Libertarian Southern Strategy
by digby
I don’t know whether or not Rand Paul is personally a racist. But it is a little curious that he’s so darned popular among white supremacists. I guess you can’t help who supports you, but it does raise questions about why these extremists find him and his father so attractive. Until you read this about daddy Paul:
The letters published between Paul’s first run for president and his return to Congress in 1996 are another story—replete with claims that Martin Luther King “seduced underage girls and boys,” that black protesters should gather “at a food stamp bureau or a crack house” rather than the Statue of Liberty, and that AIDS sufferers “enjoy the attention and pity that comes with being sick.”
I guess it’s not much of a mystery, is it? In looking for that little snippet, I came across this question from LA Times libertarian blogger, written at the time of those revelations:
[I]t’s weird that a philosophy of non-aggression, ownership of self and property, individual choice, free trade and so on is so attractive to people whose greatest passion is arguing that Abraham Lincoln was the foulest butcher in American history, that black people are stupider than white people, that Mexicans are naturally inclined to favor a welfare state, that our culture is being undermined by the feminization of boys, and so on. Folks of this stripe are present in not-inconsequential numbers in both small-l and big-L libertarianism. I can understand why drag queens, pot smokers, gun lovers and entrepreneurs are libertarians. I comprehend why localist, traditionalist, Chestertonian Christian types gravitate toward the movement. But why are Confederate apologists attracted to a philosophy that draws so much of its thinking from either abolitionists (Lysander Spooner, Robert Green Ingersoll, Henry David Thoreau and others) or market-based freedom types (Adam Smith, J.S. Mill, etc.)? Why is Lincoln — whose one-liner “As I would not be a slave so I would not be a master” could easily be the motto of the Libertarian party — not given the same warts-and-all historical courtesy that is extended to Thomas Jefferson? Why does Woodrow Wilson’s support for Jim Crow laws not get more attention among the many other particulars that cause libertarians to view him (rightly in my view) as the worst president of the twentieth century? Why the fascination with how different ethnic groups score on standardized tests if you believe in an individualistic, non-averaged universe?
This is actually very easy. It’s the same reason why many conservatives are conservatives: because they deeply resent the government (and the greater society) forcing them to stop being bigots. Taxes are anathema because the government takes their money and gives it to people they hate so they hate taxes. Civil rights laws make them go to school and do business with people they hate so they hate civil rights laws. Federal laws make it impossible to escape laws that benefit people they hate so they hate the federal government. With these neo-confederates and anti-government bircher tea party types it’s all about resentment that they aren’t allowed to freely exercise their hate in every given situation. (The first amendment isn’t enough.)The “freedom” these people love is the freedom to enslave or marginalize others.
When Rand Paul says he doesn’t think it’s fair to ask a business owner to accommodate blacks that’s music to their ears. And while Rand may very well have philosophical grounding for his beliefs that have nothing to do with America’s centuries long problem with race, people can be forgiven for thinking it does given the fact that his daddy seems to have been quite cozy with these racists over the years. After all the attention Ron Paul got for his ties to white supremacy during the 2008 presidential cycle, it’s fair to surmise that Rand knows exactly who he’s appealing to.
Update: Are all libertarians racist? Of course not. Are all conservatives racist? No. But their philosophies are welcome to those who harbor resentment at having to accommodate loathed “others.” Or put more simply: not all conservatives and libertarians are racist, but all racists are conservative or libertarian.
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