By Michael Kennedy

It seems that everywhere you look on campus there’s an advertisement for Ron Paul: chalkings, signs and stickers on binders.

A large portion of the Internet community, bloggers and digg.com users alike are ardent Paul supporters. He has more than 30,000 subscribers to his YouTube channel, and his name is Google searched more than any other candidate. What is it that is leading so many college students to support this man for President of the United States?

Surely it’s not his political views. Paul, a Libertarian congressman from Texas, is running with the Republican Party.

Anyone who’s seen a Republican debate knows that Paul pays the price for his eccentric political views; most people, and many of his supporters, don’t even know all of his views.

Let’s recap them. He would like to do away with the CIA, FBI, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Education, IRS and most other government agencies. He would also like to abolish the Federal Reserve and let Congress control the money supply. He would allow any law-abiding citizen to carry concealed deadly weapons, and he is “an unshakable foe of abortion.” Oh yeah, and he thinks that our country’s actions were ultimately responsible for 9/11.

“I support Ron Paul because he stands up for the liberties of the people and fights for the Constitution and limited government,” Joe Ross, a sophomore said.

Okay, so maybe some like him for his politics, but why do so many others support him? Is this generation really the most conservative yet? Are we spearheading the next great Federalist movement? Are we that concerned with the tax rate? I don’t think so.

I’ve seen many claims that our generation will, in fact, be the most liberal. In the 2004 election, Kerry received 10 percent more votes than Bush among the college-aged crowd. So why is Paul so popular on the college campus, one of the greatest bastions of liberalism in America?

It has nothing to do with his policies, but everything to do with his attitude. There’s an increasingly popular sentiment that the two main parties have become the same: both corrupt, inept and undependable.

Paul seems to transcend these characterizations, pledging to tear down the bureaucracies that the others have worked so hard to build up. He’s irreverent and unafraid to speak his mind, two things college students love.

For his followers, supporting Ron Paul is about being a part of something greater than themselves. There’s a feeling that they can mount a formidable grass-roots campaign, just by using word-of-mouth and the Internet. Paul supporters are saying that traditional politics is not going to work with this younger generation.

It’s easy to get carried away and overestimate Paul’s chances at the Presidency; about two percent of the Iowa caucus supports him.

Although he may be popular on the college campus, there are not enough students to make a difference, and less than half of 18-24 year-olds vote anyway, the lowest of any age group.

Even if he does get elected, Congress would never go along with his ideas.