--- In cp3@yahoogroups.com, "mikelericz" <mikelericz@...> wrote:

Ron Paul a Racist?
Monday, May 21, 2007 - FreeMarketNews.com


The mainstream media has ignored the Ron Paul (R-TX) presidential
campaign and cast the eight-term congressman as a "kook." Now the
media may provide a platform for those who dredge up a smattering of
texts that Paul has personally disavowed, according to those close to
his campaign.

"Paul is no racist," says one source. "He's been in the public
spotlight for years. Wouldn't someone have noticed? They had to go
back to the early 1990s to find something – and he's explained that
he was not aware of what was going out under his name and publicly
disavowed it. They're desperate and willing to try anything before he
gains more momentum."

Nonetheless, Ron Paul's past writings on race are catching flak from
right & left, according to the USA Today OnPolitics website:

Some things published in the past under the name of Rep. Ron Paul, R-
Texas, especially about blacks, are getting renewed attention from
bloggers on the left and right now that he's made something of a name
for himself after his performances in the first two Republican
presidential debates. From the right, Flopping Aces says
Paul "appears to have had a few racist viewpoints." From the left,
Daily Kos calls him "a vicious, contemptible racist who comforts the
radical right wing like no presidential candidate since David Duke."

Getting much attention: A 1996 Houston Chronicle story that says a
newsletter Paul published in the early 1990s "highlighted portrayals
of blacks as inclined toward crime and lacking sense about top
political issues." That newsletter was called the Ron Paul Political
Report, and according to Kos, Paul told Texas Monthly magazine in
October 2001 that "I could never say this in the campaign, but those
words weren't really written by me. ... It wasn't my language at
all." Kos points out, though, that the newsletter was eight pages
long and "whether he employed other writers or not, it beggars belief
that Paul would not have had full control and approval over its
contents."

http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2007/05/ron_pauls_past_.html

Ron Paul's own words on racism, circa 2002, are perhaps his own best
rebuttal, according to sources close to the campaign:

"The true antidote to racism is liberty. Liberty means having a
limited, constitutional government devoted to the protection of
individual rights rather than group claims. Liberty means free-market
capitalism, which rewards individual achievement and competence, not
skin color, gender, or ethnicity. In a free market, businesses that
discriminate lose customers, goodwill, and valuable employees – while
rational businesses flourish by choosing the most qualified employees
and selling to all willing buyers. More importantly, in a free
society every citizen gains a sense of himself as an individual,
rather than developing a group or victim mentality. This leads to a
sense of individual responsibility and personal pride, making skin
color irrelevant. Rather than looking to government to correct what
is essentially a sin of the heart, we should understand that reducing
racism requires a shift from group thinking to an emphasis on
individualism."

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul68.html

Sources close to the campaign point out that Paul's message is one of
liberty and individual achievement divorced from government giveaways
and self-worth-sapping programs. These sources add that for Paul to
espouse racism - the idea that one's physical characteristics are
more important than his or her abilities and promise - he would have
to run counter to the conservative libertarian philosophy that he
espoused during a previous campaign for president as libertarian
candidate.

Ron Paul's message, articles and dozens of major speeches on the
floor of the U.S. House of Representatives clearly portray his
beliefs and perspectives. None of them are racist. None of them
contain racist imagery. They deal with taxation, the federal reserve
and focus on attempts to constrain the power and abuses of the
federal government.

http://www.freemarketnews.com

--- End forwarded message ---