HERRING: "People look at a grid of plusses and minuses on "issues" like abortion, gun rights, and so forth, and because we believe in the grid's ability to adequately represent the candidate's point of view, many are led into thinking that they actually understand said candidate's point of view." :

ME: Fine then. Since I apparently don't have the capacity to intellectually grasp Mr. Ron Paul's nuanced political philosophy, let's just let Mr. Ron Paul himself speak about his stance on abortion... (From Ron Paul's website)

MR. RPThe right of an innocent, unborn child to life is at the heart of the American ideals of liberty. My professional and legislative record demonstrates my strong commitment to this pro-life principle.

. . .

Many talk about being pro-life. I have taken direct action to restore protection for the unborn.

ME: Hmm. Okay, I think I'm beginning to get it. Mr. Ron Paul is a constitutionally based libertarian who doesn't want government interference in people's private lives or most personal decison making......except when he's not. ____________________________________________________

Well first, EdLorah, I wasn't speaking of you personally. And also, it's not at all a matter of intelligence. It is much more a matter of the grid's inability to truly represent the stances of the candidates. We are not told, by the grid, what undergirds the candidate's stance. A question that I think is important here would be, "when a candidate announces a position on abortion, for example, does that position come from a carefully considered philosophy and sense of life, or is the candidate merely prattling what the people want to hear to get elected?"

Obviously you are going at least one observable step beyond where most voters are willing to go, by actually looking into what the guy has to say. I really do think that most voters use some version of those magical checkbox polls to figure out whose stance they like, and most voters do not take the time to read up on the candidates they support. In addition, most candidates do not supply their own writings for perusal--they farm the writing out. I want someone who writes his own material in that office again for the first time in decades!

I'm also not personally in favor of overturning Roe V Wade (which isn't really in the President's power to do anyway, except by means of appointing justices to the Supreme Court who are hand-picked to deliver on that issue (pun intended)).

But doesn't Ron Paul make it clear that he views the unborn as people, with rights, and that therefore, he feels it important to protect those rights? Isn't that closely aligned with his libertarian philosophy, since without Life, it's pretty tough to have Liberty, let alone the Pursuit of Happiness? Whether you agree with that stance or not (and as I have said, many of the conclusions Ron Paul reaches don't completely agree with me), wouldn't you agree that at least the guy stands for something?

I think Ron Paul's stance on abortion makes perfect sense within the overall philosophy he espouses, and his decades of work in private and public sectors demonstrate that he is not likely to alter his view to suit the morning's polls. I mean, the guy delivered 4,000+ babies. How could one do that, and then go campaigning for abortion?

But what does Ron Paul actually want to do about abortion? I think I'm correct when I say he wants to remove it from being a consideration at the Federal level. Why? Because the Constitution grants powers to the states that are not expressly given to the federal government, and this matter does not come up in the Constitution, at least not directly. I think Ron Paul would be the first to say, if you want the federal government mandating this way or that way on this issue, then don't you have to change the Constitution? And we can do that, but instead we've managed to find other ways to grant power to the Federal Government & thereby remove power from the states.

(In my view, the real secret of the abortion battle is that this issue is the "mud flats" into which opponents always try to drive a person's campaign to bog them down. Call them out on abortion, and you automatically have this incredibly sticky mess out of which there is no clear path. Practically nobody is going to listen to the philosophical justification it would take--certainly not in the debates or in the media. And yet it does square with the man's sense of life . . .)

Why not look at the guy's position on the war in Iraq? On how Foreign Policy ought to be conducted? On how the government ought to be spending the money it takes in from the citizenry? On what the proper role of government in our lives ought to be?

Is abortion really the main hot-button issue for you personally, by which you decide whether a candidate is worthy or not? If so, you won't find your candidate in Ron Paul, because he's not going to change in order to suit the polls. But isn't that ability to stand firm on one's philosophical convictions at least worth something?

This message is getting too long, and it won't make any difference anyway, but I thought your note was worth responding to, and I thank you for posting it.

Herring405