Attention supporters of Ron Paul: You might be able to repurpose those presidential yard signs.

In an interview with ABC News ranging from marijuana laws to defense cuts, Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) talked to Jonathan Karl about the future of the Republican Party as well as his presidential plans. "I'm not going to deny that I'm interested," the son of the libertarian icon said. Yahoo reports that, “While Paul is quick to add that he isn't ready to make a decision about a presidential bid yet, he is not hesitant to say that the Republican Party needs a new message.”

"I think we have to go a different direction because we're just not winning and we have to think about some different ideas," the senator told Karl. One one the planks Paul would have party policymakers rip out of the Republican platform is that covering the “war on drugs.”

While he claims to personally oppose the legalization of marijuana, Paul says states should retain the the right to determine pot policy — something voters in Washington and Colorado did in November. "States should be allowed to make a lot of these decisions," Paul says. "I want things to be decided more at a local basis, with more compassion. I think it would make us as Republicans different."

Although he doesn’t suggest a complete legalization, Paul does recommend relaxing the penalties for violating drug laws. "I think for example we should tell young people, 'I'm not in favor of you smoking pot, but if you get caught smoking pot, I don't want to put you in jail for 20 years,'" Paul says.

In the illuminating interview, the scion of the godfather of the liberty movement suggested taking the scalpel to the sacred cow of defense spending, yet still evincing a more temperate (read: easier to sell to party power brokers) attitude than that of his famous father.

"How about another compromise?" Paul told Jonathan Karl. "Republicans who think military spending, myself, who think national defense is important, should compromise and say, you know what, not every dollar spent on the military's sacred, we can reduce the military spending, that's a compromise.”

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Photo of Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.): AP Images