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BY GABE SEMENZA – VICTORIA ADVOCATE
January 08, 2008
Ron Paul came under fire on Monday night for a story supporters thought died seven years ago.
Welcome to presidential politics, congressman.
Paul, a Texas Republican vying for the U.S. presidency, is linked to ideas centered on racism, homophobia and paranoia.
Paul published newsletters for decades that included editorials calling black people “animals,” gays “limp-wristed”and accusing Martin Luther King Jr. of being “a pedophile,”said James Kirchick, a writer for The New Republic.
The New Republic is a national magazine of opinion published twice per month. It has a circulation up to 65,000. Politically, the magazine supports modern liberal policies.
Kirchick researched Paul and his newsletters for a lengthy piece set to publish in the magazine on Friday, and online today on its Web site, www.TNR.com.
Paul’s camp said the congressman did not write the newsletter editorials, and he regrets not having better reviewed the content in them.
Tucker Carlson said that’s a shoddy defense. Carlson, a political news pundit, hosts MSNBC’s “Tucker,” the TV show in which Kirchick shared his findings on Monday night.
Hours before the live TV show, Kirchick offered a telephone interview with the Victoria Advocate.
“The newsletters were called the Ron Paul Freedom Report and the Ron Paul Political Report,” Kirchick said by phone. “There’s no way he didn’t know what was in there.”
Paul published these newsletters dating back to 1978.
When confronted about them in 1996, Paul said the ideas were taken out of context, Kirchick said. In 2001, Paul “took moral responsibility for them” and apologized for not reviewing the content.
This year, Paul said the words were ghostwritten, Kirchick said.
“I think people have the right to know what a presidential candidate writes in public,”Kirchick said. “These were newsletters sent to tens of thousands of people.”
Kirchick accuses Jesse Benton, Paul’s presidential campaign spokesman, of changing stories.
When he asked Benton about the newsletters, Benton said Paul “granted various levels of approval” as to what appeared in print, Kirchick writes in his editorial.
Later, Benton said he never reviewed the “incendiary stuff.”
By phone, Benton said Kirchick is an avid Rudy Giuliani supporter with an ax to grind.
“Ron did not write those words. He’s horrified,” Benton said. “(Kirchick) is hashing up an old story. It’s troubling and irresponsible. He’s self-promoting himself and he has a political agenda here.”
Benton and Paul were in Los Angeles on Monday for a visit to NBC’s “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.”
Paul was excluded from a Fox News presidential debate, so Leno invited the candidate to speak, Benton said.
Paul was unavailable for comment, Benton said.
As for the criticism, the campaign spokesman said it’s a sign Paul is doing well.
“It’s a sign Ron is turning some heads and gaining support,” he said. “If you’re not being attacked, you’re not being effective.”
Kirchick disagreed. After noting it’s impossible to attribute every newsletter editorial to Paul, he writes that the articles were published under the candidate’s name, “and it therefore seems reasonable to ascribe the views to him.”
Kirchick seemed unnerved that Paul raised almost $20 million in three months, and that the candidates receives praise as a straight talker.
He seemed especially unnerved about the newsletters.
“What they reveal are decades worth of obsession with conspiracies, sympathy for the right-wing militia movement, and deeply held bigotry against blacks, Jews and gays,” Kirchick wrote.