To those in the Democratic Party that say derisively, “oooh, we could get the libertarian vote–both of them,” and to those in the Republican Party who similarly sneer at losing such support, consider this little passage from a piece in American Conservative on the breakup of the Cold War Consensus between the traditional conservatives and the libertarians: [via Libertarians for Dean]

The rift between conservatives and libertarians is not merely an esoteric debate between dueling pundits; it has also has concrete political ramifications. In one of the hardest-fought races of the 2002 campaign, Republican John Thune lost to incumbent Sen. Tim Johnson (D-S.D.) by just 524 votes. Libertarian Party candidate Kurt Evans won more than 3,000 votes�even though he dropped out of the race and endorsed Thune�more than enough to alter the outcome of the election. Small-l libertarians voting for Libertarian Party nominees rather than Republicans helped cost Republican Slade Gorton of Washington his Senate seat in 2000 and helped Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada hold onto his in 1998.

To quote another writer:

If you prick us, do we not bleed? […] and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

Taste my vote, GOP.

This article on Reason’s blog is interesting, not merely for the article they tout by Julian Sanchez on the appeal of Howard Dean for libertarians. Count me as one libertarian (small L, I tend to vote for the Libertarian party when an election is either not close or when I don’t care about the outcome, hoping that the LP vote will be big enough to cause the two large parties to pander to me to get my vote) who reluctantly, tenatively, and not without reservation, supports Dean.

If you’re curious just who the heck these “libertarians” are and what makes them tick, there’s a good representative sample in the comments.

Libertarians run the gamut from conservatives who believe the libertarians are closest to the spirit of the old Republican party of their dreams (something of a Founder’s Intent ideal that never really existed) to former liberals who don’t like the power of the state being wielded against hippies and other cultural refuseniks. It is a fractious bunch, but core to it are a group who are not, as Julian puts it, “Republicans who smoke pot,” or even “Democrats who took an econ class”. Libertarians are different–our overriding concern is the individual, and our overriding concern for the individual is freedom.

But we have a big problem. Well, two.

Continue reading →

I wrote this.

Treat this post as a confessional more than a publication.

That loud report you heard at 1:11AM Monday morning was the spleen of my colleague Jason exploding over poorly-implemented e-voting technology and the officials who buy anything a Lyle Lanley-like character sells. A little bit ago, a relative of mine commented on a solution to just such an issue, and got modded up by Slashdot moderators. Which means it’s right. So accept it. Or else you will be called a “luser”.

Hey, this is a blog. If I had something insightful to add, I’d be asleep by now.