Do people think he is just stupid on some issues? A white hat? A black hat? Or what?
He's very different from most people in Senate. The GOP, especially in the Senate is full of cuckservatives, as we all know. What does that mean exactly?
It means that in order to get there, for the most part, they were vetted by the GOP elite and found to have "sound Conservative views". Those would include things like supporting Free Trade, supporting a powerful military, supporting lots of immigration, not wanting to fight on culture-war issues like gay marriage or abortion.
This is why they are made fun of as cucks and "Conservatism, Inc.".
The purity of the Party and not allowing it to be harmed by having an openly racialist candidate in it is also paramount. This leads to GOPe being very susceptible to having the "racism" word used against them as. It's sort of a kryptonite that kills conservatism.
Rand Paul doesn't hold most of these beliefs, didn't come up through "normal" channels, and never agreed to most of the vetting conventions of the GOP establishment.
Rand was raised by Ron Paul, who is more of a libertarian with paleo-conservative tendencies than a GOP Establishtment type.
Remember one of Ron's big issues was auditing the Federal Reserve. He bought into the very old-school Conservative theory that the Central Bank was a terrible thing. Think about that - he was actively fighting to repeal a 100 year old institution that is central to our entire political and economic order. He was laughed at by the establo-cucks for this position: he was a crank, he was a conspiracy theorist, he was an anti-Semite.
A few results of this. He probably has a lot of ideas that are quite divergent from the main-stream Conservatism, but he also learned from watching his Dad that you need to pick your battles and not reveal everything you think.
There is an interesting video out there of one of his first long interview when he was running for Senate, with Rachel Maddow. She starts asking him about the Civil Rights laws of 1965. His response is from a libertarian perspective: that parts of the law that prevent the government from doing bad things to some races were good and needed, the parts that forbid private property owners from serving who they want to may have gone to far, and violate our freedom of association.
This same view was argued by Barry Goldwater in his book Conscience of a Conservative, but that was 40 years ago. Maddow pounced and framed this as "so you think it's OK for racist white restaurant owners to not serve blacks?".
Eventually Rand had to walk this back, but it shows what's going on with him. In his heart, I am sure he still believes what he said originally.
He has a political philosophy, which he learned at his Dad's knee, and it has nothing to do with what Mitch McConnell would say. Does Mitch have a political philosophy? Could he articulate it?
I don't think Rand is "stupid" on some issues. I think he could do a great job of explaining why he feels the way he does over beers at the nearby steakhouse, but he's grown wise enough not to air a lot of his beliefs on TV.
But he still votes his conscience, and because his beliefs are so different his votes don't always line up with the rest of the party.
One area you see this in a lot is defense. Ron Paul was the leading non-interventionist of his generation in Congress. He voted against Iraq, he voted to cut defense spending, he always argued we should bring American troops home from foreign hotspots and stop policing the world.
Again, this is anathema to Buckleyites, who cut their chops being the hawkiest of hawks in the Cold War. And it was a terrible heresy to the NeoCons who were the driving force behind the Bush foreign policy and the wars it entailed.
Rand's part of an older Conservative tradition (some would say an ignoble one) of wanting almost no foreign intervention. I'm sure he can tell you who the Conservatives were who opposed US Entry into WW1, and Ron Paul is a direct philosophical discendent of those who opposed US Entry into WW2.
That's the deal with Rand Paul, in my opinion.
“There is an interesting video out there of one of his first long interview when he was running for Senate, with Rachel Maddow. She starts asking him about the Civil Rights laws of 1965. His response is from a libertarian perspective: that parts of the law that prevent the government from doing bad things to some races were good and needed, the parts that forbid private property owners from serving who they want to may have gone to far, and violate our freedom of association.”
I don’t agree with Rand on everything, but I do agree with him on this. Freedom of association and rights of private business. Just think, if government recognized those liberates it wouldn’t be able to put Christian bakers out of business or use the Little Sisters of the Poor.
Wow! That was extremely helpful.
I really appreciate that you took the time to post that.
It seems that I agree with Rand and Ron on a lot. In the pre-Q era, I was vaguely aware of people arguing about the Fed, but it was too far removed from my everyday concerns to pay much attention. I still think it is a few layers deep and can’t be tackled immediately, but I agree with Ron (and Rand?). The problem is, some of these issues that are a few layers deep are also part of the foundation of the corruption. So it would be nice to remove the foundation. I am so hoping/praying the Trump team can complete the full plan. Soon!
That physical attack on Rand a few months back is even more suspicious now.
Again, thanks. Very helpful.
Very astute analysis, and some founding fathers warned against foreign entanglements, so less intervention is as you say an older conservative philosophy.
I enjoyed reading your post.