[Peace-discuss] More on Paul from a liberal blog

[C. G. Estabrook]

	Monday November 12, 2007 14:31 EST
	Ron Paul distortions and smears

I'm not trying to be Ron Paul's advocate but, still, outright 
distortions and smears are distortions and smears. In an otherwise 
informative and legitimate (and widely-cited) post today about Paul's 
record in Congress, Dave Neiwert claims:

     Even though he claims to be a "libertarian", he opposes people's 
freedom to burn or destroy their own copies of the design of the U.S. flag.

He then links to two bills which Paul introduced in Congress which 
would, in essence, amend the Constitution in order to allow prohibitions 
on flag burning.

But Neiwert's claim here is, in one respect, completely misleading and, 
in another respect, outright false (in both cases, I assume the error is 
unintentional). Unlike Hillary Clinton -- the Democratic Party 
front-runner who, "along with Sen. Robert Bennett, a Utah Republican, 
introduced a bill that would make flag burning illegal" -- Ron Paul was 
and is vehemently against any and all laws to criminalize flag burning, 
including the constitutional amendment he introduced. He introduced that 
amendment solely to make a point -- one he makes frequently -- that the 
legislation being offered to criminalize flag burning was plainly 
unconstitutional, and that the only legitimate way to ban flag burning 
was to amend the First Amendment.

Indeed, he only introduced those flag-burning amendments in order to 
dare his colleagues who wanted to pass a law banning flag burning to do 
it that way -- i.e., the constitutional way. When introducing his 
amendments, he delivered an eloquent and impassioned speech on the floor 
of the House explaining why he considered anti-flag-burning measures to 
be "very unnecessary and very dangerous." And he urged his colleagues to 
vote against them, including the ones he introduced:

     As for my viewpoint, I see the amendment as very unnecessary and 
very dangerous. I want to make a few points along those lines.

     It has been inferred too often by those who promote this amendment 
that those who oppose it are less patriotic, and I think that is unfair. 
. . .

     It has also been said that if one does not support this amendment 
to the flag that they are disloyal to the military, and that cannot 
possibly be true. I have served 5 years in the military, and I do not 
feel less respectful of the military because I have a different 
interpretation on how we should handle the flag. But nevertheless, I 
think what we are doing here is very serious business because it deals 
with more than just the flag.

     First off, I think what we are trying to achieve through an 
amendment to the Constitution is to impose values on people -- that is, 
teach people patriotism with our definition of what patriotism is. But 
we cannot force values on people; we cannot say there will be a law that 
a person will do such and such because it is disrespectful if they do 
not, and therefore, we are going to make sure that people have these 
values that we want to teach.

     Values in a free society are accepted voluntarily, not through 
coercion, and certainly not by law, because the law implies that there 
are guns, and that means the federal government and others will have to 
enforce these laws.

Rep. Paul did exactly the same thing with the invasion of Iraq, which he 
opposed. He argued (accurately) that the only constitutional method for 
Congress to authorize the President to invade another country was to 
declare war on that country. The Constitution does not allow the 
Congress to "authorize" military force without a war declaration. Rep. 
Paul thus introduced a Declaration of War in the House on the ground 
that such a Declaration was constitutionally required to invade Iraq -- 
and he then proceeded to vote against the AUMF (because, unlike Hillary 
Clinton, he actually opposed the invasion). Thus, saying that Paul wants 
to outlaw flag burning (as Neiwert's post does) -- or that he supported 
the war in Iraq -- is just false.

* * * * *

This raises a broader point. It has become fashionable among certain 
commentators to hurl insults at Ron Paul such as "huge weirdo," 
"fruitcake," and the like. Interestingly, the same thing was done to 
another anti-war medical doctor/politician, Howard Dean, back in 2003, 
as Charles Krauthammer infamously pronounced with regard to Dean that 
"it's time to check on thorazine supplies." Krauthammer subsequently 
said that "[i]t looks as if Al Gore has gone off his lithium again."

For a long time now, I've heard a lot of people ask: "where are the 
principled conservatives?" -- meaning those on the Right who are willing 
to oppose the constitutional transgressions and abuses of the Bush 
administration without regard to party loyalty. A "principled 
conservative" isn't someone who agrees with liberals on most issues; 
that would make them a "principled liberal." A "principled conservative" 
is someone who aggressively objects to the radicalism of the neocons and 
the Bush/Cheney assault on our constitution and embraces a conservative 
political ideology. That's what Ron Paul is, and it's hardly a surprise 
that he holds many views anathema to most liberals. That hardly makes 
him a "fruitcake."

Hillary Clinton supported the invasion of a sovereign country that had 
not attacked us and could not attack us -- as did some of the 
commentators now aggressively questioning Ron Paul's mental health or, 
at least, his "seriousness." She supported the occupation of that 
country for years -- until it became politically unpalatable. That war 
has killed hundreds of thousands of people at least and wreaked untold 
havoc on our country. Are those who supported that war extremist, or big 
weirdos, or fruitcakes?

Or how about her recent support for Joe Lieberman's Iran warmongering 
amendment, or her desire to criminalize flag burning, or her vow to 
strongly consider an attack on Iran if they obtain nuclear weapons? Is 
all of that sane, normal, and serious?

And I read every day that corporations and their lobbyists are the bane 
of our country, responsible for most of its ills. What does it say about 
her that her campaign is fueled in large part by support from exactly 
those factions? Are she and all of her supporters nonetheless squarely 
within the realm of the sane and normal? And none of this is to say 
anything of the Giulianis and Podhoretzs and Romneys and Krauthammers 
and Kristols with ideas so extreme and dangerous, yet still deemed 
"serious."

That isn't to say that nobody can ever be deemed extremist or even 
crazy. But I've heard Ron Paul speak many times now. There are a lot of 
views he espouses that I don't share. But he is a medical doctor and it 
shows; whatever else is true about him, he advocates his policies in a 
rational, substantive, and coherent way -- at least as thoughtful and 
critical as any other political figure on the national scene, if not 
more so. As the anti-Paul New York Sun noted today, Paul has been 
downright prescient for a long time in warning about the severe 
devaluation of the dollar.

And -- as the above-cited efforts to compel Congress to actually adhere 
to the Constitution demonstrate -- few people have been as vigorous in 
defense of Constitutional principles as those principles have been 
mangled and trampled upon by this administration while most of our 
establishment stood by meekly. That's just true.

Paul's efforts in that regard may be "odd" in the sense that virtually 
nobody else seemed to care all that much about systematic 
unconstitutional actions, but that hardly makes him a "weirdo." 
Sometimes -- as the debate over the Iraq War should have demonstrated 
once and for all -- the actual "fruitcake" positions are the ones that 
are held by the people who are welcome in our most respectable 
institutions and magazines, both conservative and liberal.

* * * * * *

This whole concept of singling out and labelling as "weirdos" and 
"fruitcakes" political figures because they espouse views that are held 
only by a small number of people is nothing more than an attempt to 
discredit someone without having to do the work to engage their 
arguments. It's actually a tactic right out of the seventh grade 
cafeteria. It's just a slothful mechanism for enforcing norms.

Under the right circumstances, enforcement of norms might have some 
utility. Where things are going relatively well, and the country has a 
healthy political dialogue, perhaps there isn't much of a need to expand 
the scope of ideas that we consider "normal." Having all the people 
whose views fit comfortably in the mainstream stigmatize as "fruitcakes" 
all those whose views are outside of the mainstream might, under those 
happy circumstances, bear little cost.

But our country isn't doing all that well right now. Our political 
dialogue isn't really vibrant or healthy. It seems rather self-evident 
that it is preferable to enlarge the scope of ideas that we consider and 
to expand the debates that we engage. The "norms" that have prevailed 
over the last six years have led the country quite astray and are in 
need of fundamental re-examination, at the very least. That a political 
figure (or pundit) clings loyally to prevailing norms isn't exactly 
evidence of their worth, let alone their mental health. The contrary 
proposition might actually be more plausible.

There is something disorienting about watching the same people who 
cheered much of this on, or who will enthusiastically support for 
President a candidate who enabled and cheered much of it on, trying to 
constrict debate by labeling as "weirdos" and "fruitcakes" those who 
have most aggressively opposed it all. As the debates of 2002 should 
have proved rather conclusively, the arguments that are deemed to be the 
province of the weirdos and losers may actually be the ideas that are 
right. They at least deserve an honest airing, especially in a 
presidential campaign with as much at stake as this one.

* * * * * *

For anyone with any questions about what this post means and, more 
importantly, what it does not mean, please see here (Update II).

UPDATE: Bruce Fein is an example of a conservative who -- by virtue of 
his outspoken opposition to Bush lawbreaking -- has generated 
substantial respect among Bush critics, including many liberals. Yet 
Fein hasn't changed his views at all. He is, for instance, emphatically 
pro-life, and rather recently urged that "President George W. Bush 
should pack the United States Supreme Court with philosophical clones of 
Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas and defeated nominee Judge 
Robert H. Bork." Fein is still a hard-core conservative, but a 
principled one. At least in that regard, I would compare Fein to Paul.

On another note, I wrote in my prior post concerning Paul that I found 
the efforts (by Neiwert and others) to smear him by linking him to some 
of his extremist and hate-mongering supporters to be unfair (for reasons 
I explained here). Neiwert responded and compiled what he thinks is the 
best evidence to justify this linkage here.

For reasons I'll detail at another time, I found virtually all of that 
to be unpersuasive, relying almost entirely on lame guilt-by-association 
arguments that could sink most if not all candidates (the only arguably 
disturbing evidence in this regard is this 1996 Houston Chronicle 
article, which Neiwert didn't mention, and the pro-Paul response is 
here). Everyone can review the evidence -- all of which is quite old and 
very little of which relies on any of Paul's own statements -- and make 
up their own minds.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/index.html