Ron Paul is a true American hero and a true constitutionalist who stands for the freedom of its citizens. He has been winning many straw polls and leading many others so far. Maryland: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/08/AR2007090801653.html Alabama: http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/2007/08/ron_paul_wins_alabama_straw_poll/ Here are the other numbers: http://www.ronpaul2008.com/straw-poll-results/ Pretty impressive. Dr. Paul is the only candidate who can fix the broken policies of both parties. A vote for any other candidate from any party is a vote for the status quo. It's somewhat sad to see the mainstream media ignore such a powerful candidate who has energized the youth and independents back into the political system. Giuliani better watch his back.
Ron Paul supports the dismantling of the Department of Homeland Security, FEMA, the IRS, NASA, DHHS and the Department of Education, calling them unnecessary bureaucracies. Dealbreaker. No vote. They're necessary bureaucracies.
I call them Paulestinians Also, I'm not voting for him because I don't pine for the good ol' days of the gold standard, and he's one of those "war on Christmas" idiots
The biggest threats to the future of this country are Homeland Security, FEMA, the IRS and the Federal Reserve Bank. The Department of Education is totally unnecessary and wastes money, I hope he also ends alot of the other wasted federal programs that add no value to the efforts of state governments and local communities. If Ron Paul got that much done without being assassinated I would have to call 'Divine Intervention' Don't worry he won't be elected, this country at this point doesn't deserve a good president.
Ron Paul's a nut. He's sort of the Biden-on-steroids of the Republican Party... sounds really good on some stuff, but has no idea how to make it happen and then on the next topic sounds absolutely bonkers. I admit, I do like some of the stuff he says, but I would never vote for anyone who wants to destroy Social Security, return us to the gold standard, and withdraw us from NATO, the United Nations, and other obligations of the post-WWII world. He also thinks Star Wars is swell. I listened to one of his speeches on CSPAN the other day and it was hilarious. The evils of the world have come about because we haven't followed the Constitution, but when there's something he wants to do, he has no problem proposing changes to the Constitution. He must have come out with at least 4 proposed amendments and offered twice that number of odes to the original intent of the Constitution in the 10 minutes I watched. He would be a disaster as President. The really sad part about all this is that Ron Paul is the most sane candidate vying for the Republican presidential nomination.
That's probably because you are a liberal. Of course you are going to disagree with having a small government.
It's because we don't live in the 1880's anymore. We're the dominant military and economic power on the globe (in spite of W's best attempts to make it not so). You can't walk away from that fact.
There's a difference between being pro-small government (which I'm not, but I digress) and enacting utterly r****ded policies such as returning to the gold standard and abolishing any sort of infrastrucural programs.
Also, his foreign policy is extremely questionable - withdrawing from Iraq sounds like an excellent idea at face value, but not when it's a part of an overall isolationist foreign policy. For example, he refuses to condemn Sudan for the Darfur genocide and was the single "no" vote on a bill preventing the government from doing business with companies which that conduct business operations in Sudan. There's a massive difference from having a humble foreign policy and sticking your head in the sand.
The foreign policy that we've been following has worked really well, right? Lets get involved in Sudan. I'd love to have another mess to clean up in 15 years.
Neither party is even remotely in-line with small government. The one thing I like about Ron Paul is how he wants to clean out all these useless branches of beaurocratic futility. However, much of his other ideas seem random to the point of kooky.
Maybe so, but it's consistently been our nation's mode of operation since the 1940s. Go in, clean up a mess, make another one, go in, clean that one up. The other way worked better. rimrocker may be right. It is certainly possible that the world can't make it without us policing it. If that proves to be true, I'll admit that I'm wrong, and we can go back to the Truman/Eisenhower/Kennedy/Johnson/Nixon/Reagan/Bush/Clinton/Bush way.
But I don't recall advocating the use of force in Sudan in my above post? I'm perfectly fine with using financial means to put pressure on Sudan - hell, the above bill I mentioned basically amounts to the US using their power as a rational economic actor to refuse to do business with immoral companies. Of course, I agree with the idea of using force to protect genocide victims, much like Clinton did in Bosnia, but that's not what I was arguing before.
Paul also supports removing all restrictions on trade. Why should the National Government legislate morals to American businesspeople?
