Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul is making clear his desire to be the GOP Presidential nominee in 2016, and this was known even before he won the Senate seat in 2010 over the opposition of fellow Kentuckian, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Following in the footsteps of his father, former Texas Congressman Ron Paul, who gained the backing of naive college students when he ran for President in 2008 and 2012, Paul hopes to mine the support of Tea Party activists and libertarians to overcome the business establishment, the Neoconservatives who wish military intervention overseas all of the time, and mainline Republicans who see Paul as an alarm bell for the future of the Republican Party.
Rand Paul, meanwhile, has demonstrated again and again of his sympathies with Confederate types who still fight the Civil War, and has shown lack of sensitivity about racism.
Paul has kept on his Senate staff an individual who goes around in Confederate uniform and mask, a person by the name of Jack Hunter. And Paul has expressed in the past his view of his doubts about the Civil Rights Act of 1964. And he comes across as naive about the outside world, and his libertarian views, while appealing to naive people, has never worked, and will never occur in reality!
Face the facts: Rand Paul is a lunatic, a weirdo with no qualifications, no message of significance, and with troubling connections to racism (which his father has also shown in his political career), and the odds of his being the GOP nominee against all of the other Republican factions is less than zero!
Were he, somehow, to win the nomination, which would require a miracle, it would lead to the total destruction of the Republican Party, worse than Barry Goldwater in 1964 or Alf Landon in 1936, both men of intelligence, which Rand Paul is not!
And imagine Paul against Hillary Clinton, the likely Democratic nominee. She would walk all over him in a debate, and would join Lyndon B. Johnson and Franklin D. Roosevelt in a massive win over their Republican opponents!
Hello Professor,
Yes Rand Paul is a lunatic, a weirdo with no qualifications, no message of significance, and with troubling connections to racism; which makes him the perfect candidate to be embraced by the oxymoron example of those who call themselves, “Conservative Tea Party Patriots.”
This latest political movement’s origins is from the John Birch Society’s “Minute Men.” A branch off of the Klan in the 1960’s.
The true and real Boston Tea Party of 1773, where the colonists, were not in a compromising mood. They were still angry over the Boston Massacre, which had occurred 3 years earlier, and they were ready to boycott British goods.
They were the liberal aspects of the time who decided as a protest to destroy private property. I give you examples below:
MYTH 1:  The American Revolution was a rebellion against “Taxation without representationâ€, similar to the modern day Tea Party tax revolts.
THE TRUTH: Actually, the Boston Tea Party was ultimately a protest against a corporate tax cut, whereas the modern Tea Party movement is in favor of tax cuts.
The original Boston Tea Party was a protest against the British East India Company (BEIC) for receiving huge corporate tax cuts. By the 1760s BEIC was dominating trade from India to China as well as in the Caribbean. They controlled nearly all commerce to and from North America with the help of those tax cuts along with subsidies and special dispensation from the British crown.
MYTH 2: The founding fathers wanted limited federal government
THE TRUTH: Actually the Founders were a diverse group, often times with opposing viewpoints. For instance Hamilton and his Federalist Party believed in a strong federal government and a powerful executive branch. George Washington supported this view as well.
At the same time Jefferson and his Republican Party (which bears no relation to the modern GOP) supported strong states’ rights and a weak federal government. Madison supported this viewpoint as well.
MYTH 3: The Constitution demands strict and literal interpretation
THE TRUTH: As was the case with the issue of federal government, there was much dispute over how to interpret and apply the Constitution and one cannot overlook the fact that the Constitution was only ratified in the first place with the understanding the Bill of Rights would be added later.
Jefferson and his Republicans promoted a strict interpretation of the Constitution while Hamilton and the Federalists endorsed a liberal reading of the Constitution.
Hamilton and his Federalist Party espoused a strong federal government, led by a powerful executive branch, and endorsed a liberal reading of the Constitution; although he resisted the label at first, Washington clearly belonged to this camp.  Indeed Washington and Hamilton’s embrace an expansive view of the interpretation of the Constitution runs diametrically opposed to that of the Tea Party who tend to embrace the theory of originalism, the viewpoint that any interpretation of the Constitution must take into account and abide by the original intent of the Founders.
MYTH 4:  created a “Christian Nation†founded upon “Christian Principlesâ€.
THE TRUTH:Â One need look no further than to Thomas Jefferson to understand the false nature of this claim.
“Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. “
-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782
And one cannot forget that Jefferson strongly advocated the separation of church and state:
“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between church and State. “
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT., Jan. 1, 1802
Another founder, John Adams, was a Congregationalist who later became a Unitarian. However, he deliberately avoided creed-based dogmatic religion.
The Treaty of Tripoli, introduced to the Senate by John Adams and ratified by unanimous decree, was signed by Adams in 1797 and includes the following passage for any doubters out there:
“As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.â€
– The Treaty of Tripoli, signed Nov. 4, 1796, effective Jun. 10, 1797
Now back to current day events with regards to the reactionary extreme conservative Tea Party. Karl Rove has set up a Super PAC to keep controversial conservatives from winning Republican primaries and the Senate leadership has established a “buddy system†to keep Tea Party congressmen in line (“buddy†as in “you should probably vote the way we tell you to, buddy…â€). These Teabaggers are to get in line, assimilate, or be purged from the Party. But the most important changes are taking place at Fox where heavyweights Sarah Palin and Dick Morris are out as contributors. A lot of this is post-election house clearing suggests that the GOP establishment is blaming the 2012 election loss on the Tea Party and the impolite Right.
So in summation, the days of the Reactionary, Racist, hate driven based Teabaggers’ 15 minutes of fame is now over…..and good riddance of this disgraceful moment of this countries history.
WOW, Engineer, this entry is AWESOME! LOL Thanks for your clarification of history, which is ABSOLUTELY correct, and I deeply appreciate it! The Liz Cheney-Rand Paul rivalry will also help to cleanse the GOP, if it can be saved, which I still have strong doubts can occur!
Engineer wrote, “So in summation, the days of the Reactionary, Racist, hate driven based Teabaggers’ 15 minutes of fame is now over…..and good riddance of this disgraceful moment of this countries history”.
Ummmm, Engineer I love and agree with everything you write but this one tiny tiny little thing I have a bit of a disagreement. It just seems to me that when I think no far-right Republican can say or do something else quite as stupid or unbelievable than what they did or said the day before, they always manage to pull another one out of their
A…I mean Hat! : )
You are right in that I believe people will read the history of this time and wonder what in the heck was going one during this time. I think they will wonder if the whole country went batshit crazy!
Yes, Maggie, a book or books can be written about the madness of Republican Right WIngers and the embarrassing, stupid, inane, maniacal things they say and do, and yet no embarrassment, no apologies, no shame! It will be a best seller, for the person who has the patience to weed through all of the crap being enunciated and done!
I sense a confusion in the air between wanting a strong federal government is somehow against being in favor of limited government. The federal government can be strong and powerful within its limits imposed by the Constitution. Confusing strong and power with limitlessness and overreaching is the same as confusing weak government with limited government. Federalist I believe wanted a strong federal government, a strong Executive, within it powers. I do not believe that they wanted an unlimited unrestrained overbearing government. Otherwise, why have a Constitution with enumerated powers at all? A liberal reading nowadays is in reality a calling for unlimited federal power, without restraints , especially in the economy. I always ask my liberal friends, OK where is the limit on what the federal government can do with respect to commerce? And frankly they cannot answer. Maybe because they truly believe there should be no limit. And that I don’t think was the belief of the Federalist. Also bear in mind that the Federalist were comparing there situation with what they lived through during the Confederation, and even back during the Continental Congress and the troubles they had financing the Revolutionary War. Clearly the Confederate model was not adequate. But that does not mean that they supported some kind of Central Constitutional government instead of a Federation, seated in Washington, like the French have in Paris, or British in London.
What you have said above, Robert, is highly debatable, and one has to consider the size of our population in a complex world, and wonder whether counting on state and local governments to do the job on many issues will work.
When one looks at the cities and the states now, one has to wonder about their competence to do anything right! I still would rather trust the federal government, even with its shortcomings, to the kinds of state governments we now see in many states, particularly in the South and Great Plains and Mountain States, where poverty and ignorance seem to reign, and if the federal government does not step in, we have great inequality and deprivation present and expanding! This is what has created the great paralysis in government now, that power is so diffuse and contradictory!
And I do not see Great Britain and France as bad examples, but rather proving that a strong federal government is bound to get more done, than having 50 state entities that can contradict and fight the federal agenda. That is why we have a Congress and political parties!
Many of the reasons explained about on this blog is why I disagree with those pushing for less government: http://www.governmentisgood.com/articles.php?aid=8
Thanks, Princess Leia, for this citation, which shows the value of a strong federal government!
Ronald, I am not suggesting that GB or France are bad examples. I am merely saying that it is not the system of governemnt that the Federalist had in mind when they talked about a strong federal government. As a matter of fact I believe that the Constitution was established to have a strong federal government but within its jurisdiction. That is to say limited within the constitutional framework.
Yes, Robert, but the Constitution was created with the inclusion of the Elastic Clause, (Article 1, Section 8), which allows for expansion of federal authority based on changing times and circumstances that were unforseen at the time of the Constitutional Convention. The Constitution was not meant to be a rigid document, but one that would adapt to modern times as the situation in the nation changed. This is the genius of the Founding Fathers, and they knew what they were doing when they created the Elastic Clause!
Good morning Ronald.
The elastic clause of Art.1 Sec 8, you mean the Necessary and Proper clause of Congress’s enumerated powers? Why yes of course, as Hamilton said this clause only permits the execution of powers already granted by the Constitution. In other words Congress has the power to make all laws necessary and proper to carry out the execution of the foregoing powers, that is of the powers within the jurisdiction of Congress as enumerated in Art.1 Sec. 8. That means that the necessary and proper laws must be not only “necessary and proper” but also constitutional.In other words if Congress enacts laws that are outside of its jurisdiction they are then unconstitutional no matter how necessary and proper they may be. Otherwise you would be adopting the anti-federalist view and concern that clause grants the Federal government unlimited expansionary powers. But maybe I am wrong and you do believe that in grants unlimited expansionary powers. But I am really curious to know where you see the words elastic in Art. 1 Sec. 8 of the Constitution? Does elastic mean that the Executive can legislate because it would be easier to “get things done” and of course “necessary and proper”? Does it mean the the Executive can execute only the laws it considers proper to and policy wise convenient and ignore and not apply the laws the Executive does not like or doesn’t consider “necessary and proper”? Does it mean the Executive can say, this law is unconstitutional therefore I will not execute it, thus assuming the power of judicial review, because we need to get things done and the Executive considers it necessary and proper? Does it mean a “law” can pass and be signed by the President with only the vote of one House , lets say the Senate passing the bill, because you know, we need to get things done? In other words can a bill that is not law be considered law because it is “necessary and proper”? Lets say Congress dominated by what you would call “right wing nut jobs”, considers that it is essential to save the oil industry and therefore decides that every American must purchase a car or motorcycle and must at least purchase 10 gallons of fuel per week otherwise you must pay a penalty when you file your income tax? Is that proper and necessary? Probably the “need to get things done” crowd would argue of course. Is it constitutional? I don’t think so. What I am trying to say is that by all means the Founding Father were not idiots and new that there would be tremendous advancements in science and technology. After all Franklin was a scientist himself was he not? For example the Fourth Amendments states “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,” but does this apply to telephone conversations? Of course, even though there were no phones in 1789, the principle is the same and applies to knew technology, such as emails today.Even an originalist Justice such as Scalia agrees with that. But adapting those principles to new technology and advancements does not mean that those same principles should be ignored or violated. Just because we have a more complex world does not mean that the separation of powers (within the Federal government and between Federal government and the States) should be “adapted and modernized” by practically eliminating them in favor of a boundless expansion of Federal government or the Executive not limited to its constitutional jurisdiction. All because, we need to “get things done.” At least that is my humble opinion.
I respect the points you have made, Robert, and the way you have expressed yourself, and of course, the examples you give are not acceptable adaptation of Article 1, Section 8.
But if the nation is seen as needing expansion of the federal government as in the Civil War and Lincoln, the Great Depression and World War II and FDR, and the reality of the changed world we live in since the Cold War began and ended, and as we entered the new world of terrorism, this is a normal, common sense expansion of the federal government that no one could specifically predict 225 years ago.
If our Constitution cannot be stretched and expanded, then our experiment, which is what it is, in the American democratic republic, will be under siege, without any clear cut solution to any of the many problems we face!
I find it interesting that you say my examples are not acceptable adaptations when all of them have already been done, except the one House bill example. They have been implemented mainly by the Obama administration. So its really curious. But I really do not understand how our Republic can be under siege if we don’t unconstitutionally expand the power of government. Seriously , why have a written Constitution with jurisdictional limits if under the pretext of necessity, either economic or security necessities, those limits can be erased? Limits that were put there in the first place to protect us, the people, from not only government but even from ourselves. You talk about common sense. Art 1 sec. 8 clause 3, known as the Commerce clause, stipulates that Congress shall have the power to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes. In other words it establishes Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce, that is commerce between the states. I ask you, if you have a farm and grow corn or wheat or have pigs, chicken and eggs for your own consumption, you never sell it nor plan to put it into local commerce much less interstate commerce , that is commerce between the states. Can the federal Congress regulate you? Common sense would say no, yet the Court decided of course! Does that make sense to you? Is this the expansion you agree with? I suppose you would say yes because we “need to get things done”.
I agree Professor. The Constitution is supposed to be adaptable to modern times, not stuck in the 1700s.
Robert, the example you give on commerce seems ridiculous, and I am not saying that everything that the federal government does, or the courts do, is proper. But I DO believe that the federal government, by necessity, must deal with and adapt to changing times to protect our nation and promote equality and justice!
Ronald; what you call ridiculous is actually the basic legal reasoning and the foundation for the expansion of the Federal government regulation of commerce. Without this authority granted by the Court in Wickard v. Fillburn (in that case it was wheat not corn), not the Constitution, almost 90% of the current federal government regulation would be inviable. Now I agree with promoting justice and equality before the law. That is why we have the Judiciary which must be impartial and treat everyone equally. I guess in the end I believe yes that government must adapt to the times, but within the constitutional framework, that’s all.
A critique of libertarianism: http://www.winningprogressive.org/we-the-people-part-i-what-are-we
What progressivism is all about: http://www.winningprogressive.org/progressivism-keeping-rat-st-out-of-baby-food-for-more-than-100-years