Jacking Up Rand, Part 4

Evan McMorris-Santoro has a round-up of  last night's Kentucky Senate debate between Rand Paul and Jack Conway, and it was a doozy.  Last week's Conway "Aqua Buddha" ad attacking Paul ended up being the center of the entire debate, with Paul basically refusing to answer any questions until Conway apologized for it and grousing the entire time in indignation.

"He's descended into the gutter," Paul, who referred to himself as a "pro-life Christian" said. "Jack, you should be ashamed of yourself. Have you no decency? Have you no shame?"

Several profiles have referred to Paul's membership in an irreverent student society known as the NoZe Brotherhood that was banned from Baylor for, according to school officials, mocking Christianity, a no-no at the Baptist university. A GQ profile last summer exposed some of Paul's shenanigans with the group, including one occasion where he and a friend allegedly led a female student to a creek, tied her up and requested she worship "Aqua Buddha."

Paul claimed the stories were not worthy of voter attention. Run on the issues of the day," he told Conway. "Don't make up stuff about me from college that you think you've read on the Internet blogs. Grow up."
"it wasn't from the Internet blogs," Conway shot back. "It was on CBS News, it's been in Politico, the Lexington Herald-Leader."

Conway refused to say whether or not Paul is a "good Christian," (as one of the debate's moderators put it) but said that the ad was not about Paul's faith.

"Values matter," Conway said. "Why did he freely join a group known for mocking or making fun of people of faith? And secondly, when is it ever a good idea to tie up a woman and ask her to kneel before a false idol called Aqua Buddha?"

Paul never once answered those two questions, and attacked Conway throughout for, it seemed, having the audacity to ask them.

As I said a few days earlier, the ad intimates a little too hard that Paul is anti-Christian, and that is a pretty low blow.  But as I also said, Paul did and said all the things the ad says he did, and Paul, given the chance here to answer questions about it and give his side of the story, instead pitched a fit and refused to believe that Conway would even do such a thing.

Paul is the one making a federal case out of this Aqua Buddha ad, and he just made things a lot worse for himself.  Not to mention Conway him Paul again on Medicare and Social Security and Paul still didn't have an answer for those, either.

This race is down to the wire here in the last two weeks, and I think Paul hurt himself badly last night.