Let me declare that Both Barr and Paul were right today in what they intended, and both wrong in the way they went about it. It would have been far better for Barr to have attended the event, and from there or afterward issued his altogether correct criticism of it (that it was an indecisive gesture that led to nowhere). Yes, Paul wanted to expand the public's awareness beyond the two parties, but the strongest way to do this would have been to have used the occasion to announce C4L would sponsor an inclusive, nationally televised Presidential debate for the four candidates, with Paul serving as host. This would have been especially meaningful since his group has the funds to do so, and would have been a superb vehicle for positively promoting the C4L. What he did do was put together a non-event event of a press conference that made Paul look good, but will be utterly forgotten by the public in a week---assuming they even took notice of it today. So who ended up being more selfish here, Paul or Barr, in the long run?
Yeah, maybe Barr should have kept his promise about attending the Paul press conference, instead of not delivering---and maybe Paul should have fulfilled his promise to make a truly 'unprecedented announcement,' instead another weak generalized solidarity statement on behalf of third parties, that did exactly nothing to concretely further any of them. Folks, when we started last year it was specifically about getting Ron Paul elected President, based on his specific liberty agenda. It was not about furthering third parties just for the sake of promoting third parties (as the Ron Paul Republicans keep reminding us), or even about cultivating a cult around Paul that worships his every statement or gesture, to the exclusion of every other interest in the liberty movement.
What, Paul has the right to insist on maintaining his current Republican status, but Barr has no right to insist on his Libertarian one? We should respect Paul's right to choose not to give up his seat, but Barr has no right to choose not to give up his nomination? Paul can choose to not endorse a candidate, but Barr absolutely has to endorse Paul's press conference? Is it all Paul, no one else matters? By Paul not putting his group's funds into any follow-up measure that specifically would help the third party candidates beyond the words, yet another opportunity is lost to maintain momentum---as was lost when the campaign pulled out of organizing the July 12 rally, and when it set up a multi-million dollar C4L that, strangely, is not legally structured to provide badly needed funds on behalf of Paulite candidacies.
I challenge the presumption that Paul's approach today represented the better "long view" while Barr was being shortsighted. For better or ill, the LP provided the strongest platform to further the liberty agenda outside the two major parties, and its improved ballot status (state by state) via a Paul candidacy would have been the strongest specific advance we could make short of Paul actually winning. Instead, Paul's team has drifted towards generalized education versus structural electoral progress, and the pattern has been (thus far) lots of rhetoric leading to stillborn events and no specific progress. Barr basically called Paul on it today, and does it from the authority of having helped to provide several chances for Paul to make specific progress that would be lasting.
