Ron Paul to be honored at GOP convention with tribute video
Photo by T.J. Kirkpatrick/Getty Images
(CBS News) To illustrate its partnership with Ron Paul and his supporters, the Romney campaign on the second night of the Republican National Convention will show a short tribute film about the libertarian-leaning congressman and former presidential candidate.
"While they certainly disagree on many issues, they always have had... a mutual respect," Romney campaign strategist Russ Schriefer said of Mitt Romney and Paul, who ran against each other in the Republican primary.
As Romney prepares to formally accept the Republican presidential nomination at the convention, there have been concerns that Paul's ardent supporters could complicate the process. After a relatively strong showing in the Republican primary, Paul still controls several hundred delegates who will participate in next week's convention. Romney campaign, however, is committed to showing its alliance with the congressman.
"Congressman Paul's people came to us and said they'd like to do a short tribute to him and we said absolutely," Schriefer told reporters on a conference call Friday. The video, he said, will feature his colleagues giving "testimony to his principles and dedication to America."
Schriefer also pointed out that Paul's son Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky is slated to speak at the Tampa, Fla., convention on Monday night.
Campaign 2012: complete coverage
"We feel that we're in a good place," he said. "We know that not everybody is going to agree with us all the time, but we know as a Republican party we're going to unite and beat Barack Obama in November."
The Republican delegates will start the roll call vote to nominate Romney on Monday, the first day of the convention. There were reports that the vote was starting early in part because of concerns about Paul's delegates, but the Romney campaign maintains the roll call vote was always slated to start Monday. Romney is still slated to formally accept the nomination on Thursday.
The overall convention theme is "A better future," Schriefer said, while the last night, Thursday night, will focus more specifically on telling Romney's story "in a very complete way."
Part of Thursday night's program will include several people who worked with Romney in the Mormon church, including a church leader who succeeded Romney and will talk about what it was like "to fill Romney's shoes."
The campaign has also rounded up about 15 Olympians to appear at the convention, highlighting Romney's stewardship of the 2002 Salt Lake City games. At least three of them will speak at the convention, including skeet shooter Kim Rhode, speed skater Derek Parra, and Michael Eruzione, the captain of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" hockey team.
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Ron Paul and his millions of supporters know that there is almost no difference between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.
Both Romney and Obama support:
Assassinating American citizens without due process;
The indefinite detention of American citizens without charge, trial, or attorney;
Warrantless spying on American citizens;
Federal restrictions on gun ownership;
The George W. Bush foreign policy of pre-emptive, unconstitutional, undeclared no-win wars of aggression;
Sending your money to foreign dictators to prop up their repressive regimes;
The racist War on Drugs responsible for more Americans being imprisoned than in any other nation;
Wall Street bank bailouts of Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan Chase which fund their campaigns;
Corporatism or crony capitalism, favoritism of privileged elite special interests, and the concept of "too big to fail."
Both Romney and Obama oppose:
Balancing the budget in less than 30 years;
Paying down the 16 trillion dollar national debt;
10th Amendment rights of states to make their own laws or nullify unconstitutional federal legislation;
Ending the Federal Reserve banking system which enables the American empire overseas and its welfare-warfare State at-home.
why not hold a tribute for Todd Akin as well?!?
It's kind of like a door prize or most colorful costume prize.
All you have is fear mongering.
That's the extent of it.
end this FOOLISH tyranny!
SUPPORT..............ANYONE, ANYONE at Else!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ALL in Support of Marvin the Martian,....say ...AYE!
PICK ANY FICTITIOUS CANDIDATE AS A WRITE IN! ...maybe sponge-bob? maybe Darth Vader?... who ...........flippin .............cares!..........
I'm about down with a revolution really really soon... just sayin.
1. He's a liar
CBS' "The Early Show," January 3, 2012
Gingrich: "Well, you seem shocked by it! This is a man whose staff created the PAC, his millionaire friends fund the PAC, he pretends he has nothing to do with the PAC - it's baloney. He's not telling the American people the truth..."
"I just think he ought to be honest with the American people and try to win as the real Mitt Romney, not try to invent a poll-driven, consultant-guided version that goes around with talking points, and I think he ought to be candid. I don't think he's being candid and that will be a major issue. From here on out from the rest of this campaign, the country has to decide: Do you really want a Massachusetts moderate who won't level with you to run against Barack Obama who, frankly, will just tear him apart? He will not survive against the Obama machine."
2. He's not a conservative
CBS' "The Early Show," January 3, 2012
"It's just like this pretense that he's a conservative. Here's a Massachusetts moderate who has tax-paid abortions in 'Romneycare,' puts Planned Parenthood in 'Romneycare,' raises hundreds of millions of dollars of taxes on businesses, appoints liberal judges to appease Democrats, and wants the rest of us to believe somehow he's magically a conservative."
3. He can't win
Concord, N.H., Jan. 4, 2012
"I find it amazing the news media continues to say he's the most electable Republican when he can't even break out of his own party...The fact is, Gov. Romney in the end has a very limited appeal in conservative party."
4. His immigration reform plan is an "Obama level fantasy"
Univision interview, Jan. 25, 2012
"Now, for Romney to believe that somebody's grandmother is going to be so cut off she is going to self deport? This verges - this is an Obama level fantasy. He certainly shows no concern for the humanity of people who are already here..."
"I think you have to live in worlds of Swiss bank accounts and Cayman Island accounts and automatic $20 million a year income with no work to have some fantasy this far from reality."
5. He profits off the poor
CNN debate, Jan. 26, 2012
"Maybe Governor Romney in the spirit of openness should tell us how much money he's made off of how many households that have been foreclosed by his investments."
6. He looted companies as head of Bain Capital
Manchester, NH, Jan. 9, 2012
"Now you have to ask a question - is that really, is capitalism really about the ability of a handful of rich people to manipulate the lives of thousands of other people and walk off with the money? Or is that in fact somehow a little bit of a flawed system? And so I do draw distinction between looting a company, leaving behind broken families and broken neighborhoods and then leaving a factory that should be there."
7. He's full of "pious baloney"
NBC News/ Facebook debate, Jan. 8, 2012
"Can we drop a little bit of the pious baloney? The fact is, you ran in '94 and lost. That's why you weren't serving in the Senate with Rick Santorum. The fact is, you had a very bad re-election rating, you dropped out of office, you had been out of state for something like 200 days preparing to run for president. You didn't have this interlude of citizenship while you thought about what you do. You were running for president while you were governor."
8. Romney's adviser was right to compare Romney to an etch-a-sketch
Lake Charles, La., March 21, 2012
"Now given everybody's fears about Gov. Romney's flip flops, to have his communications director say publicly to all of us, if we're dumb enough to nominate him we should expect by the acceptance speech he'll move back to the left, triggers everything people are worried about."
"Their pictures aren't permanent. There's nothing locked down. You can re-do every time you want. And that's the problem."
9. He's a timid leader who can't bring about change
Des Moines, Iowa, Jan. 4, 2012
Romney's a "Massachusetts moderate who, in fact, is pretty good at managing the decay." He's "given no evidence in his years in Massachusetts of any ability to change the culture or change the political structure."
10. He's out of touch and thinks we're stupid
Mt. Dora, Fla. Jan. 26, 2012
"We're not going to beat Barack Obama with some guy who has Swiss bank accounts, Cayman Island accounts, owns shares of Goldman Sachs while it forecloses on Florida and is himself a stockholder in Freddie Mae and Freddie Mac while he tries to think the rest of us are too stupid to put the dots together to understand what this is all about."
What irritates me about talk of less regulation and smaller government is the fact that that is what partly led to the mess we are in now. With more regulation there may have not been a mortgage crisis, near failures of the banks, etc. Corporations left to their own devices will simply do what makes the most money, bottom line. Getting rid of regulations will only make things worse next time. IN fact it can be argued we need bigger government and more regulations to protect the citizens from the corporation bent on just making a profit. regulations and testing of imported goods so little kids are not playing with lead laced toys or brushing their teeth with toothpaste with harmful chemical sweetners. Consumer protections from outrageous interest rates, Environmental Protections to protect our water from pollution as well as being taken over by corporate interests. Less regulations give Corporations the power and all we are then is a consumer that will make them money, their interest is not to make you safe, feel better, protect you it is about profit. Government is there to protect you by using regulations. We don't need less regulations that is of course unless the goal is to make corporations richer. That is not the kind of government I want. Provide for the public welfare not the corporate ... oh how we have strayed.