Retired Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul is seeking assistance from the United Nations in order to seize the domain names RonPaul.com and RonPaul.org from a small group of his diehard supporters, the website owners announced Friday.
According to the complaint filed with the United Nations’s World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Paul is demanding the two domain names without compensation and to be handed over to the three-time presidential candidate. His representatives argue that he should be given the domain names for free because he already maintains a common law trademark on his name.
The website’s authors, who are stunned because they have been vocal supporters of the libertarian-leaning Congressman since 2007, have 20 days to prepare a response and are in the stage of looking for a lawyer.
“Back in 2007 we put our lives on hold for you, Ron, and we invested close to 10,000 hours of tears, sweat and hard work into this site at great personal sacrifice,” the group said in a statement. “We helped raise millions of dollars for you, we spread your message of liberty as far and wide as we possibly could, and we went out of our way to defend you against the unjustified attacks by your opponents. Now that your campaigns are over and you no longer need us, you want to take it all away – and send us off to a UN tribunal? That’s not cool! We want our old pre-retirement Ron Paul back!”
Following an interview on the Alex Jones Show last month, Paul discussed how disappointed he was that he didn’t own RonPaul.com. After many of his supporters urged the website to contact him, the authors offered him RonPaul.org as a free gift and if he did insist on acquiring RonPaul.com then he could be offered “a complete liberty package:”
It would include RonPaul.com and a mailing list of 170,000 “liberty lovers.” The price-tag for the deal would be $250,000.
During his more than 30-year career, Dr. Paul has fought against the UN and accused the international body of eroding national sovereignty by influencing various domestic laws, such as guns, labor and taxes.
“The choice is very clear: we either follow the Constitution or submit to UN global governance. American national sovereignty cannot survive if we allow our domestic laws to be crafted by an international body. This needs to be stated publicly more often. If we continue down the UN path, America as we know it will cease to exist,” said Dr. Paul in an op-ed published at LewRockwell.com.
Tim Martin of RonPaul.com told Economic Collapse News in an interview that Paul could have used any of the approved UDRP providers, especially the United States-based National Arbitration Forum, “or he could have just sent us an email to work things out privately.”
It is still unclear if Dr. Paul is fully in charge of the situation and Martin even said that he doesn’t know if Dr. Paul is aware of what is transpiring. Martin noted that the bestselling author of “End the Fed” and “The Revolution: A Manifesto” conceded that “he doesn’t fully understand the Internet, so chances are he only knows what his staff tells him.”
Since the website owners “love him anyway” and are in disbelief of what is occurring, they have attempted to contact Dr. Paul through all means of communication and are hoping he will inform his lawyers to withdraw the petition.
“If it turns out that we were supporting a hypocrite over the past 5 years then this will be a very traumatizing experience. We will probably be going through the four stages of grief: 1) Denial, 2) Anger, 3) Depression, 4) Acceptance & Hope,” stated Martin in an email. “Right now I’m in denial but moving towards anger. My partner is already in stage 3.”
This isn’t the first time that Dr. Paul’s supporters have criticized him. Late last year, ardent followers were upset that Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul endorsed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney during the campaign. It was days before Paul even made any remarks regarding his son’s endorsement.
Dr. Paul is being represented by David Warrington.
In 2005, Hillary Clinton posted a similar petition for HillaryClinton.com and won it from a person who was involved in an advertising scam and wasn’t a supporter of the former Secretary of State and potential 2016 presidential candidate.
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