Alan K. Henderson's Weblog

Ron Paul does have white-sheet supporters. But then, everybody has nutbags within their support constituencies.

Why does he resonate with these sorts? I went to Stormfront's site (find the link yourself), and read the first post in the Ron Paul comment thread, linked plain as day at the bottom of the home page. The author, Charles Coughlin (not to be confused with, but most apparently inspired by, this guy[)] lifted certain quotes from the candidate's issues page:

-------------------

Debt and Taxes

Working Americans like lower taxes. So do I. Lower taxes benefit all of us, creating jobs and allowing us to make more decisions for ourselves about our lives. (more)

American Independence and Sovereignty

So called free trade deals and world governmental organizations like the International Criminal Court (ICC), NAFTA, GATT, WTO, and CAFTA are a threat to our independence as a nation. (more)

War and Foreign Policy

The war in Iraq was sold to us with false information. The area is more dangerous now than when we entered it. We destroyed a regime hated by our direct enemies, the jihadists, and created thousands of new recruits for them. (more)

Border Security and Immigration Reform

The talk must stop. We must secure our borders now. A nation without secure borders is no nation at all. It makes no sense to fight terrorists abroad when our own front door is left unlocked. This is my six point plan: (more)

Privacy and Personal Liberty

The biggest threat to your privacy is the government. We must drastically limit the ability of government to collect and store data regarding citizens personal matters. (more)

Property Rights and Eminent Domain

We must stop special interests from violating property rights and literally driving families from their homes, farms and ranches. (more)

-------------------

The common theme in these issues is a "leave us alone" attitude. Don't take our stuff, don't let the world meddle in our trade decisions, don't let foreigners criminally tresspass into the country, don't get us involved in wars irrelevant and/or harmful to national security. All of those sentiments are sane. Including the last one; I disagree with Paul's claim that Iraq is such an unnecessary and bad war.

Stormfront and its fellow travelers insert two additional attitudes that are not so healthy. First is xenophobia; white racialists seek a sort of cultural protectionism to insulate themselves from nonwhite groups. Second is whackball conspiracy theories that misplace the blame on real and perceived threats, and that misidentify the true intentions of various groups.

Good ideas can be used to serve bad causes, and the white-sheets find much that is useful in Ron Paul's political platform.