5 Myths About Ron Paul: Nick Gillespie in the Wash Post
I've got a piece up at the Washington Post debunking "5 Myths About Ron Paul." The myths include he's not a top-tier candidate, he's a doctrinaire libertarian, his call to "end the Fed" is crazy, he's anti-military, and the kids only like him because he wants to legalize the drugs.
From the intro:
?Ron Paul is the Rodney Dangerfield of Republican presidential candidates. The 12-term Texas congressman ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket back in 1988 and was widely seen as a sideshow in 2008, despite finishing third in the GOP field behind John McCain and Mike Huckabee. Why, despite a small but devoted set of supporters, does this 76-year-old obstetrician turned politician routinely get no respect from the media and GOP operatives? Let's take a look at what "Dr. No" — a nickname grounded in his medical career and his penchant for voting against any bill increasing the size of government — really stands for.
Here's the good doctor's son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) sticking a fork in Newt Gingrich and sticking up for his father:
While one candidate in the race, my father, Rep. Ron Paul, was publicly warning about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the crisis they were helping to create, Gingrich was earning millions to not only endorse but also promote the status quo….
Gingrich is not from the tea party. He is not even a conservative.
He is part of the Washington establishment I was sent to fight. He has been wrong on many of the major issues of the day, and he has taken money from those who helped cause the housing crisis and create millions of foreclosures.
What establishment politicians like Gingrich don't understand is that the Republican Party wins when it stands up for what it believes in, as many of my new colleagues did in 2010.
We also win when we effectively run against big government. We cannot do that if we nominate a candidate who has both embraced it and been enriched by it.