The Standard Bearer

While a sniff or a snort may not be the best response to the idea of the 'perfect political storm', the idea that libertarian 'strategists' are in any position to be as equally incompetent as their major party counterparts is in fact as ludicrous as the discontents who abandon the LP based on a benign pledge to non-violence in the conduct of the polity. As Americans abandon hope in the either/or aspect of the process, Democrats are split and reeling from their unseemly conduct of democracy. Republicans are lost in their limited government rhetoric when confronted with the Trillion dollar reality of occupation of foreign lands. None of this means that the right 'tweak' to an outsider party will have any real effect in the next thirty years. Just as 9/11 was a slap to the sensibilities of liberty in terms of our very own governance, perhaps only complete collapse or meltdown followed by real chaos and destruction will prove cathartic. While I'm always ready for the Road Warrior scenario, I hope my kids don't have it or complete authoritarian despair to look forward to.

While platforms may be important elements of third parties, they are rarely things that spur the average voter's imagination or perceptions in the big show. The voter knows that the eventual winner will be given birth to by a donkey or an elephant. The huddled penguins of the LP, no matter how noble or unique, will be regulated to the Antarctica of world political views.

Is the temptation of celebrity or experience in governance the promise of the original promulgators of a party based on Big Time Liberty ? Perhaps it is time, in so much that the promise of the heavy parties have simply disappointed the former players whose aspirations were perhaps noble at the outset or based on a quality of 'good' intent. If such a person or candidate can address the historical libertarian reasoning along with their own and still have a balanced perspective on their own prospects without being rendered ridiculous or prostrate to pandering, perhaps there is reason to dream a bit. In 1971 those people in that Colorado living room were markedly frustrated with war and government intrusion. Eight years later they even managed almost a million votes in the POTUS hunt.

While media savvy is important for any political candidate, it requires more than just a good infomercial. The undercurrent on the Internet and the overt gate keepers operate under a paradigm of perception, acceptance, importance and outright arrogance. Few Ron Paul supporters will forget the George Stephanopoulos snub that Sunday morning. Some may have even noticed Gravel being excluded by NBC from some of the most important debates of our times. Charlie Rose and Bill O'Reilly are their own separate monsters from Markos Moulitsas Zúniga or Glen Reynolds. But when the articulated vision of a tight group is brought forward on the national stage, it should require a few words about important things to those people who put them forward.

Even if one does not accept the idea of the zero aggression principle, it should be able to be articulated accurately and with some reflection. Understanding party loyalty is real politics. Understanding the real plight of ballot access is not nonsensical blithering. It affects thousands of considerations about good people seeking political office. Minimizing ambition is one of the Libertarians rare and infrequent virtues where all too often it is the hallmark of other opportunists and their influence on our daily lives. Any issue that is derived from the idea of personal responsibility or business should always be relevant to the libertarian ethos. Big policies like Social Security, the war on drugs and the distribution of free legal ones are easily assailable and replete with frequent and copious documentation from the hordes of think tanks that operate in the stew of pluralism.

Without unjust wars we might not even have a Libertarian Party. While there is a small quirky blend of liberventionists and blow hard pro-defense mouthpieces, the fundamental prospect of peace, prosperity and freedom should never be far from our candidates lips and thoughts. The individual who can make that case in the most eloquent and sophisticated manner should be the standard bearer in my estimation. Nothing consumes lives, treasure and hope like war. It is in fact the health of the state.

The bottom line after all of this is party building. Who will return again and again and defend these ideas and principles ? Whatever the place of the anarchist, minarchist or otherwise, when we gather to defend and promote liberty through the political process, we need more than a label or pedigree. We need staunch defenders of truth and the individual. We need civility, grace and generosity in our public pursuit. We do not need nitpickers, malcontents or petty rioters. This alone will bind us and promote us beyond a simple anachronistic label. Everyone thus engaged, should try to win on some level, but it cannot be the only measure of success, especially in the heady race for President.

It took Conservatives almost twenty years between the heady days of Goldwater and the disappointing reality of Reagan, to achieve resonance amongst so many that they enjoy today. Yet the scribblers, yappers and dogged politicos kept on plugging and promoting. As it slowly unravels under the precepts of empire, we libertarians can retain measure knowing that milquetoast centrism is not our goal. The individual most be resolute in their demand for unabated freedom to do as they see fit, until it violates the space or right of another. While the mechanisms of resolution and justice will always be in dispute, if it is guided by common sense and decency, all matters should be suborn to it. When it is not, tragedy will always follow. Unfortunately the observance of the latter always drives the need for the state. To that end we are consigned to selective example and possibility as well as dismissal, vilification and disdain.

The earnest and unduly uptight will surely say "But what do you offer us but education instead of results ?" To this one can easily respond that truth and a sense of justice can never be placed aside for an end that needs to be justified with means. But if one as myself could promulgate a practical solution over all other in this limited field of play, it would be, embrace the immigrant. Show the love and openness of a free society and its people. Let the struggle go into the inner city and shanty ghettos and the deep love for family and friends who get defined into this unfair caste. The image of the freaky white guy doused in logic should be burned from the program. The hard work that this would require and demand seems to escape the best radicals and reformers alike. Even the best thinkers in the movement prefer to make this statist bait and switch than confront the reality of free people everywhere.

The reality for us as Libertarians is that we cannot win the office that is the common focal point of political action in all parties throughout the country's history. As Madison sought to dissuade factionalism through a winner takes all electoral system, perhaps he was incredibly naive to think the common, noble person would always step up and offer his service in public capacity. As 19th century parties gelled around ideas, movements and commonalities of purpose, our experience in the 20th century is that personality drives these notions. As we are bound by concepts and ideas, we must ask ourselves if the improbability of winning is worth the risk of nominating the charisma that can only tally a few more votes by its own force, bereft of the most resolute and fundamental principles of being. While some would couch it as practical or prudent, is the emotional need, for it is nothing more when confronted with true reality, really worth it ?

My ideal for the Libertarian Party would be a band of electoral pirates capable of mounting spirited campaigns of liberty despite the odds or the likelihood of victory. Victory will be the supremacy of the individual over the puerile interests of the collectively servile and trained. A civil and respectful dialogue amongst participants need not be regulated to a few of the elite and their merry bands of looters of the public trust. It could be a wonderful journey of discovery and joy rooted in truth and perseverance. Alas, knowing people and their desires for success and unbounded wealth, our individual sovereignties will always clash and those who would seek and procure allies with similar interests and purposes directed against us. If after all the writhing and posturing amongst this ever declining sentiment of liberty produces a result that even makes strategic voting unpalatable, there's always the write-in ticket of McManigal/Sartwell.