GOP nominated wrong candidate, making Obama the best choice in November

To read Punditty’s recent political columns, one might think he has been a supporter of Democratic nominee Barack ObamaBarack Obama from the beginning. Not so.

Punditty came around to the Obama camp after the race narrowed to two major candidates, Republican Sen. John McCainJohn McCain and Obama. During the primary season, Punditty supported GOP candidate Ron PaulRon Paul (R-Texas) for three major reasons:

1. Paul’s grasp on economic matters, especially the role of the Federal Reserve in creating and perpetuating so many facets of the false economy deteriorating so dramatically before us today.

2. Paul’s wise, Constitution-based, non-interventionist approach to foreign policy, especially his correct view that the invasion and occupation of Iraq have been and continue to be tremendous strategic blunders by the Bush Administration. His recognition that blowback - unintended negative consequences resulting from covert operations - is a factor in how America got to where it is today also showed that he was willing to talk to Americans as adults, not as emotional beings to be played and swayed by feel-good, "patriotic" sloganeering.

3. Paul’s recognition that the War on Drugs is a total failure, and that an entire re-evaluation of both the Drug War budget and the (morally and economically) bankrupt philosophies behind it are in order.

Paul, needless to say, voted against the costly, unfair bailout package on Monday, Sept. 29, when it failed. He voted against it again on Oct. 3, when it passed.

The odds were stacked against Paul's truly maverick candidacy from the beginning, as he was mocked or ignored by know-it-all media functionaries who dismissed him as irrelevant. Other GOP candidates also ridiculed him, as evidenced in the way he was treated by Rudy GiulianiRudy Giuliani, Mitt RomneyMitt Romney and other, less successful Republican candidiates. GOP voters chose style and name recognition over substance and integrity in choosing McCain over Paul, to detriment of the party and the country as a whole. Whereas McCain rushed back to Washington push for a bailout, Paul would have been leading the fight against it - and likely surging to a lead over a pro-bailout Obama in the process.

Barring a political miracle, it is too late for Ron Paul to mount an independent candidacy for the presidency. Despite his endorsement of Constitution Party candidate the Rev. Chuck Baldwin of Florida, Punditty believes Baldwin’s qualifications for national elective office (Baptist minister, GOP political operative in Florida) are roughly on par with those of Alaska Gov. Sarah PalinSarah Palin. He may have been endorsed by Paul, Baldwin does not have the heft -- nor will he develop it between now and Nov. 4 -- to be taken seriously as a presidential hopeful.

Both Obama and McCain are so beholden to Wall Street and the financial giants gaining from the bailout that the best they can do is offer vague assurances about "protections" for the taxpayers. By virtue of his voting record and consistent support of regulatory safeguards, however, Obama wins on integrity when it comes to who has Americans' best interests at heart. The fact remains that the economic mess we’re in now accelerated under the current President BushPresident Bush, and in the larger sense, with the deregulatory ideology set in place by President Reagan in 1980.

It may seem odd for someone who supported Paul in the 2008 primaries to blame Reaganomics and trickle-down theory for the current economic woes, but as well-intentioned as he was, Reagan overlooked or downplayed one very important factor: Greed.

The 1987 film “Wall Street” epitomized the dark underbelly of Reagan’s economic approach, highlighting the clash in values between working class Americans who were losing their livelihoods and financial speculators who were gaining clout. Meanwhile, Americans across the board were manipulated by all manner of deregulatory smoke-and-mirror games and financial dog-and-pony shows (wait until Americans wake up to the monetary monster known as derivatives) as they lived large under the illusion of paper wealth or eternal credit, both of which have no basis in reality or in a "sound money" system as espoused by Dr. Paul. This trend began under Reagan, continued under the first President Bush and President ClintonPresident Clinton, and finally reached its logical conclusion under our sitting president.

Unlike Reagan, the Bushes or Clinton, Paul said he would go right at the No. 1 systemic flaw that allows for such greed to not only flourish but become institutionalized: the arguably unconstitutional role played by the Federal Reserve System.* Had Paul been the GOP nominee instead of McCain, voters would get a thorough explanation from him on why America needs to eliminate its reliance on this public/private amalgamation and return to what he terms sound money. Sound money is money backed by something other than thin air and the Treasury Department's printing presses. Something, for example, like gold.

But the potential for a much-needed, far-reaching debate on the monetary system faded when Republican voters chose McCain, a man who by his own admission is weak on economic matters. "The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should,” McCain said in December of 2007. “I’ve got Greenspan’s book." In Paul, the Party of Lincoln had a rare opportunity to nominate a man worthy of Honest Abe's legacy. Instead, it chose McCain, a man who is looking less suitable for the presidency at every turn.

On the other hand, Obama has the potential to be a profoundly effective reformer in the tradition of Franklin D. RooseveltFranklin D. Roosevelt. Rather than campaigning on the premise that government doesn’t work so no one should expect government to get anything right, Obama knows that government can get things right - like Social Security - when the people who make up that government believe in the integrity of their mission and their ability to carry it out. Lest we forget, Reagan himself was a great admirer of FDR, even going so far as to tell other Republicans not to denigrate Roosevelt in his presence.

In 1932, America needed a strong leader like FDR; in 1980, it needed a strong leader like Reagan. In 2008, it needs a strong leader like Paul or Obama (depending on one's political views), but the last thing it needs is someone unstable, erratic and given to melodrama and grandstanding when it suits his whim. True to form, we saw President Bush do that once more with his gun-to-the-head panic speech of Sept. 24. McCain also played the panic card when he "suspended his campaign" and tried to play the hero in some sham con being foisted on the American People. To behave that way as the nominee of a major party is bad enough - the last thing America needs is John McCain in the Oval Office.

Given the choice between McCain’s reckless, "now I don’t see a problem, now I see an economy about to crater" approach and Obama’s long-established understanding that things have been in bad shape for many years; between McCain’s overly dramatic tendencies toward grandstanding and Obama’s intelligent, rational decision-making processes; between a political party that exhibited a collective ignorance in rejecting their best and brightest candidate and a party that chose the candidate that best represents its values, Punditty sees it as a no-brainer.

Sen. Barack Obama will be a much better, more effective 44th President of the United States than Sen. John McCain could ever hope to be.

Perhaps their looming election loss on Nov. 4 will inspire the Republican Party to reinvent itself in the mold of someone like Paul, which is to say a party that embraces the three underlying principles Punditty cited for his support of the Texas congressman in the first place.

* "A system of capitalism presumes sound money, not fiat money manipulated by a central bank. Capitalism cherishes voluntary contracts and interest rates that are determined by savings, not credit creation by a central bank." - Ron Paul