There has been a lot of speculation lately about what kind of a President Congressman Ron Paul, a libertarian Republican, would be.  From my research, it’s clear he would not support any EPA action on climate change, and in fact the EPA is a part of our government that he wants to eliminate.  He’s not in favor of EPA authority, even that given to them by the Supreme Court. Paul even wants to eliminate the Department of Energy.  He won the CPAC straw poll vote last weekend, for the second time, so it’s clear he has quite a bit of grass roots support within the Republican party, but he would not be good for the country’s environment as a whole because he relies almost entirely on a philosophy of “free markets”. Free markets is where the climate change problem started in the first place.

Ron Paul would be a good alternative to Obama and most other candidates in a couple of respects, such as ending war. Our current wars are not just wrong and counterproductive, they are incredibly damaging to the environment. These military adventures also waste an awful lot of money that could be spent on scientific and technological research for renewable energy and other things.  (The Afghanistan “war” is costing American taxpayers over $2 billion dollars a week, or about $10 billion a month). Congressman Paul would put an end to the wars we are in as well as the hundreds of military bases we have all over the world. That is a big plus in his column.  (See Raw Story’s article).

There are many negatives to Paul’s philosophy, especially on the environment and on women’s reproductive rights. On the environment, Paul says he wants to protect clean air and clean water, but he doesn’t support any sort of government power or EPA power to enforce that.  That would be a huge problem.  In this video, he discusses some of his viewpoints on environmental issues.

Because climate change is such an important issue, most environmentalists will not support Ron Paul in 2012.  See his previous statements and votes on environmental matters below:

From On the Issues

Big Oil profits ok; Big Oil subsidies are not. (Jun 2007)
Voted NO on enforcing limits on CO2 global warming pollution. (Jun 2009)
Voted NO on tax credits for renewable electricity, with PAYGO offsets. (Sep 2008)
Voted NO on tax incentives for energy production and conservation. (May 2008)
Voted NO on tax incentives for renewable energy. (Feb 2008)
Voted NO on criminalizing oil cartels like OPEC. (May 2007)
Voted NO on removing oil & gas exploration subsidies. (Jan 2007)
Voted NO on keeping moratorium on drilling for oil offshore. (Jun 2006)
Voted YES on scheduling permitting for new oil refinieries. (Jun 2006)

Voted NO on passage of the Bush Administration national energy policy. (Jun 2004)
Voted NO on implementing Bush-Cheney national energy policy. (Nov 2003)
Voted NO on raising CAFE standards; incentives for alternative fuels. (Aug 2001) [...]