Last quarter, FMNN was first with the news that Ron Paul's effort might result in a fund-surge of between $3 and $5 million. As it turned out the campaign raised almost $2.5 million, and this quarter, there are reports that Ron Paul could top that number significantly. But by how much?
The campaign itself has indicated that this quarter's total will exceed last quarter's - and that was apparently before the big fund-raising push to raise an additional $500,000. Now this $500,000 goal has been upped to $1 million and rumors are flying that the $3 million-plus that the campaign has seemingly acknowledged may be a good deal more than that.
How much more? Speculation is a game being played on many Ron Paul oriented web sites and posting boards. Whatever the total is, it will likely catch the attention of other candidates, Democratic and Republican who have been struggling with fund raising. John McCain has long been short on cash; Mitt Romney has injected a good deal of his personal fortune into his campaign; Rudy Giuliani's fund-raising head recently quit. Tancredo, Brownback and Hunter never attracted significant funds to begin with.
There is an observation, probably more true than not, that most politicans, with the exception of Ron Paul, are likely to lack a sense of a strong personal identity. Politics attracts those whose stock in trade is the ability to be "liked" on a surface level and a craving for that sort of attention. Often this leads to much more severe problems - as such people lack a moral compass and thus are as likely to give away billions without a second thought as they are to authorize brutality and commit murder - if they believe those around them approve. Such is their craving for attention and "instinct for survival."
Bearing this in mind, the question must be asked: Will Ron Paul's fund raising success (money being the currency of popularity) lead other in his party to rethink their current attraction to authoritarianism. Is Ron Paul's fund-raising success going to spawn a generation of GOP politicians that will utilize the rhetoric of libertarian-conservativism? In fact, Fred Thompson - a prototypical politician of the authoritarian variety - has already adopted Ron Paul's playbook on almost all issues but the war. And other GOP politicians are lurching in that direction as well.
FMNN has predicted that Ron Paul is leading a coming resurgance of libertarian-rhetoric at a national political level. He is literally changing the language of politics, much as did Barry Goldwater in the 1960s.
While the language is changing because "that's where the money is" and because the rhetoric must flow to areas that are not yet debased, such ephemera is yet noteworthy. Human beings are creatures of language and when the vocabulary shifts, so too do thought patterns. In the next decade, political pundits will endlessly debate the nuances of the platform that Ron Paul has erected and funded. This was exactly his hope, and he has already succeeded - probably beyond his "wildest dreams."
Ron Paul's current monetary success is no more than a yardstick; yet it is noteworthy and bound to have an impact far beyond what is apparent now. The combination of Ron Paul's fund raising success and rhetoric is literally changing the face of American politics. Think what will happen if he actually wins a primary.
