On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, Jamie Kirchick told Tucker Carlson that he has a newsletter which contains evidence of long-held racist ties to Ron Paul. He also claimed that Ron Paul uses stumps and interviews to send secret messages to white supremacists in a “code” that only they can decipher. The hit piece was an old story. The conspiracy theory about was new. David Frum drew some obnoxious conclusions from this. Here they are:
“Jamie Kirchik quotes at length from old Ron Paul newsletters, revealing him to be a racist, anti-semitic, paranoid crank. And here is Reason.com shocked, shocked, shocked; Andrew Sullivan shocked, shocked, shocked; and here, refreshingly, is Lew Rockwell undaunted. (If there is any poor sap out there who doubts that the newsletters reflect the core values of the Paul movement, I recommend a visit to the library for a reading of Lew Rockwell's newsletter from the 1990s. Lew Rockwell served as Ron Paul's chief of staff from 1978 to 1982 and has continued as his chief supporter in the blogosphere.)”
Calm down, sport. First, no one sounded “shocked”, certainly not enough to say it three times each. Reason writer Matt Welch actually said the movement goes forward. Andrew Sullivan said he’s glad that Paul disavows it, but he hasn’t gotten over it yet (It took me a while too, but that was several months ago). Frum quickly descended into a criticism of the “core values” of the entire Paul movement. As proof, he cited Lew Rockwell. Right. Because the years Ron Paul has spent promoting liberty, peace, and prosperity are not the core values of his campaign, but some obscure writing by Lew Rockwell is. Michael Moore would be proud.
But here’s the doozy:
“All I can say is that I am surprised that anyone is surprised. I thought political writers were supposed to do at least a little bit of research before they pledged their enthusiasm to a candidate? The particulars on Ron Paul have been available to anyone who cared to know them for years. Who was it who said that there is a moral obligation not to be stupid?”
Maybe Frum is right. Political writers who endorse candidates, aside from listening carefully to their platform, should probably learn more about their background. But if that is true shouldn’t the political writers who dissent be just as accurate in their criticisms? Accuracy about Paul, has not been one of Frum’s strong points.
When Ron Paul supporters asked Frum why he has a beef with Paul, Frum complained about the gold standard. However Paul doesn’t actually advocate a return to the gold standard as even a cursory review of his platform would demonstrate. Worse, if Frum has been privy to this information for a long time, why did he choose to complain about gold? One would think that he would have a bigger beef with Paul being a “racist, anti-semitic, paranoid crank”. Maybe Frum feels that the gold standard is a bigger threat to United States than a xenophobic president. Or perhaps Frum never really heard these particulars which have “been available to anyone who cared to know…for years”. At any rate, the standard ought to apply to everyone.
Also, Frum ought to argue better before he calls Andrew Sullivan “stupid”. Sullivan can string a line of rhetoric together without offending basic rules of Boolean logic. I have never seen him resort to hysterical, uncharitable disparages. Oh, and he didn’t predict the Iraq War would go swimmingly, did he?
Of course, Frum’s hysteria is understandable. Having written the “axis of evil” speech and being Giuliani’s foreign policy advisor, Frum would practically have the job of his choice in a Giuliani administration. Since Giuliani only squeaked past Paul in New Hampshire and lost badly to him in Iowa, the curtain is closing on Frum’s BFF. Considering that Paul started at 0% to climb to the same percentage Giuliani dropped 30% to get to, Frum has got to be upset. I would be upset too. I wouldn’t be dishonest about it and I wouldn’t pretend that my opponent needs to rehash the same, tired story about racism. But I would definitely be upset.
