I’ve been reading news stories about Ron Paul’s newsletter scandal—in the Huffington Post, The New Republic, and the Christian Science Monitor, to name just a few. And I feel like they’re all overlooking something important.
These analyses all seem to focus strongly on his offensive attitudes on race, sexual preference, and, frankly, the usual litany of Right Wing hot button phobias. “Was he a racist?” these stories seem to ask. “If so, is he still? Or did he ‘just’ employ others who were racists or wrote racist material? Was it just the climate of the time and of course has he since evolved?” Some of the stories ask tentative questions, others boldly conclude. It’s very attention-getting, so the debate rages.
In the past, before Internet scrutiny was ubiquitous, it might have been possible to get away with statements like those in the newsletters. But they don’t look pretty with harsh sunlight pouring in on them. And it’s pretty clear that Paul himself knows better than to assert otherwise, so he’s backing away from the matter like a hot potato. He’s never been shy about defending things he thinks are worth defending, even unpopular things. So if he’s not defending this, he must know it’s indefensible.
But still, it doesn’t seem likely that he’s poised to volunteer a confession. So discussing this matter is likely to go in circles forever even when there’s little controversy. We can debate forever about what he felt in his heart back then or whether he’s changed. Some Republicans seemed to believe Gingrich when he said he’d asked God for forgiveness and was a changed man. Maybe Paul could do the same. And then what of this criticism? It’s highly emotionally charged, but politicians have a way of wriggling free of these issues, I think because they come down to opinion, and there are tried and true ways to deny having an opinion.
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“I didn’t write ’em.
I disavow ’em.
That’s it.”
—Ron Paul
So here’s what’s bugging me...
The guy is running for “Responsible Person in Chief.”
By this I mean that the Republicans have, after all, asked Obama to be responsible for all military actions, for all job losses, for all rises and falls in the stock market, for action that follows earthquakes and hurricanes, and even for every detail of what the Presidential Christmas card looks like. Some of us might disagree about which of these are properly responsibilities of the President, but what I think we all agree with is that the President is the chief executive of our nation, the nation with the largest economy on Earth, the most powerful military on Earth, and so on. It’s an awesome responsibility.
So what amazes me, and seems objectively damning, is that Paul seems perfectly comfortable casually disclaiming responsibility for newsletters bearing his name (the Ron Paul Investment Letter, the Ron Paul Political Report, and the Ron Paul Survival Letter). This seems like the kind of enterprise where you’d expect him to care about what was going on inside it, yet he talks about it like it wasn’t really his responsibility.
If we were attacked, would President Paul shrug and say he has generals who should have handled it? Would he tell us sorry about some new economic collapse, but he wasn’t even paying attention so why are we blaming it on him? If the CIA or FBI went rogue, would he just laugh it off and say that’s what we get for having such a big government?
In my view, it is the job of a chief executive to know what’s going on, to care about what’s going on, and to take responsibility when something goes wrong.
So yes, I worry he doesn’t have a very modern set of attitudes on a lot of social issues. But even if, just for argument’s sake, I give him a pass on all that, I still can’t get past this other matter of his managerial qualifications. Sure, it was a long time ago, but why should I think he’s gotten better? I didn’t hear him say “Wow, I really just didn’t know how to be a manager back then. I should never have let things get so out of control. But I’ve gone back to school and learned how to do that right.” I don’t even hear him say the first part—that he recognizes what he did was bad management, whether he’s improved since then or not. And it’s that lack of recognition—now, today—that is bugging me. He sounds today like he thinks what happened back then was fine and defensible.
Perhaps he even likes the idea that no one was running the show back then—maybe that’s a metaphor for his small government ideal. Well, regardless of motive, his recently observed lack of concern about lax management as he looks back at those past events tells me what I think I’d want to know about how and whether he could govern today.
I can just see the sign that would sit on his desk, and it’s sadly not as pithy as the one on President Truman’s desk:
“The buck stops—well, gee, why are you asking me?
Just help yourself.
I’m too busy to be responsible for every little thing.”
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• • • • •
UPDATE
The uncut interview with Ron Paul was posted on YouTube. It shows quite a different interview than the one that most people saw. I don't think it changes my basic point here, and to some extent it reinforces it, because many have said the full interview makes him look more reasonable on the “issues.” My concern here is not the issues but the management competence, which in my view is unaffected by the differences of the two interviews. But certainly feel free to watch the longer, uncut interview yourself and make up your own mind. Anyone who thinks it should make a difference to my point here should feel free to make the case.
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Comments
The fact that you responded to my first comment is what led me to make further comments. I thought you'd seen the relevance to your blog. Since you do not see that relevance, it is pointless for you to move them somewhere they were never intended to be.
Thank you. Bye.
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Kent - you're on the money......and, FWIW, a lot of the spin-guys out there are blathering on about this very point. Not to mention that it should register spontaneously with anyone out there with an ounce of consciousness...
Rarely have I see such a public display of petulant weaselhood. "I'm not going to talk about it anymore, so there!" Why is it so difficult to address past failings? Ignoring them just makes them loom larger and larger...until they messily explode.
Doesn't it logically follow that when a process, decision, oversight, etc., results in consequences, so should the responsibility result in some consequence of considered relevance? What do these "responsibility takers" typically suffer beyond making the statement, that could reasonably be seen to have any scale of relevance? Even (rare as this may be) were they to lose their positions, they are typically so well situated and connected that they may have to forgo a bit of luxury until they are taken back into some fold of the good 'ol boys (and gals) club.
The groundskeeper at their country club would suffer worse consequences for getting fertilizer on their shoes accidentally.
Sam, the question of what it means to take responsibility is another matter, I agree. But I tend to reason in modular fashion, as doing otherwise ends up down the Machiavellian “I don't like him so let's just pick an outcome we like and call it a day” way of reasoning. It's absolutely true that we need to see more consequence to politicians being responsible for things than we do. Although sometimes (not here) we have to also recognize that indeed they cannot do everything and forgive them some lapses. But that should be our judgment, not theirs.
vzn, yes, both lines of discussion need to be pursued independently, I think. I'm not trying to give him a pass on the racism stuff for sure, as I think that's a forseeable consequence of the politics he likes, and so it's a ntural refuge for people who think that way. Such people would not make good and fair policy for a pluralistic society, I think. I've often pointed out something that goes straight to the issue of Libertarianism: “Where there are no rules, bullies rule.” Bouncing back from the competence issue to the ideology issue, Paul is a supporter of what I'd call a “bullydom.” Thanks for visiting and thinking aloud with me.
Grace, I wrote the piece to add to the arsenal of reasons not to pick Paul as the candidate. Many are considering Paul as a possibly rational choice these days not because he's great in any of these areas but because other Republican candidates have been pushed so far to the Right that Paul looks a moderate by comparison. (He wants to shut down health care, education, EPA, etc. just lke the others, but he doesn't want to take away civil rights and he wants to end the wars and torture. So he's only half as bad ideologically by some measures.) My point here is that ideology is not the only way they should consider him. On grounds of competency, I have big reservations. As an independent voter who's probably going to designate Republican just for the fast-approaching primary, even though I'll almost surely vote Obama in the general, I've crossed Paul off of my list of people to vote for. I'm trying to pick someone who would be a rational fallback if Obama loses (which at this point seems a remote possibility, though fortunes change). Right now I'm looking at Roemer and Huntsman but until this fiasco I had thought I might hold my nose and vote for Paul. Roemer's anti-money stance is appealing but I wish he'd offer clearer support for the EPA and Climate; he's been criticizing the other candidates for their Climate stance, but criticism is cheap.
Also, it is very sad to see that the Republican Party cannot find a quality candidate - none of the existing gaggle of Republican POTUS wannabes has a snowball's chance in hell of beating Mr. Obama.
do you vote? for whom?
isn't the concept of leaving one man master of the nation a bit, 'medieval?'
al, there's not a vote scheduled on changing the way we do things, so this is a discussion within the framework we have. That's not to say I don't engage in other discussions, but I'm pretty modular about those discussions. I think all conversations have to be had within a frame of reference, and where that frame of reference can be practical and actionable, so much the better. We will have to vote, so a discussion of how to vote is relevant.
Paul's a profiteer in the long vein of chump fleecers who made a cool million on the racist mailers. He hides behind the Social Contract while attacking it during paid speeches to bumpkins- and wouldn't last a minute without it.
Surfer, indeed. It's his responsibility, and probably indeed it's cynically intentionally. I don't mean at all to discount that as a possibility, only to say that as a point of argument, he's not qualified for office even if those other things that are probably true were not to be.
Abrawang, thanks for visiting. Yep, an exercise in strategic opportunism. (Maybe that's redundant.)
http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2011/12/re-thinking-the-paul-endorsement.html
thinking more about this, I think we have to look at ron pauls record. there is not really anything racist in his public statements. I dont like all ron pauls positions. but Im willing to do a priority analysis here. ron paul is basically the ONLY candidate in the ENTIRE field, even among DEMOCRATS who unequivocally challenges the unrestrained WARMACHINE. even obama who claimed to do that, has folded his cards on entering the presidency, and his position on that now turns out to be clearly a hollow sham to anyone with half a brain. so theres lots of stuff about ron paul that I dont like, but Im willing to make a BET that his strong antiwar[machine] stance will survive his election, even as it does NOT in all other candidates. so yes, you have to read between the lines, you have to make a BET as a voter, and stuff that people say is a sure thing may not turn out to be that way. but I think its a very valid BET that ron paul would cut back the military to some reasonable level in office, and Im willing to "pay" for that on other issues that dont have as much significance or priority in my mind. so in that sense Im doing as a "potential" voter exactly what a president needs to do. priortize, choose his battles wisely. to me the unrestrained warmachine is the key issue of our times, and a life-or-death issue for the future of the country, and ron paul agrees, and you can "keep the change" on the rest.....
"My point is that even then the problem is that he hasn't shown himself to be a good manager. He's got his theories of what he wants, but being President means being in charge of a lot of things and it means learning each and every day to so that you don't get snowed with so many things you must deal with that you never have time to get to the thing you promised or that you wished you would do. It's that skill of cutting through the smokescreen made by staff, by lobbyists, etc. that is important. PREZ OBAMA has a skill of simply ignoring things that is hard to distinguish from the skill of wanting things to go away. The American people don't want an Ignorer in Chief even if some do want someone to cut intelligently. He hasn't shown his ability to make that distinction in a way that he can easily demonstrate."
I think the whole newsletter thing is what the Elite has used to discredit paul in the past, and its not working as well this time around, and paul is surging in the polls, so you can see some mass & mounting panic in the Elite circles.... manifested as a coordinated, synchronized smear attack in the MSM.... truly a wonder to behold! can paul withstand it?
dude, full disclosure & deference to your intellectual position-- I am a realist & a cynic, and frankly, I will tell you kent, he has a snowballs chance in hell of surviving on this rare occasion when the Elite media guns are all lined up, as they are now....
I'm not trying to discredit Paul. He's doing enough of that himself. I'm not on that bandwagon, I'm just watching with no tears shed. I don't like the man. I don't find him harmless. But I wanted to point out that he needs to do more than show an interest in this or that outcome to be qualified for office. There are other independent things people are not scrutinizing and competence is one. And that means if someone clears him on this or that ideological ground, he's not home free.
so kent, do you have enough control over your brain to figure out exactly WHY you dont like him? does it actually have something to do with newsletters published something like 2 decades ago under ron pauls name? what in the newsletters actually bothers you? or do you not like ron paul because the MSM TELLS you, you dont like ron paul? do you have the ability to actually determine the difference? I will admit, it is indeed quite subtle, and if you can actually articulate your real issue for YOU, outside of what the MSM tells you is the real issue, why it seems youve transcended more than 99% of the human race and reached the elite 1%, so to speak =)
I know the reasons why I don't like him, but they are not the subject of this blog so I'm not going to engage it at length as my argument does not hinge on the question. My point was that this is not an argument about him on the basis of whether I like him, but on the basis of competence.
You raised the issue of whether Obama was someone that could have had the same argument raised, and I think during his initial run for office the issue was raised. I was swayed that he had run an excellent grass-roots campaign and that it was the campaign itself that showed he had the management skills. Reports from people following him said he ran a very tight ship and showed strong executive capabilities during that campaign. And, in fact, I think he's shown that ability to manage in his Presidency. A subtle but related skill, though, which he has come to only slowly is the difference between being a Senator and being a President. He has not taken quickly to the bully pulpit and has tried to persuade in situations where he should have acknowledged his central role as President in being able to push an agenda. In fact, I don't think Ron Paul would make that mistake so I don't think he's lacking that. But I do think that the issue of organizational management is different than the issue of strategic management and that you have to have both. And I don't see it in Paul. What I see in Paul is someone who's used to having money roll in because there is a steady vapor pressure of people with a particular antipathy to certain cultural movements willing to just constantly send him money. That's not the same as being able to do a real movement. If anything, I see him succeeding in spite of poor management, not because of good management. That's just my judgment.
Am I even right all the time? I don't know. I have definite (if even sometimes changing) opinions. I don't assert I'm always right. I take a position and try to work it through. My asserting something here or in any of my posts is not a claim I will fight to the death over it. If I think I'm wrong, I'll just say so. If I need to change, I'll try to do that. Sometimes I'll say I'm doing that, but mostly I write way too long so sometimes I don't bother to identify such change even if I know of it. I reserve the right to learn and grow, so inconsistencies within my posts are of no matter. You can refer specifically to those inconsistencies and ask polite questions, but you may not make broad assertions that merely call me inconsistent as such assertions are neither adequately focused nor possible to respond to usefully. But I expect to be respected as if I mean what I say and am not being intentionally disingenuous at any point.
So you can discuss that aspect of him if you want, or compare my views of Obama and Paul. But if you stray again and start talking about me and my abilities, preferences, etc. whether consistent or inconsistent or whether fixed or changing, I'll stop the conversation in its tracks. If you find reason to criticize me or anyone posting comments here, do it in your own blog on your own time, not here. At the point where you think I'm being disingenuous, you do not belong here. This blog is for discussing things respectfully with others and having them treat me with respect in exchange.
It depends on what the purpose of the newsletters was. For example, we don't hold the OS editor responsible for everything that appears on the pages of OS, because the purpose of OS is to provide a venue in which anyone can publish most anything.
I think it is entirely possible that the purpose of Paul's newsletters -- in addition to making money -- was to publish a range of conservative opinion up to and including rants about race and gender and anything else that might stir the passions of "the faithful." The newsletter was obviously written for a narrow audience that enjoys this sort of thing. Right wing folks need to be maintained in a constant state of outrage and umbrage, and I suppose Paul's newsletters were designed to do that.
So for what do you want to criticize Ron Paul? Because he wanted to make a buck giving the faithful the kind of stuff they want to read? His readers wanted a certain product and Paul provided it and made money at it. I haven't seen any evidence to indicate that he agreed with the more controversial stuff.
I'm not going to vote for him for all sorts of other reasons, and the whole right-wing-daily-outrage thing doesn't appeal to me. But the newsletter "scandal" seems like a tempest in a teapot to me.
From what I've read, in 2008 Paul said this:
"When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, I have publically taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name."
If "publicly taking moral responsibility" is not sufficient, then I am curious to know what would be sufficient.
Doesn't reassure me as to how he'd run the office of prez.
But let's say even for a moment that he had done that. Another bit of wisdom I've offered with respect to a similar concept, “thank you” on more than one occasion is that gratitude should take as long or cost as much as the thing done. So if someone saves up all year to buy you something and you say “thank you” and think you're done thanking them, you're mistaken.
And I think the same is true of apologies. Race hatred, gay bashing, and other intolerant attitudes cause persistent damage throughout our society that affect people over long arcs of time. If those people seem genuinely unhappy about the lasting effects and end up repeating themselves on the point, then so be it. It's not their fault for continuing to be affected. What it is to take responsibility is to legitimize the hurt, even the lasting hurt, and that hurt is not legitimized by saying something in a moment like “I take responsibility” and then subsequently saying “What more do you want?” I think at minimum apologies of a more sincere kind are needed, promises that this would never happen in the future are needed, and acknowledgments that even if gripes occur in the future, words like: “You know, I've apologized for this in the past, but an apology doesn't really fix the hurt done, so I understand why people are still angry. I want to renew my sense of sadness that I didn't do better on that and remind you of these concrete steps I'd promised you I'd take and report on my progress in trying to make amends in the time since.”
No, I don't think we'll see that, and I think the reason we won't see it is because it's necessary to the complex dog whistle going on here that he merely stand up to the criticism but never say anything out loud to acknowledge in a legitimate way that a wrong was done. Doing so would then be repeated throughout Intoleranceville and he would become persona non grata there. By not saying anything, he allows them to think to themselves “The mainstream media has beaten him up for telling truth and he's my hero for not giving in and apologizing.” That's why the apology is so important here. It's just words, yes, but it's words that say “I have sided with the other team.” And by not saying any words, he seeks to have it both ways.
But why is this relevant to competence? To me it's relevant because one's competence is judged against what one seeks to achieve. We have nowhere a statement of what he sought to achieve. It may well be that he was not racist, but as some have noted, he profited handsomely from the enterprise. That makes him responsible. If his company had committed any of various crimes or torts, he'd be held to account. Why is he exempt here? He says because he was a poor publisher. That's what he said. So fine, we accept that theory. What is it about publishing that he wasn't able to do? Was it the reading? I'm going to guess he could read. I think it was that he didn't want to or couldn't manage. If he couldn't, that's bad. If he didn't want to, that's bad, too. It sounds a lot like Libertarianism, which is a very hands-off ideology. I have to think it's how he'd run a Presidency and it's not how I want it run.
What do I want him to do? I don't need him to do anything. He's done enough to tell him I'm not voting for him and that I'm not recommending him to anyone. And no, I didn't come into this with a closed mind. In fact, he was on my short list of people to vote for in the upcoming NH primary. I'm an independent and will designate Republican to vote in that primary. I want to make sure I have the best possible second choice if Obama fails. I have ruled out a number of candidates and it's been between Paul, Huntsman, and Roemer. None of these is a perfect choice, and I'd actually contemplated Paul on philosophical grounds, actually, no matter what people think. I think he's got terrible views on these matters of race and gay rights, but I think that's not exactly news in the Republican camp. All of them seem to. He is at least in favor of getting us out of wars and in favor of privacy. That seemed like a better package than some. But the idea that he thinks it's OK to take charge of something, like a newsletter, with himself at the top, and then to ignore it, is very troubling to me. I think he justifies it to himself by just saying “I get to choose what I have to care about and not, and the rest of everyone be damned.” And it's that which has decided me he's not the guy who will get my primary vote. I'm still up in the air between Roemer and Huntsman. I liked Huntsman on Climate but he recently caved on that. I'm hoping Roemer will be more clear about his stance; he's been critical of others on Climate but hasn't said in fact what his position is. Still, my point is not to open the debate on the whole field, only to defend any claim that I reached this competence assessment because I didn't like Paul's politics. As I wrote on twitter the other day: “@RonPaul, fixed surveyor's mark at fringe of Right as #GOP goes well beyond, seems now comparative moderate for being only 1/2 crazy.” Damnation with faint praise perhaps, but enough to defend the claim that I'm not seeking to disqualify him among Republican options.
2. How Mish can even bother to defend the behavior is astonishing.
Thanks, Kent. r.
In my book, what disqualifies Ron Paul is that he’s not a libertarian period. In fact, he’s fraud and a poser. Any real libertarians do not espouse the views discussed above and in his books (see link below). Furthermore, they don’t selectively choose subjects where the government should or shouldn’t intrude in people’s lives (e.g., personal drug consumption versus gay marriage). I could spend more time discussing these points, but I’ll leave that for another time.
I believe you may be interested in this CNN piece uploaded today:
Rep. Ron Paul's early book included controversial passages
Kanuk, those are some great points, well argued. Thanks.
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But to the question of whether Ron Paul intended these things, The Washington Post offers an interesting new story today suggesting Ron Paul did in fact sign off on some of these things.
Sure, he has an ideological base of fans. This is good. But he also needs to be able to dispense and exchange favors. And he just hasn't had the ability to accumulate that many "chips" from a mere House position.
Ron Paul doesn't have that kind of pull. Patronage is key in politics. It is the mother's milk of power, on both the Left and the Right. Exchanging favors.
Seriously, Obama's first term is virtually indistinguishable from what a GWB third term would have looked like.
http://nothingchanged.org
Instead of trying to tear down Ron Paul (who, BTW, I believe to be very flawed), how about producing a Democratic challenger who holds liberal or even moderate views, rather than excusing Obama for his evil bloodthirsty policies.