Those who have Serious Problems with Glenn Greenwald..Is it Him or His Reporting?

[geek tragedy]

12. No, Greenwald was slobbering over Ron Paul back in 2007

http://www.salon.com/2007/11/06/paul_2/

By far the most significant and interesting political story of the past 24 hours is the extraordinary, record-breaking outpouring of support for Ron Paul’s presidential campaign. Therefore, it is being ignored by much of our establishment press — not a single article about it in The New York Times or The Washington Post (though it is discussed on a couple of their blogs), nor even a mention of it on the websites of CNN or CBS News (which found space to report on Stephen Colbert’s non-candidacy). But MSNBC and Fox News did at least both post the AP article on the Paul story.

Regardless of how much attention the media pays, the explosion of support for the Paul campaign yesterday is much more than a one-time event. The Paul campaign is now a bona fide phenomenon of real significance, and it is difficult to see this as anything other than a very positive development.

There are, relatively speaking, very few people who agree with most of Paul’s policy positions. In fact, a large portion of Americans — perhaps most — will find something in his litany of beliefs with which they not only disagree, but vehemently so. Paul has a coherent political world-view and states his positions clearly and unapologetically, without hedges, and that approach naturally ensures greater disagreement than the form of please-everyone obfuscation which drives most candidates. . . . And Paul is as vigilant a defender of America’s constitutional freedoms — and as faithful an observer of the constitutional limitations on government power designed to preserve those freedoms — as any national political figure in some time.


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UPDATE IV: The most illegitimate argument against Paul is the attempt to tie him to the views of some of his extremist and hateful supporters. I referenced that fallacy above, and elaborated on it in this comment.

And here is Markos Moulitsas — no Naderite he — on Paul’s fundraising explosion (h/t Lambert): “This is the single biggest example of people-power this cycle.” Markos adds that though he wishes it were a Democrat doing this, “it’s nevertheless a beautiful thing to behold.”

http://www.salon.com/2007/11/12/paul_3/

That isn’t to say that nobody can ever be deemed extremist or even crazy. But I’ve heard Ron Paul speak many times now. There are a lot of views he espouses that I don’t share. But he is a medical doctor and it shows; whatever else is true about him, he advocates his policies in a rational, substantive, and coherent way — at least as thoughtful and critical as any other political figure on the national scene, if not more so. As the anti-Paul New York Sun noted today, Paul has been downright prescient for a long time in warning about the severe devaluation of the dollar.

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On another note, I wrote in my prior post concerning Paul that I found the efforts (by Neiwert and others) to smear him by linking him to some of his extremist and hate-mongering supporters to be unfair (for reasons I explained here). Neiwert responded and compiled what he thinks is the best evidence to justify this linkage here.

For reasons I’ll detail at another time, I found virtually all of that to be unpersuasive, relying almost entirely on lame guilt-by-association arguments that could sink most if not all candidates (the only arguably disturbing evidence in this regard is this 1996 Houston Chronicle article, which Neiwert didn’t mention, and the pro-Paul response is here). Everyone can review the evidence — all of which is quite old and very little of which relies on any of Paul’s own statements — and make up their own minds.

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Have Bruce Fein and Naomi Wolf been concealing a neo-Nazi agenda which they are finally able to express through the Ron Paul campaign, or are they simply impressed by the obvious convictions and intense (though rare) passion he brings to issues which they seem to think are of vital importance — restoration of our constitutional framework and the rule of law, along with principled opposition to America’s imperialistic and militarized role in the world?