Good Gray Libertarian

You gotta like Ron Paul. He pulls at American heartstrings that have twanged softly, sometimes not so softly, since at least 1692. He's right. If you read the Constitution as written, he's right -- like the chap in the auto accident who was Dead Right.
In other words, "I had the right of way, but the other guy had a truck."
John Locke in his Treatises on Government (1692) was right the same way. But, as I've often advised students, "If you are going to act on Locke's principles -- which are the bases for the US Constitution, have your will made out and your affairs in order.
Because, fundamentally, no government is going to tolerate being limited by Libertarian principles or by Locke's revolutionary notion that government governs by the consent of the governed. Right here at home, my local township -- some of whose officers live just down the block, isn't going to put up with such nonsense.
If my township wants to put in more water and sewer lines so that more houses can be built and more taxes paid so that it can buy this or that new governmental toy and hire more staff to run it, it is going to ram the pipelines down my throat -- and charge me for the fun -- whether I want or need the service or not.
If I opposed this with a Lockian or Libertarian argument about limited governmental rights, I would at best be considered quaint. If I acted on that argument and, say, did not pay the levy I had no voice in, I would be dealt with as any other enemy of society. Criminal and financial penalties would be imposed. So I pay. So do my angry neighbors.
Congress is no different. Monarchies were no different. Soverign State governments act no differently. None of the above will accept any serious limitation on its actions by citizen voters. Courts they must deal with. Powerful financial interests they may have to bow to. (That's not new to America. Kings and Emporers often faced lobbyists "who must be obeyed".)
Not since the first spear throwing strongman established his own government over the lesser spear chuckers has life been different.
Nor is it likely to be on this imperfect globe.
So we listen to Ron Paul. We like what he says. And we dream ... . But we cannot take him seriously.