I know we have some Ron Paul supporters here, so here are some reasons to NOT like Ron Paul

[cascadiance]

14. I may dislike Ron Paul as much as you do...

... but I do recognize the important thing is to try and convince those who might vote for him to vote for our side instead.

If I come off as completely dismissive of him, I lose people like that, because they do see some of these issues as being of value to them. Their big problem is that they are blind to the bigger weaknesses and as you aptly put show the "assholery" of him on them, and unless you can acknowledge how they might be seeing the value in what they do perceive, it is hard to get to the point where they see how they are wrong on so many of the other issues that makes him so dangerous.

I have similar problems with people that dismiss my concerns about some issues with Obama too. On balance, I still think he's the best we have available and will vote for him in a heartbeat to ensure we don't get one of the jerks in the Republican Party destroying our country. But that doesn't take away my concern on things that Obama has been let's just say not having good positions on certain issues (like the National Defense Authorization Act detention provisions) which we progressives feel are sorely needed now. If we at least acknowledge those issues and point out others where we feel Obama is the only real decent choice with, independents, etc. can't write us off (and Obama as well) for also having those concerns, but not seeing the other issues where Obama has a lot more value to us than his Republican opponents that we absolutely need to have happen.

We need to point out the big picture on all of these candidates and encourage others to do the same to do the right evaluation of them. If that is done I'm confident most of them will pick Obama in this coming election to keep us from going off the cliff.