"Resolved: Ron Paul, as US President, would be disastrous for America."

[packbat]

Being a liberal Republican, it is meet* for me to state my stance on Ron Paul.

I believe that Ron Paul would be a terrible President for the reasons cited here. Most prominently among these are:

• The gold standard would lead to economic turmoil (not to mention devastate industries which use gold),
  
• The abolition of the income tax would cripple the federal government,
  
• A law to prevent the Supreme Court from ruling on an issue is un-American, even when it is not explicitly intended to bolster prejudice,
  
• Racism - be it against black men in DC or immigrants throughout America - is wrong, (edit: I cannot defend this claim; I withdraw it.) and
  
• Undermining modern medicine would destroy millions of lives in the most brutal fashion.

Citations for Ron Paul's support of each of these are in the link.

* "Meet" meaning suitable, proper, appropriate. It's standard.

Comments

[peri-renna.livejournal.com]

I like Obama, but I honestly haven't done the research. If the primaries were today, I'd vote for McCain based on his reputation regarding torture and civil liberties. I don't like his militarism, but I dislike Ron Paul's anti-secularism (for example) more.

[roaminrob.livejournal.com]

You would be voting for increased war in the Middle East. The foundations have been laid for war against Iran, and McCain would be pleased to take us there (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAzBxFaio1I). As far as torture goes, I'm glad that McCain worked closely with Bush to institute a ban on it, way back in 2005 (http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/12/15/torture.bill/index.html). As far as secularism goes, McCain has reversed many of his views since 2000. Apparently, he found that his support base eroded when he described Jerry Falwell as an agent of intolerance, and he has since reversed that statement (http://thinkprogress.org/2006/04/02/mccain-falwell/). He is actively in favor of teaching intelligent design as part of the science curriculum in public schools. (http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/politics/90069) Etc. Finally, McCain is as much a part of the institution as anybody else. His election would ensure that the country continues on the path it is currently on.

As for Obama ... well, he is the wild card, isn't he? He's shown enough strength of conviction to stand up to the mainstream press on a couple of issues. I liked the way he handled the idiotic "lapel pin" non-issue. He just might be able to get in without owing too many favors, which just might give him the maneuverability to fix a few things. And, though I try to pay about as much attention to race as to hair color, I would like to see, at last, a black person in the Presidency. It's past time for it.

That said, he hasn't had to spend enough time yet voting for or against particular hot-topic issues to really guess what he'd actually do while in office. But, I do know what everyone else would do, and certainly don't want them doing it.

In the absence of Paul -- and at this point I have no reason to believe he'll get the nod -- I'd vote for Obama, as well.

[peri-renna.livejournal.com]

You would be voting for increased war in the Middle East. The foundations have been laid for war against Iran, and McCain would be pleased to take us there (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAzBxFaio1I). As far as torture goes, I'm glad that McCain worked closely with Bush to institute a ban on it, way back in 2005 (http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/12/15/torture.bill/index.html). As far as secularism goes, McCain has reversed many of his views since 2000. Apparently, he found that his support base eroded when he described Jerry Falwell as an agent of intolerance, and he has since reversed that statement (http://thinkprogress.org/2006/04/02/mccain-falwell/). He is actively in favor of teaching intelligent design as part of the science curriculum in public schools. (http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/politics/90069) Etc. Finally, McCain is as much a part of the institution as anybody else. His election would ensure that the country continues on the path it is currently on.

As I said, I haven't done my research. For what it's worth, I agree that McCain is a bad candidate - and the "intelligent design" idiocy is something I hadn't heard and never want to support - but none of the Republican Party candidates are people I would support wholeheartedly. If nothing else, Ron Paul's willingness as a legislator to support flag-burning bans (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:h.j.res.80:), repeal governmental health protections for workers (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d096:h.r.2310:), and eliminate minimum wage (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d098:h.r.2962:) are offputting.

Would Ron Paul upset the establishment? I have no idea. But upsetting the establishment isn't a priority for me - I just want a government I can approve of.