Nice to see one of these corrupt think tank bullshit artists held accountable for once, though I'd rather see Cenk continue to rip this guy a new one than cut him off.

This is the original swiftboating... ronpauling...

We begin with two simple questions:

Why would he put out publications under his name without the slightest idea what was in them?
And if he didn't write the stuff, why hasn't he identified the author and revealed his name?



Based on comparing the writings and positions of Dr. Paul and several other people involved, it would appear the people responsible would be:

Murray Rothbard,
http://murrayrothbard.com/category/rothbard-rockwell-report/


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My google quest began with this article and the comments in it, i have compiled my results:
http://www.redstate.com/leon_h_wolf/2011/12/22/about-those-racist-ron-paul-newsletters-that-he-didnt-read-and-completely-disavowed

------------------------------------------------ RESEARCH

HERE'S RON PAULS RESPONSE:

"The quotations in The New Republic article are not mine and do not represent what I believe or have ever believed. I have never uttered such words and denounce such small-minded thoughts. When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, I have publically taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name."

-------------------------------

OK, fair enough. Now for a 1995 interview, go to 1:54, here is transcription with his interview proving that he knew newsletters existed, not all the content. In fact, he seems more concerned with finance:

“Along with that I also put out a political, uh, type of business investment newsletter, sort of covered all these areas. And it covered, uh, a lot about what was going on in Washington and financial events, especially some of the monetary events since I had been especially interested in monetary policy, had been on the banking committee, and still very interested in, in that subject.. that, uh, this newsletter dealt with that… has to do with the value of the dollar [snip] and of course the disadvantages of all the high taxes and spending that our government seems to continue to do.”

Watch video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW755u5460A

A constant theme in Paul’s rhetoric, dating back to his first years as a congressman in the late 1970s, is that the United States is on the edge of a precipice. The centerpiece of this argument is that the abandonment of the gold standard has put the United States on the path to financial collapse.
http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/98811/ron-paul-libertarian-bigotry

------------------------------------------------------

So what about that, he did have a newsletter? Did it talk about more than money, and did he author those writings? Well it gets more interesting..

this is from a comment here:
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2011/12/22/the-ron-paul-newsletter-and-his-jeremiah-wright-moment/#comment-152657

"Wish I had saved the links. This Dondero guy was supposedly part of a group of people that wrote the content of the newsletters (maybe seven different people), and that Lew Rockwell and Murray Rothbard were the main brains behind the content. Ron Paul wrote some of the content too (probably about sound money, lol). They have also hinted (maybe Rockwell did), that the writer of some of the extreme articles was now dead. It seems that multiple people from that time have died, but the most relevant is Murray Rothbard. He’s like a messiah to this sub-culture, and Rockwell would probably never spill the beans on Rothbard. The tone of the racially offensive parts does seem like it would be written by Rothbard. If you are unlucky enough to attempt to listen through one of his lectures on YouTube, you will notice his attempts at sarcastic humor, if you don’t fall asleep first.

Dondero: “Neither Rockwell or Rothbard are/were “libertarians.” In his later yers Rothbard called himself a “Paleo” aligning with the conservative southern successionists. Rockwell, today calls himself an Anarchist, and has distanced himself greatly from any part of the libertarian movement.”

http://www.libertarianrepublican.net/2011/02/1970s80s-libertarian-party-stalwart.html

“The newsletters’ obsession with blacks and gays was of a piece with a conscious political strategy adopted at that same time by Lew Rockwell and Murray Rothbard. After breaking with the Libertarian Party following the 1988 presidential election, Rockwell and Rothbard formed a schismatic “paleolibertarian” movement, which rejected what they saw as the social libertinism and leftist tendencies of mainstream libertarians. In 1990, they launched the Rothbard-Rockwell Report, where they crafted a plan they hoped would midwife a broad new “paleo” coalition.”

http://reason.com/archives/2008/01/16/who-wrote-ron-pauls-newsletter"

---------------------------

Ok now we're getting somewhere.. so what about Dondero, Rockwell, and Rothbard?

Reason: Your former staffer Eric Dondero is challenging you for your House seat in 2008.
Paul: He's a disgruntled former employee who was fired.
http://reason.com/blog/2007/05/22/ron-paul-on-9-11-and-eric-dond

-----------------------------------
What about these mid 1990's interviews like this one from the Dallas Morning News:

In 1996, Paul told The Dallas Morning News that his comment about black men in Washington came while writing about a 1992 study by the National Center on Incarceration and Alternatives, a criminal justice think tank in Virginia. The comment about black males being fleet of foot came from a 1992 newsletter, disavowed by Paul.

Paul cited the study and wrote (NOT SAID): “Given the inefficiencies of what DC laughingly calls the criminal justice system, I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.”

“These aren’t my figures,” Paul told the Morning News. “That is the assumption you can gather from the report.”

Dr. Paul denied suggestions that he was a racist and said he was not evoking stereotypes when he wrote the columns. He said they should be read and quoted in their entirety to avoid misrepresentation. [...]

"If someone challenges your character and takes the interpretation of the NAACP as proof of a man's character, what kind of a world do you live in?" Dr. Paul asked.

In the interview, he did not deny he made the statement about the swiftness of black men.

"If you try to catch someone that has stolen a purse from you, there is no chance to catch them," Dr. Paul said.

He also said the comment about black men in the nation's capital was made while writing about a 1992 study produced by the National Center on Incarceration and Alternatives, a criminal justice think tank based in Virginia

Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said the congressman was practicing medicine at the time the newsletters were published and “did not write or approve the incendiary passages and does not agree with them.”

“He has, however, taken moral responsibility because they appeared under his name and slipped through under his watch,” Benton said. “They do not reflect what he believes in: liberty and dignity for all mankind. … Dr. Paul, renowned as a straight shooter who speaks his mind, has given literally thousands of speeches over the past 35 years, and he has never spoken such things.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul, an obstetrician from Surfside, Tex., denied he is a racist and charged Austin lawyer Charles "Lefty" Morris, his Democratic opponent, with taking his 1992 writings out of context
http://reason.com/blog/2008/01/11/old-news-rehashed-for-over-a-d

"Instead of talking about the issues, our opponent has chosen to lie and try to deceive the people of the 14th District," said Paul spokesman Michael Sullivan, who added that the excerpts were written during the Los Angeles riots when "Jesse Jackson was making the same comments."

-----------------

And all the confusion because he wanted to take responsibility. .. and the real issue? Not with what he may have said, or how consistent he has been denying this lie, but merely:

"Would he even check in to see if his ideas are being implemented? Who would he appoint to Cabinet positions?"

it comes down to an EITHER/OR false choice:

Either Paul is so oblivious to what was being done in his name that this obliviousness alone disqualifies him for a job like the presidency
— or -
he knew very well that horrific arguments were being published his name and he lent his name to a cynical racist strategy anyway.

Is there not any other choice?

There is your answer. The GOP is trying to sow any and all doubt at any and all cost. The content of the newsletters is just convenient; they would have done this anyway.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/12/the-story-behind-ron-pauls-racist-newsletters/250338/
-------------------------------------

So Why Smear Ron Paul? Here is why... and the answer may NOT surprise you:

http://www.infowars.com/cnn-poll-ron-paul-most-popular-republican-amongst-non-whites/

yet we're supposed to believe this man, a physician and politician, has actually uttered words like, ""Am I the only one sick of hearing about the 'rights' of AIDS carriers?"

Please. It is VERY unlikely.

http://www.thenation.com/blog/165290/why-do-gop-bosses-fear-ron-paul

Thank you for your time.

I'm not usually a fan of his stuff either, he usually plays it like the GOP are the bad guys and overlooks the fact that while Democrats say better things, they continue (and escalate) the wars, the lobbying, the wealth extraction, the environmental destruction etc. He occasionally picks up on this, but pretty rarely it seems, which leads me to believe there's some agenda there. Also I'm against this 'fair and balanced' type of news/media, where for some reason, every debate must involve someone with their head buried so far in the corporate think tank they may as well just be a Frank Luntz manikin that repeats talking points on request.

Also, I don't really know why people feel the need to debate the motives of the Tea Party, they only came out with their signs because they were organised and funded by think tank GOP groups (tax exempt 501(c)(4)'s)/billionaire individuals/Fox News. So their motivations are irrelevant as they were literally coached and coerced into doing what they did.

Yeeeeeah,

Except the link that you posted doesn't compare wages by "equivalents". It compares what public employees make with the entire private sector. Well, serving big macs and pumping gas are certainly important jobs, but the jobs in the public sector are more specialized, and so they mostly require educated people.

The "study" that you linked to was created by an organization of business people who's whole purpose is to show exactly what they wanted. That is: to imply that public sector employees make more money. When you compare for equivalent jobs, and add education into the mix, there's no study you can site that shows that public employees earn more. Except for maybe custodians, and good for them, they deserve it. Most private employers I know would rather bitch about immigration during the day, and pay people an illegal wage to clean up their shit at night when no one is looking.

And the second "study" you link to, also created by a partisan, republican think-tank to present their opinions as facts, is exactly the same. One of the most interesting things completely left out of the equation is that they're including the benefits of public employees who are already retired, and who accumulated those benefits on a scale that is drastically different from the one used for employees today. Here, in Oregon, those people with tier one P.E.R.S (public employee retirement system) benefits are retiring right now, or have already retired. The "public" have decided over the last decade or so, that since those people worked their entire lives on a promise of those benefits, it would be dishonest to take them away and treat those employees entire lives of service as garbage. Maybe you feel differently. Either way, employees are paid on, and accrue benefits on, a scale that offers much, much less than the old. That's what should be taken into account regarding current wages in any study of current pay, but it's not. And there are a million non-partisan peer responses out there that show that for all the education data they use, their conclusions are false. Look them up yourself if you're so interested in facts.

The thing that really amazes me about your fight to screw people out of their promised wages to make life easier for yourself without actually having to do hard work for it is this: In the AEI study, which looks more credible than the first (but should still be seen as inflated at best, considering the authors) the amount the taxpayers could save by screwing over fellow citizens is... :

77 Billion dollars?

Seriously? As you said above: "700 billion. Only HALF of just the deficit... anyone that thinks that the only place we need to cut is ‘defense’ and that’ll fix it all it living in a dream world."

So that's your big plan? Slash and burn our social programs, putting millions of people out of work, paying the essential workers minimum wage, and leaving all the people who rely on those programs in the dark, causing an unemployment crisis unseen in the history of our country, to save less money than we spent on the recent conflict in Libya that we didn't even fight in?

77 Billion dollars is what you're saying is going to bring this country to it's knees? That's your "silver plated budget?" What a crock of shit.

As an American, you should be ashamed of yourself. You're risking real people's lives by playing the game you're playing. And all for an insignificant fraction of the budget you're claiming. The attack on unions goes not only against your own interests, but against the first and most important amendment to our constitution. If people want to speak up for their rights, and negotiate their terms, well, get used to it. That's what we do here in America, public employees or not. Benjamin Franklin was a public employee, who you have limited his right to express his opinions and negotiate?

If you have a problem with the things people ask for, figure out a solution and deal with it yourself. Stop trying to get the ignorant and greedy to form a big enough group that you can legislate away the rights of your neighbors.

Jesus Christ, you wanna talk wage disparity? Why don't you try looking somewhere where the wage disparity, even with the biggest pile of evidence you can accumulate, amounts at a few thousand dollars per person at best. And spare us all your "search for the truth." Don't like the way unions work? Let them go on strike. Let them strike until they give up and are forced to accept the truth. Don't try to act like you still want everything to get done, but for less money by simply legislating people's rights away. When you do that, you'll see this country crumble before your eyes.

Stop attacking the little people to get what you want. Focus on the ones pulling your own strings.

I hate to wrap up, but my eleven-month-old is crying. I tried to tell him to go get a job if he wants some food, but all he does is whine when I do that. And if I keep typing anyway, pretty soon I'll be hearing from you about how I "might" be abandoning my children and sleeping with the guy in the next tent over.

Just for the record, I'm discussing government unions; not corporate unions. Sorry if there was some confusion in my posts. >> ^ghark:

Looks like the propaganda machine can't leave this one alone Yogi
Corporations = seek profit (not debatable).
Unions are a counter to the result of this motivation (loss of rights in favor of profit).
Simple.
Anyone that supports unchecked profit has their heads buried a little to deep in the think tank and not in reality. That doesn't mean I'm for or against unions, I'm simply saying that if unions aren't around there needs to be an alternative that does the same. In China there is some god-awful abuse of the workers, and recently I've heard of cases where unpaid or laid off workers mob/kill the person in charge to vent their frustrations. I think unions are a better alternative to that because they promote discussion rather than killing.

Looks like the propaganda machine can't leave this one alone Yogi

Corporations = seek profit (not debatable).
Unions are a counter to the result of this motivation (loss of rights in favor of profit).

Simple.

Anyone that supports unchecked profit has their heads buried a little to deep in the think tank and not in reality. That doesn't mean I'm for or against unions, I'm simply saying that if unions aren't around there needs to be an alternative that does the same. In China there is some god-awful abuse of the workers, and recently I've heard of cases where unpaid or laid off workers mob/kill the person in charge to vent their frustrations. I think unions are a better alternative to that because they promote discussion rather than killing.

Have a look around the net, it looks like he's quite successfully trolled a variety of corporate think tank organisations.

@csnel3 @dag

Steve Jobs had 7 years since his diagnosis to found a think tank or research institute. He had unusual assets to bring to the problem in the form of his abilities, capital, and influence on many of the smartest people alive. 7 years is an eternity for a radical science project helmed by a genius and funded by Jobs' own 6 billion plus donations from other sources that would want to help.

How far are we really from being able to extend the life of people in his position? What steps need to be put in place before failing body parts can be replaced well enough to sustain life?

He didn't even need to directly cure his cancer within those 7 years. Extending the amount of time he had could have allowed him to then find other interventions that extended his time even more.

Ron paul would make a great think tank person... but a horrible president.

The first clue that you've been lied to is the fact that those whom you take your intellectual cues from insist on 'debate' instead of research. Could a skillful debater convince you that the concept of gravity is a lie? Or that the Earth is flat and orbited by the sun? In science, research is how things are debated. Doesn't it give you any pause that those whom you've put your trust in want to keep this scientific 'debate' outside of the realm of science?

One of your biggest problems is that you seem to believe that you know what you are talking about; that the random hodge-podge of political buzzwords and slogans you've been trained to recite are a legitimate and coherent point of view. Not only do you believe you know what you are talking about, but you also believe you've arrived at these conclusions through a process of thought and reason, rather than just mindlessly lapping up propaganda you've been fed by politicians, corporate think tanks and industrial PR firms.

There is no legitimacy to your arguments on this subject. You are completely, provably ignorant when it comes to climate science. It's a farce that we are even having this conversation. Not all points of view are equally valid. In the debate between 2+2=4 and 2+2=5, only one side is correct. You are squarely in the wrong. I don't say this to hurt your feelings, but rather as a service to enlighten you. Rather than getting angry at me for being honest, why not instead turn your anger upon those who have armored you in ignorance and sent you off to battle ill equipped, or better yet, why not turn your anger inward for your own gullibility and lack of independent thought.

Individual freedom starts in the mind.

>> ^quantumushroom:

I wouldn't accuse anyone else of lacking credibility when my avatar is wearing an Obama campaign button.
My political agenda is individual rights, freedom and property rights, all three hated--in varying degrees--by leftists. That damned Constitution, always in the way of free gifts to the people like Obamacare!
Why are you SHEEP are so quick to surrender the last tattered remnants of your freedom for a few faked graphs and a consensus of concerned-about-grants government scientists? You have no hard evidence to tie global warming to man-made activity, only consensus aka a bunch of labcoats in a room agreeing on something without proof. And I'm not jumping on that merry-go-around again. These proud scientitians refuse to debate so-called deniers. WHY? Instead they announced "All debate is over?" BS. BS. BS.
Global warming Climate change ain't about global warming climate change and never was, it's about socialists trying to seize more power and destroy individual and property rights.
Oh, and posting videos isn't 'borrowing' other people's ideas? Please keep your cute little comments stolen from south park out of my comment box.
Global warming BS serves at least one purpose, you libs get a taste of what it feel like to have your religion insulted.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
Instead of copying and pasting other peoples ideas, why not try thinking for yourself? If you feel that business shouldn't be hindered for any reason, then say so, but to actually fool yourself into believing that politicians and industry PR agents know more about science than actual scientists is just plain dumb. I've seen other conservatives on this site begin to distance themselves from this brand of ignorance. Why not give it a shot yourself? It would certainly help you to garner more respect and credibility - two categories in which you are sorely lacking.>> ^quantumushroom:
Herp Derp

Do not be fooled by this corporate-funded PR exercise.

This is bald partisan malarkey... which figures, because The Cato Institute is a libertarian think tank co-founded by Charles Koch, chairman of the board and CEO of the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc., the second largest privately held company (after Cargill) by revenue in the USA -- responsible for the "Americans for Prosperity" behind most of the "astroturf" Tea Party and much of the "Covert Operations' that are being waged against the Obama administration.

>> ^VoodooV:

Well I'll grant you that everyone has some sort of ideology that at least motivates them to learn new things. But when it blatantly colors every aspect of your analysis, then you're a joke. I checked out their website when QM made his latest rant. They don't even put up a front that they care about their analysis more than their ideology.
Quite honestly, IMO, anyone who claims be a scientist should be apolitical. science should be above politics


Well, think tanks are more like engineers than scientists. They have problems they want to solve, and so they do research and use scientific findings to try to build something that will solve their problem.

Again, some think tanks go about this properly, and try not to delude themselves or others about the nature of reality. Others consider deception a valid tool to use in their toolbox.

Which is to say, having an opinion on how things should be does not automatically make someone dishonest. I don't really understand why people buy into the propaganda telling you otherwise.

>> ^NetRunner:

Here's an article I came across yesterday about this very topic:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/08/heritage_poor.html
Of course, that's a link to a post from a left-wing think tank.
@VoodooV re: "You don't take an ideology and then try to back it up facts. That's backwards. You learn the facts first, then make policy off that."
I'd object to the use of the word "ideology" here. The key ideological differences between the left and right have to do with moral philosophy, which isn't really something science can give us answers about.
That results in divergent goals for society -- I want to minimize suffering for everyone, and if government can help do that, I'm all for it. Right-wing people are more concerned about making sure that suffering hits the people they perceive as deserving it, and that government interceding to relieve suffering on the deserving is morally wrong, especially if it means taxing the righteous.
So obviously there are going to be divergent policy positions, because there are divergent goals. Hence, you have right-wing and left-wing think tanks, working on divergent policies, but still attempting to use logic and facts to craft policies that meet their goals for society.
That said, not all think-tanks are created equally. Heritage has a bad habit of lying to people about things. There's probably some honest way to make the case that wage stagnation for the middle and working class has still resulted in some significant increases in prosperity for the middle and working classes. But saying "poor people have microwaves, so they don't need assistance anymore" is just silly.


Well I'll grant you that everyone has some sort of ideology that at least motivates them to learn new things. But when it blatantly colors every aspect of your analysis, then you're a joke. I checked out their website when QM made his latest rant. They don't even put up a front that they care about their analysis more than their ideology.

Quite honestly, IMO, anyone who claims be a scientist should be apolitical. science should be above politics

>> ^VoodooV:

Conservative Think Tank? Isn't that an oxymoron?


Welle someone has to be thinking pretty hard to figure out how to turn all that nonsense into a semi-coherent political "philosophy" without making them look like a spoiled kindergartner.

Here's an article I came across yesterday about this very topic:

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/08/heritage_poor.html

Of course, that's a link to a post from a left-wing think tank.

@VoodooV re: "You don't take an ideology and then try to back it up facts. That's backwards. You learn the facts first, then make policy off that."

I'd object to the use of the word "ideology" here. The key ideological differences between the left and right have to do with moral philosophy, which isn't really something science can give us answers about.

That results in divergent goals for society -- I want to minimize suffering for everyone, and if government can help do that, I'm all for it. Right-wing people are more concerned about making sure that suffering hits the people they perceive as deserving it, and that government interceding to relieve suffering on the deserving is morally wrong, especially if it means taxing the righteous.

So obviously there are going to be divergent policy positions, because there are divergent goals. Hence, you have right-wing and left-wing think tanks, working on divergent policies, but still attempting to use logic and facts to craft policies that meet their goals for society.

That said, not all think-tanks are created equally. Heritage has a bad habit of lying to people about things. There's probably some honest way to make the case that wage stagnation for the middle and working class has still resulted in some significant increases in prosperity for the middle and working classes. But saying "poor people have microwaves, so they don't need assistance anymore" is just silly.