Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Libertarians Once Again Getting Screwed?

Libertarians are a naturally skeptical bunch when it comes to politics and political trends. Much of our current skepticism is that will people finally reject statism and elect pro-liberty candidates? Well the sentiment among Libertarian bloggers is that no they haven't and the mentality of "...anyone but the Democrats" is still the dominate thought. Laurence Vance of LewRockwell.com points out here and here that the Republican Pledge to America is nothing but junk and that's just the part on health care. Doug Mataconis over at Below the Beltway shares the same cynicism of Tea Party Candidates Christine O’Donnell and Carl Paladino.

Some say that such cynicism is unwarranted and takes away from the goal of fighting statism. I say it's healthy to see that is just molding into kicking out hard blue statism to putting soft red statism in it's place. You would think this kind of skepticism would actually resonate with Conservatives, apparently it did but not in the correct way. Melissa Clouthier at Liberty Pundits apparently does not like it when us Libertarians refuse to buy what Conservatives sell.

This had to be my favorite quote in the piece;

And then, the libertarians whine about why they never get A Real Seat at the Republican table. Uh, maybe if you guys actually acted like you were on the team instead of pretending to be some sort of blind line judge, you’d be taken more seriously.


Lets take alook at whats currently at the Republican Table shall we;

1. Religious/Social Conservatives
2. Neoconservatives
3. Paleoconservatives

All three of these groups have no interest in personal liberty, preferring to use government thugs to enforce morality of course in the name of the collective. Granted collective is a bad word so they use; "for the children, promoting values" among others. The first two favor a bankrupting foreign policy that does nothing for the security of the nation, which in fact does the complete opposite. The sick joke of it all is that they claim to be pro-life in the same sentence. This could be contributed to the notion that in their eyes some animals are apparently more equal than other animals as we have seen during the New York City Muslim Community Center episode. The Republican table seems to still be filled with nothing but statist Conservatives and Clouthier wonders why Libertarians are cynical about the current election and the future that it entails.

Clouthier's article also brings up the question; Why should Libertarians continue to waste their time in trying to work with Conservatives?

The Libertarian-Conservative Alliance or Conflict (depending on how you look at it) seem to remind me of an episode between a man in his 40s and a man in his late 20s. Both work together but the man in his 40s clearly see himself as the leader and the man in his late 20s just puts up with it for the sake of getting the project done. Everything is going smoothly until the late 20s man points out that something is wrong and just doesn't set right. The man in his 40s just simply dismisses the concerns as being naive and says that it's his way or the highway. This is the way the Tea Party (originally the Ron Paul Revolution) seems to be turning into. The Psychology Survey site MyType has a huge blog post on this very notion.

The way things are trending, it seems that a new movement may be needed, but who knows my cynicism may be proven wrong but I doubt it.

Monday, October 18, 2010