Ron Paul: Why They Hate Him

Andy Roth of the Club for Growth is a bit puzzled by John Hawkins’ latest rankings of the most disliked people on the right. Writes Roth:

 And let me tell you, there is something wrong when more people dislike Ron Paul than Ted Stevens or Linc Chafee

Roth has a point (though I’d be reluctant to put either Stevens or Chafee on the right, more like the center or even the left in Chafee’s case.) I doubt it’s truly about issues, but rather about the behavior of his supporters.

Though I should add  Paul is a tad hypocritical on spending issues. While he has a reputation of Dr. No, strict constructionist who opposes unconstitutional spending, only 12 times in 41 opportunities did Dr. Paul oppose unconstitutional pork spending, while at the same time he’s been proposing his own pork. I never read about shrimp advertising subsidies in the constitution.

However, Paul’s supporters have to be considered the clincher. Many (but not all) are 9/11 truthers and other undesirables. They hijack threads, barge in quite rudely to places in which they are not invited, and due to how well-organized they are, they guarantee that no blogger can hold a fun strawpoll of their readers without Ron Paul’s folks showing up to manipulate it. Overall, the Paul folks don’t show a lot of respect for bloggers and rush in far too many places and this behavior has helped to tarnish Ron Paul.

So despite the greater faults of Stevens and Chafee, the personal annoyance that Ron Paul’s supporters represent will not help Paul’s standings in the blogosphere. Like it or not, that’s the way it is.

UPDATE

Former Libertarian and 1988 Ron Paul voter Clayton Cramer just got back from a Gun Rights Convention and was disturbed at what he found:

One of the Ron Paul newsletters that turned me off so much talked about how he would look up into the galleries of the House and see Israeli agents giving directions to members of the House as to how they were supposed to vote–and I begin to sense something about two steps back from “Jews are running the world.” Nothing quite so direct and paranoid–but it gave me some real discomfort.

At the GRPC, I spoke to several Ron Paul supporters (who seemed to be a large fraction of the attendees, based on the buttons and such), and I found myself increasingly reminded of that newsletter. While we were standing in line for the buffet, I joined a conversation about the mistakes that Bush has made with respect to the Iraq war. He’s made several very severe ones–even if you agree that the war needed to be fought. I pointed out that the several reasons for the war that enjoyed general support in the U.S. at the time, even among Democrats, and this one Ron Paul supporter suddenly said, “The Iraq War was about one thing: protecting Israel. Full stop.”

The idea that the Iraq War is all about doing Israel’s bidding–because those “Jewish neocons” ran the Bush Administration–is very popular in leftist anti-Semitic circles at the moment. For purposes of argument, let’s accept that there was concern in the Bush Administration that Iraq, once in possession of a nuclear weapon, might use it against Israel. This does not preclude the other possible risks of a nuclear-armed Iraq such as a threat to Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the dangers of escalation with Iran, or of Iraq supplying such weapons to terrorist groups. This complete oversimplification of the question to doing Israel’s bidding, in conjunction with that creepy newsletter some years ago, really makes me wonder what kind of a crowd Ron Paul is attracting.

Another aspect that disturbed me was the crowd of Ron Paul supporters who suddenly showed up for his speech (but who had not been at the GRPC). There were signs that declared, “Ron Paul Will Save America.” When Ron Paul arrived, there was a frightening intensity to the chanting, “Ron Paul! Ron Paul!”

I’ve volunteered for Presidential campaigns before. In 1980, I put a lot of effort into coordinating volunteers for the Ed Clark campaign. But I do not recall ever seeing this level of leader worship–what at least from the outside looked like fanaticism.

I don’t mean that every Ron Paul supporter is a closet Nazi. But there was something just a little peculiar about what I saw and heard–and I found it a bit disturbing.

That Paul refuses to distance himself from these type of people speaks volumes about his campaign.