Reply #50: Nah. He was interviewed because he's opposed to government regulations

[social_critic]

This doesn't mean the GOP elite likes him. They endure the guy. During his presidential run, they were quite hostile towards him, and even managed to get him kicked out of debates. I was watching the primaries closely, and I like to study the way the media manipulates things by picking who can participate in the "presidential debates" and so on. It was evident from the comments at Fox news and the radio bunnies at Liberty Radio, as well as the postings in right wing blogs, that Ron Paul was seen as anathema - mainly because he was criticizing Bush and was opposed to the war and running a deficit.

I suspect you haven't been following this topic closely, but I have, because the GOP is indeed close to splintering, and one of the splinter groups may be Libertarian leaning types. The key for them will be to overcome the Rupert Murdoch, Comcast, Liberty Radio propaganda machines. These in turn are closely allied with financial lobby, israel lobby, and military industrial complex lobbies.