Your Email:

Subject:

Message:
Entry: Why the Beltway Libertarians Are Trying to Smear Ron Paul Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/why_the_beltway_libertarians_are_trying_to_smear_ron_paul#14429 Post contents: I have to take exception to the historical inaccuracy of your comments about Martin Luther King's alleged Communist associations. I don't know what you're basing that on (you don't say, and don't provide your usual source links), so I'll assume it's based on the usual canard about King attending a Communist "training" and the photo of him and a well-known Communist Party member sitting within a few feet (horrors!) of each other. The fact is, the school provided training in non-violence, not Marxism-Leninism, and the people who ran it had no connection with the Communist Party. Or perhaps you are referring to his close adviser, Bayard Rustin, who left the Communist party in 1939. I can't tell; again, you didn't say on what basis you made your claim. You also claim the Communist Party played a major role in the civil rights movement. If you read what has become the standard for scholarship on precisely that period, "The Origins of the Civil Rights Movement," you'll find no support for that notion, especially for the "early" movement in the southern states. The fact that the Communist Party "fully supported" King and the civil rights movement means nothing. They also "fully supported" John Kennedy's election in 1960 and even Joe McCarthy vs. Robert LaFollette Jr. in the Wisconsin Republican primary that ultimately led to the former's unfortunate elevation to the U.S. Senate. King, Kennedy and McCarthy are no more responsible for the Communist Party's support of their political careers and causes than Ron Paul is responsible for David Duke's support of his. I'm also mystified by your citation of the Wikipedia entry for the Revolutionary Communist Party. It "upheld" the riots as a "rebellion"? What does that mean? By itself, it doesn't sound like they instigated anything, and on the surface it seems simply to mean they supported the "rebellion" during or after the fact -- whether from near or afar, I can't tell from that quote. And as far as rebutting anyone with the testimony of former LA Police Chief Daryl Gates, all I can say is, you're putting your money on the wrong horse there. Whatever his personal racial attitudes, he led the racist institution known as the LAPD, and never thought it a problem that people like Mark Furman populated its ranks. And no, I don't think you or Ron Paul are racists, by a long shot. (I may even vote for him in the Wisconsin primary.) You both, however, show some insensitive blind spots when it comes to the Civil War and the slave power known as the Confederacy. But that's another subject and would take too long to discuss in this space. Sent at: 2008 05 17