military-industrial complex, you know, where we're subsidizing one industry against the other.
And this is the reason we aren't doing as well in that compound, but people who are trade protectionists never want to say that, you know, maybe there's some things that we haven't done right, either.
And the one reason you mentioned I was against those trade groups, you know, like WTO and all, I've always argued that they're not for low tariffs.
As a matter of fact, they're just the manipulators.
That's where you go when you want to raise tariffs.
Well, he did such and such.
Oh, okay, you can do this.
It's, you know, more government.
One thing that I read recently that I found fascinating is that we don't have a precise trade agreement with Great Britain, and yet for years and years and years, we've always traded.
So we don't need trade agreements.
That just invites people who, you know, the politicians and the special interests to control these things.
I think big business controls these trade groups, whether it's NAFTA or whether it's WTO or IMF.
They get the influence, and the smaller companies, the competitive companies, they don't have the same representation in these groups like the large corporations would.
All right, now, you brought up Russia there.
So let me ask you about what Hillary Clinton said in her big speech the other day about Russia is messing around, I think she said, on NATO's very doorstep.
And I wondered, you obviously clearly objected to that framing of the issue earlier in the interview here, a little bit unprompted, but I wonder if you could explain to the people who really don't know, because after all, Putin makes a pretty good boogeyman.
Why not?
Yeah.
Well, it made me chuckle a little bit because today on the Ron Paul Liberty Report, Daniel McAdams, I discussed this very thing, the NATO buildup on the Russian borders and these war games that they're playing and all.
Putin is no angel, but he's at least dealing with his borders.
And I keep trying to make the point, you know, what if Russia were like the Soviets and were building bases and missiles in Cuba, we would probably object.
But if Putin tomorrow said, well, you know, we want to spread our defenses a little bit better and Venezuela needs us, so we're going to bail them out and they're going to give us a couple bases.
I mean, that's all we ever do around the world, 130 countries we're always manipulating.
But if Russia did that, the American people would be hysterical about it.
But to go over there with NATO and have these war games, it's nothing more than a manipulation, spending more money for the military-industrial complex, and actually it's a war on our national security and our safety by getting ourselves involved.
I don't think they're ever there, that they're planning, you know, in six months we're going to attack Russia.
But who knows what could happen in between, accidents can happen, there's false flags and people get blamed for things that they didn't do.
And we're doing it all the time since 2014, they've had 16 war games in NATO, dealing with Russia's threats.
So I think people should try to be more objective about it.
But the bottom line is, it's very expensive what they're doing on our part, and also it doesn't help our national security, it endangers our national security by doing this.
So there's really no purpose in this, and it makes the Europeans, of course, to be more dependent on us.
So we're over there in Poland right now, and Poland, you know, is pretty inept and they sort of like us to back up.
But the other thing, and I have to go after this, Scott, but the other thing that I strongly objected to in the program today, and which I have in the past, and that is, well, we have obligations, we've signed NATO, and NATO says we have to do this.
Well NATO has no moral right or a constitutional right for us to sign a NATO treaty 10, 15, 30, 40 years ago, and we have all these treaties to obligate this generation and our kids to automatically fight if there is a war, which would be costly economically, and it would also involve our troops.
So I just think these treaties are absolutely immoral and illegal, and we should work to get, not just modify them and get a better deal, I want to just get out of them.
Alright, thank you again for your time, Dr. Paul.
I sure appreciate it.
Okay, Scott, good to be with you today.
Great to talk to you.
Alright y'all, that's the greatest American hero, Dr. Ron Paul, and he's the author of A Foreign Policy of Freedom, The Revolution Manifesto, End the Fed, and Swords into Plowshares, and I should have said at the top, I totally forgot, Liberty Report, daily, with the great Dan McAdams, the Liberty Report on YouTube and at libertyreport.com.
Alright y'all, Scott Horton Show, check out scotthorton.org for the archives, and to sign up for the podcast feed, scotthorton.org slash donate to help support, and follow me on Twitter, at scotthortonshow, thanks.
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