Ron Paul
Ron PaulReuters

During Wednesday night’s Arizona Republican presidential debate, Ron Paul, once again, professed his conviction that there is no need to attack Iran.

“We don’t know that they have a weapon. In fact, there is no evidence they have it... I don’t want them to get a weapon, but I think we are encouraging them to have a weapon because they feel threatened,” he said.

“If you look at a map of Iran, we have 45 bases around their country, plus our submarines. The Iranians can’t possibly attack anybody and we are worrying about the possibility of one nuclear weapon.”

“Just think about the Cold War. The Soviets had 30,000 of them, and we talked to them. The Soviets killed 100,000,000 people…”

He said that going to war “rapidly like this” would be “risky and reckless,” but, addressing his fellow Republican nominees said, “If you are so determined to go to war, the only thing I plead with you for is to do it properly- ask the people and ask the congress for a declaration of war”

“This is war, people. People are going to die. You need to get a declaration of war.”

He said the sanctions against Iran, to date, have only served to “enhance their power.”

He said if American could talk to the Soviets, “we can, at least, can talk to someone who we don’t have proof has nuclear weapons.”

However, as Gary Bauer, Reagan Republican who briefly ran for president in 1999 and 2000 stated, “Ron Paul’s conservatism is isolationist and conspiratorial. He’s hostile to our military, hostile to our allies like Israel, and was hostile to great conservatives like Ronald Reagan. He denies that Iran is building nuclear weapons. He says that it was a crime to kill Osama bin Laden. He blames America for creating terrorism. He says that we don’t know the truth of the 9/11 attacks because of a government cover-up. He condemns our ally Israel for defending herself. Ron Paul is not a Reagan Republican. We can do better.”