From Alan Bock

There’s a mini-controversy brewing over Ron Paul that should be too absurd to deserve much attention but perhaps could use some clarification.

I suppose such creatures exist, though their political influence is non-existent, but apparently Ron Paul got a contribution from a prominent neo-nazi.  A few people have pounced on this — since he’s raised enough money to start to be taken somewhat seriously — as a sign that he’s the kind of candidate who appeals to Nazis and racists and might even be sympathetic to them somewhere deep down inside.

On the face of it that’s pretty silly. If any political persuasion is more of a polar opposite to Naziism (which worships the State as the embodiment of the Race) than libertarianism, I don’t know what it is. But there are aspects that could lead one to entertain such a silly position. Many people still view libertarianism as a faction of the Right, and view Naziism (inaccurately, I would contend, depending how you define the Right, if such a term is even appropriate, which is a controversy too complex to engage just now) as a faction of the Right as well. So from this perspective it might be reasonable, if confused, to see an affinity there. Apparently this neo-nazi shares that common confusion (not surprising since embracing naziism is hardly a sign of clear thinking). And Ron Paul expresses his libertarian views in a more populist manner than I, for example, choose to do, which can lead some people to believe he’s really an eccentric rightist rather than a llibertarian with populist sympathies.

And then there’s the matter of foreign aid to Israel and what some call “isolationism” but is more accurately termed non-interventionism. Ron Paul opposes foreign aid from U.S. taxpayers to any foreign country, believing it isn’t authorized by the Constitution, and has consistently voted in Congress against any and all foreign aid to anybody. Of course, this includes aid to Israel (the largest single recipient of U.S. foreign aid, though Pakistan may be pushing for the honor). Some people want to see those votes as evidence of hostility to Israel or even latent anti-semitism.

Anyway, a blogger for JTA (Jewish Telegraph Agency), an Internet site that describes itself as “The Global News Service of the Jewish People,” tried to call the Paul campaign to find out if it planned to return the contribution from the neo-nazi (one Don Black, who runs a couple of Internet hate sites) and the call wasn’t returned. He wrote a blog item (on his personal site) that said the Paul campaign doesn’t return phone calls from Jews.

It’s probably true that the campaign didn’t return the guy’s call, but welcome to the crowd. The campaign has grown from a couple of laptops on a dining room table in May to an interesting boutique campaign to an Internet powerhouse capable of raising more money in a single day than any other Republican candidate. It’s had growing pains. I haven’t had the last two or three calls I’ve placed to the campaign returned, even though I’ve known campaign manager Kent Snyder for years and Dr. Paul for even longer, and they know (even though the Register has never endorsed a candidate and neither have I as a journalist), if only on the basis of this piece I did Oct. 7, that I could be classified as a “friendly.” I was mildly annoyed, but didn’t conclude the Paul campaign was anti-Bockist.

Just to clinch the inaccuracy of what reads like a slur to me, on the same day (or at least within a day or so) the JTA blogger said the Paul campaign doesn’t talk to Jews, JTA itself ran a decent and fair story, reported by a different staffer, on the Paul campaign’s limited appeal to Jews. It noted there are two organizations, Jews for Ron Paul and Zionists for Ron Paul, supporting his campaign, though they are small and represent a rather small sliver of the overall American Jewish community. The writer talked to Ron Paul himself and reported his nuanced position on foreign aid and Israel quite accurately, to wit:

“We have adopted a foreign policy that has left Israel surrounded by militaristic nations while undermining Israel’s sovereignty by demanding that its foreign and defense policies be essentially pre-approved in Washington,” he added. “That is a bad deal for Israel, as sovereign nations must determine on their own what is a most appropriate national defense. On foreign policy as well, the U.S. steps in to prevent Israel from engaging in dialogue with nations of which the U.S. administration disapproves.”

Anyway, JTA’s editor has made it clear that the blog item was inaccurate. And the idea that libertarians should be hostile to Jews when a possibly disproportionate percentage of libertarian thinkers and philosophers are Jewish is pretty odd. Ron Paul viewed Murray Rothbard as a guru and personal friend. Milton Friedman, Ludwig von Mises, Friederich Hayek, Richard Epstein, Robert Levy, Jude Wanniski, Dan Klein, Mark Rothschild — all libertarian heroes (to one extent or another) and all Jews. Not that there aren’t foolish libertarians out there, but that degree of self-hating would be beyond the pale.

As to whether the campaign should return the contribution, I can see both sides. There’s an argument that a campaign should have a polilcy of accepting whatever money it gets (so long as it’s legal under our unnecessarily convoluted campaign-finance laws) because accepting a contribution doesn’t and shouldn’t imply an endorsement of the contributor but the other way around. Then there’s the argument that it’s wise sometimes to return contributions from notoriously hateful people or known criminals, for example, if only to avoid the appearance of being associated with such reprobates. If you start down that road, of course, there’s the possibility that if you miss somebody and somebody else notices it (those FEC contribution lists are made public regularly) you could look sloppy or ignorant or hypocritical. though that can usually be fixed simply by returning the money once you know why it’s “tainted.”

If I were advising the Paul campaign, which I’m not, I would advise them to return the contribution. Heaven knows the campaign isn’t going to die on the vine for lack of that $500. But I can understand not doing so as well.

UPDATE, 11/15: I’ve been informed that F.A. Hayek and Jude Wanniski were Caltholics or ex-Catholics. All these years I thought they were Jewish, which shows you how much ethnicity has to do with my admiring somebody. A couple of people have also commented that some of the people I mentioned were not religious but secular Jews, Jews by birth but not necessarily by belief or practice. True enough, but Nazis and anti-Semites don’t make those distinctions.

Posted in: Domestic Impact • Iraq war • Israel-Palestine • Military Spending • War at Home |

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