Mona Charen writes a beautiful editorial detailing everything wrong with Ron Paul, and there is plenty to work with: (h/t bRight & Early)
1. Ron Paul is inconsistent. Though he calls himself a man of principle and is apparently admired as such by his ardent fans, his principles seem somewhat elastic. He rails against the Bush administration for its supposed assault on civil liberties, yet when he was asked at one of the debates whether Scooter Libby deserved a pardon, he said no. “He doesn’t deserve one because he was instrumental in leading the Congress and the people to support a war that we didn’t need to be in.” Notice that he didn’t say it was because Libby was guilty of committing a crime. No, because Libby argued for a policy with which Paul disagreed, he deserved to serve time in prison. Ron Paul, the libertarian, who presumably values liberty above all, is willing to deprive someone else of his because of a policy disagreement?
2. Ron Paul is historically challenged. He argues that by embracing isolationism, he fits within a Republican tradition stretching back to Eisenhower “who stopped the Korean War” and including Nixon “who stopped the war in Vietnam.” Let’s recap. Eisenhower threatened to use nuclear weapons against China. It was the Eisenhower administration that had a hand in toppling Iran’s Mohammad Mossedegh (an intervention that Paul has elsewhere cited as causing the U.S. grief 25 years later when the Islamists took power). Eisenhower also intervened in Guatemala, Cuba (planning for the Bay of Pigs began during his tenure) and Lebanon.
Nixon, an isolationist? Most observers, whatever they may make of detente with the USSR and the opening to China, agree that Nixon was an emphatic internationalist. For the record, he intervened in many countries including Chili, Peru and Cambodia. And he saved Israel by resupplying her during the Yom Kippur war. Neither his successes nor failures grew out of a Paulesque policy of “minding our own business.”
3. Ron Paul is unserious. Suggesting that you will eliminate the IRS, the CIA, the FBI and other government agencies within weeks of taking office is ridiculous. These are bumper stickers, not serious reform proposals.
Mona also goes into one very serious aspect of his candidacy. His crazy supporters. From neo-nazi’s, to twoofers, to the Alex Jones cultists who believe that the Bilderbergers are taking over the world. Many of his supporters say you can’t fault the candidate himself for crazy fans but as Mona states, he plays a game with it. He doesn’t endorse their beliefs but he doesn’t disavow himself from them either with his tales of the big bad government coming to get you, and his appearances on the Alex Jones show doesn’t help.
Instead his campaign attracts these kind of messages:
On Oct. 4 Will Williams, a former leader of the National Alliance, a
neo-Nazi group, posted on the neo-Nazi Vanguard News Network that white
supremacy supporters should support Paul for president.“Till then
I recommend folks get involved in the Ron Paul ‘revolution’ and work
with political activists in your communities who are attracted to his
anti-globalist message,” Williams wrote. “Be disciplined. Blend in; find common ground with them and artfully radicalize those who are receptive and avoid those who are not. … Most
of you would be surprised at how many good people can be exposed to a,
let’s say, ‘pro-majority’ message among the remarkable groundswell of
fed-up, mostly white Ron Paul supporters — many, early on, from the 9/11 truth movement. They
are finding their backbones as they are exposed to more and more hidden
truths, especially about the hidden hand of Jewry behind every foul
venture.”
Which tells us that many are using the Ron Paul campaign as a recruitment drive to find those who could find common ground with them. They care little about RP, but his followers could be fresh meat for their movement.
Kinda makes the the argument made by the Paul campaign against sending money back to neo-nazi’s kinda moot wouldn’t you say? “If they want to waste their money on us we will take it and use it to promote freedom and individual rights, not their agenda,” doesn’t help any when they are using your campaign to get new recruits.
No, I think her best summation of him is that he is unserious. His candidacy is unserious, his followers are unserious, and his politics are unserious.
See author page
RP’s entire candidacy in the GOP is A FRAUD! I saw the first bumper sticker for “Ron Paul, INDEPENDENT for President 2008” the other day.
RP has been using the GOP as a visible platform for attention to rally his band of naive, inexperienced supporters. He’s going to take all the money he has raised and launch an indepdendent campaign.
Those of us who remember 1992 and 1996 will recall Ross Perot and “Larry, it’s all about the volunteers.” A similar band of naive, inexperience supporters made it possible for Bill Clinton to be elected President in ’92 with 43% of the vote.
While RP won’t get anywhere near Perot’s 18.9% he may just siphon off enough votes in key states to throw the election to Hillary.
And before the Grim RP’rs start mouthing all this nonsense about some type of new political crusade, they should ask: What did Ross Perot accomplish? What is his legacy?
NOTHING!
I’ve changed my mind about including RP in future debates. Unless he can pledge to support the eventual nominee of the GOP he should NOT be included in any future debate. And that goes for every other candidate as well.
I’m shocked….
…shocked that Mike’s America posted a comment before the Ron Paulmites could come in here to make their indignation known.
American Power also blogged on this and attracted the usual round of Paulbots, Ronulans, and Ron Paul Reverists.
@Mike
“RP’s entire candidacy in the GOP is A FRAUD!”
He’s a 10-term GOP congressman. Reagan and Goldwater both endorsed him, and Goldwater just did again. That’s pretty danged republican, and the GOP base does in fact remember their history, it appears.
“Unless he can pledge to support the eventual nominee”
Ridiculous. That is “party over policy” at its worst. I wholeheartedly disagree.
And, I’ll add, he’s gonna win the GOP nom and there is nothing you can do about it – precisely because he IS the real republican. Wait and see.
Yet again we see that Ron Paul’s supporters are his worst enemies. “(H)e’s gonna win the GOP nom and there is nothing you can do about it” sounds just like a Clinton slogan against gun owners, the atheists attacking the so-called “American Theocracy”, or the left’s view on “free speech” (free for them, but silence for their opponents. The hidden next line is “so you better shut up, or else”.
So Barry Goldwater just endorsed Ron Paul “AGAIN?”
Neat trick since he died in 1998.
As for those “endorsements.”
Serving in the White House Political Office I coordinated the endoresmenents for Congressmen President Reagan made in the 1988 election. I don’t recall Dr. Paul being on that list which is probably appropriate since HE WAS RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT AS A LIBERTARIAN that year.
And just for the record, in 1988 RP got 431,750 votes or 0.5% of those cast.
Non Serviam: Either you have been misinformed or you are actively trying to misinform (otherwise called a LIE) about who and what Ron Paul is.
RP is a classic RINO (Republican In Name Only) who is using the party for his own purposes.
It’s clear you don’t understand that simple concept and I can only imagine you are in for a Ross Perot sized disappointment (scratch that… you’re in for a BIGGER dissapointment) when RP gets only a few percentage points in the primaries.
And I guess at that point we will learn what true esteem YOU and your fellow Grim RP’rs hold for the REAL REPUBLICAN PARTY.
Wow, what a highly unsubstantive article. There is no talk about real issues that face this country: $9 trillion in national debt, rising deficits, ongoing war. The “front runners” offer more of the same with costly entitlement programs and more war.
Wake up people!
Vote for positive *change* in 2008.
Ron Paul for the win.
Talk about “unsubstantive” Your comment has all the substance of a bumper sticker.
Go back to sleep!
Mike,
Slight miscomunication, he is talking about Barry Goldwater, Jr. Here is the article.
http://www.usadaily.com/article.cfm?articleID=165770
The endorsement for Ronald Regan he is talking about is also on that article.
“Ron Paul was one of four members of Congress to endorse Ronald Reagan in 1976.”
I don’t really know what your litmus test for a “Rino” is, but since Ron Paul has ten congressional terms (as a republican of course) it is very simple to look up his actual voting record.
http://www.vote-smart.org/voting_category.php?can_id=296 I would be happy to hear your objections and examples of true Republican voting records.
There is a large portion of the Republican party that has been forgotten and put into the position of supporting 3rd party candidates. We have serious issues as a country that we need to face-trade deficits, declining manufacturing, devaluing of the dollar, military over extention, and many layers of government mandated middle-men in healthcare. These are just a few, sadly.
I don’t see these issues addressed with many Republican presidential candidates, with terrorism often at the center of discussion instead and this, I dare say, is a path to militarizing our society in a way that the terrorists would applaud. They would applaud us destroying our liberties and yet our government has pressed on in the name of our security, our fear is our greatest enemy.
I’m not saying Ron Paul would magically fix all these problems but he would be a interesting counter balance to a Congress that is charging on like a derailed train. The alternative being we can setup a cooler for the Democrats and risk turning the country into a communtarian state, that many would deride for our history’s sake.
BTW: Ron Paul usually cites Taft’s foreign policy, a hundred year change, which endorses not isolationism but trade with all nations and alliance with none, as per Washington’s suggestion.
Check out a couple of my op-ed’s at Wrong Policy, the latest post is on the Republican party’s shattered base and the change this could trigger in our politics.
WrongPolicy.blogspot.com
“trade with all nations and alliance with none, as per Washington’s suggestion.”
It was a fine suggestion several hundred years ago. It would be a total abrogation of duty and responsibility to enact such a policy now. Fundamentally unserious suggestions such as this will not (I dearly hope) win you votes.
Radley Balko had a good response to Charen, here. I agree that Paul’s comments on the Scooter Libby pardon were off base but for the rest I side with Balko.
Kevin: When you run for President as a Libertarian (1988) and when nearly every single one of your current policies is more in line with Libertarianism than anything the conservative movement has advanced over the last 25 years then YOU ARE A LIBERTARIAN.
Now, if RP wants to dispel the idea that he is a FRAUD he can do it by saying he will NOT run as an Independent in 2008.
But he won’t say that will he?
And let’s be clear: The article you cite states that RP endorsed Reagan in 1976. It does NOT say, as Non Serviam suggests that Reagan endorsed RP.
Did RP also endorse Reagan in 1980? 1984?
You call it “miscommunication” Kevin, but it seems to me that RP’s entire campaign is founded on either willful ignorance or deliberate deception.
Again, if RP wants to run as a Republican, he’s free to do so. But unless he forswears any independent candidacy he has NO RIGHT to be included in GOP debates. And I have changed my mind and now fully support tossing him out of future debates unless he will make that pledge.
Mike,
>But he won’t say that will he?
Ron Paul has repeatedly stated that he has no intention to run as a libertarian, this is actually a very common question:
http://deseretnews.com/article/content/mobile/0,5223,695210444,00.html
“Ron Paul says he is no Ross Perot.
The Republican presidential candidate, who is trailing in the polls but has a loyal following, told the Salt Lake County GOP Central Committee Saturday that if he does not get the Republican nod, he will not jump to a third party.
“I have no intention of doing that,” Paul said”
Here is another article from the wall street Journal
“Ron Paul: No Third-Party Bid for Me”
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2007/10/05/ron-paul-no-third-party-bid-for-me/
“The thought does not cross my mind about a third party,†Paul told us today”
There are of course also numerous videos of mass media interviews where he is asked this question.
Ronald Regan had this to say about Ron Paul:
http://www.militaryforpaul.com/reagan.html
“Ron Paul is one of the outstanding leaders fighting for a stronger national defense. As a former Air Force officer, he knows well the needs of our armed forces, and he always puts them first. We need to keep him fighting for our country.”
– Ronald Reagan
Looking at some of the posts above supporting Ron Paul I can understand that people would want to dismiss him as a fraud or worse, but the man has been a registered republican all his life except for the six months he run as an independent. Has the second most republican voting record in congress (Second only to Tancredo in my opinion), takes no special interest money, has been married to the same woman for fifty years and is an all arround nice guy.
Maybe there is a reason why some of us are falling for him…
Mike’s America-
Surely, with your political background, you know that many states have “sore-loser” laws that prevent a candidate from participating in a general election after losing a primary. Since the ballot-registration for candidates has already occurred in a number of states, Paul wouldn’t be able to run as a Libertarian if he lost the Republican nomination. Hence, there is no need for him to “forswear any independent candidacy”.
David & Kevin: It’s entirely possible for Ron Paul to run as an Independent. Perhaps he wouldn’t be able to run as a Libertarian, but there’s little to stop him from making an independent run.
As for the Reagan “endorsement” it is nothing of the kind. Do you know how many kind words President Regan issued to Congressmen? Do you know how many Congressmen were invited to ride with RR on Air Force One?
Send your boy RP down to Hilton Head next week so I can ask him to state his absolute and unequivocal denial that he intends to run as an Independent. Unless he says in clear language that he will not run if he doesn’t get the nomination I would consider the door open.
And why not? I bet most of you folks would happily walk off that cliff with him.
Ready to take the pledge yourselves?
Mike,
I believe this is as close as we can get to agreeing to disagree.
I understand your concerns regarding a Ron Paul independent run. I have already pointed out that Ron Paul has clearly and repeatedly denied any intention of running as an independent. I can’t guarantee that he will continue to hold this position but I will say that if Ron Paul runs as an independent he will lose my support.
On the Reagan endorsement front, I agree with you, kind words are not an endorsement. You are confusing me with the original poster. In my post I was carefull to state that “Ronald Regan had this to say about Ron Paul”. I wanted to show where the original poster had gotten the idea that Reagan had stepped out of the grave to root for Ron Paul.
You keep asking about Ron Paul’s chances for getting the republican nomination. Quite frankly his only chance is based on convincing people like Mike’s America that he is a “serious candidate”. I can only hope that when Ron Paul makes it to South Carolina you will be there to ask him the hard questions.
her article is filled with distortions and misquotes – I think she had shit in her ears when she heard him speak
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZTJmOWM2ZGQzNzAzOTQwYWJlMDg4YjJiMjE4MWRlZTY
Hey Curt,
I’m interested to know who you are voting for this election in 2008. I’m sure I could find sustantially more material on any candidate you present left, right, center, whatever facade you buy into. In fact,I dare you to post who you’re voting for. I challenge you! I’ll show you what a little school boy you really are. Are you ready to be schooled?
Um, yeah. Who sounds like the schoolkid here?
You PaulBots are a funny bunch.
Mona Charen’s Ronulan Review
Former speech writer for Nancy Reagan and nationally syndicated columnist Mona Charen offers a review of the Ronulans…
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