Ron Paul: The Conscience of Conservatism
He’s the conscience of the Republican party, or, at least, of its conservative wing – a reminder of the good old days, when being a right-wing GOPer meant never having to say you voted to raise taxes, or to increase the size of Big Government. When it meant a prudential foreign policy, rather than a Jacobin one rooted in recklessness. Rep. Paul remembers those days, and his campaign for the White House is based in large part on a conscious effort to revive this nearly-forgotten conservative tradition.
I had a little chat with Ron at the Future of Freedom conference on “Foreign Policy and Civil Liberties,” recently held in Reston, Virginia, where both of us were speakers. He was mobbed, of course, and I only managed to get in a few moments, a few words. I said something like “I don’t know why you do it, you will truly go to libertarian heaven for your efforts,” or something to that effect, and he told me that before deciding to run, he had re-read my book, Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement. I don’t want to toot my own horn, or presume too much, but I’d like to think the book was not only a source of knowledge for Dr. Paul, but also a source of some inspiration.
At any rate, I was floored by this high compliment, the highest one a writer of my sort could possibly receive. Because, you see, my purpose in writing that book was to accomplish a distinctly political aim, and that is to reawaken the spirit of what Murray Rothbard used to call the Old Right in the Republican party. My goal was to popularize the ideas of such long-lost Old Right figures as John T. Flynn, Garet Garrett, Senator Robert A. Taft, Colonel Robert McCormick, and reveal this proto-libertarian legacy to a new generation of conservatives.
If anyone epitomizes the Old Right, in his principled dedication to individual liberty and his essentially conservative devotion to the Constitution, it is Rep. Paul, a 71-year old nine-term Republican congressman who represents a Gulf coast Texas farming district, i.e. red state country. Yet Paul’s early opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq, his relentless criticism of the Bush administration’s foreign policy of global aggression, his bitter refusal to countenance the administration’s relentless encroachments on the most basic constitutional guarantees hasn’t been an obstacle – so far – to easy re-election. In 2004 the Democrats didn’t even bother to field a candidate, and in 2006 he won by a 20-point margin.
He’s a red-state congressman with a blue state foreign policy and an outlook on social and economic matters that is unabashedly libertarian – with a social conservative twist. I remember a few run-ins with Rep. Paul in my younger days: us “radical” libertarians didn’t like his abortion stance (he’s pro-life), and I seem remember a contretemps or three over the Gay Question, which Dr. Paul didn’t answer to the satisfaction of the Libertarian Party’s gay caucus. I forget, exactly, what sort of nonsensical political incorrectness had provoked such ire: I do remember, however, the brief picket line we had at a luncheon where he was the speaker. To his credit, Rep. Paul refused to kowtow to the Caucus, and went on with his speech, completely unperturbed and affable as ever.
It’s hard to intimidate Ron Paul, and thank the gods for that. As Rudy Giuliani discovered to his great annoyance at the South Carolina GOP debate, when confronted with bullying, Ron not only stands his ground but goes on the offensive.
In mentioning my book (again!), I don’t want to call attention to myself as any kind of ideological avatar, I am merely pointing out how its themes are reflected in the rhetoric of the Paul campaign. One theme, aside from the history and significance of the Old Right, traced the origin and rise of the neocons as a leftist incursion into the conservative movement, one that posed a particular danger on the foreign policy front. Rep. Paul has a keen understanding of the neoconservative threat to the peace of the world and the liberty we enjoy here at home, as he made clear in this wonderful speech on the floor of Congress, which details the history, ideology, and policy prescriptions of the neoconservatives, especially in regard to the interplay of foreign and domestic policy and their pernicious and decidedly anti-conservative influence on both.
What other presidential candidate has authored such a dissertation? Paul starts out with a detailed historical account of the neocons’ origins on the far left, traces their evolution as erstwhile followers of Leon Trotsky to the “New Right” of William F. Buckley, Jr., and National Review, and chronicles their ascension as the foreign policy elite of the Bush administration and the intellectual authors of the Iraq war. Of particular interest is Paul’s total demolition of the views of neocon guru Michael Ledeen, of Iran-Contra fame, a figure who has long had a reputation as a kind of neoconservative Svengali, and is often seen in the vicinity of the neocons’ biggest, most brazen scandals.
The Texas troubleshooter of the GOP pack is gunning for the neocons, and what an eminently deserving target they make! This means, of course, that they are gunning for him, and the results, so far, have been all too predictable. Writing in the house organ of the New York neocons, the New York Sun, Ryan Sager accused Rep. Paul of being a “racist” because some newsletters from the 1990s expressed politically incorrect sentiments: yet the staffer who actually wrote the comments was immediately fired. Naturally, this is not enough for the neocons, who hope to get Paul in the same way they got Trent Lott and Don Imus. One has to wonder, however—in the context of a GOP presidential primary, where everyone is running to the right of the President—if the way to knock out the most conservative candidate in the race is by making appeals to political correctness.
The newsletter comments averred that a great deal of the population of Washington, D.C., is “criminal or semi-criminal,” and attacked the pro-Israel lobby for being "by far the most powerful lobby in Washington of the bad sort”—two statements so obviously and glaringly true that they are unutterable precisely because they are indisputable. Oh yes, and the criminal element of D.C., according to the anonymous “hate-criminal” who wrote these newsletters, is “fleet-footed” – another truism of the sort that dare not speak its name.
Of course, Sager hasn’t actually seen these aged newsletters: he is relying on the second-hand account of Paul’s Democratic opponent, Charles (“Lefty”) Morris, which is telling in itself. Sager didn’t even try to unearth the originals, since accuracy isn’t his main concern: the idea is only to smear Ron Paul. The remarks about blacks are mild compared to some of the demagogy that has appeared in, say, Commentary magazine over the years, but that is just the icing on the cake: the real crime of which Paul stands accused is – you guessed it! – anti-Semitism. Sayeth Sager: “For all those getting really excited about anti-war, libertarian Republican Ron Paul, it’s worth noting that he’s pretty racist and also an anti-Semite.” After all, says Sager, he believes “that the goal of the Zionist movement is to stifle criticism” – and, of course, that’s nonsense. Or is it? Perhaps we ought to ask Norman Finkelstein, Tony Judt, and Professors Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer.
There is an almost ritualistic quality to Sager’s smear that renders it flaccid and unconvincing: after all, the Israel lobby is the most powerful influence on American foreign policy, especially when it comes to the Middle East, and everybody knows it. Sager’s accusation is not meant as an accurate description, but as a warning: Paul has transgressed, and will be made to pay. Sager even uses the old-fashioned Stalinist phraseology: Paul, in his view, is “objectively anti-Semitic.” Yes, comrade: tell us all about it.
David Weigel, writing in the online edition of Reason, takes all this very seriously, and avers:
“It was an embittered libertarian who told me to fear the Ron Paul 2008 campaign. Early in February, a few short weeks after Paul confirmed he’d be making the run, my source shelled peanuts and slugged beers and waved the red flag of doom. "’It’s going to get ugly,’ he said.
"’We really don’t know that,’ I countered. ‘Chuck Hagel is just shadowboxing, so Paul will be the only anti-war Republican candidate. He’s going to confuse the hell out of the other Republicans at the debates. At best, what’s he trying to do: Shift the debate three or four inches over to the libertarian side on the war, on whether or not we should have a Department of Education?’ "’Maybe he could, if he got to talk about that,’ he said. ‘He won’t get to talk about that. Once the 1988 campaign gets rehashed, once people start digging through his old Ron Paul Letters, then what’s his campaign going to be about?’ “He quieted down for his final point. This was obviously what kept him up nights. ‘At the end of this, if you say you’re a libertarian, are people going to say ‘Oh, like Ron Paul?’ And are you going to want them to say that?’
That was February, this is May, and libertarians aren’t ready to answer that question.”
But of course they are more than ready – except, of course, for Weigel and much of the editorial staff of Reason magazine, which, like Sager, believes that abortion rights, drug legalization, and gay marriage are the central doctrines of “libertarianism” properly understood. Sager’s book, The Elephant in the Room: Evangelicals, Libertarians, and the Battle to Control the Republican Party, is based on the premise that social conservatism and libertarianism are opposites in a political dichotomy which must be resolved by the expulsion of the former from the GOP. Reason is the Iskra of this brand of “socially liberal” libertarianism, which is why liberal Democrats like Bill Maher are under the mistaken impression that they’re “libertarians.”
For these people, Ron Paul – pro-life, socially conservative, a red-state libertarian if ever there was one – is an embarrassment, a reminder of the libertarian movement’s populist, rural, “isolationist” roots. They want him to talk about gay marriage – favorably – and yet he insists on bringing up the Federal Reserve, not a “respectable” issue at all. Sure, Ron’s against the “war on drugs” – here’s an early clip from the 1980s that shows the Texas troubleshooter in fine form – and yet he isn’t at all “hip” about it. When he discusses the drug issue, he doesn’t crack a knowing Jon Stewart-like smile, he clearly doesn’t approve of drugs or like them, and that, ironically, is what makes him so … cool. And by that I mean authentic.
Authenticity counts for a lot this election season, because all of the other candidates – including the minor ones – are chiefly interested in positioning themselves, rather than advocating this view or raising that issue. Sincerity is at a premium, and if Paul could be reduced to a single quality, the one characteristic that typifies his politics and his personality, then surely it is his authentic passion for the ideas that energize his campaign. This campaign isn’t about him, as it is for, say, John McCain, Mitt Romney, and Fred Thompson, it’s about ending the war, redirecting our foreign policy, reining in the metastasis of Big Government, and restoring constitutional government in America.
Senor Weigel was wrong: the smears haven’t stopped the momentum of the Paul campaign, which has taken off from the margins and placed the candidacy of the most conservative member of Congress in the national spotlight. Paul has gotten to talk about the war, about dismantling the federal Leviathan, and more – and no amount of sniping from the neocon peanut gallery is going to be able to obscure his powerful message.
The neocons hate Ron Paul not just on account of his antiwar stance, and his principled approach to foreign policy questions – which always puts real American interests first – but also because of his radical populism. Neocons, who believe in rule by “enlightened” elites (i.e. themselves) hate populism in all its forms, but especially the right-wing populist version epitomized by Paul in his opposition to the Federal Reserve and what he calls the “banksters” – the elite financial class that makes a very good living out of the business of inflation. Our system of fiat money enriches the privileged few at the great expense of the long-suffering many, and this isn’t due to capitalism, but to a system created by regulators to benefit the monetary-industrial complex. In combination with the military-industrial complex, these characters control the country – and much of the world.
Weigel’s “embittered libertarian” confidante believes that if Paul becomes a threat to the GOP Establishment a smear campaign will be unleashed that will render him harmless, and yet Paul is already a threat in an important sense: that he gets up there at Republican debates and raises issues no one else dares to raise, such as the moral culpability of the US government as it goes about the world committing war crimes, is in itself a major victory, because it changes the terms of the debate. The neocons would much prefer a GOP primary contest that bears no relationship to the electorate beyond the 30 percent or so who make up the Republican “dead-enders” who still support the war. When it comes to our crazed foreign policy, only Ron Paul is speaking to the electorate, especially independents who might otherwise lean Republican – he’s acting like the frontrunner, while his rivals pander to a rapidly-shrinking base.
I was on the radio the other day – KALW, a public radio station in San Francisco – and the hostess was a very cute leftie type (of course: what other type works at a San Francisco public radio station?) who was astonished by the very existence of Ron Paul. Omigod – he refuses to take his pension! Wowie zowie – he’s never voted for a tax hike! Jeezie-peezie – he’s a consistent opponent of Big Government! Oh, and look at his list of campaign contributors – nary a PAC to be seen!
In her mind, Rep. Paul is unique, some sort of political mutant whose existence can be explained away as an anomaly. Yet there is precedent for Paul: he had a precursor. His name was Howard Buffett.
Yes, we’re talking about those Buffetts – Howard was the father of Warren Buffett, the legendary investor whose generosity is as renowned as his financial acumen, and Howard, too, was a financier, a stockbroker. He was elected to Congress in 1942 vowing to block Franklin Roosevelt’s plan to “fasten the chains of political servitude around America’s neck.” Like Paul, he refused all pay raises, and his political credo limns the Texas troublemaker to a tee: before taking a position on a bill, he would ask himself “Will this add to, or subtract from, human liberty?”
Buffett was a pillar of the Old Right, just as fiercely anti-imperialist as he was anti-statist. As Murray Rothbard recounts, he opposed the Korean war – and the dangerous precedent set by Truman when he sent US troops to the Korean peninsula without bothering to consult Congress – when the entire body of “respectable” American opinion, from The New Republic to the Republican party establishment, was behind the first big confrontation with the newly-minted Commie enemy. For years, Buffett tried to get the government to declassify the testimony of Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter, then the CIA director, that would have established American responsibility for starting the war: alas, to no avail.
Rep. Buffett retired from politics in 1954, just as the Old Right sun was setting and the “new” right of William F. Buckley, Jr., and his gaggle of ex-Trotskyist intellectuals were ginning up the third world war with the Soviet Union. Out of step with the militarized, hopped-up “anti-communism” of the conservative movement, he represented the last gasp of a movement that had fought, heroically, to preserve liberty in America against the depredations of the New Deal-“Fair” Deal and America’s second crusade to spread “democracy” around the globe.
Ron Paul, Buffett’s contemporary doppelganger, represents the revival of the movement Buffett fought to preserve. If Buffett stood at the end of a tradition that was in decline, then Paul stands at the beginning of an Old Right that is being renewed.
Postscript
The question that arises in the minds of Ron Paul’s more serious supporters is: what happens after the Republican convention, when one of the “majors” – my money is on Romney – is nominated?
There is currently an effort by some of his prominent supporters to persuade Paul to run as a third party candidate, but there’s no telling what will come of that. The idea is to have both the Libertarian and Constitution parties nominate him, and this would ensure ballot status virtually everywhere. Keep checking back here to find out the latest ….
Comments
justin, i have been very impressed with your commentary and viewpoints for many years, so it is no suprise ron paul had read your book.. keep up the great work and thanks for all you do.. i never get to leave these kind of messages at antiwar.
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What about a Ron Paul-Mike Gravel Unity08 ticket? That’s probably a better bet then any of the embarassments that call themselves third parties.
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RP’s showing in the early primaries could move the so-called majors to recalibrate their message. Winning the debate is oft more important than winning the vote.
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Another wonderful post, congratulations. I think you posting here is the ‘bees knees’.
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Any plans to re-publish “Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement”?
You could easily add another couple of chapters on the past decade into an updated version.
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To MJT: Yes, ISI Books is bringing out a new edition of Reclaiming the American Right sometime next year. With a new introduction by me, and companion essays by three conservative scholars of note.
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The old joke about libertarians is that they were Republicans
that smoke dope (or have unconventional sexual habits).
It’s really true.
The problem with “libertarianism” is that it comes
in two varieties, the Alan Greenspan/CATO-AHF/Dick Cheney
version, or “establishment” version, which is merely
an apology for the excesses of crony capitalism and
socialism for the rich. The other is the the more
traditional, uniquely American Lysander Spooner or
“populist” version.
Ron Paul’s stands against unrestrained immigration,
abortion-on-demand, redefining marriage just show
he’s real libertarian of the traditionalist variety.
Not some pimp for the CEO classes and Wall Street Bankers
like Dick Cheney or Alan Greenspan.
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I’m just going to write his name in and check it off
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Paul is sounding better and better to me. I might switch over to him from Tancredo, unless Tom gets hot pretty soon.
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I support Ron Paul for president as by far the best man (or woman) for the job. I sincerely hope that if he is not the Republican nominee for President that the Libertarian Party will draft him for their party. That will allow the LP to grow into a major political party and then challenge the Democract and Republican socialism.
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Ron Paul is miles ahead of Tancredo because he talks sense about the war. Tancredo is a one-issue candidate, and, what’s worse, he embarrasses other people who hold his only view by using borderline racial slurs.
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I knew as soon as I heard that Ron Paul opposed all foreign aid as unconstitutional, which would include aid to Israel also, that he would be subject to attacks of “cry-wolf anti-semitism” by the neocons. Let’s hope most Americans are smart enough to ignore it.
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Regarding the comments by poster Matt Swartz that Tancredo is “one-issue candidate” and uses “borderline racial slurs"--that’s ridiculous. Oops, I forgot-anyone who opposes illegal immigration is automatically a “racist”. Well, if we don’t shut our borders down, the United States will be unrecognizable as the same country in 20 years; we’ll be just another third-world country. Maybe, therefore, the issue that Tancredo is focusing on is actually the MOST important issue.
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Excellent article!
If by some chance Dr. Paul doesn’t win the Republican nomination for President, there’s probably no reason that he can’t run for his House seat as a Republican the same time that the Libertarian, Constitution, American, and other third parties run him as their candidate for President.
Of course, we shouldn’t forget the importance of the House, where all revenue bills must originate. In the future, if neither the Republicans or the Democrats don’t run a “Ron Paul” type candidate for Congress, is there any reason that the “Third Parties” couldn’t cooperate in providing a choice within each Congressional District? What we really need are 218 Dr. Ron Paul’s in the House.
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Go Ron Paul 2008!!!
http://www.RonPaul2008.com
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I am reading stuff on Unity08 that is also thinking of having Paul headline their ticket as well.
I wonder if getting him on the ballet will mess up all of the preprogrammed Diebold voting machines? I mean, how do you split 51/49 (the way a hacked machine works, with 51% going to the winner) among three candidates? Rove, champion of fair voting, will have to go into overdrive…
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tancredo is great and a possible VP choice but come on. Do you want to ride a pony or do you want to ride a horse!
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We must not allow ourselves to despair or waste a single vote on anyone other than Ron Paul. If he doesn’t get the deserved Republican nomination we must stay strong and vote for him on whatever third party ticket he runs on so that we can send a message to the corporate clowns who currently run our country.
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Ron Paul is the only hope. God bless him.
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I thought buffets were about choice, at least when dining.
I’ve posted many place (I think even here) that I would much prefer being ruled by the person I most disagree with on the issues as long as they agreed they had no power to impose their views on me. If you believe the Feds have no power on anything concerning marriage, you don’t have to worry about accepting gay or traditional marriage. Yet if it has the power to impose one definition, it has the right to impose the opposite.
Better an atheist gay libertarian than an activist christian neocon.
When one does not support freedom, does anything else really matter?
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Word on the street is that Paul’s current top choice for the VP spot is Walter Williams. That would be quite a ticket.
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Excellent article...and I don’t think you should be so shy about promoting your book..it speaks to the freedoms that this country was founded on. I believe that Ron’s message will continue to spread… no other candidate has as enthusiastic of followers a Ron’s does. His message inspires people to raise up and finally do something for their country...GO RON PAUL 2008!!!
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Great Article, Thanks.
http://www.ronpaul2008.com
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here’s a nightmare:
2008 shakes out to Clinton vs Giuliani vs Ron Paul (who narrowly misses the Republican nomination and runs as an independent).
the electoral college vote goes something like
Clinton-246
Rudy-135
Paul-157
No one breaks the 270 mark needed for a win. So the 2008 House elect gets to vote in the POTUS (from the 3 candidates) and the Senate elect picks the Vice Prez. Thanks to the GOP being bugfuck crazy these days, the Dems will own both the house and the senate elects and will dutifully appoint both of their party’s candidates (Clinton and some southerner or another) to the White House.
Then the DFL, having control of both the house, the senate, and the presidency, will proceed to spend our already insolvent republic to death.
All Ron Paul backers will have to show for the exercise is an ashy mouthed “told ya so!”
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So I’m not a libertarian (nor was meant to be). Libertarianism seems to require: government limited in ambition and in its power to restrain individual liberty; general avoidance of international ties; and, well, low taxes. I can certainly see why, with those basic ideas in mind, a libertarian would dislike much socially progressive wealth distribution, and the current international “Jacobinism” of the neo-Wilsonian Republican sometimes-theocrats.
I don’t understand a few things, though, and I’d appreciate it if you guys (I place myself) would not scream at me for asking.
1. Gays. What’s your problem with them? Is it government’s role to indicate how we’re supposed to feel about each other?
2. Drugs. Why not? Why alcohol and not marijuana? I can see where heroin gets to be problematic, though, were I a libertarian, I’d be arguing that, while heroin’s bad, it’s not government’s role to tell us that.
3. Jews. I know the author bends over backwards to distance himself from anti-Semites. But there are a lot of buzzwords that tickle the meter anyway: “neo-con”, “the Israel lobby”, “zionism.” I’m not convinced that somewhere behind all the anti-international-banking sentiment there isn’t a hint of “the Jews made us do it.” They also cured Polio, for what it’s worth.
The author does a good job of summing up the libertarian position, even in quotation: “Will this add to, or subtract from, human liberty?”
The first two concerns (drugs, gay-ness) the answer seems clear to me, so I’m missing the libertarian argument against them. The last (Jews), I just wonder whether there’s a lingering sentiment that somehow the Jews, well, subtract from human liberty.
Thanks for not flaming me on this one.
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Have been reading you for over 5 years Justin and am delighted to see two important aspects of your message come to higher prominance in public debate via Ron Paul.
i.e. War as the greatest threat to liberty and an understanding of the ideals of the old right.
I hope you know many of us think you have played a significant role in this development.
Thanks for teaching so many of us over the years:-)
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bill- the founders of libertarianism, well libertarianism by nature will probably get you different answers as to who the founders are, were both jews. udwig von mises and murray rothbard. the neo cons are for big government, mainly on the foreign policy front. that’s the only reason any libertarian i know says anything about jews at all. Also, libertarians tend to speek without politicalcorrectness, so you may actually here the word jew to describe a jew. as opposed to a muslim or christian.
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ludwig von mises, sorry
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To:Bill Re: Jews/Anti-Semitic/etc..... The best way to see it, and to understand the view of most anything Ron Paul and most libertarians have about it, is to remember this - it is a matter of INDIVIDUAL freedom AND responsibility. Not group freedom or group responsibility, as there is no such thing. Groupings are transient figments of one’s imagination, based on INDIVIDUAL’S beliefs and actions. GroupThink only serves to construct conflicting factions that really don’t ‘exist’, per se, except in our minds. There are only individuals - thinking, acting and reaping consequences. The primary problem is that nearly everyone has become schooled to think in terms of groups (and their spurious ‘rights’) and not individuals (and their endowed rights).
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I have a dream:
Ron Paul, President
Justin Raimondo, Attorney General
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Ok, thanks Lester and AnIndividual for your comments on group identity and the origins of the school of thought.
On the group identity thing, I’d respond by wondering whether one’s status as a historically contingent member of a group might need to be taken into account when protecting one’s individual liberties. That is to say, protecting black people, Jews, gays, Mexicans, etc. from the real damage that sometimes results from the racism (of whomever, of whatever other group) might require acknowledging the existence of the racism. Hence affirmative action stuff, hate speech laws, hate crimes stuff.
I’ll give you an example and analysis. Two people commit assault and battery different victims. The first assault is due to the perp being in a really bad mood and just wanting to wail on someone. The second is due to the perp’s hatred of the group to which the victim belongs. I think it’s not unreasonable to say that, as a society, we’re particularly horrified by the latter in a way we’re not by the former. In large part, this horror is due to the world’s history of poor group interrelationships, and scares us more because it’s a universalizable claim, namely, that all members of this group deserve a similar beating. The merely-wanting-to-wail perp doesn’t make that sort of claim with his crime.
So if the world were perfect, and people were hurt because of their group membership, then we wouldn’t need to protect them on that basis. But it’s not, so we should.
Thoughts?
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I am a libertarian, and a Libertarian Party Life Member. I petitioned for Ron Paul to get on the ballot in 1988, and I voted for Ron Paul in that election.
Earlier this year I dismissed the notion that Ron Paul could win the Republican Party nomination, but now I am not so sure.
However, if Dr. Paul fails to get the Republican nomination for president, a third party, or even a coalition third party run would absolutely fail, for no other reason than something like 15 to 20 states forbid a candidate who runs in the primary with one party, to run for the same office on another party line. The person toask would be Richard Winger, who is the “ballot-access guru”.
I would suggest however, if Dr. Paul fails to get the Republican nomination, the Libertarian Party candidate would likely get support from a significant percentage of Ron Paul supporters.
Thus I see a Ron Paul run for the presidency as a Republican, either by succeeding or failing will only have a tremendous positive effect for libertarians and liberty.
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In reference to Bill regarding his “Hate Crimes” commentary.
As far as “assault and battery,” regardless of any potentially originating or collateral “racist” animosity, it is generally against the law to just go “wailing” on people, regardless of whatever motivates such criminal conduct.
The guilty still get punished.
For any emotion, there are legal ways to express them, and there are illegal ways. But this slope get extremely slippery when you start punishing people, not for their
criminal conduct, but instead for the emotional state they are experiencing consequent of any conduct.
The example you give is not really very honest, mostly because you imply that “the great unwashed masses may consider one beating as horrible
while the other is perceived as “more acceptable.”
Under the constant of “Equal Treatment Before the Law,"both victims have received a beating and under that constant, both perps are punished equally. Regardless
of whether the latter crook keeps beating people up ecause of their racial/religious/cultural heritage, he then becomes an habitual offender and is punished appropriately. As far as his emotional state during
his crimes? He may just LOVE beating people who are in some way different from himself (that effectively identifying the rest of humanity).
When you make an emotional state the crime, then you open the prospect of charging ANYONE with this sort of “criminal” conduct.
I would certainly qualify under this rather subjectively perverse paradigm of unequal justice, because I just “hate” constitutional treason.
DanD
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Laws have always considered “aggravating” circumstances such as racial motive for punishing crimes. No more laws, please. Existing hate laws violate equal protection and need to be repealed.
When I hear talk of some “group rights/protection” dynamic, I think of the “F” word--"fascist" (oh, and the other word too). Laws are for protection of individuals’ rights--not groups.
“Everyone” is being tagged racist, bigot, (fascist), and God knows what else in this media-driven, politically-correct sandstorm in which we’ve found ourselves. Americans are tired of it--on all sides.
People who want these hate laws could care less about victims of violent crime, especially those victims outside of their own “group”. They simply don’t like the often bitter fruit born of free speech and thought. And nothing is more bitter or hurtful as is truth--that is, if you can find it amidst all the ballyhoo.
Slippery slope indeed. “Beware the tyranny of the minority”. (Latin proverb)
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Mike W. writes ‘When I hear talk of some “group rights/protection” dynamic, I think of the “F” word--"fascist" (oh, and the other word too). Laws are for protection of individuals’ rights--not groups.’
Let’s pick that apart for a second.
Fascism, and by I assume he actually means Nazism (correct me and we’ll switch from Germany back to Italy) was, in large part, dedicated to the notion that there was a primary group within each state, that all others were interloping and polluting the blood stream, and that therefore it would be in straight white protestantism’s best interests to exterminate the pollutant races.
Now, Mike’s not a fascist. But what can be inferred from his argument that it is fascist to acknowledge that group identity exists. Now, if you asked the Jews of, say, Munich, in 1939, whether they’d prefer to live in a race-blind society, I would wholeheartedly agree.
But if you were to tell them, in 1945( (if you could find a few) there is no such historical phenomenon, rightly or wrongly asserted, as race, they’d laugh (cry) in your face.
Regardless of whether they wanted it, their ethnic affiliation was asserted to them. And acknowledging that is not itself the fascism that that acknowledgment ultimately might hope to counteract.
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Mike Williams makes a stronger argument, I think—namely, that it is sufficient consequence to face punishment for the specific harms done by an attitude that leads one repeatedly to criminal conduct.
Before I address that, though, let me say that I disagree that I was being dishonest. I didn’t mean the “great unwashed masses”—not in any condescending way. Since my great-(great)-grandparents showed up at Ellis Island, I’m ok, I suppose, with rephrasing that as “huddled masses, yearning to breath free.” But really, I meant, everyone—you and me. I thought that was clear, but them’s the breaks, I guess. Ask yourself—watch, say, American History X and tell me whether the merely physical crimes Ed Norton’s character commits are as reprehensible as if he had done them with a less universalizable motive.
Now, Mike’s argument pulls in for its defense the paragraph, “I would certainly qualify under this rather subjectively perverse paradigm of unequal justice, because I just “hate” constitutional treason.” He’s a litle sloppy with his phrasing, but I gather that he’s calling my argument merely “subjective”, while his is somehow an objective hate for unequal justice.
So I’ll try one more time. No only is being a victim of a violent crime a think to be prohibited, but we know that people are sometimes singled out for victimhood based on something that, unfairly, was thrust upon them.
We’d prefer that our criminals ante up and treat even their victims as people, and not mere members of a group. Which is the same perversity that Mike seem to be criticizing.
In that sense, we agree—I just haven’t persuaded Mike that it’s problematic when people deny other’s personhood, and Mike hasn’t convinced me that it’s problematic that the government acknowledge that people do sometimes deny each other’s personhood, and structure its notions of criminality accordingly.
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The last post was in re: Dan D’s arguments, not Mike W’s. Apologies.
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Let me see if I can put it all back together in the wake of all those assumptions and inferences:
The use of, fascist, is not to elicit any “particular” political doctrine or historical event. It’s actually its own word, (Latin, fascis--"Bundle"), independent of any affiliation or group and can be applied even now--in modern times. Go figure.
“Now, Mike’s not a fascist. But what can be inferred from his argument that it is fascist to acknowledge that group identity exists.”
That’s a stretch. And although I’m not a fascist, I do play one on T.V. Maybe this is clearer: There are benevolent [democratic] groups who like to help people. And then there are malevolent [fascist] groups--who want to help themselves. Can you name one group from each category?
Ironically, it is written within the same “sentence” of the [1st] Amendment where our Constitution allows for the “assembly” of groups, that we also find the lackluster “free speech” clause which those same groups want curtailed. “Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?”
Governments need not fiddle with melting-pot chemistry. In concert with its media partners, I liken their activities and failed policies to that of an old-fashioned power tube; stimulate the anodes and the cathodes will excite themselves beyond reason.
In any event, amplification of the problem is the end--or indeed, the desired result. Divide/Conquer. No more laws. Please--no more prisons.
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We seem to be forgetting that ‘groups’ do not exist, except as fleeting, temporary mental constructs. Y’all keep talking about them as if they are real, solid, tangible objects.
Find yourself a ‘racist’. Let’s say he hates ‘blacks’. Parade in front of him 100 different people, each with differing degrees of darker skin color, differing degrees of hair qualities, differing degrees of eye shape, nose shape, mouth shape, head shape, body shape. Throw in differing degrees of intelligence, personality, emotionality, athleticism, artistic ability, food preferences, clothing preferences, and so on and on.
Ask this racist which of these 100 people are the specific ‘hated blacks’.
The ‘racist’ will have to admit that they are not all blacks, and that quite a few are ‘kinda black’ but not completely, others are ‘hardly black’, and so on.
The point is that it’s a continuum… a long line of subtle to large differences between people called ‘black’. When one gets down to it, where, exactly is the dividing line?
There is none. There never was one, except in ones own mind… and NOWHERE else.
One is forced to admit that their racist designation is simply their own mental construct-of-the-moment (belief) that occurred at some specific point in their lives. An experience happened, they emotionalized it, gave it a label called ‘racist’, and then they clung to that whole construct and continue to carry it around as an egoic identification.
It’s all bullshit and fantasy, but it gives the ego something to do, a grudge to nurse, probably until death. Some fortunate people are able to rise above their BS destructive fantasies and grow up. ‘Tis a rare thing though…
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In the realm of True Purity
there is no such thing as
“I” or “he” or “she;”
nor can “friend” and “foe”
be found.
With the slightest confusion of mind,
innumerable differences
and complications arise.
- Muso (1275-1351)
Zen Master
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Yes, an excellent article, thank you. It calls to mind the old saying about an idea first being ignored, then fought, and finally accepted as obvious. We are in the state where Ron Paul’s ideas are being fought.
I have to take issue with this one statement: “The question that arises in the minds of Ron Paul’s more serious supporters is: what happens after the Republican convention, when one of the “majors” – my money is on Romney – is nominated?” The word “when” does not belong here. It should be “if”. Far too many of us make the very wrong assumption Ron Paul really can’t, after all, be elected. See these articles for example:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/ostrowski/ostrowski83.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/pitkaniemi1.html
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“racist”, “terrorist”, “fascist” and other such childish name calling are teh childish attempts by people who have no real arguments --and no intellectual capacity to form real arguments--to express their disagreement with this issues under discussion. These labels should be taken as empty assertions of strong emotional disagreement and NOTHING ELSE!
Ron Paul is doing us a great favor by returning politics to a discussion of issues in terms of essentials, and his detractors should be ignored, atleast ununtil they have something worthwhile to say, and not unpleasant and ignorant sslander.
PEACE AND FREEDOM!!
David K. Meller
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Does Ron Paul have a flaw in his Libertarian credentials? I just heard from a friend who takes a keen interest in our freight and rail passenger systems that Ron Paul wants to bring back regulation of rail freight rates, which were done away with in 1980 (The Staggers Act). Re-regulation will mean a lowering of rates, of course, because the last thing the Republican oilgarchy wants is a healthy railraod industry, which saves us so much on fuel costs. Also, re-regulation will mean a whole new layer of bureaucracy. Do any Ron Paul enthusiasts care to comment?
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SAO PAULO, Brazil Luis Fabiano scored twice as Brazil rallied to beat Uruguay 2 1 in a World Cup qualifier on Wednesday night. Coming off a 1 1 tie at Peru on Sunday, Brazil fell behind before a sellout crowd of 65,000 at Morumbi Stadium when Sebastian Abreu headed in a cross in the eighth minute. In other qualifying action on Wednesday, Ecuador snapped a goalless drought in routing Peru 5 1 at Quito, Ecuador. Later, Chile played Paraguay in the Chilean capital, Santiago. Luis Fabiano tied the score in the 44th minute with an angled shot from the right that went between the legs of goalkeeper Fabian Carini, then scored the go ahead goal in the 65th on a rebound following a shot by Gilberto. Before last weekend, Luis Fabiano not played for Brazil’s national team since 2004. Brazil (2 0 2) is tied for second in South American qualifying at eight points with Colombia, one behind Argentina (3 1). Peru is now in ninth place with two points, followed only by Bolivia with one point. The…
http://best-news-blog.com/
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28. Eliminations time is local Las Vegas time (PT) and subject to change. TELEVISION: Qualifying highlights for the Seventh annual NHRA ACDelco Las Vegas Nationals can be seen on ESPN2 / ESPN2 HD late Saturday night (Oct. 27) beginning at 10 p.m. and concluding at 12 midnight. ESPN2 / ESPN2 HD will also air same day coverage of eliminations on Sunday (Oct. 28) from 7 10 p.m. The elimination show repeats early Wednesday morning, Oct. 31, from 2:30 4:30 a.m. Also, be sure to tune into NHRA Race Day, the show which provides the drag racing fan with the latest information about the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series. The ACDelco Las Vegas Nationals installment of NHRA Race Day can be seen on Sunday…
http://my-newsblog.com/
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