(top reddit comment) SixBiscuit 368 points 5 hours ago*

Predicting an Iraq war in April 2002 was not exactly difficult or limited to Ron Paul. The rest of the video has a certain amount of horoscope logic to it.

>> A major war... the largest since WWII.

Nope. Iraq is in no way larger than Vietnam even. -- http://www.lies.com/wp/2006/11/05/us-deaths-in-iraq-vs-vietnam-the-handoff/

>> The Karzai government will fail and US involvement will end in Afghanistan

Nope. -- http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/04/03/us-afghanistan-election-idUSTRE6320X220100403

>> An international dollar crisis will dramatically boost interest rates in the United States

Nope. -- http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/fed/key-interest-rates.asp

He is completely off on the scope of what he predicted. The video is manipulative. I'd really like to see a Paul supporter write these out and back them up.

For instance crude oil did shoot up to record highs but not because of an oil embargo. Does he get credit for predicting that? He's half right. Oil shot up because of instability in the region and speculation, not an embargo.

What about what he's left out. If he had such clever predictive powers why isn't Iran mentioned? Iran filling the power vaccum Iraq's destabilization left is something that could have been easily predicted but he doesn't.

Saying that the Arab Spring was the Islamic fundamentalist overthrowing their government is mischaracterizing what happened. Yes Islamic fundamentalist may end up in power in Egypt and Libya but they were not the instigators of the uprisings.

No doubt Ron Paul along with Hunter S. Thompson and a lot of people knew going into Iraq was a terrible fucking idea and would lead to ruin. That doesn't make him some sort of Cassandrian prophet. It means he was one of the few elected officials brave enough to speak out against it. Which is admirable but it hardly makes him alone. Powell believed it was a terrible idea at the time as well but was too chickenshit to stand up and stop it.

Whilst dystopian's quote is right, i think they had a tendancy to sell the guy short.. not sure if he's anti-ron paul (whatever that may be), but i'd have to say he deserves a bit of respect for not only saying that stuff, but also being reasonably on the mark about a succession of crises, it's not perfect but i don't think it needs to be in order to be impressive.

I think the video is probably poorly titled and too emotive and with the music choice - ignoring that though, the things may not be true, but he's not done too badly as far as 10 year future predictions go.. he managed to identify some of the major sources of problems at least? If you just taking it on merit, that is..

TBF these are generally accurate, far more accurate than most predictions turn out to be. But they'd have been just as accurate without the dramatic music turning it into some sort of party political broadcast.