Rand Paul Strikes Back At Mainstream Media Smear Machine

Steve Watson
Prisonplanet.com
Friday, May 21st, 2010

Related: Desperate Establishment Launch Baseless “Racist” Attacks On Rand Paul

Related: The Establishment Is In Full Blown Panic Over Rand Paul

Would be Kentucky Senator Rand Paul has hit back at a desperate and sustained mainstream media attempt to smear him as a racist extremist following his historic primary victory earlier this week.

Paul appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America today to make it clear that the attacks against him regarding views he expressed on the Civil Rights Act, which we covered in our article yesterday, are “red herrings” and part of an establishment effort to “trash” his campaign.

“I’ve just been trashed up and down and they have been saying things that are untrue. And when they say I’m for repealing the Civil Rights Act, it’s absolutely false. It’s never been my position and something that I basically just think is politics.” Paul said.

Following Paul’s initial appearance on Wednesday’s Rachel Maddow program, during which the MSNBC host suggested Paul would tolerate racial segregation because he opposes federal government regulation, the cable network devoted a full day of coverage to the same talking point.

Despite Paul’s repeated statements that he did not tolerate discrimination or racism in any form, and that he supported the Civil Rights Act in totality, MSNBC wheeled out its liberal attack dogs in the form of Jesse Jackson, Democratic Congressman James Clyburn, liberal professors Boyce Watkins and Michael Eric Dyson and Democratic strategist Karen Finney. The network aired eight different segments totaling 37 minutes, without a single guest to defend Rand Paul’s position or provide any balance whatsoever.

Yesterday Paul’s opponent in the Senate race, Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway, now lagging behind Paul by a whopping 25 points according to a Rasmussen survey, claimed that Paul had said he wanted to “repeal” the Civil Rights Act, a blatantly false accusation that prompted Paul to issue a corrective statement. Ridiculously, Paul had to clarify that he did not wish to repeal the Civil Rights Act:

“Even though this matter was settled when I was 2, and no serious people are seeking to revisit it except to score cheap political points, I unequivocally state that I will not support any efforts to repeal the Civil Rights Act of 1964.” Paul’s statement read.

“Let me be clear: I support the Civil Rights Act because I overwhelmingly agree with the intent of the legislation, which was to stop discrimination in the public sphere and halt the abhorrent practice of segregation and Jim Crow laws. As I have said in previous statements, sections of the Civil Rights Act were debated on Constitutional grounds when the legislation was passed. Those issues have been settled by federal courts in the intervening years.” the statement concluded.

Despite Paul’s statement, the smear machine went into overdrive and even led to comments from White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, who said “I think the issues that, that many fought for in the ‘50s and the ‘60s were settled a long time ago in landmark legislation and the discussion about whether or not to support those, I don’t think, shouldn’t have a place in our political dialogue in 2010.”

The LA Times devoted its front page to the smear attack, meanwhile, Organizing for America, an Obama campaign group run by the Democratic National Committee began emailing thousands of people on it’s mailing list in an effort to convince them that Rand Paul supports segregation and that there should be a “massive public outcry”.

• A d v e r t i s e m e n t

Late yesterday afternoon, Sen. John Cornyn (Tex.), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, also issued a statement, noting that “It is apparent that the Democrats are trying to twist Rand Paul’s words and create an issue that does not exist because they are rightfully worried that he is leading Jack Conway,”.

A fired up Paul hit out further at the establishment left’s political smear campaign on Good Morning America today:

“If you want to bring up 40-year-old legislation, why don’t you bring me on with Sen. [Robert] Byrd, and we’ll talk about how he filibustered the Civil Rights Act,” Paul said of the 92-year-old West Virginia Democrat. “Make him, call him to task for something he actually did as opposed to calling me to task for something they insinuated that I might believe that’s not true.”

“What is going on here is an attempt to vilify us for partisan reasons. Where do your talking points come from? The Democratic National Committee, they also come from Rachel Maddow and MSNBC.” he added.

Watch the video:

Rand Paul’s father, Congressman Ron Paul, defended his son on Thursday, describing the smear attacks as “overkill”.

“I don’t think he has anything to recover from,” the elder Paul said in comments reported by Politico. “Get out there and talk to the people … You’re talking about recovery. That’s an insult.”

Ron Paul also refused to comment on his views on the constitutionality of the powers granted to the federal government in the area of civil rights, noting that his comments would only be taken out of context and used to further smear his son. Instead he pointed to a chapter in his forthcoming book in which he addresses the matter.

Historian Tom Woods, who has contributed to Ron Paul’s best-selling books, addresses the smear campaign using concise and eloquent language:

The Left is going after Rand Paul over the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Why, Rand Paul secretly wants to repeal it, they say, which means we’d have segregated restaurants all over again. Now any non-hysteric knows a segregated restaurant would be boycotted and picketed out of existence within ten seconds, but we’re supposed to fret about fictional outcomes from the repeal of a law that will never be repealed. And certainly we cannot question the 1964 Act, since our betters have decided the matter is closed.

Of course, someone might have objected to that Act on the grounds that it would of course lead to affirmative action, since racially proportionate hiring is the only practical way to prove one has not been “discriminating.” One might also object to the law on constitutional grounds, or on the grounds that (as has indeed happened) it would lead to legally protected classes whose members simply cannot be fired, since their employers know they will be hit with groundless but costly and time-consuming litigation. (Incidentally, black employment statistics saw far more progress in the one year before the 1964 Act than in the two years after it.)

As the Left sees it, none of these reasonable concerns can be the “real reason” for opposition to the 1964 Act. The real motivation is (what else?) a sinister and arbitrary desire to oppress blacks and other minorities for no good reason. The Left’s opponents are always and everywhere wicked and twisted people, who spend their time wondering how they can cause gratuitous harm to black people they have never met. Don’t believe me? Read the comments to this Politico article. These people have never in their lives deviated from what Official Opinion has demanded they believe. Without federal guns, we’d be back in the Dark Ages. The Left has its bogeymen and the neocons have theirs. The outcome is always the same: more power to the monopolists with the guns, and the unshakeable conviction that peaceful remedies are impossible.

Leading Libertarians have lauded Rand Paul, noting that his stance is at the core of Libertarian philosophy. True liberty requires a society in which all people can live and thrive without coercion from controlling forces such as the federal government.

Such core principles the are at the foundation of the U.S. Constitution.

George Washington said “Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. And force, like fire, is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”

Should racial discrimination be overcome by reason or by force?

This notion is at the heart of Rand Paul’s stance on civil rights. Those who equate this notion with racist beliefs are either intellectually incapable of grasping it or are purposefully seeking to defame those who embrace it.

Instead of running to the federal government for protection from and a quick fix to everything that is socially reprehensible, it is time for all of the afore mentioned detractors – from Maddow, through all her minions at MSNBC and their zombie choir – to look at the bigger picture, to wake up, grow up, break out of their pre programmed political paradigm.

Without such an awakening, discrimination and divisions will always exist and will always be taken advantage of by those who seek to control our society.

This article was posted: Saturday, May 22, 2010 at 8:02 am

---

---

---

---