re: "paul is generally thoguht highly of. even if people disagree with him on issues they most think highly of his integrity -- which is far more than most ows thnk of obama"
Yep. Almost everyone likes him. Many, MANY people (clo and my NH cousin,for instance) have told me over the years that they agree with a lot of what he has to say but won't vote for him because there's no way he can win.
Now that it's obvious that he CAN win, many of them are now struggling to come up with new reasons why they won't vote for him.
The truth is that most of those who won't vote for Paul won't do so because they're actually happy about the speed and direction of the country's slide. If you don't want the country to improve, you DON'T want Ron Paul.
That's hard for people to admit since it amounts to an admission that they are human leeches! For some reason, the many bad people in America today are strangely loathe to own up to what they are!

Gold is $1,581/oz today. When it hits $2,000, it will be up 26.5%. Let's see how long that takes. - De 3/11/2013 - ANSWER: 7 Years, 5 Months