Posted on 06/15/2007 7:24:20 AM PDT by Fiji Hill
The Conservative Case Against Ron Paul
By John Hawkins
Friday, June 15, 2007
Even though he's not one of the top tier contenders, I thought it might be worthwhile to go ahead and write a short, but sweet primer that will explain why so many Republicans have a big problem with Ron Paul. Enjoy!
#1) Ron Paul is a libertarian, not a conservative: I have nothing against libertarians. To the contrary, I like them and welcome them into the Republican Party. But, conservatives have even less interest in seeing a libertarian as the GOP's standard bearer than seeing a moderate as our party's nominee. In Paul's case, his voting record shows that he is the least conservative member of Congress running for President on the GOP side. So, although he is a small government guy, he very poorly represents conservative opinion on a wide variety of other important issues.
#2) Ron Paul is one of the people spreading the North American Union conspiracy: If you're so inclined, you can click here for just one example of Paul talking up a mythical Bush administration merger of the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, but you're not missing much if you don't. Reputable conservatives shouldn't be spreading these crazy conspiracy theories and the last thing the GOP needs is a conspiracy crank as our nominee in 2008.
#3) Ron Paul encourages "truther" conspiracy nuts: Even though Ron Paul admits that he does not believe in a 9/11 government conspiracy, he has been flirting with the wackjobs in the "truther movement," like Alex Jones and the "Student Scholars for 9/11 Truth." Republican politicians should either ignore people like them or set them straight, not lend credence to their bizarre conspiracy theories by acting as if they may have some merit, which is what Ron Paul has done.
#4) Ron Paul's racial views: From the Houston Chronicle, Texas congressional candidate Ron Paul's 1992 political newsletter highlighted portrayals of blacks as inclined toward crime and lacking sense about top political issues.
Under the headline of "Terrorist Update," for instance, Paul reported on gang crime in Los Angeles and commented, "If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be."
Paul, a Republican obstetrician from Surfside, said Wednesday he opposes racism and that his written commentaries about blacks came in the context of "current events and statistical reports of the time."
..."Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the `criminal justice system,' I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal," Paul said.
...He added, "We don't think a child of 13 should be held responsible as a man of 23. That's true for most people, but black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such."
Paul also asserted that "complex embezzling" is conducted exclusively by non-blacks.
"What else do we need to know about the political establishment than that it refuses to discuss the crimes that terrify Americans on grounds that doing so is racist? Why isn't that true of complex embezzling, which is 100 percent white and Asian?" he wrote."
Ron Paul has since claimed that although these comments were in his newsletter, under his name, he didn't write them. Is he telling the truth? Who knows? Either way, those comments don't say much for Paul.
#5) A lot of Ron Paul's supporters are incredibly irritating: There are, without question, plenty of decent folks who support Ron Paul. However, for whatever reason, his supporters as a group are far more annoying than those of all the other candidates put together. It's like every spammer, truther, troll, and flake on the net got together under one banner to spam polls and try to annoy everyone into voting for Ron Paul (which is, I must admit, a novel strategy).
#6) Ron Paul is an isolationist: The last time the United States retreated to isolationism was after WW1 and the result was WW2. Since then, the world has become even more interconnected which makes Ron Paul's strategy of retreating behind the walls of Fortress America even more unworkable than it was back in the thirties.
#7) Ron Paul wants to immediately cut and run in Iraq: Even if you're an isolationist like Ron Paul, the reality is that our foreign policy isn't currently one of isolationism and certain allowances should be made to deal with that reality. Yet, Paul believes we should immediately retreat from Al-Qaeda in Iraq and let that entire nation collapse into genocide and civil war as a result. Maybe, just maybe, Paul's motives are better than those of liberals like Murtha and Kerry, who want to see us lose a war for political gain, but the catastrophic results would be exactly the same.
#8) Ron Paul excused Al-Qaeda's attacks on America: In the single most repulsive moment of the entire Presidential race so far, Ron Paul excused Al-Qaeda's attack on American with this comment about 9/11,
"They attack us because we've been over there. We've been bombing Iraq for 10 years." In other words, America deserved to be attacked by Al-Qaeda.
This is the sort of facile comment you'd expect to hear from an America-hating left winger like Michael Moore or Noam Chomsky, not from a Republican running for President -- or from any Republican in office for that matter. If you want to truly realize how foolish that sort of thinking is, imagine what the reaction would be if we had bombed Egyptian or Indonesian civilians after 9/11 and then justified it by saying "We attacked them because those Muslims have been over here."
#9) Ron Paul is the single, least electable major candidate running for the presidency in either party: Libertarianism simply is not considered to be a mainstream political philosophy in the United States by most Americans. That's why the Libertarian candidate in 2004, Michael Badnarik, only pulled .3% of the vote. Even more notably, Ron Paul only pulled .47% of the vote when he ran at the top of the Libertarian ticket in 1988. Granted, Paul would do considerably better than that if he ran at the top of the Republican Party ticket, but it's hard to imagine his winning more than, say 35%, of the national vote and a state or two -- even if he were very lucky. In other words, having Ron Paul as the GOP nominee would absolutely guarantee the Democratic nominee a Reaganesque sweep in the election.
Summary: Is Ron Paul serious about small government, enforcing the Constitution, and enforcing the borders? Yes, and those are all admirable qualities. However, he also has a host of enormous flaws that makes him unqualified to be President and undesirable, even as a Republican Congressmen.
Mr. Hawkins is a professional blogger who runs Conservative Grapevine and Right Wing News. He also writes a weekly column for Townhall.com and consults for the Duncan Hunter campaign.
Copyright © 2006 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.
Yes, but there's a wide gulf between what he meant and the audience actually heard. I was stunned, and I've always been a Paul admirer.
His handlers need to keep him on a short leash.
Again, it's just not true. You are indicting the whole party because of the actions of some, but not all. The Dems are far more homogeneous against conservative values.
How would you know?
Those "clear differences" you see are largely superficial.
The sameness occurs in areas of extreme importance, like our naitonal sovreignty, for instance.
If you look closely at who, exactly are the most powerful people in the country, you see that they largely eschew any outward affiliation with either party. Instead, they all are working toward a common goal; to subsume our country into a socialist one-world government that will be controlled by themselves.
May I ask, RacerF150; why doesn't that matter to you?
There are a number of issues that are considered to be “conservative” that Dr. Paul routinely votes against based on the questionable constitutionality of that legislation.
Case in point - the House recently voted to expand the government’s reach as it applies to previously passed gun control legislation. Dr. Paul actively campaigned against it. It was reported that Dr. Paul was the ONLY NO vote.
So I hear. No popcorn with their lattes. Bummer.
I'm good. I'm in a place where stuff that blows up is kind of the norm. :)
Proof positive the author is an interventionist, nation building Wilsonian liberal not a conservative. US involvement in WW1 caused WW2 not the isolationism of the 20's/30's.
In 1917 the war was stalemated, neither side could win. Then along came the USA and turned the tide for Britain and France. Had the USA stayed out a peace treaty of some kind or the other would have been worked out. Instead Germany surrendered on the basis of Wilson' 14 points. As soon as Germany laid out it's arms the 14 points were throw out the window and extremely harsh terms were imposed on Germany. Germany was blamed for the war, it's government abolished, lands taken and a huge imdemment placed on it. German resentment of the totally unfair terms that ended WW1 gave rise to Hitler and caused WW2.
I disagree. That would be Kookcinich.
>>> Ron Paul is not a conservative
>> How would you know?
Because no conservative could make many of the statements that he has made. “Fiscally conservative” is not good enough ...
A
The definition of an American conservative is someone that believes the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. Very few in DC believe that, certainly W doesn’t. Paul is one of the few left that actually believes the Constitution means what it says and should be followed. FYI I am not supporting Paul (or anyone else at the moment).
Yep, exactly. Too bad FReepers here have bought into this anti-Paul garbage.
Ron Paul served in Vietnam and is a doctor who delivered thousands of babies. What the Hell did Bush ever do, besides ride Poppy's coattails and was in a drunken haze until age 40.
Careful, the ‘Paulies’ have taken to complaining to the mods if you dispute their hero’s bonafides.
And Heaven Help you if you quote his explanation of why terrorists are attacking us....(chuckle)
They throw hissy fits almost as well as the chuckleheads at daily kos.
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