In the past, when Senator Rand Paul has been asked about enforcement of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or other civil rights bills, he’s fallen back on the idea that you can better assure, for example, desegregated lunch counters by denying that particular Woolworth’s your business than by enacting federal legislation. When it came to housing, he said this, “Decisions concerning private property and associations should in a free society be unhindered. As a consequence, some associations will discriminate.”
Using this rough logic, if you can call it that, people who seek to order lunch or buy a home are behaving a certain way. And people who deny patrons a meal or won’t sell them a house are also behaving a certain way. And people should be free to behave pretty much however they want. In a free society, some people will exhibit racist behaviors: “some associations will discriminate.” Other people will try to do certain things and find that they can’t accomplish them because of their race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation. But no one told them that they couldn’t try.
For Rand Paul, the best way to change someone’s behaviors is to behave some way yourself. Like Indiana Governor Mike Pence, who said he wouldn’t continue to eat at a restaurant that turned away gay couples, Rand Paul thinks that businesses can best be persuaded to serve all people by the threat of lost business from customers whose patronage they actually want.
So, pretty much across the board, Senator Rand Paul thinks about civil rights as a matter of how people behave rather than a matter well-suited for legal solutions or protections.
But, then, look at this:
“I don’t think I’ve ever used the word gay rights, because I don’t really believe in rights based on your behavior.” –Senator Rand Paul
The logic of that statement appears straightforward. Being black or a woman, how old you are, are not things you can change through behavioral modifications, but who you are physically attracted to is purely a matter of choice. Someone can deny you a sandwich or a wedding cake based on their perception of your sexual orientation because the presumption is that you behave a certain way, not that you are a certain way.
So, suddenly, the gay couple seeking dinner is distinct from the black gentleman seeking lunch, even though their behaviors are nearly identical.
If you’re seeking some consistency here, it’s not that hard to find. Rand Paul, in all circumstances, defends the right to discriminate and opposes the government’s right to protect people from discrimination.
He’ll shift around how he justifies these positions, but the positions remain the same.
There’s a certain appeal to the Paulista philosophy that has the potential to attract a lot of people in the younger generations, but here we see him running afoul of a core value of our youth, which is that gays should not be denied the same rights as everyone else.
It’s not just that he seems to be insisting that sexual orientation is a choice, but also that he wants to defend people’s right to behave any way they want, even in an openly discriminatory manner, unless their behavior involves sex.
This is not a winning position and it will hurt Paul badly with the very generations that might otherwise flock to his campaign.
The muthaphucka told you that he would have voted AGAINST
the Civil Rights Bill of 1964
the Voting Rights Bill of 1965
why are people confused about him?
seriously?
this is the beginning, middle and end for me. I never needed to hear another word the muthaphucka said. I know where he stands and who he is..
MY ENEMY
Look Paul will say whatever he needs to say to better his chances at getting elected. He is brown nosing to his base so hard his whole head is up their A$$es.
While I agree that Paul will say whatever he needs to say to better his changes of getting elected (see the fact that this supposedly foreign adventure skeptic is proposing an increase in the Pentagon budget), in this context, I think it’s important to keep in mind what rikyrah said above. In his Kentucky Senate race, he said that he would have voted against the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act. He later walked that back a bit, but that’s who he is. I think it very well may be that he’s just too stupid and wrapped in his cocoon of white privilege to truly grasp what he’s saying, but that’s who he is. The government acting to protect the rights of American citizens is more offensive to him than the rights of American citizens being systematically denied by other citizens. The federal government interfering with local government is more offensive to him than local government abusing American citizens.
As Deathtongue said, this is a neo-Confederate ideology. The entire concept of “states rights” comes out of historical compromise – at the time the Constitution was formulated, the most powerful units of government were the states, and they didn’t want to cede any more power than they had to. But, really, who gives a rat’s ass about the “rights” of a made up organizational unit? Having local divisions of government responsible for more local concerns makes sense, but endowing the states with rights was a (necessary) mistake. The only rights that deserve anyone getting agitated about are the rights of human beings. All human beings. Paul and his confederates just don’t see things that way.
Economics as motivator. (Loss/threatened loss of business.) One would think that he would use his elevated visibility to initiate something just a bit more inspiring.
To the libertarian, that’s as inspiring as it gets.
The Pauls are consistent even if their fanboys can’t figure out what the Pauls’ governance orientation means in the real world. In plain English:
At the national level, government is to operate a military to protect US business interests and a SCOTUS to protect wealth.
At the state level, government is to operate prisons.
At the local level, government is to protect real estate private property rights and operate law enforcement to insure no infringement on such property.
Otherwise, “the people” are on their own to do as they please.
Buy PaulBucks!
Otherwise, “the people” are on their own to do as they please, except women may be protected by local or state governments from accessing reproductive health services. Because women are too dumb or selfish to know what’s in their own best interests.
Make that women and organized labor, Paul’s a big right-to-work advocate and fan of Lochner v. New York.
I’m going to disagree. Organized labor doesn’t get and/or maintain power absent government protections. So, on that one Paul is completely consistent with the “small government” model in his small mind.
No, “right to work” laws cause governments to intervene in the relationship between employers and employees. They outlaw crucial aspects of contractual language which have been negotiated between management and their organized workforce, and effectively doom the future relationship between the two by financially undermining the Unions which represent the workers. “Right to Work” laws are as big-government as the many anti-women’s choice laws passed recently.
“Organized labor doesn’t get and/or maintain power absent government protections.” Well, this is an interesting way to view it. Multinational corporations and other employers also cannot get/maintain their powers without government protections. Which side has had their power grown massively in recent years by government actions, and which side has had a long knife dragged through their guts?
A bit of a chicken or egg question on this issue. No question that owners/employers have long used (their bought and paid for) government to suppress union organizing. Most significant and notable was the Sherman Anti-trust law (1890). That Clayton Act (1914) removed restrictions on organized labor. (Ludlow massacre April 1914, House passed Clayton Act June 1914, Senate passed its version September 1914.) However, it’s the Wagner Act (1935) that is foundational to labor unions.
Taft-Hartley (1947) an amendment to the Wagner Act that whittled down the Wagner Act protections and power. A key provision in it allowed for state based “right to work laws” which are end runs around the Wagner Act.
It was after passage of the Wagner Act and not the Clayton Act that private sector unions grew substantially. And it’s not accidental that they’ve been shrinking since passage of Taft-Hartley. Repeal the Wagner Act and states wouldn’t need “right to work laws.”
Taft-Hartley rules our world much more than Wagner right now. We’re not back in the 1880’s yet, but we’re headed there much too rapidly.
Obama’s pressing for fast track of the TPP is an issue where I am furious with our President.
The ideology mutated to an extent such that it can now be more accurately be described as neoconferate doctrine. And it has been that way for awhile. Barry Goldwater whined endlessly about the religious right infecting the Republican Party, but he himself was responsible for the neoconfederates infecting libertarianism.
This was more-or-less inevitable. Raw libertarianism just doesn’t appeal to many segments of the population. Robber barons can already get what they want with conservatism. The religious right would clash endlessly with ‘pure’ libertarianism. Modern progressives realize that government intervention is really the only way to preserve rights of minorities and protect the commons. And even most social conservatives at the end of the day want farm subsidies and Medicare and Social Security.
I mean, yes, the Silicon Valley libertarians are still the ones who build the websites and design the talking points and craft the advertising campaigns, but the influx of Neoconfederates is the only reason why it isn’t even more of joke than it already is.
I wish SCOTUS would just rule on this already. Make same sex marriage the law.
Then we can watch supposed “principled conservatives” like Jeb “JEB!” Bush and Krugerrand Paul decry the “judicial activism” of the Court.
The more this plays out the better for people who care about LGBTQ rights.
Hmm, isn’t it the case that Pence and co are freaking out because of all the actions taken by various people? Public behavior reaction might be what causes them to cave.
Senator Rand Paul is right, I support it because it introduces the freshness. The idea of the law by very good to me 🙂 clash of kings cheats