By RODNEY ZWAHLEN
Rodney@newsroom.byu.edu
Alan Keyes may be a distant third in the race for the Republican nomination for president, but one conversation with the family of Stephen Stone and Keyes sounds like a runaway favorite.
Members of the Stone family, including the eight children, have dropped everything to offer their sup-port for Keyes, who they said is the only choice for president of the United States.
'He's saying what I'd like to say myself,' Stephen Stone said.
Stefani Stone, 21, daughter of Stephen, is the Utah campaign coordinator for Keyes and her father is the strate-gist.
Family members run the campaign out of their home, using a network of five computers to spread the word. Stefani said they work 10-12 hours a day on the campaign.
The school-aged children receive home school instruction and Stephen said the family runs a wedding music business and keeps a small farm in Lakeshore to support itself.
At a meeting held Friday in the Provo municipal council chambers, about 30 supporters of the Keyes campaign dis-cussed with the Stone family the key components of Keyes' platform.
Keyes, who is '100 percent pro-life' according to his Web site, supports an abolition of the income tax, a stronger national defense and preservation of the right to bear arms.
Ethan Stone, son of Stephen, said Keyes is running to restore America's sense of morality, return America to the principles of the founding fathers and help Americans support a candidate who represents what they truly believe.
Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, who said he got to know Keyes well during President Clinton's impeachment process, spoke at the meeting and offered his support.
'Keyes is running the principled campaign,' he said.
Cannon said Keyes is behind in the polls, not because he doesn't have what it takes to be president, but because he doesn't have the money and the organization to win.
Cannon officially endorses Gov. George W. Bush because, as he said, 'you also have to have the organization that will carry you.'
But Cannon said Keyes should not be taken lightly.
'Even if he doesn't win the election, he's going to be a major force in politics for a long time,' he said. 'Alan Keyes is a great man and a great orator, and more importantly he is a man of great integrity who is worthy of support.'
Stephen Stone said more citizens would vote for Keyes if they understood his platform correctly.
At the meeting Friday, Feb. 18, the Stone's played audio clips from an Independence Day speech Keyes delivered last year in Iowa.
In that speech Keyes said the strength of America has not been a government that does everything for the people, but a people that do for themselves what their freedom allows them to do.
Keyes said it is important to remember the source of our unalienable rights. He said the focus should not be on re-ligious denomination, but on the fact that Americans received their rights from a creator.
'Our founders didn't just tell us those rights,' he said. 'They told us where they came from.'
Keyes said a people not willing to accept and fight for liberty will soon lose it.
Stone said evidence of Keyes' success has been found on several Internet polls, which reflect, he said, 'the informed, educated voter.'
Cannon said the importance of the Internet cannot be underestimated.
'I think this election is going to be a battle for the soul of America and the Internet is going to play a major role in it,' he said. 'It's clear that the Democrats are more well-organized on the Internet than the Republicans, but I believe that most people in America will favor conservative beliefs if they understand the issues.'
A handful of BYU students attended Friday's meeting.
Elke Jackson, 19, a sophomore from Gig Harbor, Wash., majoring in physics, attended with friends Amanda Richards and Lorrie Patton. All three said they were pleasantly surprised by the strength of Keyes' views.
Richards, 19, a sophomore from Falmouth, Maine, majoring in American studies, said Keyes' arguments are more straightforward than those of the other candidates.
She said she became a Keyes supporter after watching a recent debate between Keyes, Bush and John McCain.
'He had his facts down more than the other candidates did,' she said. 'He told things the way they are. He's so consistent.'
Patton, 20, a sophomore from McDowell, Ky., majoring in business management, also said she was impressed by the clarity of Keyes' message.
'He's so intelligent, but he speaks to the common man and he's easy to un-derstand,' she said.
The three students said they wish more BYU students would become involved in the political process.
Richards said the consequences could be fatal if the younger generation allows politicians to act without checks on their authority.
'If people don't know what's going on they aren't going to know what to do when something goes wrong,' she said.
However, the three students said apathy is only one of the reasons why more students don't become involved.
They said other problems are that students have difficulty obtaining absentee ballots, feel they don't have an influence on what goes on in Washington and live in a sheltered college environment.