If we could step back and look at this Ron Paul newsletter situation outside of policy, which is exactly what Ron Paul supports believe should not be done, we would find an issue much larger than shaping laws and policies to solve problems.
Let us not overlook that at one point Ron Paul backed the statements of his newsletters, claiming the problem was not in the actual text, but in the way people interpreted the words (unless, you believe only the things printed about Paul that cast a good light on him is credible, and everything else is not).
The problem outside of policy that it cannot fix, is people’s attachment to ‘heroes.’ We, as humans, tend to defend actions of the people to whom we look up. Regardless of how we feel about Ron Paul’s ideas, his policies won’t free us from our attachment to heroes — a human character flaw. It is no different than Barack Obama supporters minimizing or rationalizing the atrocities he perpetuates throughout the globe. If he were president, would Ron Paul loyalists use the same rationale to defend statements attributed to him in –a newsletter he touted– be used to minimize and rationalize unfavorable decisions and acts he makes and commits as president?
I believe that if Ron Paul was true to his espoused principles, he would continue supporting and defending his own sanctioned newsletters. If he believed his followers and supporters follow and support him because of his stances on foreign and domestic policy, there would be nothing wrong with or no negative consequences to admitting that the positions in his old newsletters were ideas he supported at the time but no longer supports (if, in fact, he no longer supports those ideas, which he now says he does not).
Ron Paul is a politician, no matter how anyone tries to spin it. Now, by pretty much denying anything to do with the newsletter, he is pandering to would-be voters. But, if he agrees with what he says at different times, those would-be Ron Paul voters/supporters would focus on policy and not racist rants from way back in the 1990′s.
In a recent GOP debate, Ron Paul stated, “If you’re persistent, and you present your case, they will come your way.” Well, if that is true, presenting his case as he did in a 1996 Dallas Morning News article (below) would not cause any supporters or would-be supporters to leave his side. Also, he would not have to be a member of the Republican Party to present his case and be a viable candidate for president of the United States.
The Dallas Morning News, May 22, 1996 (full text)
WASHINGTON – Dr. Ron Paul, a Republican congressional candidate from Texas, wrote in his political newsletter in 1992 that 95 percent of the black men in Washington, D.C., are “semi-criminal or entirely criminal.” He also wrote that black teenagers can be “unbelievably fleet of foot.” An official with the NAACP in Texas said the comments were racist and offensive.
Dr. Paul, who is running in Texas’ 14th Congressional District, defended his writings in an interview Tuesday. He said they were being taken out of context. “It’s typical political demagoguery,” he said. “If people are interested in my character . . . come and talk to my neighbors.”
Dr. Paul, an ex-congressman and former Libertarian Party presidential candidate, defeated Rep. Greg Laughlin, R-West Columbia, in April for the Republican nomination for the U.S. House. An obstetrician from Surfside, he faces Democratic lawyer Charles “Lefty” Morris of Bee Cave in the November general election.
Mr. Morris, who said he was familiar with the writings in question, declined to comment about the specifics. “Many of his views are out on the fringe,” Mr. Morris said. “But voters in the 14th District have to characterize these the way they see it. His statements speak for themselves.”
According to a Dallas Morning News review of documents circulating among Texas Democrats, Dr. Paul wrote in a 1992 issue of the Ron Paul Political Report: “If you have ever been robbed by a black teenaged male, you know how unbelievably fleet of foot they can be.”
Dr. Paul, who served in Congress in the late 1970s and early 1980s, said Tuesday that he has produced the newsletter since 1985 and distributes it to an estimated 7,000 to 8,000 subscribers. A phone call to the newsletter’s toll-free number was answered by his campaign staff.
Dr. Paul also said he did not know how his newsletter came to be included in a directory by the Heritage Front, a neo-Nazi group based in Canada. The newsletter was listed on the Internet under the directory’s heading “Racialists and Freedom Fighters.” No one answered calls to the Heritage Front, which lists only a hotline connected to a tape-recorded message in the Toronto telephone directory.
Gary Bledsoe, president of the Texas NAACP, urged Dr. Paul to apologize for his comments about blacks and asked Republicans to denounce their nominee. “We need someone who can represent all the constituents of Texas, not someone who is negative or engages in stereotypes,” Mr. Bledsoe said. “Someone who holds those views signals or indicates an inability to represent all constituents without regard to race, creed or color.” About 11 percent of the population in the 14th District, stretching from near Austin to the Gulf Coast, is black.
Dr. Paul denied suggestions that he was a racist and said he was not evoking stereotypes when he wrote the columns. He said they should be read and quoted in their entirety to avoid misrepresentation. Dr. Paul also took exception to the comments of Mr. Bledsoe, saying that the voters in the 14th District and the people who know him best would be the final judges of his character.
“If someone challenges your character and takes the
interpretation of the NAACP as proof of a man’s character, what kind of a world do you live in?” Dr. Paul asked.In the interview, he did not deny he made the statement about the swiftness of black men. “If you try to catch someone that has stolen a purse from you, there is no chance to catch them,” Dr. Paul said.
He also said the comment about black men in the nation’s capital was made while writing about a 1992 study produced by the National Center on Incarceration and Alternatives, a criminal justice think tank based in Virginia. Citing statistics from the study, Dr. Paul then concluded in his column: `Given the inefficiencies of what DC laughingly calls the criminal justice system, I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.”
“These aren’t my figures,” Dr. Paul said Tuesday. “That is the assumption you can gather from” the report.
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