Ron Paul's useful idiots on the left

[geomancer]

https://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/jan/06/ron-paul-useful-idiots-on-the-left

Ron Paul's useful idiots on the left

Progressives who make common cause with Paul on US foreign policy ignore his stunningly reactionary views on everything else



Megan Carpentier (https://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/megan-carpentier)





guardian.co.uk (https://www.guardian.co.uk/), <time datetime="2012-01-06T16:33EST" pubdate="" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">Friday 6 January 2012 16.33 EST</time>

If you told a liberal in 2008 that progressives ought to give Republican Texas Congressman Ron Paul (https://www.guardian.co.uk/world/ronpaul) a chance because he was the most anti-war candidate on the ballot, you would have been laughed out of the room – or, more likely, the bar. But in 2012, some prominent (and white, male) progressives are arguing exactly that (https://www.salon.com/2012/01/05/progressive_beer_googles_for_ron_paul/singleton/). What's changed? Not Ron Paul, that's for certain.

He's still the same guy who thinks the US should withdraw from the WTO (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmGcaOkRsTU) and the United Nations (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legislation_sponsored_by_Ron_Paul#International_organizations), and who wants to eliminate foreign aid (https://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2011/11/foreign-aid-0) and the<a href="https://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2011/10/17/ron-pauls-economic-plan-cut-5-cabinet-agencies-cut-taxes-cut-presidents-pay" "="" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">Department of Commerce and all its trade regulation and promotion activities. But, we are told, since he advocates for a complete, immediate withdrawal from <a href="https://www.guardian.co.uk/world/afghanistan" title="More from guardian.co.uk on Afghanistan" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">Afghanistan (which military intervention, notably, he voted for), he's a better foreign policy candidate than President Obama.

And, if his newest converts are to be believed, his support for the withdrawal from Afghanistan, his impassioned pleas for a return of Americans' civil liberties from an overreaching government and his opposition to the drug war are reason enough to give the man a chance. After all, they say, President Obama has not delivered on his promises and supporters' expectations in those areas, either. But to the women, minorities and LGBT people (and their supporters) who have paid attention to Paul's record, it comes as little surprise that his most vociferous supporters on the left are pale and male … and their arguments stale.

This is the man who, to trumpet his pro-life agenda in Iowa to social conservatives, <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/12/ron-pauls-abortion-problem.html" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">released an ad that questions whether repealing Roe v Wade would eliminate women's <a href="https://www.guardian.co.uk/world/abortion" title="More from guardian.co.uk on Abortion" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">abortion rights in enough states, since it would create "abortion tourism" (a situation with which the Irish and the British are already familiar). He <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/health/2011/10/06/338285/ron-paul-greater-access-to-birth-control-makes-a-mockery-of-christians/" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">opposed the Obama administration's decision to declare birth control a preventative medicine, which pressures insurance companies to cover it without co-pays. He has said he would <a href="https://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/03/07/Ron_Paul_Supports_DOMA/" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">allow states to decide same-sex marriage rights for their citizens but keep the Defense of Marriage Act intact – which restricts federal rights, including immigration and social security survivor benefits (among others) to opposite-sex married couples.

He also <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Ron_Paul#Sexual_orientation_legislation" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">opposes the US supreme court decision in Lawrence v Texas that decriminalised consensual sodomy in the <a href="https://www.guardian.co.uk/world/usa" title="More from guardian.co.uk on United States" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">United States. He<a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/01/ron-paul-civil-rights-act_n_1178688.html" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">opposes the 1964 Civil Rights Act. He <a href="https://www.issues2000.org/tx/Ron_Paul_Immigration.htm" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">wants to restrict birthright citizenship, denying the children of immigrants legal status in the United States if they are born here, voted to force doctors and hospitals to report undocumented immigrants who seek medical treatment, and sponsored bills to declare English the official language of the United States and restrict government communications to English. And that's just for starters.

Nonetheless, there have been calls by progressives, most notably <a href="https://www.salon.com/2011/12/31/progressives_and_the_ron_paul_fallacies/singleton/" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(0, 86, 137); text-decoration: none; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; ">Glenn Greenwald, to ignore all of that and more, and focus instead on Obama's policy failings to have "an actual debate on issues of America's imperialism". He went on to argue that there are no policy priorities more imperative than those – certainly not abortion, immigration rights, LGBT equality, racial justice or any other aspect of the US's extensive foreign policy. (Greenwald, who is gay, was in the relatively privileged position of being able to travel to Brazil to circumvent Doma.) And so people whose lives, safety, livelihoods and health depend on them should accept that they are trading their concerns for, say, the lives of Muslim children killed by bombs in Afghanistan.

In fact, many of Ron Paul's newest supporters on the left look strikingly like the majority of the ones on the right who have been following him for years: the kinds of people whose lives won't be directly affected by all those pesky social conservative policies Paul would seek to enact as president, either due to their race, class, gender or sexual orientation.

And so, to the women who worry they'd be left without access to reproductive healthcare, immigrants who need to see a doctor or understand a government form (like an immigration form), African Americans who rightly wonder what this country would look like in the absence of a civil rights act, and LGBT people who would like to get married and get access to the rights straight Americans take for granted on a daily basis, all are told, again, to wait: there are more important issues to talk about, more important problems to be solved, more life-or-death situations that we're simply ignoring out of selfishness.

Seems like there's a lot of that going around.

[phredo]

"If you told a liberal in 2008 that progressives ought to give Republican Texas Congressman Ron Paul a chance because he was the most anti-war candidate on the ballot, you would have been laughed out of the room"

And rightfully so, because most of us at that time thought Obama was against war and for civil liberties. How times change!

Glenn Greenwald, in his salon article (well worth reading @ https://www.salon.com/2011/12/31/progressives_and_the_ron_paul_fallacies/singleton/ ), clearly states that he is not supporting (or opposing) Paul's candidacy, that he is rather "going to proceed to make a couple of important points about both candidacies even knowing in advance how wildly they will be distorted." He then goes on to contrast Obama and Paul's positions on many issues. I was glad to see it, because, unlike Greenwald, I had already made up my mind to vote for Paul in the primary, and it's always nice to get some validation.

Call me a "useful idiot on the left", if you like, but I cannot see why it would not be better to have Paul be the Republican candidate instead of any of the other dreadfuls. Certainly the American public would benefit by having Obama have to explain his many lapses from what he should be doing and not doing. I would try to list them, but Glenn Greenwald does it so much better, one should really read his article. The other Republican candidates are worse than Obama on most war and civil liberty points, so they would bring nothing to a debate.

What would be the downside? That Paul might win? Let's look at that by breaking it down into the several possibilities.

(1) If Paul would win but Romney, say, would not, what would that show? That people were voting for Paul because they like his positions on the "war on drugs", the growing police state, the criminal and bankrupting 9/11 wars with a new one against Syria and Iran waiting in the wings, the "war on terrorism", Palestinian rights and US policy on Israel, Bradley Manning and Wikileaks. He could try to promote his libertarian, constitutionalist schemes but would probably have a difficult time getting congressional majorities (especially that Senate filibuster-proof super-majority that Democrats kept complaining about). On the other hand, as chief executive, he could stop waging undeclared wars, stop prosecuting the war on drugs, declare Bradley Manning a national hero, and stop bailing out banks, all of which he says he would do. Perhaps not such a bad deal, especially if you are on the receiving end of some of those wars and incarcerations.

(2) If Romney would win but Paul would not, then you get someone who is worse than Obama on almost all counts, and we would have had no discussion of the above topics, except by Obama and an "opposing" candidate who opposes only in that he would accuse Obama of not dong enough bad things.

(3) If Obama wins against either of them, then wouldn't it have been better if Paul had been the opposing candidate who brought up all the issues?

It might make some "progressives" feel smug and justified in voting for Obama to hear him criticized for not doing enough of the wrong things by a Romney or Gingrich, but it would be better for all of us and the country if he is brought to task by someone on the right side of those issues. I probably wouldn't vote for Paul for President, although I'm reserving judgment on that. I voted for McKinney last time; I certainly won't vote for Obama; I probably will vote for the best sounding leftist this time; and I'm voting for Paul in the Republican primary. I don't know how the rules work -- I'm hoping I won't have to register Republican, but if that's what it takes, I'll do it.