Andrew Meyer and Ron Paul

I was recently looking through this past Friday's edition of The Independent Florida Alligator when I ran across an opinion piece by Andrew "Don't Tase Me Bro" Meyer. Apparently, Mr. Meyer has decided to go ahead and use his First Amendment rights to express himself freely after all. Good for him, and good for the rest of us as well! But we'll see if our illustrious local prosecutors decide to get aggressive with Andrew should he ever express something not to their personal liking (such as saying that he wasn't sorry after all)!

Meyer basically wrote his article to extol Republican candidate for President Ron Paul. Although a member of the GOP, Paul expresses liberal Democratic ideas on several issues. Still, he subscribes to a more Libertarian, laissez-faire creed when it comes to the economy. For Meyer, the most important issues that he supports Paul for is the candidate's adamant opposition to American military involvement in Iraq and in other parts of the world as well as his professed vehement support of the U.S Constitution, particularly in the application of its Bill of Rights. Paul's candidacy sounds eerily a bit like Democrat Howard Dean's four years ago in that he had built his campaign largely on the Internet.

Ron Paul sounds to me like a pretty decent fellow. And he may or may not make a pretty decent President. However, one person alone does not make up the entire Executive Branch, and whoever gets elected as President is bound to bring in members of his own party to fill in most of the important policy-making positions, especially in the Cabinet. And you can rest assured that, if Paul brings in his fellow Republicans, then his administration will contain many who oppose him on some of the important issues that would have gotten him elected.

Wouldn't it make more sense to support a candidate whose opinions largely resonate within his or her own political party? If someone like Barack Obama were elected as President, I am fairly confident that his administration would be mostly composed of those with whom he is philosophically in agreement regarding the proper function of government within society, as well as the best way for America to promote its interests across the world. A Paul Presidency, on the other hand, by the very "maverick" nature of the candidate, would be problematic: his own party would be deeply divided, and he would still have to deal with the Democrats as an opposition party. This, to me, would make for a dangerously weak Presidency. Why not just let one party stand for the conservative viewpoint, the other the liberal viewpoint, and let us voters decide which direction we want to go in? Although I don't agree with Andrew Meyer's promotion of Ron Paul, I do appreciate his comments and look forward to more in the future.