Posted by CNN's Shawna Shepherd and Ashley Killough 12/21
1995 video shows Ron Paul discussing newsletters
Although he now says he did not write them and knew little of their contents, GOP candidate Ron Paul described specifically his controversial newsletters in a 1995 C-SPAN interview made when he was seeking to return to Congress.
In the interview, which was posted Tuesday on YouTube, Paul described his "educational" efforts including videos and the newsletter, which he describes as a "political type of business investment newsletter."
"It covered a lot about what was going on in Washington: financial events, especially some of the monetary events, since I had been especially interested in monetary policy, had been on the banking committee and am still very interested in that subject," he said in the interview. "This newsletter dealt with it; this has to do with the value of the dollar, the pros and cons of the gold standard, and of course the disadvantages of all the high taxes and spending our government seems to continue to do."
Paul served three terms in Congress from 1979 to 1985 (he left to run unsuccessfully for the Senate in 1984) and was elected again in 1996. While he was out of office, in addition to practicing medicine, he published a variety of newsletters, some of which included racist, anti-Israel or anti-gay comments. A 1992 newsletter, for example, said 95% of black men in Washington "are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."
Paul campaign spokesman Jesse Benton said that in the C-SPAN interview Paul was describing an investment newsletter, one of several published by Ron Paul & Associates, his company. The controversial remarks were made in a newsletter called The Ron Paul Survival Report, he said. "Ron was much less involved with them, and they are the source of the material Ron did not write and has disavowed," Benton said in an e-mail. "For the investment newsletter, he wrote as much as he could on economic topics … in his very limited free time."
On CNN on Wednesday, Paul said he read the newsletters only "on occasion," did not write them and "disavow(s)" the racist comments. Pressed by a reporter on whether the newsletters were "incendiary," Paul removed his microphone to end the interview and walked away.
An article in Reason magazine said the newsletter company had income of more than $900,000 in 1993, citing tax documents. The newsletters provided Paul with income as late as 1997, when he received as much as $200 in dividends, according to his 1998 congressional financial disclosure form. That form valued the newsletter company at between $100,000 and $250,000.
Benton said Paul "does not recall" how much money he earned from the newsletters directly, "only that is was relatively small." Most of his income came from his practice, Benton said. Paul is an obstetrician/gynecologist.
The newsletter company was described as "inactive" in 1999 and was closed on March 31, 1999, two years after he returned to the House, Paul's congressional financial disclosure forms for 1999 and 2000 show.
Paul's accounts of the newsletters' contents have varied since 1995. He told The Dallas Morning News in 1996 that the contents of the newsletters were accurate but needed to be taken in context. At the time, Texas Democrats were circulating copies of the newsletters as they campaigned against Paul's return to the House.
In 2001, Paul told the magazine Texas Monthly that the language in the newsletters wasn't his, but that his campaign staff told him not to say others had written them because it was "too confusing."
The C-SPAN interview was posted Tuesday on YouTube by Alexander Kaczynski, a New Jersey college student who has previously unearthed old video of current presidential candidates, including a clip of then-Massachusetts candidate for governor Mitt Romney in 2002 calling himself "someone who is moderate and my views are progressive."
Romney, now a former governor, faces criticism from Paul and other candidates that he has changed his views in order to make himself more appealing to conservative Republican primary voters.
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Today is
White Men Who Had Racist Beliefs, Are They
Trust Worthy Today? HELL NO!!!
The Issue that has to be addressed is all about "Character".
What we do as we transition from child to adult to grandparents, all matter.
Your Immediate living environment dictates what type of young adult one would be, but, ones individual ability to understand information, process information and make "independent individual conclusions" sticks with a person his or her entire life.
The Question that continue to haunt Ron Paul is "What was he thinking in the past, and is he that same person today"?
The Reason why Mr. Paul avoids questions associated with his past is an attempt to disallow questions, associated with his character of the past, compare to his positions today, which will allow us to determine if he has changed, and if he has,,, in what way.
Additionally, Mr. Paul's association with having a negative opinion of blacks today, as received today, is totally different of how people viewed him and his negative opinion of blacks in the 80s and 90s.
The Changing Demographics Matter:
The Opinion of Blacks, in the 90s and prior years, mattered to the extent that.., racism was acceptable in the white communities, the nation was extremely prejudice, and the ratio of whites to non-whites were hugely different..., as compared today. The ratio of non whites has risen to more than 1/3 of the U.S. population as being Black or Hispanic,,, which matters immensely. 90 Million Non-Whites U.S. Citizens.
Blacks & Hispanics ascent has provided a foundation for each race, and with the changing dynamics of technology and access to information, the fair treatment of all people is on display daily, for the entire world to see, and mal treatment or a race, based on racism, or bigotry, isn't relegated to any local community anymore.
Technology Affect:
Any act of racism is immediately uploaded to the internet, allowing the world to be privy to all acts of racism, which in itself, is a deterrent and a equalizer, forcing fair treatment of all people, in today's world.
However, for those who are in their 60 years of age or more, if you were a racist of the past and your acts or actions can be validated, based on something that you said, wrote, or did.., the judgment of you today, based on your racist past,,, is validated.
Character Is Life Long:
A Racist Act of any kind is wrong, and your age matters, in that, a racist act of a person older than 20 years of age, suggests that one is old enough to know better.
Mr. Paul's Racist, Sexist and Anti Gay comments in the 70s, 80s, & 90s, were comments made by a adult, who had time to understand right from wrong, and to choose to make mal statements of the nature in the writings that are associated with Mr. Paul, suggests that Mr. Paul is a man of very bad character.
Ones Character matters when it comes to holding a political office, and the character of Mr. Paul hasn't changed at all. He continues to rant about all the mal's of the government and his display signifies that Mr. Paul is still the person who wrote those documents.
To Deny any responsibility of those documents or refuse to discuss those documents today, is simply displaying Mr. Paul's unwillingness to take ownership of his past actions, which is a act of one who has bad "Character".
In My Opinion
ASMFMB
12/23/12
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