Ok, I've got to defend a guy with the balls to take an ideology the the uncomfortable extremes and...well sorts take it on. Even if he's crazy.
We've all heard how Rand Paul exposed himself as a racist etc. but really what we saw last night was the libertarian ideology taken to a place that makes people quite uncomfortable, and instead of running from his beliefs he stood up and said, (at least from my understanding) that while he does not want any segregation etc. it might just be an ugly manifestation of his beliefs.
Now it would have been much better for him if he did say that, but honestly even us as liberals have some uncomfortable zones with our beliefs. If we hold true, we must state that we want a blue collar worker just making enough to own a home and perhaps go on a vacation or two, to be taxed on his income while somebody who abuses the welfare system gets money from the govt.
That being said, I'm sure Rand would want to use all the (in his case private) tools in his arsenal to prevent segregated restaurants, as we would use all the tools we could to snuff out welfare abuse and give working class Americans tax breaks.
So while I think that Rand has been reading too much Ayn for his and the country's good, its a good thing that he is being called on these statements and this ideology that has been so embraced by the tea party is finally given its stress tests nationally. And if people like Rand will just stand up instead of backing away like he did from Rachel (for the most part) last night and in his statements this morning, then we can have a good old fashioned national debate that will crush the libertarian thought.
There are soooo many of those "uncomfortable" places to go with libertarianism that with Rand in the national spotlight even the most ignorant tea bagger (ok perhaps not) will finally see where this kind of thinking can get you.
But doing so, bringing this up into the national spotlight as a man trying to get elected to the US Senate. Man that takes balls. So Kudos to you Dr. Paul.
Update:
Must be a cloudy headed day for me, and a post by Little I think cleared it up. There is a line that when crossed does not make following an ideology ok anymore, and Rand crossed it and then some. The difference between my analogy with a welfare abuser and a business owner refusing to server somebody on race is that the latter case is morally wrong on an entirely different plane, like saying jaywalkers and serial killers are both criminals.