Ron Paul Message Muffled Despite Record Breaking Fundraising, Strong Support from Military and Americans

According to the Los Angeles Times, Ron Paul was the biggest GOP fundraiser last quarter raising nearly 20 million dollars, $6 million of which was raised in one day breaking the record for the most money raised by a national candidate in a single day. “That is a significant amount of money from a man who gets the least time on TV debates.” wrote the Times. The Ron Paul campaign website currently shows contributions are up to over 5.1 million dollars so far for the first quarter of this year.

So one might ask where all this money is coming from? What’s this Presidential candidate have that the others don’t have? Besides his consistent voting record, his interest in abolishing the IRS, income tax, and the CIA, and a recent 51 year marriage anniversary, apparently he’s also got significant military support. The Paul campaign often boasts that the campaign’s money comes mostly in the form of small donations from average Americans, many of which are active military officers. This is quite the contrary to most of Paul’s oppenants who have significant support from corporate lobbyists.

 Ron Paul has received more military donations than all his opponents combined. Below are the numbers released by Jeff Schulman.

• Paul: $286,764; 1349 donors
• McCain: $79,597; 413 donors
• Romney: $29,250; 140 donors
• Huckabee: $24,562; 94 donors
• Obama: $81,037; 466 donors
• Clinton: $49,523; 181 donors

Verifying the above numbers we were led to a post on the Ron Paul website that read:

Dear Ron Paul,
I am a hard-working sailor in the U.S. Navy. I don’t make very much money to start with, but this month I am donating my entire paycheck to your campaign. You are the only candidate, Democrat or Republican, who is actually addressing issues that are critically important for every American. I hope your impeccable integrity, personal honor, and clear convictions will see you through to victory–not just for Republicans, but for all Americans. - J.P., U.S. Naval Officer.

The Korea Times did a story earlier this month on Ron Paul (translated version) where they discussed the unusual interest in U.S. politics around the globe. According to the Times, “Korea is one of 29 countries that have meet-up groups supporting Ron Paul outside the United States. No other candidate has anything vaguely matching this level of enthusiasm.” said George Whitfield, owner of a recruiting company in Seoul and founder of the Ron Paul local campaigning group.

“The troops on the ground have more insight into the situation in the conflict zones, and on the world stage. They see what’s going on from a first-person perspective - not from news snippets or editorials. So they know that Ron Paul’s positions are the closest to the truth from what they observe and experience.” said Jeff Schulman, 28, formerly with the United States Marine Corps.