It's Time for Civil Disobedience

It's Time for Civil Disobedience
by Jake Morphonios

"I couldn't stop this movement if I tried." - Ron Paul in
an LA Times interview.

Ron Paul will not be President of the United States. He
has confirmed repeatedly that he will not run as a third-party or
independent candidate. He has already admitted that he cannot win the
Republican nomination. "Let me tell you my thoughts. With Romney gone, the
chances of a brokered convention are nearly zero."

Paul supporters that keep hoping that he can snatch up all
the delegates of Romney, Huckabee, Guiliani and other GOP candidates are
fooling themselves and wasting valuable time. There is absolutely NO WAY
that Paul can win the Republican nomination.

The Republican party has not reflected a belief in
constitutional principles for decades. The party is dead and cannot be
resurrected. I spit on its grave. I say, let this monstrocity die its
rightful death.

Ron Paul is not the revolution. We are.

How do we want to procede? Consider Ron Paul's support
base: disenchanted Republicans, anti-war Democrats, Libertarians and
Independents... does anyone really believe that these parties want to form
ranks behind Ron Paul to save the Republican party? NO.

The answer is not to shut our mouths and be loyal to a
corrupt party, hoping against hope that one day it will return to sanity and
a constitutionally-sound party platform. Even if Paul is successful in
sending enough delegates to the nominating convention to have some influence
on how the party planks should be written, does anyone expect the neo-cons
to abide by the platform? If they won't follow the US Constitution then they
won't follow a Constitutional party platform. Duh!

We have accomplished too much in the past year to go away
quietly. We have been snubbed by ignorant voters who don't even know the
difference between a republic and a democracy or between capitalism and
socialism. We have been insulted and silenced by the mainstream media, under
the control of corporate dictators like Rupert Murdoch. We have been called
kooks, nuts, and Paul-tards.

Now the movement is fracturing because there is no clear
objective.

I propose a new course:

DEMAND REFORM THROUGH CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

Ron Paul has said many times that he believes in civil
disobedience. Read comments he made on the floor of the House of
Representatives on May 22, 2007:

"Resistance need not be violent, but the civil
disobedience that might be required involves confrontation with the state
and invites possible imprisonment."

"Peaceful non-violent revolutions against tyranny have
been every bit as successful as those involving military confrontation.
Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. achieved great political
successes by practicing non-violence, yet they themselves suffered
physically at the hands of the state."

"But whether the resistance against government tyrants
is non-violent or physically violent, the effort to overthrow state
oppression qualifies as true patriotism."

"True patriotism today has gotten a bad name at least
from the government and the press. Those who now challenge the
unconstitutional methods of imposing an income tax on us, or force us to use
a monetary system designed to serve the rich at the expense of the poor, are
routinely condemned. These American patriots are sadly looked down upon by
many. They are never praised as champions of liberty as Gandhi and Martin
Luther King Jr. have been."

"Liberals, who withhold their taxes as a protest against
war, are vilified as well especially by conservative statists."

"Unquestioned loyalty to the state is especially
demanded in times of war. Lack of support for a war policy is said to be
unpatriotic. Arguments against a particular policy that endorses a war once
it's started, are always said to be endangering the troops in the field.
This, they blatantly claim, is unpatriotic and all dissent must stop. Yet it
is dissent from government policies that defines the true patriot and
champion of liberty..."

I believe that if we are to keep our revolution alive, we
must strike hard against tyranny. We must organize a grand march on
Washington DC. We must commit acts of non-violent civil disobedience to wake
this country up.

All successful civil rights campaigns, from women's
suffrage to equality for blacks, involved a march on Washington DC and the
extensive use of sit-ins, protests, demonstrations, and other forms of
non-violent civil disobedience.

I think we should begin a substantive discussion of what
actions we can take individually and as a whole to demonstrate our absolute
refusual to continue to tolerate government tyranny against us and our
families.

To those of you who feel no anger, I invite you to go back
to suckling the beast that feeds you. Fair-weather supporters who are too
afraid to stand up for their rights against a vicious government are welcome
to stay out of the way of those of us wishing to emulate the founding
patriots of our nation who spent more than trite words for the just cause of
liberty.

I leave you with Dr. Paul's words from this past January:

"The whole world is watching how we do today.. on a day
dedicated to the memory of Martin Luther King, the great champion of
non-violence at home, peace abroad, and civil disobedience against
tyrannical government."