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."