by James Buchanan

The last Republican Debate had some good points and some ridiculous points to it. Questions on immigration exposed Giuliani, Romney and Huckabee as being “Open Borders” sell outs, despite their “tough on illegals” rhetoric today. Ron Paul stood out again as the only sane candidate, who would bring our troops home from Iraq and save one trillion dollars in the process. Huckabee tried to steal Ron Paul’s anti-IRS position. Fortunately, an old video clip of Huckabee showed him happily raising taxes back as governor of Arkansas. Romney proudly announced that he was pro-life, but he had to explain why he was pro-abortion when governor of Massachusetts.

A survey on Youpolls had Ron Paul winning the latest debate according to 77 percent of the people. Another online poll on CBS News has Ron Paul also winning with 80 percent. And a CNN poll shows Ron Paul winning with 56 percent.

A CNN article reports “The acrimony from the Republican campaign trail carried over quickly into the CNN/YouTube GOP presidential debate Wednesday. The debate marks the first time the candidates have faced off on the same stage in over a month… Romney attacked Giuliani’s record, saying that as mayor, he promoted illegal immigration. And Giuliani shot back, accusing Romney of having a ’sanctuary mansion’ at his own home… In his quest to appeal to the hard-line immigration wing of the party, Romney also turned some of his fire on the same topic toward former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who has been rising in the polls.”

By attacking each other, Romney, Giuliani, Thompson and Huckabee are saving Ron Paul from having to “go negative.” In their desperation to crawl ahead of each other, they are airing all their dirty laundry. Ron Paul meanwhile has the cleanest and most consistent background of all the candidates. After a heavy session of mud-slinging, Ron Paul will always be the only one standing there spotless.

The CNN article also notes: “Sen. John McCain, freshly back from a visit to Iraq over Thanksgiving and the most hawkish of the candidates, and Rep. Ron Paul, the most anti-war of the candidates, tangled on two occasions over the Iraq war. Asked which government programs they would cut, Paul said bringing the troops home from Iraq would save ‘a trillion dollars.’ ”

For some unknown reason, an old army general was drudged up and proudly proclaimed he was Gay. The old fruity officer then babbled about Gays in the military –bringing up an issue much more appropriate for Democrats than Republicans.

Ron Paul got a question about conspiracy theories and the CFR. It seemed as though this question was meant to marginalize Ron Paul as a “conspiracy nut” but Paul fired back that the CFR is a real organization and it played a key role in pushing through NAFTA and GATT. Over 80 percent of Americans opposed NAFTA and GATT and many still think it was a huge sell out of the American people.

Ron Paul also pointed out that the “European Union” was another creation of the CFR which came to fruition. Too bad Ron Paul didn’t mention by name the CFR members, who were sharing the stage with him. That would have really opened some eyes.

None of the neocon candidates were able to pull away from the pack. Romney tried to usurp the illegal alien issue, but his past record makes his new “tough on illegals” position unbelievable. Huckabee tried to steal the idea of abolishing the IRS, but his past tax-raising tendencies made his words ring hollow. Meanwhile, Ron Paul, who wants to eliminate the anchor baby loophole and enforce immigration laws AND eliminate the IRS, stood out as the real deal, who didn’t just draw up his positions in the last few days to try to pander to Republican voters. Ron Paul means what he says and people respect him. Romney, Huckabee and Giuliani can’t be trusted any further than they can be thrown.