Yeah... could of been more socially agnostic had not the right and left both bltized them with fake racism charges.

They were supporting a lot of democrats early going and there was plenty of room for Libretarian and Clinton style democrats to jump on.

You really want a female version of Bush Jnr to lead the most powerful nation on Earth?

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/sarahpalin/a/palin-top-10.htm

Ron Paul is leagues more intelligent than all of them put together. Shame he can't get anywhere near as much media time as the others due to being pro free market of the Adam Smith kind which is essentially anti-Corporatist.

I was hoping to see piece of shit Rick Perry in the op.... I have lived in Texas for the past 10 or so years. This guy is pathetic and stands little chance of actually winning. Do you think the American public will elect another Texas governor after Bush? I believe the American public has a short memory span but they still remember the pathetic Bush. Give up now Perry because you will lose anyways.

" His claim to fame (other than being George Bush's successor as governor of Texas) is that since the recession, Texas has been responsible for more job growth than all other states combined and multiplied (about 75% of all jobs were created in Texas)."

-This is truly pathetic and shows just how bad the USA economy/job market is.  I bet over half of those 75% jobs created in Texas were minimum/near minimum wage temp jobs (with little to zero benefits).  Talk about growth all you want but when the average worker wages go down and they are forced to take terrible paying jobs then that is nothing to brag about.   Adding thousands of 7.50 a hour jobs isn't an accomplishment.

The only Republican that is actually worth something to USA is Ron Paul (too bad he will never get the nomination).  Republicans and Democrats need to disband their parties.  They both plainly suck and do nothing good for the country.

You Americans constantly confuse me.

You're lucky enough to have a political system that gives libertarians like Ron Paul a chance to shake up the dichotomy of retards vs retards, but you still vote for people who perpetuate a two party system in which both choices are anti-freedom (whatever they may say, the hard-line Republicans are just as firmly in favour of big government as the Democrats; they differ in form rather than spirit). I'd give my right arm (I'm left-handed) to have a system in which politicians like Dan Hannan had a chance of affecting how the country is run.

I've come to the conclusion that Americans actually like their false dichotomy.

That, or the system by which candidates are decided is fundamentally flawed and gives an advantage to candidates that appeal to the hard-line members of the two parties, who will generally vote for people who perpetuate the current system.

Still, it's better than the British system of "let's allow the ruling party to change the Prime Minister whenever the hell they want and not give anyone a chance to vote". This is exactly how Gordon Brown came to power; the public certainly didn't vote for him as Prime Minister.

I love all the Republican HATE that goes on everywhere. Its almost as if people truly believe the Democrats of today are ANY better, which they are not.

Both sides have their good and bad parts and unfortunately BOTH parties are suffering from an abundance of those exact parts. I have no problem with conservatives, or of people trying to hold onto their own values. Its when those beliefs (both conservative and liberal) are thrust on those who DO NOT WANT THEM.

I have been Republican my entire life (what kills me is that I said Republican, but most people will instantly think "conservative") and I do not see that changing any time soon. I guess a more correct label would be Libertarian Republican.

The only candidate in the field that I can get behind (Primary wise) is Ron Paul. Social issues need to take a back seat to the economy, and he is one of the few politicians that I agree with on the economy.

God help us. If he gets in, it'll make even democrats long for the days of George W. Bush...

Actually it's much the same as it is in Britain. Like when Richard Nixon resigned and we got President Gerald Ford, 100% unelected. Not that that he was a bad president, but nobody sure as hell worked to put him there

It's just that there is far far less incentive for any of our presidents to resign (basically you resign to avoid impeachment, and impeachment was only ever attempted three times out of 44 presidents), whereas in Britain a strategic shakeup of the PM makes sense because you don't want a bad PM to mess with your party's chances in the next general election or worse yet, to prompt a Vote of No Confidence. You see that more clearly in Japan, where the last man they actually voted for was Yukio Hatoyama, who resigned to make way for Naoto Kan, who has already announced his resignation, to have the second prime minister in a row selected by Party Men and not the people of Japan, and in both cases because Hatoyama and Kan had gained degrees of unpopularity that was bad for the Party

He'd make a good president he really helped the Texas economy.

And this is why the two systems are very different.

Ford was an unelected president, yes, but in exceptional circumstances. Nixon had to step down.

The British system encourages changing the Prime Minister without voter consent for purely party political purposes. It also makes changes of Prime Minister more frequent; two out of our last four Prime Ministers were unelected; there have been 13 unelected British Prime Ministers since 1900 (although, to be fair, one of them called an election within two months of becoming PM).

I believe Ford was the only fully unelected president in American history, unless you count Dubya.

I have nothing against Ron Paul, but he is a liberal Republican and is therefore un-electable. Democrats won't cross party lines to vote for him and the conservative Republican base won't vote for him. He is nothing more than a Republican spoiler unfortunately.

The tea party could not get a presidential nomination to be elected either (IMO); they are seen as too extremist by Democrats AND Republicans. The best bet for a Tea Party candidate would be as VP.

I think the two most electable Republican candidates are Romney and Perry. Assuming Perry wins the nomination (big assumption but that is how I think it's going down) I'd really like a Perry/McCain ticket, though I think that is unlikely. So my next preference would be a Perry/Hailey ticket or a Perry/Giuliani ticket.

So what do I think of Perry? I think he has a good chance of gaining wide-spread Republican support for a 2012 election, and as I'd like to see a Republican in office, I would vote for him.