Former Congressman Ron Paul of Texas is a genuine American hero. He stood for a new way of thinking about America’s place in the world and recognized that the war party and its policies were both destructive to the US Constitution and imperiling liberties at home. He is a national treasure. But I sometimes have to wonder why he has surrounded himself with so many grifters? I keep getting emails from the Campaign for Liberty (C4L), which represents itself as an heir to the Paul legacy, even though it is nothing of the sort. It is a money generating machine preying on the millions of Americans who have fond memories of Dr. Paul, constantly promising to do something important tomorrow but never quite delivering. It ultimately benefits no one outside the small group of scalawags that did so little so poorly in the 2012 election campaign, failing disastrously to get Ron Paul either nominated or at least having a seat at the GOP table to advance his views. They cut deals with the Romney campaign and even kept Paul’s unhappy supporters from disrupting the convention’s proceedings. In return Dr. Paul got nothing.
Some of the folks associated with the campaign and C4L have been linked recently to bribery in Iowa and other malfeasance. The campaign manager Jesse Benton, became the $1.1 million dollar man while mismanaging the effort and is now working for the lugubrious Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Benton has stated that he does so holding his nose, which says a lot about the integrity of Benton and also reveals the cunning of perpetual Washington fixture McConnell, who hopes to attract Paul supporters and teabaggers when he runs in 2014.
Ron Paul had enormous appeal in 2012 which was not capitalized on by his handlers. In my state of Virginia, which was the only state where Paul ran head-to-head against Mitt Romney, the campaign was invisible even though well-connected contractor Mike Rothfeld reportedly billed the Paul campaign for $1,196,376 for “advertising, bulk mail, and email services” in Virginia in 2011 alone. I live in a battleground county but did not receive a single mailing, did not hear a radio ad or see a television commercial supporting Dr. Paul. A swing of 10% would have delivered Virginia to Ron Paul and it could have happened. If he had won the state it might have shifted the momentum of the entire campaign.
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