The Washington Post has new information today on Ron Paul’s racist, antisemitic newsletters; a former secretary in the company that produced the newsletters says Ron Paul was fully aware of their content: Ron Paul signed off on racist 1990s newsletters, associates say.

Ron Paul, well known as a physician, congressman and libertarian , has also been a businessman who pursued a marketing strategy that included publishing provocative, racially charged newsletters to make money and spread his ideas, according to three people with direct knowledge of Paul’s businesses.

The Republican presidential candidate has denied writing inflammatory passages in the pamphlets from the 1990s and said recently that he did not read them at the time or for years afterward. Numerous colleagues said he does not hold racist views.

But people close to Paul’s operations said he was deeply involved in the company that produced the newsletters, Ron Paul & Associates, and closely monitored its operations, signing off on articles and speaking to staff members virtually every day.

“It was his newsletter, and it was under his name, so he always got to see the final product. . . . He would proof it,’’ said Renae Hathway, a former secretary in Paul’s company and a supporter of the Texas congressman.

And there’s more; Paul apparently made a deliberate effort to peddle his newsletters to racists and extremists, using the mailing list of a notorious antisemitic newspaper published by Holocaust denier Willis Carto:

Ed Crane, the longtime president of the libertarian Cato Institute, said he met Paul for lunch during this period, and the two men discussed direct-mail solicitations, which Paul was sending out to interest people in his newsletters. They agreed that “people who have extreme views” are more likely than others to respond.

Crane said Paul reported getting his best response when he used a mailing list from the now-defunct newspaper Spotlight, which was widely considered anti-Semitic and racist.

This comes as absolutely no surprise, but I predict it will have no impact on Ron Paul’s popularity. Anyone who still supports this creepy old crypto-racist has either found a way to rationalize this stuff, or has no problems with it.