It would take me practically forever to respond fully to this article, given that every sentence requires three paragraphs of refutation. That’s what Thomas Sowell said about leftism: its bumper-sticker slogans at times require volumes to disprove. I’ve already addressed most of Gregory Hilton’s complaints. See the following:
War, Ron Paul, and Conservatism
Thought Controllers Call Ron Paul “Extreme”
Democrats Warn: Beware Ron Paul!
Futility and the War on Drugs
Smashing Myths and Restoring Sound Money
See also:
The Brainwashed Refrain: Ron Paul Is “Crazy”
An Open Letter to the Catholic Community in Behalf of Ron Paul
Do Conservatives Hate Their Own Founder?
No Patronizing, No Sloganeering
Come Home, Conservatives — To the Antiwar Conservative Movement
Since the propagandist in question — who calls himself conservative, interestingly enough — knows nothing about gold and money apart from the left-wing cliches he reflexively repeats, I also recommend my Learn Austrian Economics resource page. He evidently thinks conservatives ought to steer clear of Ludwig von Mises and F.A. Hayek, though Ronald Reagan himself admired both. (Another “extremist”!)
I did post a comment on the article, but having covered most of these phony arguments against Dr. Paul in the past, I kept it brief and didn’t bother repeating myself. Again, see above for more defenses of Dr. Paul. But here is my comment, which is “awaiting moderation”:
This is typical of the intellectual level of the most committed Paul opponents. The author has obviously never read a blessed thing about the gold standard, against which he repeats every left-wing canard. He evidently has no idea what the Austrian School of economics is.
He thinks school vouchers are self-evidently desirable. He thinks Ron Paul opposes silent prayer, when his view is that such issues should be stripped from federal judges and returned to the states, which was Jesse Helms’ position. He repeats every propaganda argument about the bipartisan foreign policy consensus, a consensus from which Russell Kirk, whom our author has never heard of but who was the most significant conservative thinker of the twentieth century, vigorously dissented. He accuses Ron Paul of having foreign-policy overlap with the radical Left, without pausing to note his own overlap with Hillary Clinton and Madeleine Albright.
He thinks Ron Paul thinks abortion is fine if done at the state level, deliberately misstating Dr. Paul’s position that morally speaking abortion is always wrong but that our Constitution does not envision a federal policy on abortion.
Even if Dr. Paul were wrong on earmarks, which he isn’t, the U.S. government blew that much every ten minutes in its left-wing war to bring feminism to Afghanistan.
“Anti-Semitism,” which I see mentioned in the comments, is the phony Right’s answer to “racism.” Anyone who listens to Ron Paul for five minutes knows this grandfatherly figure hasn’t got a hateful bone in his body, which is more than we can say for the bloodthirsty savages who occupy the right-wing airwaves these days and who would have embarrassed an earlier generation of conservatives.
The discussion of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is simply laughable. So Barry Goldwater isn’t allowed into our author’s universe, either? Ron Paul could get creeps like this off his back in ten seconds by simply repeating the party line about this Act. Respectable Opinion(tm) has told us there is only one allowable position on this issue. Yet he opposes it anyway, knowing what it costs him in terms of votes, popularity, and attacks by centrists posing as conservatives. Some people actually welcome a person with that kind of integrity.
Or, dear author, you can have your intelligence insulted all day long by listening to the bumper-sticker slogans in which the Tim Pawlentys and other establishment drones routinely speak.
You have made your choice, and I have made mine.