Rand Paul defends the right of private businesses to discriminate

Republican Kentucky Senatorial nominee Rand Paul was on The Rachel Maddow Show last night and was asked what seemed to be an easy opening question: "Do you support the 1964 Civil Rights Act?". What followed was a near 20-minute fiasco for Dr. Paul, where he turned what should have been a simple "yes" into an exhibition in deflection.

Take the following phrases and mix-and-match them, preceed each with "What's interesting is..." (apparently his tell for when he's trapped by his own conflicting views) and you have almost the whole content of the interview:

"I deplore discrimination in any form"
"I would never belong to a club that discriminates"
"I think the parts of the Civil Rights Act that eliminated institutional discrimination were correct"
"But..."

The "but..." part was his non-answering answer to his statement that he opposes the part of the Civil Rights Act that desegregated private businesses, such as restaurants. He continually equivocated, trying to draw a line between forcing a business to cater to all customers and taking away that businesses ability to exclude people with weapons. (Huh??)

He would never directly answer and admit that he believes that private businesses should have the right to discriminate, though everytihng out of his mouth says that's what he believes. I'm not sure what's more shameful, his belief or that he won't man up and admit it.

Dr. Paul also doesn't see the disconnect between the idea that, as he says "racism is morally wrong" and his extreme limited-government approach which might acknowledge racism as wrong but would render the government powerless to do anytihng about it. In essence, 'I don't like racism but I don't think the government should do anything about it.'

Rand Paul is looking less and less like a viable candidate. If this is the type of person Kentucky (and the GOP, and the Tea Party, and Fox News) wants in the Senate, then we have to strongly reconsider the state of our nation.

I'll warn you about watching the video - it's excruciating.