Why the Libertarian party has done so badly.

[WRellim]

I agree with you completely 100%. If the Libertarians weren't a bunch of idealists, they would take all that money that they WASTE on the presidential race, and focus their resources on 1-3 congressional seats that they have a chance of winning. This would "legitimize" them in the minds of Americans. In the next election cycle, they would run for maybe 10 congressional seats. Let the pattern continue until you have roughly 50 congressional seats. At that point, focus on 1-3 senate seats as well. The year after though, shoot for 4-6 senate seats.

Then, once you have roughly 50-100 house seats and 5-15 senate seats, you can begin to consider a presidential run. But doing so without any base seems like a waste.

If they were a serious party concerned with tangible progress instead of idealistic rhetoric that gets you nowhere, they would follow that kind of approach. Instead, after 27 years they are still where they started, no where.

Yea, now THAT would be a practical plan.

Instead they take someone who will get them some "publicity" even if it ends up losing them virtually everything they stand for and discolors their "brand" to make it worth even less than it currently is.

But hey, it's not like they or other party's have ever tried it (what they are currently doing) before, have they? ...Well, even so, like maybe, like, the magical "electoral" fairies will grant them their wish this time.

 

[Knightskye]

Can we just dump the chart and the letters and blame the media?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qqzvy4VTMBI&feature=user
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e9JAsM2x-4&feature=user

 

[apc3161]

Bob Barr will lose, and lose bad. I'd rather be principled and lose than unprincipled and lose.

Barr is already polling 6% without doing anything! If he polls above 10%, he will get into the debates.

While he might be a long shot from winning, getting into those debates should be priority #1. Because then people can realize how much the democrats/republicans are full of it.

As of now, the libertarians have never gotten more than 3% of the vote and after almost 30 years, they are barely stronger than when they started. The party needs a candidate such as Barr to legitimize them.

 

[AmericaFyeah92]

Barr is already polling 6% without doing anything! If he polls above 10%, he will get into the debates.

While he might be a long shot from winning, getting into those debates should be priority #1. Because then people can realize how much the democrats/republicans are full of it.

As of now, the libertarians have never gotten more than 3% of the vote and after almost 30 years, they are barely stronger than when they started. The party needs a candidate such as Barr to legitimize them.

ur the only person with any fucking common sense on here

BTW, whoever was saying that the Far-Right should be labeled "Fascism", fascism is actually a mostly leftist phenomenon

 

[PeterWellington]

Barr is already polling 6% without doing anything! If he polls above 10%, he will get into the debates.

While he might be a long shot from winning, getting into those debates should be priority #1. Because then people can realize how much the democrats/republicans are full of it.

As of now, the libertarians have never gotten more than 3% of the vote and after almost 30 years, they are barely stronger than when they started. The party needs a candidate such as Barr to legitimize them.

Maybe an example will help here, taken from www.gop.com:

"The name "Republican" was chosen because it alluded to equality and reminded individuals of Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party."

If Jefferson were alive today, he would vomit on the Republican party (Ron Paul not included). And where did it go wrong? How did it change so much? By doing the same thing you're suggesting; trading principles for power, a little at a time, until you finally get the power you're after, only your values are gone. What's the point?

 

[Don Wills]

Bob Barr will lose, and lose bad. I'd rather be principled and lose than unprincipled and lose.

In both cases you're a loser.

Yes Bob Barr will probably not win this year. He needs to get about 45 million
votes to win and folks have said he may only get 20 million. Oops - that's
twenty times the number who voted for Ron Paul. Maybe you need a better
reason to not vote for someone who actually has a small chance of winning,
as compared to Ron Paul who had zero from day 1 as a Republican.

 

[Don Wills]

... the libertarians have never gotten more than 3% of the vote and after almost 30 years, they are barely stronger than when they started...

Actually they've never gotten more than 1.1%, and they only got more than 1%
that one time 28 years ago.

 

[WRellim]

ur the only person with any fucking common sense on here

BTW, whoever was saying that the Far-Right should be labeled "Fascism", fascism is actually a mostly leftist phenomenon

Fascism (or as Mussolini preferred to call it, "Corporatism") is put on the "right" rather than the left because while it is a totalitarian form of government, it pays lip service to "property rights" even while subverting the functionality of them (i.e. you are allowed to continue to "own" your factory even though the government will order what you will produce, how much, when, and be your only customer).

 

[WRellim]

Maybe an example will help here, taken from www.gop.com:

"The name "Republican" was chosen because it alluded to equality and reminded individuals of Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party."

If Jefferson were alive today, he would vomit on the Republican party (Ron Paul not included). And where did it go wrong? How did it change so much? By doing the same thing you're suggesting; trading principles for power, a little at a time, until you finally get the power you're after, only your values are gone. What's the point?

QFT.

 

[AmericaFyeah92]

Fascism (or as Mussolini preferred to call it, "Corporatism") is put on the "right" rather than the left because while it is a totalitarian form of government, it pays lip service to "property rights" even while subverting the functionality of them (i.e. you are allowed to continue to "own" your factory even though the government will order what you will produce, how much, when, and be your only customer).

it was put on the "right" by Leftists during and after World War 2 so that they wouldn't be associated with Hitler

But if you look at the main plans and implementations of Fascism, its mostly left-wing

Then again, the whole left-right political spectrum is obsolete in my opinion.
It should be a collectivist-individualist scale, which would be much more straightforward and understandable (Totalitarians on one side, Libertarians/Anarchists on the other)

 

[AutoDas]

The Libertarian Party should try doing that Free State Project by having a Libertarian candidate for every position possible in every election for the next 4 years.

 

[CorkyAgain]

media coverage

Because he is the only one who would get any coverage from the media. If there was a big name candidate who was also a radical, I would agree with you. Barr has already gotten more media coverage that probably every LP candidate ever. There is no chance any of the other candidates would have gotten any attention. A better, radical message is of no use if nobody can hear it.

"If voting changed anything, it would be illegal."

If a candidate represented a real threat to the status quo, he wouldn't get any media coverage. Ask yourself why Bob Barr is getting favorable coverage when Dr. Paul did not. Surely you don't believe the MSM has suddenly had a change of heart!

I predict that the recent coverage is a flash in the pan, and will be the highwater mark for Barr. He'll be shut out of any debates and what coverage he gets will be more and more dismissive. The only way he can prevent that is to be even more accommodating to the opinions of beltway insiders, i.e., by even more watering-down of the libertarian platform.

 

[CorkyAgain]

Because, obviously, people do NOT like to "drink" things that are HOT or COLD... -- everyone knows that people much prefer LUKEWARM tasteless things...

You've inspired me to go out for Thai food tonight, as a statement of libertarian radicalism.

Make mine 5 stars and bring me a cold beer to wash it down!

 

[WRellim]

You've inspired me to go out for Thai food tonight, as a statement of libertarian radicalism.

Make mine 5 stars and bring me a cold beer to wash it down!

See now that's the problem. If you were a TRUE Bob Barr supporter you would know that eating Thai food (and drinking Beer!!!) are virtually treasonous.

A TRUE Bob Barr supporter would be having a meal of those flavorless rice-cake things, with a side of whit margarine and a glass of nice luke-warm city tap water. Yummmm!

 

[CorkyAgain]

If they were a serious party concerned with tangible progress instead of idealistic rhetoric that gets you nowhere, they would follow that kind of approach. Instead, after 27 years they are still where they started, no where.

I think you have it backwards. The LP has always been a "pragmatic" party insofar as it has sought to effect change through the electoral process. That is, they've tried to reform the system from within.

The truly radical libertarian position eschews voting and political campaigning altogether. It sees these as tacit acceptance of the existing institutions of power. It refuses to participate in what amounts to an attempt to legitimize state power.

The "purist" or "idealist" wing of the LP has always been realistic enough to see that electoral victory is out of reach. But they believe that campaigns provide a way to educate people about libertarianism. That's a more achievable, pragmatic goal than getting a presidential nominee elected.

But I think the educational goal has been undermined by the dynamic of campaigning, where messages have been reduced to sound bites and where the MSM likes to stir up "controversies" and focuses on the "horse race" aspects of the contest. The message simply doesn't get through.

I no longer believe in the political approach myself. I think we need to continue trying to educate, and obviously we need something more than an academic thinktank to do this. I think we need to harness popular entertainment and the open source movement in software...