Paul's ideas will be grotesquely distorted in establishment media "hit pieces." They'll say he wants to permit heroin use in public schools, or that he wants old people to die in the streets without their Social Security checks, or that he wants to allow greedy industrialists to dump toxic waste into your drinking water.

The next arrow in the oligarchy's quiver will be scandal--real or fabricated. Usually, this takes the form of pictures, billing records, etc. involving financial or sexual hi-jinks. For these folks, it would be child's play to implicate him in some sort of phony ethical, moral, or financial skullduggery (doctored pictures, sordid media accounts from "eyewitnesses," etc.).

If Paul somehow survives this assault, the oligarchy will move on to the criminal justice system. On some fine day, a stretch limo will pull up to the Capitol Building and one of the establishment's hit men (Jim Baker or maybe Vernon Jordan) will ooze into Paul's office for a "chat."

Maybe Paul forgot to fill out Form X109/23W on his 1997 income tax return? Or drained a mud puddle when he built his new house that could be classified as a "wetland"? Or maybe a close relative is in hot water with OSHA/FDA/IRS/youname-it (federal prosecutors love to go after relatives
in order to gain "leverage"). Paul's sentence could be lessened if he agreed to drop his candidacy as part of a "plea bargain."

Ayn Rand once stated that the hallmark of authoritarian systems is the creation of innumerable, incomprehensible laws. Such systems make everyone an un-indicted felon and allow for the exercise of arbitrary government power via selective prosecution. If all this failed and if Paul remained a threat to win the presidency, the establishment may decide to let him take office and then use their considerable influence to ensure his presidency ended in failure--mostly through their control of Congress, the federal bureaucracy and the mainstream media.

The oligarchy's problem with this strategy is that it entails considerable risk. As president, Paul could use the powers of the office to inflict untold damage to the imperial structure (especially if he chose to withdraw American troops stationed overseas). Worse, he could appoint anti-tyranny "ideologues" to a variety of positions in the federal government. The damage to the oligarchs could take decades to undo.

Steven LaTulippe is a physician practicing in Ohio. He was an officer in the Air Force for 13 years.

Only Ron Paul can beat HIllary? That must be good stuff that you're smoking? Grass? Hash? Or something else? Pipe dreams? Opiates?