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Published: September 13, 2007

Abortion’s “unshakeable foe”

Presidential candidate Ron Paul visits California

Texas Congressman Ron Paul, who is running to capture the Republican Party nomination for president, is visiting California this week. His visits -- to Pasadena on Sept. 12, San Francisco on Sept. 13 and Palo Alto the same day -- are for fundraising ($500-$2000 minimum for dinner and cocktails). They are part of a larger West Coast campaign. From the Bay Area, Paul will go on to Seattle.

Congressman Paul has been a controversial candidate because, though a Republican, he has been critical of the Bush Administration’s “War on Terror” and the president’s immigration policies. Paul favors strong border controls and enforcement of immigration laws.

At a Columbia, South Carolina debate with Republican candidates last May, Paul came under fire from Republican candidate Rudolph Guiliani for saying the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center was because “we’ve been over there; we’ve been bombing Iraq for ten years…” When asked by a Fox News reporter if he was saying the U.S. invited the 9/11 attack, Paul replied, “I’m suggesting that we listen to the people who attacked us and the reason they did it. They don’t come here to attack us because we’re rich and we’re free. They come and they attack us because we’re over there.”

On his web site, Paul says he doesn’t favor isolationism in foreign policy; he endorses American “generosity” to people around the world and “open trade.” But he criticizes “entangling ourselves in the affairs of other nations … We are spread so thin that we have few troops defending America. And now, there are new calls for a draft of our young men and women,” says Paul. The U.S., says Paul, should not go to war on a United Nations resolution.

Though favoring “open trade,” Paul, however, sees “free trade deals and world governmental organizations like the International Criminal Court …, NAFTA, GATT, WTO, and CAFTA” as "a threat to our independence as a nation. They transfer power from our government to unelected foreign elites.”

Paul favors traditional Republican policies, such as tax cuts to create jobs, and is an economic libertarian. He criticizes what he calls threats to privacy and personal liberty in measures such as the Patriot Act. He supports home schooling and opposes government regulation of it. He says he will “veto any legislation that creates national standards or national testing for home school parents or students.”

“The right of an innocent, unborn child to life is at the heart of the American ideals of liberty. My professional and legislative record demonstrates my strong commitment to this pro-life principle,” says Paul, an OB/GYN, who says he has delivered over 4,000 babies. In Congress, he says, he “authored legislation that seeks to define life as beginning at conception, HR 1094.” He has also been “the prime sponsor of HR 300, which would negate the effect of Roe v Wade by removing the ability of federal courts to interfere with state legislation to protect life.” He has supported legislation preventing federal funds for “population control.”

Paul calls himself “an unshakable foe of abortion,” one who thinks “there cannot be liberty in a society unless the rights of all innocents are protected. Much can be understood about the civility of a society in observing its regard for the dignity of human life,” says Paul.

© California Catholic Daily 2007. All Rights Reserved.