April 11, 2010, Holy fool!
I mean that in the Shakespearean sense, that of the only character generally permitted to speak the unvarnished truth, because, well, he is, you know, a fool. A fool, even if, of course, he is, speaking the truth.
And hence, we get Congressman Ron Paul's address to the Southern Republican leadership conference, in which he tells his fellow Republicans the unpleasant truth that pretty much cleans them out of talking points, wait for it, i.e. Barack Obama is not a "socialist" after all, but is instead (like most of the Republican audience he was addressing, who had selected Mitt Romney over him by a hair's breadth in their "straw poll"), a "corporatist." Further, Paul told the audience that when he got back to Washington, he would introduce legislation to amend the truly offensive part of the health care legislation just passed, that being the individual compulsions to buy private health insurance. And he would try to reduce the presence of the American military on foreign soil.
But for the fact that he's a Republican (and hence, will be involved in a primary I can't vote in), and the fact, of course, that he has a troubling history of racist, antisemitic and homophobic rants, and otherwise spouts many things (ra ra for gold, down with the Federal Reserve) commonly associated with fools, knaves and assorted nuts, I might think "hey, this guy makes some sense," and, assuming I had any interest in voting for anyone, I might consider him.
What's interesting is if any part of his message ("Barack Obama isn't really a socialist") will trickle down to his ideological supporters. That's not how you bet; the back-story and myth are always more important than the facts; just how the mind, especially the pre-programmed, short attention span American mind, functions.
But taken at face value, Ron Paul's speech makes some sense. Go figure. This has been, "Holy fool!"