printMy new, WND.COM column is “Ron Paul: Stand Tall For Middle America.” Here’s an excerpt:
“Terrible,” “tricky” and “a phony”: Who was the incorrigible racist who thus described Martin Luther King Jr.? Was it the unknown author of the politically improper newsletters published under Rep. Ron Paul’s name during the 1980s and 1990s?
Not quite.
Those were the words of the nation’s most engaging first lady, Jacqueline Kennedy.
Audio recordings of Mrs. Kennedy’s historic 1964 conversations on life with John F. Kennedy were released in September of 2011. Conducted with the late historian Arthur Schlesinger—and delivered in her hallmark dulcet lilt and exquisite diction—the exchanges reveal Jackie as a dazzling conversationalist, and a forceful, thoughtful persona.
This Jacky O held a low opinion of MLK, the man America has since deified, and was unafraid to say as much.
There were many reasons not racist for which to dislike MLK, not least of them was the man’s dalliance with communists. “His associations with communists” is why Jacky’s husband, hero of Chris Matthews’ latest book, ordered the wiretaps on King.
Mrs. Kennedy’s brother-in-law, Robert Kennedy—recounts Patrick J. Buchanan in his towering “Suicide of a Superpower”—“saw to it that the FBI carried out the order.” Among his other endearing qualities, the not-so enchanting Martin Luther King had “declared that the Goldwater campaign bore ‘dangerous signs of Hitlerism.”
Indisputably, MLK set the tone for “assailing America as irredeemably racist” forever after. Other brothers have built on MLK’s work to sculpt careers as professional race hustlers.
Faithful to this legacy, the media monolith has been fulminating over the reference in the Ron Paul newsletters to …” MORE in “Ron Paul: Stand Tall For Middle America.”
My book, “Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa,” is available from Amazon. (Don’t forget those reviews; they help this cause.)
A Kindle copy is also on sale.
Still better, shipping is free and prompt if you purchase Into the Cannibal’s Pot from The Publisher.
UPDATE I: IN THIS COLUMN I was trying hard to show how everyone, Paul too, twists into pretzels in order to blame … white, liberal politicians for the problems in the black community. It’s the explanation du jour: Democrats corrupted the black community. The Democrats ate my homework. Nothing, not even hags like Pelosi, can explain away the facts in my column.
But bad habits die hard. Our Myron writes:
There are 500,000 blacks in federal prison for non-violent drug offenses that would be free if that “racist” [Ron Paul] had his way! And there would likely be less “real crime” (against people and property) without the idiotically distorted economy created by the War on Drugs and anti-business regulations.
I oppose the war on drugs, always have. But unlike the libertine perspective that I believe Myron echoes, I have no delusions about the drug dealer. He is NOT a productive member of society, who has been corrupted by politicians. He is unlikely to become a productive member of society once drugs are legalized. If anything, the dealer is more likely a low-life looking for a way to make a living that involves no graft.
On the heels of legalization, the price of drugs will drops as the price is “pushed up by the high costs of circumventing the law as well as by the reduced supply brought on by prohibition.” Once the price of drugs drops, do you think, Myron, that the hoodlums that we’ve just released will open up a mom and pop store supplying medical marijuana to the needy at the new, lower prices?
Our hoodlum will go in search of other sources of easy, no-graft cash. Upward mobility for the drug dealers is the next most lucrative contraband that will yield maximum profit with minimum effort.
UPDATE II: As an addiction expert explained to me, many cocaine or heroine recreational users work, are productive, and manage to keep their use under control. It is no one’s business what they do in private, so long as they perform the jobs for which they are hired and do not aggress against others.
I have distinguished the user from the dealer; and the recreational user from the addict. Naturally, none of these people should be arrested, except for property or other crimes perpetrated (for instance, if a used needle was tossed in a park, and someone was stuck and became ill; nab the user for harm done). However, don’t expect a good “career” outcome, post legalization, for the career dealer in the hood. Pimping and stealing will likely be his next “career” options. It is one thing to be pro-legalization on the grounds that an individual owns his body. It is quite another to fantasize about human nature. Were I Paul, I would follow up wishy-washy exhortation to legalize drugs with promises to enforce the law against property crimes and other spillover effects that may accompany the loss of an easy buck.
UPDATE III: Loser Libertarian Lunges At Lew Rockwell. Some loser writes (ungrammatically) on the Daily Paul, no less: “Lew Rockwell ‘may have’ wrote racist newsletters! research this for yourself!”
The corollary of my latest column is that only the obsequious lick-spittle toadies among us libertarians are going to use this mainstream argument to launch a witch hunt against other libertarians. The “Lite” variety of libertarian will relish the ideologically confused in-fighting, for he is indistinguishable from the Left in may ways.
UPDATE IV: Via LRC.COM. Robin Williams’ quips are not “racist”; in the context, they were realistic:
UPDATE V (Dec. 31): RAPE IN NORWAY IS AN IMPORTED AFFAIR.
UPDATE VI: DJ: What the Norwegian officer says is not unreasonable; you don’t want individuals to be stigmatized. At the same time, you’d like these Norwegian girls to be forewarned by their elders to watch out for themselves. You would never find American law-enforcement officers making such an honest admission. Should you, do send it along … before the officer is fired. Europe is way ahead of the US in exposing the unhappy cult of multiculturalism.
Ron Paul was asked on Leno to name his favorite President and he named my man Grover Cleveland (also a hero to Jim Ostrowski) – who used the slogan “we love him for the enemies he has made” as an 1884 rallying cry:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F3091FFE3E5B13738DDDAD0A94DE405B838DF1D3
I have been responding to Jews for Ron Paul to answer some of the calumnies that are just beginning from Fox News, the New York Times, etc. No leftist is racist to the Times and no rightist is racist to Fox News but an “out of mainstream” thinker like Ron Paul …
I just saw today some anti-Paul blogger claiming that his supporters are
leftist Moslem dope-smokers (I never knew I was a leftist Moslem dope-smoker!). Soon it will be that Ron Paul INVENTED THE BUBONIC PLAGUE just to smear Jews and sickle-cell anemia to kill blacks, wrote the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, was a General in the Gestapo before inventing Apartheid, etc…
There are 500,000 blacks in federal prison for non-violent drug offenses that would be free if that “racist” had his way! And there would likely be less “real crime” (against people and property) without the idiotically distorted economy created by the War on Drugs and anti-business regulations.
I agree the “low life” you use as an example will find some low-life, criminal lifestyle even if drugs are legalized. But if drugs are legalized, the millions of harmless weed smokers currently in jail (they’re not all stereotypical “stoners”) will be free to contribute to society. Not to mention all the people getting killed in crossfires in Mexico, Colombia, Peru, et. al.
[Indeed. See post update.]
100 years ago, immigrants could grab a pushcart and start a “business” – nowadays, it costs $ 1 million to get permission to operate a cab in Bloomberg’s New York…. Also, the rate of out-of-wedlock children has skyrocketed as the welfare state has expanded (this affects whites too but blacks the most) … and the enormous profitability of drugs drives the ghetto economies.
I am sure there would be drunks, addicts, and criminals but perhaps with more stable families, repeal of anti-opportunity laws – things would be a bit better. “Crime” and “booze wars” dropped when Prohibition ended although alcohol use increased – but does the current course of Welfare-Jail-Regulations (like minimum wages laws..) make things better or worse? Some people will always fail but it doesn’t have to be half the population..
Replacing government run schools might also help.
There is plenty of blame to be heaped on the state for encouraging certain behaviors. However, at some point personal responsibility must come into play. There are many who make the personal decision not to enter the life of crime to rise to better economic and social circumstances. One of the few things that the old Baltimore school system (elementary school) taught me was personal responsibility. I know that isn’t the norm today. In all honesty I have an easier time with old Flip Wilson’s comedic line “The devil made me do it” than the state or society. I know you just made the last statement to make a point as I highly doubt that you buy into the social determinism doctrine. In order to maintain personal property, defend it, and maintain liberty individual or personal responsibility is required.
Post prohibition history should give us a pretty good clue about what drug dealers and those higher up the illegal drug industry food chain would do once illegal drugs were legalized.
Many people seem to be blaming ‘the State’, ‘welfare’, ‘the democrats’ for everything that afflicts the black community.
One could conclude there was some semi-idyllic world before the rise of the State, when blacks formed stable families, mostly held jobs and did not commit crime at the actual (appalling) rate.
I’m not a sociologist nor a historian, I wouldn’t now. I ask for enlightenment.
“when blacks formed stable families, mostly held jobs and did not commit crime at the actual (appalling) rate.” Yes and no. The blacks in the large cities have always had high crime rates, so have Irish, Poles, Hispanics. Cities are havens for criminals. When you get into the rural areas of the country one finds a different standard of neighbors and neighbors. When in New Mexico, I found that many criminals left the small towns to join with the criminals in the big cities, locals of all races know their criminals and push them out. Small town Blacks and Hispanics are usually stable family members with jobs. Speaking of theft and assault that is, drugs are everywhere; mostly because they are tax free.
[Nice but a little naive, RG. The kind of lessons that if imparted to the young, could end up in THIS.]
Well, with regard to the morals of your average drug-dealer, I remember the late Mike Royko use to say that [paraphrase] “in the ghetto, a job’s a job.” As drug-dealers, they are just supplying the needs and desires of others and that’s what the free-market is all about. I can understand harshly judging a drug-dealer for what he does, but judging him for what he might actually be smacks too much of the Dept. of Pre-Crime.
[And this comment smacks of a profound misunderstanding of libertarianism. From conceding that individuals have a right to engage in certain odious behaviors it does not follow that these behaviors should be endorsed morally, although the left-libertarian seems to get confused that way.–IM].
The Robin Williams segment on Johnny Carson was hysterically funny. Today he couldn’t get away with that on television. How far we have fallen.
Thanks for posting the Norway video Ilana, I found it very informative. I must say however, that I found the police spokesperson at the end of the video warning that the statistic shouldn’t be a “stigma” just made me shake my head. I suppose I am a bit naive in that I had hoped that political correctness was more of a trait in the insane asylum that is the USA. It is not encouraging whatsoever to know that the rest of the world is ruled by fools as well.
[See post update.]
The wife of a friend of mine and other nurses in Brussels were raped by some men from the Congo – the authorities did not want to do anything about it. As Derek and Sam Francis pointed out, we are sliding to anarcho-tyranny (lack of enforcement of law protecting life/liberty/property combined with aggressive enforcement of laws against liberty and property).
Today’s Washington Post now had a political cartoon with Ron Paul in a Klan outfit – although the “newsletters” were more “insensitive” and sophomoric than “racist” and are completely not written in Paul’s writing style – the mainstream media is having their field day. I predicted this but figured that they would do it AFTER Iowa.
I agree with you that inter-libertarian jihads (over the newsletters) will serve no real purpose and will only help the statists.
“RP in a KKK outfit”. Excellente. Right now RP not doing so well in the Old South, where they think conservative=waving Old Glory and attacking Iran (ie, Gingrich). This sort of stuff from Yankeedom, tho, will play right into his hands. Go to it, WaPo, NYT, et al.