Iowa Caucuses Today!

[A Black Falcon]

My opinion of Ron Paul:
http://www.tcforums.com/forums/showpost....stcount=25

On Ron Paul...
http://www.mainecampus.com/home/index.cf...af1ad39a08

Editorial from the college paper here, anti-Ron Paul. There are several long responses that attempt to "defend" Ron Paul, but reading their defenses to me is like reading a long list of all the reasons why I so, so strongly disagree with Republicans and Libertarians.

To put it simply, Democrats believe that government can be a good thing. Libertarians believe it cannot be a good thing beyond the absolute most basic minimum level. Republicans believe that it is mostly a bad thing, but is useful on subjects relating to security. This is really a key difference -- Republicans and Libertarians are constantly trying to reduce the size of government, downsize it, destroy international alliances like the UN (because they "don't work"; my position on the UN is the exact, utter opposite of that -- I think it is an incredibly important and often quite successful organization that we should be strongly supporting, not attempting to disband... yes, many there disagree with us, but our reaction there doesn't exactly help our chances of convincing many people to change their opinions on us now does it?), get rid of vital federal departments because "the private sector can do it better" (this is ABSOLUTELY NOT TRUE! Just look at the army vs. the mercenaries in Iraq or Medicare/Medicaid/the Veteran's Authority versus HMOs. Which works better and is more cost effective? That's right, the government-run healthcare agencies, not the private ones. Etc, etc.), et cetera. I agree with libertarians on the danger of infringing on civil liberties and on not wanting to get into bad wars like Iraq, but on a lot of other issues I totally disagree. Government is not evil or unnecessary.

Oh yes, and he's as much a Republican as he is a Libertarian. That's why he's anti-abortion, seems to question evolution, etc. He's not a pure libertarian.

Rudy Giuliani... ugh, he's horrible. While he's liberal on social issues, he's a neocon on military, foreign policy, and domestic security issues. Essentially, he thinks that the only thing wrong with Bush's foreign policy is that he didn't go far enough... or at least all of the advisers around him sure think that, but Rudy's record of supporting the Bush administration is long and clear. He has also never seen a restriction of civil liberties he didn't like. The attached image is entirely appropriate... "Rudy is a fascist" is a pretty minimal exaggeration, to say the least. (if you don't know it, The American Conservative is a magazine funded by Pat Buchanan, so it's very much a traditional, isolationist-style fiscal conservative mag and can't stand the neocons who run the Republican party now)

http://www.amconmag.com/2008/2008_01_14/cover.html

As for the Democrats, I definitely prefer Kucinich because he's the most liberal, but between Obama and Hillary I prefer Hillary. More experience in politics, more experience facing the Republican smear machine that will hammer down on whoever the Democrats nominate, very similar politics (though Hillary's probably a bit better on health care and Obama slightly better on Iraq, they're both quite moderate and not too far apart on the issues)... Obama certainly would make a great candidate too, but is he ready?

Anyway, Giuliani, or "9iu11ani" as some are calling him now. This is such an awesome image...