Americans Reject Libertarianism (Even Republicans)

Recently, Republican presidential candidate has been running away from his Libertarian roots as fast as he can. Why is he doing this, when it is pretty well known that both he and his father have long been Libertarians? For a couple of reasons.

First, he saw what happened to his father's numerous attempts to run for president in the Republican Party. Ron Paul probably milked as many votes as possible out of the Republican Party -- but it wasn't nearly enough to make him a contender for the nomination.

Second, he understands (like his father did) that running on the Libertarian Party ticket was nothing more than an exercise in futility. If you're serious about trying to be elected president in the United States, you must get the nomination of one of the two major parties (Republicans or Democrats) -- at least at this point in our history.

Third, while many with Libertarian leanings are posing as Republicans these days, they only make up a tiny percentage (about 13%) of the party (see chart above). They are outnumbered by at least three other groups in the party -- teabaggers, evangelicals, and establishment (business-oriented) Republicans. That's why Paul is trying to re-invent himself -- because he must appeal to these other groups to have a chance.

And Americans in general are much more accepting of libertarianism than the Republicans are. The chart below shows the segments of the population willing to ID themselves as Libertarians -- and as you can see, it's a pretty tiny percentage across the board.

These charts were made from information in a new YouGov Poll -- done on April 8th and 9th of a random national sample of 1,000 adults, with a 4.1 point margin of error.

Snapshot Of Virginia Governor's Race

As we draw within days of the gubernatorial race in Virginia, it looks like the Democratic candidate (Terry McAuliffe) is extending his lead over his Republican opponent (Ken Cuccinelli). This had started out a few months ago as a very close race, but McAuliffe is now leading among likely voters by 12 points -- the largest lead in the race so far.

The above chart shows the demographic breakdown of the race as it stands now. The only support for Cuccinelli that exceeds the margin of error is among Whites (who prefer him by about 5 points). Two other groups (those making between $50k & $100k and men) are virtually split on their preference, with both groups giving the Republican a 1 point edge. All other groups prefer McAuliffe by a significant margin.

But it looks like this race is going to be won in the gender demographic. While men are split between the two candidates, that is not true of women. They prefer McAuliffe by a whopping 24 point margin. It looks like the rabid anti-woman policies of the Republican Party is coming home to roost -- and it's going to cost them dearly in this Southern state.

It would seem to make sense for the Republicans to moderate those anti-woman views, but that probably still won't happen. The party is controlled in too many states (including Virginia) by the teabagger/fundamentalists, who still think women should be second-class citizens (and subject to the whims and desires of men). The more moderate business-oriented Republicans will have to wrest control of their party away from the extremists before those policies can be moderated at all -- and that is not going to be an easy task.

This same poll shows the Republican Party has damaged its image with voters in Virginia, just as it has in many other parts of the nation. Virginia voters have a 33 point bigger unfavorable view of the national Republican Party than a favorable view. Their view of the state Republican Party is not a whole lot better, where the unfavorable opinion is 16 points higher than the favorable opinion. The situation is much better for both state and national Democrats, where the favorable view of both entities is slightly better than the unfavorable views.

Both of these charts were made from the latest Washington Post / ABT-SRBI Poll that was taken between October 24th and 27th of 762 likely Virginia voters. The poll has a margin of error of 4.5 points.

Capitalism

This is a good definition of capitalism. An unregulated capitalism gives the owners (the capitalists) the power to abuse their workers to make the largest profit possible. It brings out the greed and nastiness in employers. If we are to keep a capitalist (free enterprise) system, then it must be regulated and worker's rights must be protected -- including the right to a fair and decent wage, and a share of the rise in productivity. Conservatives (and Libertarians) would take us back to the "law of the jungle", where the powerful get what they want and the rest must scramble for the crumbs left over. We should be better than that -- and we should consider the lives of humans to be more important than conservative ideology.

A Uncontrollable Mouse In The GOP Tent

There is a mouse (teabaggers, evangelicals, libertarians) in the Republican tent, and it's starting to scare the elephants (establishment Republicans). A few years ago, the Republican Party began to appeal directly to these groups in an effort to build their party into what they hoped would be a majority. They thought these groups would be a tame "mouse" that they could control, and turn loose at election time to serve the party. But it didn't work out like they expected.

Instead of remaining timid mice, the teabaggers, evangelicals, and libertarians combined to force out many establishment Republican moderates, and take over the party in many states. And their newfound power was very evident in the primary elections that were just held. The establishment Republicans were able to get the nominee they wanted, but that nominee (Willard Mitt Romney) had to move far to the right to get the nomination (maybe too far to appeal to a majority of voters in November). And even then, there was a significant number of these new Republicans that refused to vote for the nominee.

Now, as I wrote a few days ago, many of the libertarians and the teabaggers are saying they will not vote for Romney. They view him as a moderate (or even worse, a liberal) who will return to his old views and abandon the right-wing now that he has the nomination. Teabagger leaders are saying many of their members are telling them they will stay home on election day -- and the libertarian faction (the Paul supporters) is even stronger in their opposition to Romney (and they have another place to go -- the Libertarian Party). And we must not forget the evangelicals -- some of whom are having trouble considering mormonism to be a christian sect.

Now there is more evidence that the Republican Party is far from unified, even though they have a presidential nominee. About 163 delegates to the national convention, who are pledged to Romney because of party rules, have banded together to sue the Republican Party. They want to be freed from their requirement to vote for Romney at the convention.

Now these delegates could not stop Romney from getting the nomination. Even if all of them were allowed to vote against him, he still has enough delegates for a first-ballot victory. The important thing is that, at this late date, there are still Republicans willing to embarrass the party to oppose Romney. He clearly has work to do to get his own party unified and supporting him for the coming election -- and he's not going to win these people over by moving back toward the center (as he must do to appeal to Independents). It's a real dilemma for Romney.

But the Republican Party brought this on themselves. They thought they could control these people and groups. Now they are fighting them for control of the party, and may well lose. Those timid mice they let into the party have turned out to be rats (and rabid ones, at that). The elephants should be scared.

Romney Still hasn't Solidified The GOP

It took him a while, but Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) finally has enough delegate votes to assure him of the Republican presidential nomination. Normally, this is the time (after a majority of delegates have been won) that a party starts to solidify behind the nominee. But that is not happening for Romney -- at least not yet.

There are still two groups of Republicans who are saying they will not vote for Romney in the Fall -- and together, those two groups potentially make a significant number of voters. The first group is the libertarian wing of the party -- the Ron Paul supporters. This group has never liked Romney, or any of the other candidates for that matter. They are not ready to back Romney, and the chances are he won't get many of these people's vote in November.

The other day, after realizing that the race was over, Rand Paul (Ron's son) endorsed Romney for president. If anything was going to bring these people on board to support Romney, that should have been a very good start. It wasn't. All it did was to make them angry with Rand Paul. They are calling the younger Paul a "traitor", a "turncoat", and a "sellout". It's really looking like this group will either vote for the Libertarian candidate (Gary Johnson) or stay at home on election day.

The second group is the teabaggers. Teabagger leaders are saying that a lot of their members are telling them that they are going to stay home in November rather than vote for Romney. This is the group (along with evangelicals) that backed candidate after candidate in the hopes of finding someone other than Romney, and finally wound up supporting Rick Santorum.

The teabaggers have never trusted Romney. They consider him to be a moderate (or maybe even a liberal) who adopted their beliefs just to secure the GOP nomination. Now that he has that nomination, many of them believe he'll abandon them and move back toward the left -- and they may well be right about that. Romney has had so many differing beliefs that it makes one wonder if he really has any beliefs at all (other than to cut taxes for himself and his rich buddies).

Teabagger leaders are encouraging their members to vote for Romney -- saying that no vote is actually a vote for President Obama. Will that work? Only if they can convince the rank-and-file teabaggers that Romney is a real improvement over Obama for right-wingers. And that is still up in the air right now. Many teabaggers may also find a third party to vote for, or just stay at home.

This has to be somewhat worrying for establishment Republicans. They got the candidate they wanted, but if significant numbers of these two groups stay at home on election day it could cost them the White House -- and it would hurt them down-ballot also.

It's still a little more than four months until the election, but Romney definitely has his work cut out for him. He needs to start winning over the independents, but he can't really do that until he solidifies his own party's support. 

WikiLeaks - Not Even Close To Treason

Progressives and Libertarians are usually thought of as being on opposite ends of the political spectrum, and there are some things we disagree on (such as the size of government and how to finance that government).   But there are many things the two groups have in common also. Both groups believe in the freedom of the individual, and both groups believe the government we have should be open and honest with its citizens.

That's why I was not surprised to find one of the best Libertarian Texas blogs, The Whited Sepulchre, views the WikiLeaks affair much the same as I do.   And the author of that blog has printed an excellent piece from small business owner and Vice-Chair of the Dallas County Libertarian Party, John Jay Myers.   I agree wholeheartedly with what Myers has to say about WikiLeaks, so I am reposting it here in hopes of giving it a wider audience.   Here is what he said:

"It Is Treason To Call Wikileaks Treason" by John Jay Myers 

Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; Now get over it.

You might believe some speech might give away national secrets for instance how we prop up puppet dictators in foreign countries, or how we have been training troops who are now turning against us in droves, how we are supplying billions of dollars to countries who supply millions to those who want to attack us, how we back companies that supply men with young boys for sex slaves in Afghanistan. How the leaders of the countries we manipulate are now scared that we aren’t bombing Iran. Surely no one should become privy to this.

Or should they? I am shocked to realize that the American people don’t stand up and say, “Why are we putting in these puppet dictators? Why are we arming and training troops to fight us? Why are we giving billions to those who want to do us harm? Why are we pimping young boys? Why would we want to bomb Iran in the name of Saudi Arabia?

Seems to me we have an Ostrich mentality in America, Americans can choose to have information, or they can go lock step with their favorite news channel and fight for the right to keep their heads buried in the sand.

They say knowledge is power, would we rather cede that power to those who 87% of us are completely dissatisfied with. Do you really believe that in matters of foreign policy this corrupt group of ninnies somehow becomes more competent?

We have to make a choice, do we want to know these things that could save countless lives and restore America as the shining light on the hill, or should we sacrifice our greatness for what may harm a few? 

I think all government correspondence that does not involve missile codes, or troop locations should be public, and any government correspondence that isn’t made public should be labeled as treason.

Wikileaks needs to be permanent, I think we should just make all government wires transparent, starting now. Tell all federal employees, “oh... by the way all of your correspondence is public, any correspondence you engage in that is "government business" not made public will be labeled as treason”.

Wikileaks would be the full body scanner for the United States government. 

Were you aware that Iran was offering to help in the stabilization of Iraq and the war on terror if we would remove their name as a sponsor of terror? I was not, but thanks to Wikileaks I am .

Maybe we would consider diplomatic above board solutions rather than espionage and corporate sabotage. Maybe we would stop doing backroom deals with mega corporations like Halliburton, Lockheed Martin and BP and start dealing with other countries, their people, and let those people stand up for their own freedom, instead of being inspired to hate us, by our foreign policy of corporatism.

I imagine there is quite a bit of “small stuff”s in the 248,000 yet to be released documents that the media has not sifted through to protect the innocent, which I might add is a procedure that has happened to all 1200 of the pages released so far.

But I don’t sweat the “small stuff”, what concerns mean is the big stuff, the obvious information that reveals our government is lying in regards to how our trillion dollar foreign policy is working out. They are lying to us in regards to the actions we are taking in other countries and even lying to us in regards to whether we are violating the constitution.

If the government is involved with illegal activities than they need to exposed, no matter the cost. Wrong is wrong, and the safety of the people is no excuse for hiding illegal secrets. The more these acts are disclosed, the less likely they will occur in future.

The most disturbing factor about wikileaks is the nature of the attacks from the political class and the media, it should be startling to all of us the lengths those who are supposed to protect us will go in order to maintain a web of lies. 

It could be that the most enlightening thing about wikileaks is just how anti-constitutional our leaders have become.


And while we are on the topic of WikiLeaks, I would like to say something about Julian Assange (pictured above) and the criminal charges that have been filed against him in Sweden.   Those who disagree with the release of the information on WikiLeaks are using that criminal charge to attack the veracity of WikiLeaks.   And those who agree with the release of the WikiLeaks information are defending him and denigrating the charges.   Both sides are wrong in these actions.

I don't know if Assange is guilty of the charges in Sweden.   If he is, then he should be punished.   But that is a matter for the Swedish courts.   And it has NOTHING to do with the information leaked by WikiLeaks.   To condemn or defend Assange because you think it might have something to do with whether it was right to leak the State Department cables is just STUPID.   The way Assange has lived his personal life has absolutely no bearing on the veracity or the value of the information leaked.

After all, even a jerk can do something good once in a while.   And WikiLeaks did a very good thing by releasing the State Department cables.

Even Libertarians Think Paul Is Wrong

By now you've probably heard about the furor caused by the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate in Kentucky -- Rand Paul. After winning that nomination, Paul let it be known that he believes the 1964 Civil Rights Act was wrong when it mandated that businesses could not discriminate on the basis of race. He said businesses should be able to discriminate against anyone they wanted to, and if they wanted to discriminate on the basis of race then they should be able to do that.

After seeing that he had kicked a hornet's nest with that pronouncement, Paul has tried to back-pedal. He claims he is not a racist (even though he holds racist views) and says he would not try to overturn the law preventing discrimination. A few others, including disreputable former newsman John Stossel, have tried to defend Paul. They say this is just a basic belief in the importance of property rights and is shared by all Libertarians.

Unfortunately for Paul, that is just not true. AOL News decided to see if all Libertarians believed businesses should have the right to discriminate, so they asked that question of several Libertarian scholars, and the three who responded to their inquiry all disagreed with Rand Paul. They did not disagree with the law, and in fact, felt it was necessary to break the iron grip of Jim Crow in America (especially in the South). Here is what they said:

Brink Lindsey (Cato Institute)

"Rand Paul is appealing to the general principle of freedom of association, and that general principle is a good one. But it has exceptions. In particular, after three-plus centuries of slavery and another century of institutionalized, state-sponsored racism (which included state toleration of private racist violence), the exclusion of blacks from public accommodations wasn't just a series of uncoordinated private decisions by individuals exercising their freedom of association. It was part and parcel of an overall social system of racial oppression."

Richard Epstein (University of Chicago)

"To be against Title II in 1964 would be to be brain-dead to the underlying realities of how this world works. In 1964, every major public accommodation that operated a nationwide business was in favor of being forced to admit minorities."

David Bernstein (George Mason Law School)

"If segregation and discrimination in the Jim Crow South was simply a matter of law, federal legislation that would have overturned Jim Crow laws would have sufficed. But, in fact, it involved the equivalent of a white supremacist cartel, enforced not just by overt government regulation like segregation laws, but also by the implicit threat of private violence and harassment of anyone who challenged the racist status quo. Therefore, to break the Jim Crow cartel, there were only two options: (1) a federal law invalidating Jim Crow laws, along with a massive federal takeover of local government by the federal government to prevent violence and extralegal harassment of those who chose to integrate; or (2) a federal law banning discrimination by private parties, so that violence and harassment would generally be pointless. If, like me, you believe that it was morally essential to break the Jim Crow cartel, option 2 was the lesser of two evils. I therefore would have voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act."

The fact is that Paul does not hold this racist view because he is Libertarian, but because he is a teabagger, and it is the teabaggers he has been trying to appeal to -- a group much more prone to accepting racist views than Libertarians. He evidently thinks this racist viewpoint will appeal to the voters in Kentucky. I sincerely hope he is wrong.

It is one thing to win a Republican primary with racist views -- a party that has been taken over by teabaggers in several states. But it may be a lot different to try and win a general election with that viewpoint. He's going to need a lot of independents to win the general election, and they could easily be offended by his racist views.

Although this country still has racial problems, a lot of progress has been made (and much of it was due to the 1964 Civil Rights Act). I don't think most people are going to want to re-open this can of worms and replay the bad old days of segregation.

Repubs Nearly Dodge The "Barr" Bullet

The Libertarians held their national convention this past weekend, and it looked for a while like Republicans might get lucky and not have the Libertarians nominate a candidate that would appeal to many in their disaffected base.

There were 14 candidates seeking the Libertarian nomination for president. The only one who has any real public name-identification is former right-wing Republican congressman from Georgia, Bob Barr. Many thought because he was a well-known ex-congressman, Barr would easily get the nomination. But it didn't work out that way.

The Libertarian rules says the contest goes as many ballots as necessary to give one candidate a majority of votes cast. With each round, the person with the least votes (and anybody with less than 5%) is dropped from the ballot.

After the fifth round of voting, it still looked like the Republicans might not have to worry about Bob Barr. The fifth round had Texas candidate Mary Ruwart in first place with 37%, Barr in second place with 36% and Wayne Allyn Root finishing last with 21%. It all came down to who Root's supporters would back in the sixth round.

That's when Root showed how badly he wanted on the national ticket in any capacity. He threw his support to Barr, and asked Barr's supporters to support him for the vice-presidential nomination. That did it. On the sixth ballot, Barr received 52% of the vote and became the nominee. Without Root's political opportunism, Barr might well have lost.

But Barr is now the nominee, and that has to have establishment Republicans worried. McCain is already having problems with the right-wing fundamentalist base of the Republican Party. Until yesterday, it looked like they might be forced to vote for McCain, even though they really don't like him. Now they have an alternative.

This will make it much harder for McCain to move toward the middle and try to appeal to independents. If he tries to do it, he could lose a big chunk of his base to right-winger Bob Barr. The Libertarians were hoping to pass the one million mark in votes in this election. With Barr's established right-wing credentials, they could do even better than that.

I don't know if they needed it or not, but the Democrats just got a little help for the November election.