David Edwards and Ron Brynaert
Monday May 21, 2007
'Dark horse' presidential candidate Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) believes that "that the majority of Americans are with me," regarding his harsh insurgent attacks on President Bush's Iraq policies.
During CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer host John King asked Paul a hypothetical question, in reference to the war in Iraq: "If China took back Taiwan today, you say go to the Congress, or does the president not have the authority as commander in chief?"
"Absolutely he does not have the authority," Paul said. "Where does he get it? You can't go to war without Congressional approval. And that's not a threat to our national security. That's something internal affairs. Why should we send hundreds of thousands of Americans to die in a civil war?"
Paul added, "I mean, are we over in Russia right now over Chechnya? I mean, it wouldn't make any sense. Did we go to war over Hong Kong?"
"We should follow the Constitution and the advice of the founders," Paul continued. "Don't go looking for dragons to slay. I mean, why should we go and provoke and look for trouble? We should talk to people, negotiate, be diplomatic and trade with people."
Paul also blasted criticism that he isn't "Republican enough."
"I support the Republican platform better than any other candidate, I am convinced of," Paul insisted. "Take out the platform. They're for less government. They're for personal liberty. We ran on our program in 2000 for a humble foreign policy."
Paul asked incredulously, "How can anybody say I'm not Republican? I'm the most conservative member of the Congress. I vote for the least amount of spending and the least amount of taxes, and they say I'm not Republican enough?"
"I mean, why don't you challenge that side rather than challenging me and feed into the frenzy that say get rid of the reporter, get rid of the person delivering the information rather than dealing with the information," Paul added. "Non-intervention is a real political victory. We cannot win as Republicans next year if we just continue to dig our heels in, send more men and women over there to die on a policy that has failed."
Paul said that "Republicans are scared to death to face up to the truth. And my job is to make them face up to it and show them that the majority of Americans are with me, not with the current foreign policy that we're following."
"Low in the polls but certainly shaking and stirring things up in the Republican race," CNN's King remarked at the end of the interview.
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