Ron Paul launches 2012 presidential run in "spirit of liberty"

 Ron Paul, the 75-year-old Texas congressman whose libertarian-infused beliefs have put him at odds with Republican orthodoxy, launched his third presidential campaign in New Hampshire Friday, telling an Exeter town hall audience that "the people have awoken."
"The revolution is spreading, and the momentum is building," he said. "Our time has come."
Pointing to the role of technology in spreading his beliefs, Paul suggested that an "intellectual revolution" is underway and has helped people understand that "government isn't the solution, government really has created the problem."
Paul said that the federal government should not be an "intervener," either in personal liberty or foreign policy. He said a president should show strength not by policing the world but by "standing up for liberty" and keeping the federal government from unnecessary interference.
"I take a strict constitutional position, that the government has very little authority to get involved in our economic or personal lives," he said.
Paul pointed to the question of drug use to make his point. He said Americans "have a freedom of choice with [their] bodies," calling the idea a "basic principle of liberty." He complained that while Americans take freedom of speech and freedom of religion as a given, they "have conceded way too much to the government to decide what we put into our bodies."
Paul said that pundits "wanted to paint me as this monster" because he has said that he believes heroin should not be illegal on a federal level. Saying that he "happen[s] to have a personal real disgust with the abuse of drugs" - both illegal and prescription - Paul said that didn't mean people shouldn't have the freedom to make their own choices.