<table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" ><tr><td valign="top" style="font: inherit;">Good post, thanks for sending it.<div> --Jenifer<br><br>--- On <b>Sat, 5/22/10, unionyes <i><unionyes@ameritech.net></i></b> wrote:<br><blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"><br>From: unionyes <unionyes@ameritech.net><br>Subject: [Peace-discuss] Fw: The Roots of Rand Paul's Civil Rights Resentment<br>To: "Peace-discuss" <peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net><br>Date: Saturday, May 22, 2010, 8:31 AM<br><br><div class="plainMail"><br>----- Original Message ----- <br>From: <<a ymailto="mailto:moderator@PORTSIDE.ORG" href="/mc/compose?to=moderator@PORTSIDE.ORG">moderator@PORTSIDE.ORG</a>><br>To: <<a ymailto="mailto:PORTSIDE@LISTS.PORTSIDE.ORG" href="/mc/compose?to=PORTSIDE@LISTS.PORTSIDE.ORG">PORTSIDE@LISTS.PORTSIDE.ORG</a>><br>Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010 9:14 PM<br>Subject:
The Roots of Rand Paul's Civil Rights Resentment<br><br><br>> The Roots of Rand Paul's Civil Rights Resentment<br>><br>> Lurking beneath the Paul family's libertarian<br>> politics is a strategy of pandering to "populists"<br>> like Pat Buchanan<br>><br>> By Joe Conason<br>> May 21, 2010<br>> <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/rand_paul_kentucky_senate_republican/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/05/21/racial" target="_blank">http://www.salon.com/news/rand_paul_kentucky_senate_republican/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/05/21/racial</a><br>><br>> To understand Rand Paul's agonized contortions over<br>> America's civil rights consensus, let's review the<br>> tainted pedigree of the movement that reared him.<br>> Specifically, both the Kentucky Republican Senate<br>> nominee and his father, Ron Paul, have been closely<br>>
associated over the past two decades with a faction<br>> that described itself as "paleolibertarian," led by<br>> former Ron Paul aide Lew Rockwell and the late writer<br>> Murray Rothbard. They eagerly forged an alliance with<br>> the "paleoconservatives" behind Patrick Buchanan, the<br>> columnist and former presidential candidate whose<br>> trademarks are nativism, racism and anti-Semitism.<br>><br>> Repeatedly during Ron Paul's political career, his<br>> associates used the same kinds of inflammatory rhetoric<br>> used by Buchanan in order to attract support and raise<br>> money, all while Paul himself pretended not to know<br>> what they were doing and saying in his name. Paul could<br>> always cover himself by saying, just as Rand Paul says<br>> now, that his opposition to civil rights statutes is<br>> purely constitutional and has nothing to do with<br>> bigotry.<br>><br>> The last time that
anyone examined the details of the<br>> Paul family's gamy history was back in 2008, when the<br>> New Republic dug up copies of newsletters sent out<br>> under Ron's name to raise money, and found that they<br>> were replete with ugly references to blacks, Martin<br>> Luther King, homosexuals and other targets of the<br>> racist far right. At the time, Reason magazine, a<br>> libertarian magazine that opposed the "paleo"<br>> deviation, gave the most revealing account of its<br>> movement's degenerate element in a long article by<br>> Julian Sanchez and David Weigel.<br>><br>> Following Ron Paul's dismal performance in the 1988<br>> presidential campaign as the Libertarian Party<br>> candidate, Rockwell and Rothbard "championed an open<br>> strategy of exploiting racial and class resentment to<br>> build a coalition with populist 'paleoconservatives,'<br>> producing a flurry of articles and manifestos
whose<br>> racially charged talking points and vocabulary mirrored<br>> the controversial Paul newsletters" uncovered by the<br>> New Republic. Rothbard died in 1995, but in 2008<br>> Rockwell was still at Paul's side as a top advisor,<br>> "accompanying him to major media appearances; promoting<br>> his candidacy on the LewRockwell.com blog; publishing<br>> his books; and peddling an array of the avuncular Texas<br>> congressman's recent writings and audio recordings."<br>><br>> According to Sanchez and Weigel, the tone of Paul's<br>> newsletters shifted to reflect his political<br>> circumstances. Between his first presidential campaign<br>> and his return to Congress in 1996 as a Republican,<br>> they were filled with slurs against blacks generally<br>> and Martin Luther King Jr. in particular, including the<br>> accusation that the civil rights leader "seduced<br>> underage girls and boys." Rothbard
hated King deeply,<br>> describing him in November 1994 as "a socialist,<br>> egalitarian, coercive integrationist, and vicious<br>> opponent of private-property rights ... who was long<br>> under close Communist Party control," and concluding<br>> that "there is one excellent litmus test which can set<br>> up a clear dividing line between genuine conservatives<br>> and neoconservatives, and between paleolibertarians and<br>> what we can now call 'left-libertarians.' And that test<br>> is where one stands on 'Doctor' King." (Then again, he<br>> hated Lincoln too, whom he disparaged in the same essay<br>> as "one of the major despots of American history.")<br>><br>> This offensive drivel was calculated to wring<br>> contributions from a narrowly targeted segment of the<br>> population. The Reason story quotes Ed Crane, longtime<br>> president of the Cato Institute, recalling a discussion<br>> with Ron
Paul about the most fertile source of direct-<br>> mail contributions to his campaign: the mailing list of<br>> the Spotlight, the anti-Semitic national tabloid<br>> published by the "populist" Nazi sympathizer Willis<br>> Carto.<br>><br>> Both Rothbard and Rockwell wrote of their strategy for<br>> a "right-wing populism" that would bring "the rednecks"<br>> into the libertarian movement. In an essay that<br>> appeared in their own joint newsletter in January 1992,<br>> Rothbard cited Joe McCarthy and David Duke, the openly<br>> racist former Klan leader, as "models" for this<br>> approach. (According to Sanchez and Weigel, a 1990<br>> issue of the Ron Paul Political Report discussed Duke<br>> and his movement "in strikingly similar terms.") This<br>> new movement would seek to mobilize an alienated white<br>> middle class against wealthy East Coast elitists and<br>> the "parasitic Underclass" spawned
by liberal policy --<br>> identified clearly enough in a regular newsletter<br>> feature called "PC Watch," which featured news items<br>> about "interracial sex" and "thuggish black men<br>> terrifying petite white and Asian women."<br>><br>> As for policy, the paleolibertarians advocated lower<br>> taxes, abolishing welfare, and "elimination of the<br>> entire 'civil rights' structure, which tramples on the<br>> property rights of every American" -- a sentiment that<br>> Rand Paul echoes in alluding to the right of private<br>> businesses to practice racial discrimination.<br>><br>> In 1992, Ron Paul joined with Rothbard and Rockwell to<br>> support Pat Buchanan's insurgent primary candidacy<br>> against the incumbent Republican President George Bush.<br>> (Buchanan returned the favor in 2008.) "We have a<br>> dream," wrote Rockwell, "and perhaps someday it will<br>> come to pass. (Hell, if 'Dr.'
King can have a dream,<br>> why can't we?) Our dream is that, one day, we<br>> Buchananites can present Mr. and Mrs. America, and all<br>> the liberal and conservative and centrist elites, with<br>> a dramatic choice ... We can say: 'Look, gang: you have<br>> a choice, it's either Pat Buchanan or David Duke.'"<br>><br>> No wonder Sanchez and Weigel concluded with a<br>> forthright condemnation of Ron Paul's dishonesty on<br>> race. "Ron Paul may not be a racist," they wrote, "but<br>> he became complicit in a strategy of pandering to<br>> racists." The same polite formulation could be applied<br>> to the hard-line activists behind the Goldwater<br>> campaign in 1964, or the "Southern strategists" of the<br>> Nixon White House, or the "populist conservatives" of<br>> the George Wallace campaign, many of whom still remain<br>> active on the right today.<br>><br>> Despite the persistent efforts of
Buchanan, Rockwell<br>> and many others on the far right, their deranged<br>> "dream" of political advancement through racial<br>> conflict never developed into a full-scale national<br>> nightmare. Instead, King's dream has since drawn closer<br>> to fulfillment with the election of Barack Obama. But<br>> the profound resentment of the first black president<br>> symbolized by Rand Paul and his Tea Party supporters<br>> arose from an old political fever swamp that has never<br>> been drained.<br>><br>> _____________________________________________<br>><br>> Portside aims to provide material of interest<br>> to people on the left that will help them to<br>> interpret the world and to change it.<br>><br>> Submit via email: <a ymailto="mailto:moderator@portside.org" href="/mc/compose?to=moderator@portside.org">moderator@portside.org</a><br>> Submit via the Web: portside.org/submit<br>> Frequently
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