The Voice of Identity - Barack Obama & Ron Paul

The US Presidential election of 2012 could mark a watershed moment in international economics. It appears as if it will be the battleground on which the last holdouts of the Keynesian School will face off against the austerity led economics favoured by the IMF (Chu, 2011).

However, in order to have this meaningful debate, the primaries must first produce candidates who can best express the benefits of each school of thought. The candidates who have repeatedly shown themselves capable of that task have been President Barack Obama & Senator Ron Paul. Each of them firmly and intelligently represent their sides in the Keynes versus von Mises debate, respectively.

'No matter who I've met with, whether it was the business leaders today or the labour leaders I met with last week, my message has been the same: the American economy is at its strongest when we have a common set of values that it reflects - when we reward not just wealth but also work and worker's who create it, because what we've relearned in painful fashion over the past few months is that Wall Street can't thrive so long as Main Street is struggling. So to strengthen our long term economic competitiveness... we need to build an economy that lifts up all Americans. Now if we're serious about making America more competitive in the 21st century, we also have to finally solve our energy crisis... When America wanted to send a man to the moon, we put the full resources of our federal government behind it and spent over a $100 billion dollars, in today's dollars. Well I want to make an even bigger commitment to free this nation from its addiction to oil and that's why I will invest $150 billion over the next 10 years,... investments that will create up to 5 million new green jobs, that pay well and can't be outsourced and that will create billions of dollars in new business. That's the kind of leadership we need to realise the potential promise of green energy, our economy, our safety and our security and that's the kind of leadership I will offer as President of the United States'

- Then-Senator Obama, 26 June 2008.

'Government is literally out of control. Spending, taxes, regulations, monetary inflation, invasion of our privacy, welfarism to both the rich and the poor, military spending, and foreign adventurism around the world will one day precipitate a crisis that will truly test our will to live in a free society. If government were not so much out of control, would not the most conservative president of the last 50 years be able to do something about the runaway deficits? The deficits have tragically only gotten very much worse under Reagan. All the problems we face, high interest rates, inflation, deficits, vicious business cycles with accelerating unemployment are serious problems indeed, but the real threat under the conditions to come will be the potential loss of our personal liberty. Without liberty, prosperity is lost and equality of poverty prevails

- Then-Representative Ron Paul, Congressional Record - US House of Representatives, September 20, 1984.

Due to the global impact of the American economy, this is a contest that will have a huge impact on the next decade of economic thought. Considering then the importance of the debate, it seems right that it be between two of the United States' finest orators, campaigners & public thinkers.

So to supporters of libertarian small government or liberal public intervention; of free speech, free press & free peaceful assembly; of local decisions being made by local people; of constitutional rights that apply to all equally -

• getting an Obama versus Paul debate means challenging attempts to manufacture candidates and filter the news that reaches you;
• getting an Obama versus Paul debate means avoiding the inaccurate rhetoric and 'personality politics' of political popularity contests and allows for a real discussion about how people live;

- so to supporters of all sides, regardless the winner of this primarily economic presidential contest, an Obama versus Paul debate will give America a president that fought hard, a president that won the argument and a president that will likely set the tone internationally for the next decade.

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References:
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+ Ben Chu's 'Did the IMF preach austerity?'; in The Independent; 21 September 2011.

+ Senator Obama on the Economy and Energy, on YouTube; 26 June 2008.

+ Ron Paul's speech from the Congressional Record — US House of Representatives, 20 September 1984; in the article 'The Economics of a Free Society'; on Mises.org; 23 May 2008; excerpted from Ron Paul's 'Pillars of Prosperity'; Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2008.