Is Barry Manilow a Closet Libertarian? (He Gave $2,300 to Ron Paul's Campaign)

Reason Magazine ^ | July 17, 2007 | Nick Gillespie

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

OK, pal, if you think that's true, name one.

I was speaking in generalities. You don't know who voters are unless you seen them up close and personal.

I can name one liberal whack-job that donated to Paul: Barry Manilow.

BFD again. One liberal donation does not a liberal Paul make.

[L.N. Smithee]

I was speaking in generalities.

You were speaking out of your posterior.

[Charles Martel]

Please explain to me why would liberals support Paul in the primaries?

It's an old trick, and as simple a strategy as it is old. In the primaries, supporters of the candidates who are not and obviously will never gain the lead, will sometimes try to tear down the opposition party rather than waste their vote on an also-ran. In this example, Democrats "cross over" and vote in the Republican primary. The whole idea is to give a weak candidate a boost at the ballot box, resulting in a Republican nominee that they believe the leading Democrat would easily trounce. Under the right conditions, this practice (called "raiding", IIRC) can certainly influence who makes it to the general election.

So it's not about the Democrats actually supporting Paul, it's about them using him in open primary states in hopes of knocking out another more threatening Republican. We know about Barry Manilow's contribution, but we don't know yet if that was a fluke - or if there are other big-name liberals doing the same. It might be interesting to check out the usual suspects (Streisand, Clooney, etc.) on Opensecrets to see whether there's a trend forming.