GOP Madness, Round 1, Match 14

Whoowhee! We had a photo finish in yesterday's matchup:

Only three more first round matches before we get into the next round. Today's winner will face off against Romney's Ford Field Fiasco in the Sweet 16.

1. RON PAUL DIDN'T WRITE RACIST NEWSLETTERS THAT HE WROTE

Once upon a time, Ron Paul was all into these little fanzines with titles like Ron Paul's Freedom Report, and Ron Paul Political Report, and Ron Paul Survival Report, and Ron Paul Investment Letter. Why would anyone think that, you know, Ron Paul had anything to do with them?

Those newsletters had all sorts of, um, interesting material:

[O]pinion polls consistently show only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions [...]

[I]f you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be [...]

'Order was only restored in L.A. [during the Rodney King riots] when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks three days after rioting began [...]

As early as December 1989, a section of his Investment Letter, titled 'What To Expect for the 1990s,' predicted that 'Racial Violence Will Fill Our Cities' because 'mostly black welfare recipients will feel justified in stealing from mostly white 'haves.'' Two months later, a newsletter warned of 'The Coming Race War,' and, in November 1990, an item advised readers, 'If you live in a major city, and can leave, do so. If not, but you can have a rural retreat, for investment and refuge, buy it.' In June 1991, an entry on racial disturbances in Washington, DC's Adams Morgan neighborhood was titled, 'Animals Take Over the D.C. Zoo.' 'This is only the first skirmish in the race war of the 1990s,' the newsletter predicted. In an October 1992 item about urban crime, the newsletter's author--presumably Paul--wrote, 'I've urged everyone in my family to know how to use a gun in self defense. For the animals are coming.'

South Africa's transition to multiracial democracy was portrayed as a 'destruction of civilization' that was 'the most tragic [to] ever occur on that continent, at least below the Sahara'; and, in March 1994, a month before Nelson Mandela was elected president, one item warned of an impending 'South African Holocaust.'

One newsletter ridiculed black activists who wanted to rename New York City after King, suggesting that 'Welfaria,' 'Zooville,' 'Rapetown,' 'Dirtburg,' and 'Lazyopolis' were better alternatives.

By 2001, Ron Paul denied that the words written in the RON PAUL newsletters were written by him, RON PAUL. The newsletters included no other bylines or names on a masthead, and often used pronouns like "I" and "me," which could only mean one thing, given that the newsletters were titled after RON PAUL.

Yet this year, when the newsletter became an issue, Paul held to the notion that he had little to do with the content of the newsletters:

"I was not an editor. I'm like a publisher'. There were many times when I did not edit the whole letter and other things got put in."

Yet he continued to pretend it was a few stray words here and there:

"These were sentences that were put in ' I think it was a total of about eight or ten sentences, and it was bad stuff," [Paul] told host Jan Mickelson. But, he added, "it wasn't a reflection of my views at all, so it got in the letter, I think it was terrible, it was tragic."

I wonder if Paul's 8-10 sentences included the entire "Special Issue on Racial Terrorism" scanned above? His excuses and rationalizations were ludicrous, but that was okay, because his entire campaign was ludicrous. And really, could you expect anything better from one of the GOP's fringiest lunatics?

2. RICK SANTORUM WARNS AGAINST SEX FOR PLEASURE

Be honest. You miss this sort of thing, don't you?

One of the things I will talk about that no president has talked about before is I think the dangers of contraception in this country, the whole sexual libertine idea ... Many in the Christian faith have said, "Well, that's okay ... contraception's okay."

It's not okay because it's a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be. They're supposed to be within marriage, for purposes that are, yes, conjugal ... but also procreative. That's the perfect way that a sexual union should happen. We take any part of that out, we diminish the act. And if you can take one part out that's not for purposes of procreation, that's not one of the reasons, then you diminish this very special bond between men and women, so why can't you take other parts of that out? And all of a sudden, it becomes deconstructed to the point where it's simply pleasure. And that's certainly a part of it'and it's an important part of it, don't get me wrong'but there's a lot of things we do for pleasure, and this is special, and it needs to be seen as special.

Again, I know most presidents don't talk about those things, and maybe people don't want us to talk about those things, but I think it's important that you are who you are. I'm not running for preacher. I'm not running for pastor, but these are important public policy issues.

Rick Santorum is obsessed with gay sex, and clearly doesn't enjoy having straight sex.

Hmmm ...

Instead of an "important public policy issue," this seems more like a "bizarre and perhaps a little tragic personal issue."