A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

Progs for Paul?

The rather odd premise of this Reason article is that libertarian “constitutionalist” GOP candidate Ron Paul may have appeal to disaffected progressives.

Now, this may be true in the broad sense that progressives will likely find themselves agreeing with Paul on the war, the PATRIOT Act, the war on drugs, etc. but what is the upshot supposed to be here? That progressives are going to cross party lines en masse to vote for Paul in the GOP primary?

After all, it’s virtually a foregone conclusion that Paul won’t get the GOP nomination (especially when an astonishing 65% of Republicans still say that President Bush is doing a good job according to a recent poll). So there’s really no question of Paul appealing to progressives and liberals in the general election.

And besides, if progressives want to vote for a longshot candidate who shares their views on the war, they’ve got Dennis Kucinich with whom they’re likely to agree about much else. Ron Paul’s vision of an ultra stripped down nightwatchman state is likely to send big-government liberals running for the hills.

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11 responses to “Progs for Paul?”

  1. Bret

    Not so fast. More than a few Dems are entirely disenchanted with the failure of Big Government to deliver on its promises – it’s amazing how strong the support is among the younger crowd, as well. A libertarian awakening is happening. The Dems had a shot at turning things around, but 2006 is turning out to be an enormous disappointment. I think their goose is cooked.

    We’ll see soon enough, won’t we?

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  2. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus

    Bret’s “younger crowd” of Democrats are a different group from the progressives.

    So are, in general, the sociolibs and even the generic liberals.

    The progressives remain wedded to their heritage of a century of social democratic and progressive construction of “Big Government.”

    If anything, they are even more hostile to powerful private interests like Big Business, Big Pharma, Big Media, or the Military Industrial Complex, as well as other ‘malefactors of great wealth,’ than their political ancestors.

    And what, in their minds, is the true rallying cry of “minimal state” libertarians like Ron Paul? “All power to the oligarchs! All power to the malefactors of great wealth!”

    Alas, it’s a little too long for a bumper sticker.

    PS. You are quite right. RP will not be a nominee. But nor will DK.

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  3. Lee

    I think Bret overstates the libertarian-ishness of younger Dems. At least if the younger crop of pundits are representative, the younger liberals seem to be lefter on economic issues than their immediate predecessors, the Clinton-style neo-liberals and DLC-types who currently control the Democratic party.

    RP is too libertarian for my blood, but I’m glad he’s there in the debates mixing it up with the uniformly pro-war GOPsters. If I was going to be living somewhere that the primary actually mattered I might even be tempted to register as a Republican and cast a protest vote for him.

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  4. ericaustinlee

    As much as I appreciating RP being anti-war, there are plenty of reasons that I would want to really distance myself from him. Here is a post by David Neiwert covering Ron Paul’s far-right views on a bunch of stuff.

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  5. Lee

    Yeah, the race stuff is particularly troubling if true.

    It’s a little odd, though, to get so worked up about a fringe of militia men, goldbug, and anti-“New World Order” boogeymen given what the people who actually hold power advocate like torture, preemptive war (with nukes!), etc.

    That’s why I’m not a conspiracy theorist: the things advocated openly by politicians is bad enough. 😉

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  6. ericaustinlee

    Lee, fair enough.

    Although, why I’m not sure if you are accusing Neiwert of being a conspiracy theorist or not, he actually isn’t one — far from it. His beat just happens to be immigration, hate crimes, and racism, etc. He’s spilt a ton of ink criticizing Michelle Malkin’s execrable book defending internment (for Japanese and for Muslims). He’s actually a fairly level-headed guy– reminds me a lot of how you engage in matters, just with a different focus.

    Neiwert isn’t a conspiracy theorist, although he documents many of the conspiracy theorists and nutjobs themselves, showing how extremist rhetoric by these fringe groups actually does influence those “who actually hold power.” So really, the dichotomy of merely those who hold power and those who do not isn’t exactly a clean one. Those who hold power have a base to pander to.

    Peace,

    Eric

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  7. gaius sempronius gracchus

    Personally, I would never vote for RP precisely because “All power to the oligarchs” is not, to my mind, a good idea.

    Now, there is not and never was the least chance of him being the GOP nominee, exactly because of his isolationist politics. He is pure poison to military/political globalists, and they drive the bus.

    But all the same the War Party need to discredit this messenger, whose isolationist policies, given time and a fair opportunity, would certainly resonate with the very same conservative voters who so far have formed the loyal and necessary popular base for the GOP’s neocon wars.

    So there is a need to deny him time and a fair opportunity to publicize his views. There is a need to discredit him with these same conservative voters. There is a need to force him off topic, into a maximally humiliating and defense posture.

    You can’t do that by harping on class war themes. You can’t do that by sounding like a progressive yelling, “Hey! He’s bad! He’s a conservative!” They would just love him all the more. Has not Tucker Carlson had him on the show to “teach people about freedom”?

    So they need to undermine him and force him off topic by attacking him for something else.

    In America, what could that “something else” be but race?

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  8. Lee

    Eric – I wasn’t accusing him of being a conspiracy theorist. I’m just less inclined to see the hand of the dark forces he identifies as having much influence when there seem to me to be other influences whose influence is much more pervasive (big money, the military industrial complex, etc.). Which isn’t to say that those other groups ought not be scrutinized of course. But it’s sort of like how a lot of liberals get really het up about the impending theocracy when it seems obvious to me that the Christian Right is largely being led around by the nose by the big players in the GOP.

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  9. Lee

    Wow, I really used “influence” too many times in that last comment.

    Reply
  10. Lee

    For the record, I think there are three kinds of charges against Paul made in the piece Eric provided of varying degrees of merit.

    The first is that Paul made some racist comments in a newsletter published sometime in the 90s. Paul has repudiated these and claims that they were ghostwritten by a staffer. At the very least that shows some poor judgment on his part in hiring staffers. At worst it indicates he really believes these repellent things.

    The second is that Paul associates with and/or is endorsed by people and groups with varying degrees of dubious character or views. This ranges from anti-NWO conspiracy theorists to goldbugs to outright white supremacists and nationalists.

    On the one hand, it’s troubling when people like that are attracted to your views and ought to make you at the very least question them. On the other hand, a politician isn’t responsible for the views of everyone who endorses or supports him. I recall that in 2004 the Communist Party USA endorsed Kerry – that hardly makes Kerry a communist!

    Third, Paul is accused of having “extremist” views of various sorts, from opposition to public schooling to being anti-UN to wanted to eliminate about 90% of the federal government. The first thing to note here, it seems to me, is that Paul has made no secret of the fact that he’s an ultra-libertarian of the paleo variety. So, wrongheaded as some of these views may be, merely being “extreme” doesn’t show them to be wrong, much less the kinds of views that ought to get one expunged from polite society.

    Maybe I’m sensitive on this point because, judged by what passes for “centrist” views in American politics, I hold to some views on certain issues that could fairly be judged “extreme.” So, I’m not prepared to write someone off simply because their views are outside of the narrow confines of respectable opinion.

    Reply
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