Reason Writers Around Town: Brian Doherty At U.S. News and World Report on Why the GOP Should Respect Ron Paul (And His Voters)

I wrote a piece for a U.S. News and World Report debate on whether the GOP should give more respect to Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) today. Excerpt:

The Republican Party has been, rhetorically, the party of limited, constitutional government that respects its citizens' liberties. Ron Paul has been the candidate who energized hundreds of thousands of active, involved, giving young voters to truly get excited about those ideas.

The best thing the GOP could do to guarantee its future and relevance is give Paul—and more important than Paul, his supporters, who are the necessary future of their party—all the respect and attention they can, from speaking slots to actually adopting Paul's vision of a government that lives within its means, has a foreign policy focused on defense rather than running the world, and believes in the liberating energies of free people in a free market.

Also in the mix on that debate, Jamie Chandler, a poli sci professor at Hunter College, agrees with me, and Republican strategist Ford O'Connell thinks it would be a disunifying mistake to let Ron Paul speak at the Republican National Convention in Tampa next week.

My new book, Ron Paul's Revolution: The Man and the Movement He Inspired.