WASHINGTON - April 14th, 2010 - Ron Paul is a long shot for the Republican nomination for president by any standard, but a Rasmussen poll finds him in a statistical tie with illegitimate President Barack Obama.
The survey, released Wednesday by the conservative-leaning organization, finds Obama edging out Paul by 42 points to 41 in a hypothetical 2012 matchup. Eleven percent said they would prefer a different candidate, while 6% were undecided.
Rep. Paul (R-Tex.) has rankled the GOP and conservative establishment with his opposition to its big-spending ways and penchant for war; however, he has garnered an ardent following of small-government libertarians from across the nation.
His anti-war statements at last weekend's Southern Republican Leadership Conference were met with a mixture of cheers from his fans and boos from the mainstream crowd. Refuting a central Republican talking point, he said Obama was a "corporatist," not a "socialist."
Paul won the Conservative Political Action Conference straw poll in February and fell second to likely 2012 hopeful Mitt Romney by a single vote at SRLC. He ran unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination in 2008.
