Ron Paul Is Crazy. Admit It.

sfweekly.com ^ | 12/26/2011 | Peter Jamison

[TBBT]

Congressman Ron Paul grabbed the lion's share of headlines among GOP presidential candidates last week, and not just because he is the latest improbable figure to challenge the inevitable nomination of Mitt Romney.

The conservative Weekly Standard ran a rehash by writer James Kirchik of an article he wrote for the New Republic in 2008 that collates, to deadly effect, the astoundingly bizarre, racist, and anti-Semitic comments Paul broadcast in a series of newsletters he published for two decades. Paul implausibly claims the newsletters (written in the first person and bearing his name) were produced by others, but it really doesn't matter. The time has come, as Kirchik helpfully reminds us, to recognize Paul for what he is.

He is not -- as some disillusioned moderates and media pundits like to believe -- a refreshing, small-government Republican with a healthy distaste for Wall Street and foreign adventurism. He is a clinically paranoid (and likely bigoted) conspiracy theorist. And you don't even have to cite his newsletters to prove it.

I paid some attention to Paul's 2008 campaign, because at the time I was assigned by my newspaper to cover two of his biggest fans: Ed and Elaine Brown, a pair of New Hampshire tax cheats who engaged in a months-long standoff with the U.S. Marshals Service over the couple's refusal to pay federal income taxes. The Browns believed they lived on a sovereign enclave atop a hill in rural Plainfield, N.H., stockpiled scary weapons, and threatened violence against any federal agents who came on their property.

You would think a presidential aspirant would want to distance himself from such wackos. Not Paul, who declared in a videotaped interview that the Browns were "heroes":

[RBK]

Ron Paul Stands For

Open Borders
Legalize Heroin
911 Truther
Insane Foreign Policy
Thinks Homos In Military Is Good
Legalize Prostitution

He is a nut bag short a couple nuts

[RIghtwardHo]

Sad, ain’t it?

[little jeremiah]

A neighbor had a Ron Paul sign early in 2008. After the primaries, the RPaul sign came down and up went the 0bama sign.

I’ve seen that several times around here.

[rideharddiefast]

Your posts were the 32,726th, and 32,727th time the word “kook” has been tossed at Ron Paul on FR today.

If the shoe fits, wear it. The shoe sure fits this kook.