Sent from Mike Murburg via his phone on 8/26: Just picked it up today.

Reporting live from the USF Sundome, Ron Paul Rally.  The dome is filling.  Ron Paul is where libertarianism has been.  Gary Johnson or Rand Paul is likely where it will go. The crowd is young, some gray hairs, someiddle agers.  Asians, whites, atabs, blacks, some….a pretty good crosssection, Mostly white but a surprising number of burka wearing women. There are bikers and babies….well mannered and polite, middle class.  I am comfortable here with these people, the Republicans of a Neolithic age, the vanishing middle class.  “The Ron Paul Revolution, Respect the Constitution” is heard as a scant chant.  The crowd builds.  The VIPs are beginning to arrive.  No glamourazzi here, no bulls or brown shirts.  This is no Nuremberg.  No skinheads… Just the comfortably passionate and reasonable.

The music is setting the stage.
Tom petty, won’t back down
Jackson brown, lives in the balance, For Everyman
John Mayer, waiting on the world to change
I am a patriot, Jackson Browne
Michael franti, time to go home, yell fire,
Sly, war
Millet halstead, interlude
Jackson Browne, doctor my eyes
Bob marley,  no more trouble

Time for the speakers to arrive.
Perhaps what I am seeing and realizing is that at heart I am a pragmatic progressive with the heart of a libertarian or some mixture of that.  Without liberty there is no life.  Without life there is at best, only the liberty of others.  These people are not crazy.  This is the libertarian wing of the republican party, moderates, veterans, the disenfranchised by the party power elite who have homogenized and centralived the party from the rules committee to the delegate process and turned their backs on truth and the common weal.

This wing has its internal differences, surprisingly abortion still unsettles many and states rights vs trespass theory of being a fetus still foments discussion but not derision.

Perhaps science will dissolve this problem and the early fetus saved and warded to the state and adoption.  When our fertility and birth rates drop to a point where humans need each other and life is precious from conception to the grave will it no longer be an issue.  It’s just a thought, for now.  Freedom to assemble and to speak are the obvious values embraced here today.  The abandonment of the Fed, getting rid of the patriot act, irs, dangerous institutions today. Down with big brother…making ones chain longer does not freedom make. Santorum’s name gets booed, fox gets booed, John Stewart gets cheered.  I feel comfortable here.

Ron paul’s wife speaks.  She is an intelligent amd sweet woman.  Impressive family of fjysiciams. Rand Paul speaks.  He knows his being in the senate is a miracle.  Now his dad.  Good speech, more talking points.  It all makes sense.  Here is where the Goldwater Republicans have come to dwell.

So, in the end, what have I learned?  In a word, no system can be one without compassion sewn into its cloak of doctrine.  Perhaps in two words, libertarian progressive no longer seems like a true contradiction in terms

Mike Murburg

UPDATE: To Mike’s report on the Ron Paul delegation:

Ron Paul Delegates Walk Out After Video Tribute, Rand Paul Speech

Full story at TPM