Paul's haul on King day (oh, the irony!)
Supporters of presidential candidate Ron Paul, the libertarian-leaning Congressman from Texas who recently finished second in the Nevada Republican caucuses, used the occasion of yesterday's Martin Luther King Jr. holiday for another fundraising extravaganza, collecting $1.85 million for the campaign. Last month Paul's supporters raised more than $6 million in a 24-hour period to set a new one-day fundraising record.
There's more than a little irony in the campaign's latest accomplishment, given that Paul voted against the creation of the King holiday. And then there are those unflattering remarks made about the slain civil rights leader in past issues of various Paul newsletters, as revealed by reporter James Kirchick in his recent story about Paul for The New Republic magazine:
* King was "a world-class adulterer" who "seduced underage girls and boys" and "replaced the evil of forced segregation with the evil of forced integration," according to the November 1990 issue of Paul's Political Report.
* King was a "world-class philanderer who beat up his paramours" and a "flagrant plagiarist with a phony doctorate," according to the January 1991 edition of Political Report.
* A February 1991 Paul newsletter criticizes "The X-Rated Martin Luther King."
Paul has blamed those statements on his associates, saying he has "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." He has also said that he takes "moral responsibility" for not paying closer attention to what went out under his name.
But those remarks serve to spotlight Paul's alliances with characters such as Lew Rockwell, who served as his congressional chief of staff from 1978 to 1982 and often ghostwrote the politician's newsletters. As Kirchick reports, Rockwell founded the Ludwig von Mises Institute, a libertarian think tank based in Auburn, Ala. that has published books by Paul and for which the congressman has taught seminars. The Institute has a history of romanticizing the Confederacy; for example, faculty member Thomas E. Woods Jr. is among the founders of the pro-secessionist League of the South and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, a pro-Confederate work published in 2004.
Among those who provided blurbs for Woods' book? None other than Paul, who says the work "heroically rescues real history from the politically correct memory hole."
There's more than a little irony in the campaign's latest accomplishment, given that Paul voted against the creation of the King holiday. And then there are those unflattering remarks made about the slain civil rights leader in past issues of various Paul newsletters, as revealed by reporter James Kirchick in his recent story about Paul for The New Republic magazine:
* King was "a world-class adulterer" who "seduced underage girls and boys" and "replaced the evil of forced segregation with the evil of forced integration," according to the November 1990 issue of Paul's Political Report.
* King was a "world-class philanderer who beat up his paramours" and a "flagrant plagiarist with a phony doctorate," according to the January 1991 edition of Political Report.
* A February 1991 Paul newsletter criticizes "The X-Rated Martin Luther King."
Paul has blamed those statements on his associates, saying he has "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." He has also said that he takes "moral responsibility" for not paying closer attention to what went out under his name.
But those remarks serve to spotlight Paul's alliances with characters such as Lew Rockwell, who served as his congressional chief of staff from 1978 to 1982 and often ghostwrote the politician's newsletters. As Kirchick reports, Rockwell founded the Ludwig von Mises Institute, a libertarian think tank based in Auburn, Ala. that has published books by Paul and for which the congressman has taught seminars. The Institute has a history of romanticizing the Confederacy; for example, faculty member Thomas E. Woods Jr. is among the founders of the pro-secessionist League of the South and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, a pro-Confederate work published in 2004.
Among those who provided blurbs for Woods' book? None other than Paul, who says the work "heroically rescues real history from the politically correct memory hole."
Labels: Election 2008
2 Comments:
Romanticizing the Confederacy. Hmm. Can you find a single thing on Mises.org that does anything like that? What you'll actually find is a lot of material on business cycle theory, economic calculation, the economics of the firm, and, you know, economic topics.
Why, incidentally, do you think a libertarian like me would "romanticize" the Confederacy? The Confederacy sanctioned slavery, printed fiat money, conscripted troops, etc. What is there to support in that?
Surely you are intellectually capable of understanding that believing in the right of secession doesn't mean you "romanticize the Confederacy." William Lloyd Garrison insisted that all abolitionists work toward the dissolution of the U.S. I hope you don't plan to condemn him, too.
I see romanticization of the Confederacy in the fact that LvMI publications enthusiastically support the Confederate States of America's attempted secession, view the South as fighting for its "sacred honor," and make much of the war crimes committed by the Union -- while downplaying the crime against humanity at the heart of the conflict. According to LvMI scholar and intellectual hero Murray Rothbard, Lincoln "paved the way" for all subsequent genocides -- but what of the genocide that the Confederacy fought to prolong? Rothbard, unlike Garrison, has little to say about that. And if you are so loathe to romanticize the Confederacy, why use the image of a Confederate soldier on the cover of your book and a Confederate symbol to represent the League of the South? Perhaps you and your colleagues are not, as you insist, neo-Confederates, but you certainly seem willing to appeal to them.
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