A Caveat About the Election for Libertarians

I know a lot of libertarians are still gaga over Ron Paul—an affliction which I don't understand considering Ron's regular ultra-conservative pronouncements, his inconsistencies, and his close affiliations with some extremely unsavory groups and individuals. People shouldn't forget that he endorsed the so-called Constitution Party in the last election—and they are nothing but a crazy Right party filled with racists, bigots, anti-Semites and theocrats. They openly proclaim they want to impose "God's law" on America.

But when Ron comes teetering out onto stage the saliva glands of some libertarians go into hyperdrive requiring many to attend his meetings with drool bibs securely attached to their Ron Paul shirts, as they wear their Ron Paul hates and cling to their Ron Paul action figure in the rumbled suit.

I personally consider Ron a paleoconservative, little different in policy matters from the odious Pat Buchanan. And some prominent Ron Paul advocates had previously prostituted themselves on behalf of Pat Buchanan. I don't mind people pimping themselves out, but I do criticize their lack of taste.

A lot of libertarian entertain the following utopian fantasy. In their dream Ron Paul will fight valiantly till the end, lose the Republican race, and then turn around and endorse Gary Johnson as the Libertarian Party candidate.

I'm not so sure. The grapevine told me that Gary Johnson went to let Ron know he was running in the Republican primary. This was long before Ron had even indicated a desire to run and was hinting that he wouldn't. Remember Gary had previously supported Ron and was paying a courtesy call, which was not necessary. I'm told that when Gary finished the sentence about running that Paul glared at him and stood up and walked out on him. Gary himself has never said anything negative about Paul, other than that they have some disagreements. Yes, they do. Gary is a libertarian, Paul is paleoconservative and those are some disagreements. Gary has been nothing but a gentleman and spent time praising Paul during his campaign. Paul has pretended that Johnson didn't exist.

While some libertarians think Paul is the messiah, I consider him a crafty politician who has held together a coalition of contradictory views by cleverly phrasing things so that both right-wing statists and conservative leaning libertarians hear what they want to hear. I fear his votes, for the most part, go to social conservatism and not to libertarianism, at least when those issue are up. And his votes on immigration and free trade also lean in the paleoconservative direction even while he spouts libertarian rhetoric. Libertarians have always got the words while paleoconservative got the votes—but that seems to be enough to buy off the libertarians.

The dream vision says Ron will fight to the end and then endorse Gary and that Gary will win a few percentage points pushing the libertarian idea.

I am not sure that Paul will not sabotage that vision. It is possible but I think it the least likely of four scenarios—though all are possible. Here are the possibilities.

1. Ron runs till the end, drops out, and then announces he is running a Libertarian and wants the LP to dump Johnson in favor of himself.

2. He may do this just prior to the LP nominating convention, thus not running to the end, and sucker punches Johnson at the very last second. I think the fund raising is just too damn good for Ron to want to put an end to the money bombs. And, under federal rules, his excess funds can be donated to any nonprofit of his choice and he happens to have a couple under his control.

3. Ron may have it in mind that he can get the VP nomination with Romney. Even the media has noted Ron's lack of criticism of Romney, even while he was dumping on the other Republican candidates. Romney has to pick someone. He can't pick Huntsman, that would look too much like a Mormon take-over. Santorum is far too repulsive and I doubt he wants Gingrich. I don't think he will go for the Blanche or Jane Hudson of the GOP: Bachmann or Palin. But, in spite of his own theocratic tendencies Ron doesn't appeal to the Christian appeal—though he has tried.

4. Ron could just let his true colors out and once again endorse the Constitution Party.

I think it less likely that Ron will graciously endorse Gary Johnson. I don't get that vibe from Ron. All you have to do is ask him a question he wants to avoid—and there are plenty of them—and you'll see how he glares at you and responds. While, I wouldn't care if he endorses Gary or not, I'm not expecting it. Nor am I confident that we want to attract a large number of the fringe right types that are rallying around Ron. But then, the LP seems riddled with them as is, so I'm not sure it would do any additional harm.

I think the sad thing is that Gary Johnson, while clearly the best candidate in this round, is in the unenviable position of having to run as a Libertarian Party candidate. He would be the best candidate the LP has ever offered, perhaps with the exception of Ed Clark, but he is far too good for the vehicle he will be driving. The LP ceased to be a party of principle long ago. It sadly runs neocons and conservatives (like Wayne Root), racists and bigots and crazed conspiracy mongers. The party simple is so desperate for any help that it exercises poor judgment in who it allows into positions of influence. When Birthers, Truthers, and Birchers are welcomed with open arms, then the party has become a political toilet and needs a good flushing. Gary Johnson would just give them more credibility than they possibly deserve.

Iowa and Ron Paul: How the Rockwell Strategy Harmed Ron Paul

Let’s look at Iowa and what it may mean. First, Santorum obviously pulled up at the last second. This is not particularly surprising. Santorum is one of the most fanatical of the Religious Right candidates. The rural counties in Iowa are filled with Religious Right types. Remember this is a process that put Pat Robertson into first place in the Republican caucus before and favored Mike Huckabee. So, religious kooks like Santorum do have an edge in Iowa.

The religious voters are a firm percentage of the vote. Romney had little chance with them as his Mormonism counts strongly against him. Next to gays, these people certainly hate Mormons. Ron Paul did his level best to secure their vote, but failed. He put a religious extremist in charge of his Iowa campaign, who actively courted the most extreme fundamentalists in the state, but it didn’t work. At the last minute, the Religious Right voters fled to Santorum, not to Ron Paul.

In spite of this, we should remember that the difference in votes between Santorum and Romney is insignificant. Both have 25% of the vote and with Romney winning by only 8 votes.

The other thing to remember is that these votes don’t mean a lot. There are almost 1200 precincts and each of them will elect delegates to go to the 99 local country conventions. At those conventions delegates will be elected to district conventions, which will then elect delegates to the state convention who elect the delegates to the national convention. At no stage are delegates required to vote for any particular candidate. They are free to vote for any candidate they want. Long-term. a lot can change before the state convention and delegates are free to vote for whomever they wish. Circumstance between now and then can easily sway delegates. This is why I argue the Iowa caucus doesn’t actually mean a whole lot. And Iowa has a poor record picking winners in the national election.

I will guess that a majority of the small number of delegates, 28, that Iowa sends to the Republican convention will support Romney.

From where Ron Paul gain his support? Voters did NOT support Ron Paul because of his paleolibertarian leanings. The views expressed in his newsletters were NOT the main reason people supported Paul. In addition Ron Paul’s attempts to appeal to religious conservatives failed.

The so-called paleolibertarian strategy, which was concocted by Lew Rockwell and Murray Rothbard, was an attempt to appeal to the ugliest aspects of the Right. It promoted a moralistic view, intolerance of gays, racism, conspiracy paranoia and religious-based politics. Rothbard and Rockwell were the main forces behind the ugly parts of Ron’s newsletters. And, I simply cannot accept, based on my knowledge of the newsletters, that Ron was unaware of it. In fact, some of those very elements made their way into later campaigns.

Rothbard and Rockwell hated what they called “modal libertarians,” those who promoted social tolerance, social freedom and didn’t like the bigotry they were spewing. Ron tried to appeal to social conservatives with his emphasis on abortion and his attempts to win over fundamentalist Christians.

So, how did this strategy work out in Iowa?

It didn’t. Ron’s support, according to entrance polls came from the voters LEAST likely to find the bigoted views of Rockwell and Rothbard appealing.

First, the most socially liberal age group in the Republican Party is those under the age of 29. Ron Paul won an overwhelming plurality of young voters. He had 48% support in that age group, more than double the closest rival. Santorum won the age groups of 30 to 64, those Republicans most likely to have come to the GOP during the take-over of the party by evangelicals. The oldest voters, those most likely to be old line Republicans, went for Romney. [Please note that entrance poll data is being updated constantly and that the percentages are changing. What is stated here may be slightly off when the final numbers are accumulated.]

Breaking this down further you see that Paul got 50% of the votes of those 17-24 years of age, 45% of those 25 to 29 and 34% of those 30 to 39. In each age group this is a plurality. Young voters, who tend to be socially liberal, voted for Paul.

Paul also attracted non-typical Republicans. Of caucus virgins, voters who never attended a previous caucus, Paul won a plurality with 33%. Both Republicans and independent voters could attend the caucus. Republican voters overwhelmingly rejected Paul. Paul only received 14% of Republican votes, but he got 43% of the votes cast by independents. .

Republican voters went strongly for the candidates who were most consistently attempting to use religion as the foundation for law. I define those candidates as Santorum, Perry, Gingrich and Bachmann. Between them they received 59% of the Republican votes. The candidates who were perceived as the less religious candidates, in terms of imposing religious values through the law, received 41% of the Republican vote. The GOP is still controlled by the Religious Right.

Among independent voters at the caucus a very different story is told. The theocratic wing of the GOP only got 36% of the support. Candidates not perceived as theocrats—Paul, Romney, and Huntsman—received 64% of the votes.

Voters who self identified as “very conservative” rejected Paul; only 15% of them supported him, about the same percentage as went to Romney. The theocrats received 70% of the “very conservative” vote. For those who identified as “somewhat conservative” Paul’s support increased to 21%. The theocrats received 47% of this group. Voters who identified as moderates or liberals went to Paul. Forty percent of them supported Ron Paul and 35% went for Romney with 3% for Huntsman. Only 22% of these voters supported one of the theocratic candidates.

When it comes to the evangelical voters Ron Paul only received 18% of the vote. The plurality of the evangelicals went to Santorum. The theocratic wing won 66% of the evangelical vote. Romney, Paul and Huntsman received 33% of the evangelical vote. Among non-evangelicals Paul did better; support was 8 points higher. The non-evangelicals preferred Romney and Paul, giving them 64% of the votes.

Ron Paul also jumped into this campaign with a renewed opposition to abortion. He has been more strongly in favor of federal regulation of abortion than any time in his past. But he didn’t gain much because of it. Only 13% of Republicans said abortion was the most important issue. Of these voters, only 7% supported Ron Paul. His support came from people concerned about the budget deficit not abortion.

Look at each group where Paul did well and you see a consistent pattern. They were not the kind of bigoted voters that Lew Rockwell was trying to appeal to with this paleolibertarian strategy. Ron’s support came from voters who were most like the libertarians that Rockwell has consistently slandered.

The very kind of voters that Rockwell would dismiss as “hippies”—the young, independents, liberals and moderates—were the people who made up the majority of Ron Paul's supporters. The people that Rockwell tried to appeal to were far more likely to vote for Santorum.

The flaw in the paleolibertarian strategy was that the people they tried to win over like big government. They are not libertarians. The very kind of people that Rockwell and Rothbard attacked in those newsletters, and in other places, were the ones willing to vote for Ron Paul.

If Ron Paul had sounded more like Gary Johnson, I suggest he would have done better, perhaps enough to win. The publicity about his hateful newsletters lost him a lot of support. He was polling better a few days ago. By trying to appeal to the bigoted vote that Rockwell cherished, Ron Paul lost votes in Iowa.

What about the future for Paul? Can he leave behind the newsletter baggage. He can, but he won’t. To effectively leave behind the ugly images of racism and bigotry Paul would have to name the author of his newsletters. He has refused to do that. And he is not likely to throw Rockwell under the bus. Without doing that the newsletter will always be a ghost from his past that will haunt him.

Paul would also need to more consciously abandon paleo strategy that he has been following. He would need to reduced his anti-abortion rhetoric—which didn’t help him—and stop trying to appeal to the Religious nutters on the Right. They rejected him as well. He needs to ratchet up his appeal to young voters, independent voters and to moderates and liberals. In other words, he needs to the do the complete opposite of what Rockwell and Rothbard laid out in their grand paleolibertarian scheme. Paul can strengthen his position by cutting his ties to Rockwell, admitting he was behind the ugly newsletters, and consciously gooing after the voters who have proven most receptive to his message—and that isn't the Religious Right.

A Libertarian's Lament

Will Wilkinson takes on the ahistorical views of Ron Paul:

As a rule, libertarians have an unhealthy tendency to apply their principles without due regard to America's history of state-enforced slavery, apartheid, and sexism, or to the many ways in which the legacy of these insidious practices persists to this day. Paul represents this tendency at his worst. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, Paul has argued, led to "a massive violation of the rights of private property and contract, which are the bedrocks of free society."

It’s hard to interpret Paul’s position on this matter in a kind light. During the last campaign season, James Kirchick revealed in the pages of this publication that in the late 1980s and early 1990s Paul had published newsletters under his name containing rank bigotry against African Americans and gays. Paul claimed he did not write the columns in question or even know about them. Whether you believe that or not, the newsletter scandal highlighted Paul's longstanding ties with figures, such as Lew Rockwell, with a history of catering to racist and nativist sentiments for political gain.

Read the whole thing here.

What's Their Excuse Now?

Over the years I've run into libertarians (real ones) who justified their support for a conservative like Ron Paul with the excuse: "He's better than anyone else running."

They admitted that Paul wasn't really all that libertarian but they used the dismal records of the other candidates to justify drinking the Rondroid Kool-Aid.

They weren't thrilled with Ron's rabid immigrant bashing, his voting for the wall along the border, or his denying that he once supported abolishing the immigration department. They weren't happy that Ron simply lied about libertarian positions he once took and now pretends he never did.

They were not happy with Ron's record of voting against measures that reduce trade barriers under the pretense that they didn't totally abolish them. They didn't buy that excuse since it would argue that a tax cut is wrong unless it abolishes all taxes.

They were not happy with Ron's bigotry and appeals to racists and the like in his sleazy newsletters, his business venture with fellow conservative bigot, Lew Rockwell.

But, they argued, he was still better than the other choices.

But Gary Johnson got into the race and did so before the befuddled Texan joined the race. So what did the Rondroids do? Did they recognize that Gary was good where Ron was shitty, good where Ron was good, and had NONE of the insane conspiracy theories that Ron entertains? No!

Now they are attacking Gary for ruining Ron Paul's chances.

What are those chances? Zero. Most voters don't know Ron's record. Imagine the first time Ron and Obama square off.

All Obama has to do is read out the hateful, bigoted comments that appeared in Ron's newsletters, under his editorship and under his byline. It matters little whether his business partner, Lew Rockwell, wrote the racist comments or not. Ron approved them. He KNEW they were appearing no matter how often he now denies it. Ron suffers from political induced Alzheimer's, he conveniently forgets things. He forgot he was editor with Rockwell. He forgot he was business partners with Rockwell. He forgot that he signed on to the newsletters and published them over a period of five years. He forgot his wife and daughter were paid staff members of the newsletters—even if they did no work for their salaries. And he claims he forgot who wrote the vile material that appeared under his byline. How convenient!

The senility of the situation should humiliate any decent libertarian. But there are so few decent libertarians left. Ron Paul and Lew Rockwell introduced a poison to the libertarian movement. They promoted the anti-immigrant, anti-gay views of the conservative Right. They pushed the venom of racism and bigotry in a way that the modern libertarian movement has never before experienced. And they attracted a bunch of intolerant, bigoted morons to the movement in the name of a floating abstraction called anarcho-capitalism. This is rather contradictory given Paul's living off of the taxpayers for most his adult life.

Gary Johnson is what libertarianism used to be about, before the sheet-wearing neo-Confederates infiltrated the movement. And he is the only choice for libertarians who remain true to the original definitions of libertarianism.

A question for Libertarians

There are a lot of libertarians who still buy into the Ron Paul myth, I'm sad to say. Ron is no libertarian. He's a paleoconservative and his voting record backs that up. In addition he has all the crazy shit he gets from the Birch Society and continues to spew out.

But what I find surprising is how gullible some libertarians are regarding Ron's excuses for all this. Take the newsletter that Ron edited and sold, during his stint out of office, between his LP presidential bid and his next Congressional race.

Ron was listed as co-editor of the newsletter. There was a staff of four people, including his wife and daughter. So it was hardly a huge enterprise. It published some pretty bigoted remarks about blacks and gays and had the usual crazy Ron Paul shit about conspiracies.

In his Congressional race the issue of his newsletters came up. Ron took full credit for the material, said he wrote it, and claimed that he was just being quoted out of context. Actually, in context it was damn awful as well. But Ron did not dispute his role in producing this newsletter nor his authorship of the articles. Remember also that these articles had been appearing for a period of five years.

When Ron next decided to build his group's bank account by "running" for president the issue of the newsletters came up again. This time he said the opposite of what he said before. He no longer stood by what he wrote. In fact, he claimed he didn't write it. And he claimed he didn't know it was going on.

Odd that he didn't know what was going out under his by line for a period of five years. Odder still that neither his wife nor daughter decided to let him in on the secret that the publication paying them a salary, was spewing bigotry. Odd that Ron's co-editor and good buddy, Lew Rockwell, also never told Ron what was being published. Odder still is that over the five years Ron never heard about this from a single reader, campaign supporter, friend, or fan anywhere, at anytime, during the entire period it was going on.

But there are libertarians who buy every word of this. Why? I suggest for one reason only, because they like Ron and don't want to give up their illusions.

So here is a mental exercise. Pretend there was the Sarah Pallin Newsletter. Pretend it said the same bigoted things that Ron said. Pretend that Sarah's husband and daughter were both employed by it. Pretend the she was co-editor and that the other co-editor was her business partner and good friend. And pretend the only other staff member was Sarah's campaign manager.

Now pretend the newsletters are exposed and Sarah admitted she wrote them, took credit for it but claimed she was being taken out of context. But later Sarah claims she didn't write them. She even claims she didn't know it was being done in her name. In addition she wants you to believe that she found out about any of this during the entire five years it was happening, over and over again.

Would you believe her? Somehow I doubt it. I am sure the Palin fans out there would accept this on face value just because their guru said it. That is, after all, how personality cults operate. People don't like to acknowledge their idols have clay feet. And sometimes they just go through some bizarre mental gymnastics to avoid having to acknowledge the obvious because they don't want to lose another icon they worship. I suggest that this is precisely how Ron Paul is treated by some "libertarians."

A charming reminder of the ugly side of Dr. No.

People might have forgotten the sort of things that Ron Paul's newsletter said. You will remember that he retired from Congress before. And then used his mailing list to solicit subscriptions to his new political report, which was written by Paul, Lew Rockwell and a few others. Rockwell and Paul were business partners in it with Rockwell as editor and a major ghostwriter for Paul. The same mailing list when, as I understand it, later used by Rockwell to solicit donations to start the paleoconservative Mises Institute.

Here are a few charmers from the newsletter.

When Al Sharpton and others were pushing to rename New York City after King, the newsletter suggested other names, all charming.

Welfaria

Zooville

Rapetown

Dirtburg

Lazyopolis

The newsletter said demonstrations in favor of honoring King in this way were better held "at a food stamp bureau or a crack house."

When a gay reporter criticized the commentator Andy Rooney for anti-gay remarks, the newsletter said he "certainly had an axe to grind, and that's not easy with a limp wrist."

In the June 1990 issue Ron was attributed with saying: "I miss the closet. Homosexuals, not to speak of the rest of society, were far better off when social pressure forced them to hide their activities."

The January, 1994 issue said that gay men in San Francisco "don't really see a reason to live past their fifties. They are not married, they have no children, and their lives are centered on new sexual partners." As for the issue of AIDS, it said that gay men "enjoy the attention and pity that comes with being sick." In the Dec. 1989 issue he quoted Right-wing Bill Dannemeyer claiming that "the average homosexual has 1,000 or more partners in a lifetime." In January, 1990 they ridiculed the "Silence=Death" campaign, on AIDS awareness, by suggesting it should be changed to "Sodomy=Death." In September, 1994 he assured his white, heterosexual readers that unless they have sodomy, or a blood transfusion, or swap needles that they are "virtually assured of not getting AIDS unless they are deliberately infected by a malicious gay."

In a letter urging various Right-wing loons, anti-Semites and bigots to subscribe to his newsletter Paul wrote: "I''ve been told not to talk, but these stooges don't scare me. Threats or no threats, I've laid bare the coming race war in our big cities. The federal-homosexual cover-up on AIDS (my training as a physician helps me see through this one.) The Bohemian Grover-perverted, pagan playground of the powerful. Skull & Bones: the demonic fraternity that includes George Bush and leftist Senator John Kerry, Congress's Mr. New Money. The Israeli lobby, which plays Congress like a cheap harmonica."

So, Ronnie laid bare "the coming race war" in America's cities. That was over two decades ago; did we have a race war when I wasn't looking? Nope. In Dec. 1989 Paul ran an article "The Coming Race War," that said: "If you live in a major city, and can leave, do so. If not, but you can have a rural retreat, for investment and refuge, buy it." Paul said "Racial Violence Will Fill Our Cities" because "mostly black welfare recipients will feel justified in stealing from mostly white 'haves.'" In 1992 he said: "I've urged everyone in my family to know how to use a gun in self-defense. For the animals are coming." Hmm, were those "animals" the black race rioters he was paranoid about? He blamed liberals for preventing "white America from taking action against black crime and welfare."

But back then Paul was pandering to what they called "Outreach to the Rednecks" where they would forge a paleoconservative/paleolibertarian alliance. So you will find various issues favorable citing the white supremacist Jared Taylor. Taylor is a long time racist, and has just released his newest screed "White Identity." But he's been in the race baiting business for decades and was so when cited by the Paul newsletter as an authority.

I got Paul's newsletters at the time and these were the final straw for me. I stopped supporting him entirely after reading year after year of these hateful letters.

Yes, I know Ron, claims he doesn't know who wrote the material. Odd that the paid staff of the newsletter was Paul's wife, his daughter, Lew Rockwell and one other person, who ran his campaigns. There aren't many to pick from. Apparently we have to believe that Paul's wife, daughter, campaign manager, and business partner/friend Lew Rockwell, all kept Paul in the dark about the hateful material that was being distributed in Ron's name, sometimes under his byline. We also have to believe that Ron never got curious enough to read one of his own newsletters, and that in the period of years that this was going on, not one single reader brought the bigotry to his attention. I don't find that plausible. Add in that Ron claims he can't remember the mystery employees name, that no other employees showed up on the tax records, and that Ron refused to investigate who it might have been. It is obviously his attempt to lie his way out of the mess he got into.

I just wanted to remind people as to what sort of venom Ron Paul was peddling to his readers over a period of several years. I know his cult following will simply ignore it. But there are a lot of decent libertarians who do not take kindly to bigotry, at least I hope there are.

Ron Paul signs pledge that would keep most libertarians out!

The Right-wing conservative, or paleo-conservative Ron Paul, who has fooled some libertarians into thinking he's one of them—usually when it comes to raising funds, though not when it comes down to certain votes, has signed a pledge that would keep many, if not most libertarians out of his administration if he were somehow to be elected president.

Paul signed a pledge to "select ONLY pro-life appointees for relevant Cabinet and Executive Branch positions, in particular the head of the National Institute of Health, the Department of Justice, and the Department of Health and Human Services." He also said he would only nominate judges "who are committed to restraint and apply the original meaning of the Constitution...."

A lot of the less-educated libertarians don't understand why that is wrong, and few conservatives do. The judiciary is not supposed to be restrained. It is a equal branch of the federal government not the ugly step-child. Judges are supposed to view government power narrowly and rights broadly. The Bill of Rights was not the be all and end all of rights. It made that clear by stating that there are rights not enumerated in the Constitution, but they are STILL rights. Lets remember what the conservatives are pissed off about.

Take the wholly libertarian decision by the Supreme Court to decriminalize "sodomy," which was a vaguely defined crime under the best of circumstances, contrary to the assumptions of the uninformed. Sometimes it meant oral sex, sometimes it didn't. Sometimes it meant anal sex, sometimes it meant any sex that was not straight-0n vaginal intercourse. They were laws that were selectively enforced as a means of harassment. Targets for this harassment tended to be the black community and the gay community. So, we had laws that were unequally applied to classes of people that were more likely than not, not part of the white, straight culture. In other words, inequality of rights before the law. And that is what the Supreme Court found to be the case. This ruling was praised by libertarians, especially by libertarian law professor Randy Barnett.

But Ron Paul damned it and lamented that it was "a tough summer for social conservatives." Remember a social conservative, by definition is NOT a libertarian. Take a side track for a second. If you support social freedom, non-intervention and free markets you are a libertarian. Drop any of those and you are NOT a libertarian. If you support "free" markets, social conservatism and interventionist foreign policies, you are a full on conservative (though you can be very, very weak on free markets). If you reject the war policies, but embrace state regulation of social freedom, and want free markets then you are a paleo-conservative. But a paleo-conservative is NOT a libertarian no matter how much some of them insist they are.

A prime function of courts is supposed to be to protect us from government which infringes liberty. That is why it a judicial branch was created, among other purposes. It rarely does it, certainly not as much as it should. But, when it does it should be applauded, not damned. Only social conservatives damn it when it does that and Ron Paul is a social conservative.

Paul whined because the court ruled "that Texas had no right to establish its own standards for private sexual conduct, because gay sodomy is somehow protect under the 14th amendment 'right to privacy.'" Actually Paul is ignorant, yet again, of the facts. The ruling was made on the basis of unequal status before the law. Texas had repealed the sections of sodomy laws that applied to everyone and only had laws that now applied to gay people, exempting heterosexuals. It was a case of inequality before the law. Conservatives embrace such inequality, not libertarians. Ron Paul embraces such inequality, not libertarians.

Take a real legal scholar like Randy Barnett, instead of the usually befuddled Paul, as more aware of the libertarian position on the constitution. Barnett has argued that the "equal protection clause" of the 14th Amendment, along with the 9th and 10th Amendments create a "presumption in favor of liberty." He argues that this legal foundation means the courts should presume that liberty is the favor position in ANY ruling, even the rulings that confused, old men of Christianist bent don't like.

Consider the following material from this man: "The State of Texas has the right to decide for itself how to regulate social matters like sex, using its own local standards." That doesn't sound libertarian to me. It sounds like the typical remark from a conservative. First off, Texas as a state, has no rights. It might have powers, but only individual have rights, not governments. Second, libertarians hold that no government, not even local government, has the right to violate the rights of individuals. Conservatives use the "states' rights" argument as a trump card to destroy individual rights. Libertarians use individual rights as the trump card to destroy state power. It is clear what side Ron Paul is on here and he isn't a good guy.

Compare Ayn Rand to the conservative Paul. She said that the concept "states' rights" ONLY "pertains to the division of power between local and national authorities, and serves to protect the states from the Federal government: it does not grant to a state government an unlimited, arbitrary power over its citizens or the privilege of abrogating the citizens' individual rights." Paul's position is that it does give the state UNLIMITED powers to do anything to the citizen it wishes to do because, he argues, NONE of the bill of rights applies to state governments. Ron Paul's "constitutional theory" is one of total and complete control, without limitations, by state governments, except perhaps what the state constitutions may say. And Paul is an advocate of changing constitutions to restrict liberty according to local "community" standards.

Well, at least he says he is. But when the District of Columbia repealed its sodomy law the Moral Majority and other theocrats were in furry over it. They immediately started invoking their "divine" calling to make other people miserable and insisted that the US Congress should overturn the local community standards. And Ron Paul rushed to the barricades, once again, to support repressive social legislation that fit his narrow-fundamentalist mind-set. To justify his unlibertarian position Paul resorted to his favorite tactic—lying: just as he pretends to this day to not know that his good buddy and confidant wrote those racists tirades in the Ron Paul Newsletter.

Ron Paul does what I call the "Ron Paul Shuffle," when he is trying to divert attention from some anti-freedom position he has taken. He misdirects the public, usually by lying, about the legislation, or by finding some less than convincing excuse for his vote. In this case he said he had to vote for sodomy laws because the DC law lowered rape penalties. This, form the guy who argued that Texas had the right to legally harass gay people for having sex because it was their local, community standard. What about lynching? Was that a local, community standard as well? The community standard excuse is one Paul holds to, except when he doesn't. So community standards in DC didn't matter, the Christianist agenda of the Moral Majority mattered more.

And while the DC law did lower rape penalties. it was reduced at the request of anti-rape groups. The penalty was so high that juries were reluctant to convict when they had the slightest doubt, even if the evidence of guilt was pretty strong. Prosecutors and anti-rape advocates both supported the revision, because it would make it easier to send rapists to jail. Ron Paul lied when he said he was defending sodomy laws, because he wanted to get rapists. In truth, he was making it easier to let rapists off, in order to persecute people for sodomy.

Consider Paul's newest anti-gay campaign, the Defense of Marriage Act. Until this odious piece of legislation the federal government bowed to the states when it came to defining the legal state of marriage. If you were married in any state, the federal government recognized your marriage because it was a state power to regulate marriage, not a federal power. Ron Paul, that great advocate of "states' rights" wants to strip states of that power by setting a federal definition which says the federal government many not recognize state marriage licenses, but only if they are given to gay people.

Paul is quite happy for the federal government to recognize the marriages of heterosexual couples that are issued by the states. The only marriage licenses he has to pretend it doesn't see are those given to gay couples. Once again "community standards" of those states are ignored. Paul's principles are selectively enforced and, when it comes to gay men and lesbian women, Paul's principles are only used against them.

Another selective use of states' rights by Paul is that the pledge he signed also commits him to signing into law an anti-abortion federal law "to protect unborn children." Unborn children? Think about that concept for a minute, it is truly bizarre. Maybe we can call people "pre-dead corpses" and have fun with that theory too. But Paul's "principles" are very flexible indeed. He wants community standards to control private conduct except in the case of DC that legalized sodomy and except when it comes to a federal law restricting abortions. Isn't it funny that Ron Paul always abandons his so-called principles when it comes to his moralistic, religious agenda. Remember he is a fundamentalist Christian, he didn't used to be, but he converted.

Another issue which will be ignored by the Rondroids is that the federal legislation that Paul has pledged himself to support justifies federal abortion control under the auspices of the congressional power "to regulate Commerce... among the several states" which libertarian attorney David Kopel notes, "is plainly unconstitutional under the original meaning of interstate commerce." Kopel noted that Paul opposed a measure to restrict anti-gun lawsuits because he said it relied on too broad an interpretation of "interstate commerce." Kopel, a contributor to several law journals, said Paul got the whole argument wrong because the purpose of the interstate commerce clause was to expand trade among the states, not restrict it. Yet, when it comes to abortion Paul pledges himself to a vast expansion so that the interstate commerce clause would apply to whether or not a woman chooses to carry a pregnancy to term. Under "interstate commerce" it appears Ron Paul thinks a woman's uterus is subject to federal control.

In closing let me quote something Ayn Rand said about another noxious advocate of states' rights, the racist George Wallace. I think what Ayn said about Wallace would apply quite well to the clownish conspiracist from Texas. He is "no defender of individual rights, but merely of states' rights—which is far, far from being the same thing. When he denounces 'Big Government,' it is not the unlimited, arbitrary power of the state that he is denouncing—and he seeks to place the same unlimited, arbitrary power in the hands of many little governments. The break-up of a big gang into a number of warring small gangs is not a return to a constitutional system nor to individual rights, nor to law and order." Amen!

I should add that the Gov. Gary Johnson, who is far more libertarian than the fake libertarian, Ron Paul, has refused to cave into the Religious Right and not signed the pledge. And, all the Rondroid fanatics who drool over the drooling clown from Texas, don't bother leaving your hate messages. Comments are moderated and insults, slanders and attacks won't be posted. If you can argue, and give evidence, that any of this is wrong, then go ahead. That will be published, just not you insults and slanders. And, by the way, if you think you have a good argument, then leave out the insults and slander if you want it posted.

Tea Party Favorite Shows Her Ignorance -- Again

Michele Bachmann is a Ron Paul acolyte, she is also one of the worst conservatives in Congress. The Tea Party types like to portray themselves as "patriots" and admirers of the Founding Fathers. Yet they regularly show their own ignorance of American history. At least I hope they are ignorant, the alternative is just dishonest. For instance, take when Ron Paul wrote, or had someone write on his behalf:

The notion of rigid separation between church and state has no basis in either the text of the Constitution, or the writings of the Founding Fathers. On the contrary, our Founders' political views were strongly informed by their religious beliefs. Certainly the drafters of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, both replete with references to God, would be aghast at the federal government's hostility to religion.

Of course the drafter of the Declaration was Jefferson who swore eternal hostility to the concept of rule by the church. Jefferson warned:

Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him [Jesus] by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being.And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter.

History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State. Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.

As for the Constitution, I dare you to find one mention of any god in the text of the document. The word "replete" beings full of, abundant. Ron Paul presents himself as an expert on the Constitution and yet he apparently never read it or he would realize there are NO references to God in the Constitution.

Numerous reports and news stories have Michele as Ron's new best female friend and someone who is "learning" her history and views from him. I can see that. Given Ron's claim that the Constitution is full of references to God, is not really that much more silly than Bachmann telling an audience in New Hampshire that she loves the state because that is where the American Revolution started at Concord and Lexington. Of course, neither of those two battles were in New Hampshire, both were in Massachusetts.

Let's be honest, the Constitution, for the Tea Party crowd doesn't really mean anything. It is a magic totem that they invoke to justify ANYTHING they believe no matter how out of sync with the Constitution the belief may be.

Consider the anti-immigration bigotry that these "constitutionalists" exhibit all the time. What does the Constitution say about immigration? Actually not much. It says Congress has the power to "establish a uniform Rule of Naturalization," and that's it. Naturalization means citizenship, not immigration.

At the time the Constitution was written, and for more than a century afterwards immigration meant getting on a boat and coming to the United States, no permission slips required. Anyone was free to come to America and Congress could determine how, after they got here, they could become citizens and apply this to all the States, hence a "uniform" rule of naturalization. The only other reference, vaguely I might add, to this is the 14th Amendment.

It says that anyone "born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States...." So, if you were naturalized you are a citizen. And, if you were born in the US, whether your parents are citizens or not, you are a citizen.

Of course, being bigots the Tea Party types dump the Constitution they pretend to worship and either demand unconstitutional end runs around it, or demand that it be changed to reflect their own prejudices. Ron Paul wants the 14th Amendment guarantee, that anyone born in the US is a citizen, to be removed. Some Tea Party Republicans, at the State levels, are saying the States should refuse to issue birth certificates to children of immigrants and to refuse to acknowledge them as citizens. By the way, the constitution also says that those born here are also citizens "of the State wherein they reside."

Bachmann and her fellow Tea Party types claim they venerate our Constitution and our history. Yet they repeatedly show they don't know our history and that they have complete disregard for the Constitution when it suits them. If this is how those who regularly invoke the Constitution behave, just imagine how bad it is with those who actually dislike it. No wonder liberty is sinking fast.

The true colors of Ron Paul! They ain't pretty.

This blog has been telling people for years that Ron Paul is NO libertarian—of any kind. He has a few libertarian-leaning positions in some areas. But he is a fucking Right-wing social conservative who believes in big government control in the name of Jesus. He was only marginally libertarian in 1988, when the Libertarian Party nominated him for president, and it has been downhill since then. But the Rondroids won't believe it. This cult of Ron Paul has no ability to think critically.

Ron Paul is a man who voted to reintroduce "sodomy laws" in Washington, D.C., when the city council repealed them. Congress can veto legislation in D.C. or repeal it, if they don't like what the city council does. When the D.C council repealed sodomy laws, which is clearly the libertarian thing to do, the bigoted Religious Right had fits. They want gay people arrested and imprisoned, they want such laws enforced because they are sure that is what Jesus wants. DAMN the constitution, damn the rights of people, they want theocracy.

When theocratically-inclined Republicans introduced legislation to reinstate sodomy as a crime Ron Paul jumped on their bandwagon. Then, when libertarians questioned him, he did the typical double-talk he has used for decades to justify his authoritarianism on social issues. Ronnie Paul lied and said it was absolutely necessary to recriminalize sodomy because the same legislation reduced the penalty for rape.

What Paul never told people was that anti-rape groups wanted the clause, reducing the penalty for rape, put into effect. The penalty was so high that they found juries were reluctant to convict rapists for their crimes. An ultra-high penalty may punish a few rapists more severely but it also means that any slight doubts jurors may have dominate in a very large number of cases and rapists are found "not guilty" because jurors fear imposing such a severe punishment without absolute and total certainty.

Instead of bashing homosexuals in order to protect women from rapists, Congressman Paul, always the lying conservative, was willing to let rapists go free in order to bash gay people. His views on gays were so strident he was willing to help rapists beat the rap.

Now, consider the odious Defense of Marriage Act. DOMA, even by Right-wing constitutionalism is wrong. It is federal legislation over what is historically an area totally under state control: marriage.

The Obama Administration has finally come around to realize that DOMA is wrong and said it would no longer defend DOMA in cases currently going through the court system. Ron Paul is furious. He released his own statement attacking the administration for refusing to defend what is probably an unconstitutional law. See, Ronnie the Righty, would rather ignore the Constitution if it allows him to use his fundamentalist Baptist religion as a guidepost for American law. He is so keen to bash gay people that he will betray his pretense at principles. Ron Paul is one of the biggest frauds to be perpetrated on libertarians in the history of the movement.

Paul claims that DOMA was to stop government "from re-defining marriage and forcing its definition on the States... I believe that marriage is between one man and one woman and must be protected." So federal legislation has to be passed to strip gay people of their rights because Ron Paul thinks a dead messiah wants him to impose his theology on others.

The man is a moron and has always been a moron. I mean he really is stupid. Allow me let you in on a little secret. He doesn't write his own material and never has. He has ghostwriters who make him sound intelligent by putting his name on their work. That is why, when he gets in-depth questions he looks like a deer in the headlights and starts stuttering and stammering and talking around the issue. He can't support the claims in his "books" because he didn't write the books and doesn't know or understand what is in them. And yes, I do know who the ghost-writers were in several of the cases.

That is precisely why he got caught publishing racist rants in his silly little newsletter. The shit that was published was done in his name. But he didn't write it, not even the hysterical, lying material on AIDS that was written in the first person. (Yes, he was a major campaigner attacking people with HIV.) When Ronnie the Liar was asked about the racist rants in his publication he said he didn't know who wrote them. Hmm, maybe he should check the auto dial on his phone, he'll still find the author of those rants there. They remain close friends to this day, even if he told the press he can't remember who it was. He wasn't forgetful, just lying.

I don't think Ron is a racist, though I do think he is an anti-gay bigot. It is possible he is a racist but I don't have personal information that would support that conclusion. It's never come out in conversations I've had with him. While Ron said he had no idea that the material was being printed the facts prove he was lying about that as well. The newsletters came out of his Lake Jackson office. His campaign manager was the publisher. His good friends were the editors, one of whom is still alive and still bosom buddies with Ronnie. His wife and daughter were both on the payroll of the publication—though it is possible they never actually did any work for the salary they receives and that this was merely a means to launder funds into Paul's personal accounts. Ron knew who wrote the material. He still does. He knew what the newsletters said all along. He knows who was responsible for the material and he and the culprit, who has associated himself with numerous racists and anti-Semites, are still good friends. In fact, I went to this person's website and ran "Ron Paul" through the search engine for the site. Ron comes up over 13,000 times. They are still in close cahoots. I am waiting for associates of the actual writer to come here and begin attacking us, in defense of Ron, when they are also defending their own organization and fellow neo-confederates.

Paul got caught when the media saw the actual newsletters that he published. And his defense was to openly lie to the media and to the American public. That's Mr. Integrity.

Paul's bigotry goes so far as to demand that judges not rule on the Constitutionality of laws passed by legislatures. He would strip judges of their duty to rule on whether laws violate rights or not. You didn't hear Ron ranting about activist judges when the Second Amendment was upheld by the Supreme Court—as it should have been. He only rants about activist judges when they rule in ways that go against the Religious Right.

Ron has claimed that First Amendment protections don't apply in the States. He has said that the State's can impose Christianity as the state religion because the First Amendment doesn't matter at that level. Yet, apparently he has no such criticism when the Second Amendment is applied to the states. Why? Because he supports imposing Christianity as a state religion and he supports the right to own guns. His constitutional principles are twisted to conform with his personal moral preferences, not with any consistent theory of constitutional law. And given that he's a gun-rights fundamentalist Christian he's happy to contradict himself.

Ron Paul also lied when he said the Obama Administration said they "will abandon the obligation to enforce DOMA." Actually what the administration said was that they would cease to defend DOMA in the courts but that they would still enforce the law while waiting for the outcome in the courts. Mr. Paul is, once again, woefully misinformed. He usually is.

We saw the same befuddled interpretation of the facts when he engaged in gay bashing when seeking the Republican nomination for president last time around. When asked about DADT he said that he then supported DADT because sexual harassment should be stopped. DADT had NOTHING to with sexual harassment or misconduct. Ron clearly had no idea what DADT was about so he said the first thing that came into his head and often the first thing that comes into his head is completely wrong. He eventually did come to vote for repeal, one of his few libertarian votes in the social arena.

Ron presents himself as a Constitutional scholar yet he says absurd things such as the Constitution is "replete with references to God..." Go read the constitution and you will see Ron Paul doesn't know the constitution. Replete means "abundantly filled." But instead of there being an abundance of references to God there are none. Does Ron believe the bullshit he spreads? I suspect so, as I said, he is not a particularly bright man. I'm sorry but I first meet Ron Paul almost 30 years ago and he wasn't bright then. If anything he just appears more confused than he was then.

He would do his Ron Paul "shuffle." He is a good politician, in the sense he knows how to lie to the constituents and keep both conservatives and libertarians happy. He votes with the conservatives and sounds like a libertarian. That's all it takes. Dance with the Right while sounding libertarian seems to give conservatives what they want and give libertarians worthless rhetoric.

The one thing Ron Paul wants from libertarians are campaign contributions. But he is not one of us. He is a paleo-conservative. He is not a libertarian. He has never been a libertarian. He is libertarian on some issues, but then even Obama is libertarian on some issues: DOMA being one of them. The one thing Ronnie wants from libertarians is their money, not their principles.

Paul says he will stand with the state's and defend their "right" not to respect the rights of same-sex couples. There is no such right. State's don't have rights but people do. State's have powers. And the powers of the State should never allow the State to disrespect the rights of people. Individual rights precede, and are superior to, government powers. That is libertarian. The pablum that Ronnie is dishing out is pure Right-wing conservatism, not libertarianism.

I don't even want to go in the truly insane views the man has about secret conspiracies. But to say the least, he is bonkers. The man is a crank and has always been a crank. He doesn't deserve libertarian support and never really has, though, as I said, he was once more libertarian than he is today. Ron Paul is a hypocritical, lying politician. He is not the messiah. He is not the knight in shining armor. I know other paleo-conservatives, particularly those associated with the man who DID write the racist diatribes, will be furious for me saying this.

But Ron Paul is NOT now, nor has he ever been a libertarian. He was close at one point, but he is a paranoid, right-wing loon with Christianist tendencies who is a social conservative and wants government to impose Christian morality, especially at the state level. But libertarians are so desperate for a messiah that they turn a blind eye to this idiot.

But I don't expect any of this dent the Rondroids. They are a cult more than anything I've seen in a long time, outside real cults. They will continue to make excuses for the man and pretend he is their knight. Ron Paul does a lot of harm to the libertarian brand and shouldn't be allowed to get away with it. When he got caught with the racist material he claimed he couldn't be a racist since he's a libertarian. He was never a libertarian and his defense only associated the racist articles with libertarianism, which only hurts libertarians. Fuck Ron Paul, and I don't mean in the nice way.

Gary Johnson, CPAC, conservatives and Ron Paul

Gary Johnson is the only politician who I could support. He's far better than paleoconservative Ron Paul.

Speaking of Ron, I find it hilarious that YAF (which should stand for Youth Against Freedom, but supposedly means Young Americans for Freedom) has said they are throwing Ron Paul off their advisory board. Advisory boards actually never advise, they are for show and usually used by the organization as a fund raising tool to give them legitimacy.

YAF is upset because of one of the issues where Ron Paul is correct, his support for the Old Right position of non-interventionism. YAF tries to paint Paul as some sort of Lefty for this position. In truth however, the bipartisan foreign policy that now has the US stationing troops around the world is Woodrow Wilison's policy and FDR's policy. It is an imperialistic policy that came from the political Left. Though some lefties, like William Jennings Bryan, were clear exceptions.

What is particularly hilarious is that the clowns at YAF claimed to be the oldest "conservative/libertarian" organization around. There is no such creature as a conservative/libertarian. Conservatives are not libertarians and real libertarians are not conservatives. Gary Johnson is no conservative, he is a libertarian. Ron Paul, however, is not a libertarian but a conservative albeit one with some libertarian tendencies, but more paleoconservative than anything else.

I have watched the debate about the CPAC conference for conservatives in DC with some amusement. The presence of a gay conservative group at the CPAC has the theocratic Right foaming at the mouth. Moralistic assholes kept popping up and announcing that they would not attend because, shock, horror, there were "homosexuals" in the crowd.

These people react to gays the same way that Nazis react to Jews, or the Klan does when a black man walks down the street. It is pathetic.

But CPAC has always attracted a younger crowd and they are less concerned about being warriors for Christ, so they aren't quite so willing to host a Holy Inquisition and burn a few heretics on top of the faggots used to light the fire. (Yes, that is the origin of that insulting word, it was the kindling used to burn people at the stake in the name of a loving god.) So, the CPAC attendees aren't so interested in the verbal gay bashing that Christians do so well and so endlessly.

To me the debate that ought to be held is why are libertarians at CPAC, not why are conservatives there. Let's face it people: the modern conservative is not a libertarian. He is even less libertarian than the Old Right conservatives, who still failed at being libertarian. Conservatives are bad on almost everything, when it comes to their political view points.

Libertarians are quite a different species entirely. And the less time libertarians spend with conservatives the better.

Move on, there's nothing to see here folks.

Rand Paul won the Republican nomination for Senate in Kentucky. Yawn!

Rand Paul is like Daddy, a social conservative who pretends to be libertarian, especially when fund raising. Some foolish libertarians want to claim Paul is a libertarian. Michael Tomasky, a writer at the left-wing Guardian newspaper, headline a column "Rand Paul, not a libertarian." Tomasky is right. This reminds of the Fox News Commentator interviewing Bob Barr, who was also pretending to be a libertarian, who had to explain to Barr what libertarianism is and how Barr wasn't one, even if the morons that infest the Libertarian Party thought he was.

Tomasky warns that Rand Paul is a libertarian when on "safe ground," issues where Tea Party conservatives would agree, "But when need be, he's a religious conservative. A perfect amalgam of what the tea party movement is. But don't look for any consistency." In other words, the acorn doesn't fall far from the tree.

Tomasky notes Paul's positions on abortion and marriage equality, which mimic daddy's positions perfectly, or imperfectly from a libertarian viewpoint. One consistent pimp for conservatives in libertarian clothing tries to excuse Paul's view by saying he is merely against government involvement in marriage. Sure, that's the ticket. He's against state involvement in marriage right up to the moment he got his own marriage license. Both Daddy Paul and Little Paul have never had problems with marriage until gay people try to get married. While they have no such principles about straights getting married they do have them when gays marry.

Anyone who thinks that is principled ought to see me about a bridge I want to sell.

Political scientist Stephen Voss, of the University of Kentucky, described Paul fairly well: "When he's talking economics and money, he is philosophical a libertarian. When he talks social issues, he's sending guaranteeds tot he right wing that he's not libertarian."

In Rand Paul's view a woman who is raped, and becomes pregnant, must be forced by the state to carry that pregnancy to term. Even if her father rapes her she is a slave to the fetus. Even is the pregnancy may kill her she is forbidden by Big Brother from aborting. But Paul insists he wants to keep the state from intruding on people's private lives, ...except when he doesn't.

Remember that when Jerry Falwell's front group, Christian Voice, was rating the votes of congressman in view of fundamentalist morality, they gave Paul the Elder a score of 92%, almost perfect. That was after Daddy Paul voted to keep "sodomy" a criminal offense in Washington, D.C., something he excused by distorting the bill in question. Rand Paul has learned how to con libertarians almost as well as his father. But there are at least two differences, Rand Paul opposes earmarks, while Ron uses them and tries to justify them. And Rand is not good in foreign policy mattes, there his father is better.

That either of these men are better than many other candidates is a given. That doesn't say how good they are, just how bad the other choices are.

Photo: Daddy Paul and his jazz hands accompanied by his legally married wife, and son Rand Paul. accompanied by his legally married wife. Good thing they both oppose state involvement in marriage—albeit only for gay couples.

Calling all porkers, your trough is ready.

“Soo-eee, soo-eee, calling all porkers.” Yes folks, its that time again, when Congressvermin line up with their earmarks to buy favor from the locals in their districts.
And once again, conservative Ron Paul, is passing out the pork like a dyed-in-the-wool politician. Here are just a few of the projects Paul has requested using tax payer funds to finance. As far as I know none of them are within the Constitutional scope of government.

Bayside Community Hospital – $20,000,000 due for being “adversely impacted by huriccanes Rita and Ike and by the displacement of individuals by Hurricane Katrina.” Adversely impacted is a very all-emcopassing term.

TecGen - $2,800,000. As best as I understand it TecGen is a private company that produces fire protection gear. They want Texas A&M to test their gear and Ron Paul is happy to have the taxpayers, through earmarks, pay for what appears to be a subsidy to a private company. His justification is it “will also provide protective materials for law enforcement and homeland security operators” and can be used in Irag and Afghanistan. The fibre is produced in Texas and also sold on the basis that the Texas “will benefit from job creation.” Surely Paul knows that is not the case.

Revelation Missionary Baptist Church - $2,500,000. The purpose is to build a “community outreach center” for the church. Remember Paul says that separation of church and state is a fiction. But he also said that separation only applies to the federal government, not to the states. So precisely how is $2,500,000 in federal pork, for a church, not violating the separation of the federal government from the church?

Wharton County Youth Fair - $4,500,000 to build them a “new facility.” Which part of the Constitution authorizes that?

Wharton County Jr. College - $220,000 to help train students for work in the nuclear power industry. I’m pro-nuclear myself, but I’m not sure the federal government should be subsidizing the production of staff members for that field.

Trinity Episcopal School -- $1,000,000. This is put in as to help the school due repairs from hurricane damage. I should say that this church seems relatively decent and sane, from what I can see. I’m not into the god claims but these aren’t fundamentalists and bigots. Quite the contrary. But I find no mention of hurricane damage on the school’s web site. However, the church is raising money for damage to the church. Is this a fast one, where the school is being substituted for the church, because it will be easier to get funding? And while this church and school seems relatively decent, is it a constitutional function of the federal government to fund local religious institutions?

Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership - $4,000,000 to train small business on how to use “knowledge and technology from the US Space Programs to commercial use.” Sounds like a business subsidy to me, with all the defects of subsidies.

Kendleton RV Park - $1,000,000. For an RV park to “enhance tourism to retain and expand job opportunities.”

Victoria Channel – $7,000,000. “Designed to protect jobs and economic activity.” Hmm, how does that fit with Austrian economics again?

Those are a few of the sort of Pork-barrel projects that Ron Paul proposed to the budget. He really outdid himself this year. A quick tally shows his pork projects totaling almost $395,000,000. Last year he only managed to line up only $96 million for the little piggies in his district, making him the biggest spender in the Texas delegation in the House of Representatives. He clearly outdid himself this year.

The Rondroids, however, won’t see these pork projects as a bad thing, at least not when St. Ron of Paul is proposing them. These things are only bad when other Congressvermin do them. I’ve even seen comments on the Rondroid sites praising Paul “for taking care of his district.” Yep, that’s a good libertarian view, get your Congressman “to take care of you.” I guess when it comes to pork-ridden earmarks he’s Dr. Yes Please.

The District recognizes state's rights, will Ron Paul?

Ron Paul watchers, and the Rondroids themselves, ought to watch the development of one issue very carefully.

Just today the City Council for Washington, D.C., voted to recognize gay marriages that are performed in the states that allow it. That would currently be Vermont, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Iowa—Maine seems posed to join that group any day now. Only one council member opposed the measure, that was the coke-snorting moralistic Marion Berry. Berry is also known to ignore laws (such as not paying taxes, driving without a license, etc) which he, as a city council members, helps keep in place. Laws are for the little people.

What makes this interesting for Ron Paul is that this proposal has to go to Congress for a vote. Remember that as the nation’s capitol, the District can have laws over-ridden by Congress when they so chose.

If you go back to 1981 the District revised their laws regulating sexuality. One of the main measures was that it repealed the laws making it a crime for adults of the same-sex to have sex with one another. Of course, the moment that was announced, Jerry Falwell and his Moral Majority went into a tizzy fit demanding that the Republican-controlled Congress stand up for “morality” and reinstate “sodomy” as crime. Ron Paul joined in that campaign

Paul’s excuse, when questioned by libertarians. Was that the legislation reduced the District’s penalties for rape. Technically that was true but he neglected to tell the whole story. The reduction in the rape penalty came at the request of anti-rape organizations. The penalty was considered so high that jurors were reluctant to convict without absolutely overwhelming evidence. As a consequence many rapists were being found not guilty. A reduction in the penalty made it more likely that a rapist would be convicted.

When questioned by members of the Religious Right Paul didn’t need an excuse.. In fact, that year, Christian Voice, a Christianist group pushing social conservative theocracy, gave Paul a 100% perfect score, partly due to Paul’s willingness to make private sexual acts between adults a crime. It took another twelve years before the sodomy laws in the District were finally repealed without a Congressional override.


So does the city council of the District have the right to recognize legal marriages from other states? Of course, they do. The measure in question is a one-issue piece of legislation without other clauses to provide cover for a socially conservative, anti-libertarian vote.

On basic federalist principles there is no legitimate reason for Congress to step in and overturn the District’s recognition of legal marriages performed in any of the states. All the District is saying is that if a state recognizes a couple as married they will do so as well. So, will Paul allow the District to recognize the decisions of the various states or not. Or will he prefer to impose a federal restriction preventing the District from recognizing the actions of the various states?

It is hard to guess what he will do. Certainly Paul’s record has been heavily socially conservative, often downright unlibertarian. He says he recognizes the rights of the states to make their own decisions yet he has been rather inconsistent on that as well. As I see it there is no clear-cut libertarian case to override the City Council in this matter—but there wasn’t a legitimate reason for doing so in 1981 but that didn’t stop him. I don’t know what he will do, though if I had to bet, I would lay my money on him voting to overturn the measure.

A Democratic-controlled Congress is no guarantee that the measure won’t be overturned. There are plenty of socially conservative Democrats. If the measure appears to be a tight vote that situation would be especially telling in regards to Paul’s vote. In a tight vote the Religious Right, which has Paul’s heart, will be putting hard pressure to overturn the measure. That may make it impossible for Paul not to vote his heart—which is not libertarian on these matters. If the measure has no chance of winning, or if there is little pressure from groups like the National Organization for (sic) Marriage, then Paul might get away with making some federalist noises and voting no on repeal. Of course it is also possible he will take the coward’s way out and simply find an excuse not to vote at all.

Whatever happens it will be interesting to watch.

Ron Paul: "This guy's a queer."

I have never enjoyed the humor of Sascha Baron Cohen. I don't think he's funny. Actually I find him rather revolting. His most recent target was conservative congressman Ron Paul.

In this stunt Cohen, playing the gay stereotype Bruno, is supposedly interviewing Paul in a hotel suite when a bulb goes out. While the crew is fixing the problem Bruno asks Paul to wait with him in another room, which turns out to be the bedroom. Paul sits on the bed.

Our stereotype Bruno starts dancing in front of Paul. Paul grabs a newspaper and pretends to read it. Paul asks Bruno what is happening. Bruno tells Paul not to worry and then drops his trousers.

At this point Paul wisely heads for the door. Unfortunately, at the same time, he unwisely makes remarks in the process of leaving, which included calling the Bruno character "queer".

An aide to Paul, Rachel Mills, tried to sell the claim that what Paul really said was "weird" but then she tries to excuse the other term as well. "In any case, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Queer as Folk... it's not exactly a shocking term." Of course, much hinges on how one means it.

Unfortunately, the press article on this incident is headed, "Libertarians Gone Wild." Paul is a conservative, not a libertarian. And this sort of brand contamination is not good for libertarianism.

Given Paul's relatively consistent record (voting to keep sodomy a crime in D.C., supporting Don't Ask, Don't Tell) and his generally conservative viewpoints on social issues (ban abortion, pro censorship at the state level, denying separation of church and state as a constitutional principle) I suggest he used the term "queer" with the same sort of intentions that a Southern sheriff might call a black man a "nigger."

Paul, however, doesn't win an award for putting his foot in his mouth by way of a bigoted remark. That honor, at least this week, belongs to the police chief in Homer, Louisiana, Russell Mills.

Homer is in an uproar because of the police killing of 73-year-old Bernard Monroe. Police said they wished to speak to Monroe's son who ran into the house. A rookie officer ran after the man, who was not actually wanted for anything. A minute later the officer came out of the house as Monroe was walking up the steps. The officer pulled his weapon and shot the elderly man to death.

Witnesses then say that the police realized they were in trouble. Monroe, a gun owner, always kept in open view on his porch. One of the officers went over to the gun and using a latex glove picked it up. A few minutes later witnesses saw the gun now lying on the ground next to Monroe. One witness says he saw the office pick up the weapon from the porch and asked him, at that time, what he was doing. The officer told him, "Shut the hell up, you don't know what you're talking about."

As you can imagine a lot of investigations are going on. So how does the local police chief handle it. He publicly justifies harassing people just because they are black. He said, "If I see three or four young black men walking down the street, I have to stop them and check their names. I want them to be afraid every time they see the police that they might get arrested."

I suggest this moron won't be police chief for long.

Imagine my surprise!

Imagine my surprise when I read that Wayne Root, the loudmouth conservative hypester from Vegas, who made a deal with Bob Barr to inflict both of them on the Libertarian Party as candidates, has written a book. The real surprise is that it is supposed to be about libertarianism.
That's a double surprise.

First, I didn't know he'd ever read a book. Secondly, since when did he know anything about libertarianism? He thinks his blather about state's rights is libertarian. Wrong! He's flipped and flopped as he thought necessary in order to secure the V.P. nomination for the clearly desperate Libertarian Party.

Root continues to tell the media that he's "Ron Paul on steroids" -- a claim that doesn't carry much weight here and carries none with Ron Paul. I don't think Ron Paul on steroids would be a good thing as Ron seems intent on emphasizing his most unlibertarian positions. Witness his endorsement of the theocratic, anti-social freedom Constitution Party. So in this libertarian's view, Ron Paul himself on steroids, wouldn't necessarily be a good thing.

But I can tell Mr. Root: I know Ron Paul and you're no Ron Paul.

Speaking of Paul I had something of a shock yesterday. I was speaking to an old friend of mine who mentioned something that has me taking memory pills. We were discussing the current dire situation for libertarianism and he made reference to the time that he, his now exwife, myself and my partner went out to have dinner with Ron and Carol Paul. My jaw dropped as I simply don't remember the occasion. But he remembered well even telling me the part of town where we had dinner.

Back in the 80s I spent several occasions with Paul and I found him and Carol both to be decent individuals. He was marginal as a libertarian then, with very strong conservative tendencies, but since then the tendencies have strengthened and the social conservatism started to dominate.

I still don't remember that dinner. Then to make things worse for my sense of memory I went to tell a business associate, who I have known for decades as well, about my total lapse of memory. As I started to tell him about completely forgetting about going out for dinner with Ron he says: "Oh, I didn't know about that, I just remember the lunch you had with him at...."

Poor me, I'll have to take some memory pills. I had forgotten about the lunch as well. It must have been around the same time. As my friend Leon Louw, from South Africa says, "I have a good forgetter." I'm going to have to call my ex and find out what else I've forgotten.

Enough of the diversion, so back to Wayne Bozo Root. Root's a hoot. He alone is spreading the claim that he's Ron Paul on steroid. But he keeps telling people "The media calls me Ron Paul on steroids." I can't find any reference to the media calling him that at all. I do find the media quoting Root saying that about himself, however. It's Root's current con job, to wrap himself in the mantle of Ron Paul. Apparently Ron isn't so keen on Root and has refused to endorse him. Having watched Root in action I can say that he comes across more like a used car salesman on steroids. And no, I wouldn't buy a car from him. He's the sort of fellow who, if I'd shake hands with him, I'd go off and count my fingers.

I was wondering precisely how he'd use the LP nomination mistake to make some money. I knew he'd use it to promote himself -- that is his one full time occupation -- to tell the world how wonderful he is. But I figured he'd try to make a buck off it as well. I just never imagined he'd hawk a book purporting to explain libertarianism to the world. That would be like me written an introduction to brain surgery. I can only hope that he had it ghost-written. If not, I can only hope no one reads it -- much the way no one read self-promotional book Millionaire Republican.

Ron Paul comes out of the theocratic closet.

This blog has contended that Ron Paul is a social conservative who was using libertarians to raise funds. Ron Paul has consistently moved farther and farther to the fringe Right. Every time he deviated away from libertarianism it was to satisfy the social authoritarians on the Right. He’s always had an excuse for it but his voting has been consistent.

Ron Paul publicly endorsed the loony far Right John Birch Society. Ron Paul even went so far as changing his church from mainstream Episcopalian to a fundamentalist Baptist variety. Now Ron Paul has come out of the closet and endorsed the extreme Right Constitution Party.

Paul said: “I’m supporting Chuck Baldwin, the Constitution Party candidate.”

Now, there is no good reason to support Bob Barr, in my opinion. And the reasons I don’t support Barr are precisely the same reasons I opposed Ron Paul. He is a social conservative pretending to be a libertarian. And the man Ron Paul is supporting is himself a fundamentalist theocrat. I contend that no real libertarian could support the sorts of policies promoted by the Constitution Party. Let us look at the policies that Constitution Party runs on, and which have been tacitly endorsed by Ron Paul.

The Constitution Party is specifically Christianist and wants to impose fundamentalist Christianity on the United States. They don’t even pretend to respect the religious values of others. They instead claim that “our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” is the “Creator, Preserver and Ruler of the Universe and of these United States.” Please note they specifically claim that Jesus Christ is the “Ruler of the Universe and these United States.” How much more clear can their theocratic tendencies be?

They say: “The goal of the Constitution Party is to restore American jurisprudence to its Biblical foundations...” They are saying that American law should be based on Biblical law -- this is Christian Reconstructionism. What does Biblical law mandate? As the Reconstructionists are not shy saying, it mandates a government that executes sinners. It is the Taliban in Christian drag.

They say that gambling “promotes an increase in crime, destruction of family values, and a decline in the moral fiber of our country.” They want to repeal federal legislation to allow the states and local communities to regulate and restrict gambling on tribal lands.

They argue that a fetus is a “pre-born child... created in God’s image.” They want the government to ban abortion entirely. They make no exceptions even for rape or incest. Their position is theological to the core. For the same theological reasons they “oppose all ‘legalization’ of euthanasia, infanticide and suicide.” What kind of theocrat can be so stupid as to want to make suicide a crime? Hey, why not? They could impose the death penalty for it, something else they support. This is what Ron Paul is endorsing.

When it comes to the war on drugs they say: “The Constitution Party will uphold the right of states and localities to restrict access to drugs and to enforce such restrictions. We support legislation to stop the flow of illegal drugs into these United States from foreign sources.”

What about state education? They say that the federal government has no role in education but they do not exclude state and local involvement in education. And they openly say that such government schooling “cannot be separated from religious faith.”

They offer bullshit about how states rights should dominate but they also make it clear that when it comes to “morality” the states have to impose Biblical morality. Under their view no individual state could grant equal rights to marry to gay couples. “No government may legitimately authorize or define marriage or family relations contrary to what God has instituted.”

They say that the states have the right “to proscribe offensive sexual behavior.” Notice that it says nothing about proscribing sexual behavior that violates the rights of others only that the states may ban sexual behavior that they find offensive. As part of their morality crusade they also with to ban “adoption of children by homosexual singles or couples.” Once again this is the candidate that Ron Paul is publicly endorsing.

As for immigration their xenophobic, nativist tendencies are very extreme. They don’t just want to “secure the border”. They want a complete “moratorium on immigration to these United States, except in extreme hardship cases or in other individual special circumstances...”. This is supposed to stay in effect until all state welfare is abolished -- as if that is going to happen in our lifetime or in the next century.

Because they are theocrats they want to ban an judicial review of legislation based on theological premises. “We particularly support all the legislation which would remove from Federal appellate review jurisdiction matters involving acknowledgement of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government.”

They also want to abolish freedom of speech for erotica or material with sexual content because it is “a distortion of the true nature of sex created by God.” They absurdly argue that censorhip is required to protect freedom of speech: “We call on our local, state and federal governments to uphold our cherished First Amendment right to free speech by by vigorously enforcing our laws against obscenity... we also believe that our collective representative body we call government plays a vital role in establishing and maintaining the highest level of decency in our community standards.”

As for free trade, they oppose it. They say tariffs “are legitimate revenue-raising measures” and a means of protecting local companies from competition. They clearly say that the tariffs must be sufficiently high to prevent any foreign good from being able to compete on the basis of price with comparable American goods. They explicitly restrict competition from foreign competitors.

As for their opposition to government handouts and welfare they don’t oppose them with a blanket opposition. They in fact want “generous health, education and other benefits” but to veterans only.

As bad as Barr is he is still heads above Chuck Baldwin. As much as the Libertarian Party has deserted principles it is still superior to the theocratic Constitution Party. While Paul would have an excuse to not endorse Bob Barr there is no justification for endorsing Rev. Baldwin and his Christian Taliban. Well, there is no excuse for a libertarian to do this. On the other hand this is precisely what you would expect from a social conservative.

This blogger has warned libertarians that Ron Paul was heading in precisely this direction and heading there very rapidly. We were not believed by most. Ron Paul has now proven our concerns were correct. Ron Paul used libertarian sounding rhetoric to cover up his real agenda. His endorsement of an openly theocratic political party is proof positive that Ron Paul is not one of us. But then he doesn’t care anymore -- he’s got the millions of dollars that libertarians gave him to promote his real agenda. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

PS: If Ron Paul doesn't support these ideas, and his history indicates he does, then he shouldn't have endorsed Baldwin and the Constitution Party. The argument that Paul is having a hissy fit over Barr snubbing him is disrespectful to Paul. It implies that he would chuck out principle simply because his feelings got hurt. At least my view is that he has come clean and is showing some integrity by making explicit the views I contend were implicit in his campaign all along. What libertarians have to do is realize that Paul took them for a very expensive ride. The money is in his bank accounts now and he can be quite open about his views as he doesn't need libertarians anymore -- this is his last run for office. So you decide whether it is more respectful to say he is being a cry-baby over Barr or showing some integrity by coming clean on his real views.