I’ve never understood the appeal of Ron Paul. I mean, I loved my crotchety nasty racist old Grandpa, but I also recognized his failings, and would never have voted for him for local garbage collector, let alone president. But once you strip away the filial affection and the personal history of good moments, which Ron Paul completely lacks, there’s nothing left but a hypocritical and bigoted elf with an incomprehensible libertarian agenda, so no, please, don’t put him in a position of any influence at all.
Wonkette has an excellent summary of Ron Paul’s contradictory and un-American positions. Read it, Paulites, and go away.
FTFY, and what follows is lies and bullshit. We don’t believe a word you say. That is what happens when you get caught telling lies. We don’t care what you say, unless you can cite the literature like Google Scholar to back up your claims. And the amount of evidence you produce is zero. Which means all we hear is blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah.
aluchko@ 498
This whole obtuse defense of Paul in regard to bigotry and racism, who is by necessity a bigot and racist, even discounting all but that his ideology would facilitate and increase bigotry (and racism and misogyny and and and) according to everything we know about history and human nature…
It’s starting to come off like aluchko has experience with being accused of bigotry and racism. Which, of course, wouldn’t be surprising given his “moral” apprehension with “forcing” someone to hire a black man. Because, you know, his freedom not to be around blacks.
It really is starting to read like he is more defending himself than Ron Paul.
Not really. It was based on the assumption that you were using known definitions.
If you want to use non-standard definitions, go ahead and present them, then at least we can talk about whether your definitions are reasonable.
So far, you haven’t even suggested what other definitions you might be using.
+++++
You can go into an argument and proclaim “God exists, and by ‘God’ I mean ‘the universe'”, and however silly that might be, at least you are communcating clearly enough.
But if you just proclaim “God exists”, then you are just plain wrong until you explicitly define God.
To be fair, I hear “I AM A FUCKING COWARD RACIST WHO DOES NOT HAVE THE INTESTINAL FORTITUDE TO BE HONEST WITH MYSELF” on repeat, not “blah blah blah”. Well, also, misogynist, homophobe, ableist, etc.
Because the available evidence of his stated positions on policy suggests that he is a bigot. A perfect example being the border fence: his libertarianism states that people are free to seek their opportunities without the yoke of oppressive federal government opposing them – unless, of course, it means more brown-skinned people in his backyard.
The Civil Rights Act, once again – good example. It can be easily shown that by creating a broader base of economic opportunity, it creates greater freedom for a greater number of people. Presumably a Libertarian would support it for that reason. But it must be opposed, ’cause blacks might get a leg up on ol’ whitey.
Racism is the simplest, most probable explanation for these apparent contradictions. As pretty much everyone here has been saying for almost 500 comments now.
You have been pushing the concept of ‘nuanced ignorance’ and nobody here is buying it. I don’t doubt that RP feels his Libertarianism more deeply and strongly than his bigotry. I don’t doubt that, even to himself, he cloaks his distaste for dark-skinned people in the guise of Libertarian ideals. But I also don’t doubt that this distaste is there, is real, and colors (heh) his actions and reactions.
Frankly going through his positions I’m coming to the opinion that inconsistency might be better explained by the fact that Ron Paul isn’t really a libertarian.
He’s fairly libertarian when it comes to economic issues, and the drug stance made me think he was a libertarian in general along with the fights with the Republican party. But his quote on DADT (though he did vote to repeal) along with his belief that anti-sodomy laws are supported by the constitution, doesn’t strike me as libertarian. Plus when you remove the libertarianism and assume the government has a lot more power to enforce religion or moral stances than his anti-gay stuff becomes a lot more plausible.
I still find it implausible that it’s all based on bigotry but I don’t have a strong enough grasp on his personal philosophy or ultimate vision to say if he’s applying it in a consistent manner or not. But I no longer think it’s accurate to call him libertarian.
combat #337:
Libertarian entitlement at its finest. It doesn’t matter how everyone else uses the word, only how the libertarian use it. And the libertarian is free to demand that his opposition use it or his (pseudo-)top-10% white straight cis ass has every right to cry foul. And then, of course, his ideology is right until he deems we’ve proven it wrong within his little rules.
Why, it’s almost as if the libertarian thinks himself in the position of defence counsel, judge, and jury, all at the same time. Not only that, but he also seems to think he has every right to walk into someone else’s courtroom and assert that he is all three of those.
And yet, it’s still us liberals who have the problem…
I think that’s true. Paul is more of a paleoconservative. Despite the hype of his supporters, he doesn’t actually believe consistently in civil liberties; he wants a less powerful federal government, but he’s happy for state governments to oppress their citizens without federal interference. He’s against abortion and thinks states should be able to ban it. And he’s anti-immigration and supports a border fence – which is not at all a libertarian position, but is entirely consistent with paleoconservatism, since paleoconservatives tend to be isolationist and nativist. And although he’s got a reputation for being anti-war, his opposition to overseas wars is based not on pacifism but on isolationism and an “America first” worldview; he’s argued that the US should withdraw from the UN, for instance.
Actual libertarians can be criticized for a great many things – not least, the observation that their economic theories don’t work well in practice. But I don’t think Ron Paul is actually much of a libertarian in any case. I think he’s a throwback to the old Southern brand of conservatism.
…oh, yeah, and if comment #7 goes up anywhere outside of the liberal sphere it gets derided with the same empty cries of bias, unfairness, tribalism, assumptions, ignorance, et cetera.
Yeah, us liberals are soooooo powerful and privileged, what with how we can’t advance any fact-based argument that comes remotely close to the misrepresentation, bullshit and lies spewed by the Right’s noise machine, including the ego-stroking shitstain of a magazine known as Reason, without having to deal with the exact reverse of what’s happening here: the lone voice is the liberal, getting pounded on by litigious righties picking at every possible detail and “centrist” concern- and tone-trolls wailing about tribalism, assumptions, negativity, balance, the subtle and sophisticated arguments for regressive policies, and how we’re scaring away all the independents and should make concessions and try to think of things from the perspective of conservatives.
So powerful and privileged, that we can’t escape this empty, fact-free, whitewashing bullshit even in our own supposedly safe spaces where we’re advancing the discussion. There always has to be a Reich-winger or “centrist” to come out of the woodwork and talk down to all us irresponsible closed-minded liberals with our evidence and logic and trying to make society work for as many members as possible.
So powerful and privileged that for the past 30 years our options have been austerity from the conservative political parties and slightly less austerity from the liberal political parties.
So powerful and privileged that “communism” and “anarchism” have been turned into scare-words meant to evoke images of repression and chaos, when really all they represent is skepticism towards our current authoritarian-capitalist (and growing increasingly so) system.
So powerful and privileged that when unrestricted campaign finance was allowed with Citizens United, we got massively outspent.
So powerful and privileged that when we protest, our declarations of nonviolent protest are ignored because a few people dressed up all in black with covered faces and weapons smashed some windows, causing the police to unload rubber bullets and teargas on everyone and turn the protest into a war zone; but when Tea Partiers protest they walk around carrying their massive guns openly and not a cop bats an eye. The fact that the “black bloc” is a regular at leftist protests but conspicuously absent at gun-toting-teabagger rallies is also ignored, such is our privilege.
So powerful and privileged that “balance” means always, always, always talking about how the Left needs to get people to come to their side from the Right, never about how the Right needs to draw people from the Left.
There are probably more things I can say, but if you have a shred of honesty in you, you’ll get it by now.
@Walton
Heh, I googled “ron paul paleoconservative” and the first link that came up was from conservapedia. And you know the really crazy part?
The article seemed… sane.
Seriously! At a glance the article looks relatively informative and unbiased. I have uncovered what might be the only* non-crazy conservapedia article in existance!
On a more serious, note given how the label seems to apply I’m curious why there’s not more mainstream affiliation of the paleoconservative label with RP. I’m not surprised that the MSM avoids it since libertarian is already a bit esoteric, but certainly considering his inconsistencies with libertarianism I’d expect more articles linking him with paleoconservatism. If conservapedia is the first link it’s probably not a common position.
*Ok I exaggerate, I also checked out the article on water and it seemed kinda reasonable too.
aluchko,
Stop that.
Just stop it.
I refuse to believe that these defenses of Ron Paul’s bigotry, in this case in form of a straw man, are just a result of your failure to comprehend.
Nobody here has even implied that Ron Paul makes every single one of his life choices based upon his bigotry. Nobody. Nobody has even given a fucking fleeting whiff that his politics are “all based on bigotry”.
Just fucking stop it.
Nobody is claiming that only libertarians are bigots, or racists or misogynists. There is plenty of room for bigots and racists and misogynists in every party.
But an informed human adult (like a god damn M.D. grown-ass man with a long fucking career in politics who running for the god damn president should be) promoting either the current GOP or libertarian agenda is, by fucking necessity, all three.
This does not mean, you thick piece of shit, that I assume they spend every waking hour tailoring their fucking lives or politics to keeping the “niggers”, “womenz” and “others” in their place. That every fucking decision they make has an 80% weight upon oppressing groups of people and 20% weight on practicality or idealism.
And more important: IT DOESN’T FUCKING MATTER JUST HOW RACIST OR BIGOTED OR MISOGYNISTIC THEY ARE IN THEIR HEART OF HEARTS.
What matters is WHETHER OR NOT THEY ARE TRYING TO SUPPORT, AND EVEN ENCOURAGE THEM IN REALITY.
It is not noble or wise or a matter of intellectual honesty or thoroughness or even useful in any way what-so-ever for you to mentally wank off at us concerning just how bigoted and racist and misogynistic a person is who is ATTEMPTING TO ENSURE racism, bigotry and misogyny.
Not to mention IMPOSSIBLE, because you CANNOT READ HIS FUCKING MIND, you dumbass.
Just stop it with that shit.
Just stop.
@ aluchko: you sure have had a lot of time to do research on this subject, considering a lack of time to do research was your excuse for dodging my question. Any chance you have had a chance to do research on my question?
@TheBlackCat
I was trying to disentangle myself from the thread :)
Anyway I came to the not-libertarian conclusion when looking over his positions for an answer.
One thing that might fit is arguing against physician licensure, which, as a medical doctor, would both reduce his income and his prestige. He also would have taken some political heat from opposing the Iraq war (though he probably won out in the end).
aluchko,
Please stop with the crazy-blaming. The conflation of evil with mental illness is unfairly stigmatizing, and it misrepresents conservativess’ moral agency.
Walton,
Hey, if you’re going to play that game, paleolibertarian is even more accurate.
He was the Libertarian Party candidate for president in 1988.
He is therefore a libertarian. Libertarianism is that which libertarians do.
You and I are well aware that there is considerable diversity of views among libertarians. It is by this awareness that I see what you did there. You are either accidentally projecting onto reality the understanding of libertarianism which you last identified with, or you are deliberately still trying to do the intralibertarian culture warrior thing by arguing for the superiority of your preferred brand (or most likely some semi-deliberate mix of the two).
I don’t in principle have a problem with any of that, but I think it is dangerously misleading in this case.
But that is U.S. libertarianism! That’s what it’s about; that’s what it’s always been about.
The friendly way of putting it: anti-federalism, manifesting as a willingness to trade “big” federal power for “smaller” and “more accountable” state power has always been a feature of U.S. libertarianism. The 1972 party platform included secession, for heaven’s sake.
[brb]
You’re absolutely brutal at reading my mind so please stop trying.
Aluchko, For someone who was done here two days ago, you sure do keep coming back.
It’s like me with donuts, only more so.
Why are you still here? We’ll never agree with your inane presuppositions, so all you can do is repeat stoopidity. You can’t put up evidence to back your insipidity, and you can’t shut the fuck up. Guess where that puts you: square in liar and bullshitter land, where you have been since your first inane post….
aluchko,
That comment you quoted, #515, it wasn’t directed to you at all. It was directed to Walton. Notice how it starts with “Walton”.
#514 was for you.
A) He is
B) The fucking cult of personality of Pauls need to be shattered with a hammer. The public persona of a consistent principled smart government outsider that the oh so biased against him media has swaddled him in need to die a quick death.
Walton,
The less friendly way of putting it: secession was just as much a neo-Confederate dogwhistle in 1972 as it is today.
There’s many reasons why Barry Goldwater is recognized as one of the huge influences on U.S. libertarianism:
and one of those reasons is his white supremacist activities — his development of the Southern Strategy, his vote against the CRA 1964, and his overt racist agitation: “It may be just or wise or expedient for negro children to attend the same schools as white children, but they do not have a civil right to do so”.
Oops, well I guess that’s why the mind reading failed then :)
(to be fair a lot of people have been inaccurately speculating as to my motives, beliefs, etc)
Conservapedia articles are crazy and delusional.
The writers of conservapedia articles on the other hand are for the most part probably not mentally ill.
That being said I do see the issue with the use of the words crazy or insane stigmatizing mental illness, though it’s hard to accurately describe the irrationality of some positions without them.
That’s called the fallacy of reification.
Words, sentences, paragraphs, articles are not delusional; they are simply true or false.
Nah, it’s hard to accurately describe the irrationality of those positions with words terms like crazy or insane. Typical delusions are not anything like Austrian economics or antifederalism.
Your fellow combat thought zealotry was a pretty good word for it.
Oh, I see our Liberturd is quite persistent. If PZ is listening, perhaps a TZT incarceration?
Oh good, we need yet one more organization, like churches, which claim to represent on “coherent” set of ideals, but which, in reality, either don’t have any, have 500 different standards, or thinks they can interchange them, depending on who they are talking to, what the subject is, or whether or not it will gain them something by being for, against, or against before being for, or for, before being against, it….
How much of that is due to them being in large groups, and thus the behavior being deemed, “normal for their culture”, is something different. Need I remind you that mental illness describes **two** very different things:
1. Actual, verifiable, chemical/physical disorders, which result in the brain not working properly.
2. Behavior that is deemed abnormal, due to being self destructive, dangerous, etc., but where the behavior is ***not*** traceable to actual physical defects. By the former definition, its not “insane” to be a serial killer, a pedophile, or a wife beater, either, but such things are, never the less, defined as “mental illness”, to varying degrees of certainty, because there isn’t entire cultures full of them, or religions, or political parties, etc., and **most** people find their thinking to be delusional and/or seriously dangerous.
So.. I am not so sure there is a clear line between the, entirely disconnected from history, facts and/or reality, thinking of these people, and some sort of mental illness. Its just.. we are not supposed to insult them by calling it that…
Hmmm. I probably am projecting my own former view of what libertarianism is, to a certain extent – in particular, my past grounding in libertarian theory and philosophy, and my consequent understanding of libertarianism as an internally consistent and coherent set of principles, rather than an ill-considered set of mismatched reactionary positions. (I don’t think those principles are right, but that’s a different issue.) But it may well be that you’re right, and that my understanding of “libertarianism” is unrepresentative of what “libertarianism” actually means to most self-described libertarians.
Really, I was thinking of libertarianism as libertarian theorists understand it. Of course there’s huge diversity of thought, and little common ground, among people who could be described as libertarian theorists. But the likes of Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman, despite all their other faults (and despite their significant differences with one another), were at least for open borders, for drug legalization, and against the draft, for instance; and those positions were consistent with the principles they espoused. It’s hard for me to understand how opposition to immigration, for example, could possibly be consistent with libertarian principles as they’re understood by any major libertarian theorist. But of course this doesn’t mean you’re wrong; it may just be that “libertarianism”, as actually understood by ordinary libertarians in the real world, isn’t a coherent philosophy but rather a set of mismatched positions defined largely by tribal identity (much as “conservatism” and “liberalism” often are).
There is another reason why I’m interested in this, of course. Since I’m strongly for open borders, for drug legalization, against the draft, and so forth, I obviously have an interest in persuading libertarians that these positions are correct according to their philosophy. I don’t share their philosophy any more; but I care more about the conclusions than the reasoning, and if a particular argument gets them to the right conclusion, then I’ve succeeded. (Just as I have an interest in, say, persuading Christians that gay rights are consistent with the Bible, notwithstanding that I’m not a Christian myself and don’t see the Bible as authoritative.)