Ron Paul is the best candidate for President in 2008

First, I will concede that I agree that Ron Paul is correct on many issues and is obviously the best candidate among the Republican party. He acknowledges the truth when it comes to Islamic terrorists, the economy, and several other major issues, and he often has legitimate plans to correct issues. I am in almost total agreement with his foreign policies as well as many of his economic polices. In reality, I have no debate with the content of your statement, but rather with the topic of the debate. Ron Paul is not the best candidate for President. The reasons are as follows: 1. Ron Paul wants to repeal all bans and measures restricting citizen from obtaining firearms, as well as easing the procedures on purchase and registration of firearms. This means that any law-abiding U.S. citizen could purchase anything from a .38 snub up to a fully automatic AK-47. In addition, Paul wants to make it legal for citizens to carry concealed, legally acquired firearms. 2. While Ron Paul supports withdrawing from the IMF, the WTO, the World Bank, NAFTA, and CAFTA, which are mainly tools for international corporations to expand into countries where they can pay workers 10 cents an hour and charge the same price to their consumers, Ron Paul also supports withdrawing from the UN. The United States definitely should focus more upon its national interests, but isolating itself from the rest of the world community will not provide the type of national image that this country desperately needs at this point in time. Paul even takes this isolationist position as far as to say we should ignore the legal slavery of black Christians in Sudan. While I support the non-intervention foreign policy, it is also important to acknowledge extreme loss of human rights in other countries, and act accordingly through the United Nations. 3. Ron Paul holds the position that no goods or services imported or exported to or from the U.S. should be inhibited in any way. Also that the United States should not be held accountable for its trade positions. This deregulation could lead to consequences as disastrous as the recent lead filled Chinese imports did for China. Not only would these policies allow for more situations like this to happen on imports to the U.S., but it would allow for these situations to occur on exports from the U.S. as well, with no accountability to the government. This would weaken our international image even further. 4. Paul claims universal health care will not work, and claims that the current health care system is not working. His solution? Abolish all medicare plans and similar acts and leave it up to each individual state. This is not suggesting a solution, it is proposing that each state decide which of the two options it would rather try and work out on its own. Paul's conservative small government ideals are refreshing, but a plan for health care is badly needed. He voted no on the SCHIP bill, and if he has no viable alternative to universal health care, I see no reason why he should be elected. The health care crisis in this country is enormous. 5. To use a nice sounding clichï¿½... last but not least: Ron Paul does not support energy independence or pushing towards cleaner energy. He voted no on implementing the Kyoto Protocol, voted no on prohibiting oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, voted no on raising CAFE standards in 2001 (fleet-wide average of 27.5 mpg by 2007), voted yes for the scheduling of new oil refineries in 2006, voted no on keeping the 25 year moratorium on off-shore oil drilling in environmentally sensitive areas, and finally he voted no on removing Big Oil subsidies on Jan. 18, 2007--despite claiming that the Big Oil subsidies should be removed just 6 months later at a GOP debate at Saint Anselm College. I feel that these are five of the largest issues with Ron Paul's policies, growing worse as you further down the list. This is why Ron Paul is NOT the best candidate for president in 2008. I personally believe Dennis Kucinich, who happens to be friends with Ron Paul, is the best candidate. He holds a similar non-intervention foreign policy, but he also recognizes the need to deal with the world community. He also wishes to withdraw from many of the corporate-run world organizations at the same time. Kucinich, in my opinion is by far the best candidate of them all. However, I realize that he has almost no chance of winning even one state in the primary, and as a result we must find a balance between the slew of normal candidates and the radicalism of Paul and Kucinich. I find that Edwards holds many of the same foreign policy ideals in terms of the aggravation of the Middle East, while at the same time promoting dealing with the world community. Edwards is further right of Kucinich, which makes him a slightly more unifying figure. I won't go into a lot of detail about either of them however, as I feel it is more important to spread knowledge of ALL of Ron Paul's policies. It is important to know which issues are important both nationally, as well as globally. The United States can't function if it continues to consider itself the most important country in the world.