Buckets of Exposition: Don't Overlook Rep. Non-Frontrunners: Ron Paul & Mike Huckabee

It seems like the race for President is starting earlier and with more energy and contention than usual. We're still 20 months out from the election, and already there more than a dozen candidates total.

The obvious frontrunners for the Democrats are Hillary Clinton, Barrack Obama, and John Edwards. And the frontrunning trio scraped up for the Republican side are Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney.

However, those aren't the only six people running (thank goodness), and I want to start keeping my eye on the "2nd tier" candidates, or even "3rd tier" if there is one.

Don't get me wrong, I haven't researched these candidates enough to pledge my support to either one yet, but the two I've started looking into and like what I see in them so far are: Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and former governor Mike Huckabee (R-Arkansas).

I happened to catch Mike Huckabee on C-SPAN being interviewed on a radio call-in show in a New England state (I think it was Vermont), and after that, I looked him up online. He's a former Baptist minister who lost over 100 pounds and plays bass in a rock band. From what I can tell so far, he has good values, he has a strong focus on health care, he advocates art & music in schools, and he's way way way more articulate than our current president. When he was still a governor of Arkansas, he led a campaign to apply 100% of the state's tobacco settlement revenues into the state's health care system instead of a general fund; he used tax money to improve roads, highways, and the state park system; and he handled very well the influx of Hurricane Katrina survivors into Arkansas from Louisana.

I'm just starting to look into Ron Paul, but a friend at work has really been signing praises for Ron Paul for some time. Ron Paul was a former Libertarian but is now a part of the Republican party. Despite being a Republican from a conservative district of Texas, he does not go along with everything the president does or says and seems to be much more open and honest about that fact in interviews. Paul is against the war in Iraq. He feels the American economy is on borrowed money and borrowed time and that we must change things before China owns any more of our debt. There is a website that summarizes his voting record, and I agree with most (not all but most) of his decisions.

For all I know, the next thing I read about either of these guys may change my mind about them. Plus, I admit I haven't researched the frontrunners yet. However, I just thought I'd mention Paul and Huckabee here so that people know they're around and they may be worth a 2nd look.

Ron Paul Links