The Ron Paul Devolution comes to Central Jersey

I had the distinct pleasure this past Saturday of live blogging from the 2008 GOP Presidential Candidate Debate and Straw Poll in the center of central Jersey in the Woodbridge/Edison area.

This event was organized by our very conservative friends over at Conservatives With An Attitude and Michael Illions. For this progressive Democrat, it was a truly spirited gathering of neo-cons, paleo-cons and Ron-Cons----those Republican conservative libertarian devotees of Congressman Ron Paul. Paul, by the way, is the only candidate on the Republican side who favors an immediate withdrawal of all troops from Iraq.

Each Republican presidential candidate was represented by a local NJ Republican. Former Assemblyman Guy Gregg took the podium for Senator Fred Thompson. Former Rep. Rush Holt opponent Bill Spadea took up the mantle for Mayor Rudy 911uliani. And former gubernatorial candidate and future senate candidate Murray Sabrin was there to speak on behalf of Rep. Ron Paul.

The Ron-Cons were definitely there in great numbers. Throughout the day, chants of “Murray! Murray!” or “Ron Paul Rules!” could be heard even louder than the Hillary, Obama, and Edwards bashers.

In answer to a question about United States involvement in the United Nations, Sabrin replied, “Ron Paul supports withdrawing from the UN, and making them condos on the east river. That will handle the homeless problem in NYC.” Good libertarian values on the housing problem, that Sabrin.

After all the votes were counted, Paul walked away with the win in a big way:

128 Ron Paul
27 Fred Thompson
22 Mitt Romney
15 Mike Huckabee
15 Rudy Giuliani
4 Duncan Hunter
2 John McCain

Does anyone take this seriously? Put it this way, the other day Sabrin sent out a press release more or less endorsing himself for Senate. Go figure.

At least Paul is the one Republican candidate who believes in evolution. So it goes.