The old Ron Paul

Ron Paul, who's rising in the 2012 cycle in a way he never has before nationally and who came in just behind Michele Bachmann in the Ames Straw Poll last weekend,complained yesterday to Fox News about why he isn't getting coverage in the mainstream press commensurate with his status:

Advertisement "They don't want to discuss my views because I think they're frightened by me challenging the status quo and the establishment."

But there are reasons why Paul, and his fan base, might be grateful for the minimalist coverage that he's received, because a more thorough vetting of the kind that mainstream candidates generally receive would invariably lead to some of the newsletters that bore his name (if not his byline or direct authorship) decades earlier.

The New Republic reported in detail on the newsletters in a 2008 piece that can be read here.

The bulk of it is subscription-only, but the newsletters themselves are rife with "deeply held bigotry against blacks, Jews, and gays. In short, they suggest that Ron Paul is not the plain-speaking antiwar activist his supporters believe they are backing—but rather a member in good standing of some of the oldest and ugliest traditions in American politics," according to the TNR story.

It's those newsletters, as much as his failure to hit certain benchmarks for candidate success, that has contributed to the use of the term "fringe" around Paul over the years.

Paul adviser Jesse Benton, however, had a response to my question on the newsletters: "Once again, the establishment is trying to flog a lame, tired 20 year old story that has been explained ad naseum in campaign after campaign. These items were not written by Dr. Paul and they are anathema to belief in human liberty."