This could turn into a miss step by the Ron Paul Campaign:

Typical of his view, at an event on September 11 of this year at Johns Hopkins' School of Advanced International Studies, Paul argued for withdrawing from the Middle East, telling his audience that "Israel is quite capable of taking care of itself" - though interestingly adding that US policy has "hurt Israel tremendously." Paul also downplayed the threat Iran poses to Israel, saying that even if Iran does develop nuclear arms, that it would not be a serious danger to Israel, which, he added, possesses roughly 300 nuclear weapons of its own.

Paul's position towards Israel is not innately anti-Jewish, nor is it necessarily even anti-Israel - particularly with such a caveat about America impeding Israel's interests. Such a statement lends weight, for example, to Zionist extremists who wish to terminate Israel's Herodian dependence on the US, such as the members of Zionists for Ron Paul, a group run by American expatriates now living as religious settlers in the West Bank.
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Indeed, Ron Paul has become the most popular candidate among right-wing extremists, including white separatists, neo-Nazis, and conspiracy theorists who believe that "the Zionists" were behind 9/11. This group includes Frank Weltner, creator of the antisemitic website JewWatch.com, who in a YouTube video, accuses the "Zionist-controlled media" of attacking Paul's candidacy. Paul has also received favorable coverage from the Vanguard News Network, a White Nationalist news organ, members of Stormfront, an online neo-Nazi community, as well as the National Alliance, the "mainstream" White Nationalist group featured prominently in Marc Levin's 2005 film Protocols of Zion.

Of course, Congressman Paul cannot be held accountable for the views of his extremist supporters, unless he publicly acquiesces to those views. Yet, when his extremist supporters begin providing a substantial amount of campaign funds, things get a bit dicier. And that’s Paul's biggest problem.

According to the Lone Star Times, White Nationalists have become a noticeable source of financial contributions to the Paul campaign. Indeed, even Don Black, the founder of Stormfront, and one of the most notorious neo-Nazis in America, has personally contributed $500 to Paul's campaign.

Though it's true that Paul's campaign has no control over who sends them money in advance, once it becomes apparent that a neo-Nazi leader is sending money, any sensible politician who does not wish to be identified with neo-Nazism should send the money back. Not so for Ron Paul, however, whose campaign is still making up its mind as to whether or not to return Black's money.

Now this could simply being a case of a low level functionary in the campaign, who has no decision making authority, being the first to find out about, and not wanting to speak above his pay grade, so to speak.  But this ought to be a no brainer for the Paul campaign, and they ought to return the money immediately with as little thought as possible.  That is the right P.R. move to make, as Glenn Reynolds has suggested.

But this got me thinking... as pretty much every candidate in existence has received funds from people currently under investigation for a crime, or someone who has done time for something unsavory... what exactly does it imply when candidates take money, and then have to return it later?  With all the talk of campaign finance reform, and the need to get "dirty money" out of politics... and the idea that candidates shouldn't be beholden to donors to do favors... doesn't returning money imply that candidates are beholden to their donors for favors?

By returning money, isn't a candidate explicitly saying that it would be wrong to take your money, because I can't do what you're paying me to do?  Doesn't that, in turn, suggest that candidates will do the bidding of those who give large sums of money?  And if you don't believe that accepting money forces a candidate to do that person's bidding... wouldn't it make more sense to keep the money of those you don't agree with?  After all, now that's wasted money for the donor you don't like.

Just a thought... because he should return the money anyway.

Cue Sean in 3...2...1...