Ron Paul connected to white supremacists?
I've also updated this blog's post on "Ron Paul, religious kook" to point out his recent statement that he doesn't accept the reality of evolution.
UPDATE: The alleged campaign expenditure link to Wednesday restaurant meetings with white supremacist groups has been conclusively refuted at the Irregular Times blog, which goes through the expenditures in detail and shows that while Ron Paul has spent money for meetings at the Tara Thai restaurant in D.C. (which is right around the corner from an office he rents in D.C.), none of those expenditures have occurred on a Wednesday. The source of the allegations, Bill White of the American National Socialist Workers Party, is not a particularly credible source, as has been remarked repeatedly in the comments at Ed Brayton's blog (first link above).
However, Paul has definitely taken contributions from and posed for photographs with at least one white supremacist, Don Black, who runs the Stormfront website.
Posts
35 comments:
Back around May, before all this "white supremacist" BS was popping up, Ron Paul was asked who he would like as Vice President. Ron Paul responded to the effect, "Walter Williams because he is a good economist."
Guess what? Walter Williams is a black guy.
Ron Paul believes in individual liberty. Ron Paul believes that racism is an ugly form of collectivism. Collectivism such as the brand that Jesse Jackson and the KKK equally represents.
So what if Ron Paul took a picture with a white supremacist? In Ron Paul rally's hundreds, if not thousands of people, line up to get a picture with him. Do you think he asks people their life story?
You show me one picture of Ron Paul with a white supremacist and I will show you 10 more pictures of Ron Paul with a minority. Enough of the BS arguments, it only makes this blog look foolish. Have some dignity and try to search for the truth instead of grasping at straws with cheap rumors.
Paul probably isn't a white supremacist or racist, and may not be a conspiracy theorist (though he seems to be), but he's quite comfortable hanging out with them and pretending to agree with them. Has he ever spoken out and publicly disagreed with them? Has he ever rejected a campaign contribution from a source that supports racism or white supremacy?
Paul is a politician who opposes pork, yet solicits earmarks for his constituents, knowing that his "no" votes will not stop the measures from passing. He purports to be in favor of unilateral free trade, yet opposes free trade agreements and is happy for protectionists to think that he's also a protectionist. He claims to be a supporter of the Constitution, but he wants to remove the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship and thinks that the Constitution is "replete with references" to God.
Jim, if anyone has evidence that Ron Paul has lied, is inconsistent, is a white supremacist, etc than I want to know. I'm not a Ron Paul cheerleader that will ignore evidence.
As for you comments:
"Paul probably isn't a white supremacist or racist, and may not be a conspiracy theorist (though he seems to be), but he's quite comfortable hanging out with them and pretending to agree with them. Has he ever spoken out and publicly disagreed with them?"
What's the evidence that he hangs out with white supremacist? Even in your own blog, you said it has been disproven that Ron Paul was hanging out with white supremacist at the thai restaurant. And like I said before, a picture means nothing because Ron Paul takes thousands of photos and it's imjpossible to ask people who they are.
If you truly are concerned about racism then you are doing a great disservice. Ron Paul's principles are the antithesis of racism. He believes in individual liberty and treating people as individual. Asked about gays in the military, Ron Paul said,
"And the problem that we have with dealing with this subject is we see people as groups, as they belong to certain groups and that they derive their rights as belonging to groups. We don't get our rights because we're gays or women or minorities. We get our rights from our Creator as individuals. So every individual should be treated the same way. So if there is homosexual behavior in the military that is disruptive, it should be dealt with. But if there's heterosexual behavior that is disruptive, it should be dealt with. So it isn't the issue of homosexuality. It's the concept and the understanding of individual rights. If we understood that, we would not be dealing with this very important problem."[167]
Does that sounds like a statement by a racist white supremacist?
Yes, Ron Paul has always spoken out against white supremacist ideology. It's the principles that is relayed in all his speeches.
The Campaign Manager Jesse Benton's take on this:
"Dr. Paul stands for freedom, peace, prosperity and inalienable rights. If someone with small ideologies happens to contribute money to Ron, thinking he can influence Ron in any way, he's wasted his money," Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said. "Ron is going to take the money and try to spread the message of freedom."
Even the white supremacist Don Black who donated to Ron Paul says, "We know that he's not a white nationalist. He says he isn't and we believe him, but on the issues, there's only one choice," Black said Wednesday.
Black said he supports Paul's stance on ending the war in Iraq, securing America's borders and his opposition to amnesty for illegal immigrants.
Jim said... "Has he ever rejected a campaign contribution from a source that supports racism or white supremacy?"
Campaign Manager Jesse Benton says,
"Dr. Paul stands for freedom, peace, prosperity and inalienable rights. If someone with small ideologies happens to contribute money to Ron, thinking he can influence Ron in any way, he's wasted his money," Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said. "Ron is going to take the money and try to spread the message of freedom.
"And that's $500 less that this guy has to do whatever it is that he does," Benton added.
That makes sense to me. If all the white supremacist want to give their money to Ron Paul for Ron Paul to spread freedom then hurray for liberty. What sense does it make to return the money if it doesn't buy Ron Paul's influence? Other than a superficial political game of appearances it does nothing, but gives the money back to white supremacist.
We don't get our rights because we're gays or women or minorities. We get our rights from our Creator as individuals. So every individual should be treated the same way.
I'd like to point out that such a sentiment is incompatible with Paul's stance on immigration.
The best evidence for Ron Paul hanging out with racists and white supremacists that I've seen is here.
A rebuttal from Glenn Greenwald (not a Ron Paul supporter, which gives him more credibility in this dispute) is here.
I'll retract the part about Paul hanging out with racists and white supremacists, but he definitely hangs out with conspiracy theorists.
Jim says....
Paul is a politician who opposes pork, yet solicits earmarks for his constituents, knowing that his "no" votes will not stop the measures from passing.
Ron Paul explains the system like a tax credit. For example, Ron Paul wants to get rid of the income tax because it's ideaology is that the government owns 100% of us and that it will allow us to keep a percentage of our labors. However, it would be dumb if Ron Paul opposed taking tax credits just because it's part of the system.
The earmarks are similar. The money has already been collected for government use. It would be dumb of him and a disservice for the people he represents to not ask for some of that money back because he opposes the collection of the money in the first place.
Ron Paul said that he doesn't like the system and the solution is removing the power of the government from overtaxing us... collecting all the loot.. and then they become Santa Claus redistributing the wealth. No wonder corporations have lobbyists that buy out our politicians. The solution isn't to expect politicians to not play along with the corrupt game, but it is to stop the government from collecting the loot in the first place.
It's not really like a tax credit, because the earmarks cause money to flow to small groups in amounts that can far exceed what they are paying in taxes. It's a transfer payment to special interests. Ron Paul should join with Rep. Jeff Flake in opposing earmarks. (On many issues, I'd support Paul over Flake, but not this one.)
Jim says...
He purports to be in favor of unilateral free trade, yet opposes free trade agreements and is happy for protectionists to think that he's also a protectionist.
Ron Paul believes these free trade agreements are "free trade" in name only. It is really corporate+big government managed trade.
Ron Paul says, "So called free trade deals and world governmental organizations like the International Criminal Court (ICC), NAFTA, GATT, WTO, and CAFTA are a threat to our independence as a nation. They transfer power from our government to unelected foreign elites.
The ICC wants to try our soldiers as war criminals. Both the WTO and CAFTA could force Americans to get a doctor’s prescription to take herbs and vitamins. Alternative treatments could be banned. "
If you were against a tariff set up by one of the "free trade" organizations, who do you talk to? These free trade organizations are even less responsive to you and me then the Federal Government.
jim says...
He claims to be a supporter of the Constitution, but he wants to remove the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship and thinks that the Constitution is "replete with references" to God.
Please provide the reference to this statement.
Have multilateral free trade agreements opened up markets, reduced tariffs and quotas, and increased trade? Yes, they have. To the extent they have, that's a good thing, not a bad thing. If you insist on waiting for completely open trade rather than any compromise that is closer to it than we have today, you'll be waiting forever. Nations don't want to give up the ability to regulate trade, but they have been willing to make compromises that increase trade.
Here is the reference to Paul's idiotic "replete" quote.
einzige: Please tell me what you think our immigration policy should be?
Do you believe that the amount of immigration shouldn't be controlled?
Ron Paul has said that if we had a stronger economy then we could be a lot more generous in allowing LEGAL immigrants to the country.
Also, if the welfare state wasn't as expensive than we could allow a lot more immigrants. With the current welfare state of allowing free education and free health care, the influx of immigrants is bankrupting many hospitals and hurting the schools.
If you believe in open borders and easy legal immigration then I think you should look into Ron Paul's economic and monetary policy. I was first attracted to Ron Paul's message because of the economic policy. I'm a good sized "amateaur" investor who has seen the housing crash, the credit crisis well before Wallstreet (Wallstreet is still clueless) and I believe Ron Paul's economic policies would help stabilize the economy.
A good economy will make America need immigrants to fill jobs and it will make people welcome immigrants.
Paul was asked a question about birthright citizenship at his first campaign appearance in Phoenix, which I attended, but he dodged the question. You can find a link there to Sameer Parekh's blog and his discussion of the subject; he's the one who asked the question. Paul's argument against birthright citizenship can be found at lewrockwell.com, in which he says "I’ve introduced legislation that would amend the Constitution and end automatic birthright citizenship."
His statement about the U.S. Constitution being replete with references to God was discussed here in this post, which includes a longer quotation from and link to the essay at lewrockwell.com where he made the statement.
Jim says...
Have multilateral free trade agreements opened up markets, reduced tariffs and quotas, and increased trade? Yes, they have. To the extent they have, that's a good thing, not a bad thing. If you insist on waiting for completely open trade rather than any compromise that is closer to it than we have today, you'll be waiting forever. Nations don't want to give up the ability to regulate trade, but they have been willing to make compromises that increase trade.
I understand what you are saying and truthfully, I do not know enough about the history of this subject to comment right now about it.
However, I'm wondering, is it not conceivable to have a world with true free trade without having a world government agency like the WTO? True there would be some countries who are foolish enough to enact protectionist policies, however, free market theory and history has shown this only goes to hurt their own economy the most.
The problem I have with large government involved in these issues is that I believe free markets are a natural consequence if a country wants to do its best. It doesn't need trade agreements because those that don't participate in free trade are the ultimate losers and will face pressures to become free traders.
The problem with large government agencies involved in this issue is that they do not represent us. True, you may agree with their policies today, but what about tomorrow when they do something you don't agree with? For examples, the regulation of natural herbal medicine or a tariff or sanctions placed on a country?
"Ron Paul has said that if we had a stronger economy then we could be a lot more generous in allowing LEGAL immigrants to the country."
Allowing more legal immigrants would be good for the economy, both here and in the rest of the world. They build wealth and they spend money. Our quotas for H1-B visas for the year get filled in a day.
Compare Singapore, which allows a much larger percentage of foreign guest workers and provides a means for them to become permanent residents, if they choose (most don't). Beefing up border security actually encourages illegal immigrants to stay, rather than being mobile between countries, though it's also encouraging some to leave or at least move within the United States to more hospitable areas.
I'm not impressed by his naming Walter Williams as a potential VP. Williams is a true believer in The Market and guest host for Rush Limbaugh (which disqualifies him from credibility for any public office in my mind.) He also thinks that DDT is magic fairy dust that you can pounds of a day with no consequence.
If - and I emphasize IF - Paul is racist, naming Williams in and of itself doesn't means he's not, since his hypothetical brand of racism is filtered through his libertarian views. Hence the Newspeak about collectivist aka people on welfare being racists.
That Paul letter that was archived by Nizkor says as much, saying that when blacks can't take the white man's money via taxation that take it via rioting.
Jim says... His statement about the U.S. Constitution being replete with references to God was discussed here in this post, which includes a longer quotation from and link to the essay at lewrockwell.com where he made the statement.
I'll check that later when I have more time.
Jim says..
Paul was asked a question about birthright citizenship at his first campaign appearance in Phoenix, which I attended, but he dodged the question. You can find a link there to Sameer Parekh's blog and his discussion of the subject; he's the one who asked the question. Paul's argument against birthright citizenship can be found at lewrockwell.com, in which he says "I’ve introduced legislation that would amend the Constitution and end automatic birthright citizenship."
Well, at least Ron Paul is principle enough that he would amend the Constitution instead of ignoring it.
Whether you agree with birthright citizenship is another issue.
Ron Paul's take on this issue is:
He think our whole immigration policy is ridiculous. We invite immigrants in with free health care, free education, and birth right citizenship. Then we treat them as second class citizens. Then we use them as scapegoats when the economy goes bad.
My impression is that Ron Paul does not dislike immigrants and would actually welcome more immigrants once we get our spending under control. He just doesn't like the system.
jim says...
It's not really like a tax credit, because the earmarks cause money to flow to small groups in amounts that can far exceed what they are paying in taxes. It's a transfer payment to special interests. Ron Paul should join with Rep. Jeff Flake in opposing earmarks. (On many issues, I'd support Paul over Flake, but not this one.)
I believe Ron Paul thinks he has the obligation to bring the requests of his constituency to the congress. Therefore, he passes all requests along. However, he has stated that he always votes NO on the actual bill because that is the stage where he decides the merit of it.
"The problem with large government agencies involved in this issue is that they do not represent us. True, you may agree with their policies today, but what about tomorrow when they do something you don't agree with?"
This problem exists with any government, any agency, and any organization, for that matter, and the only solution is two-fold: constitutional/statutory limits on power and maintaining checks and balances on those in power so that they don't just ignore or override the constitutional limits.
Hume's ghost, I've heard about the the alleged racist newletters, but I have not ever seen any proof of it. I'm not asking this in an antagonistic way, but do you have proof of it? If it's out there I would like to see it.
Please tell me what you think our immigration policy should be?
Do you believe that the amount of immigration shouldn't be controlled?
I believe that government shouldn't "control" the amount of immigration (leaving aside the issue about whether or not such a thing is even possible) any more than it should "control" the trafficking of recreational drugs.
However, I also believe that open borders will lead to a "flooding" of immigrants in much the same way as legalizing drugs will turn everyone into hopeless dope fiends -- which is to say: it won't.
If you actually buy in to the idea that we'll be overrun by immigrants if we open the borders then you need to pick up your Econ 101 textbook again and revisit the section on "diminishing marginal utility". Probably also a good idea to brush up on the efficient markets hypothesis while you're at it.
jim says...
This problem exists with any government, any agency, and any organization, for that matter, and the only solution is two-fold: constitutional/statutory limits on power and maintaining checks and balances on those in power so that they don't just ignore or override the constitutional limits.
The problem with big government like the Federal Government or world governments is that the bigger they get the less an individual's opinion can be heard. For example, our Federal Government is unresponsive to the American people. Their approval rating is in the 30s because their a disconnect with what they want and what the American people want. Checks and balances has not worked there. Our three branches of government are part of the same party. The Republicans and Democrats are more alike than people really know. It's a divide and conquer strategy and when someone like Ron Paul comes in they rally together to attack him.
However, in smaller government like my city I can state my disagreements and at least I can get a live person to talk to me. And with enough of my neighbors we can get our representatives to act.
Here is the letter. The Paul campaign says it was not written by Paul, although that wouldn't excuse it going out in his name and Paul not distancing himself from it for years.
It strikes me as strange as it would be were Barry Goldwater to attempt to distance himself from The Conscience of a Conservative by saying Brent Bozell wrote it. Although the difference being that the Paul campaign has created the impression that Paul had no say so or knowledge of the letter.
If you actually buy in to the idea that we'll be overrun by immigrants if we open the borders then you need to pick up your Econ 101 textbook again and revisit the section on "diminishing marginal utility". Probably also a good idea to brush up on the efficient markets hypothesis while you're at it.
What about the welfare state that they can take advantage of when they come here? Are you in favor of a reduction of the size of the welfare state? How do we pay for all these things? We are paying for it right now by borrowing money or printing money (monetizing the debt). This is obviously not sustainable.
As for the
I have a lot more to say about EMT and marginal utility, but I'll save that for when I have more time.
Good discussing thing with you guys. If you guys have a scanned copy of the racist newsletter I would really like to see it.
Dennis for President!
It seems that Ron Paul doesn't like the way many things are run, with good reason. But it also seems that there are some things he's willing to play along with - earmarks, and others he is not - free trade agreements.
I think welfare reform is a great idea. We actually had significant welfare reform in 1996, when Bill Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996.
Wikipedia reports the outcome:
"The consequences of welfare reform have been dramatic. As expected, welfare rolls (the number of people receiving payments) dropped significantly (57%) in the years since passage of the bill. Substantially larger declines in welfare rolls were posted by many states, and even big city-dominated Illinois achieved an 86% reduction in welfare recipients. [MacDougal 2005] Child poverty rates for African American families have dropped the sharpest since statistics began to be tallied in the 1960s; although critics argue that this is due more to overall economic improvement than to welfare reform, and that in any case the rate of child poverty in the United States is still far higher than in nations with greater welfare protections. Some would counter that this apparent disparity is due to misleading statistical analysis (measuring inequality rather than poverty) and that welfare rolls in the United States historically are much more closely correlated with government spending rather than economic fluctuations."
What about the welfare state that they can take advantage of when they come here?
Is the problem the welfare state or is it immigration?
Sheldon Richman has a nice series of posts about Ron Paul, in which he defends Paul's position on earmarks and excoriates him for his position on immigration.
einzige says...
Is the problem the welfare state or is it immigration?
I think the problem is more welfare. If we didn't have this burdensome welfare state then a lot more immigrants would be welcomed and there would be no doubt that they all are coming to the U.S. to work.
You mentioned the efficient market theory. I'm not quite sure what you are getting at related to the topic of immigration. The hard form of the efficient market theory is in my opinion complete BS. It doesn't explain the intentional misinformation of our government (yeah right.. inflation is at 2%). It doesn't explain the psychological effect of greed and fear that drives bubbles and busts. It doesn't explain the misaligned interests of the financial institutions. They claim to be professionals that look out for the best interest of the invidual customers, but they get paid billions of dollars by corporations such as Enron and they facilitate the CDO, MBS scams.
Here is the reference to Paul's idiotic "replete" quote.
First off, I'm an atheist.
As far as I understand the Constitution isn't replete with reference to God. So I would agree with you that I think Ron Paul is wrong on that. However, in context of the article, "The War on Religion", I understand Ron Paul was trying to make his case and may have erred in that point. However, I don't entirely disagree with the article itself. It's not that I think the government should ever prop Christianity up to the official religion (not that Ron Paul wants that), it's just that I think we have a lot more things to worry about right now.
If we are true to ourselves, none of us will ever agree 100% with a candidate. I have researched a good deal regarding all the other candidates and though I may not agree wtih entirely on all issues, Ron Paul differentiates himself in that he bases his views on a few core principles. That is the the rule of law, freedom, individual liberty, peace, and that the concept that the people own the government (not the other way around).
You are bound to be able to disagree with him on some issues, however, I hope you look at the bigger picture. Ron Paul supporters support him because we are fighting for our freedom by restraining the move towards the police state. Sacrafice of individual liberty for perceived safety is never acceptable.
We are fighting for our wealth. We are headed for a destruction of our currency. The Social Security has been raided and it is now nothing more than a giant pyramid scheme. Our monetary system is a scam. The financial industry is a scam. As an investor who understands the game I beat the market handidly every year. Top 99 percentile returns, so this game is actually very profitable to me. It is also very profitable to others who understand the game, which is probably why the game doesn't change. Something is wrong with our economic system when a trained engineer is able to make multiple times more in playing the financial markets than in a solid profession such as engineering.
I believe that government shouldn't "control" the amount of immigration (leaving aside the issue about whether or not such a thing is even possible) any more than it should "control" the trafficking of recreational drugs.
You would at least agree with me that we shouldn't subsidize illegal immigration?
We give illegal immigration free education and free health care. (No, I'm not saying we should let illegal immigrants die in ER) Why wouldn't they want to come here?
It would be like if we subsidized recreational drugs. For example, how about we give out free cocaine.
I find your use of the word "illegal" to be distasteful. Because I am an individualist I make no distinction between legal and illegal immigration. I couldn't care less if a person has crossed a border "illegally." Doing such a thing harms no one.
I mostly mentioned the EMH as an afterthought, though an understanding of the underlying ideas is helpful. Marginal value theory is more apt to the discussion--and, no, I don't think government subsidies are a good idea, as the subsidy lowers the point at which the marginal cost of X equals the marginal value of X. So, you get too much of X--in this case, immigration. That, however, is not an indictment of immigration, per se--but of the subsidy.
I'm not feeling particularly prolix today, so I'll leave it at that.
Victor:
It's clear that Ron Paul has no chance of winning the presidential nomination (he's been dropping on Intrade, he's now at 7% from a peak of about 9%, well behind Giuliani, Romney, McCain, and Huckabee). The only thing his campaign can achieve is to promote ideas and possibly have some influence on the Republican Party's platform--though that seems highly unlikely. I gave him $200, and I think I've gotten my money's worth for his anti-war stance, but I'm not at all happy with his courting the followers of Tom Tancredo through his anti-immigration positions. I don't think he's going to have any significant effect on the Republican Party, nor that he's building any kind of organization that will promote liberty beyond the election. I'd much rather devote any further funds to organizations that are more consistent in their stances and effective in their actions, like the Institute for Justice.
Personally, I'd rather see a Democrat in the White House and another party in control of at least one House of the Legislature--my own informal look at NBER data suggests to me that such divided control of government tends to prevent the worst abuses.
BTW, the Constitution has one reference to "Lord" and that's only in giving the date. There are no other references to God of any kind. James Madison, the primary author of the Constitution, wrote in "Memorial and Remonstrance" (a critique of Patrick Henry's proposal to collect a tax for support of nonsectarian Christian education that was signed by several thousand people and led to the successful passage of Jefferson's Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom in 1786): "Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity in exclusion of all other religions may establish, with the same ease, any particular sect of Christians in exclusion of all other sects? That the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute threepence only of his property for the support of any one establishment may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?"
This was the basis of the wording of the separation of church and state in the First Amendment.
Post a Comment