Ron Paul long ago disqualified himself for the presidency by peddling claptrap proposals like abolishing the Federal Reserve, returning to the gold standard, cutting a third of the federal budget and all foreign aid and opposing the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Now, making things worse, he has failed to convincingly repudiate racist remarks that were published under his name for years — or the enthusiastic support he is getting from racist groups.
Paul, a Republican congressman from Texas who is doing particularly well in Iowa's precaucus polls, published several newsletters in the '80s and '90s with names like the Ron Paul Survival Report and the Ron Paul Political Report.
The newsletters interspersed libertarian political and investment commentary with racial bigotry, anti-Semitism and far-right paranoia.
Among other offensive statements, the newsletters said that 95 percent of Washington's black males were criminals, and they described the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday as "Hate Whitey Day."
One 1993 article appeared under a headline lamenting the country's "disappearing white majority."
Other articles suggested that the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service, was responsible for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, praised the Louisiana racist David Duke and accused some gay men with AIDS of deliberately spreading the disease, "perhaps out of a pathological hatred."
A direct-mail ad for the newsletters from around 1993 warned of a "coming race war in our big cities" and said there was a "federal-homosexual cover-up" to suppress the impact of AIDS.
Paul, who, beginning in 2008, has disavowed the articles and their ideas, now says that most of them were written by others and that he was unaware of their content.
Even if that were the case, it suggests a stupendous level of negligence that should force a reconsideration by anyone considering entrusting him with the White House.
When the newsletters first became an issue during his congressional campaigns in the 1990s, however, he did not deny writing some of them or knowing about them.
Paul has never given a full and detailed accounting of who wrote the newsletters and what his role was in overseeing their publication. It's especially important that he do so immediately.
Those writings have certainly not been forgotten by white supremacist and militia groups that are promoting his candidacy in Iowa and in New Hampshire.
The New York Times reported on Sunday that dozens of members of the white nationalist website Stormfront are volunteering for the Paul campaign, along with far-right militias, survivalists and anti-Zionist groups.
Don Black, the Stormfront director, said his members were drawn to Paul by the newsletters and his positions against immigration and the Fed (run by Jews, Black said), even if Paul were not himself a white nationalist.
Paul, saying he still hopes to "convert" these supporters to his views, has refused to disavow them or to chase them out of his campaign.
If he does not do so, he will leave a lasting stain on his candidacy, on the libertarian movement and, very possibly, on the Iowa caucuses.
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Bored and Useless
Bored and Useless
ou guys must be really scared" crap. No one in their right mind thinks any of those people are getting elected because no one is really that stupid. Even BT knows he isnt getting elected despite his trollery.
