A few weeks ago I read this blurb about Ron Paul and immediately my antennae shot up and I began to wonder if this guy was as genuine as he tried to make himself out to be. Paul accepted a $500 donation from a white supremacist, legitimizing his acceptance by stating that by accepting the money, the supremacist has $500 less to do whatever nefarious acts he does. Sounds like a nice excuse, only, I had to wonder if Paul would have used the same M.O. if the guy supported terrorism or was into child pornography. I mean, I know you can’t possibly know where all of your donations come from, but in this case, Paul did, and that gave me cause to be suspicious.
Still, after I read that Paul was excluded from the Republican debates by Fox News, I wondered about the unfairness of giving the man a platform from which to espouse his ideals.
However, this afternoon I was pretty much convinced that Ron Paul was not the man he purported himself to be. Back in the 80’s and 90’s, Paul had a newsletter that voiced some pretty rank (in my opinion) ideas. These were ideas about Blacks, Jews, homosexuals, Martin Luther King Jr. and an apparent paladin in Paul’s eyes, David Duke. A lot of Paul supporters are calling this a smear tactic, and maybe it is. Paul denies writing the newsletters and it is said that the person who “did” write them was fired. I have to wonder, though, about a man who is aware that there is a newsletter out there circulating with his name on it, but has absolutely no idea what is being written in it.
Anyway, I didn’t want to delve into politics with this blog. Not at all. But over the last few days I have seen how ugly things may get with this next election. A lot of people seem to think we have progressed past the days of racism, xenophobia, misogyny and just plain hate, but I’m here to tell you, keep your eyes open. If you really want to know what you neighbor is like, what he/she thinks about the society in which he/she lives, observe them in their political choices. I am frankly wary of every candidate running. However, I am more wary of some than others. For instance, I don’t think Obama is an undercover Muslim terrorist hell-bent on bringing down the United States. I don’t think the “angry old dude” moniker placed on McCain is really justified. I don’t think Hillary is shedding crocodile tears. I don’t think Bill Clinton was the first Black president (if he was, he’d be dead by now, or at least maimed). I do hope Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and Andrew Young remain in the background if Obama wins the nomination. And I do hope that Paul makes his voice heard without winning over too many people who embrace his words as truth and justify them by stating that they are politically incorrect but 100% accurate.
If you want to know the true nature of this country and how close we are to equality, keep your eyes open for the next few months. You may be surprised by how wrong you were.
Some of Paul’s articles:
A Special Issue On Racial Terrorism
So…a female friend and I were emailing back and forth today — Happy New Year, how’s tricks, this and that. She asked me how my dating life was going and then said that she envied me a bit. See, she’s married, been married for….two and half years maybe. And already she is saying that as much as she loves her husband, if things happened to fall apart, she would probably never get married again. She would date, hang out, but that would probably be it. Hmm.
Now, I know this couple. I’ve known her forever and knew him pretty much since they met. I like them both…a lot. And I think they work well together. So, when I hear that after two years she is already feeling like she’s been rolled hard and put away wet, well…that doesn’t do much for my optimism when it comes to tying the knot.
After I told her that she was scaring me, she backtracked a little and told me not to fear. She said she was sure I would find someone wonderful and assured me that this person would have to pass her rigid evaluation, but after that, I would probably have a eternal wedded bliss. I’m not buying it. I often wonder what makes people so sure that they have done the right thing. Relationships alone are hard enough. Marriage. I can only imagine what hell marriage would be if you married someone who turned out to be completely the wrong person. Maybe they are right in the beginning, but five, ten years down the line something changes and all of a sudden you realize that your spouse is an albatross.
Remember that Russian billionaire Roman Abramoviche who gave his wife $2.5 billion dollars just so he could get out of the marriage. I mean, yeah, he was worth almost $30 billion, but still…imagine how unhappy you have to be to give up that much coin just so you can be free again. Has anyone ever paid that much money to get married? I’m thinking no. I imagine that noose must feel pretty tight to want to give up so much of your wealth to cut yourself loose. Wow.
I’m trying not to be skeptical. I figure that one day someone in my life is going to knock me on my ass and I will be so in love and so sure that she is the one, I will take the leap.
Yeah, right.