Barbara Ehrenreich, writing in The Nation:Â
“When did you begin to think that Obama might be unstoppable? Was it when your grown feminist daughter started weeping inconsolably over his defeat in New Hampshire? Or was it when he triumphed in Virginia, a state still littered with Confederate monuments and memorabilia? For me, it was on Tuesday night when two Republican Virginians in a row called CSPAN radio to report that they’d just voted for Ron Paul, but, in the general election, would vote for… Obama.”
Ms. Ehrenreich and I are on the same wave-length, apparently, because the key to unlocking to this seeming conundrum is to be found in my column tomorrow ….
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And here we have the full meaning of the Paul betrayal. The very real possibility of the anti-war mantle being carried by someone less meritorious, one whose credentials are spotted by a willingness to cave to AIPAC pressure when it is exerted and, for me at least, the very considerable additional handicap of being anti-life. For as attractive a person as Obama may be – and his wife most certainly is – he is, after all, a Democrat and cannot possibly have transcended all of the limitations such an identity typically imposes on one. And there can be no way after his election that he might be encouraged to cast off these encrustations.
In my view, Paul has failed utterly in what would seem to have been his exclusively pedagogical purpose – I say pedagogical because it certainly couldn’t have been his plan to have made much of a political impact – if the inheritor of the anti-war message is Barak Obama. With Obama we get eggroll but nothing more, no guarantees respecting Iran or Pakistan, no grasp of the historical when it comes to Russia and NATO, no sense of the damage done with an attitude supportive of the Israeli aggression against Lebanon in 2006. In a phrase, we’re getting a cheap imitation. It could have been otherwise. We have Ron Paul to account for that.
Oh my dear Lord, Not John Lowell again. Seriously, man you need to get a life. Now it’s Ron Paul’s fault that Obama might get the nomination? Why don’t you blame him for global warming and sun spots or the price of tea in China?
Get over it. Ron Paul has done more for America than anyone else in decades. He has educated the masses. Obviously not everyone but still way more than anyone else. He can NOT win with a third party run, face it. I would love it if it were otherwise but its not. If he had a billion dollars in the bank he still would not win. America is waking up but not fast enough for him to have a shot at winning the presidency. It’s a sad fact but America is not ready for the truth.
Blaming Ron Paul for the ignorance of others is simply infantile. Grow UP!
Peace.
I believe we have Rockwell and Rothbard to blame for that. The racism issue pulled the tracks away before the train could arrive. Raimondo’s simplistic critique of Obama’s anti-war positions is somewhat of a betrayal as well.
I think we should all vote for McCain, let the military go kick butt and sak questions later… seems to be the only way to end all this crap
Raimondo’s analysis is always worth reading, whatever the subject. It is never less than first class, and often great or near-great.
Ya’ll need to drop this “betrayal” nonsense. Ron Paul cannot run a third party campaign and keep his seat in congress, where he will be the key to effective resistance to the Empire, whoever is elected president. He is the only politician to ever stand up to the lobby and survive. The only reason he has gotten ANY attention is because he is a Republican; were he to run as a third party candidate the end result will be exactly zero for all the time, money and effort spent. Check out the Libertarian Party to see pissing in the wind in action.
Have a little faith; the man is smart, tough, and agile enough to take advantage of any mistakes the Borg might make. Why is Huckabee still going? Because McCain is a very weak candidate, unstable and with potential scandal around every corner.
You’re right though, Justin, about the march being a bad idea. It might be better for Paul supporters to participate in the already scheduled UFPJ march.
the GOP cuold have at least made a step forward by backing Huckabee. They wouldn’t have won, but they’d have someone they could rally behind.
Huchabee is a creation of the CFR. His foreign policy advisor is(or was) Richard Haas, prez of CFR. His “foreign policy coming out” was published in Foreign Affairs, the mag of the CFR. And I say his candidacy was promoted by the CFR to take the light off Ron Paul. Paul had just done the first money bomb as the other guys, Rudy, Fred, Romney, McNuts, were fading. Huckster was the blocking back. Where did he get the money to pay that fat phoney “conservative” Ed Rollins? The MSM focuses on him, and lets Ron Paul fade from view. NBC News (sic) used Huckelberry as their default pet (McNuts has always been their hero). Why, and how, else could Dinkleberry stay around. He had no money, no contributors, and he believes that the world started when Adam and Eve strolled into the Garden of Eden 6 thousand ago. Tell me the MSM didn’t know this, and what they would have done to any other candidate that held such beliefs. I rest my case!
I must say it has perplexed me how Huckabee has remained in the race (and run numerous TV ads) with supposedly no money. I traveled to Chicago a week before super Tuesday. The only TV ads I saw were for Huckabee. When I returned to New York, again, the only ads I saw were for Huckabee. What gives? Wasn’t this guy supposedly broke, and he’s running ads in two of the most expensive markets in America, both with next to no Repblican voters?
Soemthing isn’t right in Denmark.
mr.raimondo i think you are missing a lot in your article to situate obama as an ” anti-war : candidate . it may have some thing to do with your desire to keep a grand narrative that war party will go after any one who does not totally toe the line . how ever it is a big leap from there to claiming some one is anti-war . former senator gravel was much closer to mark when in one of the debates he asked him who would you nuke ( bomb ? ) next . he speaks from at least 3 sides of his mouth to make sure one gets to listen what one likes .
let us see :
obama wants (1) 100000 more combat troops ( 2) stronger defence / more money for MIC (3) no option off the table vis a vis iran ( 4) more war in afganistan ( 5 ) start a war on pakistan ( 6 ) definitely does not want to close any bases / cut troops / bring them home ( 7 ) did his obligatory crawling before AIPAC here and isaraelies there when he put a stamp of approval for their war crimes against lebanon ( 8 ) have a look at his advisers . how many war criminals / staunch believers in american empire . perhaps not as belligerent as neo-cons but still imperialists to core .
i can add few more ..
i am kind of disappointed as you are usually lot more sharper . let us hope some obamaites will be pleased enough to donate to fund raiser ( a silver lining ? :) ]
regards .
ps : you should now and then cross post some blog posts from Taki’s . i think more readers here .
Huckabee is definitely the Establishment’s diversion candidate. They can route all the conservative angst about McCain behind Huckabee, who will, by all indications, simply endorse McCain once he gets the sufficient number of delegates. While there are still 3 active Republican candidates, the media, and the Republican Party, and McCain and Huckabee, all portray it as a two man race between McCain and Huckabee. Paul is the subject of media blackout. If the Republican campaign was a simple two man race between McCain and Paul, then Paul would likely be the beneficiary of conservative distaste for McCain, which would give him more momentum and potential influence at the Republican convention.
Obama is definitely capitalizing on the “anti-war” sentiment among the public, but from what I can tell, he is opposed to the way the Republicans conducted the Iraq war and wants to substantially withdraw troops, but he isn’t opposed to potential wars in other countries, and isn’t opposed to the US govt’s interventionist foreign policy.
It is once again an argument on technicalities (how long do we intervene in which country at what time?), and not a fundamental rejection of interventionism. Paul is the only candidate offering non-interventionism, and Obama’s supporters appear content to bash Bush and the Iraq war (which is justified) while not thinking about the more strategic and critical issue of whether a foreign policy of interventionism is justified. The latter would require a high level of rationality in our society, electoral process, and political parties, a level of rationality which is conspicuously absent.
And Zbig as one of Obama’s foreign policy advisors clearly signals that interventionism will continue under a Pres. Obama. Their issues will not be how to end interventionism, but how to manage and conduct interventionism better than Bush has. Raimondo is stretching it a bit to consider Obama anti-war in any meaningful sense.
And this – your commentary about Obama – is precisely why Paul’s refusal to launch a third party or independent bid is so treacherous. It permits the antiwar question to be defined in the most misleading way possible. Frankly, I hope Paul never rears his head again politically. His judgment is atrocious and, God knows, he’s obscure enough in the House already that not having him there at all will hardly be noticed. Would it really make a difference who replaces him? Republican or Democrat, will the lay of the land change? Of couse it won’t. Right now, Paul’s “revolution” is looking a bit like the Kapp Putsch, and Paul like a wuss. Never again, thank you.
I always read Mr. Raimondo first, always a great take on things whether I agree or not but mostly I agree.
God Bless Ron Paul the closest thing we have to Thomas Jefferson in these dark times. The task to defeat the Borg is momumental and long. I think much will be required from everyone if we are to succeed in restoring the Republic.
Anyone who thinks Dr. Ron is responsible in any way for the message not getting out is just very wrong. Blame the power of the Borg to smear and censor anyone or anything that threatens its rotten kingdom.
“God Bless Ron Paul the closest thing we have to Thomas Jefferson in these dark times.”
Oh, by all means, God’s blessing to Paul, and to all creation and to everyone within it for that matter, but the business about Jefferson, the comparison, just has to be the most insufferable tripe imaginable. Egad, young man, a sense of proportion! Jefferson seems to have known that one had rather to run for president in order to be elected to the office, a fact which seems wholly to have eluded Paul. At this rate, the next thing we’ll read is that Ron Paul appeared to three school children somewhere in Texas or that some photograph of Paul has begun to shed tears. Cloud arrangements or rock formations will be said to ressemble Paul and some here actually will believe it. Will someone call the attendant, kindly.
…littered with Confederate monuments and memorabilia?
this part of your statement is insulting. littered implies “trash”. the men that fought for the confederacy had the nerve to fight and die against tyranny and for what was the republic. an association of several independent states forming a federal government. not a federal government dictating to those independent states. a confederation of states.
lincoln did not care one iota about the institution of slavery neither did the war criminal sherman. their intent was to preserve the union.
Obama is well spoken and he should really be commended for not playing the race card.
However, read his book, he is an extreme liberal. He says the nation will be more “polyglot” and he is happy about that. And he says his daughters will have to speak Spanish and he is fine with that. Well, I’m not fine with it. People like Obama and his multi culturalist fanatical friends are ruining America. The importance of a common language is mentioned in no less than the Federalist Papers. People like him want to change America and ignore our nation’s history. They don’t want us to be “one nation under God.” They want us to be a house divided, each to his own community. Well I’m sick and tired of it. I just bought a new bumper sticker for my car today. It says “Welcome to America. Now Speak English.”
Yes Tim, not speaking English is evil in an of itself.
Christ on a bike.