Election season is fast approaching again, and it seems like you can’t turn on the news today without hearing something about the upcoming Republican primaries for the presidential nomination. Just around a week and a half ago Michele Bachmann won the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa, and shortly thereafter our own governor Rick Perry formally announced his bid.
It seems like this election has more frontrunners than you can wave a “Don’t Tread on Me” flag at. The media is having a field day going on about candidates like Perry, Bachmann, and Romney, and some pundits still hope others like Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan or New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will join the fray. But wait, aren’t we forgetting someone else who’s already in the race? Someone who trailed Michele Bachmann by only a single percentage point in the Ames Straw Poll?
Oh yeah, it’s Ron Paul! But you probably wouldn’t know that if you were only following this race through the lens of the mainstream media. As Jon Stewart recently pointed out, many newscasters treat Paul’s name like “the 13th floor in a hotel.” His performance in the Ames straw went largely unreported by major media outlets. When CNN was offering live coverage from the poll, an anchor told the correspondent how nice it would be if he could get some video of Sarah Palin at the event, but he could “hold the Ron Paul stuff.”
Rush Limbaugh even went so far as to say that Paul “is going to destroy this party” and called his campaign “nuts on parade.”
I for one don’t understand why Paul’s campaign has become so anathema to both the media and the Republican establishment. Frontrunners like Bachmann and Perry constantly go on about cutting the size of government, lowering taxes, and implementing other fundamental Tea Party ideas, but Ron Paul has been espousing these same ideas since before the Tea Party even existed. Moreover, he’s one of few members of Congress to offer actual solutions to our country’s budget problems like bringing an end to our various wars abroad and drastically cutting our defense budget, which accounts for 20 percent of all government spending.
Unlike other candidates running for president, Ron Paul is a true libertarian calling for an end to the War on Drugs, corporate welfare, and bloated defense spending. Moreover, Paul receives an overwhelming majority of his campaign contributions from individuals and not Political Action Committees. He’s a consistent candidate who sticks to his principles and doesn’t sell his soul to special interests.
I certainly don’t agree with every policy that Ron Paul puts forward. For instance, a few years ago he wrote a book called End the Fed that advocated the abolition of the Federal Reserve. He’s also made it a goal to eliminate various parts of the executive branch like the Department of Education. However, he has repeatedly shown that he is a practical politician willing to compromise. Senators and Members of Congress for years now have talked about implementing “commonsense” solutions to our nation’s problems, but sometimes it seems like Paul is the only one with the political fortitude to put such ideas forward.
The earliest primary elections are still months away, and the political momentum surrounding each potential Republican candidate certainly still has time to change. It would be nice if the media could catch on soon and finally start giving Paul the attention he deserves. After all, one of the other top GOP contenders has espoused seceding from the US and the other has accused homosexuals of living in “spiritual bondage.” Come on America, I think we can do better.
Brandon Bub is a sophomore majoring in English. He can be reached for comment at [email protected].
