Paul said his campaign 'is where the enthusiasm is.' Paul calls Newt a 'chickenhawk'

Ron Paul came out swinging Wednesday against Newt Gingrich for calling him a dangerous candidate, dubbing Gingrich a chickenhawk who avoided the Vietnam War.

“I don’t want to fight a war that’s unconstitutional, and I’m the dangerous person? You know, when Newt Gingrich was called to service in the 1960s during the Vietnam era, guess what he thought about danger? He chickened out on that, he got deferments and didn’t even go,” Paul said on CNN later in the morning.


“So right now, he sends these young kids over there to endure the danger, and the kids coming back, the young people coming back and the ones in the military right now, they overwhelmingly support my campaign. We get twice as much support from active military personnel than all the other candidates put together. So, Newt Gingrich has no business talking about danger because he is putting other people in danger. Some people call that kind of a program a chickenhawk and I think he falls into that category,” Paul said.

Paul also said his third place showing in Iowa came from voting blocs — particularly young people where the “excitement is” — that will be essential to defeating President Barack Obama in 2012.

“If you’re looking to bringing new people in, the frustrated young people Obama had, you have to look at my campaign. That’s where the enthusiasm is,” Paul said on the “Today” show. “So I would say the Republicans would be very neglectful if they say you don’t need the independents, you don’t need the young people. That’s where the excitement is, and that’s where the changes are coming about, and that’s how you would have to beat Obama.So I think there were some very encouraging statistics.”

Paul said that while he’s energized by his Iowa results, he’s looking to do even better down the stretch.

“You always can do better.It inspires our people, and it inspires me to do better, but coming in third in essentially a very, very close race if you put the other two together, we’re actually in second place. They were tied for first. I think it’s doing very well to be in the money and getting an opportunity to go into New Hampshire with a good showing,” Paul said on “Today.”

Paul also flaunted the support he enjoyed among moderates in Iowa, suggesting in a later interview on Fox News that this will be helpful for him in New Hampshire next week.

“When you look at my votes, about a half of them were considered very conservative, but the other half of them were considered moderate,” he said. “And I think my position I hold for limited government across the board is very attractive across the board and in New Hampshire, there are a lot of independents.”

He added, “There are more registered independents than there are Republicans or Democrats. So we’re looking forward to New Hampshire.”

As for seeing himself in the Oval Office, Paul told “Today” that when he said “not really” earlier this week, his quote had been “taken a bit out of context.”

“I think the quote you’re using was taken a little bit out of context because obviously I’m running on issues, which are very important, but the best way to promote your issues is to win elections,” he said.

Paul also addressed challenges to his foreign policy approach. “I think it’s misconstrued to think I don’t want to deal with the world, because I do. I want to deal with it in a different fashion.”

MJ Lee contributed to this story.