-By Warner Todd Huston
On the day after his historic primary win, National Public Radio rabidly went after Rand Paul, newly minted GOP nominee for Kentucky Senator, trying to make him out to be a KKK sympathizer or perhaps a racist that would have agreed to keep Jim Crow alive and well in 1964. This rabid, left-wing attack is uncalled for and, further, is meant only to stir anti-Republican hatred and not to help voters discover anything relevant about nominee Rand Paul.
Nearly at the top of the interview the host of NPR’s All Things Considered tried to paint Mr. Paul as some sort of hater that would have opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Catch this loaded and irrelevant question by NPR:
You’ve said that business should have the right to refuse service to anyone and that the Americans for Disabilities Act, the ADA, was an over reach by the federal government, would you say the same by extension of the 1964 Civil Rights Act?
Paul gave a very good reply but the best thing he said was that he hadn’t read through the entire 1964 legislation because it had been passed 40 years ago and didn’t have any role in today’s campaign. And that is just it, isn’t it? The 1964 Civil Rights Act is ancient history as far as current politics goes. It is fully accepted and is not a law in dispute, nor does it have any part in current political discussion. The law is fact the legitimacy of which no one questions. Talking about the 1964 Civil Rights Act is not relevant alt all to today’s issues.
Of course, that wasn’t good enough for NPR as the hack that was interviewing Paul harped on and on trying to get Paul to say he wished that blacks in America were still forced to live under Jim Crow. In fact, the NPR interviewer wasted most of the interview trying to out Paul as a racist.
One wonders what NPR was next going to ask Rand Paul about if they hadn’t run out of time? Would NPR had tried to get Paul to say that he disagreed with entering WWII? Maybe NPR would have next grilled Paul on his thoughts of Abraham’s decision to sacrifice his son Isaac to God? Aren’t all of these heady issues as important to the Kentucky Senate campaign as revisiting a 40-year-old piece of legislation that no one is considering repealing, altering, or revisiting?
Of course, we know why NPR did this. NPR is desperately trying to destroy Rand Paul before the next phase of his campaign is fairly off the ground.
The fact is that rehashing 40-year-old legislation that is not up for review or even in question is a pointless discussion. After all, is Paul — or any other American politician, for that matter — running a campaign saying that the 1964 Civil Rights Act should be repealed? Have any said it was the wrong decision? The discussion is pointless… unless you can use it to destroy a Republican, right NPR?
Transcript of 1964 Civil Rights Discussion
NPR: You’ve said that business should have the right to refuse service to anyone and that the Americans for Disabilities Act, the ADA, was an over reach by the federal government, would you say the same by extension of the 1964 Civil Rights Act?
Rand Paul: What I’ve always said is that I’m opposed to institutional racism and I would have, had I been alive at the time, I think, had the courage to march with Martin Luther King to over turn institutional racism. I see no place in or society for institutional racism.
NPR: But are you saying had you been around at the time you would have hoped you would have marched with Martin Luther King but voted with Barry Goldwater against the 1964 Civil Rights Act?
Paul: Well actually I think it’s confusing on a lot of cases with what actually was in the civil rights case because see a lot of the things that were actually in the bill I’m in favor of. I’m in favor of everything with regards to ending institutional racism. So, I think there’s a lot to be desired in the civil rights. And to tell you the truth I haven’t really read all through it because it was passed 40 years ago and hadn’t really been a pressing issue in the campaign on what…
NPR: But…
Paul: …for the civil rights act.
NPR: But it’s been one of the major developments of American history in the course of your life, I mean, do you think the ’64 Civil Rights Act or the ADA for that matter, were just over reaches? And that business shouldn’t be bothered by people with basis in law to sue them for, for redress?
Paul: Right, I think a lot of things can be handled locally. For example I think that we should try to do everything that we can to allow for people with disabilities and handicaps, you know we do it in our office with wheel chair ramps and things like that. I think if you have a two story office and you hire someone who’s handicapped it might be reasonable to let them have an office on the first floor rather than the government saying you have to have a hundred thousand dollar elevator. And I think when you get to solutions like that the more local the better and the more common sense the decisions are rather than having a federal government make those decisions.
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“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 200 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, CanadaFreePress.com, StoptheACLU.com, AmericanDailyReview.com, among many, many others. Mr. Huston is also endlessly amused that one of his articles formed the basis of an article in Germany’s Der Spiegel Magazine in 2008.
Huston has been a frequent guest on talk-radio programs to discuss his opinion editorials and current events and is currently the co-host of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Conservatism” heard on BlogTalkRadio. Huston’s work has appeared on Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Neil Bortz, and Michael Savage. He has appeared on the G. Gordon Liddy show, dozens of local shows from coast to coast, and many blogtalk radio shows.
Mr. Huston has appeared on local TV news to discuss his writing, has been a guest of CNN’s blogger lunch, and has appeared on Breitbart TV’s B-Team show.
Warner is also the editor of the Cook County Page for RedCounty.com and has a blog on the Tribune-Owned http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/publius-forum/ChicagoNow.com website. He is a well known writer on Illinois politics.
He has also written for several history magazines and appears in the book “Americans on Politics, Policy and Pop Culture” which can be purchased on amazon.com. He is also the owner and operator of PubliusForum.com. Feel free to contact him with any comments or questions : EMAIL Warner Todd Huston
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