Well folks, It’s almost time!  The Iowa caucus is upon us and the country is waiting with trepidation for the results.  Who will rise up and take the lead, who will fall into obscurity, and will any of the candidates surprise us?  Well, if we are to be surprised, I would say that it is the doctor from Texas who will do it.  It seems that most of the news world has thrown in the towel for Mr. Paul.  They say there is no ”media blackout” against him, yet I watched the news almost all day today and failed to hear even the mention of his name, although I did catch an interview with Duncan Hunter!?!  But this post isn’t about some media conspiracy to hide Ron Paul’s message from the people.  It isn’t about why you should or shouldn’t vote for him.  In fact, it isn’t really about Ron Paul at all.  What it IS about is something amazing that is happening around this country and what it could show us about our future.

    If you own a computer, and you are connected to the Internet, then I would wager that you have been confronted by the “Ron Paul Revolution” at some point or another.  There is barely an online community that has not been infiltrated by posts, pictures, and videos about him.  Some say that it is the supporters themselves who are invading our interweb societies and bombarding them with endless amounts of his propaganda.  But the more I search the more evident it becomes that this is not just the result of a small group of “avid” proponents to the Ron Paul cause cruising around the Internet and “spamming” our favorite sites with his message.  No, it becomes more and more evident to me that the people who shout for “revolution” and change, those who chant Mr. Paul’s beliefs up and down Youtube, those who refuse to stop shoving him into our faces, they are the same people who populated these online communities to begin with, they were already there.

    What is the internet?  I’m starting to belive that it is nothing more important than a vehicle by which to have our voices heard, and that all this stuff about “revolution” is what happens when thousands of Americans with the power to “speak” to the world find something they passionately believe needs to be heard!  Yet, there are those who say the internet cannot be believed.  There are those who say that online polls cannot be trusted because this “faction” of “Paulites” that are mostly crazy and sometimes terrorist in nature are “messing” with them.  They say that it must not be hard to get 10,000 people to vote a certain way… ?  I don’t really understand that statement.  These people tell us that the results from their “scientific” polls are the only real results we need pay attention to.  Well, if you haven’t been living under a rock then you know that Mr. Paul has dominated online polls like, for example, the AOL online straw poll which puts him either on top or second in EVERY state!  Yet, the scientific polls done over the phone don’t even put him with double digits, usually only pulling 6%, if that.  That seems strange to me.  Something somewhere is very off in a very bad way.  Is it that the scientific polls are now outdated and no longer relevant?  Or is it so easy to manipulate online polls that a few people can change the results that significantly?  Why is it that the online world is flooded with things about candidate Ron Paul, yet if you turn on the news, you’d be lucky to hear his name?  Is all this pro Paul propaganda the work of a fervent group of internet savvy people?  Or is it that our news channels and reporters are also now outdated and no longer relevant, along with their polling system.    

    Wherever you may stand on these issues, one thing is true, the results of the caucus and primaries to follow will show us a great deal.  And whoever you support, you have to admit that what is happening across this nation in the name of Ron Paul is amazing.  Whether the good doctor becomes our next president or not, the effect his campaign, his mostly grass roots campaign, has had on the American psyche is indisputable, and I, for one, pray that the fervor and passion, the hope and hard work that have come from this movement never leaves our minds and our hearts.  This thing that is uniquely American, this thing that shouts to the mountains of “Hope” and of “Liberty”, I truly and wholeheartedly hope it sticks. 

Author: JD