“There is no one I know that serves as a symbol of liberty better than Ron Paul,” said Kyle Gavin ’13, president of Colgate’s College Republicans, the student group primarily responsible for bringing Paul to campus.
As a libertarian, Paul’s message centered on the idea of personal liberties and how an irresponsible and overly large U.S. government is endangering these liberties. Paul entreated students in the audience to step up and tell Washington D.C. to respect their freedoms, saying, “Things down in Washington haven’t been going so well, and I’m looking forward to your generation to do something about it.”
During his lecture, several of his speaking points, including his desire to abolish the income tax and federal reserve system, and shrinking U.S. foreign policy by becoming less involved overseas, elicited hearty applause.
Paul also spoke about the proliferation of laws directed at harnessing and manipulating personal liberties is not what Americans deserve from their democratically elected government, saying, “Freedom will take care of the people a lot better than a bunch of bureaucrats and politicians.”
In a lengthy question and answer period after his lecture, proponents and opponents of Paul’s political beliefs took to the microphone.
Javed Narejo ’14 asked Paul about whether or not America has a humanitarian responsibility to intervene in Syria. Paul, a supporter of decreasing the U.S. presence overseas, responded, “We don’t have a moral or constitutional authority to meddle in Syria.” Adding, “It sounds good, but may well backfire.”
