Ron Paul should attack Citizens United and run as a reformist third party

With a growing number of Ron Paul supporters advocating that he run as a third party, Paul has two big decisions to make. In last my last column, "Calling wealthy Democrats," I called for a national campaign to reverse the Citizens United decision, which enables wealthy individuals and special interests to spend unlimited money to buy our democracy. Ron Paul should support this campaign. Second, Paul needs to decide whether he is a typical insider Republican, in which case he will stand proudly endorsing Romney, Santorum or Gingrich. Or whether he is a true alternative to business as usual, in which case he will run as a third party.

The Republican Party today is looking very European. Some Republicans quote Austrian economists. Others resembles conservative leaders in Germany and France. Others play to anti-immigrant attitudes similar to the far right in Europe. Most Republicans today advocate the fusion of big business and big government. Does Ron Paul support this, or oppose this?

I agree with those Ron Paul supporters who call for a third-party candidacy. He will be discredited if he stands on the platform at the Republican convention side by side with a smiling Mitt Romney. Or Santorum. Or Gingrich. He will receive far greater attention, acclaim and credibility if he runs as a third party and champions a true alternative to Republican candidates he now says are almost identical to each other.

There is a second, very large issue involving Ron Paul. He has to make a decision whether he is truly challenging a corrupt system, in which case he will join me and others attacking the Citizens United decision, or whether he will be a champion of the corruptions of the system by championing the power of the few to buy it.

Ron Paul, to his credit, has been respectful of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Ron Paul, very correctly, in my view, says that corporations are not people, while Mitt Romney and other pay-for-play Republicans say they are. Ron Paul, to his credit, criticizes those who make vast fortunes by gaming the system.

And yet — Ron Paul has big trouble on the issue of personal responsiblity, because he opposes the very policies that would enforce personal responsibility. Either corporations are not persons and liberty means equality of citizenship among real people, in which case Paul should oppose Citizens United, or, if Paul supports Citizens United, his actions belie his words. Either financial crooks should be punished, which is personal responsiblity, or government is all-evil and there would be no one to punish crooks, which is the conflict of personal responsiblity Ron Paul has never resolved.

While I would not go as far as Ron Paul on the isolationist foreign-policy side, he has won some support from some on the left alongside others on the right. If he championed the attack against special interests having unlimited power to spend unlimited money to try to buy and own our democracy, and ran as a third party with this dual platform, he would be formidable in November.

Does Ron Paul ultimately want to be another Republican pol who becomes Mitt Romney-lite?

Or does Ron Paul want to change history and challenge the corruptions that plague our politics and finance?