Dude had his victory party at a private golf country club.

Classic.

At least he is consistent with his craziness. I can understand how he would want to allow private business to discriminate when he thinks that private business should be able to do whatever the fuck they want. He should move to Somalia where his libertarian ideals are upheld every day.

Also Rachel Maddow is awesome. I really like that she want be fair and give airtime to someone she opposes. Her opinion comes off much stronger when she does not belittle and talk over her guest like Bill O'Reilly does.

Remember the good doctor not only hates blacks, he hate government handouts except for medicare payments to doctors! Now THAT'S consistent!!

(And he opposes any legislation that would reduce what medicare will pay to doctors as well) But any other government hand out? Forget it!!

That was very, very well parsed. Basically, he doesn't really support the Civil Rights Act, but doesn't want to say that.

This probably shouldn't be surprising - Tea Partiers have the tendency to parse their views like this on almost everything they actually believe in. To me, that's much more frustrating than their views themselves. It's one thing to have radical views, sure. But to constantly try to pretend you don't is another.

"An abstract, obscure conversation from the 1960's."

This makes my brain hurt.

Why is anybody surprised by this? Most of America apparently thinks private businesses should be allowed to discriminate. The TV show "What Would You Do?" featured a segment last night about a gay family being harassed by a waiter at a restaurant and eventually asked to leave. (The gay family & the waiter were actors and the entire incident was a test to see if anyone would stand up for the family.) Very few of the other patrons said a word - apparently having no problem with the family being harassed & kicked out simply because the parents were gay. Other patrons didn't even get involved when the little girl attempted to engage them in conversation about the treatment and appeared to be on the verge of tears.

The show used a set of lesbian moms as well as a set of gay dads to see if the gender made any difference. It didn't.

The segment was completely depressing and one of the most accurate depictions of the pitiful state of our country.

http://abcnews.go.com/WhatWouldYouDo/vid…

Paul nailed it when he ended on the red herring note. He isn't interested in getting a Senate seat to deal with social issues that he feels the government has no business in in the first place. Maddow selectively picked a topic with a racial component because Paul represents the tea party movement and she knows a libertarian will argue property rights over government mandates every time. He was happy to have the philosophical debate but in the end it really comes down to what they believe the role of government should be. Progressives believe the government should involve itself in striving for social equality. Libertarians believe the government should protect our rights and freedoms. Libertarians have no tolerance for violence (except maybe a government overthrow).

The right wing is going over a cliff. They now see that November elections are going to be about whether we want extremist, racist government as presented by them or government that regulates and intervenes on behalf of all Americans. They will lose big time.

Libertarians have no tolerance for violence (except maybe a government overthrow).

@9: Mighty naïve of you.

I don't know, I kind of respect Rand Paul for sticking to his principals. This is more a debate for a Political Science class than for Rachel Maddow.

Paul had a point about guns in private businesses too. The 1964 Civil Rights Act DID set up a precedent of the government being able to interfere. Personally, I support it but at least Paul attempted to describe the intricacies of the law as it related to pvt/public institutions unstead of lying like most Republicans would have.

I'm sorry, I just really wish I could broadcast this message across the entire nation at once.

Libertarians have no tolerance for violence (except maybe a government overthrow).

It's absolutely astounding how tone deaf Republicans are these days, but what's more surprising is how casually Libertarians make them look sensible.

@7: Well, if he is going to be elected to the Senate, it might be nice to know what his political viewpoints are...

I mean, that does seem a little relevant, doesn't it?

Maddow is awesome, but I'm surprised she didn't call him out on the obvious illogic of his comparison between black people not being allowed in a restaurant to gun carriers not being allowed in a restaurant. You can leave your gun at home--you can't leave your black skin at home (well, you could, but then you'd be in no shape for dining out).

And yeah, segregation is an obscure issue from the 60's. Really?

While the whole exchange with Maddow was a bit nauseating and Paul was obviously trapped in a corner on the wrong side of private discrimination, isn't backing any candidate or political party a matter of finding someone who's on your side with the issues that matter most to you, and putting up with the stench of the issues where you don't agree?

I'm not a Paul supporter, but I am a big fan of his support of reforming campaign finance to take some of the influence of lobbyists out of the process, his dislike of the bank bailout and his dad's support for drastically reducing military spending.

A lot of us on the left like to attack others for specific portions of their platform, but it's time to turn that attack on to our own side as well. I don't hear many voices on the left clamoring for a reduction in the military, and we didn't say much about the atrocious stimulus package that bailed out Wall Street and allowed those guys to keep doing what they do, which will bring on another financial crisis in the future.

Sure there are a few Bernie Sanders type exceptions, but the majority of Dems are corporate shills, just like the GOP. It's time we start holding our own politicians to the fire in the same way we do the oppositions.

@12 - I'm glad you liked that quote but I'm not an official spokesman for any group. That was a tongue-in-cheek comment that was meant to convey that the enemies of the libertarians are those who use force to get what they want. That's all it meant.

@15: I mean, sure, but Rand Paul is running for the power of voting on things like the Civil Rights Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act right now. So his political views are relevant to voters, and Rachel wanted to be able to report to viewers on what those political views were.

He sort of expressed them, but tried very hard not to. Paul clearly disagrees with the Civil Rights Act, but knows that saying so is politically toxic, so he's trying to leave it alone. I do respect that he went as far as he did, though, in standing up for something that's unpopular. We need more of that. If politicians weren't so afraid of expressing their political views, we'd definitely see more people calling for a reduction of the military.

Nonetheless, even though he stood up for unpopular viewpoints, I wouldn't support him. I disagree with his views in a pretty substantial way. It'd just be nice if he made that clearer so I'd know not support for him ahead of time, instead of pretending to be someone I could support and then disappointing me later.

@12: You obviously have never seen an active, Libertarian U.S. Senate candidate beg for getting ever more horsefeather-whipped whilst harnessed securely by stocks (inside, of course, a BDSM dungeon) — quitting only after much blood was drawn.

Or for that matter, the same guy's serious love for heavy arms and blowing shit up.

Again, you're naïve to run with such generalities.

Each state has laws establishing the legal drinking age for consumption of alcohol in a private business. Would Dr.Paul suggest that each private business has the right to decide, as a principal of free speech, what is the appropiate age for consumption within the boundries of its business? Based on his reasoning, he would have to support this notion, however I don't think anyone would necessarily enjoy watching children being served alcohol. I think Dr. Paul is surfing on a very slippery slope.

Sorry. It was actually a pillory, not merely stocks.

@17 - Yeah, but it gets sticky when you distill an entire thought process down to a Yes or No on a topic like that. The only reason it sounds appalling to you when you hear he wouldn't support passing a Civil Rights Act is because you think the best way of dealing with race issues is for the government to pass a law about them to try and force equality. Is that the best way? I don't know but it obviously hasn't solved our societies racial problems yet.

@17 - I wouldn't support Paul, but I don't see how he could make his views much clearer, aside from admitting that he's for allowing lunch counters (whatever those are) to discriminate, which would be plain stupid and political suicide.

"Rand Paul is running for the power of voting on things like the Civil Rights Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act right now." - No he's not. Those issues aren't part of his platform. While he may have to vote on those issues at some point, he's not running to address those issues.

Let's flip the script on this. Who did you vote for on a national scale? How did they vote on the bailout, and did they vote to approve the budget with it's bloated military spending?

I'm not saying he's a great candidate. I'm saying that you can take any single issue and rip politicians to shreds on them. What I am saying is that we (all political persuasions) love to jump on opponents over individual issues, when the people we support aren't any better.

While everyone is having fun jumping on Paul today, where are the articles in Slog taking our Democratic politicians to task for all of their bullshit? We love to act like the other side is evil incarnate, and then submit our votes for GOP-lite Dems. Rand Paul is running for Senate in Kentucky. Who cares what those hillbillies do? Let's use this energy to clean up our own house.

@14, Yeah, that's what was going through my head as well. Also, comparing black people to gun carriers seems to promote that whole "black people are more dangerous than 'the rest of us'" way of thought.

I agree with Fairhaven; the government regulates private businesses in all sorts of ways where the public interest is deemed to outweigh private freedoms, such as in matters of public health and safety, fairness in commerce, and so forth. There are extensive and highly intrusive laws regarding the sale of safe food, preventing accidents, carrying insurance, selling alcohol, employee compensation, just on and on and on.

Talking about private freedom in terms of serving particular types of patrons is a total red herring. What you have to ask instead is whether the government has a right to interfere at all. Most of us generally accept that it does, so that we can have a reasonable expectation of eating safe food, being warned of slippery surfaces, being paid fairly for our work and so forth.

The public interest in maintaining a civil society where everyone enjoys equal access to resources is what is at question. Is this just as important as the public interest in keeping food safe?

Try asking a libertarian that! You have to back up a bit to see the dangers of segregating a society, or allowing such public incivility, but the danger is there, and we've already seen how serious it is.

@16 - I'm well aware that you're not a spokesman for Libertarians, which is why I didn't make any sincere effort to shout what you said to the world. Rest assured, if Ron Paul had said that to my face, I would be telling everyone and printing T-shirts.

Libertarians believe they invented Pacifism for some reason, but the anti-Iraq war protests were a liberal movement. One that Libertarians later claim to have been involved in, but were never a fraction as loud and obnoxious about as they are now that a Democrat is in office.

Libertarians are also lax believers in our Republican form of government. During the run-up to the 2008 election, every Ron Paul supporter everywhere declared that Ron Paul would solve all of this country's problems by instituting a radical agenda to transform the government. Not one of them would ever acknowledge the fact that both Republicans and Democrats would unite against him in the legislature and in the courts to render him completely powerless if he actually tried to take us back to the gold standard or eliminate entire departments of Government. Whether Libertarians believe in Authoritarian rule, or whether they're all just extremely ignorant of how our government works (Which is why they want so much less of it) is irrelevant. The only relevant thing to note is that Libertarians are not currently contributing anything positive to America.

Telsa, what the hell are you going on about? Am I naive for not being involved in BSDM with Senators?

Or are you naive for believing everything that everyone says at face value and immediately jumping to the conclusion that I'm defending Libertarianism?

*BDSM, rather. I will, of course, admit to all naivety to that subject.

@6,

Most people are too non-confrontational and wimpy to do anything in that kind of situation. That series has demonstrated it on a number of occasions with many different kinds of participants.

@25 I think most Libertarians would agree, though. And I'd hope you'd agree that if the government did become actually oppressive (not "black president = all mah rights have been taken from me!"-style Tea-Party "oppression"), violence would be necessary. I'm guessing you cheered when Tibetans deployed violence against the Chinese. It's the same thing. Just because it's unlikely in the US doesn't mean it's impossible.

@25 - I think you have a incorrect opinion of what Ron Paul supporters actually felt during the campaign. Paul himself readily admitted his policies would have to be introduced gradually and his supporters were under no illusion about how much the Republican party hated his presence. We saw how the two-party system made his run hopeless. So it's funny that you used the capitol L libertarian when saying they are contributing nothing positive to America. They haven't been able to contribute anything at all.

@26: You're fascinating.

He may not be running at the moment on the idea that the ADA and the Civil Rights Act are bad law, but he is running for the power to change those laws. That's the reason anybody runs for political office (beside the opportunities for personal enrichment...). So this year he may be voicing concern over government spending, but who knows what he'll have to say on other issues that come up next year, or the year after that....
Knowing he's a whackjob now may make a few voters think twice about voting for his immediate message.

I don't know Dr. Paul, but I take him at his word when he says that he doesn't/wouldn't discriminate on the basis of race. That being said, the import of what he is preaching--i.e., the limitation on the government to dictate certain practices to private property owners--is being lost in the noise about racism. That policy position should fully be examined because I believe it would in fact cover a larger swath of potential KY voters than just the African-American voters--musch to Dr. Paul's detriment. For example, would his philosophy bar the impostition of a minimum wage? Could the government tell private businesses to post certain information? Could OSHA set safety regulations for a private businesses employees? Etc. I think the really important issue is being loss in the rush to paint this as a racial-bias issue.