I find white supremacists to be a pretty despicable lot, all in all. I really wish there was a way to boot these people off the planet, frankly.

But if I were in Ron Paul's shoes, I would be doing precisely what he's doing.

Paul, one of the pack of GOP Presidential candidates, has received heavy criticism for a $500 campaign donation from a white supremacist. He has been pressed to return it, but says he will keep it. Although I support Paul, I will concede that his spin on why he is keeping it is kind of amusing, but be that as it may, he has a point.

I do not believe that campaign donations, provided they come from legitimate donors, should be the subject of undue scrutiny. It is very possible for a candidate to hold many similar views with someone who is utterly reprehensible, but not share an allegiance with the underlying ideology. The issues that Paul and this white supremacist have in common are not race issues, but border control and small government issues.

If Paul was speaking at white supremacist rallies, I would feel differently. There's a big difference between courting someone's vote and accepting a campaign donation. And it doesn't matter whether it's Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, or Green, I believe your vote should be guided by the candidate's stance on the issues, not who slipped money into their bank account. And, to their credit, given the minimal coverage this has gotten on blog sites, I think it's reasonable to assume I'm not alone in my thinking.

The donor who slipped Ron Paul the money has not, to my knowledge, done anything that would merit his loss of freedom of speech or of association. He simply made a donation to a candidate he favors, and there isn't anything in the world wrong with that.