Ron Paul – Many things OK, but Not President
“Ron Paul: The GOP’s Henry Wallace”
However, the first responsibility of any government is to protect the security of its citizenry and it is here that I have issues with Rep. Paul.
Ron Paul
That is why I decided to run this article b y Spyridon Mitsotakis from Big Peace.
I don’t agree with all of it, including the gratuitous attack on the John Birch Society, but it makes some important points that Mr. Paul’s highly honorable supporters should stop to consider.
The conspiracy-minded John Birch Society, long ago expelled from the conservative movement by Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley, Jr., is abuzz over Congressman Ron Paul’s “Blame America First” performance at Thursday night’s Republican presidential debate.
Oddly, it was Paul’s bizarre assessment of a nuclear Iran that impressed Birchers—and his many devoted supporters. “Just think of how many nuclear weapons surround Iran,” said Paul. “The Chinese are there. The Indians are there. The Pakistanis are there. The Israelis are there. The United States is there. All these countries … Why wouldn’t it be natural if they might want a weapon? Internationally, they might be given more respect. Why should we write people off?”
After arguing for Iran—the world’s leading terror state for 30 years and counting—to have nukes, Paul next implored America to negotiate with these terrorists, citing examples from the Cold War, invoking Eisenhower in the 1950s and Reagan in the 1980s: “In the fifties, we at least talked to them [the Soviets]. At least our leaders and Reagan talked to the Soviets. What’s so terribly bad about this? And countries you put sanctions on you are more likely to fight them. I say a policy of peace is free trade, stay out of their internal business, don’t get involved in these wars and just bring our troops home.”
This distain for strong action against America’s enemies is nothing new for Ron Paul. A few months ago, he was asked his reaction to the elimination of Osama Bin Laden. His response? He stated that the Navy SEAL raid on Bin Laden’s hideout in Pakistan “was absolutely not necessary.” Why? Because of the violation (alleged) of Pakistani sovereignty. Paul asked rhetorically ”What if he [Osama] had been in a hotel in London?”
Of course, Thursday was hardly the first time the libertarian congressman went out of his way to make excuses for America’s enemies, or blame America first. In 2007, when asked by Tim Russert, “How have we, the United States, provoked al-Qaeda?” Paul responded: “Well, read what the lead—the ringleader says. Read what Osama bin Laden said. We had, we had a base, you know, in Saudi Arabia that was an affront to their religion, that was blasphemy as far as they were concerned.”
Funny that Congressman Paul fancies himself a new Ronald Reagan, because it was Reagan’s pro-military investments which made the Bin Laden raid possible, plus much more. In fact, when Russert asked Dr. Paul about a 1988 statement made by Paul against Reagan, when Paul had proclaimed, “I want to totally disassociate myself from the Reagan administration,” the congressman didn’t back off. Paul declared Reagan had been “a failure.”
It is distressing to see such silliness having an appeal, especially among many college students, but, alas, it does.
And yet, in an ironic twist of fate, what we as Republicans are experiencing has happened before, but it happened to Democrats. The Democrats of the post-war 1940s had to deal with their own version of Ron Paul: Henry Wallace.
Henry Wallace
Like Dr. Paul, Wallace was a man of many great ideas. He was, in the words of Cold War historian Ronald Radosh, “an agricultural genius—a man who believed in the concept of scientific agriculture, and in the diligent agronomic use of statistical research; and in the diligent agronomic use of statistical research; and a scientist whose own research led him to develop and spread the process of hybrid corn—a process that revolutionized the yield of corn and led to an agricultural revolution.” In short, agriculture was to Wallace what monetary policy is to Paul.
Wallace served as secretary of agriculture and later vice president in the Roosevelt administration; that is, he did so until his weirdness and remarkable reverence for Stalin’s Soviet Union prompted FDR to switch him with Harry Truman in the 1944 election, making Wallace his secretary of commerce.
After FDR died, the new president, Truman, kept Wallace as secretary of commerce. With the war over, however, Wallace found himself in a tough spot. Troubled by the onset of the Cold War, he was driven to speak out on September 1946, and denounce the new threat to world peace: that is, the threat posed by America and Truman to that amiable peacenik Joe Stalin. Shortly thereafter, Wallace was removed from his position.
Importantly, Wallace was far from finished. Like Ron Paul, Wallace steadily denounced American foreign policy, as pursued by both Democrats and Republicans—and he pursued the presidency. Like Ron Paul, Wallace would not let those World War III seeking “Imperialists” working in the interests of “British Colonialism” get off easy. (For Paul today, replace the words “Imperialists” with “Neo-cons” and “British Colonialism” with “Israel.”) And when Stalin would do something unpleasant, such as take over Czechoslovakia in February of 1948, Wallace would explain that it was Truman’s fault. Wallace blamed America first, in spite of the blatantly aggressive actions of an obvious external enemy.
Thus, Wallace and some of his old friends from the Department of Agriculture started their own version of Paul’s “Campaign for Liberty.” They called themselves “Progressive Citizens of America.” Wallace’s supporters believed that the U.S. government was behind a conspiracy to create worldwide crises in order to subvert and dominate other nations for American imperial purposes. They insisted that “innocent” people, like Alger Hiss, were being unjustly persecuted. This group later morphed into the Progressive Party, from which Wallace would challange Truman for the presidency in 1948.
In 1948, presidential candidate Wallace proclaimed: “There is no real fight between a Truman and a Republican. Both stand for a policy which opens the door to war in our lifetime and makes war certain for our children. … The American people read of the fantastic appropriations that are being made for military adventures in Greece, Turkey, China—and billions for armaments here at home. … Two years ago I denounced those who were talking up World War III as criminals. Of course, the bulk of our people are not criminals, but it is possible for a little handful of warmongers to stampede them.”
And with his comrades, men like Harry Magdoff, Victor Perlo, and Charles Kramer, Wallace set out to win the presidency in 1948. His comrades failed to disclose to Wallace their other names, to wit: KANT (Magdoff), RAIDER (Perlo), and PLUMB (Kramer)—their code names as Soviet agents.
If it isn’t obvious by now, what had happened was that Wallace had been duped, and much to most of his party was controlled or influenced by the Communist Party. It took Wallace two more years after suffering a humiliating defeat in that election, and watching as the so-called Progressive Party backed the communists against American troops in Korea, for him to realize what was going on, whereby he denounced his own party and resigned.
But the impact of that campaign went far beyond its time. In a review on the back cover of a first edition copy of Curtis Macdougall’s ”Gideon’s Army,” a KGB-published book (1965) about the Progressive Party, radical left-wing academic Staughton Lynd wrote: “There might have been no Bay of Pigs, no Vietnam, no Santo Domingo if the ideas of the third party of 1948 had prevailed … those ideas of 1948 are alive today.” Just as Ron Paul, when asked by Tim Russert, “Under President Paul, if North Korea invaded South Korea, would we respond?” Paul promised he would not have. “Why should we unless the Congress declared war?” responded Paul. “I mean, why are we there? South Korea, they’re begging and pleading to unify their country, and we get in their way. They want to build bridges and go back and forth. Vietnam, we left under the worst of circumstances. The country is unified. They have become Westernized. We trade with them. Their president comes here. And Korea, we stayed there and look at the mess.”
Needless to say, Ron Paul’s commendable embrace of free-market principles in no way makes him sympathetic to Soviet communism, as was the case for Henry Wallace. Ron Paul is obviously not pro-Soviet or pro-communist—quite the contrary. The commonality is each man’s breathtakingly bad positions on foreign policy and America’s enemies. And unfortunately for Ron Paul, it will be that twisted view of foreign policy that forever keeps him from his party’s nomination and the White House—just as it did Henry Wallace.
What good is sound money and an honored constitution, if your country is a smoking rubble?
To survive and prosper America needs sound money, a return to Constitutional disciplines and the best defense systems and military the country can afford.
Two out of three just ain’t enough.
Danger: Ron Paul’s Naive Views on Iran and Cuba
Rep. Paul, who is excellent on many other issues, reveals both a shocking naivety regarding Cuba and Iran, and a deep misunderstanding of the principles of free trade, when applied to belligerent nations.
Florida Rep. Allen West has a much better grasp of these issues.
Ron Paul for Secretary of the Treasury. Allen West for Secretary of Defense or Commander-in-Chief.
“Why is Russian TV Backing Ron Paul?”
During a time when Ron Paul supporters are complaining, with some justification, about the major media not giving their candidate’s success in Iowa enough attention, the Texas congressman is getting enormously favorable coverage from a foreign propaganda outlet—Russia Today television.
One of Paul’s leading supporters in the media, if the term “media” is broadly defined, is Adam Kokesh, host of a show, “Adam Vs. The Man,” on Moscow’s English-language channel. On Monday, Kokesh used his show, which reaches many U.S. cities, to complain about the American media not giving Paul more favorable coverage, attacking the newspaper Politico for ignoring Paul’s second-place finish in a headline over a story about the results.
Kokesh uses disparaging language when referring to other Republicans, such as calling Rick Santorum “a homophobic theocrat” and Rick Perry a “Ken doll.” He regularly attacks the “corporate media” in the U.S. without criticizing the Moscow regime that pays his salary.
Commentators have typically described Paul’s second place finish in the Iowa straw poll as the result of “college kids” supporting him. AIM has noted the major media’s reluctance to credit Paul for his success in presidential primaries.
But the advent of Russia Today (RT) television, which has been accused of serving as a vehicle for Russia’s intelligence services, puts the question of media coverage of the campaign in a new context—one of foreign interference in U.S. politics. The channel is carried in the Washington, D.C. media market by MHz Networks, a subsidiary of Commonwealth Public Broadcasting, which receives $3 million a year from federal and state governments.
Several websites feature a series of videos from RT, not limited to the Kokesh program, that are extremely favorable to Paul’s campaign. The channel features attractive female anchors who speak flawless English and claim to have America’s best interests at heart. Many observers agree the channel is far more effective than the heavy-handed Soviet propaganda of the Cold War years.
But RT has been such an enthusiastic supporter of the Paul campaign that some observers think the channel, which is registered as a foreign corporation in the U.S., has violated U.S. election law. Foreign corporations are prohibited from “contributing, donating or spending funds in connection with any federal, state, or local election in the United States, either directly or indirectly,” according to the Federal Election Commission.
On June 6, 2011, Kokesh ended his show with remarks that go beyond merely reporting the news to endorsing Paul and highlighting a “money bomb” and fundraising for him. The transcript reads as follows:
“Kokesh: I’d like to end tonight on a note of some good news. We have some good news from the front lines of the Ron Paul “LOVEalution” with our money bomb on June 5. I was happy to donate to that. Yesterday we raised over one million dollars for the Ron Paul campaign. And I’m starting to figure out what electable means, because electable or non-electable is really a code word for ‘if this person wins, I’m not gonna be able to get as much money from the government.’ But if you want electable, please support the reelection campaign of President Barack Obama. If you want a President who’s going to honor his oath to the Constitution and your freedom; I urge you to support none other than Congressman Ron Paul.”
Kokesh publicly endorsed Paul, saying, “I urge you to support none other than Congressman Ron Paul,” and mentioned that he was “happy to donate to that [Ron Paul money bomb].”
A disgruntled U.S. Marine veteran who openly acknowledges his current role as a paid agent of Moscow, Kokesh says his program is an example of “libertarian television.” He has been backing Paul—and Paul’s organization has supported him—since Kokesh unsuccessfully ran for the Congress in New Mexico in 2010.
But Tim Sumner of 9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America said Kokesh is masquerading as a conservative-libertarian in order to lure viewers into accepting a far-left agenda. Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin called Kokesh a “smear merchant” who wears “GOP clothing.”
Nevertheless, Kokesh continues to advertise himself as a Republican supporter of Ron Paul. “Ron Paul trampled the competition with logic and reason at the Ames debate,” Kokesh insists. During the debate, Paul said he would not object to Iran getting nuclear weapons and called for trade relations with Communist Cuba. Paul also complained about “war propaganda” designed to lay the groundwork for military action against Iran.
“Rep. Paul, who is excellent on many other issues, reveals both a shocking naïveté regarding Cuba and Iran, and a deep misunderstanding of the principles of free trade, when applied to belligerent nations,” countered anti-communist blogger Trevor Loudon, a prominent critic of Russia Today.
On the Big Peace website, writer and researcher Spyridon Mitsotakis called Paul the Republican Party’s Henry Wallace, a reference to the Democrat considered so naïve about the communist threat that he ran for president on the ticket of the Progressive Party, which was dominated and manipulated by the Communist Party.
Some political observers think Paul’s campaign has the potential to undermine the Republican Party as it goes into the 2012 campaign and help guarantee Obama’s re-election. Conservative columnist Douglas MacKinnon says, “I spoke recently with a senior Democrat strategist who offered up a quite logical and incredibly frightening scenario for those who are desperate to vote Barack Obama out of office in 2012. His theory goes like this: That the Obama White House and the Obama re-election team are going to work overtime behind the scenes to push enough of Texas Republican Ron Paul’s ‘libertarian’ buttons to eventually have him declare as a third-party candidate.”
This theory holds that Paul could attract enough votes away from potential Republican voters to throw the election to Obama.
Russia Today Complains About Ron Paul Media Treatment
There is no doubt that Moscow backed propaganda station Russia Today, is correct in their allegation that Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul does not get fair treatment from the US “mainstream media.”
But then, what GOP candidate does?
The interesting question is, why does Russia Today champion Ron Paul, but not more sound national security candidates like Michele Bachmann or Rick Santorum?
