I would think that, of all political pundits, those who are blogging and commenting on the internet would get this obvious truth. These traditional polls are about as relevant to Ron Paul’s candidacy as the number of subscriptions to newspapers are measure of where Americans are getting their information these days.

Traditional polls, especially of the Republican Party, are conducted by calling those who were registered Republicans in 2006, or maybe 2004, on landline phones. And these traditional polls have not even included Ron Paul’s name as a choice.

Ron Paul’s support is among those who have not bought a newspaper, do not have a landline phone and who, IF registered in 2004 or 2006, registered independent of any party.

So, looking at these so-called “polls” as an indicator of what is going on in this Republican Primary is about as relevant as judging how popular this blog is by looking for mention of it in your local newspaper.

He’s a CPA or something.

There were rumors of some funny financial dealings with some quetionable clients, but never heard anything hard on the allegations.

There was also talk that he was some sort of “Irwin Shiff” style tax protester.

Can’t confirm anything. Ironically, the one time I did meet him I remember him to be a very friendly and pleasant guy, though softspoken.

Well, the very last day of the campaign, election day, the entire staff was told to go into the storage room. We ended up staying there for 6 hours! They wouldn’t allow us to go out. Only the women escorted for bathroom breaks.

The join was crawling with Lawyers, Accountants and local Police Detectives from the Nassau Bay PD (Clear Lake/Houston).

They pinned it on Nadia. She ended up going to jail for 6 months, and had to pay like $200,000 in restitution.

Many of us suspected that it was far more reaching than just Nadia Hayes.

The Campaign Finance Chairman Burt Blumert (still with Ron til this day), was never implicated, neither was Ron’s new fundraisinger David Mertz, alias David James (he’s the John Bircher fundraising guy from Jesse Helms’s operation who is still with Ron after all these years.)

This is just the tip of the iceburg. I’m not even talking about the 1992 campaign which is far more mysterious.

But like I said, the media is not interested in any story that shows Ron Paul in a negative light. Ron Paul is opposed to the War in Iraq, and that’s all they care about. So, he gets a complete pass.

As I said to Eric, the media will be all over Paul should he ever look like a viable candidate.

What will really be amusing is when the Paul supporters respond to the members of the media when they report anything that is not 100% positive or which questions whether Paul can win. Assuming their email is anything like the responses I get to posts on Paul (which is a safe bet) they will get hundreds of email full of irrational rants. Virtually every comment from them, most of which never get past the moderation que, are based upon distorting what I wrote in order to respond. A large number are full of conspiracy theories as to why anyone would criticize Paul. A significant percentage express racism and/or Anti-Semitism.

While it isn’t entirely fair to blame Paul for his supporters, and those who make all this noise might not be representative of the majority of his supporters, but most people’s reaction to seeing the lunacy sent out by his supporters will be to have a more negative view. Should he pull in enough votes to get the attention of the media, negative press will lead to such responses from Paul supporters, which will lead to even more negative press.

Can you prove he embezzled any of the money?

“Of course, the liberal media loves to give Ron Paul a pass.”

It’s not because of any bias. It’s more a case of the media doing little real reporting, especially on a candidate who is doing so poorly in the polls. It is quite common for candidates to rise after getting little negative coverage. Then the reporters see stories in some of the negative aspects of the candidate and the candidate may or may not survive that. If Paul should wind up coming close to winning any primaries (and he might even win some in a divided race) then the media will look at many of the stories they are now ignoring.

It could be embezzled as it was in his 1988 Libertarian Presidential run to the tune of at least $140,000. Insiders at the time suspected it was a lot more; promised TV ads to top donors to be used by the over $3.5 million raised never materialized.

Or it could just be “withered away” as it was in Ron Paul’s brief 1992 Presidential Exploratory effort. Estimates of over $80,000 was raised in that particular campaign. When Ron Paul opted out at the last minute, using the excuse of a late night phone call from Pat Buchanan urging him to step aside, all the money raised just was forgotten about. There were vague references for a few weeks after by top Paul Fundraising Chairman Burt Blumert of Burlingame, CA, but nothing ever materialized.

Of course, the liberal media loves to give Ron Paul a pass. Notice how they haven’t delved deeply into his fundraising shenanigans from the past, and have sidestepped the whole racist issues stemming from the 1996 campaign.

So long as Ron Paul is bashing Bush and opposing the War in Iraq, the liberal media not only looks the other way on his failings, but quietly cheers him on.