Cassis plays 'truther' card in new ad attacking Bentivolio

[DeMintConservative]

From my understanding, Goldwater stayed out of it. The reprehensible self-proclaimed totalitarian CIA warmonger William Buckley led the charge. And as you said, Kirk was an enemy of libertarians. These aren't the guys whose methods you want to be triumphing if you want to promote freedom and liberty



Ron Paul goes around the country espousing John Birch Society style ideas. That's what he does. Non-intervention, gold standard, end the Fed, down with globalism. That's JBS and that's Ron Paul. Birchers also have a tremendous amount of credibility considering all of their predictions have come true. Watch for yourself:

Throwing credible defenders of freedom under the bus in some vain attempt at electoral success will only lead the freedom movement to become a watered-down version of the establishment and as ineffectual as the modern Republican Party has been at establishing freedom in America.

1. Goldwater didn't stay out of it; quite the contrary. He called out the craziness of Welch ideas in multiple instances. Don't believe the historical fabrications Rockwell et al. have been serving for decades, especially about Senators Goldwater and Robert Taft.

Goldwater wrote an article for NR calling out the JBS and Welch.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?n..._QuAAAAIBAJ&sjid=qWUEAAAAIBAJ&pg=1725,2799674

He said Welch should quit and since he didn't that people should leave the John Birch Society.
---

https://sites.google.com/site/ernie124102/jbs-4

I think you have clearly stated the problem which Mr. Welch’s continued leadership of the John Birch Society poses for sincere conservatives. . . . Mr. Welch is only one man, and I do not believe his views, far removed from reality and common sense as they are, represent the feelings of most members of the John Birch Society. . . . Because of this, I believe the best thing Mr. Welch could do to serve the cause of anti-Communism in the United States would be to resign. . . . We cannot allow the emblem of irresponsibility to attach to the conservative banner.

"I think I was supposed to have read it in the closet with a candle, and this was the famous book that downgraded the Eisenhower brothers and Mrs. Roosevelt and Mr. Truman. I told him the next morning, when I returned the book, that he would be very wise to destroy all copies because he couldn't prove a word of it and it would do great damage to the conservative cause and his own friends if it were allowed to get out." Goldwater also suggested that Welch step down as leader of the Birch Society: "If he removed himself as leader of the Birch Society, it might allow that organization to proceed." [See Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 5/27/64, p1-2, "Barry To Welch--Step Down".]

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2 - I don't think Kirk was an enemy of libertarians. He was an enemy of Rothbardian libertarians, but libertarianism, let alone the cause of freedom, is not some Rothbard's feud. I'm a libertarian leaning conservative with no use whatsoever for Rothbard.

3 - Nobody said Welch didn't make some good points. Buckley, Kirk and Goldwater were all friends of him and until he started making those bizarre claims about Eisenhower being a Soviet tool and communist agents and conspiracy theories everywhere, political allies. That's exactly why disassociation is necessary. If JBS didn't defend any conservative ideas and didn't claim to be conservative, there would be no need for it. It's the lunatics in your side you need to call out - otherwise they'll drag your credibility down.

 

[NewRightLibertarian]

1. Goldwater didn't stay out of it; quite the contrary. He called out the craziness of Welch ideas in multiple instances. Don't believe the historical fabrications Rockwell et al. have been serving for decades, especially about Senators Goldwater and Robert Taft.

He said Welch should quit and since he didn't that people should leave the John Birch Society.

Interesting, I didn't know he was so instrumental in the purge of the JBS from the conservative movement. That's another big strike against him as far as I'm concerned

2 - I don't think Kirk was an enemy of libertarians. He was an enemy of Rothbardian libertarians, but libertarianism, let alone the cause of freedom, is not some Rothbard's feud. I'm a libertarian leaning conservative with no use whatsoever for Rothbard.

His work was a critique of libertarians. Rothbard was probably especially influencial toward developing his disdain for libertarians, but he didn't just go after Rothbard and his adherents and instead went after them as a whole with the usual idiotic statist bullshit.

3 - Nobody said Welch didn't make some good points. Buckley, Kirk and Goldwater were all friends of him and until he started making those bizarre claims about Eisenhower being a Soviet tool and communist agents and conspiracy theories everywhere, political allies. That's exactly why disassociation is necessary. If JBS didn't defend any conservative ideas and didn't claim to be conservative, there would be no need for it. It's the lunatics in your side you need to call out - otherwise they'll drag your credibility down.

Since the Birch Society as as much credibility as any conservative organization around, affiliating with them will have zero to do with lessening that for the freedom movement. The only drag is the baseless smears, and they'll do that to us regardless of anything we do because we're opposing the Federal Reserve, CIA and the rest of the whole rotten power structure

 

[AuH20]

Agreed.

Goldwater and Russell Kirk, that Ron Paul often references, did the same to the John Birch Society leadership in the 60s.

No political movement can achieve any sort of meaningful influence while carrying along loonies.

Ron Paul unwillingness to disassociate himself from certain people and groups (a consequence of the strategy him, Rockwell and Rothbard outlined and pursued in the 80s/90s) has always limited his electoral potential.

Fortunately Rand Paul seems more serious about actually implementing his policies and being more than the leader of a protest movement. I expect a strong Sister Souljha moment from him once he decides to run for national office.

Which is very ironic because at the end of Goldwater's career he came to the very same unsettling conclusions that Welch did if you read his memoirs.

 

[Matt Collins]

Here is another example as to why conspiracy theories are easily used against you:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/...nnessee-obama-rumor_n_1725053.html?1343768099

 

[angelatc]

1.

3 - Nobody said Welch didn't make some good points. Buckley, Kirk and Goldwater were all friends of him and until he started making those bizarre claims about Eisenhower being a Soviet tool and communist agents and conspiracy theories everywhere, political allies. That's exactly why disassociation is necessary. If JBS didn't defend any conservative ideas and didn't claim to be conservative, there would be no need for it. It's the lunatics in your side you need to call out - otherwise they'll drag your credibility down.

Says the guy defending the faction that sees Muslim terrorists behind every door and under every bed.

Politics makes strange bedfellows. In retrospect, kicking the Birchers out in favor of the neocons doesn't seem like the greatest idea that Goldwater and Kirk came up with. Looks to me like they were tools. Nobody outside of us political wonks knows who Kirk was, and the Goldwater name is scorned in the upper ranks of the party that he loved.

 

[jmdrake]

So it's official. In this case the truther card didn't make a difference. Of course in the case of Medina the card was played by supposedly "neutral" Glenn Beck as opposed to by her opponents. Still, lesson learned, for those willing to listen, is that if you don't overcompensate it ain't a big deal.

 

[DeMintConservative]

Says the guy defending the faction that sees Muslim terrorists behind every door and under every bed.

What the heck? Who exactly is that faction? How have I defended them? I can't even figure out where that came from.

You seem to have some sort of paranoiac with anti-Muslim bigots but leave me out of it please. I have little patience for that level of arguments.

Politics makes strange bedfellows. In retrospect, kicking the Birchers out in favor of the neocons doesn't seem like the greatest idea that Goldwater and Kirk came up with. Looks to me like they were tools. Nobody outside of us political wonks knows who Kirk was, and the Goldwater name is scorned in the upper ranks of the party that he loved.

Nobody kicked the Birchers out in favor of neocons. They kicked the Birchers out in favor of their credibility with the electorate at-large.

 

[DeMintConservative]

Which is very ironic because at the end of Goldwater's career he came to the very same unsettling conclusions that Welch did if you read his memoirs.

I've read them.

Where exactly does he state that Einsenhower was a KGB agent and water fluoridation a communist plot? Because I must have missed that part. I have a William Morrow and Co. edition from 1979.

 

[DeMintConservative]

Interesting, I didn't know he was so instrumental in the purge of the JBS from the conservative movement. That's another big strike against him as far as I'm concerned

Fair enough. I see no point in snubbing Goldwater to side with someone like Welch. Unless you believe in Welch's crazy thesis that are all pretty discredited by now. They were pretty much in agreement in regards to everything else.

His work was a critique of libertarians. Rothbard was probably especially influencial toward developing his disdain for libertarians, but he didn't just go after Rothbard and his adherents and instead went after them as a whole with the usual idiotic statist bullshit.

I disagree. Kirk was very careful in separating waters. He was after what he'd call "doctrinaire libertarians", not libertarians at large. Even though he'd concede the term "libertarian" to the first type. He'd call non-Rothbardian libertarians "well intentioned but mislabeled men with imperfect understanding of the general terms in politics".

Since the Birch Society as as much credibility as any conservative organization around, affiliating with them will have zero to do with lessening that for the freedom movement. The only drag is the baseless smears, and they'll do that to us regardless of anything we do because we're opposing the Federal Reserve, CIA and the rest of the whole rotten power structure

Welch wrote that Einsenhower was a soviet agent in a book. It wasn't a baseless smear.

 

[DeMintConservative]

So it's official. In this case the truther card didn't make a difference. Of course in the case of Medina the card was played by supposedly "neutral" Glenn Beck as opposed to by her opponents. Still, lesson learned, for those willing to listen, is that if you don't overcompensate it ain't a big deal.

I think the difference was that Bentivolio merely participated in a film plus he delivered a strong rebuttal of trutherism promptly. If there were direct quotes from him as a truther, he'd be done.

 

[erowe1]

2 - I don't think Kirk was an enemy of libertarians. He was an enemy of Rothbardian libertarians, but libertarianism, let alone the cause of freedom, is not some Rothbard's feud. I'm a libertarian leaning conservative with no use whatsoever for Rothbard.

He was against libertarians. His Chirping Sectaries that you referred to earlier was not just a rebuttal of Rothbard, but a rebuttal of fusionism, or the attempt to make a coalition out of conservatives and libertarians, such as Buckley tried to do.

That said, Kirk differed as much with neoconservatives and all the big-government Republicans who RP ran against in 2008 and 2012 as he did from Ron Paul.

 

[DeMintConservative]

Chirping Sectaries ends like this:

Meanwhile, I venture to predict, the more intelligent and conscientious persons within the libertarian remnant will tend to settle for politics as the art of the possible, so shifting into the conservative camp. At the Last Judgment, libertarianism may find itself reduced to a minority of one, and its name will be not Legion, but Rothbard.

Chirping Sectaries was written as a reaction to Rothbard's criticism of Reagan. The discussion with Meyer over fusionism was well over by then.

 

[erowe1]

The discussion with Meyer over fusionism was well over by then.

I don't think that's true. Reagan was supposedly the culmination of fusionism.

At the beginning of Chirping Sectaries Kirk writes:

What else do conservatives and libertarians profess in common? The answer to that question is simple: nothing. Nor will they ever. To talk of forming a league or coalition between these two is like advocating a union of ice and fire.

 

[DeMintConservative]

Yes, but then he later clarifies what he means by libertarians:

But surely, surely I must be misrepresenting
the breed? Don’t I know selfproclaimed
libertarians who are kindly old
gentlemen, God-fearing, patriotic, chaste,
well endowed with the goods of fortune?
Yes, I do know such. They are the people
who through misapprehension put up. the
cash for the fantastics. Such gentlemen call
themselves “libertarians” merely because
they believe in personal freedom, and do
not understand to what extravagances they
lend their names by subsidizing doctrinaire
“libertarian” causes and publications. If a
person describes himself as “libertarian”
because he believes in an enduring moral
order, the Constitution of the United
States, free enterprise, and old American
ways of life-why, actually he is a conservative
with imperfect understanding of the
general terms of politics.
It is not such well-intentioned but
mislabeled men whom I am holding up to
obloquy here. Rather, I am exposing the
pretensions of the narrow doctrinaires who
have imprisoned themselves within a
“libertarian” ideology as confining and as
unreal as Marxism - if less persuasive than
that fell delusion.

As I wrote in some other thread a bit ago (was it in this one?), Kirk would cede the term "libertarian" to, well, "doctrinaire libertarians".

 

[erowe1]

Yes, but then he later clarifies what he means by libertarians:



As I wrote in some other thread a bit ago (was it in this one?), Kirk would cede the term "libertarian" to, well, "doctrinaire libertarians".

Right. And of these libertarians he says they cannot form a coalition with conservatives. This statement is a castigation of fusionism. A lot of the Old Right was made of doctrinaire conservatives, like Nock.

It also looks from your quote like Kirk was confused about the people who called themselves libertarians who were not what he considered doctrinaire libertarians. At one point he describes them as believing in "personal freedom," which would make them very much like doctrinaire libertarians, if not identical with them. At another point he says they believe in "an enduring moral order, the Constitution of the United States, free enterprise, and old American ways of life." But these are just empty platitudes. And I presume, since he tries to distinguish them from doctrinaire libertarianism, that he means by them things that go against a belief in personal freedom.

In either this essay or another similar one Kirk tries to anoint Hayek as one of his examples of conservative but not libertarian. But Kirk is just flattering himself there by pretending that he belongs in a category with Hayek. To the extent that "old American ways of life" were antithetical to personal freedom, Kirk wouldn't have found a fellow champion of them in Hayek. I think Kirk just mentions Rothbard to make a caricature of libertarians. But if he really defined them in such a limited way that their name is not legion but Rothbard, then his essay loses its whole point, because then there would be no one left whom he would exclude from a coalition with conservatives except one single person.

 

[erowe1]

Here's another quote from Chirping Sectaries:

Conservatives have no intention of compromising with socialists; but even such an alliance, ridiculous though it would be, is more nearly conceivable than the coalition of conservatives and libertarians. The socialists at least declare the existence of some sort of moral order; the libertarians are quite bottomless.

This one's really telling. Again he mentions a "moral order" like he does in the long quote above. This vague phrase could mean about anything. And it would have to mean something other than what the simple words themselves imply in order to say that doctrinaire libertarians (including Rothbard) don't believe in any such thing. Clearly here by "moral order" he means institutions by which some people can rule over other people. To him, this is essential to conservatism. This is not just anti-Rothbard. It's anti-fusionist.

 

[jmdrake]

Now that Kerry has one both primaries (and will most likely win the general) can we finally bury the lie that association with 9/11 truth is an automatic political kiss of death?

 

[NewRightLibertarian]

Now that Kerry has one both primaries (and will most likely win the general) can we finally bury the lie that association with 9/11 truth is an automatic political kiss of death?

Nope, the truth deniers will never cease their crusade for the government's official story