Ron Paul's latest (revealing) missive

Mr. Matthews: Just to bring it up to date on this, the political context -- you know, Mayor, that Hillary Clinton has proposed -- she's co-sponsored legislation to do just this: require the president to come to Congress for any decision to go to attack a nuclear facility in Iran.

Mr. Giuliani: It really depends on exigency of the circumstances and how legitimate it is, that it really is an exigent circumstance. It's desirable, it's safer to go to Congress, get approval from Congress.

If you're really dealing with an exigent circumstance, then the president has to act in the best interests of the country.

And the point of -- I think it was Congressman Paul made before -- that we've never had an eminent attack, I don't know where he was on September 11th.

Mr. Paul: That was no country.

(APPLAUSE)

That was 19 thugs. That had nothing to do with a country.

Any comments from local sympathisers with Ron Paul? Dyslexia?

[..] much to his Jewish supporters' chagrin, Congressman Paul's willingness to stand up to the neocons has also had the effect of making Paul a popular candidate among those from whom Presidential candidates would typically not desire support: Bona fide antisemites.

Indeed, Ron Paul has become the most popular candidate among right-wing extremists, including white separatists, neo-Nazis, and conspiracy theorists who believe that "the Zionists" were behind 9/11. This group includes Frank Weltner, creator of the antisemitic website JewWatch.com, who in a YouTube video, accuses the "Zionist-controlled media" of attacking Paul's candidacy. Paul has also received favorable coverage from the Vanguard News Network, a White Nationalist news organ, members of Stormfront, an online neo-Nazi community, as well as the National Alliance, the "mainstream" White Nationalist group featured prominently in Marc Levin's 2005 film Protocols of Zion.

Of course, Congressman Paul cannot be held accountable for the views of his extremist supporters, unless he publicly acquiesces to those views. Yet, when his extremist supporters begin providing a substantial amount of campaign funds, things get a bit dicier. And that's Paul's biggest problem.

According to the Lone Star Times, White Nationalists have become a noticeable source of financial contributions to the Paul campaign. Indeed, even Don Black, the founder of Stormfront, and one of the most notorious neo-Nazis in America, has personally contributed $500 to Paul's campaign.

Though it's true that Paul's campaign has no control over who sends them money in advance, once it becomes apparent that a neo-Nazi leader is sending money, any sensible politician who does not wish to be identified with neo-Nazism should send the money back. Not so for Ron Paul, however, whose campaign is still making up its mind as to whether or not to return Black's money.

Paul's spokesman Jesse Benton told the Lone Star Times:

At this time, I cannot say that we will be rejecting Mr. Black's contribution, but I will bring the matter to the attention of our campaign director again, and expect some sort of decision to be made in coming days.

Frankly, this is a no-brainer. Any other candidate would unequivocally reject that money as soon as its donor's identity was known. That Paul's campaign needs time to think about it is shocking.

Also of concern is the fact that Paul's campaign has ignored my repeated attempts to interview the Congressman for JTA, the Jewish newswire service by which I am employed. I had intended to write a story about the Congressman, and to provide him with the opportunity to distance himself from his extremist supporters, to clarify his position on Israel, and to state his case to the Jewish community. Yet, after three weeks of repeated telephone calls, two chats with his Deputy Communications Director, and several left voicemail messages, I have yet to receive a callback to schedule an interview.

Which leads me to conclude the following about the Congressman from Texas: Ron Paul will take money from Nazis. But he won't take telephone calls from Jews. [..]

A few hours ago Ron Paul's campaign met reporters at the National Press Club to confirm that, yes, their candidate had shattered the record for one day of primary fundraising. Campaign manager Lew Moore and Jonathan Bydlak marshalled FEC data to prove that they'd beaten Mitt Romney's January take [..] and Hillary Clinton's numbers at the end of June [..].

I asked Bydlak about attention the campaign is getting from creepy white supremacists, and whether if they discovered donations from specious people they'd give them back. "If people who hold views that the candidate doesn't agree with, and they give to us, that's their loss," he said. What if the campaign keeps getting scrutiny as its coffers grow? "The scrutiny is a perfect sign of how this campaign is growing."