Rand Paul Surrenders

I had never completely liked Rand Paul. The fact that he advertised himself to libertarians while at the same time holding certain neocon views such as keeping Gitmo open suggested to me that he was a panderer. However, a couple days ago when I heard about his criticism, albeit mild, of the Civil Rights Act and his defense of private property, I changed my mind. Despite his flaws, very few public figures have the courage to criticize the Civil Rights Act.

Now I have to change my opinion of Rand Paul yet again. Instead of defending his views, he is now saying he does not support repealing the Civil Rights Act. Not only that, but he now claims to support using the federal government to force desegregation:

There was a need for federal intervention to say that you can't have segregation, that we shouldn't be doing that.

In other words, the federal government should dictate the business practices of every store in America. With libertarians like this, who needs liberals?

He should have held his ground. Yes, if he did not support the Freedom of Association Destruction Act, he would have been attacked mercilessly by liberals. But he's a libertarian who wants to abolish most of the imperial government: liberals will attack him mercilessly anyways. Likewise, he has no need to pander to blacks. No matter how much he grovels before them, they won't vote for a libertarian Republican who wants to take away their free stuff.