In the middle of the discussion about faith in politics during the GOP Presidential Debate -- the one where Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich both had facepalm moments -- this little gem dropped out of Ron Paul's mouth.

KING: Congressman Paul, does faith have a role in these public issues, the public square, or is it a personal issue in your home and in your church?

PAUL: I think faith has something to do with the character of the people who represent us and law should have a moral fiber too and our leaders should. We shouldn't expect, uh, us to try to change morality. You can't teach people how to be moral. But the Constitution addresses this by saying literally it says no theocracy but it doesn't talk about church and state. The most important thing is the First Amendment -- that Congress shall write no laws -- which means Congress should never prohibit the expression of your Christian faith in a public place.

Hmmm. The question wasn't about "Christian faith". The question was about "faith". Period. John King didn't limit it to Christian faith. But Ron Paul was very specific that Congress should not limit the expression of Christian faith.

Did he mean that? Well, in Republicanland, any viable candidate is going to have to find a way to capture the Ralph Reed contingent, and Ron Paul isn't really very popular with them, particularly after being endorsed by Muslim newspapers, and capturing some attention in the Muslim community with his anti-war stance. He stood up for the rights of Muslims to build a mosque where they wanted, but here he seems to be trying to reach out and capture some percentage of the Christian contingent.

So yes, it appears to have been entirely intentional, and probably won't play all that well with his base of strict libertarians.