Worse than racist

The "free market" didn't solve this problem (photo courtesy of dneiwert.blogspot.com)

By Devona Walker, from theloop21.com. Devona Walker is TheLoop21.com's senior financial/political reporter and blogger. She can be reached at devona@theloop21.com. Walker is spot on here:

Rand Paul got caught up in controversy because he said he disagrees with provisions of the U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964 -- specifically he disagrees with the federal government forcing any private citizen to do business with nonwhites. Now, he’s all surprised that his political hopes, once considered the bright spot in the GOP, are now definitely less so.

But me, I’m wondering WTF America? What did you expect from the Tea Party and any of their candidates? What do you expect of Libertarians? Anytime you elect someone who is right of the far right in this country, what you are going to end up with will be entirely wrong. And why now? Why are you only interested or even aware of his views now, when Rand Paul has been Rand Paul and spewing his ideologically purist libertarian nonsense, which is by definition completely unconcerned or undeterred by real social ills and reality for that matter, for his entire career.

First off, I don’t think Rand Paul is a racist, not consciously at least. He simply represents a mindset that is completely ignorant and disinterested in all issues concerning race and racism. He's disinterested in how that affects people in this country who happen to not look like him. He is primarily concerned with preserving the liberties of those who happen to look like him. That's essentially the nature of true libertarians. That's why his father has been relegated to the margins in politics. That's why we don't have national libertarian candidates. While their views may be based on principles, they are not based on reality.

"The trouble with Dr. Paul is that despite his independent thinking, much of what he stands for is repulsive to people in the mainstream," the (Louisville, Kentucky) Courier Journal wrote in an op-ed piece months ago about Paul. "For instance, he holds an unacceptable view of civil rights, saying that while the federal government can enforce integration of government jobs and facilities, private business people should be able to decide whether they want to serve black people, or gays, or any other minority group."

In Paul’s mind, being a racist is a personal liberty. The fact that bigoted people deny liberties and freedoms to minorities due to their racism, sexism or homophobia is not really important. The only liberty to consider there is that one individual's right to be a jerk. Government cannot legislate against it. The "free market" in his mind will correct it in the end. So, the minorities who are refused jobs, housing, insurance, we would simply be collateral damage in the libertarian world view. Our freedom to pursue happiness is not as important as a racist's freedom to express his own hatred for us by denying us freedoms.

Paul also wants to do away with Social Security as well as all entitlement programs. He is against the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Philosophically speaking, this falls in line with traditional liberterian thought. Libertarians, often portrayed as Republican-light, are actually far more extreme and troublesome than Republicans. The contradiction, of course, is that their extreme views are based on principle -- the very simple principal that we are all individuals and the government's sole purpose and only responsibility to us is to protect our borders. In return, libertarians think we should be paying less for taxes. And we would ultimately live more free lives because of it. The only problem is this premise is entirely unreasonable. If we learned nothing from the last two years, it’s that the free market will not police itself, it needs government oversight. We also learned how destructive a few individuals can be if not properly policed by government.

Government is dysfunctional -- that I will give Paul and his fellow libertarians. The only problem is that there are many Americans who are even more dysfunctional and without government, minorities in this country would have no liberties whatsoever. The only problem is that we are expected to pay the cost for their "liberties."