More Conservatives Defend Ron Paul

Yesterday I discussed the defense of Ron Paul by Libertarians Lew Rockwell and Jacob Hornberger. As the Republican establishment talks about leaving him out of future debates still more of the old style conservatives come to his defense.

A few months after 911 it was Par Buchanan, a man I loath most of the time, who wisely said "they don't hate us because of who we are, they hate us because of where we are". Buchanan of course was correct and he explains that so was Ron Paul when he essentially said the same thing at the republican debate.
But Who Was Right – Rudy or Ron?

It was the decisive moment of the South Carolina debate.

Hearing Rep. Ron Paul recite the reasons for Arab and Islamic resentment of the United States, including 10 years of bombing and sanctions that brought death to thousands of Iraqis after the Gulf War, Rudy Giuliani broke format and exploded:

"That's really an extraordinary statement, as someone who lived through the attack of 9/11, that we invited the attack because we were attacking Iraq. I don't think I have ever heard that before, and I have heard some pretty absurd explanations for Sept. 11.

"I would ask the congressman to withdraw that comment and tell us that he didn't really mean that."

The applause for Rudy's rebuke was thunderous – the soundbite of the night and best moment of Rudy's campaign.

But wait, how did the rest of the country feel about what Ron Paul had said?

After the debate, on Fox News' "Hannity and Colmes," came one of those delicious moments on live television. As Michael Steele, GOP spokesman, was saying that Paul should probably be cut out of future debates, the running tally of votes by Fox News viewers was showing Ron Paul, with 30 percent, the winner of the debate.

Brother Hannity seemed startled and perplexed by the votes being text-messaged in the thousands to Fox News saying Paul won, Romney was second, Rudy third and McCain far down the track at 4 percent.

It's little wonder that the Republican establishment don't want to give Dr Paul a soap box.

Is Ron Paul wrong or even unpatriotic?

Ron Paul says Osama bin Laden is delighted we invaded Iraq.

Does the man not have a point? The United States is now tied down in a bloody guerrilla war in the Middle East and increasingly hated in Arab and Islamic countries where we were once hugely admired as the first and greatest of the anti-colonial nations. Does anyone think that Osama is unhappy with what is happening to us in Iraq?

Of the 10 candidates on stage in South Carolina, Dr. Paul alone opposed the war. He alone voted against the war. Have not the last five years vindicated him, when two-thirds of the nation now agrees with him that the war was a mistake, and journalists and politicians left and right are babbling in confession, "If I had only known then what I know now ..."

Rudy implied that Ron Paul was unpatriotic to suggest the violence against us out of the Middle East may be in reaction to U.S. policy in the Middle East. Was President Hoover unpatriotic when, the day after Pearl Harbor, he wrote to friends, "You and I know that this continuous putting pins in rattlesnakes finally got this country bitten."

Pearl Harbor came out of the blue, but it also came out of the troubled history of U.S.-Japanese relations going back 40 years. Hitler's attack on Poland was naked aggression. But to understand it, we must understand what was done at Versailles – after the Germans laid down their arms based on Wilson's 14 Points. We do not excuse – but we must understand.

Of course Ron Paul was saying what many of us on the left have been saying. He's right of course which is why the Republicans want him silenced.

Ron Paul is no TV debater. But up on that stage in Columbia, he was speaking intolerable truths. Understandably, Republicans do not want him back, telling the country how the party blundered into this misbegotten war.

By all means, throw out of the debate the only man who was right from the beginning on Iraq.

Another Libertarian conservative, Thomas R. Eddlem, points out that everything Dr Paul said was in the 911 Report.

It’s outrageous for Ron Paul to expect Rudy Giuliani to have ever "heard that before," even though he could have read the same perspective in the 9/11 Report. After all, he was only the mayor – the chief executive – of New York City during the 9/11 attacks, the worst terrorist attack in American history. Why would anyone suggest he needed to read the official government report on the attacks?

Since it’s outrageous to expect Rudy Giuliani to have to read the 9/11 Report, it’s also outrageous to think that he would have read the part of the 9/11 Report where they outline the principle of blowback in great detail. Heck, he’s only trying to be President of the United States. It’s not like he needs to know about the long-term implications of our foreign policy.