Gay Survivalists of Rapetown
Jamie Kirchick has released his long talked about piece on Ron Paul. Apparently everyone in Washington was reading it and so it was difficult to get to TNR’s server. Just a few interesting notes. The piece is titled "Angry White Man," which is odd because that is also the title of an old Washington City Paper profile of the paleo-conservative and racialist theorist Sam Francis.
Kirchick focuses on offensive things that appeared in various Ron Paul newsletters in the 80s and 90s. Apparently there was such a thing called "The Ron Paul Survival Report"- (I’m trying to imagine other congressmen giving their names to something like that: The Jerry Nadler Survival Report perhaps?)
My immediate thoughts are these: Shouldn’t it be "Avuncular White Man"? Paul can get worked up about sound money, or the military industrial complex, but I don’t see him all that angry, ever. I interviewed the man for over an hour and I didn’t get a whiff of gunpowder from him. Talcum powder, maybe. After preparing us for an absolutely devastating indictment Kirchick ends his piece with a really lame charge.
Maybe such outbursts mean Ron Paul really is a straight-talker. Or maybe they just mean he is a man filled with hate.
Uh… maybe I’m bored already. Can we go back to the part where someone (Kirchick gives us no clue who) called New York City Rapetown?
The indispensable Dave Weigel reports Paul’s response in which he gives MLK and Rosa Parks the goldbug hug.
Also noteworthy DC gays love Dr. No. Berin Szoka writes:
You hear that? Gayest slate ever!The richest irony is that the Ron Paul grassroots campaign in Washington, DC—Jamie’s hometown—has found its earliest and strongest supporters in DC’s gay community. It would not surprise me if our slate of delegate and alternate delegate candidates for Ron Paul is the gayest slate in DC (measured by number of gay individuals—not gayness of individuals), very probably the gayest slate in DC ever
There is a reason Ron Paul attracts Stormfront, David Duke, UFO-ologists, Gold Bugs, conspiracy theorists (Paul believes the Mossad was behind the 1993 WTC attack) and of course, the anti-Semites.
People unable to apprehend reality substitute conspiracy theories for the obvious. Nineteen Muslim men fly planes into buildings, and the problem is not Islamic Jihad but “the Jews” and Neo Cons. Something the CIA did fifty years ago.
Ron Paul is a lunatic, racist, and disgraceful figure on the American Political Scene.
That being said, there is a great deal of anger, by middle and working class people, mostly white, over a variety of issues. Illegal immigration (which is not Ron Paul’s issue — instead “blaming Jews for the Iraq War” is his issue). Cultural degradation and erosion — “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas,” and permitting/celebrating Eid, or any other holiday in the public square (buildings in NYC were lit green for Eid) but forbidding any creche or other overtly Christian symbolism in the public square.
Consider Teddy/McCain’s Amnesty bill. Every elite wanted it but it was killed, TWICE, by public outrage. The same thing goes for the war on Christmas, and so on. These are things Ron Paul doesn’t care about, nor his lunatic followers. But have a lot of traction. Senators were overwhelmed by the calls, faxes, letters, emails, and so on about Illegal Immigration. Even McCain had to back down. Maverick himself!
If Ron Paul has the “gayest” slate among the Candidates, that alone should cement him as outside the mainstream. Considering that gays make up a tiny percentage of the population (more like 3-5% of men instead of 10%). And that straight men are unsurprisingly hostile to gay interests. Given that they are mutually exclusive interests — i.e. gays can only “win” in their interests if straight men “lose.”
Having a lot of gay supporters of course does not make one an “anti-straight” bigot. It does cement him as being politically on the fringe (given the mutual exclusive nature of gay-straight interests). But it does not mean he’s not a bigot either.
Given Paul’s view that “the Jews” were behind the 1993 WTC bombing I’d say that alone cements him as an anti-Semitic bigot unworthy of any public attention in politics.
— Jim Rockford · Jan 9, 01:22 AM · #
Dunno Jim, I’m mostly interested in women. Not sure how teh gays will interfere with that.
— Justin · Jan 9, 03:37 AM · #