Libertarian Message “Become Ungovernable.”

[Procrustes Stretched]

I guess the “Become Ungovernable" themed Libertarian Party convention lived up to it's pronouncements and expectations. They had Trump and RFK Jr. there, with Trump throwing the Libertarian party under the proverbial bus even before he'd been led off of the stage.

The convention got to witness first hand the historian Richard Hofstadter's observations of "The Paranoid Style in American Politics."

Mr. Trump: “Maybe you don’t want to win. Only do that if you want to win. If you want to lose, don’t do that. Keep getting three per cent every four years.”

Libertarians Skip Over Trump and R.F.K. Jr. for Chase Oliver

The party selected Mr. Oliver as its presidential nominee. He ran for a Senate seat in Georgia in 2022.

www.nytimes.com

Donald Trump promised members of the Libertarian Party that he would “put a libertarian in my cabinet” and commute the life sentence of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht, a top demand of a political movement that intends to run its own candidate against him.

“On day one, we will commute the sentence,” Trump said, offering to free the creator of what was once the internet’s most infamous drug clearinghouse. “We will bring him home.” His speeches more typically include a pledge to execute drug dealers, citing China as a model.

“It’s time to be winners,” said Trump, asking rhetorically if third party delegates wanted to go on getting single-digit protest votes. “I’m asking for the Libertarian Party’s endorsement, or at least lots of your votes.”

Mr. Kennedy, praised Libertarians for opposing COVID stay-at-home orders, vaccine mandates, and online censorship, while saying he’d pardon Ulbricht, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, and NSA leaker Edward Snowden.

Kennedy quickly skedaddled out of the convention when he realized the Libertarians did not believe he could bring back Camelot.

What gets lost in the stories is that both Misters Kennedy and Trump were asking to be the candidate of people who say they want to Make America Ungovernable (that's is what I was hearing the 'tarians screaming for). These two men both begged to represent a party that praises becoming ungovernable. At least that is what their convention's themes was advertised as promoting: “Become Ungovernable.”

 

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

If a person you know declares that (s)he is a 'libertarian,' the person is no longer qualified to be your friend.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

If a person you know declares that (s)he is a 'libertarian,' the person is no longer qualified to be your friend.

I don't go that far, but since my late teens/early 20s I've considered them to be like the followers of Ayn Rand -- nitwits.

 

[Independent thinker]

If a person you know declares that (s)he is a 'libertarian,' the person is no longer qualified to be your friend.

I kind of feel sorry for Libertarians. They have condemned themselves to an entire life of being losers. After all of these years of the Libertarian party, their newest nominee proudly proclaims that he thinks he can get at least 2% of the vote. Yeah, that'll show Republicans and Democrats. Why do they even bother? They'd be better off becoming stamp collectors.

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

I kind of feel sorry for Libertarians. They have condemned themselves to an entire life of being losers. After all of these years of the Libertarian party, their newest nominee proudly proclaims that he thinks he can get at least 2% of the vote. Yeah, that'll show Republicans and Democrats. Why do they even bother? They'd be better off becoming stamp collectors.

Such an odd comment. "They have condemned themselves to an entire life of being losers." The implication of that being that they should support candidates that don't share their principles so they can "win?" Or that they should support a candidate who talks somewhat like they have some libertarian ideas but then never actually does anything remotely libertarian so that they can "win?" That's an odd conception of winning.

 

[Independent thinker]

Such an odd comment. "They have condemned themselves to an entire life of being losers." The implication of that being that they should support candidates that don't share their principles so they can "win?" Or that they should support a candidate who talks somewhat like they have some libertarian ideas but then never actually does anything remotely libertarian so that they can "win?" That's an odd conception of winning.

What is an odd conception of winning is losing every time you vote for the rest of your life. Hey, I'm not a fan of the two parties either but when you lose constantly, you need to change something. Libertarians have changed over the years from getting 10% to 20% of the vote to getting 2% of the vote. Obviously something ain't working. If you want to give voters an option other than the other two parties then you need to give them an option. Libertarians never do. They have done absolutely zero changing the two party system. In fact, they are going backwards.

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

What is an odd conception of winning is losing every time you vote for the rest of your life. Hey, I'm not a fan of the two parties either but when you lose constantly, you need to change something. Libertarians have changed over the years from getting 10% to 20% of the vote to getting 2% of the vote. Obviously something ain't working. If you want to give voters an option other than the other two parties then you need to give them an option. Libertarians never do. They have done absolutely zero changing the two party system. In fact, they are going backwards.

When on Earth did they get 10 or 20% of the vote?

I never said losing election after election was an example of winning. But you seem to be implying that libertarians should vote for people that they don't agree with and that that would constitute winning somehow. But it wouldn't be winning because it still wouldn't be libertarians in office. So libertarians can either vote for LP candidates and lose, or they can vote for Republicans and Democrats and still lose because what's the difference from the other situation? Voting for the winning candidate is meaningless if you don't actually agree with them or believe they'll do anything you support.

 

[Independent thinker]

When on Earth did they get 10 or 20% of the vote?

I never said losing election after election was an example of winning. But you seem to be implying that libertarians should vote for people that they don't agree with and that that would constitute winning somehow. But it wouldn't be winning because it still wouldn't be libertarians in office. So libertarians can either vote for LP candidates and lose, or they can vote for Republicans and Democrats and still lose because what's the difference from the other situation? Voting for the winning candidate is meaningless if you don't actually agree with them or believe they'll do anything you support.

I'm saying that if Libertarians want to be relevant in any way, shape, or form then they need to do something different. One of their biggest problems is, for some reason, they want to start at the top (president) and work their way down instead of the other way around. Even if by some miracle they won the presidency, they wouldn't be able to do a damn thing because the House and Senate would still be comprised of the two parties. If they ever want to be relevant they need to win races from dog catcher on up and then, eventually, down the road, the House and Senate would have Libertarians in it not only making a presidential win more likely but if they were to win the presidency then they would have fellow Libertarians already in both houses. There is no point to being nothing but a protest vote that doesn't even change election results. Might as well just stay home and watch reruns of Gilligan's Island.

 

[leftwinger]

Chase Oliver, the Libertarian Party’s nominee for president, is a woke leftist.

Oliver, a 38-year-old openly gay former Democrat, was chosen as the party’s nominee on Sunday evening after multiple rounds of voting.

According to Politico, he is “aligned with a more traditionalist faction of the Libertarian Party, the Classical Liberal Caucus,” and “defeated a more hard-line Mises Caucus candidate by less than 1 percent in the penultimate round of voting.”


However, it has since emerged that far from being a libertarian, he is an ultra-progressive who supports the Marxist terror group Black Lives Matter, drag queen story hours, open borders, and Big Tech censorship.

*********
Well well. GaterMac&Cheesedic BlackPeekknobss Finally ruined the Libertarian party into home O Demwitted loons. No wonder the fags support everything Obiden 100% never to be found in any Common Sense President Trump posts in support of.

 

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

libertarianism in and of itself in unimportant.

It is important in draining off GOP support.

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

I'm saying that if Libertarians want to be relevant in any way, shape, or form then they need to do something different. One of their biggest problems is, for some reason, they want to start at the top (president) and work their way down instead of the other way around. Even if by some miracle they won the presidency, they wouldn't be able to do a damn thing because the House and Senate would still be comprised of the two parties. If they ever want to be relevant they need to win races from dog catcher on up and then, eventually, down the road, the House and Senate would have Libertarians in it not only making a presidential win more likely but if they were to win the presidency then they would have fellow Libertarians already in both houses. There is no point to being nothing but a protest vote that doesn't even change election results. Might as well just stay home and watch reruns of Gilligan's Island.

You make fair points, but I would simply point out that that's what the Libertarian Party is doing. They run local candidates and yes even win local races. That bedrock is being built for a viable political party, but there are election laws, written by Democrats and Republicans, that purposely make it harder for independent and third-party candidates to run in almost any election you can think of at any level. That's a fact that should be a scandal. Regardless, even if you took those laws away I've become convinced at least to some degree that the American electoral system has no room for three parties, and even more convinced that even if the LP could become a legitimate, competing third-party at the level of Republicans and Democrats that it would become just a third with no discernible difference from the other two. Even more so if it were to, say, replace the Republican or Democratic parties as the second major party.

So from my perspective, you're not likely to see the Libertarian Party win elections beyond some random local election somewhere regardless of the electoral laws that basically prohibit them from winning, and even if they could it wouldn't be worth it because it would no longer be anything resembling libertarianism. I take the Ron Paul view that libertarians are better off working within one of the existing major parties and trying to gain influence that way. Ron Paul himself is a success story at this strategy, his son Rand Paul despite being less of a libertarian, Justin Amash and Thomas Massie are other examples. The purpose of the Libertarian Party, in my opinion, should be to put pressure on the GOP to move more in the direction of libertarianism and to take libertarian candidates seriously. You want to demand our votes and treat us like garbage, then we can vote for the LP candidate in any given race or not vote at all. But if you want to work with libertarian candidates and move toward libertarian stances then that's another story. Libertarians are not going to dominate the Republican Party, probably ever, but we could make up a significant bloc. There are areas of the country where a libertarian candidate running as a Republican might do better than a conservative candidate, but if they both run then that's splitting the difference and allowing the Democrat to win. The problem with this strategy is that Republican leadership up to this point, and many conservative voters, simply think they're owed libertarian votes despite wanting nothing to do with libertarians otherwise. The fact that Trump felt like it was at least in his interest to go to the LNC seems like a step in the right direction to me.

 

[Independent thinker]

You make fair points, but I would simply point out that that's what the Libertarian Party is doing. They run local candidates and yes even win local races. That bedrock is being built for a viable political party, but there are election laws, written by Democrats and Republicans, that purposely make it harder for independent and third-party candidates to run in almost any election you can think of at any level. That's a fact that should be a scandal. Regardless, even if you took those laws away I've become convinced at least to some degree that the American electoral system has no room for three parties, and even more convinced that even if the LP could become a legitimate, competing third-party at the level of Republicans and Democrats that it would become just a third with no discernible difference from the other two. Even more so if it were to, say, replace the Republican or Democratic parties as the second major party.

So from my perspective, you're not likely to see the Libertarian Party win elections beyond some random local election somewhere regardless of the electoral laws that basically prohibit them from winning, and even if they could it wouldn't be worth it because it would no longer be anything resembling libertarianism. I take the Ron Paul view that libertarians are better off working within one of the existing major parties and trying to gain influence that way. Ron Paul himself is a success story at this strategy, his son Rand Paul despite being less of a libertarian, Justin Amash and Thomas Massie are other examples. The purpose of the Libertarian Party, in my opinion, should be to put pressure on the GOP to move more in the direction of libertarianism and to take libertarian candidates seriously. You want to demand our votes and treat us like garbage, then we can vote for the LP candidate in any given race or not vote at all. But if you want to work with libertarian candidates and move toward libertarian stances then that's another story. Libertarians are not going to dominate the Republican Party, probably ever, but we could make up a significant bloc. There are areas of the country where a libertarian candidate running as a Republican might do better than a conservative candidate, but if they both run then that's splitting the difference and allowing the Democrat to win. The problem with this strategy is that Republican leadership up to this point, and many conservative voters, simply think they're owed libertarian votes despite wanting nothing to do with libertarians otherwise. The fact that Trump felt like it was at least in his interest to go to the LNC seems like a step in the right direction to me.

The builders building the bedrock have accomplished nothing for decades. In fact, the little they did build was using inadequate materials and whatever structure they did have has fallen down. They have close to zero candidates in state and local offices and a complete zero in the US House and Senate. In fact, the Libertarians are so bad that people such as Rand Paul don't even run as Libertarians because they knew they would lose so they run as Republicans instead. They aren't building bedrock. That's the point.

 

[Natural Citizen]

Kevin, you get it.

 

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

If we had three or more viable parties, most Presidential elections would be settled by the House.

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

The builders building the bedrock have accomplished nothing for decades. In fact, the little they did build was using inadequate materials and whatever structure they did have has fallen down. They have close to zero candidates in state and local offices and a complete zero in the US House and Senate. In fact, the Libertarians are so bad that people such as Rand Paul don't even run as Libertarians because they knew they would lose so they run as Republicans instead. They aren't building bedrock. That's the point.

So you're just repeating what you said before without responding to what I said.

 

[Independent thinker]

So you're just repeating what you said before without responding to what I said.

I did respond to what you said. You said they were laying a foundation but the foundation crumbled. You've got to face facts, when you only win 5% of the vote, at best, you're never going to get anywhere. Just ask the Green Party and others. There is no foundation. I'm sorry but the truth is the truth. I'd like to break up the two party system too but no other party is relevant and no other party will ever win, at least not for a hundred years or more. I had high hopes for the Reform party but their internal bickering destroyed themselves.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

I kind of feel sorry for Libertarians. They have condemned themselves to an entire life of being losers. After all of these years of the Libertarian party, their newest nominee proudly proclaims that he thinks he can get at least 2% of the vote. Yeah, that'll show Republicans and Democrats. Why do they even bother? They'd be better off becoming stamp collectors.

The Tea Party and MAGA have too. So what?

 

[Kevin_Kennedy]

I did respond to what you said. You said they were laying a foundation but the foundation crumbled. You've got to face facts, when you only win 5% of the vote, at best, you're never going to get anywhere. Just ask the Green Party and others. There is no foundation. I'm sorry but the truth is the truth. I'd like to break up the two party system too but no other party is relevant and no other party will ever win, at least not for a hundred years or more. I had high hopes for the Reform party but their internal bickering destroyed themselves.

You really didn't though.

 

[Independent thinker]

The Tea Party and MAGA have too. So what?

The tea party was never a party. The tea partiers were Republicans. There is no MAGA party.

 

[Independent thinker]

You really didn't though.

I look at the bottom line. The bottom line is that the Libertarian party is nothing but a shell of their former selves, which wasn't much to begin with. They are going backwards, not forwards. During a time where a gazillion Americans would rather vote for someone else than either Biden or Trump, the Libertarian nominee says he'll be happy getting 2% of the vote.