Yeah, those newsletters suck and as Gillespie writes, they should be confronted by Paul...
Paul is going to need to deal with the newsletter issue more directly than he has so far, especially if he doesn't want it to loom larger and larger as the stakes get higher. He is actually in control of the issues that most vex contemporary America, which have nothing to do with affirmative action, "racial terrorism," or the transmission of AIDS via saliva. He is running against Republicans who were for individual mandates in health care long before they were against them or who seriously invoke sharia law as a threat to the American way of life, and he faces a possible general election against a president with low approval ratings precisely because he passed his awful health care, bailout, and stimulus plans, among other things. As Friedersdorf argues, Paul actually has a far better record on matters that directly affect the minorities slagged so disturbingly in his newsletters.
As I've argued elsewhere and often, Paul is providing the alternative that Americans are craving in politics.That alternative, by definition, is going to discomfit conventional politicians and politicos who are more concerned with whether their party is in power than what is done with that power; with whether deficits and entitlements and "defense" spending will bankrupt the country; with whether Americans should be treated like adults when it comes to deciding what to eat, smoke, and drink. Paul is not the perfect vessel for a libertarian message, but waiting for perfection is something ideologues insist on. Most of us are far more interested in someone who at least has shown he understands the most pressing issues of the moment - and the future.
Whether Paul can fully deliver on the promise he's shown so far may well rest upon the way that he puts the newsletter issue to bed, once and for all.
Emphasis Added.
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