Ron Paul is a John Birch "palaeolibertarian," which...explains his proclivity for conspiracy theories, since the JBS' whole worldview is that Leftism is a mere front for "The [Zionist] Conspiracy."
The JBS does not promote the idea of a Zionist conspiracy and eschews Judeophobia. However, they do believe in what they call the "Master Conspiracy," a sinister plot to establish a totalitarian world state that was hatched by the Trilateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Skull & Bones fraternity, etc.
::Sigh:: Please allow me to state again: I am a former John Bircher(just as I am a former Catholic), and I know their "official" positions. Unfortunately, they have also long chosen to promote a number of "unofficial" positions, and many of their important members have been people who think that "Zionism" is the driving force behind the "master conspiracy" (Frank Capell is one example). And their brief period of sympathy with Israel under the early Begin prime ministership, lasted all of five minutes.
The JBS may have "officially" eschewed anti-Semitism, but in their "unofficial" publications (and according to them only the Bulletin is "official") they have promoted anti-Israel viewpoints, writers, and books. They used to sell the works of Nesta Webster, a British anti-Semite and pro-Nazi whose official works were published by a notorious Nazi/racialist organization--so they sold illegal pirate editions instead! They have published and promoted books by the Romanian anti-Semite and Iron Guard apologist Prince Michel Sturdza (the Romanian Iron Guard was one of the most vicious and murderous of all the European anti-Semitic organizations in the days before WWII). They "unofficially" promote a book entitled The Rapture Cult, a book which promotes Rushdoonyian "reconstructionism" and attacks traditional pro-Israel Protestant Fundamentalism. One former member of their National Council, Charles Carlson, is a virulent Israel-hater who has a net site named "Pharisee Watch."
The John Birch Society is alien to the traditional "chr*stian right" (ie, people like Falwell, Pat Robertson, etc.) and exists completely outside that tradition. In fact, they ("unofficially") attack those conservatives as "statists" (an epithet they never apply to the foreign totalitarian dictators they so admire). Despite the great numbers of pro-Israel chr*stian conservatives, there are none in the Birch Society. And if one joins, he either winds up poisoned against the Jews or has to leave in disgust.
The Birch Society is the proud, avowed successor of the pre-WWII anti-Semitic right. Anti-Semites like Charles Lindbergh and Henry Ford are their heroes (never mind that Ford built truck plants for Stalin in the Thirties; anyone who hates the Jews just has to mean well!). While defending the military draft during the Cold War, they have suddenly discovered (since our current war allegedly benefits Jews too much) that all of a sudden the military draft is "unconstitutional" again, just as it was in WWII (those drafts were bad, the Cold War draft was good).
The John Birch Society has had among its members Willis Carto (the grand pooh-bah of anti-Semitism in America) and even Ben Klaasen, a sick man who hated the Jews so much that he became an atheist and attacked chr*stianity as Jewish (he also founded the "church of the creator"). Many, if not most, of the most notorious anti-Semites in America have spent time in the JBS, absorbing its subtle poison. This is why I insist that it is the "blue lodge" of the anti-Semitic movement.
The Birch Society may not "officially" blame "the conspiracy" on "Zionism," but many of their members and leaders do. Even Alan Stang, born a Jew (and now a non-Fundamentalist Rushdoonyite "Baptist" of some kind) attacks "Zionism" as the force behind the "conspiracy," though he defends Israel against it. Yes, that's right--Alan Stang thinks "the Zionists" are out out to destroy Israel!
Until I joined the JBS I never dreamed there was such a thing as an anti-Israel conservative. Through them I discovered a sickening legacy that I knew nothing about, that is completely alien to my Fundamentalist heritage, and which I want nothing to do with. The Birch Society is worse than a group of lunatics--it is evil. And I will maintain that till the day I die. All you have to do is look around and notice that anyone who attacks Israel (such as Buchanan and Sobran) automatically becomes a hero and a martyr to it. If this doesn't say more about what they think about Israel, Jews, and Zionism than anything they have the guts (or honesty) to publish in their "official" Bulletin, then I don't know what they could possibly say or do to confirm it.
I have been a member of two organizations in my life whose "official" positions are allegedly laudable but who have a great deal of "unofficial" teachings which are promoted so vociferously that they might as well be "official": the JBS and the Catholic Church (which doesn't "officially" endorse evoluton or the documentary hypothesis, but almost all of whose clergy and theologians do). I have come to see those two groups as very similar--and in fact, considering the admiration the Birch Society has for the Catholic Church (which it can't bring itself to have for Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, or John Hagee), I wouldn't be the least surprise at a connection somewhere, especially in the more virulently anti-Semitic wings of the Church.
By making itself an ally of the enemies of the Jewish People and an opponent of Israel's Ingathering in its Holy Land the JBS has made itself the enemy of G-d A-mighty. But then, the JBS (like all "palaeos") don't believe in a universal G-d anyway. The whole "G-d-family-country" slogan implies that each country and family has its own particular "gxd." To posit a single objective G-d is to advocate "one world government!"
The Birch Society can kiss my tachat, along with all their thugs, hangers-on, and front groups.
Robert Welch, the founder of the JBS, was a Unitarian. He always eschewed anti-Semitism and racism in his writings, and when he concocted his "Master Conspiracy" theory in the mid-1960's, he took pains to explain that the cabal was not Jewish.
Nonetheless, by promoting this sort of worldview, the group was bound to attract extremists, including Jew-haters and racists. Now that you mentioned it, I do, indeed, recall a couple of Birchers who urged me to read Nesta Webster, whose books drip with hatred of Jews on just about every page. And Michael Sturdza's book on the Chappaquiddick affair--written under a pseudonym--was published by Western Islands, the JBS house organ, heavily promoted in the JBS' official Bulletin.
Initially attracted to the JBS because of its uncompromising anti-Communism, I gradually soured on them as I became more familiar with their worldview. In 1976, I split with the Birchers for good when they refused to back Ronald Reagan's presidential bid.