I think there's little question now that he's more of a rightist libertarian than a leftist one.

U.S. Senate candidate Rand Paul is stirring it up again, this time by saying he opposes citizenship for children born in the U.S. to parents who are illegal immigrants. 

Paul, who a week ago won the GOP primary, told a Russian TV station in a clip circulating on political Web sites Friday that he wants to block citizenship to those children.

"We're the only country I know that allows people to come in illegally, have a baby, and then that baby becomes a citizen," Paul told RT, an English-language station, shortly after his win over GOP establishment candidate Trey Grayson. "And I think that should stop also."

Legislation dubbed the Birthright Citizenship Act was introduced in the House last year seeking to prevent citizenship to babies born to illegal immigrants even though the 14th Amendment to the Constitution guarantees citizenship to everyone born in the U.S. More than 90 lawmakers signed on as co-sponsors.

Paul told the TV station that partisan politics may be at play in not stopping illegal immigration.

"I'm not opposed to letting people come in and work and labor in our country," Paul said. "But I think what we should do is we shouldn't provide an easy route to citizenship. A lot of this is about demographics. If you look at new immigrants from Mexico, they register three to one Democrat, so the Democratic Party is for easy citizenship and allowing them to vote. I think we need to address that."

The media is acting like this is a really big deal, though as this paper points out more than a fifth of sitting congressmen agree with him.  Unfortunately they seem to be the ones with the least power (Neither Boehner nor Cantor appears on the co-sponsors list).  Will Mitch McConnell run from this position too?

In electronic conversations Tom Piatak, Grant Havers, and I attempted to figure out why Jonah Goldberg posted his recent idiocy, proclaiming the Civil Rights Act to be a bulwark of economic freedom and scolding Rand Paul as an ally of Southern bigots. One not necessarily wrong but insufficient reason for this rambling diatribe is that Jonah is an incoherent suck-up, like Ross Douthat and David Frum, someone who fawns on the liberal establishment when he's not posing as its critic. Significantly, Douthat and Goldberg both began their tirades against Rand Paul by saying reasonable things: in one case that Ron and Rand Paul may have been influenced by paleoconservative associations; and in Goldberg's case, that Rand Paul was expressing reservations about the scope of the Civil Rights Act once held by perfectly respectable statesmen. The two columns then lurch off into vitriolic attacks on Rand Paul, linking him to racism, anti-Semitism and other obscene practices. Needless to say, the allegations are never proved, and the minicon attack dogs rely on broad accusations, which obviously play well with the (predominantly Jewish) liberal media.

But without denying that the gratuitous attacks are intended to accommodate the media establishment, it seems to me that there is more at stake here. I can't imagine that anyone but engaged leftists and civil rights lobbyists would care much about Paul's critical thoughts from a distance of many decades about the Civil Rights Act, given the fact that, as Goldberg admits, the act is not likely to be revoked. Paul's objection, moreover, was painfully qualified, as Goldberg explains in the first half of his column.            

In two articles I could’ve predicted were coming this week Frum Forum worries that Rand Paul will turn minorities away from the Republican Party while Paul Gottfried denounces Republicans for worrying about such a possibility and kissing up to Martin Luther King.

This got me to wondering if pandering to nonwhites on a large scale ever works.  I checked the state by state exit polls of 2008 Senate races to see whether any Republicans were able to capture the all elusive black vote.  Using Senate races is better than presidential election data, where it’s the same person in each state.  Having a wide variety of characters helps us determine whether there’s any candidate or election strategy out there which can cross the racial divide.  Here are the results, going from most to least popular GOP candidates among African-Americans.

Tennessee-Alexander 26%
Kentucky- McConnell 13%
South Carolina-Graham 13% 
New Jersey-Zimmer 13%
Iowa-Reed 10% 
Alabama-Sessions 8%
Texas-Cornyn 8%
Virginia-Gilmore 7%
Mississippi-Cochran 6%
Michigan- Hoogendyk 5%
Georgia-Chambliss 4%
Delaware-O’Donnell 3%
Illinois-Sauerberg 2%
Louisiana-Kennedy 2%
North Carolina-Dole 1%

The first and most obvious question we have to ask is, what did Lamar Alexander do?  His popularity is based on his winning over black women, who were nine percent of the electorate in his state and gave him 30% support.  Black males were only two percent of the Tennessee voting public, and a little algebra tells us that they probably voted around eight percent for Alexander, though CNN apparently didn’t think the sample was big enough to give us any numbers for them.

The New York Times noted Alexander’s success about a week after the 2008 election, telling us that the Senator “had a record of appointing blacks to government and education positions.”  He wasn’t shy in letting the voters know it either, as this ad demonstrates.

One local blogger called the message “After You Vote For Barack Obama, Vote Lamar.”  Alexander also secured the endorsement of the black mayor of Memphis.  It’s worth pointing out too that the Republican was a two term governor and incumbent, giving him all the name recognition one could hope for.

So if a Republican can somehow get liberal black Democrats to vouch for him, appoint a lot of blacks to high places, be the most well known state politician and run against a weak opponent he can sometimes get a massive quarter of the African-American vote.  The question is whether they can do that without demoralizing significant parts of the much larger white electorate.

Update: A commentator writes "May I point out that 'Lamar Alexander' sounds very plausibly like a typical black name?"

I hadn't thought of this.  Imagine the typical Memphis voter hearing all these black voices on the radio praising "our boy Lamar" and all he's done for the community.  It's certainly plausible that many of them thought that he might be "one of us," and not just politically.  I must confess that this certainly works against my name recognition theory, but polls tell us that more than half of Americans can't name their Senators.  I suspect governors are better known, but Alexander was in that position a long time ago.

I'm shocked to hear about Rand Paul's recent caving-in to the liberal-neocon establishment. From the evidence it would seem that our minimal-government senatorial candidate from Kentucky regrets he could not have marched with MLK during the civil rights demonstrations of the 1960s. Never mind the fact that vocal opposition to King and to both his tactics and rhetoric extended from National Review (when it was still a recognizably conservative publication) to the New York Times, and from WFB to Will Herberg, and Harry Jaffa. We are now supposed to bow down before all the authorized Civil Rights Icons, and this is especially true for Republicans, whose electoral support among blacks since they began their ritualistic groveling has shrunk from about 10 to two percent. With a little more kowtowing, the GOP and Rand Paul may succeed in driving the numbers even lower.

As for Rand Paul's comment that set off the media hysteria, it was bland enough to have been ignored, if GOP magnates and civil rights leaders had not weighed in. Does Congressman (and House Minority Leader) John Boehner honestly believe that Paul's failure to back every jot in the 1964 Civil Rights Act, including the enforcement of non-discrimination in accommodations in Title I, would cause a mass defection of his otherwise likely voters to the opposition? Will Paul's share of the black vote now shrink because of his seemingly tactless reservation about one title in the Civil Rights Act? How the hell can the GOP get "government off our backs," if Title I and the agency it requires for its enforcement legitimate constant government incursions into the workplace?

In the aftermath of the Rand Paul civil rights controversy a surprising number of self-identified libertarians have endorsed state-restrictions on freedom of association. In essence, the argument is that historical and contextual circumstances can warrant the broadening of anti-discrimination laws to the private sector. This  is not just  a trivial exception to the general libertarian support of strong property rights but also to the view that the *withholding of a benefit* should not be treated as a harm and punished by the state. As a matter of fact, it seems to be an argument that past “crimes against humanity”  and “group rights” should trump peaceful individual choice.

Libertarians who advocate such restrictions on the freedom of association have argued that libertarianism should not be treated as an a-historical set of dogma’s. That is not an unreasonable argument but it is interesting to note that such claims are made by the same people who display a similar kind of dogmatism on the issue of open borders. It appears that dogmatism is more objectionable when it leads to politically incorrect conclusions.

A few people have written about how they think Rand Paul should’ve handled his appearance on Rachel Maddow and other similar interviews. Here’s Christopher Donovan’s way of defending freedom of association.

Robert, the Civil Rights Act wasn’t about expanding rights, it was about taking them away — from Whites. Everyone’s got a right to decide whom they’ll associate with, and whom they won’t. This is probably the most fundamental right. The government has no business dictating who our associates will be. This may be awkward and painful at times, but that’s life. How would you feel if the government forced you to host three Ku Klux Klansmen at your condo in D.C.?

When I was watching the Maddow video I thought of how cool it would be if Paul said “What if government decided that there wasn’t enough integration in our personal lives too? Of my three children, do you think one should be forced to take a black spouse?” though I certainly didn’t expect it. To a libertarian both a business and a home are private property that government must respect; unfortunately we must face the fact that there’s a sharp difference in most people’s minds. Even Americans who own their own businesses feel there’s a distinction between where they work and where they eat, sleep, socialize and raise their families. So comparing the Civil Rights Act to mandatory intermarriage or being forced to hang out with Klansmen isn’t going to work.

That being said, I do think that there are politically smart ways not to back down. How about this

It’s funny that the media has been going after me for defending freedom of association when they don’t question any politicians who advocate affirmative action about those beliefs. If you truly believe that all people should be treated equally, how does one advocate not the freedom to discriminate, but mandatory discrimination? If a major corporation or university came out and said “We want to hire the best person for each job or admit only the best students by some kind of race blind criteria,” that would for all practical purposes be illegal. Do you think that’s right? Why don’t you question Speaker Pelosi, President Obama or my opponent about their views on affirmative action? I have made ending affirmative action a central part of my platform. Anybody who defends the practice has no right lecturing me or any American on the evils of racial discrimination.

This is a political winner, allows one to still be a libertarian and even lets the politician take a "more anti-racist than thou" posture.  I don't see the downside.   Since no one ever does this, I must be missing something. But what?

As Patrick Ford points out, the media's love affair with Rand Paul as an offbeat, civil libertarian Republican has likely reached its end. For Rand's recent sin against PC is likely cardinal -- he has been brazenly reluctant to praise "Dr." Martin Luther King Jr. and the '64 Civil Rights Act. (The Reason-oids have yet to reject Rand as a reactionary nationalist, which is a pleasant surprise, though The Atlantic has played to type. Jamie Kirchick is, no doubt, planning a research trip to Kentucky.)

The news of Rand Paul's big primary win (in a randslide) was certainly positive, tempered by his unclear foreign policy message. Now that he finds himself in the general election, the media is starting to ask questions about his views on the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Americans with Disabilities Act. Politico reports on his waffling on the CRA:

Moving from the Republican Primary to the general election means, for Rand Paul, addressing a broader set of issues than the anti-tax, anti-spending focus of his campaign.

And while he's answered this question before, I'm not sure he's going to be able to get away with an evasive response to a question today on whether he would have voted for the Americans with Disabilities Act and the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which outlawed discrimination in public places and in the workplace.

Paul has suggested in the past -- and been attacked for suggesting -- that the federal government has no place regulating private business decisions, even on issues like race and accomodations for the disabled, and was pressed on the question -- three times -- on NPR just now:

"What I've always said is, I'm opposed to institutional racism, and I would have -- if I was alive at the time, I think -- had the courage to march with Martin Luther King to overturn institutional racism, ad I see no place in our soc for institutional racism," he said in response to a first question about the act.

"You woul have marched with Martin Luther King but voted with Barry Goldwater?" asked an interviewer.

"I think it's confusing in a lot of cases in what's actually in the Civil Rights Case (sic)," Paul replied. "A lot of things that were actually in the bill I'm actually in favor of I'm in favor of -- everything with regards to ending institutional racism. So I think there's a lot to be desired in the Civil Rights -- and indeed the truth is, I haven't read all through it, because it was passed 40 years ago and hadn't been a real pressing issue on the campaign on whether I'm going to vote for the Civil Rights Act."

Paul explains his position further on the CRA at the one hour mark of this video interview with the editors of the Louisville Courier-Journal. He says he supports the parts of the bill that fought discrimination in the public arena and on public property, but disagrees with telling private business owners what to do. He then goes on a bit of a rant about his admiration for Martin Luther King Jr., and explains how he gets emotional when watching his speeches.

I have no doubt we will begin to see the media paint Paul as a racist, just as they attempted to do to his father. But the reality is that Rand , despite his positives as a candidate, is riven with many of the modern multi-culti pathologies that infect political discourse. Absent from his views on the CRA is any bit of understanding about the major cultural upheaval that resulted from the Act, and absent from his views on MLK is an understanding of the racial redistribution of wealth King advocated. Instead Paul tries to paint him as some anti-government crusader. In the end, I have no doubt that Rand is telling the truth about his views on the CRA; that it merely clashes with his ideological views on private ownership.

At any rate, Rand's clash with the media on the CRA is a healthy reminder of how hard it will be for a real alt-right candidate to infiltrate the PC state.

The title to this piece is a joke, of course, and I am glad that Rand Paul won the Kentucky Republican primary. I would have voted for him if I lived in the Blue Grass state. Paul's victory is also indicative of the power of the Tea Party movement, which originated with his father's 2008 presidential campaign but has taken on a life of its own. 

This said, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that Rand secured victory, in part, by earning the endorsement of Sarah Palin, as well as that of RedState.com's terror warrior Eric Erickson. Maybe those two know something we don't? In his major TV spots, Rand promised not to close Gitmo, stated (albeit vaguely) that "fighting back" was the proper response to 9/11, and flashed a lot of images of Military-Industrial-Complex fighter planes soaring through the sky. Though I thought this kind of stuff was on the wane, the GWOT, "standing tall against Islam," and even Christian Zionism still remain integral parts of the identity politics of Red-State Christian white people. If he wins the general, Rand won't be riding into Washington on a wave of antiwar sentiment, and it's likely that many of his voters would feel surprised, if not betrayed, if there's a major Senate debate on attacking Iran, and Rand comes out staunchly against.