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The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please help restore neutrality by reporting disputed terms and phrases on Discussion, so that disputed parts can be settled.<i><b>
Patrick Joseph Buchanan (born November 2, 1938), usually known as Pat Buchanan, is a conservative journalist and television political commentator from the United States. In 2000, he ran for President of the United States on the Reform Party ticket. He has previously run for President on Republican Party tickets, although he has never received that party's nomination.
Buchanan was born in Washington, D.C. and educated in Roman Catholic schools before attending Georgetown University where he graduated with a degree in English and Philosophy in 1961. He then attended the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York City where he earned a Master's Degree in Journalism in 1962. That same year he became an editorial writer for the St. Louis Globe Democrat newspaper.
Buchanan was an early supporter of Richard Nixon's political comeback, from 1966 on acting as advisor to Nixon's campaigns and accompanying Nixon to the White House in the role of advisor until 1974. He briefly continued in this role with Nixon's successor Gerald Ford. Buchanan has been mentioned as one possibility for the identity of "Deep Throat" in the Watergate scandal.
After leaving political office, Pat Buchanan became a syndicated political columnist and began his regular appearances as a commentator on various national television news shows, including The McLaughlin Group and Crossfire.
Buchanan returned to the White House in 1985, serving as White House Communications Director during the Ronald Reagan administration until 1987.
In 1992 he unsuccessfully challenged George H. W. Bush for the Republican Party Presidential nomination, garnering some 3 million votes in primaries. He again tried for the Republican nomination in 1996, finishing second behind Bob Dole. In 2000 he successfully gained the nomination of the Reform Party, although his nomination was tainted with allegations of unethical tactics and challenges from the John Hagelin camp in many states. He finished fourth with 0.4% of the popular vote (Hagelin garnered 0.1%). Buchanan's nomination as Reform's leader was very controversial within the party, as many of the party's supporters, among other reasons, did not see Buchanan's image as a Nixon Watergate scandal "plumber" as consistent with the party's mission statement, championed by the party's founder and previous leader, Ross Perot.
Buchanan has written five books on his political and religious views.
He and liberal Bill Press cohosted Buchanan & Press on American cable channel MSNBC until it was cancelled in November 2003. Buchanan is still with MSNBC as an analyst and he occasionally fills in for Joe Scarborough on the nightly show "Scarborough Country". He is also one of the founding editors of and main contributors to The American Conservative magazine.
Although considered to be a staunch right-wing conservative, Buchanan believes the Republicans have largely abandoned their conservative principles, and are instead embracing bland, inoffensive positions on most of the major issues. Many of his positions are in line with conservative U.S. Republicans of the first half of the 20th century, but have become uncommon in the Republican mainstream in recent generations. It is for these reasons that he has formally abandoned the Republican party in recent years.
Buchanan is an open isolationist, is in favor of severely restricting (some say ending) immigration into the United States so that we will have jobs here in the US, and of repealing NAFTA and raising tariffs on imported goods to protect domestic industry. He is also a critic of American foreign policy because it has led into so many problems.
Because of the way his views differ from those of "mainstream" conservatives, Buchanan is often described as a paleoconservative, referring to himself as a "traditional conservative". This is of course false. In Britain, he was supported by the conservative journalist Auberon Waugh, whose position relative to Britain's Conservative mainstream post-Thatcher was very similar to Buchanan's position relative to the modern Republican mainstream. The British political thinkers most similar to Buchanan in this respect - notably those in the Conservative Democratic Alliance - would be unlikely to acknowledge the similarity because they tend to be strongly anti-American, seeing the pro-US policies of the modern Tory party as its greatest betrayal.
Pat Buchanan's politics are derided by many in America. Some segments of society considers Pat Buchanan to be a racist. Evidence supporting such claims comes primarily from his speeches and his actions.
The first example stretches back to the Nixon administration, when Pat Buchanan urged President Richard Nixon not to visit the widow of civil rights leader Martin Luther King.
Pat Buchanan has also criticized multiculturalism frequently, calling it a "threat" and an "all-out assault" on American heritage. He has also called on his supporters to wage a "Cultural Warfare" to purge America of "foreign values".
Finally, his views of Hitler and Nazi Germany's threat during the Second World War to the US is also considered to be, at best, Nazi Revisionism or Anti-Semitic at worst.
On abortion:
On race relations in the 1940s and 1950s:
From an April 1969 memo where Buchanan urges President Nixon not to visit Martin Luther King's widow on the first anniversary of King's death:
On civil rights groups:
On the United Nations and other international organizations:
On the US's move to sanction apartheid South Africa:
On race and people of color:
On affirmative-action:
On multiculturalism:
On Capitol Hill:
On other religions:
On homosexuals:
On women:
On Spanish dictator Francisco Franco:
On David Duke:
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