Posted by Carl Wicklander on 10/30/09
Last updated 10/31/09

Originally published at Uncouth Ruminations

Feeling the heat that Rand Paul is a real threat to beat him in the Republican primary, establishment pick Trey Grayson has resorted to personal attacks more than six months before the primary.

The move isn't even a surprise. Being the son of Ron Paul has its downsides: the establishment hates you.

By raising over $1 million in the third quarter, nearly doubling the amount raised by the secretary of state, Grayson knows that young Dr. Paul will be able to get his name out there and be a force to be reckoned with.

Attempting to turn Rand Paul's asset as an outsider on its head, Grayson earlier this month said, "He's an outsider. He's not a Kentuckian. You know, I'm a 5th generation Kentuckian, educated here in the public schools, raising my family here."

"I'm a 5th generation Kentuckian." As my friend Don Rickles would say, "Would you like a cookie?"

Something deep inside tells me that Grayson did not say the same thing to Alabama-born and ergo fellow outsider Mitch McConnell last month when the senate minority leader and 16 other Republican senators who supported last year's bailouts threw a $500 per plate Washington D.C. fundraiser for him.

But Rand Paul, who has lived in the Bluegrass State since 1993, landed the real zinger in this verbal dust-up: "I've been a Kentuckian longer than Grayson's been a Republican," reminding voters that their Republican secretary of state was a Democratic delegate for Bill Clinton in 1992.

The other recent smear against Rand Paul is pure farce. It's so bad . . .

In unison: "How bad was it?"

It's so bad that if I didn't know better, I would have suspected the Rand Paul campaign of making it up just so they could make their opponent and his supporters look foolish.

Trey Grayson can thank Breathitt County GOP chairman and campaign donor Mike Bryant for his cute website: Too Kooky For Kentucky.

The title itself is not surprising either. In "Fire Two!" after Rand Paul was smeared by the Voice Tribune of Louisville, I wrote in this blog that it won't be long until Rand is branded as "just the kook son of chief kook Ron Paul." Lo and behold, the picture at the head of Too Kooky for Kentucky has Ron Paul on the left and Rand Paul on the right with each of them wearing a dunce cap.

Interviewed on WTVQ-TV in Lexington we meet Mr. Mike Bryant. Rotund, bald, and donning squarish eye glasses, he kind of looks like me without the long sideburns.

After obviously searching for some coherent criticism, Bryant says, "Really, we don't know yet what Rand stands for in a lot of cases."

This complaint is laughable in a couple of ways.

Neither Trey Grayson nor any of his supporters have any ground on which to stand when they charge that they don't know what Rand Paul stands for. As I've pointed out numerous times here, the Paul campaign website provides detailed descriptions of his positions whereas as Grayson's campaign website, until very recently, was as bare as Mother Hubbard's Cupboard when it came to the issues.

The other point here is that after only a brief survey of Too Kooky for Kentucky, one can easily conclude that the editor does clearly know what Rand Paul stands for. His claim on TV was, let's say, excessively disingenuous.

He knows that Rand Paul is an antiwar Republican, he knows that he is against the Patriot Act, and he knows that he wants to end the War on Drugs. Of course, all of this makes him "kooky." Kind of makes me wonder if Mr. Bryant would have dared call the late William F. Buckley a "kook," who in the last years of his life expressed sympathy with each of those views.

And every post in Mr. Bryant's little site is entered under the pen name "Ben Franklin."

In an entry that is probably too ironic for the Too Kooky for Kentucky editor to get is when "Ben Franklin" writes "Like Obama and Kerry - Rand Paul Speaks out Against the Patriot Act."

If I could get old Doc Brown's time machine up and running again, I'd like to take this "Ben Franklin" so he can meet the original Ben Franklin. You know, the one who said, "Anyone who would sacrifice liberty for security will lose both."

Examples like this could go on and on. It already has here.

So why fuss over Too Kooky for Kentucky, an obviously ill-conceived smear website? Well, if it was edited by a Joe Schmo Trey Grayson supporter, it wouldn't be worth any trouble.

But it's not run by a Joe Schmo. It's edited by a county party chairman who actually did the voters of Kentucky a huge favor. Grayson, who appears devoid of any discernible political philosophy, has been shown exactly what is expected of him as a senator.

He is expected to be a Bush Republican.

He is expected to do war, he is expected keep government appraised of our personal lives, he is expected to ignore the Constitution and he is expected to do war some more.

But this is also the Kentucky Republican Party strategy: Slime Rand Paul.

They cannot debate him on the issues. If they could, they wouldn't have to call him a "kook" or disparage his outsider status. Or they could tell us about the "unkooky" ideas of Trey Grayson.

What they want is for Rand Paul to just go away. He's inconveniencing Trey Grayson's ascension as Mitch McConnell Jr.

But since Rand Paul insists on yapping his gums about antiquated ideas like the Constitution and balanced budgets and fiscal responsibility the Grayson people will have just one card to play:

The FEAR RAND PAUL CARD.

And they will play it, as they say in Kentucky, 'til the cows come home.

*

Stick it to Trey Grayson, Mitch McConnell, and their lackeys by donating to a candidate with real ideas here.

Join the discussion here.  

Update: Call and Adams, the Voice-Tribune columnists who smeared Rand in August (here and here) issued him a back-handed compliment last week in this column. They write, "Traditional candidates must secretly envy guys like U.S. Senate candidate Rand Paul, who can raise big money over the internet from donors all over the country in events named 'money bombs.'" But notice their contempt when they say, "If Paul is smart, he'll use the extra time on his hands to campaign with Kentuckians who can actually vote for him."

I wonder if they had the same advice for Trey Grayson, the recent beneficiary of a $500/plate D.C. fundraiser. Since it was in Washington D.C., I'm sure there were only Kentuckians there scratching checks for Grayson. Oh, and according to the Paul campaign, their August "money bomb" had an average donation of $86 with 70% of the donations under $100. Just some food for thought about the "big money" Rand Paul gets on the internet.

Posted 10/30/09 libertyspirit Modesto, CA

The best revenge is success. Go Rand!

Posted 10/30/09 adiamalcontent Staten Island, NY

The fact that Mr. Bryant laughable site has the pen name Ben Franklin and that quote made me guffaw. Ben Franklin would have punched him in the face with something witty and insulting.

Posted by Carl Wicklander on 10/27/09

originally published at Uncouth Ruminations

As gubernatorial races approach in New Jersey and Virginia, Republicans are rubbing their hands in anticipation of the beginning of a comeback. Delivering one or both of the governorships into GOP hands may be an early sign that Americans are not receptive to the change of Barack Obama's status quo-ism.

This prospect can be very enticing. There is some speculation that Sarah Palin might run for office again. Her endorsement of Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman in New York's 23rd district may make the difference in 2010. So too might Arlen Specter be sent packing and Chris "Countrywide" Dodd might finally pay for that sweetheart mortgage.

While extricating those suits from their seats might be attractive, one has to wonder what the Republicans have to offer the country other than the "R"'s beside their names.

One potential sleeper contest in 2010 is the Florida senate race. Charlie Crist, global warming-monger and stimulus money beggar, has announced that he will not seek another term as governor so he can run for the senate seat vacated by Mel Martinez. Crist is the favorite in both the primary and the general election, but he faces a challenge from a former underling, one-time Florida Speaker of the House Marco Rubio.

Rubio's positives make him popular among the grassroots activists. He is a Fair Taxer, supporting a national sales tax instead of the income tax, a solution that fellow anti-IRSites like myself fear might only rearrange a problem instead of solving it. He favors a balanced budget amendment, a position sure to make conservatives swoon in reaction to President Obama's ridiculous spending habits.

The rarely-mentioned benefit of Marco Rubio is that he is of Cuban ancestry. The media and haughty liberals never shirk an opportunity to remind the GOP that they are the "Old White Guy Party." Rubio's Hispanic heritage automatically catapults him to the front of the line of Republican examples of diversity where he can sit with Michael Steele, Sarah Palin, and Bobby Jindal.

National Review placed the 38-year-old on the cover of its September 7 issue claiming "Yes, He Can" and that the party's conservative activists need to get behind this "true conservative."

Whether young Rubio is a "true conservative" or not is a sub question to the earlier one of what the Republicans have to offer: What does a "true conservative" have to offer during the Obama regnancy? What is "conservative" in the post-Bush era?

In a National Review Online interview with the insurgent, Rubio "counts former Gov. Jeb Bush as one of his most important political mentors" and the former governor has since endorsed Rubio as has son, Jeb Jr.

Not one to beat a dead elephant, but conservatives ought to ask themselves one of these days, What exactly has the Bush family done for conservative causes? Break promises not to raise taxes? Take turns invading Iraq? Spent like there was no tomorrow and completely nullifying any good tax cuts could do? Of course Jeb is his own man, but there are many sins of the father and brother for which he must atone.

One of the other GOP veterans who has hitched himself to the Rubio wagon is Mike Huckabee, who is reciprocating the endorsement Rubio made for him in 2008. When asked why he supported Huckabee, who had difficulty attracting much support outside single issue social conservatives, Rubio said,

"Two things I like about Mike Huckabee: One was his support of the Fair Tax . . . Second, I thought that of all the candidates, he did the best job of connecting how the people's social and moral well-being cannot be separated from their economic well-being." (emphasis mine)

"the people's social and moral well-being cannot be separated from their economic well-being."

Translation of that into actionable policy: excessive domestic spending known during the Bush years as Compassionate Conservatism.

Toeing both sides of a fine line to appease immigration restrictionists in the party as well as the open borders crowd, Rubio concedes that "On immigration, [Mel Martinez] voted for a package I probably would not have voted for . . ." (emphasis mine)

Rubio also chooses to toe both sides when it comes to the biggest fiasco of the generation, the Iraq War. Here he takes Jonah Goldberg's Orwellian position on Iraq: it was a mistake but it was not wrong:

"Obviously, the Iraq War has had the chilling effect of making us question all intelligence findings now. . . . I think that there is some credence, in hindsight, to the notion that the real battlefield was in Afghanistan all along. . . .

"But understand at the same time, we were being told that Iraq was on the verge of gaining a nuclear capability. . . . So it's impossible to sit here and give a fair analysis in hindsight."

Translation: OK, maybe the Iraq War wasn't such a great idea after all. Maybe. But who are we to say it was a mistake? It was just a war. No reason to worry about responsibility for it.

So for all the talk about the Republican Party getting its act together and finally getting back to its conservative principles, if it ever really had them, that "conservatism" looks eerily similar during the Obama regime as it did during the Bush one.

Mushy immigration rhetoric, government taking an active role in the people's "well-being" and a persistent refusal to criticize GOP foreign policy, Rubio is probably better than Charlie Crist, but might we entertain the possibility that there might be a better potential standard-bearer?

Join the discussion here. 

Posted 10/28/09 moondog 67 2000 Cheboygan, MI

Once again you give good question to a future prospective in politics and government. Although Jeb Bush is a Bush, he has also done quite well in a lot of areas for his once governed state of Florida. Remember when the hurricanes hit his state and State Farm as well as a few others basically stole what they were suppose to be liable for? Jeb told them all, (not an exact quote), if you are going to say that you do something in my state and take money for it, then do it, but if you do not, you are not welcome here and you will no longer do business in Florida. Basically kicking them out of Florida for not covering their claims. That is the kind of government we need. Just think of the prospective things that would come out of a President like that! But as you said, he is a Bush and so far 2 out of the 3 have not really took in consideration what some things would do to their nation as a whole. But yet again, George Jr. did in fact go off of information that was suppose to hold clout. Lately in the news even Fox, they have found that yes indeed, the countries in the middle east were in fact developing weapons of mass destruction, ie. Nuclear. The U.S. does seem to owe former President Bush a sorry for that. It does show some clout toward his efforts in the middle east, at least to me and I use to be one hell of a critic of his BS. One more lesson to me in my life of judgments that I had made on others. But, he did help to raise oil prices severely to the point our economic system suffers greatly. The working class is once again stuck in the middle and can not afford the gas to have leisure time to help out with the pressures of their surrounding environment. After all, former President Bush could have waved his hand and said, we are the greatest nation under God and we should not allow our working class to suffer in that way and made the oil companies lower prices or be taxed highly each time they raise prices with bad speculation. I know, another but….But, is Jeb Bush the same type of man? Do we do as our government would do? Do we discriminate against Jeb Bush just because of his last name? What about Jeb Bush’s record? What is his record like? We as the “We The People” of the United States of America, can we afford to keep making the same cycle of mistakes? Do we try to break from those miss-guided mistakes by looking truly at what someone has done their whole life? Or do we look at their life long record just as any true employer would? Then since we are human, just like a true employer, do we take our right to terminate an employees employment on the grounds of abuse? I believe everyone who reads this comment on Mr. Carl Wicklander’s Blog would agree that we, all of us, are some what to blame for how things are going. For ourselves and our children, we need to take up the responsibility that God and Country has given us and start adhering to our responsibility’s to our fellow Americans as well to our future fellow Americans. Once again, I would like to take this time in thanking Mr. Wicklander for his compelling insights and his questions.

Posted 10/30/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

I get what you're saying. Jeb Bush is really a subpoint in all of this. A lot of conservatives are getting pretty excited about Rubio but I see in him the seeds of many of the problems that got us here. I wrote this because I want to avert further problems and keep people from putting faith in someone that's not necessarily going to help us. Besides, that's one of the reasons we have the Campaign for Liberty. Thanks for reading, Moondog.

Posted 11/01/09 moondog 67 2000 Cheboygan, MI

I hope I get alot of eyes on my latest entry "Presidential Impeachment: The Legal Standard and Procedure". I wish I knew another way to get the message out there. This guy has to go. By the way, you are welcome for my time in reading, you really throw down some good ink.

Posted by Carl Wicklander on 10/16/09

http://uncouthruminations.blogspot.com/2009/10/sending-rush-to-pillory-letter-to
.html

(The following letter to the editor will be appearing shortly in the Belleville [IL] News-Democrat.)

The news that Rush Limbaugh will not be a partial owner of the St. Louis Rams should not be too surprising. The outcry was loud, widespread, and predictable. If Mr. Checketts had not removed Rush from the bidding group, the PC football league would never have approved the deal.

More of a GOP hack than a truly principled conservative, Rush is best at being provocative and talking about football.

While most of the negative reaction has been directed at quotes of spurious origin, people seem to be consumed by the wrong issue. What is plain to see is that while we have freedom of speech in this country, some speech is more equal than others.

Even if the most acidic of Rush's quotes are real, what difference should it make? If a statement is offensive, let us discuss why it is offensive instead of criminalizing the opinions of private citizens some of us don't like.

This attitude is also evident in Rush's quotes that are verifiable.

Whose civil liberty is infringed upon when we are pressured from discussing whether a particular football player might be overrated because of his skin color? Is it the person who asks it or is it the rest of us who are to resist talking about that because it is considered offensive to somebody?

Like Don Imus two years ago, Rush Limbaugh is guilty of a thought crime against elites who are uninterested in hearing anyone else's opinion except the ones they give us.

Read the original article and join the discussion here. 

Posted 10/21/09 annarlutz Lexington, SC

This is just like the thing with Joe Wilson recently. As soon as he said it, it became a racial issue. The fact that he was correct and Obama was misrepresenting HR 3200 was never addressed. I've come to accept this type of tangled thinking from the status quo. We basically have another term of Dubya, but because Obama is black and puts on a thoughtful front, it's ok when he makes war and infringes on personal liberty.

Posted 10/27/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

Yep. Making the charge of racism is just a way to halt any debate or discussion. "That person's a racist! Therefore nothing they have to say is worth listening to." And Republicans are just as guilty of this sort of thing as the Democrats. Even the mildest form of criticism of Israel is automatically turned into a charge of anti-Semitism. You'd think the Republicans will know better next time but I doubt it.

Posted by Carl Wicklander on 10/06/09

http://uncouthruminations.blogspot.com/2009/10/holocausts-are-easy-to-come-by.ht
ml

When Florida Congressman Alan Grayson called America's level of uninsured people a "holocaust," he did more than touch a few nerves.

Taking the inability or unwillingness of millions of Americans without health insurance and planting in many the imagery of the systematic deaths of over 10 million people in the 1940s, Congressman Grayson made a statement that was far beyond the line. However, considering the rhetoric used in modern politics, it is hardly a surprising analogy.

Coupled with these terms are always the inevitable parallels to World War II. "The Good War" is always selected as the morality tale on behalf of every modern day intervention, be it domestic or foreign. For example, Moammar Gaddhafi, Slobodan Milosevic, and Saddam Hussein have all been tagged "the second Hitler" making Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at least the fifth Hitler by this count.

All of these criminals have been labeled a "Hitler" at one point or another and, of course, "second Holocaust" usually follows shortly thereafter.

These images to World War II, Hitler, and the Holocaust are always convenient in making a political point, often out of desperation. No one in polite society would say that they disagree with the outcome of World War II, think Hitler was just misunderstood, or that the Holocaust was a good event that should be commemorated on the church calendar. No. Those three are the greatest consensuses in the western world.

Since nobody thinks the Holocaust was good, who would dare oppose anything when the alternative would be a "holocaust"? Don't want a holocaust? Well, we'd better pass this health care legislation. Don't want a holocaust? We'd better take out Saddam Hussein. Don't want a second Holocaust? Then you know what we should do with Ahmadeinjad.

Likewise, recent news that the Iranians have an underground nuclear facility near the city of Qom, southwest of Tehran, has elicited the usual catcalls of "appeasement" and the necessity of regime change or sanctions in Iran.

Not satisfied with only having wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, neoconservatives and warmongers in both parties are anxious to begin the bombing of Iran over weapons no one can say with any certainty that they have.

A lot of people were convinced that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that could hit either the U.S. or Israel. Nothing of the sort was found and Iraq proved to be far weaker that we suspected. As for Israel, their actions in Lebanon in 2006 and Palestine last year should prove that they are more than capable of defending themselves. Plus, whether Iran would be able to hit Israel should be immaterial to America. Israel's security is Israel's responsibility.

But it's the specter of "holocaust" that is meant to fill Americans' minds with images of destruction, carnage, and total death, whether there is evidence to justify the illustration or not.

The same is true with Congressman Grayson. There is no evidence to suggest that unless there is a "public option" or universal health care that people will just die by the thousands. Likewise, there is no evidence that Iran is using this new facility in Qom to build a bomb to drop on Israel. But the holocaust plea is issued when its users know their case is weak.

The public option and the road to universal health care in the short term is dying. Countless charges of racism against opponents of government sponsored health care have rendered any hope of meaningful or bipartisan reform moot. Eight years in Afghanistan with no end in sight and numbers turning against the enterprise make it difficult for President Obama to answer his general's plea to plunge America further into the Afghan malaise. That same war-weary population is not willing to militarily engage Iran unless they know that THIS one is a genuine threat to us. So far it has not been demonstrated.

But this phenomenon ably demonstrates the bankruptcy of America's two-party system and their collective pandering to the lowest common denominator. Every dying political cause can be reduced to Hitler, the Holocaust, or World War II. It's time for Americans to awaken and see that instead of facing a holocaust around every corner, the problem is the politicians who talk down to Americans by using these references to scare them into total dependence.

It is insulting and demeaning to a free people.

Posted 10/06/09 MichaelBarry Sebring, FL

I don't find calls for more interventionism overseas credible when administrations of both political parties categorically refuse to secure the borders. With open borders we simply cannot be in as much danger as has been suggested. Almost a full decade after 9/11 there are no controls on student visas, thousands of visa overstays every year, and entirely porous borders. In this atmosphere appeals to National Security are nothing more than a bad joke. There is no point in waging war in some God forsaken corner of the globe when there is no concern to defend the nation at home. So to me all the calls for 'finishing' the job in Iraq, surging more troops into Afghanistan, and preventing Iran from getting a bomb...to me this all rings hollow. The truth is that the federal government does not want to defend the American people, and even if they did, they are not competent to do so.

Posted 10/07/09 dean.engelhardt Westgrove, PA

Please tell me you are a poli-sci professor. If every voter demonstrated this level of critical thinking, we'd have a much better government.

Posted 10/08/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

Michael, Very true. Our government's hypocrisy is staggering. We have wide open borders here but our military is being used to patrol the borders in Iraq to make sure more terrorists don't get in. How does that make any sense? Protect our borders here and let the Iraqis learn to protect theirs. I believe the worse joke is not that all these actions are done by the government under the cover of "National Security." The worse joke is that this is called "Defense." Saying that all of these measures (Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran) are all part of national "defense" is an absurd re-defining of defense. We defend ourselves by attacking! It would be like the quarterback leading his football team to a touchdown and being considered "defensive," even though they just attacked and defeated the other team's actual defense! I truly wonder how football fans would react to hearing that quarterbacks and wide receivers are actually part of the team's "defense"!

Posted 10/08/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

Dean, Thanks for the flattery! But that's part of the reason for the Campaign for Liberty - we have to educate people and get them to think deeper about the issues. I just replied to a comment on the original blog post that considering how things went so horribly wrong in Iraq regarding WMDs, we should probably exercise at least a little bit of skepticism when it comes to dealing with Iran and their supposed WMD stock.

Posted by Carl Wicklander on 09/18/09
Last updated 09/22/09

http://uncouthruminations.blogspot.com/2009/09/is-glenn-beck-healthy-for-right.h
tml

Following the anti-Obama festivities of the weekend of September 11, 2009, headlined by Glenn Beck's 9.12 Project and march on Washington, one must certainly attest that the radio and TV host wields some amount of influence on the grassroots Right and beyond. Beck's exposure of the depravity of ACORN and a rare willingness to sharply criticize the Bush administration make him stand out among the conservative commentariat. But could Beck be just as much of the problem of the Right as its solution?

Watching in 2009, it might appear as though Beck would be a suitable spokesman for a Bush-less Republican Party. He wails against the bank bailouts and the readiness with which Dubya expanded the government. Beck's eagerness to attack the Bush administration is commendable and many of those attacks are those which Republicans and conservatives need to hear because if someone's goal is to cut government, restore individual liberty, and be governed by laws instead of men, the first fact that must be grasped is that today's Republican Party is not your friend.

The problem with windbag talkers like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, and their minor league impersonators, is that they never seriously challenge the status quo of their party. This is done to the point that conservative talk radio may as well be called Republican talk radio. After all, these are the folks who jumped on the bandwagon for pro-choice, state-run health care Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney. The speed with which they followed the empty suit perfectly illustrates how empty the vessel of contemporary American conservatism is. And it is why the talk radio medium ought to be generally, but not completely, ignored.

Is Glenn Beck different? It's true that he frequently has Ron Paul as a guest, as well as his son, Rand. Judge Andrew Napolitano, who readily calls Republican and Democratic politicians the criminals that they are, is a regular guest host. Another regular is Professor Kevin Gutzman, a contributor to takimag.com, among the most anti-Bush and anti-GOP establishment webzines, Left or Right, to talk about states' rights, an issue faux conservatives avoid like the Bubonic plague. Plus, Glenn Beck openly criticizes the Republican Party when the sycophants are still tip-toeing around the fact that maybe Bush might have, possibly, done some things that might not have been really okay.

I actually somewhat like Beck. His schtick can get a little tiresome, going from crying to yelling to having a fire-side chat all in the same afternoon, but he also does some relevant reporting. Everyone following the news right now has heard about Beck's reporting of the ACORN scandals. He's the only TV or radio personality I can think of who has actually taken a skeptical view of the Federal Reserve and the insane monetary practices of printing a trillion dollars. He's also the only TV host I'm aware of who actually has members of Ron Paul's Campaign for Liberty for segments on his show. To people like Rush and Hannity, Ron Paul is still a four-letter word.

Beck's 9.12 Project is admirable and rather uncontroversial. "Common Sense" was a decent read and was actually pretty independent-minded, calling out both parties for their extravagance but most of it falling on the Democrats.

However, a recent mish-mash video has surfaced where Beck can be seen calling Ron Paul a "crazy, kooky guy," suggesting that last year's bank bailout "wasn't nearly enough" and that he "supported the Patriot Act." Interspersed were neocon party lines of Ahmadinejad as Hitler who was making preparations for a second holocaust. (Also see this video where he contemptibly smears Ron Paul supporters for having a "money bomb" on November 5, Guy Fawkes Day, as domestic terrorists, oddly foreshadowing the Obama administration's reports about potential right wing domestic terrorism which Beck would ironically denounce.)

Such a video obviously has the potential to be easily taken out of context and spliced together in Michael Moore fashion to make Beck look like a despicable flip-flopper. Indeed, anyone could be embarrassed by seeing their worst predictions all glued together. For example, in a needlessly rambling blog from over a year ago, I implied support for the war in Afghanistan over the one in Iraq, a position I certainly do not hold today.

Since the material from the nefarious video was originally uttered, Beck has admitted that he did support the Patriot Act but regrets it. In a more surprising video, Beck reveals that

"I guess the scales are falling off my eyes. . . . In 1900 with Teddy Roosevelt . . . we're going to tell the rest of the world, 'We're going to spread democracy.' . . . in Latin America, we really became thuggish and brutish. It only got worse after the next progressive came into office . . . the next one was a Democratic progressive, Woodrow Wilson, and we did, we empire built. The Democrats felt we needed to empire build with one giant, global government, it was originally . . . League of Nations . . . then it became the United Nations, one world government. The Republicans took it as 'We're going to lead the world and we'll be the leader of it.' I don't think we should be either of those. I think we need to mind our own business and protect our own people. When somebody hits us, hit us hard, and then come home." (emphasis mine)

If there is one issue that continues to unite the mainstream Right, outside of opposition to Obama, it's the unwavering support for Bush's wars. Even if it took him more than seven years, Glenn Beck should be commended for speaking out against enduring military occupations. May he keep it up.

But it's still quite precarious that Glenn Beck has shed his more odious positions once the Republicans were thoroughly repudiated. His antics are a bit annoying, bordering on bad soap opera acting, but he still displays better independence than his more unoriginal talk radio colleagues.

So, is Glenn Beck healthy for the Right? Maybe, maybe not. Is he part of the solution or is he part of the problem? If he's part of the problem, he's far less of it than Rush, Hannity, Levin or Coulter.

Conservatives have been betrayed in an unrepentant fashion for the entirety of this century. If the evolution of Beck's positions mean anything, it means that he might be a spokesman and a platform for an effective and genuine anti-government movement. It also means he's someone who's worth keeping at an arm's length for any Republican Party that wants to move past the errors of the Bush administration.

Update:  Here's a video preview of Glenn Beck's interview with Katie Couric.  He says "I think I would have much preferred [Hillary Clinton] as president and may have voted for her against John McCain" and "McCain would have been worse for the country than Barack Obama."  Interesting to be sure.  It's a very short clip, so we'll have to wait and hear his elaboration on that one. 

Update #2:  Via the lewrockwell.com blog, see this Examiner story where Glenn Beck says he would like to take back the things he said about Ron Paul and "reexamine those issues."  Let us hope he's had a real change of heart. 

Read the original piece here and join the discussion. 

Posted 09/18/09 moondog 67 2000 Cheboygan, MI

I just watched the video you posted described as calling Ron Paul a "crazy, kooky guy. In my opinion, you have mistaken what he had said. He was talking about the the group who was going to blow up parliment. Just incase you do not know, a little known secret is that Glen does get alot of his information from the membership. Thats why it is a striking coinsodence that he seems to be paralleling our own efforts. I like Glen, he does a good job, he just takes the longer road to get there. For example, the Presidents Green Czar, to which is no more. Thank you Glen Beck.

Posted 09/18/09 wrdiii lebanon, NJ

I agree with moondog, Glen Beck is a good guy. He is doing stories and investigations that no one else is, and then puts the story out. Weather he sounds like a nut or not he is getting people to start thinking, sometimes for the very first time. I listen to him at work and the guys I work with have finally started to pay attention to the news and study up on things on their own. Rush and Sean can't get that to happen.

Posted 09/19/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

Moondog, did you also watch this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wm96uz11NM) where Beck conflates Ron Paul supporters with domestic threats? He had no proof that anyone wanted to destroy the government, but he assumed they did with nothing other than the date on which the "money bomb" occurred. You also say that Beck gets a lot of his information from the membership. What do you mean by that? Does he get some of his information from the Campaign for Liberty? Is that something's he's said? If it is, I'd like to hear more about it as well as where you heard it. It's true that Glenn Beck has done some good reporting and I want to support him, but I'm not ready to completely trust him just yet. I'm just being skeptical about him. You won't have to do much research on this site to find people with far more angst about Beck than me. Thanks for reading, Moondog and wrdiii. I hope you'll be back, especially if you can find something about Beck and the Campaign for Liberty. ~Carl Wicklander

Posted 09/20/09 moondog 67 2000 Cheboygan, MI

Like I said....It's a little known secret. I am 1 of those of our membership that sends him quite a bit of information. I poste a bit on our membership bolg page but do not usually see very many commenting on them. One thing I can agree on is that no one should trust anyone with everything. Always be sceptical when it comes to people. Campaign for liberty is a website for all, Dems, Repubs, and everyone else. I am sure there may be quite a few on here that actually spy for some in congress even. But the important thing is we all have our opinions and can express them freely on here. I was only pointing out to you the truth, Mr. Beck did and still does get alot of his information for his show from our membership. Why should he blat it out to the millions and lose all the ground and momentum he has made paralleling our own interests to boot? I just watched your video file with Glen and do not see or hear what the problem is. He talked about our group using the term money bomb, he isnt saying we are bad people. He is only saying America should wake up before disinfranchising begins. And I am sorry, he is right, some of our membership has taken things too far. Ron Pauls vision of revelution is not take over a country to make a new one, it's to take back the one we had. A small group of our membership are causing some problems in other states. This always happens in every group, you get a few wack jobs and they give us a bad rep.. Thats how he stated it, "The Ron Paul Revolution is meant as a catchy slogan. But I fear {SOME} of his {FRINGE SUPPORTERS} are taking the word REVOLUTION too literally. What did he do wrong?

Posted 09/21/09 jfhobbs Spring Creek, NV

I injoy Beck's insider pod cast, a few days ago he mentioned Ron Paul. He said he wished he could go back and look at Paul closer before jumping the gun. He said he at the time agreed with many of Pauls points but today says he is fairly sure he is right there with Paul's ideology. Said that he dismissed Paul as a kook to soon. The other two guys on his show wouldn't go that far and argued with Beck a bit on the issue.

Posted 09/22/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

Moondog, What I'm saying that he did wrong was make a broad statement about "revolution" and "fringe supporters" without any concrete evidence to suggest why there might be a danger. He made this point a week after the fact. Nothing violent happened on Guy Fawkes Day. So what was the worry? Remember, "revolution" is a word Dr. Paul did not disavow since he titled his book "The Revolution." In that same video, about half-way through, while discussing disenfranchisement from the Left, Beck is the one who makes sure that Ron Paul is included in the conversation. His guest David Horowitz also says some libertarian websites like lewrockwell.com are "in bed with the Islamofascists," a point Beck never even questions. All that said, I'm afraid you've missed the point of what I wrote. Beck's done some good things. I do generally approve of what he's doing right now and I want to fully support him. I approvingly cite Beck where it sounds like he's adopting a foreign policy that sounds closer to Ron Paul's than what Beck used to say. I just want to point out that there might be some baggage that accompanies some things that Beck is saying today. He's changed a lot in a short period of time. I am just wary of quickly anointing him our savior in the media.

Posted 09/22/09 Carl Wicklander Nashville, IL

jfhobbs, Thanks for sharing that. I know Beck has Ron Paul on his show from time to time and that's good. I'm not a Beck insider or anything, but that's encouraging to hear. My hope is that he keeps it up.

Posted 09/23/09 annarlutz Lexington, SC

Here's something: I dislike Glenn Beck a little less since so many of his major advertisers pulled their support. I think if companies like Wal-Mart denounce someone for their political views, then that means it's likely that the person's opinions are right over the target. I don't appreciate Beck's antics, which I think detract from his credibility. However, I can appreciate how much he has been able to mobilize support for Constitutionally minded folks. And now, the fact that he does not have much support from corporate America, makes him truly grassroots. However, it does bother me that corporations continue to try to influence politics through money. It isn't surprising, nor is it a new development. It still bothers me though...a lot. I believe it's one of the biggest problems with our government. Since when did corporate interests hold more importance than the Constitution or the will of the governed?

Posted 09/27/09 moondog 67 2000 Cheboygan, MI

Corperate interests started to become more important to goverment than it's own people back in 1913, when the Fed was first being born. It's our job as the people to get our country back from this type of disease thats continues to obstruct our countries true path. 1 of the reasons to Audit the Fed is to also show where corperate america took over. After we show America this, we shoul not have too hard a job taking back what has been taken from us.

Posted 10/15/09 kderentz Henderson, NV

Great write up and great reading in the comments. I have been a Ron Paul supporter since I saw him in the 08 Presidential Debates and ran out to read his Revolution book and have since became a member of C4L. It was on my last business trip that I forgot my iPod so I went in one of the book stores at the airport and purchased Glenn Becks "Common Sense" book that I was shocked that it seemed much in line as Dr. Paul's book (however I still believe Dr. Paul's was not only better but in much more depth). I decided today to do some research on Glenn and his opinions on Dr. Paul and found the Neo-Con video as well as a lot of commentary on how he is not a Libertarian, which I found confusing after reading the "Common Sense" book. After reading this post and a little more research I can see Beck has come around recently to value the similar views to that of C4L and for that I am glad as he is one of the fastest growing political show and this should be looked at a tool for marketing C4L principles.