The Republican National Convention will feature a video tribute to Texas Rep. Ron Paul on Tuesday in an effort to appease the failed presidential candidate’s fanatical supporters.
The Republican party and the Romney campaign have long been concerned about Paul’s potential impact at the convention because he controls the state delegations from Nevada, Iowa, and Minnesota — and his supporters usually refuse to toe the party line. Earlier this month, Paul certainly didn’t sound ready to cooperate with Team Romney. He promised to deliver a speech that “the Republican Convention doesn’t want the rest of America to hear” at a “We Are The Future” rally hosted by his campaign on Sunday.
At some point, however, Paul evidently changed his mind and decided to cut a deal.
“Congressman Paul’s people came to us and said they’d like to do a short tribute to him and we said absolutely,” Romney campaign strategist Russ Schriefer told reporters on Friday. According to Schriefer, the video will feature Paul’s colleagues giving “testimony to his principles and dedication to America.”
Unfortunately this means that the video probably won’t contain the most interesting parts of Paul’s legacy. Barring a major surprise, the short video won’t have time to delve into Paul’s long history of publishing wacky videos and newsletters claiming that the United Nations wants to impose a military dictatorship in America, that “malicious gays” deliberately infect the innocent with AIDS, and that Martin Luther King was a socialist pedophile (among many other wild and insane theories.)
But fear not: between Rick Santorum, Donald Trump, and Ted Cruz, Paul’s legacy of homophobia, racism, and paranoid conspiracies will be well represented in Tampa.
AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, File
