Ron Paul's Raised $4 Million In One Day - Shocks Presidential Race

Maverick Paul sets one-day, GOP fundraising record

By BENNETT ROTH
Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — Maverick GOP presidential contender Ron Paul of Lake Jackson continued his fundraising juggernaut, raking in $4.3 million in one day over the Internet.

The 24-hour fundraising drive on Monday brought Paul's contributions to $7.3 million so far for the final quarter of this year, eclipsing the $5.4 million he raised in the third quarter.

Paul received 38,000 donations during the drive, which was spearheaded by the candidate's supporters in honor of Guy Fawkes Day, which commemorates Fawkes, a British mercenary who unsuccessfully sought to kill King James I on Nov. 5, 1605. Fawkes was also the inspiration for the novel and movie V for Vendetta, in which the lead character takes on a fascist government in Britain.

The Libertarian-leaning Paul is a strong opponent of many government programs and is the only Republican candidate for the White House advocating troop withdrawal from Iraq.

On Paul's Web site, his fundraising director, Jonathan Bydlak, called the cash haul "Earth-shattering, jaw-dropping ... No matter which way you phrase it, Ron Paul is for real."

Paul now holds the record among Republican White House candidates for fundraising on a single day, according to the Associated Press. Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton has raised the most, $6.2 million, on a single day during the current campaign.

While he has built a fervent fan base over the Internet, Paul still remains mired in the low single digits in most national polls.

Paul's spokesman Jesse Benton said the influx of funds will allow the candidate to increase his name recognition. Paul is already airing television and radio commercials in New Hampshire and radio spots in Iowa, South Carolina and Nevada.

Benton said the campaign has already increased its staff to 70 people.

bennett.roth@chron.com


COMMENTS
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Most recent comments

TheOddball81 wrote:
Good point, _NH. We may appear to have a two-party system, but there's really only one party. The goal of the media is to get the majority of Americans to support a pair of CFR candidates. Hillary, Obama, Romney, and Giuliani are not front-runners because they are loved by the most people or because they have the best positions on issues. They are front-runners because the mainstream media says so. This way, all media attention is devoted to these front-runners, and the public sees these candidates as "rational" choices, and they vote for them in the primaries. We are all programmed to accept the choices given to us, and have been for many years. Finally, someone like Ron Paul has come along who is not a pre-packaged puppet and actually stands for something and loves his country.
11/7/2007 2:16:24 AM
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jmunjr wrote:
"Libertarians (such as Paul) don't believe in social security, medicaid, AFDC, health insurance for poor children and many other programs not specified by the constitution."

So what is your point? All of those things are responsibilities of the STATES!!! Period. Paul would not eliminate Social Security either, but he would give the people who stand to gain absolutely nothing from it(younger people) a choice to opt-out while still taking care of those who put into all their lives.

My only fear about Paul is this country has gotten so used to getting handouts from the government that they won't vote for the guy because the handouts will stop. But guess what? You'll get far more after the federal income tax is eliminated. Granted the states will try to get more of it but you'll still end up with a heck of a lot more than you'll get from the federal government, and you'll get to choose how you'll spend it. This country if led by Paul would be more productive, richer, and freer than we've ever seen. Don't be a sheep and fall for the same old rouse put on by the Democrats and neo-conservatives.

Even if you don't like Paul, nobody from the Democrats or the rest of the Republicans has any qualities worth admiring. Most are nearly all pro-war, including Hillary, ALL want to spend out of control, and none of them genuinely want to protect our liberty, and that folks is the #1 role of our federal government.

The leaders of this nation have failed us. It is time for someone new to restore our Republic and make America the great country it once was.
11/7/2007 2:11:26 AM
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_NH wrote:
Trouble is, Hillary and Mitt's numbers are for PLEDGES not actual donations so Paul bested them too!

Look it up.

RON PAUL IS THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN BEAT HILLARY. They know it and probably won't care because either Rudy or Hillary is acceptable as they are one and the same.
11/7/2007 1:44:11 AM
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antiwardoc wrote:
Oops, I meant Romney and Clinton, sorry. As State of Brain says, the FEC filings showed that Romney only raised 3.1 MIL, and the Clinton total was collected over the course of 1 week, not in a single day.
11/6/2007 11:55:59 PM
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antiwardoc wrote:
See the press conference today by Jonathan Bydlak, Ron Paul's press secretary. They investigated the Kerry and Clinton claims of having raised about 5-6 million dollars in a single day, and both were false. The press conference is posted at ronpaul2008.com
11/6/2007 11:54:19 PM
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Ron Paul Searches Rank High On Technorati Again Today

The appearance of searches for Ron Paul blog posts has become a daily affair on Technorati.com, and today's no exception at all.

Many are writing about Paul's performance in Sunday's Republican Debate, which I did not see. Plus it seems that Fox News is at war with Ron Paul, blocking any positive news about his debate performance, or reporting that he won the post-debate poll Fox established.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer Interviews Ron Paul - Video

This interview reveals Ron Paul's first CNN interview on the Situation Room. He did well just be speaking planly. It -- this performance -- is why I'd like to see my CNN/YouTube Republican Debate Question answered. I want to hear his response.

Ron Paul, Bill O'Reilly, Politics, Blacks and Racism

This video spawned from the reactions I got from my first two videos on the subject of Ron Paul, Bill O'Reilly, Blacks and politics, as well as the "window" that was opened to another part of how society thinks.

Overall, I think it's very good to have a dialog on race as many of the improvements in American society and racial and sexual relations have come within the last 70 years, but many young adults active in politics now were born after the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment and the Civil Rights Act before it. Thus, they lack a real tangible understanding of how America was and why these laws are on the books.

Congressman Ron Paul's presidential run has drawn many young people – many of whom lack an understanding that laws are in place to protect us from ourselves – or more to the point, each other. Thus, one person wrote to advocate dropping hate crime laws because they bought in to Ron Paul's expressed idea that to point out racism is racist – forgetting that Congressman Paul himself was recently recorded as pointing to an act that's racist.

But many Paul supporters got after me about asking a question about Paul's 1996 campaign newsletter and its racist statements for the CNN/ YouTube Republican Debates . I've not seen Congressman Paul address this question in the Presidential Race or in the debate of last week. As I state in both videos, I think it's time he did, and to denounce the support he gets from White Supremacist groups.

Some wrote comments that Paul's participation in the "African American hosted" debate moderated by Tavis Smiley was evidence of his lack of any racist thought. I disagree with this because Pau's a free marketier who seems to enjoy arguing with people (thus his appearance), but came away convinced that Paul could handle answering the question I posted for the CNN/ YouTube Debates. Indeed, a question that still remains unanswered.

I was also upset with that debate, as it placed the African American inferiority complex on display for a public audience. We see a debate where the Presidential candidates are thanked for attending and much time is spent chastising those who did not. In other words, thanks for remembering us Black Americans. Who cares if Giuliani, Thompson, Romney, and McCain didn't come? And why thanks the candidates who did come? Heck, they're supposed to be there in my view.

The other video that received a lot of views and controversy was my innocent video essay blasting Bill O'Reilly for his weird comments upon visiting Silvia's, an upscale Harlem soul food restaurant. O'Reilly said essentially that he was surprised to find the Black owners and patrons created a nice restaurant that was "like any other New York restaurant."

For Bill to make that statement in 2007, with the CEO of American Express being Black, and with other examples of Blacks who are running companies and cities, and restaurants, I was totally upset with Bill, and don't know what drove him to make statements like this.

Bill spent the entire week hammering CNN and other news outlets for hammering him on his statement. He enlisted the help of Fox News Contributor Juan Williams who was the voice on the other end of Bill in the now famous clip. Williams, who's Black, explained that O'Reilly had done nothing wrong at all and that they disagree all the time.

But Williams is a friend of O'Reilly and thus not really eligible to make comments as he's got a bias toward his friend. O'Reilly is not my friend or yours – we don't know him well enough to be comfortable with the "friendly racism" he expresses, nor should we. Williams is certainly a good friend, but he didn't get Bill off the hook in this case.

In closing, I'm happy we have an active dialog about race and racism, but I'm most displeased with the debate's display of African America's inferiority complex – it's something that must be eliminated and soon. We need to remove these mental chains and grow.

Ron Paul and Racism - CNN/YouTube Republican Debate Question

This question for the CNN/YouTube Republican Debates is based on an article I found in the Houston Chronicle and dated May 23, 1996. In the article, which I present below and has this link: Houston Chroncle Ron Paul Article .

9:16 PM 5/22/1996
Newsletter excerpts offer ammunition to Paul's opponent
GOP hopeful quoted on race, crime
By ALAN BERNSTEIN

Copyright 1996 Houston Chronicle Political Writer
Texas congressional candidate Ron Paul's 1992 political newsletter highlighted portrayals of blacks as inclined toward crime and lacking sense about top political issues.

Under the headline of "Terrorist Update," for instance, Paul reported on gang crime in Los Angeles and commented, "If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be."

Paul, a Republican obstetrician from Surfside, said Wednesday he opposes racism and that his written commentaries about blacks came in the context of "current events and statistical reports of the time."

Selected writings by Paul were distributed Wednesday by the campaign of his Democratic opponent, Austin lawyer Charles "Lefty" Morris.

Morris said many of Paul's views are "out there on the fringe" and that his commentaries will be judged by voters in the November general elections.

Paul said allegations about his writings amounted to name-calling by the Democrats and that his opponents should focus instead on how to shrink government spending and reform welfare.

Morris and Paul are seeking the 14th Congressional District seat held by Greg Laughlin of West Columbia. Laughlin lost the Republican primary to Paul, a former congressman and the Libertarian Party's 1988 presidential candidate.

Paul, writing in his independent political newsletter in 1992, reported about unspecified surveys of blacks.

"Opinion polls consistently show that only about 5 percent of blacks have sensible political opinions, i.e. support the free market, individual liberty and the end of welfare and affirmative action," Paul wrote.

Paul continued that politically sensible blacks are outnumbered "as decent people." Citing reports that 85 percent of all black men in the District of Columbia are arrested, Paul wrote:

"Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the `criminal justice system,' I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal," Paul said.

Paul also wrote that although "we are constantly told that it is evil to be afraid of black men, it is hardly irrational. Black men commit murders, rapes, robberies, muggings and burglaries all out of proportion to their numbers."

A campaign spokesman for Paul said statements about the fear of black males mirror pronouncements by black leaders such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who has decried the spread of urban crime.

Paul continues to write the newsletter for an undisclosed number of subscribers, the spokesman said.

Writing in the same 1992 edition, Paul expressed the popular idea that government should lower the age at which accused juvenile criminals can be prosecuted as adults.

He added, "We don't think a child of 13 should be held responsible as a man of 23. That's true for most people, but black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such."

Paul also asserted that "complex embezzling" is conducted exclusively by non-blacks.

"What else do we need to know about the political establishment than that it refuses to discuss the crimes that terrify Americans on grounds that doing so is racist? Why isn't that true of complex embezzling, which is 100 percent white and Asian?" he wrote.

In later newsletters, Paul aimed criticism at the Israeli government's U.S. lobbying efforts and reported allegations that President Clinton used cocaine and fathered illegitimate children.

Stating that lobbying groups who seek special favors and handouts are evil, Paul wrote, "By far the most powerful lobby in Washington of the bad sort is the Israeli government" and that the goal of the Zionist movement is to stifle criticism.

Relaying a rumor that Clinton was a longtime cocaine user, Paul wrote in 1994 that the speculation "would explain certain mysteries" about the president's scratchy voice and insomnia.

"None of this is conclusive, of course, but it sure is interesting," he said.

------------------------

Someone wrote that his statements were "true." Well, that's not so at all. The studies Paul reffers to are unidentified and anyone believing this is looking for some "emprirical" reason to hold a racist viewpoint. Racism is a mental illness that must be treated and eliminated. Congressman Paul must deal with this question of racism because it's based on material produced by him and his campaign.

Moreover, Paul has White Supremacist David Duke as a supporter and gives interviews to the John Birch Society. Yikes.

Ron Paul Video Mashup Of 2008 Republican Fox Debate

To say that Congressman Ron Paul was effective on Wednesday is an understatement. He managed to establish the terms of debate in the campaign and capture the hearts of his fans on the Internet. This video shows -- amoung other things -- Congressman Paul's exchange with Arkansas Governor Mike Hukabee, the text of which is below the video.



MR. WALLACE: Congressman Paul -- (interrupted by cheers, applause) -- Congressman Paul, your position on the war is pretty simple: Get out. What about, though, trying to minimize the bloodbath that would certainly occur if we pull out in a hurry? What about protecting the thousands of Iraqis who have staked their lives in backing the U.S.? And would you leave troops in the region to take out any al Qaeda camps that are developed after we leave?
REP. PAUL: The people who say there will be a bloodbath are the ones who said it would be a cakewalk, it would be slam dunk, and that it would be paid for by oil. Why believe them? They've been wrong on everything they've said. Why not ask the people -- (interrupted by cheers) -- why not ask the people who advise not to go into the region and into the war? The war has not gone well one bit.

Yes, I would leave, I would leave completely. Why leave the troops in the region? The fact that we had troops in Saudi Arabia was one of the three reasons given for the attack on 9/11. So why leave them in the region? They don't want our troops on the Arabian Peninsula. We have no need for our national security to have troops on the Arabian Peninsula, and going into Iraq and Afghanistan and threatening Iran is the worst thing we can do for our national security.

I am less safe, the American people are less safe for this. It's the policy that is wrong. Tactical movements and shifting troops around and taking in 30 more and reducing by five, totally irrelevant. We need a new foreign policy that said we ought to mind our own business, bring our troops home, defend this country, defend -- (bell sounds) -- our borders --

MR. WALLACE: So if --
(Interrupted by cheers, applause.)

MR. WALLACE: So, Congressman Paul, and I'd like you to take 30 seconds to answer this, you're basically saying that we should take our marching orders from al Qaeda? If they want us off the Arabian Peninsula, we should leave? (Laughter.)

REP. PAUL: No! (Cheers, applause.) I'm saying -- (laughter) -- I'm saying we should take our marching orders from our Constitution. We should not go to war -- (cheers, applause) -- we should not go to war without a declaration. We should not go to war when it's an aggressive war. This is an aggressive invasion. We've committed the invasion of this war, and it's illegal under international law. That's where I take my marching orders, not from any enemy. (Cheers, boos.)

After a couple of other candidates had a crack at the question, Wallace let Huckabee get a little action.

MR. WALLACE: Governor Huckabee, the latest National Intelligence Estimate, which is out recently, says that even if we continue the troop surge -- and we're going to put it up on the screen -- Iraq's security will continue to improve modestly during the next six to 12 months, but levels of insurgent and sectarian violence will remain high, and the Iraqi government will continue to struggle to achieve national-level political reconciliation and improved governance.
Governor, if that's the best we can hope for, should we continue the surge?

MR. HUCKABEE: We have to continue the surge. And let me explain why, Chris. When I was a little kid, if I went into a store with my mother, she had a simple rule for me. If I picked something off the shelf of the store and I broke it, I bought it.

I learned don't pick something off the shelf I can't afford to buy.

Well, what we did in Iraq, we essentially broke it. It's our responsibility to do the best we can to try to fix it before we just turn away because something is at stake. Senator McCain made a great point, and let me make this clear. If there's anybody on this stage that understands the word honor, I've got to say Senator McCain understands that word -- (applause, cheers) -- because he has given his country a sacrifice the rest of us don't even comprehend. (Continued applause.)


Wait a minute, isn't this the famous Colin Powell Pottery Barn rule? Are we supposed to now call it the Mama Huckabee rule? Anyway, Huckabee continued...

And on this issue, when he says we can't leave until we've left with honor, I 100 percent agree with him because, Congressman, whether or not we should have gone to Iraq is a discussion that historians can have, but we're there. We bought it because we broke it. We've got a responsibility to the honor of this country and to the honor of every man and woman who has served in Iraq and ever served in our military to not leave them with anything less than the honor that they deserve. (Cheers, applause.)
MR. HUME: Go ahead. You wanted to respond? He just addressed you; you go ahead and respond. (Continued applause.)

REP. PAUL: The American people didn't go in. A few people advising this administration, a small number of people called the neoconservative hijacked our foreign policy. They're responsible, not the American people. They're not responsible. We shouldn't punish them. (Cheers, applause.)

MR. HUCKABEE: Congressman, we are one nation. We can't be divided. We have to be one nation under God. That means if we make a mistake, we make it as a single country, the United States of America, not the divided states of America. (Cheers.)

REP. PAUL: No. When we make a mistake -- (interrupted by applause) -- when we make a mistake, it is the obligation of the people through their representatives to correct the mistake, not to continue the mistake! (Cheers, applause.)

MR. HUCKABEE: And that's what we do on the floor of the --

REP. PAUL: No! We've dug a hole for ourselves and we dug a hole for our party!

We're losing elections and we're going down next year if we don't change it, and it has all to do with foreign policy, and we have to wake up to this fact.

MR. HUCKABEE: Even if we lose elections, we should not lose our honor, and that is more important to the Republican Party.

REP. PAUL: We're losing -- we've lost over -- (cheers, applause) -- we have lost -- we have lost 5,000 Americans killed in -- we've lost over 5,000 Americans over there in Afghanistan and Iraq and plus the civilians killed. How many more do you want to lose? How long are we going to be there? How long -- what do we have to pay to save face? That's all we're doing is saving face. It's time we came home!

MR. HUME: Okay, gentlemen. Gentlemen, thank you. (Cheers, applause.)

YouTube Metrics and The 2008 Presidential Race

I’m writing this blog post to answer a question posed by Micha Sifry over at TechPresident and also to clear some glaring errors in what was an otherwise interesting article.

Sifry write that she’s “thinking out loud about YouTube metrics, but doesn’t include all of the metrics. Sifry wants to know if there’s a relationship between the number of YouTube subscribers and viewership. The answer is it’s more complicated than that. But before I explain why, I need to clean up these problems in Sifry’s article.

Take a look at this. This article was written on August 16th 2007. This is August 29, 2007. Sifry states that “John Edwards' (You Tube) numbers are somewhat higher than the other leading Democratic candidates because his campaign is using YouTube as the player for videos on his own site, while Obama uses Brightcove and Clinton uses an in-house tool.”

Really?

I wonder which numbers Sifry was looking at?

I created a table that compares the YouTube statistical numbers for the Democratic Candidates with those of the Internet’s top Republican Challenger Ron Paul. Now keep in mind I’m pulling these numbers straight from the channel pages of each candidate’s YouTube page.

Let’s look at the results.

The leader in this area by a massive margin is Senator Obama, who has 11 million channel views. As you can see, the closes follower isn’t that close at all.

Now from this, we should expect Barack Obama’s video views to be so far ahead of everyone else’s that there’s no comparison. Indeed, a look at my own channel statistics, which you can’t see, but I can from my account, shows my overall video views to be ahead of my channel views.

But when I use TubeMogul, the best evaluator and recorder of online video traffic ever constructed, we get results that imply fewer video views than the 11 million subscribers. But here’s the problem – and I think it’s one that Sifry had – but did not see – in looking at YouTube Metrics using TubeMogul. TubeMogul only captures a date range going back six months; Senator Obama’s YouTube channel was established almost one year ago. So while we can’t see Senator Obama’s account to learn how many video views he has, I can safely say that the video views do outpace the channel views.

One major reason for this is something not properly recorded by YouTube – it’s called the embed code. It allows you to install someone’s video on your blog or website. The trouble us, YouTube only records links, not embeds, in video stats.

So an Obama video can be set and then played and replayed and there would be no record of the embed, but high video view stats, higher even than channel views.

On top of all that, Obama has more videos posted on YouTube than many candidates. Ron Paul, the overall view leader, has just 44 videos on his channel. Considering Paul’s popularity, he’s not got enough videos out there to take advantage of it. His view numbers should be far higher than they are, and they would be with 100 more videos.

Finally, it’s very important for candidates to take YouTube even more seriously than they do. It commands 60 percent of the video distribution market share, and the next closest competitor MySpace Videos only has 16 percent of the market, and then Google Video (which really doesn’t count here) has 8 percent. Plus, there are about 70 YouTube-type companies, which makes challenging YouTube’s market share almost impossible (here that NBC!?)

The lesson here is three-fold – first the relationship between YouTube subscribers is more complicated than it seems, second, TubeMogul can only capture part of the picture, not the whole, and third that people do see the candidate message on YouTube, and given the shift in YouTube’s demographics to an older audience and for no other reason than the mainstreaming of YouTube, an audience more likely to vote in the 2008 Presidential Race.

YouTube and Ron Paul Top Technorati Searches Today

Man. I can understand YouTube, but Ron Paul's on Technorati every day. I think Barack Obama would be there too, if the BarackObama.com website were Technorati registered.

Hmm.....

Not taking anything away from Ron Paul.

Ron Paul - My YouTube Question For The Hon. Ron Paul (R) Texas - Zennie Abraham