Originally Posted By ecdc In the two days since he's been elected, Rand Paul has said that businesses can legally discriminate against employees, that he would have voted against the Civil Rights Act, and now he's quite literally saying Obama has his boot on the neck of BP in the wake of the oil spill. Bravo, Republicans! Bravo!
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Paul walked that back more recently, first saying he did not support REPEAL of the civil rights act (which merits only a "BFD," since no one outside the fringiest fringe does), then saying to Wolf Blitzer that he "would have voted for it." <a href="http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/rand-paul-walkback-i-would-have-voted-civi" target="_blank">http://videocafe.crooksandliar...ted-civi</a> He's not so sure on the Americans With Disabilities Act, though - which may come back to haunt him too. Even so, early polls give him a big lead on the Democrat for November. KY doesn't have a big black population (less than 8%), and I think his stance on the CRA may hurt him less than his stand on ADA (even though the former will be brought up more in the media, which loves potential racial conflict stories), and his head-scratching support for BP.
Originally Posted By DAR Interesting article on the media not picking up an interview Paul did with the a KY paper about this issue. <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/20100520/pl_ynews/ynews_pl2167" target="_blank">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/...s_pl2167</a>
Originally Posted By Dabob2 It is a little strange that his more extreme views didn't come up in the primary, but that may be because his opponent didn't think that bringing them up would be good fodder to get votes for himself with the GOP electorate. Now that the primary is over, certain positions/statements of his may prove to be more problematic. From DAR's link: "For instance, the Washington Post published a letter Paul wrote to the Bowling Green Daily News in May 2002, where he argued against the "Fair Housing Act." In views similar to those expressed on NPR and MSNBC, Paul wrote that "a free society will abide unofficial, private discrimination, even when that means allowing hate-filled groups to exclude people based on the color of their skin." And the nice (and probably accurate) summing up: "I think he's going to have to start answering people's questions now," Ivory said. "He's going to have to. His answers are going to have to be deeper than they have been."
Originally Posted By Mr X "A free society will abide unofficial, private discrimination – even when that means allowing hate-filled groups to exclude people based on the color of their skin." 2002 Bowling Green Daily News, Letter to the Editor, by Rand Paul
Originally Posted By Mr X "...let's say you have a local office and you have a two-story office, and one of your workers is handicapped. Should you not be allowed maybe to offer them an office on the first floor? Or should you be forced to put in a $100,000 elevator? I think it sounds like common sense that you should be allowed to give them a first floor office." R.P.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<A free society will abide unofficial, private discrimination>> What exactly is this magical "free society" that these people constantly refer too? It doesn't exist in the real world. If it did, I could go out and kill anyone I wanted, or steal anything I wanted - after all, it's my "right" in a "free" society. Sorry, but we live in the real world where we have laws in place to keep people from infringing on the rights of others. And we, as a society, have decided that people don't have the right to discriminate based on skin tone, gender, or sexuality and any number of other things. (Unless, of course, you're banning gay marriage - but that's different, of course...) When will these people move on with their lives and get over it. Sorry kids, but the Civil Rights Movement happened, and it's not going to go away - no matter how much you kick and scream. It's time to join the rest of us in the 21st Century.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 What I love is when someone like Rand Paul swears that he doesn't favor discrimination personally, but in principle that part of the Civil Rights Act shouldn't have gone through. IN PRACTICE that would have meant decades more of black people not being able to eat where they choose, work where they choose, etc. etc. etc. (In other words, having their freedoms severely curtailed). In some places of the country, make no mistake - it would still be going on today. We like to think of history as inevitable - that because today attitudes towards hiring and eating with and associating with people who are different have improved greatly overall from what they were, that this was bound to happen. But it was NOT inevitable. Huge numbers of people had to be pulled kicking and screaming into that future. After being "forced" to eat at the same restaurants and work at the same jobs, most came around to "hmm... there's nothing wrong with this." But in 1964, literally millions of people, including strong majorities in the south, thought there was most definitely something wrong with it, because that's what they had been taught. It's what their parents taught them, what their grandparents taught their parents, and on and on and on. It's what they WOULD HAVE taught their children, make no mistake, and it will still be going on today far stronger than it is. In other words, these libertarians who always claim to be about maximum "freedom" would have sentenced millions of fellow Americans to a future decidedly less free than they now enjoy. Libertarianism, though I can admire certain things about it, is much like Communism or unfettered free markets in this regard. Sounds good and works great in theory. But in practice - not so much.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>Hear hear, Dabob2.<< Agreed, great post. I think through history you see a common overarching theme of unfounded fear trying to maintain the status quo, while progressives are trying to right very clear, identifiable wrongs. If slaves are freed, black men will ravage the countryside. If women are given the right to vote, morals will evaporate. On and on it goes, yet these fears are rooted in myth and paranoia, not sound evaluation. We now see the same things happening over gay rights and healthcare.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>In other words, these libertarians who always claim to be about maximum "freedom" would have sentenced millions of fellow Americans to a future decidedly less free than they now enjoy. << Bingo. The Libertarian "hands-off of private business" mantra results in maintaing the status quo in so many things.
Originally Posted By DAR If I find out that a business is discriminating against a group of people, I simply don't patronize it.
Originally Posted By ecdc So you agree with Rand Paul that businesses should have a right to discriminate?
Originally Posted By sjhym33 I have watched the Rand Paul interviews this past week and besides some of his positions, which I dont think he really expounded on well which left big gaps for others to fill in, I was surprised that he seemed rather inarticulate. His performance should be a flag to the Tea Party that they should really understand who they are getting when they support a candidate.
Originally Posted By DAR I never said it was right but if that's how a owner wants to run his or her business, that's by their choosing, as immoral as it is. The consequence is, I and others choose not to do business with them. And if word of mouth gets around what this business represents eventually enough people will stop patronizing. And that will lead to this owner having to close down because of his/her backwards way of thinking.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>The consequence is, I and others choose not to do business with them. And if word of mouth gets around what this business represents eventually enough people will stop patronizing. And that will lead to this owner having to close down because of his/her backwards way of thinking.<< You're ignoring the consequences of libertarianism that Dabob already went over. You're assuming that will happen; it won't in some parts of the south. It isn't the businesses right to discriminate. And I strongly suspect that if you were the victim of this kind of discrimination, rather than defending it, you'd be screaming the loudest.
Originally Posted By ecdc DAR, the more I think about this, the more backwards you're thinking is. You are advocating the position of racists in the 1950s. You're cheering the arrest of blacks who sat at white lunch counters in the deep south. That's seriously what you're advocating? I know, I know, you PERSONALLY think it's wrong (which is meaningless) but the practical effect is the same: A black person who went to a white's only restaurant would have to be arrested for trespassing if they refused to leave. That's what you're advocating. Astounding. And where do we draw the line? How about a black person who's refused treatment at a hospital? Cool with you too?
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan It'd be wonderful if businesses would do the right thing if left alone. But come on. For more than a century after the abolition of slavery, racist policies were still going strong. Had it not been for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, they'd be going strong today. Why on earth is any politican, in 2010, debating the Civil Rights Act of 1964? Have we been torn into two camps THAT much, that we can't even accept a law that was put into place 40 years ago in the name of equality? Maybe Rand can give his theories on the Lindbergh kidnapping next, since he's debating such up-to-the-minute news.
Originally Posted By barboy2 ecdc(anyone may jump in too and get a shot at this), should I have a lawful right to tell a man in a wheelchair at my front door to my private home who is looking for donations: "no thanks. And I want you off my property because I hate all gimps; anyone with a disability is not welcome here"? I'm not asking for you to recite some applicable statute, relevant US court decision or national poll but your own opinion as to how far gov't should be allowed in our lives.
