Comments on: Libertarian Reaction to the TNR Ron Paul Expose

By: Coogan

Coogan — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 03:15:06 +0000

Jack:
I appreciate your detailed reply. I don’t know if such a candidate as you describe ever will exist outside the Libertarian Party itself. That Party could be taken over by the Cato group as they appear to be the most financially and socially well placed as you indicate above. They could then prove or disprove your hypothesis.

I think the Rockwell side, whose blog I read often, is aware of the popular weakness an alignment such as you describe would represent. Furthermore, they recognize some overlap of their ideas with Old Right conservatives. As do I. As to who the white nationalist support, I could care less.

By: Jack

Jack — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 15:50:45 +0000

Coogan,
Judging from your interpretation of my post, clearly I have not stated my case well. I don’t want a Libertarian Purist. I am perfectly happy with a realistic libertarian leaning candidate.
- I just want one that falls more on the Cato side than the Lew Rockwell side of that divide, and a whole lot of people would consider the LR side to be more radical or pure.
- I want the guy to not have an extensive history with the neo-confederates and fringe elements, especially with years worth of newsletters filled with bigoted vitriol and conspiracy theory, much of which was probably written by a Lew Rockwell-style lib.
- I want him to be more supportive of broad brush civil liberties, and some of these stances may be unpopular with some social conservatives.
- Given all that, I think he would loose some LR style libs, and he would loose the neoconfederates and white nationalists. Those losses would be in small enough numbers, and would actually serve to strengthen his maintsteam acceptability, not weaken it.
- Conversely, taking this track would gain him all those Cato/Reason style libs that were unwilling to support Ron Paul, and I think the Cato crowd has more positive media influence and exposure with which to sell a candidate.
- I admit that such tactics might loose him social conservative voters that liked RP’s social conservitive stance on gays and abortion.
- I believe it would gain him supporters that loved his stance on the war, torture, habeus corpus, but could not go with him because of his inconsistant civil liberties stance.

So, I want a small government civil libertarian. Doesn’t have to be pure.

By: scineram

scineram — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:21:17 +0000

I do not at all agree about that characterization. The next torchbearer could be for example Murray Sabrin, who had run for offices in New Jersey as GOP and LP candidate, and is from the LRC crowd, but would not have such baggage from the past as Paul had.

By: Rojas

Rojas — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:52:03 +0000

On the larger question, I think Jack is quite correct. I hasten to add, though, that I will never, ever be ashamed to have supported Ron Paul. I wish he had been a better steward of his own movement, for all the reasons Jack outlined. But given the times he lived in, and the pressures he faced: it were a fearsome man, Ron Paul.

By: Rojas

Rojas — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:49:26 +0000

I’ve been a big-L. I’m not quite doctrainaire enough for them, but I still have reasonably strong ties within the party.

Coogan: the question you ask is a reasonable one, and the answer, sadly, is that your scenario is simply impossible due to internal party dynamics. Plenty of big-Ls don’t consider Radley Balko or Lew Rockwell to be real Libertarians. A shocking percentage thereof consider Balko, Rockwell, and their ilk to be paid agents of a neocon conspiracy bent upon the infiltration and destruction of the party. I shit thee not.

Probably these people COULD take over the LP, with a concerted effort, but the rather feeble status of the party in terms of ballot access and finances suggests that it probably isn’t worth the trouble.

By: Coogan

Coogan — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:42:11 +0000

Jack:
Sorry, I thought you at least had Big L tendencies in that you seem to want a libertarian purist for your candidate.
The point I was trying to make is that adding the lew rockwell group to the Balko group would give you an approximation of the current Big L party, would it not? If not, why don’t these groups combine to take over the Big L party and nominate a candidate that suits them? It’s a pretty small group so it wouldn’t be hard to do so, would it? They could have a candidate filling all specifications completelhy untainted by any vestige of consevativism.

Paul’s biggest problem, contrary to much of the analysis I see here, is that he was too much of a libertarian ideologue in his advertising and campaigning to do well in a Republican primary. He neglected the sensibilities of that half of his coalition. I happen to support much of his libertarian views but rank and file members of the party are not susceptible to esoteric discussions of Ludwig Von Mises’ economic theory or radical libertarian positions such as his opposition to the state having any role in marriage. For instance, if he had said that he was against the Feds having any role, he would have been on solid old Right conservative ground. Unfortunately, he had to go for the whole libertarian enchilada–No state involvement in marriage at all.

By: Redland Jack

Redland Jack — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:09:35 +0000

I consider myself a minarchist (of the Anarchy, State, and Utopia type… hopefully that’s still considered a somewhat valid text that hasn’t been thoroughly debunked!)

The main problem with the minarchist camp, is that, in my opinion, almost no one agrees with us. I don’t really know what to do about it or how to change it. I talk to my friends and coworkers about these issues and try to convince them of the glories of libertarianism (if they seem at all interested), but I don’t really foresee the libertarian movement going anywhere. It’s simply too radical and almost all people prefer something close to the status quo. (Not unreasonably, perhaps.)

I think libertarianism requires both more knowledge of philosophy and economics than most people have or desire to have.

I think that a system of voting will never produce anything resembling libertarianism because the feedback mechanisms are so weak relative to the feedback provided by “the market.” That is, not only do people not understand the issues on which they are voting, they rationally don’t understand the issues on which they are voting.

I hate to be pessimistic, since it is always unpleasant to listen to somebody moan and complain without offering any solutions, but I just don’t know what to do, and I don’t see any reason for optimism.

The only silver lining, is that life really isn’t that bad.

By: Jack

Jack — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:01:38 +0000

Which one of us is a Big L libertarian? Not me. Was that rhetorical? Or simply aimed at all readers/commenters?

By: Coogan

Coogan — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 02:48:44 +0000

Not being a Libertarian but one of those dreaded paleo conservatives, a Republican who has actually run for a political office and who has supported Paul financially, politically and rhetorically, my main question for you and the other big L libertarians is: Don’t you folks run a candidate for President every 4 years?