[Bloody Sam Roberts]

And so I asked Congressman Paul: if he were President of the United States during World War II, and as president he knew what we now know about the Holocaust, but the Third Reich presented no threat to the U.S., would he have sent American troops to Nazi Germany purely as a moral imperative to save the Jews?”

An intelligent person would not have answered this question in any way, shape or form for the simple reasons that Ron Paul could not have been president during WWII (he was 6 yrs. old in 1941), we as a nation did not know in 1941 about the extermination of Jews in Europe and Hitler did have designs on America. It is a totally useless question...unless the interviewer is trying to get Ron Paul to tacitly admit he's an anti-Semite. A trap which he blithely walked right into.

The only intelligent answer to the question would have been, "I'm sorry. I deal in reality. Next question."

[Blue_Ridge_Mtn_Geek]

[ The only intelligent answer to the question would have been, “I’m sorry. I deal in reality. Next question.” ]

On the contrary, it was a quite reasonable hypothetical, a standard “gotcha’ that every candidate must expect to field from time to time, and Paul’s answer could have contained greater detail, but it covered the essential point: US presidents do not have the constitutional authority to deploy troops into combat without reference to a pressing national interest, whether the appeal is being made for Jews, Armenians, Tutsis, Kosovites, Libyans, or North Koreans. Our current and recent presidents have not always recognized that limit on their authority, at least not on a consistent basis. Vote for more of that if you like. Some of us prefer a candidate who will respect the limits of his authority.