Ron Paul
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The man is a clear Ni dominant. Classic evidence of a focus on 'farseeing' and 'foretelling' with the typical inability to fully and clearly enunciate the patterns that are seen. That leaves only INFJ and INTJ. He's also clearly an Fe user. His sense of "should and should not" far outweighs his assertion of how things relate (Fe rather than Te), and his sense of "should" supports his Ni. Add to that, he supports his sense of "should and should not" with how he understands things to work on a small scale (Ti). Ni > Fe > Ti.
Some things aren't as clear to me as they may be to you. I need examples and details to understand things.
Personally, I do not trust a politician (let alone anyone) who cannot articulate their far-reaching mind, yet wants to be in a position of leadership and authority .. but that's another discussion.
I don't know about Fe.. His libertarian policies seem to me to be more about every man/woman for themselves... and people living the lives they want to lead regardless of who it offends or at whoever's expense.
But maybe I'm just misunderstanding.
What do you mean by his sense of should and should not?
It would be awesome if you could give details on some of his philosophies or policies to support this, because I'd really like to understand what it is that people see in Ron Paul...
Personally, I do not trust a politician (let alone anyone) who cannot articulate their far-reaching mind, yet wants to be in a position of leadership and authority .. but that's another discussion.
I don't know about Fe.. His libertarian policies seem to me to be more about every man/woman for themselves... and people living the lives they want to lead regardless of who it offends or at whoever's expense.
But maybe I'm just misunderstanding.
What do you mean by his sense of should and should not?
It would be awesome if you could give details on some of his philosophies or policies to support this, because I'd really like to understand what it is that people see in Ron Paul...
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You're thinking of Sean Hannity.
Edit: And no, I'm not just saying that because I don't like ESTJs nor Sean Hannity, and therefore he must be an ESTJ. I'm quite convinced he is a Te dominant Si secondary conservative.
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Would you rather have a politician who can very clearly lie to you, or a politician who is very sincere but isn't as eloquent?
When I mention the Ni difficulty in expressing itself, what I mean is... with us Ni users, we imply more than we should and assume that people are making the leaps of logic with us. This often results in us having to go back and explain what we mean, or over explaining. Eventually we get it out there... we're just not quickly concise a lot of the time. Ron Paul has that trait going, and it is very obvious. He makes points, then meanders into explanation when it is clear people aren't following him.
Regardless of his political views (I'm trying to avoid this turning into a debate on whether or not to support him as a politician)...
Ron Paul's assertions are based on how he feels things should be, and that he feels these are the right things to do (or the wrong things not to do). He's not approaching from the perspective of how things logically relate, which would be Te. He's approaching from "this is how it should or should not be... and here's why... and here's how it works..." That's very classically Fe > Ti.
He feels that we should abolish the IRS. One of his biggest arguments is "nobody likes the IRS". He feels that we should abolish the Federal Reserve. His argument - "It's not helping anyone." Over and over, his rationale is "Nobody wants this", "This doesn't help people", "People are going to do it anyway." All of this emphasis on the feelings of other people and consensus mentality is very Fe.
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I dont personally think he can be accurately typed. I suspect that he is probably the beneficiary of a team to help him succeed and will be influenced by ideas and information that he is given and is not given to him by his team. I agree that some of his policies might be idealistic to some, but I have never thought of him as someone who has trouble communicating. Im also not following you on the should/should not thing but you may have answered this by the time I post this message 
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I think these descriptors of an ESTJ accurately define Ron Paul.
. I think these descriptors of an ESTJ accurately define Ron Paul.
I don't trust any politician to ever fully disclose who and what they are. On top of that, may of them have advisers and speech writers, so even then, it's hard to tell who's doing the talking. Even if that's not the case, put someone in front of a camera and you get a different person, put someone behind a piece of paper with a pen and you still get a different person. I can write pages at a time and make people think I'm an extrovert, but am I really?
The only way I would judge Ron Paul is if I saw him away from the cameras, away from people he thought may be influenced and completely shut off from his politician role. In other words, place him on a desert island with about a dozen other people and then I'd be able to judge who and what he is.
You mean he thinks it should be abolished. His focus on the reality of the situation and how people are X-way leads to it is not logical to try to stand in the way of what the masses want.
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In reply to VH edit
Thats cool. I did think you protray R. P. as a INFJ because you like him though.
You're kidding right?
Here's a point for point refute of the ESTJ description.
- Ron Paul has traditionally bucked the system for as long as he's been in it. He's not trying to enforce the rules at all. He's trying to change them. He has a massive list of rules and regulations he wants removed. His platform is based on "as little government as possible".
- He's not seeking like minded people to join with. He's been trying to change the minds of everyone he's come into contact with.
- The man clearly has no sense of "normal" and could care less about it. If he did, he wouldn't be promoting so many radical changes, nor be pushing freedom the way that he does. One of my favorite quotes "If heroin were legal, I wouldn't do it, and most people wouldn't, but who cares if someone does? We are spending far more money to stop people from doing heroin than we would on any consequences from them doing it."
- How can someone who is anti-laziness be in favor of not only abolishing Drug Laws and the Drug War, but also pardoning everyone who is currently in jail for drugs so long as there are no other crimes involved? The primary reason "Drugs are Bad" is because they make people unproductive.
- Not afraid to stand up for what he believes in the face of overwhelming odds? I'll give you that one, though this is simply a J trait.
I think you're projecting your STJ perspective, but it's possible I'm projecting my NFJ perspective.
As for whether or not I like him? Meh. I'm not really in favor of any politician. The reason I posted this is because Ron Paul is in the news a lot, and I realized he was an INFJ when watching it. There are very few INFJs in politics. JFK was allegedly one. Since it's so rare, I thought it'd be appropriate to point this out.
Again, I'm not in support of or against Ron Paul politically. I'm just pointing out that he's an INFJ.
I hope the opposite of what you suggest isn't happening here... where people who are against him politically are refuting that he's an INFJ solely because they "don't like him" and therefore "don't want him on our team". Personality type HAS to transcend things like politics and public opinion if we are to understand it objectively.
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I don't claim to know for certain what MBTI type Ron Paul is, but there is no way he is an ESTJ.
Paul does not seek order or continuity. He seeks to purge the system of features that have been there for over a hundred years in some cases. He is not a joiner. He has been saying the same things for as long as I've been alive, and in recent years been surprised that people just started to listen and join him. He is pretty much computer illiterate and has almost nothing to do with the fan base that has grown around him since starting his 2008 presidential campaign. He does not have a strong sense of orthodoxy, and decries most of what is normal as injustice. He does oppose entitlements and has nothing against a strong work ethic, but I've never really heard him decry laziness either. An ESTJ would likely denigrate those who don't work hard enough, whereas he has no problem with those content to live with what their laziness allows without demanding to be subsidized. He doesn't seem to think much of anyone having power or prestige. ESTJs are often outspoken and opinionated, but I would hardly call them people of principle more than other types. They don't really break things down into principles, they just occasionally explode with raw Fi.
I've seen some sites have Ron Paul listed as an ENTJ, but seems absolutely nothing like any ENTJ I know. A lot of politicians are extraverts, but I do not believe that he is one of them. He is generally a rather private man, and seemed taken by surprise by his sudden rise in popularity a few years ago.
I've seen other sites claim that he is an INTJ, which seems far more likely but not certain. He seems to have quite a bit in common with the supposedly INTJ Calvin Coolidge, but not much with less introverted (and confirmed) INTJ Hilary Clinton. My INTJ father thinks very different from Paul, and considers the man crazy.
Ron does tend to focus more on trying to understand why things are as they are and addressing the root causes rather than finding the most efficient means of reaching goals. I could easily see him as using more Ti than Te.
I could definitely see him as an INFJ, but could not rule out INTJ or INTP completely.
Incidentally, by best real life INFJ friend is a very strong Ron Paul supporter, although she personally leans towards the more extreme wing of the Libertarian Party. She used to call herself a Christian-Anarcho-Capitalist, but more recently prefers the term Panarchist. (She was really proud of his son Rand's senate victor in the state where she was born.)
I like Ron Paul much more than most politicians, but am not one of his diehard followers. He has too strong an opposition to illegal immigration (even if it is weaker than the republican norm), when a libertarian really should oppose all the laws making such immigration illegal in the first place. If I were him I would bring up not only the fact that we are fighting undeclared wars, but the fact that the Kellog-Briand Pact would make them illegal even if Congress had followed the proper constitutional procedures. While I think we would have been better off sticking with the silver standard (the gold standard causes significant problems as the supply could keep up with population growth and meant de facto deflation, at a time when bimetallism would have worked quite well), rushing to abolish the Fed would probably cause more problems than it fixes. I would not cut taxes as much as as quickly as he would, since I don't see how we could ever pay down the national debt if we do so. I have a significant Geoist influence, so I would support raising taxes on natural capital (both in the form of land value taxes and Pigouvian "Green Taxes" on pollution) and paying Citizen Dividends rather than cutting off the poor from government assistance altogether.
(I really dislike his son Rand Paul, in large part because he supports protecting big business from being held accountable for the environmental damage they cause. Ron Paul wants to get rid of limits on tort cases were property owners sue polluters. I personally don't think this is enough (given how corporations keep better lawyers on retainer than most private citizens could ever afford), but it is much better than Rand's plan to limit such torts so strictly that it is almost impossible to punish polluters. His college shenanigans also show his character in a negative light, and when watching him speak I just get the vibe that he is kind of an asshole.)
Paul does not seek order or continuity. He seeks to purge the system of features that have been there for over a hundred years in some cases. He is not a joiner. He has been saying the same things for as long as I've been alive, and in recent years been surprised that people just started to listen and join him. He is pretty much computer illiterate and has almost nothing to do with the fan base that has grown around him since starting his 2008 presidential campaign. He does not have a strong sense of orthodoxy, and decries most of what is normal as injustice. He does oppose entitlements and has nothing against a strong work ethic, but I've never really heard him decry laziness either. An ESTJ would likely denigrate those who don't work hard enough, whereas he has no problem with those content to live with what their laziness allows without demanding to be subsidized. He doesn't seem to think much of anyone having power or prestige. ESTJs are often outspoken and opinionated, but I would hardly call them people of principle more than other types. They don't really break things down into principles, they just occasionally explode with raw Fi.
I've seen some sites have Ron Paul listed as an ENTJ, but seems absolutely nothing like any ENTJ I know. A lot of politicians are extraverts, but I do not believe that he is one of them. He is generally a rather private man, and seemed taken by surprise by his sudden rise in popularity a few years ago.
I've seen other sites claim that he is an INTJ, which seems far more likely but not certain. He seems to have quite a bit in common with the supposedly INTJ Calvin Coolidge, but not much with less introverted (and confirmed) INTJ Hilary Clinton. My INTJ father thinks very different from Paul, and considers the man crazy.
Ron does tend to focus more on trying to understand why things are as they are and addressing the root causes rather than finding the most efficient means of reaching goals. I could easily see him as using more Ti than Te.
I could definitely see him as an INFJ, but could not rule out INTJ or INTP completely.
Incidentally, by best real life INFJ friend is a very strong Ron Paul supporter, although she personally leans towards the more extreme wing of the Libertarian Party. She used to call herself a Christian-Anarcho-Capitalist, but more recently prefers the term Panarchist. (She was really proud of his son Rand's senate victor in the state where she was born.)
I like Ron Paul much more than most politicians, but am not one of his diehard followers. He has too strong an opposition to illegal immigration (even if it is weaker than the republican norm), when a libertarian really should oppose all the laws making such immigration illegal in the first place. If I were him I would bring up not only the fact that we are fighting undeclared wars, but the fact that the Kellog-Briand Pact would make them illegal even if Congress had followed the proper constitutional procedures. While I think we would have been better off sticking with the silver standard (the gold standard causes significant problems as the supply could keep up with population growth and meant de facto deflation, at a time when bimetallism would have worked quite well), rushing to abolish the Fed would probably cause more problems than it fixes. I would not cut taxes as much as as quickly as he would, since I don't see how we could ever pay down the national debt if we do so. I have a significant Geoist influence, so I would support raising taxes on natural capital (both in the form of land value taxes and Pigouvian "Green Taxes" on pollution) and paying Citizen Dividends rather than cutting off the poor from government assistance altogether.
(I really dislike his son Rand Paul, in large part because he supports protecting big business from being held accountable for the environmental damage they cause. Ron Paul wants to get rid of limits on tort cases were property owners sue polluters. I personally don't think this is enough (given how corporations keep better lawyers on retainer than most private citizens could ever afford), but it is much better than Rand's plan to limit such torts so strictly that it is almost impossible to punish polluters. His college shenanigans also show his character in a negative light, and when watching him speak I just get the vibe that he is kind of an asshole.)
Seems very Fe > Ti to me, and his interpretation of the Constitution is very outside the box.
How can you take something literal and be thinking outside the box. By definition, he thinks inside the box. Not only that, he implies he doesn't even want to see what's outside the box.
The man's been in politics for 30 years tying to do the least he can for the people, not very Fe. Not to mention, you can't have feelings if you're in politics for that long.
Have you actually listened to Ron Paul, or is this a simple case of projecting your lack of agreement with him being a Republican?
The man has bucked the system for 30 years by telling people that their interpretation of the Constitution is wrong. How is that inside the box?
The man has bucked the system for 30 years by telling people that their interpretation of the Constitution is wrong. How is that inside the box?
As I said before, I find it hard to try judging any politician, but I have trouble seeing the Ni in Ron Paul. He may have an "outside the box" view on things, but nothing he says or does in genuinely unique. Most of his arguments have been stated before by other groups and people over the decades; he's simply folded them into one single stance in our current time.
If anything, I'd place him as more of an Si/Se type since he has taken other's views and arguments and adapted them to his own. Seems to me an Ni would be more of a forward-looker than a past-dweller when it came to politics; thinking up new policies, new technologies, new way to do things, rather than resorting to old methods.
A good example would be going back to 2008 and taking the other long-shot candidate. People often compared Ron Paul with Dennis Kucinich (don't get me started on that comparison though). I could see how Kucinich would be an Ni type of personality with most of his policies and stances on issues. Ron Paul though... it's like he's just recycling stances and issues others have stated years ago - Isolationism around the turn of the century comes to mind.
If anything, I'd place him as more of an Si/Se type since he has taken other's views and arguments and adapted them to his own. Seems to me an Ni would be more of a forward-looker than a past-dweller when it came to politics; thinking up new policies, new technologies, new way to do things, rather than resorting to old methods.
A good example would be going back to 2008 and taking the other long-shot candidate. People often compared Ron Paul with Dennis Kucinich (don't get me started on that comparison though). I could see how Kucinich would be an Ni type of personality with most of his policies and stances on issues. Ron Paul though... it's like he's just recycling stances and issues others have stated years ago - Isolationism around the turn of the century comes to mind.