Ron Paul seemed like the only reasonable choice for a presidential candidate in 2008 as he backed ideologies in direct opposition to many of the inequities of the current system of government and would have sought to replace these inequities with a more Constitutionally based form of government. Sadly he also saw the handwriting on the wall and knew once he failed to win the Republican candidacy for the office that to have continued to moved forward as a 3rd party candidate would only have served as a distraction and never as a serious potential winner in the election.

While many people will say that the President is more of a figure head in the government and that the real power rests within the congress itself, while there is truth to that it would also seem obvious with the chenanigans that have occurred within the short span of the current administration that indeed the office carries more weight in having the ability to implement drastic changes than would seem to support such an assertion.

In truth the current administration as well as several previous ones have all subverted the intent of the Constitution by mandating changes to what powers the office in reality should hold and have sought and continue to seek additional powers not outlined within the Constitution and having done so have elevated the office to hold much more power than it was ever intended to.

Had Ron Paul been elected I feel the outlined principles he had mentioned during his campaign would have had a huge impact on our overall governance "if" he had been allowed to have carried out these ideologies and could well have moved us back to a much more logical course in adherence by the federal government to Constitutionally outlined parameters which at least would have returned some level of sanity to how the federal government operates.

The real problem Ron Paul would have faced in implementing these plans would have come from all the toes he would have stepped on in doing so as well as from all the agencies whom would have been dissolved as a part of that process. These people would never have just rolled over and accepted what he had planned and opposition would have been fierce from many fronts and just as surely multiple smear campaigns would likely have erupted in hopes of deriding any opportunity for success in implementing his goals.

But ... I still feel he was our only real hope for a return to reasonable governance by the fed