Why liberals have trouble challenging Ron Paul

[Heman5up]

Not exact pro-RP per se but quite educational to look at issues from liberal point of view.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/12/matt-stoller-why-ron-paul-challenges-liberals.html

[klamath]

It was an iteresting read.

[ronpaulitician]

Two more write-up in a similar vein:

Glenn Greenwald (http://www.salon.com/2011/12/31/progressives_and_the_ron_paul_fallacies/)

It’s perfectly rational and reasonable for progressives to decide that the evils of their candidate are outweighed by the evils of the GOP candidate, whether Ron Paul or anyone else. An honest line of reasoning in this regard would go as follows:

Yes, I’m willing to continue to have Muslim children slaughtered by covert drones and cluster bombs, and America’s minorities imprisoned by the hundreds of thousands for no good reason, and the CIA able to run rampant with no checks or transparency, and privacy eroded further by the unchecked Surveillance State, and American citizens targeted by the President for assassination with no due process, and whistleblowers threatened with life imprisonment for “espionage,” and the Fed able to dole out trillions to bankers in secret, and a substantially higher risk of war with Iran (fought by the U.S. or by Israel with U.S. support) in exchange for less severe cuts to Social Security, Medicare and other entitlement programs, the preservation of the Education and Energy Departments, more stringent environmental regulations, broader health care coverage, defense of reproductive rights for women, stronger enforcement of civil rights for America’s minorities, a President with no associations with racist views in a newsletter, and a more progressive Supreme Court.

Without my adopting it, that is at least an honest, candid, and rational way to defend one’s choice. It is the classic lesser-of-two-evils rationale, the key being that it explicitly recognizes that both sides are “evil”: meaning it is not a Good v. Evil contest but a More Evil v. Less Evil contest. But that is not the discussion that takes place because few progressives want to acknowledge that the candidate they are supporting — again — is someone who will continue to do these evil things with their blessing. Instead, we hear only a dishonest one-sided argument that emphasizes Paul’s evils while ignoring Obama’s.
Andrew Sullivan (http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/01/arguments-vs-associations.html)

I still believe that the newsletters, because they were in Paul's name, require a clearer explanation from Paul than the muddled ones he has given. He should not be left off the hook. And his proposals deserve a thorough vetting and discussion.

But there is something awry when a candidate is assessed not on his arguments and proposals but on the shadiness and ugliness of some of his fringe supporters. And his arguments are serious, even vital, ones for this moment: that the construct of American global hegemony is too costly, too dated and too counter-productive to work in this country's interests abroad any longer; that the welfare state cannot be sustained at its present level with our looming demographics and massive debt; that problems are often best solved closest to the ground where they occur; that dividing Americans into identity groups and pandering to each is inimical to a free individualist society, and so on. These are fresher ideas on the right than the exhausted re-microwaved Reaganism of the others.

Which is why, whatever happens to his candidacy, Paul has already achieved something important: the broadening of debate, the scrambling of right and left, and the appearance on our toxic public stage of a man who seems to say what he thinks without much calculation or guile.

[Watch]

It's because Ron Paul supports liberalism, in the classical sense, more than any modern liberal could hope to.
Good intentions and good results are two different things.

[acptulsa]

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?337143-quot-You-might-be-a-RP-supporter-if...-quot-Rebuttals...&p=3839564#post3839564

[iakobos]

Good read. He's says some things I've been saying to my conservative friends who don't support Paul on foreign affairs issues; namely military interventionism and the welfare state go hand in hand because they are both financed from the same big govt source.