In this Christmas season, Reason magazine Associate Editor (soon-to-be employed at the Economist) keeps getting the gift that keeps on giving to him and that’s the infamous newsletters from 1989-1994 that Ron Paul’s name was attached to where unflattering things were said about Martin Luther King Jr., Barbara Jordan, welfare recipients, LA rioters and black criminals in Washington D.C.

Weigel got the Ron Paul beat as soon as Reason stopped snickering at and took interest in his campaign i.e. as soon as he raised a boatload of money. The newsletter issue arose again when New Republic reporter/punk/neosomething or other and Guliani supporter Jamie Kirchick wrote a piece about them and had it released just before the New Hampshire primary.

Weigel did his first piece on the newsletters (which were hardly news in Libertarian circles) with Julian Sanchez which dealt with potential culprits i.e Lew Rockwell and company. That caused a nice kefuffle in libertarian circles but ultimately the issue died out as Paul’s campaign petered out. However, the issue never petered out as far as Weigel was concerned as he kept coming back to it again, and again, and again along with mutterings about Stormfront.com bloggers in the Paul tent at the Iowa Straw Poll and the donations from Nazis Paul never returned.

The newsletter issue suffice to say never amounted to more than internecine brawl among libertarians it’s doubtful Paul’s fortunes in 2008 rested on whether or not he should return a $100 donation from people he had no idea who they were.

But Weigel’s obsessions about those who chose on their very own (how libertarian of them) to support or associate themselves with Paul without solicitation, does point to the two biggest themes underlying the politics of 2008: Cosmo vs. Provincial and Guilt by Association.

The whole fight over the newsletter issues was really about the struggles between the Cosmopolitan Libertarians of Reason and CATO Institute against Provincials of the Von Mises Institute and the Randolph Bourne Institute (Antiwar.com sponsor). Likewise this split could also be seen in struggle between establishment Clinton and more Provincial-friendly Obama (after all, who better organized the caucus states?) and the fights between Cosmo conservatives like Chris Buckley and Kathleen Parker against those Red-State backers of Sarah Palin.

And of course we have Guilt by Association which started with Ron Paul and then went to Barak Obama (Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, etc.) and finished up with John McCain (John Hagee, Charles Keating and G. Gordon Liddy). It’s the oldest trick in the political book to try and smear your opponent by the company they keep regardless of how serious your associations. At least Paul, refreshingly, never engaged in the St. Peter-like denials of Obama of his church pastor or other friends nor engage in PC posturing to please the Cosmo crowd (even the so-call freedom of association supporting Libertarians).  If that bothers Dave Weigel that so many “weirdos” latch themselves onto Paul, that’s his problem.

Amazing isn’t it how so many libertarians don’t even recognize their own philosphy went it’s practiced right in their faces? Blame Paul for negligence of the use of his name if you like, but don’t blame him for practicing what he preaches. Some people actually find that refreshing about a politician.