Ron Paul For President?

USAToday.com posts way too many articles about the presidential candidates with 18 months to go, but I like to click on them and see what comments people leave to get an idea of how much support different candidates have (Regardless of poll results, Hillary, for instance, has virtually no support among USAToday's readers, Republican or Democrat).

Anyway, many of them have made comments to the tune of "Ron Paul is the only real candidate" or "Ron Paul is the only candidate who supports the Constitution" and other such positive statements.

Ron Paul? Who is this guy? I'd never heard of him . So I looked him up on Wikipedia. He's an interesting guy, and while it's still way too early to worry about, I might like him the most out of the candidates so far. A bit of information on the guy:

• Right now he's a Republican Congressman, listed as a Protestant, for whatever that's worth
  
• His nickname is "Dr. No" because he supposedly always votes no for bills that are against the Constitution. He has never voted to raise taxes or congressional pay. He does not participate in the lucrative congressional pension program and returns a portion of his annual congressional office budget to the U.S. treasury every year.
• Interestingly enough, he has always voted against the War, the Patriot Act, seeming to prefer targeted strikes against individuals. Not sure if that's good, bad, or neutral, but it means he's got a shot at support for votes from the Democratic types
  
• He used to "be a specialist in obstetrics/gynecology and has delivered more than 4,000 babies. Paul didn't accept Medicare or Medicaid as a physician; instead, he would do the work for free or work out a lowered payment for needy patients."
• He's for limited government that does not pay to solve our problems with our tax money, against amnesty for immigrants and for a fence.
• He's got 17 grandchildren.

It's hard to know how to true some of that information is (coming from Wikipedia and the obviously pro-Paul official website), but he at least sounds like a guy who supports capitalism and democracy, and maybe hasn't even been corrupted by his couple decades of experience as a law-maker (returns extra money from his own budget?! Supposedly he gets 96% of his contributions from individuals, suggesting a lot of support as well as not being tied to lobbyists?!)

Although a former Libertarian candidate for president, due to his political ideals and voting record he probably has a better chance at a Republican nomination than Guiliani (unclear abortion views), Romney (unwillingness to elect a Mormon), McCain (too liberal), or Brownback (too unknown).

I'm tempted to predict Ron Paul and Obama as the future contenders at this point, but again, it's way too early. Just thought I'd let my readers know about Ron Paul, since he's an interesting guy whose been getting more attention and rising in various polls.

http://www.ronpaul2008.com/html/AboutRon_fx.html
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/html/Issues_fx.html