The American Spectator : Rand Paul and Halitosis

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Rand Paul and Halitosis

By Daniel Oliver on 7.12.10 @ 6:08AM

What he said and didn't say to Ms. Rachel Maddow.

Now, while the body of Senator (and former Exalted Cyclops) Robert Byrd (KKK, WVA) is still as warm as a smoldering cross on a black family's lawn, and the memory of his record-length service in the U.S. Congress as fresh as a clean white sheet on a Grand Imperial Wizard -- now is a good time to take a cold look at the comments on the Civil Rights Act of 1964 made by Kentucky senatorial candidate Rand Paul. (They can be found here.)

What is most surprising about Dr. Paul's comments is how he barely said that a private establishment should be allowed to discriminate against black patrons.

What he did say (in an eleven-minute interview with Rachel Maddow) was that he would have marched with Martin Luther King and that it was sad that the South wasn't desegregated until 120 years after transportation in Boston was desegregated. He said that there had been "incredible problems" in the South, which had to do mostly with voting, schools, and public housing -- in other words, with "governmental racism," "institutional racism." He said that that was what the Civil Rights Act largely addressed, and that he largely agreed with it. He pointed out that the Act had ten titles, and nine of them addressed institutional racism. He then asked, If you support nine out of ten things in a law but you think the tenth is misguided, do you just vote for it or do you work to modify it?

He also said, "I'm not in favor of any discrimination of any form. I would never belong to any club that excluded anybody for race." But he said we should ask the question: What about freedom of speech? Should we limit speech by people we find abhorrent? Should we prevent racists from speaking?

He said, "I don't want to be associated with those people, but I also don't want to limit their speech in any way, in the sense that we tolerate boorish and uncivilized behavior because that's one of the things freedom requires is that we allow people to be boorish and uncivilized, but that doesn't mean we approve of it."

He couldn't have been referring to former President Bill Clinton, who, in a eulogy for Senator Byrd, excused the senator's association with the Ku Klux Klan on the grounds that he was just "a country boy from the hills and hollows of West Virginia" trying "to get elected" (read about it here). Paul couldn't have been referring to Clinton's comment because Ex. Cy. Byrd hadn't died at the time of the Paul interview.

Then Paul has some fun at the liberals' expense: "[R]ight now… many gun organizations are saying they have a right to carry a gun in a public restaurant because a public restaurant is not a private restaurant. Therefore, they have a right to carry their gun in there and that the restaurant has no right to have rules to their restaurant.…

"So, you see, when you blur the distinction between public and private, there are problems."

But not for liberals, because they care as much for property rights as they do for a first edition of The Fiery Cross. Liberals could easily decide that there is no popular consensus that property rights are fundamental -- and for them popular consensus, not the Constitution, is what governs. See the recently decided gun case McDonald v. Chicago.

Finally, the obviously frustrated moderator Rachel Maddow says, "But I think wanting to allow private industry -- private businesses -- to discriminate along the basis of race because of property rights is an extreme view and I think that's going to be the focus nationally on your candidacy now and you're going to have a lot more debates like this."

Maddow's second thought was probably correct, but it's worth noting that the statement about wanting to allow private businesses to discriminate is hers, not Paul's.

Nevertheless, the issue prompts some observations.

1. It is always useful to consider the effect any piece of legislation has on property rights (of course, it is individuals who have a right to property, not the property that has rights). Liberals tend not to be fastidious about property rights, but conservatives, and Tea Partiers, and probably most Americans, are. Liberals tend to subordinate individual rights to the dictates of the state.

2. It is always useful to remind people that it was Republicans who made passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 possible. As Time Magazine observed (Feb. 21, 1964), "In one of the most lopsidedly Democratic Houses since the days of F.D.R., Republicans were vital to the passage of a bill for which the Democratic administration means to take full political credit this year." (A bottle of champagne and an autographed copy of the new book by American Spectator editor Bob Tyrrell goes to the first ten readers who guess correctly how Senator Byrd voted on the bill and whether he engaged in the second-longest filibuster in history, taking up 86 pages in the Congressional Record.) Remarkably, the Democrats are still taking credit for the Act today, at the same time that they and their Main Stream Media colleagues excoriate, on matters of race, the party that enabled it to pass. (For a superb history of the period, see Bruce Bartlett's Wrong on Race.)

3. It is interesting to note that black progress stopped at about the time of the Civil Rights Act. Of course, that was also when the Great Society programs were introduced. Thomas Sowell has made the point that the biggest drop in black poverty took place during the two decades before the Great Society -- which was also, of course, before the Civil Rights Act. In the 1970s, Sowell says, "when the impact of Great Society programs was fully realized, the trend of black economic improvement stopped almost entirely."

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About the Author

Daniel Oliver is a Senior Director of White House Writers Group in Washington, D.C. He served as Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission under President Ronald Reagan.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (68) | Leave a comment

Amin| 7.12.10 @ 6:41AM

Great article. The idea that Rand Paul is racist is just ludicrous.

Purpleguy| 7.12.10 @ 1:03PM

Did you see the Maddow interview? If you didn't see it, you don't know what you're talking about and neither does the author.

DaveS| 7.12.10 @ 5:24PM

Who watches/listens to Rachel Maddow? Talk about affirmative action television.

Christopher Holland| 7.12.10 @ 10:49PM

I never met Jesus and I don't know anybody who did. Does this mean I can't be a Christian? Personal experience is not the only way of acquiring knowledge.

vtwin| 7.12.10 @ 1:21PM

The question is not, is Ron Paul racist, but rather does Ron Paul support “a right” of private business to discrimination based on race, in the hiring and serving …

Decide for yourself, here’s the unedited interview:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....82872.html

vtwin| 7.12.10 @ 2:14PM

Sorry, discriminate.

Alan Brooks| 7.12.10 @ 5:50PM

Today if you say anything negative about illegals, you are a racist.

Alan Brooks| 7.12.10 @ 5:51PM

... and that, not 1964-- or 1863-- is the IMPORTANT issue.

Mike Rogers| 7.12.10 @ 7:08AM

It's no surprise that "Sheets" Byrd filibustered and voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Bill, and a lot of other legislation which worked to overturn Jim Crow.

Mike Rogers| 7.12.10 @ 7:13AM

The Civil Rights act has its flaws, and Dr Paul is correct, but not racist, as he did not draw the conclusion from his remarks that "Minnow" did.
It is indeed interesting that Black progress stopped dead around that time, but I'd put the blame on the Great Society programs, not the Civil Rights Act. For a devastating analysis of how much damage government "help" did to the prospects for Black economic prospects, see the great series (3) of videos by Walter E Williams entitled "Good Intentions", which were made in 1984, 20 years later.

vtwin| 7.12.10 @ 2:04PM

“It is indeed interesting that Black progress stopped dead around that time [Civil Rights – 1964]”

Thurgood Marshall - first Black Supreme Court justice – 1967

Guion S. Bluford - first Black astronaut - 1979

Colin Powell - first Black Secretary of State - 2001

Barack Obama first Black President of the United States - 2008

Jake| 7.12.10 @ 3:07PM

vtwin has on the blinders. This is a classic liberal mistake.... pointing out singular "firsts" as progress when referring to cultural moores and trends. There are always outstanding exceptions, but as a segment of society "Black" progress has been in a generational, welfare induced quagmire.

vtiwn| 7.12.10 @ 3:47PM

I was commenting on accretion that the Civil Rights Act impeded Blacks which is bullsh*t.

Not on the failure of “Reaganomics “which is impeding not only blacks economically but also the poor and the middle class without distinction of color.

Example: cut taxes on the wealthiest Americans which results in deficits. Finance these deficits by borrowing the money back from the wealthiest Americans that they saved through cutting their taxes, at interest of course. And, stick the middle class with the bill!

Mike Giles| 7.12.10 @ 9:30PM

Spending results in deficits. Only when you spend more then you've taken in , is there a deficit. Since the tax cuts produced greater tax revenue, the only logical conclusion, is that spending rose by an even greater percentage then the rise in tax revenue.

JmsA| 7.12.10 @ 3:39PM

vtwin wrote:
"Colin Powell - first Black Secretary of State - 2001"

Thanks to Daddy Bush and Junior Bush. Without them, no one would have ever heard of Mr. Powell. And you know it!

William R| 7.12.10 @ 5:17PM

Actually Colin Powell was Ronald Reagan's National Security Adviser.

JmsA| 7.13.10 @ 1:23AM

Good, then you can add Reagan, another Republican, to his list of benefactors--which is my salient point.

Appleby| 7.12.10 @ 7:23AM

The same attempt to force children into every facet of the lives of unwilling adults (for example, the demand by Mommies that their two year olds be admitted to upscale wine bars) is reaping the same result: it is setting up a turf war between toddlers and adults. After the law was changed in Georgia to forbid adults-only apartment buildings, the place I lived went overnight from 8% Black to 60% Black, and shortly after I moved away it was raided by the DEA -- in the film shown at 11, there was not a single visible White face.

Blackknights 1802| 7.12.10 @ 7:51AM

You see, ladies and gentlemen, the left has already started with their misinformation. It’s the things that they say that gets the headlines and not what the candidate actually said. This media of ours is despicable.

canuckistani| 7.12.10 @ 9:27AM

Paul had the oportunity to correct the record as he was on air.....he didn't. Maddow gave him the chance, more than any lib talking head or any FNC talking head would have.
I watched it live for spectacle purposes, as his tone-deafness (much like his father's) is always a good sideshow for a slow evening of news.
The reason the media provides soundbites is because that's what the public wants. If candidates are too stupid to realize that then they are doomed.
How Paul could even begin to consider the CRA in a critical way with a black in the WH is mystifying. Polls are now showing the morning after walk-of-shame is growing.
As for the articles slamming of Byrd....he was reelected time and again state-wide. The electorate knows what they were getting....$$$$$. The rest is irrelevant.

ds80| 7.12.10 @ 11:02AM

"How Paul could even begin to consider the CRA in a critical way with a black in the WH is mystifying. "

Racist, racist, racist comment.

canuckistani| 7.12.10 @ 11:38AM

It would be the same if he questioned the pope's authority over Kennedy.....as the wacko right did in 1960, or challenging Lieberman or even Romney's "mainstream" cred.
Why would a candidate even begin to entertain an argument that, while rational in a poli-sci class, is impossible to rationalize in this heated environment of birthers and race-baiters? My point about a black in the WH, is that Obama's cabal can, have, and will use this as another example of the CRA apparently not going far enough, and they would be correct - in political terms, to energize their base with it. Independents, suffering buyer's remorse with Obama, may be convinced to keep these whack jobs out, or simply stay home in disgust. Either way, the dems have traction with this item.
What are you afraid of? Not seeing America for what it really is smacks of intellectual dishonesty.

On another note:
Met one of Bob Ehrlich's old operators last week: "Steele is a joke, an cynical ethnic place-holder for the GOP". He went on:"The GOP is the most corrupt he has ever witnessed in 40 years of work." He does not campaign anymore and left politics for good. That's from the inside - and from a guy that has profited from close proximity to GOP power from Nixon to Junior.

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 7.12.10 @ 8:10AM

Since the advent of the Great Society which actually took off in 1967, 7 trillion dollars has been spent, and the poverty rate in America has moved 1/10th of one percentage point.

The end game of all collectivists is to become the arbiters of winners and losers and it always congeals around race and class envy.

canuckistani| 7.12.10 @ 9:29AM

It may be important to note that free people are free to do stupid things.
There's 15% unemployment in Cali: are they all stupid? White-collar, educated, white....all stupid?

vtwin| 7.12.10 @ 2:29PM

“Since the advent of the Great Society … the poverty rate in America has moved 1/10th of one percentage point.”

“In the late 1950s, the poverty rate for all Americans was 22.4 percent … These numbers declined steadily throughout the 1960s, reaching a low of 11.1 percent…in 1973. Over the next decade, the poverty rate fluctuated between 11.1 and 12.6 percent, but it began to rise steadily again in 1980. By 1983, the number of poor individuals had risen to 15.2 percent….”

http://www.npc.umich.edu/poverty/

Did you your number out of your a**?

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 7.12.10 @ 3:55PM

No, but your a** sounds like where your brain resides.

Your comment is the greatest indicator of all that the more the government has gotten involved the worst poverty has become.

According to you the poverty rate was dropping like a rock until the government got involved. Then it started rising again.

Whether you use your numbers or mine the point is clear, the government has made the status of poverty permanent. There is no way out and there are many valid theories which analyze the destruction of the family unit and the advent of the welfare state.

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 7.12.10 @ 4:07PM

The census bureau releases a report each September and the last report from 2009 indicated that poverty rates have pretty much remained the same for the last 30 years even though 5% of the total economy is directed towards poverty.

In effect, here's how the government helps ensure the permanent welfare state:
http://blog.heritage.org/?p=14496
Conventional accounts of poverty not only give a false picture of material hardship, they also underestimate government spending on the poor. In 2008, federal and state governments spent $714 billion (or 5.0% of the total economy) on means-tested welfare aid providing cash, food, housing, medical care and targeted social services to poor and low income Americans. (This sum does not include Social Security or Medicare.) If converted into cash, this aid would be nearly four times the amount needed to eliminate poverty in the U.S. by raising the incomes of all poor households above the federal poverty levels.

How can the government spend so much and still have such high levels of apparent poverty? The answer is that in measuring poverty and inequality, Census ignores almost the entire welfare state. Census deems a household poor if its income falls below specified federal poverty income levels. But in its regular measurements, Census counts only around four percent of total welfare spending as “income”. Because of this, government spending on the poor can expand almost infinitely without having any detectable impact on official poverty or inequality.

Michael L. Hauschild| 7.12.10 @ 8:15AM

Remember, those you are trying to convince are the people who elected Obama and are now the ones still cheerleading. Excellent article but totally insignificant; there exists in this charged political environment not only the adage of “Preaching to the choir” but its counterpart “orating to the vacuum.” The conservatives and the independents already “know” what Rand said and the hard core left isn’t listening.

Bill C| 7.12.10 @ 8:16AM

I suspect liberals who are hysterical about the prospects of free enterprise and private property are mostly worried about the prospects of racial discrimination in today's climate. They believe capitalism is exploitation anyway so no wonder they're hyperventilating over this.

To calm them or normal people down one question could be asked: "Where are the "No Gays Allowed" signs in restaurants, stores etc.? Presumably since there is no law against discriminating against gays and I suspect homosexuality is probably more objected to than the color of one's skin liberals would expect to see such signs everywhere simply to bash gays.

Since that is not the case I think liberals should acknowledge that our society isn't so quick to jump to attacking unpopular minorities and that may be we don't need to create laws that only serve as income for ambulance chasing lawyers, bureaucrats and politicians. I wonder what such a litigious and bureaucratic apparatus does to the unemployment rate which is currently disproportionately impacting African Americans. It's probably not politically feasable platform but one could argue that the EEOC and the army of lawyers that litigate against business probably impede the creation of jobs for lower skilled workers many of which may be African Americans!

But that would require a thoughtful discussion and not seeking to make political gain based on race...an objective totally in opposition to the goal and reason for being for the modern Democratic Party.

Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 7.12.10 @ 8:48AM

The dumb-ocrats are at least true to their Southern dumb-ocratic roots which is why they can praise the birdman of the beltway.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“I will never submit to fight beneath that banner with a Negro by my side. Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds.” - Robert C. Byrd
Only 923 days to go.

canuckistani| 7.12.10 @ 9:32AM

he got elected again and again and again and again state-wide. I think WV knew what they were getting. $$$$$.
Is your senator as effective?

Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 7.12.10 @ 11:13AM

Rather ironic that the state formed by seceding from Virginia during the Civil War choosing to fight on the Anti-Slavery side of the Northern states, elected a committed racist to the house of ill-repute and later to the sin-8. This was not because he was good at bringing home the bacon. Rather, he was dedicated to using the devil’s cross to barbecue the freedoms of American Citizens. When he had an alleged St. Paul-on-the-Damascus-Road moment and renounced his racist past, he had to find another means of getting reelected. What better way than to pervert the very Constitution he was sworn to preserve, protect and defend to the best of his ability, by conspiring with his fellow thieves-in-the-den to steal from all Americans in order to appear to benefit his voters. As events now unraveling prove, this theft has led to the undoing of OUR Country as the strong foundation upon which its economy was built has been compromised providing legitimate fodder for those who wish to repeal the 17th Amendment. The sad truth is that any good birdbrain did for his mountaineers came at the expense of other Americans and We will be paying for these crimes for untold generations.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery?” - St. Augustine
Only 923 days to go.

canuckistani| 7.12.10 @ 11:52AM

It didn't start with Byrd, nor will it end with Byrd until the American people grow up.

Everybody loves welfare - starting with the rich. You want a revolution? Start with the 1%-ers and determine if their winfall profits were gotten by legitimate means at the benefit or expense of the American public.
You also speak about property rights, rights you enumerate that were defined in a generation when people OWNED other people, women were chattel and municipal services were inclusive of a deputy and a bucket brigade.
You can have property rights when businesses build their own roads, utilities, and protections that are paid by everyone through either consumption taxes or otherwise. Until then, business must take the bad with the good and suck it up.

Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 7.12.10 @ 8:38AM

The right of individuals to own property is fundamental to the prosperity of any nation. The only persons with a legitimate interest in how that property is used are those who as joke bite-me once said actually have skin in the game. In this case skin is money. The only time any gum’mint has a legitimate interest in how a property owner conducts his business is if that business poses a real threat of involuntary loss of life or bodily injury on its customer base or is stealing from them - paraphrasing Thomas Jefferson in a different context, if ‘... it ... picks my pocket or breaks my leg’. A building inspector may determine whether or not a business venue is structurally sound or an elevator inspector may determine whether or not a lift will function properly and what are its limits for safe operation. However, the owner of a tavern has the exclusive right to determine whether or not smoking is allowed on his premises, even though I do not smoke and consider that practice most foul. I do not allow smoking in my own house or vehicles. But I would never impose these practices on anyone else’s property. I can freely choose whether or not I wish to visit that bar. Unless that owner is forcing people into the place and once inside blows smoke in their faces, it must be assumed that the choice to be exposed to nicotine fumes was freely made and ain’t nobody’s business but their own. Similarly any proprietor who wishes to not conduct business with another simply because that other descends from Africans, Arabs, Irish or Japanese - so what? While I cannot comprehend the logic behind denying a legitimate business transaction with anyone willing to freely trade his or her treasure for my goods or services, I can neither comprehend trying to impose on their right to do so. If I’m trying to sell a house, and I deny a customer willing to pay my full asking price simply because she’s Bosnian then I deserve to go broke. Americans have presumed rights to act, speak, write, associate, like, love, hate or vote stupidly. The gum’mint has no business protecting us from our own follies.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“If I go to church on Sunday
“And I honky tonk all day Monday
“Ain't nobody's business if I do

“And if I should get a feeling
“I wanna dance upon the ceiling
“Ain't nobody's business
“Oh, it ain't nobody's business if I do”
Willie Nelson’s cover of the 1920s Blues classic, “Ain’t Nobody’s Business”.
Only 923 days to go.

Berl Goetz| 7.13.10 @ 12:01PM

Private property rights should not be absolute. One man may be an excellent steward of his land, to the benefit of everyone surrounding him. Another may clear-cut his "property" in order to build unneeded business sites and pave the rest. His neighbors and everyone else in the community lose peace, beauty, and low air-conditioning bills. This is not the frontier any more. We need zoning laws and we need to enforce them, even in the poorer states where clear-cutting, erosion, and land-abuse are widespread.

Ammo Guy| 7.12.10 @ 9:01AM

How do Ivy League universities get away with "discriminating" against under-achieving students? If they really want to provide their students with a realistic American environment they would include not only the "best and the brightest", but also the "worst and the dimmest." Then again, perhaps they already do when they admit the likes of a Ted Kennedy and his spawn.

loulou| 7.12.10 @ 10:32AM

They don't. The Ivys are in full compliance.

Minorities who lack decent SATs and grades are admitted and graduate by majoring in Black Studies, Hispanic Studies or Women's Studies.

The "worst and the dimmest" don't come into much contact with the "best and the brightest". They're segregated in their own dorms and classrooms. They write their theses on what it's like to be a minority. Hello, Michelle.

t-partpaul| 7.12.10 @ 12:14PM

How did kagan get away with hiring 29 people ALL JEWISH???

loulou| 7.12.10 @ 1:14PM

They had superior grades and LSATs.
Of course they were all lefties, duh.

Sheila| 7.12.10 @ 10:59AM

Wow, Gill O'Teen, for once mine won't be the only comment defending genuine property rights! Everyone else insists the government must enforce selling, renting, or whatever to all races, religions, and sexual preferences; mustn't trust the market. They realize that if you truly left this choice up to individuals and businesses, some of these "racist" or "antisemitic" places would actually stay in business. Can't have that now, can we? So we'll all continue to pretend that everyone loves everyone else's company, and ensure that it's enforced by government power. After all, what did the founders (dead white racist men) know, anyhow? Tribalism + democracy + stupidity = racist idiocracy. Decline and fall.

Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 7.12.10 @ 11:46AM

In his book “Liberty and Tyranny - A Conservative Manifesto” Constitutional expert, attorney, syndicated talk-radio host and President of the Landmark Legal Foundation, Mark Levin wrote on pages 17 and 18 of the paperback edition: “In the civil society, private property and liberty are inseparable. The individual’s right to live freely and safely and pursue happiness includes the right to acquire and possess property, which represents the fruits of his own intellectual and/or physical labor. THE ILLEGITIMATE DENIAL OR DIMINUTION OF HIS PRIVATE PROPERTY ENSLAVES HIM TO ANOTHER AND DENIES HIM HIS LIBERTY.” (emphasis mine)

The supremes unconstitutional decision in the case Kelo v. City of New London in 2005 when John Paul Stevens, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer voted that the theft of one private individual’s property for the economic gain of another person or corporation if the thieving authority perceived a taxable boon subordinated American Citizens to the role of existing only to pay taxes. Anybody wanting my vote has to commit to the overthrow of this shameful statist enabling.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“Allowing the government to take property solely for public purposes is bad enough, but extending the concept of public purpose to encompass any economically beneficial goal guarantees that these losses will fall disproportionately on poor communities. Those communities are not only systematically less likely to put their lands to the highest and best social use, but are also the least politically powerful.” - Clarence Thomas in Dissent.
Only 923 days to go.

Heymoore Schettler| 7.12.10 @ 12:06PM

Of course Sen. Byrd voted for it and engaged in the long filibuster!

Nate| 7.12.10 @ 12:10PM

This piece is a good example of why we liberals simply don't TRUST conservatives when they say that their version of "small government" federalist principles is the best way to secure economic and political autonomy for all.

For decades -- indeed for over a century -- "states rights" was used to legitimate and protect and inhuman apartheid system that exploited black labor and prevented -- with a mix of legal and extra-legal oppression -- black Americans from organizing themselves into a constituency that could advocate for civil rights.

When people are doing business -- even if they own the building in which their own business is being conducted -- they are NOT confined within a private sphere worthy of absolute protection.

It's a VERY different thing to say I have the right to deny someone's entrance into my home or onto my property than it is to say I have the right to deny someone the use of the services I offer or goods I sell. This is in part because such denials enforced, strengthened, and legitimated the racist system that oppressed blacks in the south for so many years.

But there is also the simple fact that when I am doing business the state has a legitimate interest in how I do my business. I don't have the right to create a fire hazard or to dump poisonous chemicals into the ground even on my own property. I don't have the right to hire children for pennies an hour. Business is a matter of public concern, as all adults know and accept. It's not as though there aren't legitimate debates to have about the nature of the government's interference with business, but the idea that the state has no justified reason to interfere ever is false, unprecedented in American history, and -- if you'd stop to think about it -- utterly silly.

Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 7.12.10 @ 1:08PM

If you read my post at 8:38 AM, you will note that I concede the point that there are indeed situations when local authorities have an obligation to assure their residents that a business is being conducted safely and in full compliance with Constitutional law. However, this does not mean that I subscribe to your marxist big gum’mint talking point that I am too stupid to act in my own best interest as well as that of my customers. Adults intelligent enough to conduct business are intelligent enough to look out for themselves. If I am unable to attract a large enough customer base to pay my own way, then deservedly my business will close. If the state wants to control my business, then it should assume all the risk without passing that risk on to the taxpayer. I don’t need a darn nanny, I need to earn money.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“Ultimately property rights and personal rights are the same thing.” - Calvin Coolidge
Only 923 days to go.

George S| 7.12.10 @ 1:40PM

The concept of private property has nothing to do with freedom to do whatever you want, to whoever, whenever. Simply put, it is the right to keep the fruits of your labor in your possession and cannot be confiscated by the state.

When you open a restaurant, for example, the private property rights only extend to ownership and the income derived as that restaurant is the personification of your labor. However, just like a cop who must abide by the Constitution, you have to abide by the laws -- you must obey the building codes; you cannot swindle customers; you cannot break a contract with your supplier; you have to pay the government for your sewer, water and roadways serving your business; you have to pay the taxes on your property because the people you attract require the state to have government services extended to your location. And, because public policy dictates law, you cannot discriminate who comes through your front door. This is the public policy the Civil Rights Act of 64 addressed, however when the law gets into who you hire; how much to pay; whether the face count has the right number of black, female or gay numbers; what you can say or not say to offend; or when you have to shell out money to comply with EEOC dictates, THAT takes money out of your pocket and impinges on your property rights as you now have to spend money to comply with regulations that have nothing to do with you running you business. What this does is rob you of income -- your property.

Does the EEOC have a right to dictate how to run your business with respect to how many blacks must be outreached for employment based on some bureaucrats random baseline number? Does the Civil Rights Commission have the power to bankrupt you because a female employee felt threatened by your wife's picture in a bathing suit on your desk? There's huge difference in being a good citizen and sacrificing some personal freedoms to work at a job or run a business, and arbitrary government dictates based on a political desire to appeal to voting blocs.

This is the issue, and liberals have cleverly deflected it by burying it in with "... so what you are saying is you don't have to obey the law on private property". No, what we are saying are the laws are reaching beyond public policy into outright control -- control of what you say, control of what you do and control of how much of your property you get to keep.

Nick| 7.12.10 @ 3:22PM

George S,

I agree with most of what you have written, except this: "And, because public policy dictates law, you cannot discriminate who comes through your front door."

Discrimination is still allowed based on age and gender. As it should be.

When you risk your own property in a business venture, you should have every right to do with your property as you please. Excepting anything that would recklessly put someone's life at risk, of course.

The way government bureaucrats have abused this power is proof positive that government should not be involved in cases of discrimination.

Discrimination in employment and services, based on race, is sinful and wrong. This goes without saying.

But, the way it should have been dealt with, was the way Rev. Martin Luther King, the Birmingham Bus Boycotters, and many others were dealing with it: Protesting and boycotting the businesses that discriminated.

If someone doesn't want to associate with blacks, or other minorities, that's his problem. It should not be made illegal. Now that the camel's nose is in the tent, we have to argue why we can't discriminate against certain behaviors, and not just the way people were created.

George S| 7.12.10 @ 5:09PM

Nick,

The libertarian in me screams out to agree with you but the constitutional republican in me has to disagree. The Civil Rights Act of 64 is a perfect example of why the Ninth Amendment was inserted into the Constitution. During ratification, the state of Virginia was uneasy that the document would fail to check an expanding federal government, even though the Tenth Amendment clearly restricted the federal government from assuming powers reserved to the States and to the People. Virginia's concern was that there was nothing to check the expansion of the federal government's enumerated powers, as stated in Article I. Madison then drafted the Ninth, which says that the rights retained by the People shall not be disparaged (in addition to stating that the document is not the source of our rights). If government expands on an enumerated power, it by definition reduces liberty and disparages the freedom of the people, therefore, along with the Tenth Amendment, it boxes in the federal government from expanding either an enumerated power or taking on power reserved to the states or the people.

When the Civil Rights Act was written, no reasonable person could disagree that the reaffirmation of the 14th Amendment to all citizens regardless of skin color was beyond the scope of the federal government. However, there were those who worried that the Act could be a vehicle for government expansion, resulting in reverse discrimination, thereby prompting Hubert Humphrey to state that he would eat the document if it stated anywhere it would do so. A good number of Democrats resisted the passage because of their cultural racism, but that's another story. But as you say, the crusade of Dr. King was already changing the landscape as he succeeded in forcing people to look into their hearts and acknowledge the the horrible treatment of blacks since the Reconstruction was not the way of God, for all men are created equal and no man has the right to change that dynamic.

And so, as feared, the Act went on to encourage courts to enact racial quotas, to limit private enterprise's ability to hire as they please, to outlaw color blind admissions to colleges, to force children onto buses to attend schools outside their neighborhoods, to the outlawing of flirting in the work place, to restricting home owners in discriminating on whom to rent, to outlaw non-wheelchair friendly buildings and gay marriage. Also in the works are a whole new category of maladies that qualify as disabilities, and the restructuring of salaries and benefits based on comparable worth. Madison would have shook his head and said "I warned you!"

But that does dovetail into not being able to discriminate against people in your own private business. Once you offer your labor to the public, you are signaling that you are providing your services to society in exchange for their services to you (with the vehicle being money). By discriminating with whom you wish to associate in that regard gives others the "right" to discriminate against you. If one chooses not to associate with blacks or women in their own private property where they live, then government has no power to tell you otherwise. But when you go outdoors, that's different. That's the public policy question I was arguing and why the government's cure for that only made it worse because we all lost some of our Ninth Amendment rights in exchange to "right a wrong".

Nick| 7.12.10 @ 6:22PM

George S,

I disagree.

Just because someone starts a business in a community, risking his private property, does not mean that the community can tell that person with whom he can do business.

Police and fire protection, use of public roads, and engaging in commerce with other members of the community, shouldn't give local, state, and federal governments this power.

Legitimate powers for government are to protect society and to keep our fellow citizens from stealing from us. I have no problem with laws against fraud or local building codes.

But, laws that prohibit me from discriminating against a group of people, were a slippery slope, not worth the damage they are now doing to this country.

As I stated, boycotting racist businesses, civil disobedience, and shaming the racists was doing a good job of changing the country's attitude about race. That, and Motown music.

If a strip club owner wants me to fix their air conditioner, I should be able to refuse them service. Okay, you say? What if I refuse service to a lesbian bar? Or, to a couple that I know are lesbians? I should still have that right.

RCV| 7.12.10 @ 5:16PM

Nick: I genuinely don't care what anyone in society chooses to believe, nor do I care with whom they choose or don't choose to privately associate. But what the Civil Rights Act addressed was a genuine social problem of actions that caused real and immediate harm to people. There were towns in which black citizens could not find a place to sleep the night or eat dinner when they were travelling. The "No Coloreds Allowed" signs caused real damage to black children in the community, in the very same way the "No Jews Allowed" signs in Nazi Germany did. I do believe that a society has the right, indeed the responsibility to legislate to prevent such societal damage. And to answer Shiela below, I don't see that as a decline, but an advancement in civilization.

Nick| 7.12.10 @ 6:41PM

RCV,

I am well aware of the situation in the Jim Crow south. I'm in no way defending it.

By '64 and '65, the civil rights movement was making tremendous inroads. That is how social change should happen. Not by decrees from the federal government, enforced at the point of a bayonet.

This did not work one hundred years earlier during Reconstruction. Which only caused whites to focus their rage and hatred on blacks, who they could retaliate against. As opposed to the Yankees, who they couldn't.

We are still living with the consequences of those bad actions of the 1860-70s and the 1960s.

RCV| 7.12.10 @ 7:37PM

There is no question that the primary credit for the advances in civil rights goes to the brave men and women who risked their lives to call the attention of the nation to the injustices going on in the South. But...the legislation was still necessary to achieve the rights still being denied blacks by the mid-60s. And that legislation helped transform the South.

I disagree with your analysis of Reconstruction, which in my view got a bad and distorted reputation from the historians of the time, and until only recently has been reexamined. It was shameful how, Hayes secured his disputed 1876 election with a deal to end reconstruction. THAT is what initiated the shameful Jim Crow history we had to live with for 100 years. Had the 13th trhough 15th Amendments been vigorously enforced, we would have saved our newly-freed Black citizens from 100 years of lynchings, vote denials and legal segregation.

Nick| 7.12.10 @ 9:18PM

RCV,

1876? What about the previous 11 years?

It was the Radical Republicans and the carpet-baggers, who took advantage of the devastation of the South and kept Southerners from holding political office, that caused the resentment and hatred Southerners harbored towards Northerners and blacks.

By the time Reconstruction was ending, Southerners were ready for some payback against the only people they could retalitate against, the former slaves. They certainly weren't going to go after the Union troops, again.

No, had Reconstruction been better implemented, we wouldn't have had 100 years of payback and hatred against the only people left around to hate. It would have been better if both sides hadn't pushed for war in the first place.

RCV| 7.12.10 @ 10:40PM

I can't agree with you. More than three and a half human beings -- no doubt their human life had begun -- were held in bondage, bought and sold like cattle, raped, beaten, children torn from parents, husbands from wives. If ever there was a cause worth fighting for -- even though many were not fighting for that cause, but for Union -- that was it. The ruling class in the South didn't start treating blacks as sub-human because of Reconstruction. Reconstruction was just a brief pause in the carnage, during which time Blacks had a brief period of equality and were elected to state and federal office throughout the South. The minute Reconstruction ended, the Southern ruling whites enacted laws that stripped those same former slaves of their rights to vote, to enjoy public accommodations, to get and education and land, and resumed slavery in a thinly-veiled system of sharecropping which kept them in bondage.

Nick| 7.12.10 @ 11:16PM

RCV,

Well, then, we will have to agreee to disagree.

Irish22| 7.12.10 @ 4:33PM

Not my original idea but: Most discrimination was created and enforced by Jim Crow laws. Laws are created by legislatures, not by business practices. It's not funny how much crap comes into our lives because of these conceited clowns, and how seriously they ride in to "right the wrongs" that they themselves created.

Nate's Mom| 7.13.10 @ 5:14AM

Na-a-a-a-ate!

Tim*| 7.12.10 @ 12:49PM

Hmmmmm !

Increased Usurpation of State , County ,Township Authority By BIGGIE FEDERAL .

Now That's An Aspiring Socialists ' Solution !

George S| 7.12.10 @ 1:14PM

If you want to throw the Maddows of the world a curve ball, ask them where -- other than private property -- do you have... a right to privacy.

Does the right to privacy, conceived in Griswold and bloody birthed in Roe, only apply to the bedroom and the obgyn's office? If the property is subject to the regulation of the state for the public good, then whoever governs the state has the final authority as to whether abortion is for the public good. Can't have it both ways -- government free bedroom on contraception but government sanctioning the sexual preferences of tenants to Catholic landlords. Can't turn a doctor's abortion OR into a zone of privacy yet at the same time deny that the property is private. It's a simple exercise in logic.

Oldefarte| 7.12.10 @ 1:31PM

As previously stated, the Great Society legislation cost $trillions and did not come close to achieving its governmental objective of eliminating black poverty. Democrats pass such laws for one purpose----the resultant votes of the recipients of such laws' governmental benefits [and D's do not give a rat's ars if improvement results or not, only that they receive the votes]. The GSL or any laws will never effect the stated results, since they are enforced, legally demanded actions. There is only one way to eliminate black [or Irish, Italian, Polish,etc] poverty, and that is through EDUCATION. If and until public education is improved to a point of being effective/adequate in insuring LEARNING and COMPREHENSION, the social promotion currently involved in public education will continue to produce ignorance and/or stupidity. Blacks can only economically/financially improve themselves by being educationally qualified to perform the work required of higher paying employment. Governmental welfare [or the GSL]will never solve the problems of black poverty; and the GSL is/was the biggest waste of taxpayer money ever enacted. As to the CRA [hate crime legislation, etc], they are all redundantly unnecessary, since existing laws on the books are adequate to deal with associated crimes involving same if adequately/properly enforced [it's typical that laws are worthless unless adequately enforced]. Currently the federal immigration laws should be enforced by our government, but are not DUE TO PARTISANED POLITICS [the current federal lawsuit against the state of Arizona is an example of a state having to duplicate the federal immigration law so that it/Arizona can perform the job that the US government SHOULD BE DOING]!!!!!!!!!

Sheila| 7.12.10 @ 1:47PM

Nate, here your argument hinges upon the "it's to prevent racism" or to "prevent pollution" or whatever progressive presumptive "good" that you believe authorizes and legitimizes (indeed, necessitates) government intervention and regulation. I seem to recall that in the past, you made the argument that it is also to prevent antisemitism. Silly me, I thought liberals didn't believe in legislating morality! What you believe in legislating, of course, is thought, speech, and action, according to mores that you believe unarguable yet still unacceptable by people too stupid to accept what you insist is in their own best interests. As I said before, what you truly fear is that if such businesses with such erstwhile "racist" or "antisemitic" restrictions are allowed to function in a truly free market of genuine private property rights, there will be enough patrons of such environments, goods, and services that your entire utopian fallacy will collapse. No, we aren't building the "best of all possible worlds," and even liberal academic Robert Putnam has conceded that increased diversity equals less trust and civic engagement. Of course, to you that means our high-minded elites must redouble their efforts to stamp out these vile remnants of human nature which remain, primarily, in genuinely conservative (as distinct from Republican) hearts. But government dictum or no, like flocks to like, and the Tower of Babel was cursed for a reason. Our national tower is also crumbling, and I continue to defy both left liberals and right liberals (i.e. American Spectator, American Thinker, et al.) who pretend we're not in terminal decline and fall.

Tim*| 7.12.10 @ 5:15PM

The U.S. Senate race in Kentucky is little changed from earlier this month, with Republican Rand Paul continuing to hold a modest lead over Democrat Jack Conway.
The latest Rasmussen Reports statewide telephone survey of Likely Voters shows Paul picking up 49% support to Conway’s 42%. Three percent (3%) would vote for some other candidate and six percent (6%) more are undecided.
With the exception of immediately after his primary win, Paul has received between 46% and 50% support in match-ups with Conway since January. During the same period, Conway has earned between 34% and 41% of the vote. The Democrat has never led in matchups between the two candidates.

RCV| 7.12.10 @ 5:19PM

According to Real Clear Politics, a more recent, and larger poll has the race now at a 43-43 tie.

Tim*| 7.12.10 @ 6:31PM

According to Real Clear Politics ,

RCP Average 5/25 - 6/30 -- 47.7 43.3 Paul +4.4
PPP (D) 6/28 - 6/30 625 RV 43 43 Tie
Rasmussen Reports 6/28 - 6/28 500 LV 49 42 Paul +7
SurveyUSA 5/25 - 5/27 569 LV 51 45 Paul +6

RCV| 7.12.10 @ 10:34PM

As I said, the most recent poll shows a tie at 43-43, with Paul's support in the three polls dropping steadily over the last month from 51 to 49 to 43. Not looking good, Timmy.