While some on our blog (including many regulars who I respect) disagree, I have never hidden my respect for Ron Paul. I have occasional lunches with Paul who is one of the brightest and most engaging minds in Congress. This segment by John Stewart does a great job in addressing the concerted effort to ignore Paul despite his almost winning the recent Iowa straw poll. Even “XXX” got more attention by Associated Press.
Though we do not agree on all issues (and sharply disagree on some), Paul is currently the only candidate (including Barack Obama) who has consistently opposed the wars and spoken out against the rollback on civil liberties. The Stewart segment is worth watching. One would think that an anti-war candidate in the Republican primary would receive overwhelming attention. This is the one guy in either party who is actually challenging the claims supporting these wars — and receiving significant support among Republicans. Yet the mainstream media seems intent on avoiding any acknowledgment that Paul or his GOP supporters exist. Why?
Consider the sharp contrast with Rick Santorum:
And what culheath said about Kucinich.
I’ll have to echo much of the sentiment expressed here already. I like some of Paul’s individual stances, but on the whole I find him an untenable candidate because of other positions. Even though I think ending the illegal wars is of paramount concern, electing Paul would be like throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
Agree with culheath regarding Dennis.
There are quite a few loyal Ron Paul admirers in my neck of the woods and they are always complaining about the lack of media attention he attracts. Many of them are former Ayn Rand enthusiasts. They are also all former Republicans who felt betrayed by Bush’s financial and war policies. They were the original subscribers to Paul’s Tea Party philosophy before the Republican Party bastardized the movement. Never in a million years would these friends and neighbors of mine support Obama for reasons that have nothing to do with politics.
I like the fact that Paul made such inroads into the Republican base especially among the younger voters. I couldn’t support him back in ’08 or now due to the same reasons SwM lists, abortion, gay rights, education and social programs.
For a republican he is rather rebellious.
My write-in candidate would Kucinich rather than Paul.
Turley, simply saying he has opposed the wars is not enough. What is his motivation for the opposition? This like when libertarians say Paul is against the drug war. Well no, he is against the federal drug, he has no problem with states making certain drugs illegal. Not only is Paul opposed to all the current wars, he wants the U. S. out of all international NGOs. Even his views on foriegn affairs are bit extreme because of his paleoconservative ideology. His civil liberty record is not that great either as he is against secularism.
The guy may be a great lunch buddy or golf partner but that is immaterial to the discussion.
Swarthmore Mom and Ishboo have it correct. Paul has one or two issues that I can agree with, but if he is elected women will lose even more privacy rights.
http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/08/16/ron_paul_2012 Paul is sitting at the same 7 or 8 percent that he was four years ago. Nothing has changed for him. Paul would need democrats to cross over and vote for him in the republican primary. Maybe a few anti-war ones can but not many will because of his stances on abortion, gay rights, education and social programs.
Paul has lunch with lots of people. Like the Black family, owners of Stormfront.org. What a nifty guy!
In the Stewart clip, Paul was at a loss to name a country that is run by his version of libertarianism. I got one : Somalia. Small government, no regulations on business, no taxes (except those collected by warlords), and no Education department.
I like Paul’s consistent anti-war message but some of his other views are crazy.
For somebody that has no problem with Christan prayer in the school, the Ten Commandments in the court house, thinking the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation, refuses to acceptt evolution (instead thinks dinos and humans roamed the planet at the same time), I am not exactly sure how he can be considered bright. He is as bright as Palin and Perry. Don’t let somebody’s charisma cloud your mind, it puts your whole reasoning process in doubt. This no different than your fawning over the Friends of Amanda propoganda.
I like Paul but for the conception that he’ll cut the social programs…
Paul is the evil-twin (separated at birth) of Palin, Bachmann, Birch etc.
Fox SuperPAC even find that too crazy….
You truly deserve it USofA. Exceptional.
One reason he does not want to run as a third party candidate is that he does not want to compromise Rand’s future in the republican party.
I should have added this link which is a Daily Beast descriptive article :
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/07/22/americans-elect-will-an-internet-presidential-race-become-2012-s-spoiler.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/ron-paul-campaign-virtually-zero-chance-of-third-party-bid/2011/08/15/gIQAZvC2IJ_blog.html
I like and respect Paul a lot..it’s just that some of his libertarian ideas are too literally individualistic for my tastes. I don’t happen to believe that individuals trump or arise prior to the social group, but rather are a product of it. Some of his ideas strike me as Ayn Randian, which is no doubt how his son got named such.
By the way are you aware of this :
http://www.americanselect.org/
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/176761-ron-paul-stresses-opposition-to-abortion-rights-in-straw-poll-speech I don’t think pandering to anti-abortion activists is being “ahead of his time”. He tried to compete with Bachmann to get the anti-abortion vote but she aced him. He is now overshadowed by another Texan. Don’t think it is the media’s fault.
If he were to get the GOP nomination or run as a third party candidate, I would strongly consider voting for him. His ideas are ahead of his time.