It would be appropos for you to visit wikipidia’s Ron Paul page.

Paul has over the last 20 years built a tight grass-roots community of supporters from around the country and the world. So much so that the GOP’s national headquarters have tried to oust him with their own hand-picked candidate and lost soundly.

He has outraised them every time and dwarfs most congressional candidates in the individual contributer category. He takes little money from Lobbyists and certainly none from lobbies that promote programs counter to the U.S. Constitution.

Since the last debate, Paul’s coffers have swelled to 5 million dollars, mostly from individual contributers. (To put this in perspective, Mitt Romney’s current cash on hand is around 11 million).

You and some of the other media pundits can pretend that Paul is just a passing fancy, but you are ill-informed and will look very silly over the next 18 months.

I have been reading about Ron Paul for well over 10 years now. His support is broad, deep and diverse. Anyone who has an interest in liberty as our founding fathers espoused, knows about Dr. Paul.

The libertarian Party may just nominate Dr. Paul as their candidate in 2008 because he so closely matches with their beliefs.

Your reference to Free Republic’s practice of “freeping” polls is amusing. That site at one time was notorious for the practice and it is because of Free Republic and Democratic Underground that the practice of verification became widespread.

Furthermore, MSNBC’s sms (text messaging) poll gathered the cell phone numbers of everyone who participated. It was not some trick or hack that put Paul just two percentage points behind Romney as the GOP debate’s clear winner.

Rush Limbaugh was quick to discount Paul’s impact as have many others. But those who discount the man are in for a rude awakening. He has impact because he speaks the truth and has always voted consistently for the things in which he believes; which cannot be said of any of his opponents Democrat or Republican. He also has the fund raising ability to jump into the “first tier” soon if he hasn’t done so already.

Ron Paul is the only candidate who has any potential to tap into the growing pool of voters who have simply given up on politics. The disenfranchised are not apathetic. They are tired of the same old set of liars being presented to them as worthy rulers.

If he is able to reach those disenfranchised voters, the election will be his for the taking. It is for that reason the mainstream media is doing its damndest to keep him under wraps.

I just think that when you see that he obviously believes everything he says, and also has the knowledge of history to back it up, you have to put aside your own assumptions for a second about what you may have assumed are “right” and “wrong” and take the time to listen and think.

And if there is any chance that what he says about an issue seems to make sense, even though it may be diametrically opposite to what you once believed, you owe it to yourself to 1) admit you know next to zero really about economic history and thought and 2) explore the issue deeper independently.

How are you, a blogger on the internet, different than any other blogger on the internet? Could you be a . . . gasp . . . TROLL?

I’ve only heard of Ron Paul recently, and yes it was from online, and I’m glad. He’s the first U.S. politician in years I’ve been excited about. Yes, excited about, in REAL LIFE. NOT the internet.

And to “Timmah: to compare informed, passionate supporters of a clearly honest man running for office to a bunch of kooks, and with a one liner no less (no citation or basis whatever), is irresponsible.

I do believe you are a troll, Here, have a cookie.

we’re a passionate and diverse bunch. I guess we’re crazy for thinking the government should operate only within its constitutional limitations. everyone knows that the founding fathers who drafted those limitations were batshit crazy. obviously tyrannical government control over our finances and libery, not to mention never ending war, is a way better option. In fact I cant wait till the CFR realizes its dreams of global government, sovereignty is totally unworkable.

yay totalitarianism! go hitler!, er , I mean.. neo-cons!