Ron Paul's Appearance on Bill Maher's Real Time

Ron Paul's Appearance on Bill Maher's Real Time

Ron Paul takes matters seriously. Even in jest it appears that he always has a point to make. He demonstrated his sense of humor when he spoke with Alan Greenspan, requesting an autograph on a copy of the essay the former Fed Chief himself wrote excoriating the Federal Reserve and promoting a gold standard two decades prior to assuming the post.

Juxtaposing Ron Paul with Bill Maher, an amusing if snarky populist and self-described libertarian while also an apparent proponent of liberty without private property, is to combine oil and water. Paul himself was less entertaining and better informed, however, Maher's sloganeering and knee-jerk bumper sticker politics earned more points with the home-crowd television studio audience more familiar with Van Wilder than with Ludwig von Mises.

The appearance as it would seem, however, was the promotion of Ron Paul's name and his clear and unwavering advocacy of his ideas. He did not cow to Maher's "you must admits" and made no real effort to curb the entrenched pundit's irreconcilable libertascist views, instead hoping to appeal to a certain general uneasiness possibly found in even the most religious viewer of Real Time.