Today I have decided to tentatively throw in my support for Ron Paul in the US presidential election. I do not completely agree with isolationist foreign policy, but I like it a lot more than neo-conservative preemption. I agree with his stances on civil liberties and minimal government. His stance on immigration is a concern, but I honestly have yet to form a real opinion on that what the immigration policy ought to be.

He seems to be the best candidate in terms of libertarian economic and civil liberty policies. I really like the way he stood up to other republicans in the debate. The fact that he has such an impact on the republican party might be his best characteristic.

There's still time for my mind to be changed though! I figure there should be some good debate on this thread, but please attack arguments and not other posters. I will use my moderator powers to maintain this thread, since it is my own creation and responsibility.

A friend of mine has recently become a supporter of Paul as well. He does have a lot of good stuff to say. It's nice to see a candidate who votes for what he believes in no matter what his party wants. He sticks to a conservative interpretation of the constitution. You could certainly do a lot worse for a presidential candidate.

Of all the candidates I've seen so far, I agree with him the most. Too bad he doesn't stand a chance of getting a GOP nom.

Yeah. The most likely now are Julianni or McCain. And McCain is ancient. Romney might come up and snag it away from him, but then Julianni would just get it anyway.

Damn glad most people like Julianni better than Hill!

And yes I know I'm spelling his name wrong.

He's second to my choice of Mike Gravel. In my opinion, both men are fine candidates. (Unlike the rest of them...)

Lots of news sites such as Digg always talk about him. I agree with most of the stuff he says, but he's still

I heard he was the only one in the republican debate who wasn't pandering to the "OMG TERRORISTS HATE FREEDOM!!!!" public. (I didn't actually see it myself)

On the Republican side, I definitely like Ron Paul the most.

McCain's not that much different than Bush. Guiliani is much worse than Bush, and what he says about Al-Qaeda and Iraq is just plain wrong. Mitt Romney's energy plan scares the **** out of me. Plus, he's just another Neo-con. So yeah, Ron Paul is the best candidate. He wants to get rid of the military industrial complex, is isolationist, wants to get rid of pork barrel projects; he's talking about doing the right things to make America better.

Interestingly enough, I have a website that holds a bunch of articles written by Ron Paul saved as a bookmark. http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul-arch.html

Read some of those if you're not convinced Ron Paul is a good candidate.

If I vote Republican in the election, Ron Paul is who I'm voting for. Of course, assuming he gets past the primaries. Whether or not I vote for him really depends on whether or not Barack Obama wins the Democratic primary.

Giuliani

Hmm, I shall have to investigate Ron Paul.

I hadn't really heard of him till now (my parents are backing Romney), but he pretty much falls in line with my own personal beliefs. I also like the fact that he knows his god damned history.

He also has a snowball's chance in hell.

A snowball with a sweater on. He doesn't bull around enough and is too transparent.

Guiliani is an idiot.

"In the May 3, 2007, GOP Debate, Paul stated that as President, he would seek the immediate abolition of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the abolition of the income tax. As Congressman, he has long fought for the prohibition of direct taxes by repeal of the 16th Amendment which created the income tax."
Sign me up!!

Yeah, that's pretty much not gonna happen.

In a recent interview, Ron Paul concedes that obvious point and mentions that his true priority is reducing spending. After all, it's harder and harder to cut taxes with a ridiculously sized government.

Considering that small government is awesome, that alone is a reason to support him.

Dear God yes. Ron Paul has been my political hero for a few years now, and I was thrilled when I found out he was running. I was even more thrilled when he told Giuliani to go read a book.

Now if only he stood a chance. I'm doing my part to get the word out though.

I watched some of the Republican debate and saw him tonight on the Daily Show. I'm definitely left-leaning, but for a Republican Ron Paul is actually appealing. He's very likable, seems honest, and has a rational approach towards foreign policy--like Tracer said: he doesn't pander to the "OMG TERRORISTS HATE FREEDOM!!!!" public.

Even on issues that I disagree with him, I can at least respect him because he seems to have intelligent arguments for them and isn't just spouting buzz words.

A Republican candidate that actually wants to understand how the enemy thinks rather than reduce them to dangerously simplistic crap like "They're just plain evil" or "They hate our freedom". Refusing to remain ignorant about the motivations, history, and mind set of the enemy does not make someone a terrorist apologist. It makes them a strategist.

The abolishing of income tax scares the hell out of me though. Rewriting the tax code, fine. That thing sucks. But getting rid of income tax? No thank you. Reminds me too much of the Articles of Confederation.

Pretty quiet night for Ron Paul. When he spoke he was intelligent and straightforward as usual, but he didn't make nearly the splash that he made in the last debate. I was hoping one of the frontrunners would give him some more free publicity, but no luck with that.

His appearance on the Daily Show was stronger than I thought it'd be, though. Maybe that will help.

Edit: Just saw the segment on the approval-meter thingies again. They weren't talking about it, but I saw a couple shots of high ratings while Paul was onscreen.

It's nice to see a Republican who is actually conservative. I've gotten utterly sick of having two liberal parties. But, still, he's not going to get the nomination.

Another problem with the party system.

We really need a multi-party system like some of the European countries have.

I hope Ron Paul makes it. He probably won't though, so if Fred Thompson doesn't make the GOP nomination, I'll just vote for Ron Paul in the write in box. Maybe I will anyway. I don't honestly know much about Thompson other than his opinions from Law and Order (which I think is scripted to reflect the actor's opinions). I'll have to do more research on him though.

If America is stupid enough to elect some BS spewing mediocre politician again, I don't care if Ron Paul has no chance of winning; I'll still vote for him. It's just as bad on either side of the party. If they put Julianni or Hillary in office, it jolly well serves them right. I'm just mad I have to suffer along with them, even it they do deserve it. Jerks. I'll just sit here and be biter ok?

If neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have a good candidate then it should be the duty of the voter to vote for someone else. Simply voting for the "lesser of two evils" will do nothing towards causing positive change or progress. A third party candidate can draw voters away from an otherwise dominant candidate, but you have to look more long term than one election. Loosing an election because of a third party candidate will surely cause the effected party to reevaluate their platform in order to regain a majority.

I really respect Richardson's integrity and honesty, but I just can't justify voting for him when some of his ideas I consider downright zany. He's more pro-gun than any of the Republicans though, which is a big plus (and kind of funny).

My respect for Obama has moderately lessened after hearing him in the recent debate. It was mostly because I don't think he's a good speaker. I'll have to research his ideas and give them a chance. One appealing thing about Obama is his dedication to lobbyist reform.

Gravel is downright senile and does not even approach the poise necessary of a president. He has a very large hippy streak too and does not tend to address reality.

Biden is too entrenched in donations and lobbyists. He has some good ideas and he's clear and concise. I like that. But I'd be really surprised if he gets the nomination.

Gore—no. Just no.

Kucinich is the most principled of the Democratic presidential hopefuls. He likes to flaunt his vote against the Iraq war, which gets annoying. I like his stance toward foreign policy more than the other Democratic hopefuls. He is very bright and his views are well-backed-up by reason. It's a pleasure to listen to him. Richardson and Kucinich are the best speakers, in my opinion.

Dodd is not even worth considering. He will never get the nomination.

As for the Republicans, I don't know the first thing about any of them, so obviously I don't have an opinion of them. I'll have to get to that sometime.

Uh what? Two liberal parties? Take a good sniff of the Republican party. Here's the party's stance:

God
God
Jesus
God
OMG TERRIST
God
Jesus
Jesus
TERRISTS!
More troops for Iraq!
Let's invade......Botswana!

Honestly, we might have a third party soon if Republicans keep acting like this and Ron Paul wins the nomination or puts up good numbers.

Ron Paul looks pretty good. Gulianni doesn't bother me much at all. Huckabee and Romney are psychos. McCaine just knows how to talk, and that makes me like him.

Honestly, I don't think any republican has a snowball's chance in hell of getting elected.

Agreed. There will definitely be a Democrat in office. Although I can see Republicans gaining some seats back in Congress. We saw how basically a one-party government did some havoc, I'm not sure Americans will like an "all blue" government as much as an "all red" one.

You all lie! RON PAUL WILL WIN!!!

*delusional*

I really don't know what to think concerning the up coming election. I don't know if I'm just disenchanted with everything, or if I really just don't care at all.

None of the Republican candidates voiced support for repealing the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. It's nice to see that they put pandering to the anti-gay crowd ahead of national security, considering dozens of Arabic translators have been dismissed. What a great way to support the troops.

Uh, what?

Don't Ask, Don't Tell (when it's executed the way it's supposed to be) is a godsend for gay servicemembers.

If servicemembers were permitted to be openly gay, there would be so many problems. Considering the amount of homophobes in the military, the amount of violence and discrimination would skyrocket.

Sure, there are some cases where the policy doesn't work out like it's supposed to, but it protects people more than it hurts. People can ***** all they want about "people should be able to be free about who they are". Bull****. Nobody is completely free to be who they are in the military. Openly gay servicemembers destroy unit cohesion. Not their fault, it's a social problem. When the number of people who accept gays (me) outnumber the number of homophobes (90% of the rest of the military) then we can allow people to be open about it.

This should be a non-issue, and I can't understand why people are still confused about it.

Besides, how are we supposed to know who the ****birds who just want to get out are? I KNOW there are a number of men and women who just keep quiet, the same way I keep quiet about my political and religious beliefs. The people who start ranting and raving about how they want out because they're gay just want out, or are so horny they can't control themselves being around 24/7 and showering with such hot, hot, juicy men as are in the Marines. The ones in the Navy obviously like fat guys (har har har!).

Anyway, continuing back on topic (let's not derail this thread, although, I expect thats not going to happen and this particular line of my post is going to be ignored) this guy seems Kosher.

If we had a mostly gay army like the ancient Greeks, we'd have one helluva fighting force.

I think Paul's the only one who has a chance in a general election, because the Republicans can only win by making the war a non-issue. The problem is that they'll never nominate him.

The Democrats had the same problem last election. They had a couple candidates who could have won, but they ended up nominating the one guy who didn't have a chance.

Damn you Americans are nuts.

They'd have a choice. I'm not talking about mandatory outing. Most servicemen would probably choose to keep their homosexuality a secret. However, if it were to accidentally slip, they'd shouldn't be kicked out, especially if they have a vital skill.

The example I'm thinking of is the Arabic linguist who mentioned his social life in an e-mail to a friend and was caught in a random sweep. He's important to the nation's efforts and willing to serve. According to him, plenty of others in his unit knew about his homosexuality and accepted him--it didn't interfere with his work. If there were no problems with unit cohesion and the man is doing work that could help save American lives, then why remove him?

I'm not arguing this issue because "people should be free to be who they are." I'm arguing this because the military needs Arabic linguists a lot more than they "need" to get rid of gay people.

And how do you propose that the military become less homophobic when there are policies in place that seem to justify and reinforce that mindset?

Yeah, but that's only to appeal to evangelicals. They don't mean a word of it. They just try to say the word "God" occasionally to try to keep them happy, while they go about, well, what ever the heck agenda the main stream GOP has, if any. I think they're pretty much aimless and clueless right now.

Your representation of their stance factors only foreign policy and social issues. The Republican Party is supposed to be fiscally conservative with small but efficient government. With grotesque spending and government enlargement, the Bush Administration has abandoned these core principles because it doesn't get them votes. However, the Democrats aren't fiscally conservative either. Thus, when it comes to fiscal policy, both parties can be seen as liberal.

Okay I see where you're coming from. I agree it should be a more case by case system.

And IMO, I think that regardless of policies, attitudes are changing, slowly.

Oh hell no. We need to abolish the party system completely. A truly different candidate can't win because he has to pander to one party or the other to get the damn nomination. A third party won't help this, but a viable independent option might.

If only it worked that way.



You don't seem to actually know what liberalism and conservatism are. Conservatism isn't about God or fighting terrorists, it's about small government. And the agenda of both parties is to make government bigger. In the case of the Democrats, it's social programs. For the Republicans, it's national security. Both parties increase spending, and both make government bigger. Therefore, both are liberal.
What's insulting, however, is your insinuation that conservatives are evangelical racists.

Hillary has a huge deficit to overcome, and no one actually knows what Obama's position is on anything... so, no, a Guiliani or Romney actually has a pretty good chance. Remember we're talking about the guy who was the 'hero of 911' and a Republican that got elected governor of Massachusetts. Neither is a little deal.

So... you get your news from Three Panel Soul? Also, consider what happens if that Muslim man discovers his translator is gay. If he's at all devout, he's going to be pissed.


The Greeks were bi. They went home and did women too.

This I can agree with.

Uh, what? Being conservative is not defined by wanting small government.





Hmm. Well that sucks, because he'll be just as pissed if he finds out that I am his translator and I don't believe in God.




Yeah we know you like men.

Someone needs to retake polisci 101 again. Conservative in its true sense means that you are resiliant to change and prefer the "tried-and-true." Notice how I said "Republicans" and not "conservatives" I consider myself a (classical) conservative. I am most certainly not an evangelical racist. What I'm referring to is in the large and growing sect of neo-conservatives (the evangelicals) in the Republican party. No, the Republican party isn't about low taxes, low spending, and a smaller government anymore. Bush has definitely increased spending by LARGE folds. And I'm pissed about it. He's also pandered heavily to the Religious Right. So just like JDKNITE said, in a fiscal sense Rep = Dem for the most part. But on the whole, Republicans are not like Democrats.

Also, you need to stop listening to Hannity et al. They may claim otherwise but they're neo-cons. Those are bad.