Questions

I invite your comments and answers:
How many third and fourth place finishes are necessary before the campaign decides that the coalition strategy is the only hope?
How many caucus victories are needed in order to call the current strategy a success?
Has Ron Paul's staff requested an interview with Tavis Smiley?
Will Ron Paul do a big speech on race relations in which he exhaustively addresses the questions that keep coming his way?
Does the campaign intend to win or does it think it can have significant influence with a third or fourth place finish?
What influence will Ron Paul have if he finishes second?
At what point do you say, "We're running an independent or third party ticket."?
What does the recent revival of media silence suggest?
Is anybody on the campaign staff asking any hard questions?

The Ron Paul campaign has decided not make this a 50 state contest but rather to focus in on states where winning is easier and finishing 1st or 2nd is more likely. This strategy focuses mainly on caucus state where candidates with an enthusiastic base of support tend to do better and where often delegates favorable to one candidate can be elected in numbers that exceed the percentage of votes for that candidate.

The caucus strategy implicitly acknowledges that Ron Paul cannot win the nomination. Why then continue to run? Perhaps Ron Paul and/or his campaign staff believe that he can influence the platform  and the eventual nominee or that a good showing  this time will put Rand Paul into position to be vice president next time. Maybe Ron Paul believes his campaign to be mainly educational to prepare the party to make the changes necessary to garner a new generation of voters.

Regardless of Paul or his campaign's motives, his followers seem to be in this to win and besides the goals of education, influence and expansion are better served by a victory or something close to it. Prioritizing the winning of delegates over votes is a sure way to lose the race for both.

As the Ron Paul campaign begins close up shop, I bid you farewell. It has been an interesting year obsessed with trying to convince progressives and libertarians that neither of them have a majority much less 60 Senators. 

In order to renew the cause of liberty

Does Ron Paul Want to Be President?

If he does then he has to revamp his campaign and go very deliberately and clearly into coalition mode. If he just wants to make a speech at the convention, he should continue with the present course. His last place finish in SC proves this beyond a shadow of a doubt.  For libertarians this is what coalition means: http://progressivesforronpaul.blogspot.com/2011/11/choice-for-libertarians.html
For progressives this is what coalition means:
http://progressivesforronpaul.blogspot.com/2011/12/what-is-green-republican-coalition.html

Responses to The Nation

Thank you JakobiFabian01 and H2O  for your responses. JakobFabian01, I think you have misunderstood or misread my statement so let me try to clarify. i do not believe that our political system works well. I was trying to say that this is the reality of how our political system functions when I said the following: "What you and other progressives against Paul do not seem to be able to take into account is how our political system, like it or not, actually works." I agree with you that proportional representation is a great idea that would make our government more responsive to the needs and aspirations of the people.

I am also glad that you correctly identify what I am proposing as tactical and wish that the nation would give the tactic serious consideration. Here is it is in greater detail if anyone is interested: http://progressivesforronpaul.blogspot.com/2011/12/what-is-green-republican-coalition.html

I am not so much interested in an entertaining GOP convention in Tampa Bay as I am  in causing well deserved, permanent and disabling division in America's proto-fascist party. 

I also agree that Ron Paul is not moving an inch ideologically but that is different from governing in a way that advances one's ideology. The evidence for Ron Paul being willing to make pragmatic accommodations is found in his transition plan: http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul647.html  I suggest that Ron Paul's opt out proposal should get  a hearing and when it fails, Ron Paul ought to allow the money designated to fund it be shifted to block grants to the states.  A minor tweak which could free up hundreds of billions of  dollars for the states to use as they please. Not ideal but one of several possible deals that could be cut between principled progressives and principled libertarians if both sides would only see that they have to do something together or continue to take separate whippings from the corporate bosses in charge of both parties.

H20, i think Jill Stein or Rocky Anderson would make excellent presidents. I just think that we need a coalition if we are going to take on the two headed Goliath. Maybe she and Gary Johnson could get together and form a coalition ticket should Paul and Kucinich not see fit to do it.

I know this is all long shot stuff but we need something big and way outside of the box if we are going to avert a global disaster.

I also do not expect that anything positive would come of a Paul candidacy except a big ruckus in the GOP. While I agree with "cfbrantley" that that would be highly entertaining, I see no evidence that Ron Paul himself will move ideologically one fraction of an inch toward the progressives who were generous enough to lend their support to him. After all, there's a financial side to winning every election, and Paul's financiers will be pulling him in exactly the opposite direction.

Ideas for Principled Compromise

Shift the funding for the states over time 100% population/0% receipts to 0% population/100% receipts.
Agree to consolidation of departments and cuts in overall domestic spending predicated on block grants to the states and progressive leadership of the consolidated departments:
Vice President Bernie Sanders
Labor, Commerce, Education: Dennis Kucinich
Interior, Environment and Energy: Robert Kennedy Jr.
Housing, Health and Human Services: Jill Stein
Transportation, Communication and Infrastructure: Rocky Anderson
OMB: Gary Johnson
Defense and Homeland Security: Walter Jones
Secretary of State: Jon Huntsman
Justice: Judge Napolitano
UN Ambassador: Cynthia McKinney
Veteran Affairs: 
Intelligence Chief
Cut all Domestic departments by 10% and allow n more than 3% increase per year for 4 years.

Public school vouchers as suggested by