Let’s Make a Deal: The GOP is Extorting Ron Paul to Prevent his Nomination at the Convention

By:  Jaret Glenn

Several news websites have announced that the Ron Paul campaign and the Republican National Committee have “struck a deal” over the seating of Paul’s delegates to the Republican National Convention in Tampa:

In an article titled, “Ron Paul Delegates Set to Strike Deal with RNC”, CNN’s Political Director Mark Preston reports “both sides are close to announcing a deal that could help avoid a potentially embarrassing moment for Mitt Romney on the day he receives the GOP presidential nomination”.   This deal “will seat more Paul delegates at next week’s…convention”.   The RNC will seat 17 delegates from Louisiana and “additional” delegates from Massachusetts.  Parts of Paul’s platform (including an audit of the Fed and push for internet freedom) will be added to the Republican Party platform and his son, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, will also get a speaking slot at the convention.

NPR’s coverage delved a bit deeper into the arrangement by admitting that Romney and the RNC colluded to arbitrarily disqualify enough of Paul’s delegates to “prevent Paul from coming into the convention with the support of a plurality of the delegates from each of five or more states.”  Why?  Reaching that threshold would allow Paul’s delegates to nominate him from the floor.  As a result, he would be entitled to a fifteen minute speech and could potentially (though not likely) win the nomination.

The Christian Science Monitor was the only media outlet to correctly ask the question, “Is Ron Paul Getting a Raw Deal from the RNC?”  Though the title asked the right question, the article missed the mark.

So what’s really going on?  Weren’t delegates already selected by the states?  Doesn’t the RNC have rules and processes to govern this selection process?  Hasn’t Ron Paul already dropped out of the race?  Why is Paul’s campaign “cutting deals” with Romney and the RNC?  Isn’t Romney already the nominee?

Yes, delegates were already selected by the states.  What you probably didn’t see on the nightly news (in spite of the number of news programs and 24-hour news stations) was that the delegate selection process was a messy one.  The RNC broke its own rules at the county, state, and (now) national level to ensure the nomination for Mitt Romney.  In spite of every attempt to quell the Ron Paul revolution, Paul still came away with a plurality of delegates from at least seven, but possibly as many as eleven states:  Maine, Iowa, Nevada, Oregon, Massachusettes, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Washington, Minnesota, Colorado, Missouri.  The problem is though there are rules in place for selecting delegates, the rules were broken by local and state parties when it looked like Paul would win.  After he came away with a plurality of delegates in enough states to be nominated from the floor at the convention, the RNC decided their last resort was to arbitrarily disqualify even more delegates.  This would ensure that Paul could not possibly be nominated from the floor as he wouldn’t have the necessary number of states.  The “deal” that Paul has cut with Romney and the RNC would permit “some” of Paul’s delegates to attend the RNC, as opposed to none.  Some deal.

Contrary to just about everything you’ve seen on the news, Ron Paul can still win the Republican nomination for President.  He is the only candidate, other than Romney, who has not dropped out or suspended his campaign.  Romney is not yet the nominee and his campaign seems so worried about what Paul’s supporters and delegates might do that he’s taking every precaution to ensure his victory.

While the articles linked to at the start of this report describe the deal-cutting going on between the Paul campaign and the Romney campaign/RNC, they miss the most important point—Mitt Romney and the RNC have colluded to commit election fraud, and they’ve done it right out in the open!  That’s the real story that nobody is talking about.  On every occasion where fraud was alleged at the county or state levels, Romney was the benefactor.  What was Romney’s involvement?  Why hasn’t the RNC (or the FEC) investigated these serious accusations (most of which are substantiated by video evidence)?  Why has the RNC gotten a free pass for arbitrarily disqualifying delegates?    Was it the RNC’s plan to nominate Romney all along?  Did the primary votes of Republicans across the country count for anything at all?

Why has the national media completely ignored this?  Why is a part-time citizen journalist the only one asking these questions?