The bigoted past of Ron Paul?

[hjmick]

Paulitics and I were exchanging thoughts on Ron Paul earlier and I expressed the notion that one factor that gave me pause where Paul is concerned is the fact that my bigot of a cousin supports him quite strongly. While I acknowledged that the fact that a racist may support him, that in and of itself does not make Ron Paul a racist, I was prompted to look into his positions a bit more. I also applied this idea to the other candidates. It seems that I am not the only one looking at Ron Paul.

While tripping around the internet today, I stumbled upon this article over at The New Republic. The author was curious about Ron Paul. He delved into Ron Paul's political past, particularly the different newsletters published under Paul's name. There is some disturbing content to be found in the newsletters, homophobic commentary, anti-semitism, racist comments.

As the author points out, there are very few by-lines, so whether or not Paul wrote the pieces is debatable. However, if he did not author the work, the question should be asked, why allow the work to be published giving the impression that these are your beliefs?

It is an interesting read. I am not accusing Ron Paul of being a bigot. I do not know the man. This is why the title of the thread is a question.

But I will say that if he is not, perhaps he would have been better served by paying closer attention to what was printed in his name.

Th jury is still out...

Angry White Man
by James Kirchick

If you are a critic of the Bush administration, chances are that, at some point over the past six months, Ron Paul has said something that appealed to you. Paul describes himself as a libertarian, but, since his presidential campaign took off earlier this year, the Republican congressman has attracted donations and plaudits from across the ideological spectrum. Antiwar conservatives, disaffected centrists, even young liberal activists have all flocked to Paul, hailing him as a throwback to an earlier age, when politicians were less mealy-mouthed and American government was more modest in its ambitions, both at home and abroad. In The New York Times Magazine, conservative writer Christopher Caldwell gushed that Paul is a "formidable stander on constitutional principle," while The Nation praised "his full-throated rejection of the imperial project in Iraq." Former TNR editor Andrew Sullivan endorsed Paul for the GOP nomination, and ABC's Jack Tapper described the candidate as "the one true straight-talker in this race." Even The Wall Street Journal, the newspaper of the elite bankers whom Paul detests, recently advised other Republican presidential contenders not to "dismiss the passion he's tapped."

Most voters had never heard of Paul before he launched his quixotic bid for the Republican nomination. But the Texan has been active in politics for decades. And long before he was the darling of antiwar activists on the left and right, Paul was in the newsletter business. In the age before blogs, newsletters occupied a prominent place in right-wing political discourse. With the pages of mainstream political magazines typically off-limits to their views (National Review editor William F. Buckley having famously denounced the John Birch Society), hardline conservatives resorted to putting out their own, less glossy publications. These were often paranoid and rambling--dominated by talk of international banking conspiracies, the Trilateral Commission's plans for world government, and warnings about coming Armageddon--but some of them had wide and devoted audiences. And a few of the most prominent bore the name of Ron Paul.

Paul's newsletters have carried different titles over the years--Ron Paul's Freedom Report, Ron Paul Political Report, The Ron Paul Survival Report--but they generally seem to have been published on a monthly basis since at least 1978. (Paul, an OB-GYN and former U.S. Army surgeon, was first elected to Congress in 1976.) During some periods, the newsletters were published by the Foundation for Rational Economics and Education, a non-profit Paul founded in 1976; at other times, they were published by Ron Paul & Associates, a now-defunct entity in which Paul owned a minority stake, according to his campaign spokesman. The Freedom Report claimed to have over 100,000 readers in 1984. At one point, Ron Paul & Associates also put out a monthly publication called The Ron Paul Investment Letter.

The Freedom Report's online archives only go back to 1999, but I was curious to see older editions of Paul's newsletters, in part because of a controversy dating to 1996, when Charles "Lefty" Morris, a Democrat running against Paul for a House seat, released excerpts stating that "opinion polls consistently show only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions," that "if you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be," and that black congresswoman Barbara Jordan is "the archetypical half-educated victimologist" whose "race and sex protect her from criticism." At the time, Paul's campaign said that Morris had quoted the newsletter out of context. Later, in 2001, Paul would claim that someone else had written the controversial passages. (Few of the newsletters contain actual bylines.) Caldwell, writing in the Times Magazine last year, said he found Paul's explanation believable, "since the style diverges widely from his own."

Finding the pre-1999 newsletters was no easy task, but I was able to track many of them down at the libraries of the University of Kansas and the Wisconsin Historical Society. Of course, with few bylines, it is difficult to know whether any particular article was written by Paul himself. Some of the earlier newsletters are signed by him, though the vast majority of the editions I saw contain no bylines at all. Complicating matters, many of the unbylined newsletters were written in the first-person, implying that Paul was the author.

But, whoever actually wrote them, the newsletters I saw all had one thing in common: They were published under a banner containing Paul's name, and the articles (except for one special edition of a newsletter that contained the byline of another writer) seem designed to create the impression that they were written by him--and reflected his views. What they reveal are decades worth of obsession with conspiracies, sympathy for the right-wing militia movement, and deeply held bigotry against blacks, Jews, and gays. In short, they suggest that Ron Paul is not the plain-speaking antiwar activist his supporters believe they are backing--but rather a member in good standing of some of the oldest and ugliest traditions in American politics...

Continued...

 

[indago]

MSNBC TV — TUCKER CARLSON — 7 January 2008

CARLSON: As many of you now, I have spent some time with Ron Paul on the trail. I’m impressed by his broad coalition of support. I have championed his commitment to always speaking the truth, no matter how unpopular it might be. Now, "The New Republic" is set to publish a piece on Friday that questions whether Ron Paul is really the man he seems to be. The piece cites offensive passages from news letters published under Ron Paul’s name going as far back to the 1970s.

Paul’s campaign acknowledges that their candidate did publish these news letters for years. But it says it did not see everything before it went to print. The campaign has also apologized, most recently to me on phone. Joining me is the author of the new piece, the "New Republic’s" Jamie Kirchick. Jamie, thanks for coming on.

JAMES KIRCHICK, "THE NEW REPUBLIC": Tucker, thanks for having me.

CARLSON: So, the Paul campaign says yes, some friends of his misused his name and published unattractive, slightly crazy, maybe very crazy things under his name. They are sorry. And Ron Paul never saw these passages. Do you buy that?

KIRCHICK: No. Well, when I first asked Ron Paul’s spokesman about this, Jessie Benton, he said that he had actually written parts of the news letter. And then he changed his story somewhat after I read him, for example, passages where Ron Paul calls Martin Luther King a gay pedophile. And after that, he said well, he goes—this was ghost written and the offensive parts were not written by Ron Paul.

So no, I don’t believe it. You have, you know, 20 years of a news letter here, which will be available on our website starting tomorrow actually, at TNR.com — 20 years of a news letter that is filled with racist, anti-semitic, homophobic invective, and it is called "The Ron Paul Political Report" or "The Ron Paul Freedom Report." It is published by an outfit called Ron Paul and Associates.

So I really find that defense to be utterly unbelievable.

CARLSON: Yes. I mean, it is — there is no doubt he was at the very least negligent. It is not much of an explanation. Here’s the one—the one thing, though, that troubles me about the allegation of racism. Ron Paul seems to be the kind of guy that will say exactly what he thinks. If he was a racist, why wouldn’t he just say so?

KIRCHICK: Well, let’s keep in mind that the actual racist portions of this news letter were published when he was not in Congress. It was in between 1984 and 1996, for the most part — sorry, 1988 and 1996, when he was not actually in Congress. So when you are not in Congress, there’s less scrutiny. There’s less attention paid to what you are saying. And look —

Let’s see what happened last weekend. We have Barack Obama who is on the verge of becoming the first black Democratic presidential nominee, serious presidential contender. So, you know, racism of this sort, as readers see—racism of this sort does not get you votes anymore.

CARLSON: OK. But — I mean, some of the stuff stuff, I agree, is offensive and weird. Some of it, though, criticizing Barbara Jordan as the archetypal half-educated victimologist. I don’t know. I mean, you don’t — it is not racist not to respect Barbara Jordan.

KIRCHICK: No, it’s not. But what about saying that New York City should be called Zooville, as opposed to naming it after Martin Luther King, which is what he said, or Welfaria. You know, he called black people animals and said that his readers of his news letters should move out to the country, buy guns because the animals are coming. This was a couple years before the Los Angeles riots.

Again, these are not isolated incidents. You should know that back in 1996, about two or three of the news letters were revealed at the time and Paul said that they had been taken out of context. Then five years later he said that he didn’t write them. But he took moral responsibility for them. So what we thought were just isolated examples back in 1996 now we are going to see are actually part of a two-decade long career full of this stuff.

CARLSON: Do you have any evidence he ever said anything like this?

KIRCHICK: You mean said it out loud or in person?

CARLSON: Yes, said it out loud, he, himself, Ron Paul, get out there and say something racist or sexist?

KIRCHICK: I haven’t seen that. We do know, however — I have found out that he spoke at a pro-secession conference in 1995. This was a neo-confederate organization putting this on. He spoke along with many other writers who advocate for secession. Actually, last week on MSNBC he touted a book called "The Real Lincoln" by a guy named Thomas De Lorenzo (ph), who is a neo-confederate. He has long associations with these types of people.

What he does, Tucker, is he speaks in code. He is a transmitter. He will say certain things that, you know, at fist may not appear to be overtly racist, but to certain audiences they know what he is talking about. So when he talks about secession, he says it in a way that’s not exactly neo-confederate or isn’t exactly explicitly neo-confederate. But to people who are in the know and people who are a part of this neo-confederate communities, they know exactly what he is talking about.

CARLSON: Boy, I must say it has gone right over my head. But I appreciate your coming on, Jim Kirchick from "The New Republic."




-

 

[hjmick]

In the interest of being fair, Ron Paul responded to the article to something called Reason Magazine.

Exclusive: Ron Paul Responds

Essentially, Paul's position is that the newsletters he wrote he stands by and someone else wrote the stuff he has disowned.

 

[Paulie]

I don't know, I don't think that guy on Tucker made a case at all.

At the end, he says Ron "speaks in code", and that the racists "know what he means". That's a pretty weak and totally unfounded argument right there. It's ridiculous, really.

I don't personally think Ron has said anything that most people haven't thought about at least once. It's just another case of people taking something he said or did out of context.

Until someone shows me a positively identifying, direct link between Ron Paul and a racist organization, I think this bullshit is exactly that...bullshit.

We're here waging a "holy war" against a religion, and have been programmed to profile Islamic people, we bitch about all the mexicans in the country, but when one guy made a few ambiguous statements that some people perceive as possibly being "racist", the flood gates open up.

How can you blame someone, especially a conservative, for being upset about the current state of the welfare system and it's abuse by so many people? How do you get "racist" from him saying Zooville, and referring to welfare recipients as "animals"? The TRUTH of the matter is that probably a majority of people in this country ARE abusing the welfare system, which to me is worth the label of "animal". What did a specific race have to do with that statement?

MLK being referred to as a "gay pedophile"...You mean to tell me that there's people in here who have never referred to anyone as a "faggot", even if you didn't literally mean it?

I'm sick and tired of the racism card being played in this country. There's way too much of a double standard when it comes to racism, and there's too much fake bullshit hype surrounding it all the time.

Bottom line...show me something that explicitly shows Ron Paul to be a racist, with connections to racist groups, besides a random photo, and maybe I'll entertain the idea. So far, the evidence is sparse, circumstantial, and taken way too much out of context.

 

[midcan5]

This surprised me. While I thought he was a little naive, the journalist's revelations on Tucker were astounding. If he were young at the time one could overlook some of it as youthful stupidity but he wasn't. He never had a chance but this has to crush many who looked at him as 'the great white hope' - pun intended.

http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=74978161-f730-43a2-91c3-de262573a129

The Newsletters: Since at least 1978, Ron Paul has attached his name to a series of newsletters--Ron Paul's Freedom Report, Ron Paul Political Report, The Ron Paul Survival Report, and The Ron Paul Investment Letter--that frequently made outrageous statements:

Angry White Man: Ron Paul's Bigoted Past

"A Special Issue on Racial Terrorism" analyzes the Los Angeles riots of 1992: "Order was only restored in L.A. when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks three days after rioting began. ... What if the checks had never arrived? No doubt the blacks would have fully privatized the welfare state through continued looting. But they were paid off and the violence subsided.""

 

[Annie]

This surprised me. While I thought he was a little naive, the journalist's revelations on Tucker were astounding. If he were young at the time one could overlook some of it as youthful stupidity but he wasn't. He never had a chance but this has to crush many who looked at him as 'the great white hope' - pun intended.

TNR basically found more of the same stuff I found when doing background on Paul about a year ago. I didn't go through all the newsletters, but enough. Now they basically went down the memory hole about 6 months ago. Good job on TNR finding them.

 

[CrpRavens30]

I don't know, I don't think that guy on Tucker made a case at all.

At the end, he says Ron "speaks in code", and that the racists "know what he means". That's a pretty weak and totally unfounded argument right there. It's ridiculous, really.

I don't personally think Ron has said anything that most people haven't thought about at least once. It's just another case of people taking something he said or did out of context.

Until someone shows me a positively identifying, direct link between Ron Paul and a racist organization, I think this bullshit is exactly that...bullshit.

We're here waging a "holy war" against a religion, and have been programmed to profile Islamic people, we bitch about all the mexicans in the country, but when one guy made a few ambiguous statements that some people perceive as possibly being "racist", the flood gates open up.

How can you blame someone, especially a conservative, for being upset about the current state of the welfare system and it's abuse by so many people? How do you get "racist" from him saying Zooville, and referring to welfare recipients as "animals"? The TRUTH of the matter is that probably a majority of people in this country ARE abusing the welfare system, which to me is worth the label of "animal". What did a specific race have to do with that statement?

MLK being referred to as a "gay pedophile"...You mean to tell me that there's people in here who have never referred to anyone as a "faggot", even if you didn't literally mean it?

I'm sick and tired of the racism card being played in this country. There's way too much of a double standard when it comes to racism, and there's too much fake bullshit hype surrounding it all the time.

Bottom line...show me something that explicitly shows Ron Paul to be a racist, with connections to racist groups, besides a random photo, and maybe I'll entertain the idea. So far, the evidence is sparse, circumstantial, and taken way too much out of context.

Great Post

 

[Paulie]

Here's some insight to what this guy said to Carlson..

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/018418.html

 

[midcan5]

How can you blame someone, especially a conservative, for being upset about the current state of the welfare system and it's abuse by so many people? How do you get "racist" from him saying Zooville, and referring to welfare recipients as "animals"? The TRUTH of the matter is that probably a majority of people in this country ARE abusing the welfare system, which to me is worth the label of "animal". What did a specific race have to do with that statement?

How can you? You gotta be kidding me. "Animals!" How many people on welfare do you know?

 

[hjmick]

I don't know, I don't think that guy on Tucker made a case at all.

At the end, he says Ron "speaks in code", and that the racists "know what he means". That's a pretty weak and totally unfounded argument right there. It's ridiculous, really.

I don't personally think Ron has said anything that most people haven't thought about at least once. It's just another case of people taking something he said or did out of context.

Until someone shows me a positively identifying, direct link between Ron Paul and a racist organization, I think this bullshit is exactly that...bullshit.

We're here waging a "holy war" against a religion, and have been programmed to profile Islamic people, we bitch about all the mexicans in the country, but when one guy made a few ambiguous statements that some people perceive as possibly being "racist", the flood gates open up.

How can you blame someone, especially a conservative, for being upset about the current state of the welfare system and it's abuse by so many people? How do you get "racist" from him saying Zooville, and referring to welfare recipients as "animals"? The TRUTH of the matter is that probably a majority of people in this country ARE abusing the welfare system, which to me is worth the label of "animal". What did a specific race have to do with that statement?

MLK being referred to as a "gay pedophile"...You mean to tell me that there's people in here who have never referred to anyone as a "faggot", even if you didn't literally mean it?

I'm sick and tired of the racism card being played in this country. There's way too much of a double standard when it comes to racism, and there's too much fake bullshit hype surrounding it all the time.

Bottom line...show me something that explicitly shows Ron Paul to be a racist, with connections to racist groups, besides a random photo, and maybe I'll entertain the idea. So far, the evidence is sparse, circumstantial, and taken way too much out of context.

You have made some very good points and I tend to agree with most if not all of them. I also commend you for posting a thoughtful reply rather than an angry tirade as we so often see from some people. I trust you know that my intent was not to level an accusatory finger at Paul, rather it was to stimulate discussion on the topic. I found it strange to come across the article after our exchange and decided that, combined with what I had said earlier it might make good fodder for discussion.

 

[Paulie]

How can you? You gotta be kidding me. "Animals!" How many people on welfare do you know?

Well you're a liberal, so let me brace for a heated volley here, as this is a big partisan issue...

I know a lot of people on welfare, actually. I know some that NEED it, and I know some that ABUSE the privilege, and substitute it for actual work. There's really no excuse for not having SOME kind of employment SOMEWHERE.

My thoughts on the matter really don't have anything to do with race, nor should they.

If you're taking money from the government in lieu of actually WORKING, especially if you don't need it for your financial survival, and there's plenty of those people, than yes, I would agree with the label of "animal". "Piece of shit human being" also comes to mind.

 

[midcan5]

If you're taking money from the government in lieu of actually WORKING, especially if you don't need it for your financial survival, and there's plenty of those people, than yes, I would agree with the label of "animal". "Piece of shit human being" also comes to mind.

And those same people wear white shirts, have expensive suits, and drive fancy cars, so where should we start our moral crusade you think?

 

[Paulie]

And those same people wear white shirts, have expensive suits, and drive fancy cars, so where should we start our moral crusade you think?

I'd say we start with taking the fucking free money away from them. I don't agree with federal entitlements anyway. If your specific state happens to offer welfare to people, than who am I to say no to that?

My problem is with FEDERAL programs. But until the feds stop holding the states hostage on conformity for funds, states are never going to be able to empower themselves.

 

[indago]

"What he does, Tucker, is he speaks in code."

Yeah, riiight...

 

[eots]

"What he does, Tucker, is he speaks in code."

Yeah, riiight...

its a favorite slander line used by he ADL..when the facts don't match they say its code

 

[eots]

TNR basically found more of the same stuff I found when doing background on Paul about a year ago. I didn't go through all the newsletters, but enough. Now they basically went down the memory hole about 6 months ago. Good job on TNR finding them.

your full of shit you where spoon fed tis ron paul racist crap just recently right on Que with the media hit pieces and ran with it .so don't try and pretend you researched it year ago ...mmmkay

 

[Annie]

your full of shit you where spoon fed tis ron paul racist crap just recently right on Que with the media hit pieces and ran with it .so don't try and pretend you researched it year ago ...mmmkay

Hell even Paulitics will tell you I posted that long ago. F off.

 

[eots]

Hell even Paulitics will tell you I posted that long ago. F off.

how long ago ? a year ?,6 months ? or a month or two ago ?can you show me your first post ?....no kat...FU

 

[eots]

Vicious Ron Paul Hit Piece Scrapes The Barrel Of Yellow Journalism
Kirchick claims Congressman thinks Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile" amongst other ludicrous smears

Prison Planet | January 8, 2008
Paul Joseph Watson & Steve Watson

Another hack journalist intent on making a name for himself in the establishment media peanut gallery is the latest to spuriously attack presidential candidate Ron Paul, making completely baseless claims that the Congressman is a racist and a white supremacist sympathizer, going as far as comparing Dr. Paul to Charles Manson.

On Tucker Carlson's MSNBC show yesterday, The New Republic 's Jamie Kirchick ludicrously claimed that Ron Paul personally called Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile," and stuffed 20 years' worth of "Ron Paul" newsletters full of "racist, anti-semitic, homophobic invective."

Kirchick also spewed idiotic claims that Paul "called black people animals," and spoke at a "secessionist conference" in a New Republic article .
Watch the video of Kirchick's appearance on MSNBC.

notice that when Carlson asks Kirchick if he ever heard Ron Paul make a racist remark he says "No." But then he announces: "BUT," he DID attend a conference on secession in 1995!!

Did Ron Paul attend such an event? Seemingly yes. Does this make him a racist? NO.

A fellow attendee and speaker at that same conference, Thomas DiLorenzo , explains just how off the mark the ignorant hack is with this attempted slander:

The proceedings of the conference, which the pimply-faced youth is obviously ignorant of, were published as a book: Secession, State and Liberty , edited by Dr. David Gordon, whose Ph.D. from UCLA is in the field of intellectual history. It includes essays by scholars and professors from Emory University, Florida State University, UNLV, University of Montreal, University of South Carolina, and even a lawyer from Buffalo, New York. It was published a few years after the Soviet empire imploded as the result of eleven separate acts of peaceful secession, which made it especially relevant to social scientists.

In fact, secession remains a lively topic of academic discourse, something that the PFY is obviously unfamiliar with. A few weeks ago a secession conference sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities was held in Charleston, South Carolina, featuring some thirty historians and legal scholars. In little Jamie Kirchick's empty mind, the NEH must necessarily be a hotbed of pro-slavery sentiment. (A friend in academe tells me that the participants in this conference spanned the ideological spectrum from left/liberal to Marxist).

Only an ignorant conspiracy theorist like Jamie Kirchick would assume that anyone who studies secession in a scholarly way is necessarily some kind of KKK-sympathizing kook. He knows that Ron Paul will not sue him for defamation because he is a public figure. I, however, am not a public figure.

Tucker Carlson himself acted as if he was somewhat shocked to hear the claims, like he did not know what his own guest was going to talk about. However it is clear that this was another pathetic attempt to smear Ron Paul by the same guy who turned up to a Ron Paul event with hookers and a pimp claiming they were fellow supporters.

Carlson also claims that Ron Paul campaign has recently "apologized on the phone" to him personally about comments made in the same newsletters referred to by Kirchick, something that the campaign would have no interest in doing given that they have already publicly distanced themselves from the writings, 99.9% of which are not written by Ron Paul and have no direct connection to him whatsoever.

Ron Paul's voluminous writings are freely available to anyone who wishes to look. There is not a scintilla of evidence in any of his personal writings that he is in any way shape or form racist. Kirchick knows this full well, but has hand-picked a dozen or so statements from articles not written by Ron Paul to launch a vitriolic guilt by association slur.

Ron Paul is a gentleman, he has served in Congress over the course of three decades and his record does not have one blip against it. Anyone who has followed Paul for any modicum of time will tell you that to imagine him calling Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile" is the most patently ridiculous claim that could possibly be made.

As one respondent to the New Republic hit piece comments, "That's the problem Ron Paul presents to those trying to smear him, you have to go back 20 years and try to twist somebody else's words to try to make him look bad. With all the other candidates you can just look at what they themselves have actually been doing in the recent past and even the present."

Guilt by association is the only recourse for those who savage the Congressman in search of a pat on the head and a job offer from one of the corporate media monsters. Last time out we had to debunk a similar flailing attack when it was claimed that Ron Paul was a secret Neo-Con because he once co-authored a book with someone who went on to become a Neo-Con fifteen years later.

The New York Times was forced to issue a retraction when they printed an article that claimed Ron Paul regularly met with white supremacists at a restaurant in Arlington, Va., a completely baseless accusation intended to smear the Congressman as a racist sympathizer. In light of the fact that numerous people are now considering suing Kirchick for his libelous garbage, we also expect a swift retraction.

The key to unraveling Kirchick's smear is the complete inaccuracy of his central claim - the contention that Ron Paul hates Martin Luther King and advocates the comments of others who inferred that King was a sexual pervert and a pedophile.

If Kirchick had bothered to actually check Ron Paul's voting record (real research doesn't seem to be his forte) he would have learned that on one of the very rare occasions when the Congressman has voted for something that is not explicitly authorized in the Constitution, it was for America to recognize Martin Luther King day as a public holiday.

"In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he voted to authorize the continuing operation of NASA and to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday on the third Monday in January," writes Politifact.com .

Why would the Congressman, who is loathe to vote for anything that isn't authorized by the Constitution, go to such lengths to break his consistency in celebrating the contribution of Martin Luther King to society if he thought the legendary activist was a "gay pedophile".

The fact that Ron Paul has also made numerous public first person references, as oppose to 20-year-old articles written by other people, to Martin Luther King being one of his "heroes" is also ignored by Kirchick.

Most of these lies stem from an article that was written by one of Paul's aides fifteen years ago about crime figures and black people in LA - another feeble jab that fizzled into nothing.

Indeed, the very publishers of many of the newsletters that Kirchick alludes to in his hit piece publicly admitted six months ago that Ron Paul had no influence over their content.

"Ron Paul didn't know about those comments, or know they were written under his name until much later when they were brought to his attention. There were several issues that went out with comments that he would not ordinarily make. He was angry when he saw them," said one publisher.

Since Ron Paul is as clean as a whistle and unlike Romney, Huckabee and Giuliani has no skeletons in the closet, the establishment media are forced to resort to the dirtiest trick in the book - guilt by association.

This was not the only appearance the shifty eyed New Republic hack Kirchick made yesterday.

He also appeared on the albino vampire John Gibson's radio show to spew more of his vile lies. In his introduction Gibson admits to having "been after Ron Paul because I think he is a 9/11 truther". The pair then go on to declare the Congressman an outright racist once more on the back of the same newsletters.



Kirchick states, "From 1978 onwards practically every issue is devoted to conspiracy mongering about the Trilateral Commission, first of all when someone mentions the Trilateral Commission in nefarious terms you know they are a little kooky."

Excuse me? This is the same Trilateral Commission founded by David Rockefeller who wrote in his own memoirs that he and his family have been conspiring against the United States. He expresses his hostility to Americans who seek "first and foremost to serve the national interests of the United States." Is any American citizen who opposes this "a little kooky"?

Kirchick continues, "The Council on Foreign Relations, the Bilderbergers, I mean that's like a real out there conspiracy theory".

No sir, the notion that the Bilderberg Group does not exist and does not play a major role in policy making and lobbying was dispensed with by even the most aggressive mainstream hacks years ago.

What have these issues got to do with allegations of racism against Ron Paul anyway? It becomes clear that Kirchick is grasping at thin air.

The pair then go on to make several extreme slurs against Ron Paul, even comparing the Congressman to Charles Manson, by citing quotes they falsely claim are written by him. They even suggest that when Ron Paul talks about "the international banking elite" he is talking about Jews and is therefore anti-Semitic.

They throw in quotes from material unconnected to Ron Paul and mix it up with selected Paul quotations which are taken completely out of context, such as past criticism of Israeli military aggression. The disgusting pair end by calling Paul a "Dirty Bigot" and "Nazi scum".

Kirchick also refers to the farcical "Stormfront Donation" saga which forced the New York Times to issue a retraction last month admitting to several errors in a post it published which carried assertions that Ron Paul meets regularly with white supremacist groups. Kirchick should be forced to issue the same retraction, Gibson and Carlson should also be brought to task for allowing known lies and smear to be broadcast on their shows.

Lew Rockwell has provided a succinct background on The New Republic in wake of the smear attempts:

TNR has a long and checkered history of pro-fascism, pro-communism, and pro-new dealism. Founded to promote the rotten progressive movement of militarism, central banking, income taxation, centralization, and regulation of business, it naturally hates and fears the Ron Paul Revolution. The mag is also famous for having published a slew of entirely made-up articles by Stephen Glass, which it passed off as non-fiction. Through the 1950s it was an important magazine, of significant if baleful influence, but it long ago declined in circulation and significance, like all DC deadtree ops. Long close to Beltway libertarians, for whom its politically correct left-neoconism is fine and dandy, TNR once published a cover story literally comparing Ross Perot to Adolf Hitler when he was running for president. That is the publication's style--hysterical smears aimed at political enemies.

Ron Paul is a hero. He stands for uncompromised integrity and unwavering adherence to the core principles of the Constitution. He also represents real Republican principals, which is why he is coming under so much attack from neoconservatives and their bootlicking media whores, who rightly recognize him and the reach of his message as the greatest threat to their usurpation of the Republican party and the values of America as a whole.

RON PAUL'S RESPONSE

Ron Paul has already responded to these ridiculous accusations and slammed them as political haymaking to coincide with the New Hampshire primary.

"The quotations in The New Republic article are not mine and do not represent what I believe or have ever believed. I have never uttered such words and denounce such small-minded thoughts.

In fact, I have always agreed with Martin Luther King, Jr. that we should only be concerned with the content of a person's character, not the color of their skin. As I stated on the floor of the U.S. House on April 20, 1999: ?I rise in great respect for the courage and high ideals of Rosa Parks who stood steadfastly for the rights of individuals against unjust laws and oppressive governmental policies.'

This story is old news and has been rehashed for over a decade. It's once again being resurrected for obvious political reasons on the day of the New Hampshire primary.

When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, I have publicly taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name."

Judging by the deluge of comments that slam Kirchick's hit piece for what it is, the majority remain impervious to this recycled trash.

Another clue to Kirchick's completely disingenuous agenda is the fact that he approached Alex Jones to be interviewed for the New Republic article by claiming he was "doing a story on the momentum behind the Ron Paul for President campaign". In a telephone conversation he also claimed that the article "wasn't a hit piece" when repeatedly asked by Jones.

At the end of Kirchick's piece, he takes an Alex Jones quote astronomically out of context by claiming Alex says the elite want to develop themselves into "superhuman" computer hybrids able to "travel throughout the cosmos". The fact that Jones himself is paraphrasing the dreams of transhumanists in clarifying their agenda as bizarre and elitist is not explained by Kirchick who, in attributing the quote directly to Jones, attempts to associate him with its incredulity.

As one respondent accurately summarizes, "So where's the evidence? Like some photocopies of the actual newsletters? I'm not familiar with any of Ron Paul's newsletters but I am familiar with Alex Jones and your description of Endgame is completely spun so it puts your entire article into question. Alex Jones has interviewed many famous figures that do not share his views. So what? If you can't present some evidence then how do we know that you haven't taken these excerpts completely out of context? It's hard to trust any attack on Ron Paul's character coming from a Neoconservative publication like yours that vigorously defends any criticism of the precious war in Iraq and "global war on terror". Furthermore, it's very difficult to align your allegations with the character of Ron Paul that is presented in his countless speeches, interviews and books. Not a trace of any bigotry and he has many times directly attacked the idea of collectivism that leads to bigotry."

We invite readers to share their views on Mr. Kirchick's article by e mailing him at [email protected] .


http://infowars.com/articles/us/ron_paul_hit_piece_scrapes_barrel_yellow_journalism.htm

 

[SolarEnergy1]

Vicious Ron Paul Hit Piece Scrapes The Barrel Of Yellow Journalism
Kirchick claims Congressman thinks Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile" amongst other ludicrous smears

Prison Planet | January 8, 2008
Paul Joseph Watson & Steve Watson

Another hack journalist intent on making a name for himself in the establishment media peanut gallery is the latest to spuriously attack presidential candidate Ron Paul, making completely baseless claims that the Congressman is a racist and a white supremacist sympathizer, going as far as comparing Dr. Paul to Charles Manson.

On Tucker Carlson's MSNBC show yesterday, The New Republic 's Jamie Kirchick ludicrously claimed that Ron Paul personally called Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile," and stuffed 20 years' worth of "Ron Paul" newsletters full of "racist, anti-semitic, homophobic invective."

Kirchick also spewed idiotic claims that Paul "called black people animals," and spoke at a "secessionist conference" in a New Republic article .
Watch the video of Kirchick's appearance on MSNBC.

notice that when Carlson asks Kirchick if he ever heard Ron Paul make a racist remark he says "No." But then he announces: "BUT," he DID attend a conference on secession in 1995!!

Did Ron Paul attend such an event? Seemingly yes. Does this make him a racist? NO.

A fellow attendee and speaker at that same conference, Thomas DiLorenzo , explains just how off the mark the ignorant hack is with this attempted slander:

The proceedings of the conference, which the pimply-faced youth is obviously ignorant of, were published as a book: Secession, State and Liberty , edited by Dr. David Gordon, whose Ph.D. from UCLA is in the field of intellectual history. It includes essays by scholars and professors from Emory University, Florida State University, UNLV, University of Montreal, University of South Carolina, and even a lawyer from Buffalo, New York. It was published a few years after the Soviet empire imploded as the result of eleven separate acts of peaceful secession, which made it especially relevant to social scientists.

In fact, secession remains a lively topic of academic discourse, something that the PFY is obviously unfamiliar with. A few weeks ago a secession conference sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities was held in Charleston, South Carolina, featuring some thirty historians and legal scholars. In little Jamie Kirchick's empty mind, the NEH must necessarily be a hotbed of pro-slavery sentiment. (A friend in academe tells me that the participants in this conference spanned the ideological spectrum from left/liberal to Marxist).

Only an ignorant conspiracy theorist like Jamie Kirchick would assume that anyone who studies secession in a scholarly way is necessarily some kind of KKK-sympathizing kook. He knows that Ron Paul will not sue him for defamation because he is a public figure. I, however, am not a public figure.

Tucker Carlson himself acted as if he was somewhat shocked to hear the claims, like he did not know what his own guest was going to talk about. However it is clear that this was another pathetic attempt to smear Ron Paul by the same guy who turned up to a Ron Paul event with hookers and a pimp claiming they were fellow supporters.

Carlson also claims that Ron Paul campaign has recently "apologized on the phone" to him personally about comments made in the same newsletters referred to by Kirchick, something that the campaign would have no interest in doing given that they have already publicly distanced themselves from the writings, 99.9% of which are not written by Ron Paul and have no direct connection to him whatsoever.

Ron Paul's voluminous writings are freely available to anyone who wishes to look. There is not a scintilla of evidence in any of his personal writings that he is in any way shape or form racist. Kirchick knows this full well, but has hand-picked a dozen or so statements from articles not written by Ron Paul to launch a vitriolic guilt by association slur.

Ron Paul is a gentleman, he has served in Congress over the course of three decades and his record does not have one blip against it. Anyone who has followed Paul for any modicum of time will tell you that to imagine him calling Martin Luther King a "gay pedophile" is the most patently ridiculous claim that could possibly be made.

As one respondent to the New Republic hit piece comments, "That's the problem Ron Paul presents to those trying to smear him, you have to go back 20 years and try to twist somebody else's words to try to make him look bad. With all the other candidates you can just look at what they themselves have actually been doing in the recent past and even the present."

Guilt by association is the only recourse for those who savage the Congressman in search of a pat on the head and a job offer from one of the corporate media monsters. Last time out we had to debunk a similar flailing attack when it was claimed that Ron Paul was a secret Neo-Con because he once co-authored a book with someone who went on to become a Neo-Con fifteen years later.

The New York Times was forced to issue a retraction when they printed an article that claimed Ron Paul regularly met with white supremacists at a restaurant in Arlington, Va., a completely baseless accusation intended to smear the Congressman as a racist sympathizer. In light of the fact that numerous people are now considering suing Kirchick for his libelous garbage, we also expect a swift retraction.

The key to unraveling Kirchick's smear is the complete inaccuracy of his central claim - the contention that Ron Paul hates Martin Luther King and advocates the comments of others who inferred that King was a sexual pervert and a pedophile.

If Kirchick had bothered to actually check Ron Paul's voting record (real research doesn't seem to be his forte) he would have learned that on one of the very rare occasions when the Congressman has voted for something that is not explicitly authorized in the Constitution, it was for America to recognize Martin Luther King day as a public holiday.

"In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he voted to authorize the continuing operation of NASA and to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday on the third Monday in January," writes Politifact.com .

Why would the Congressman, who is loathe to vote for anything that isn't authorized by the Constitution, go to such lengths to break his consistency in celebrating the contribution of Martin Luther King to society if he thought the legendary activist was a "gay pedophile".

The fact that Ron Paul has also made numerous public first person references, as oppose to 20-year-old articles written by other people, to Martin Luther King being one of his "heroes" is also ignored by Kirchick.

Most of these lies stem from an article that was written by one of Paul's aides fifteen years ago about crime figures and black people in LA - another feeble jab that fizzled into nothing.

Indeed, the very publishers of many of the newsletters that Kirchick alludes to in his hit piece publicly admitted six months ago that Ron Paul had no influence over their content.

"Ron Paul didn't know about those comments, or know they were written under his name until much later when they were brought to his attention. There were several issues that went out with comments that he would not ordinarily make. He was angry when he saw them," said one publisher.

Since Ron Paul is as clean as a whistle and unlike Romney, Huckabee and Giuliani has no skeletons in the closet, the establishment media are forced to resort to the dirtiest trick in the book - guilt by association.

This was not the only appearance the shifty eyed New Republic hack Kirchick made yesterday.

He also appeared on the albino vampire John Gibson's radio show to spew more of his vile lies. In his introduction Gibson admits to having "been after Ron Paul because I think he is a 9/11 truther". The pair then go on to declare the Congressman an outright racist once more on the back of the same newsletters.



Kirchick states, "From 1978 onwards practically every issue is devoted to conspiracy mongering about the Trilateral Commission, first of all when someone mentions the Trilateral Commission in nefarious terms you know they are a little kooky."

Excuse me? This is the same Trilateral Commission founded by David Rockefeller who wrote in his own memoirs that he and his family have been conspiring against the United States. He expresses his hostility to Americans who seek "first and foremost to serve the national interests of the United States." Is any American citizen who opposes this "a little kooky"?

Kirchick continues, "The Council on Foreign Relations, the Bilderbergers, I mean that's like a real out there conspiracy theory".

No sir, the notion that the Bilderberg Group does not exist and does not play a major role in policy making and lobbying was dispensed with by even the most aggressive mainstream hacks years ago.

What have these issues got to do with allegations of racism against Ron Paul anyway? It becomes clear that Kirchick is grasping at thin air.

The pair then go on to make several extreme slurs against Ron Paul, even comparing the Congressman to Charles Manson, by citing quotes they falsely claim are written by him. They even suggest that when Ron Paul talks about "the international banking elite" he is talking about Jews and is therefore anti-Semitic.

They throw in quotes from material unconnected to Ron Paul and mix it up with selected Paul quotations which are taken completely out of context, such as past criticism of Israeli military aggression. The disgusting pair end by calling Paul a "Dirty Bigot" and "Nazi scum".

Kirchick also refers to the farcical "Stormfront Donation" saga which forced the New York Times to issue a retraction last month admitting to several errors in a post it published which carried assertions that Ron Paul meets regularly with white supremacist groups. Kirchick should be forced to issue the same retraction, Gibson and Carlson should also be brought to task for allowing known lies and smear to be broadcast on their shows.

Lew Rockwell has provided a succinct background on The New Republic in wake of the smear attempts:

TNR has a long and checkered history of pro-fascism, pro-communism, and pro-new dealism. Founded to promote the rotten progressive movement of militarism, central banking, income taxation, centralization, and regulation of business, it naturally hates and fears the Ron Paul Revolution. The mag is also famous for having published a slew of entirely made-up articles by Stephen Glass, which it passed off as non-fiction. Through the 1950s it was an important magazine, of significant if baleful influence, but it long ago declined in circulation and significance, like all DC deadtree ops. Long close to Beltway libertarians, for whom its politically correct left-neoconism is fine and dandy, TNR once published a cover story literally comparing Ross Perot to Adolf Hitler when he was running for president. That is the publication's style--hysterical smears aimed at political enemies.

Ron Paul is a hero. He stands for uncompromised integrity and unwavering adherence to the core principles of the Constitution. He also represents real Republican principals, which is why he is coming under so much attack from neoconservatives and their bootlicking media whores, who rightly recognize him and the reach of his message as the greatest threat to their usurpation of the Republican party and the values of America as a whole.

RON PAUL'S RESPONSE

Ron Paul has already responded to these ridiculous accusations and slammed them as political haymaking to coincide with the New Hampshire primary.

"The quotations in The New Republic article are not mine and do not represent what I believe or have ever believed. I have never uttered such words and denounce such small-minded thoughts.

In fact, I have always agreed with Martin Luther King, Jr. that we should only be concerned with the content of a person's character, not the color of their skin. As I stated on the floor of the U.S. House on April 20, 1999: ?I rise in great respect for the courage and high ideals of Rosa Parks who stood steadfastly for the rights of individuals against unjust laws and oppressive governmental policies.'

This story is old news and has been rehashed for over a decade. It's once again being resurrected for obvious political reasons on the day of the New Hampshire primary.

When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, I have publicly taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name."

Judging by the deluge of comments that slam Kirchick's hit piece for what it is, the majority remain impervious to this recycled trash.

Another clue to Kirchick's completely disingenuous agenda is the fact that he approached Alex Jones to be interviewed for the New Republic article by claiming he was "doing a story on the momentum behind the Ron Paul for President campaign". In a telephone conversation he also claimed that the article "wasn't a hit piece" when repeatedly asked by Jones.

At the end of Kirchick's piece, he takes an Alex Jones quote astronomically out of context by claiming Alex says the elite want to develop themselves into "superhuman" computer hybrids able to "travel throughout the cosmos". The fact that Jones himself is paraphrasing the dreams of transhumanists in clarifying their agenda as bizarre and elitist is not explained by Kirchick who, in attributing the quote directly to Jones, attempts to associate him with its incredulity.

As one respondent accurately summarizes, "So where's the evidence? Like some photocopies of the actual newsletters? I'm not familiar with any of Ron Paul's newsletters but I am familiar with Alex Jones and your description of Endgame is completely spun so it puts your entire article into question. Alex Jones has interviewed many famous figures that do not share his views. So what? If you can't present some evidence then how do we know that you haven't taken these excerpts completely out of context? It's hard to trust any attack on Ron Paul's character coming from a Neoconservative publication like yours that vigorously defends any criticism of the precious war in Iraq and "global war on terror". Furthermore, it's very difficult to align your allegations with the character of Ron Paul that is presented in his countless speeches, interviews and books. Not a trace of any bigotry and he has many times directly attacked the idea of collectivism that leads to bigotry."

We invite readers to share their views on Mr. Kirchick's article by e mailing him at [email protected] .


http://infowars.com/articles/us/ron_paul_hit_piece_scrapes_barrel_yellow_journalism.htm

Ok okay so if Ron Paul said so then it's fine. I noticed with the ronbots that when they accuse other candidates of doing things or spinning their records that must be true,and any attempt to explain their positions are ignored, yet anything negative on Ron paul has to be false... I see how i works.