The Libertarian Case for Re-electing President Bush

This week’s entry is addressed to my fellow libertarians – that is, to all persons (however they identify themselves, politically or philosophically) who take liberty, the freedom of the individual, as their highest political value. (I include within the word libertarian, as I use it here, all kinds of limited-government libertarians, whatever the philosophical basis for their libertarianism: Objectivist libertarians, utilitarian libertarians, Christian libertarians, etc. For reasons discussed below, I exclude anarchist libertarians, whom I do not hope to persuade with this essay.)

Some of my fellow libertarians are wondering why I plan to vote again for George W. Bush (that is, for the Bush-Cheney electors) in the 2004 presidential election. In many ways Bush’s presidency has been deeply disappointing to libertarians, chiefly because he has failed to slow the growth of government and in important ways (the war on terror, the war in Iraq, the addition of a prescription-drug benefit to Medicare, etc.) even has expanded government. Notwithstanding these failings, however, I maintain that Bush is unquestionably the best choice in the presidential election. The best practical way, at the present time, to advance the cause of liberty is to re-elect President Bush.

My case for why libertarians should re-elect Bush boils down to two basic arguments, each of which can be summarized in one word: 9/11 and incrementalism. The radical Islamic terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001 changed fundamentally the foreign policy of the United States, for we are – and for a long time into the foreseeable future, we will remain – at war. President Bush’s leadership as a wartime president has been essentially right, and for that he deserves re-election. Moreover, notwithstanding the general failure of the Bush administration to reduce government, in important ways President Bush has instituted reforms that, when more fully implemented in his second term, will move the U.S. government in the right direction. These reforms may fall far short of the libertarian ideal, but they are the kind of incremental changes that are essential, in practical political terms, as first steps toward the kind of limited-government society we desire.

(As suggested above, I’m not addressing this essay to anarchist libertarians, who hold that government is not necessary or legitimate. It seems to me that anyone who holds this position, to be fully principled and consistent, would not be voting in the general election this year, anyway. Moreover, I would hope that anyone who does not vote, either because of a principled opposition to government per se or the decision that none of the candidates are acceptable (the “none-of-the-above” vote), would publicize their reasons for abstaining – to help counter the propaganda of the “good-government” types who urge citizens to vote as their “civic duty.” As we libertarians know, the best reason to vote is to defend ourselves from our fellow citizens who believe that the ballot box entitles them to force their preferences on us. To paraphrase Ayn Rand’s definition of politicians, one also could define voters as “those who are privileged to enforce their wishes at the point of a gun." Any libertarian who sincerely agrees with the sentiment behind the slogan, “Don’t vote – It only encourages them!”, ought to publicize his or her reasons for not voting; otherwise, it still may indeed encourage them, for the statists can continue to assert that nonvoters are merely apathetic.)

Those who blame 9/11 on the USA – including many libertarians who have argued that the terrorist attacks were caused by resentment against American interventionist foreign policy in the Mideast – are wrong; they do not understand the roots of the radical Islamic enemies of America.

Islamic fundamentalist groups like al-Qaeda seek to destroy America, “the great Satan,” because they abhor the values America represents: capitalism and free-market economics, as opposed to feudal, pre-modern controlled economies; limited, constitutional government, as opposed to theocratic dictatorships; and individualism, including the full freedom of all individuals (women as well as men, non-believers as well as theists, regardless of their beliefs) to pursue their own, individual happiness. Because Islamic fundamentalism is based on values diametrically opposed to the values on which America was founded and which America epitomizes (as the full flowering of the capitalist, limited-government, individualist elements of Western civilization), the radical Islamic terrorists not surprisingly regard us as their enemy. By attacking the United States on September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda began the war on terrorism.

We are at war, and will be at war for some time to come. The war on Islamic terrorism is, in effect, the Fourth World War. (The Third World War, the so-called Cold War, against Soviet Communism, was won by the United States when the Soviet Union collapsed and its remnants, in eastern Europe and even in Russia itself, were opened to capitalism and therefore to freedom.) As in previous wars fought by the United States in the past century, our enemy is collectivism, in some form. Islamic fundamentalism is simply the new collectivist threat to the United States; like its predecessors – Hitler’s National Socialism, Mussolini’s fascism, Japanese militarism, Marxist communism, or Maoist communism (or – the internal enemy we continue to fight – Bismarck’s socialism) – this current form of collectivism threatens the principles on which our American civilization is based. And it’s not just an ideological or a cultural battle; it is a real war, with bullets, bombs, and other weapons designed to kill men, women, and children. The nation has been attacked, and continues to be under the threat of further attacks; our survival is at stake.

Sadly, far too many libertarians today – including personal friends and staffers at respected classical-liberal or free-market think tanks whose views on most other issues I highly regard – have become so pacifist, so virulently anti-war, that they’re sounding like leftists during the Cold War era. Like leftists, their views on American foreign policy seem to be premised on moral relativism, equating U.S. military intervention to combat communism with European powers’ colonialism in the 19th century or even with communist totalitarianism itself.

To put it bluntly, many libertarians are so blinded by their hatred of government – all governments, including the U.S. government – that they’ve become, quite literally, anti-American. And they’ve forgotten that among the legitimate functions of government (under our Constitution, it’s perhaps the most important of the enumerated powers of the national government) is national defense. War is a necessary and legitimate action that our government must take, under appropriate circumstances, to defend American lives and property from external aggression.

However unwise U.S. military intervention in Korea or Vietnam might seem today (20/20 hindsight has taught us that the “domino theory” that dominated American foreign policy during the Cold War was fundamentally flawed), in the context of the times – and most importantly, in terms of American policy objectives – our involvement was in not “imperialist,” in any meaningful sense of the word; rather, we were helping the people of those nations fight for freedom from communist tyranny. And we believed (naively so) that if South Korea and South Vietnam were conquered by their communist neighbors to the north, that eventually the United States would be endangered by a world-wide communist threat. (Although we failed in Vietnam, our success in Korea is underscored by the freedom and economic prosperity under capitalism that people not only in South Korea but in the entire Pacific Rim region generally enjoy.)

Libertarians who argue that it’s not the proper role for the United States to act as “the world’s policeman” are right, in part: it’s certainly not proper, under the U.S. Constitution (which authorizes the national government to use military force “for the common defence,” which is to say, for selfish purposes, for the defense of the United States, and not for altruistic purposes, for the defense of others). Thus, when both Democrat and Republican U.S. presidents have sent U.S. troops to such places as Grenada, Haiti, Somalia, or Bosnia, they have not only exceeded their powers under the Constitution but also have misused the U.S. military, even if Congress (tacitly) consented.

But U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan, to topple the Taliban regime that had sheltered the al-Qaeda terrorists, is different. It was a necessary part of our nation’s defense, an appropriate response to the 9/11 attacks. And, in addition to removing the Taliban regime’s threat to the U.S., the war in Afghanistan brought some measure of freedom to that country – which was demonstrated dramatically this past weekend, as the presidential elections were held there (the first time in Afghanistan’s 5000-year history that its people could directly choose their head of state).

The war in Iraq also is different. It’s different from the earlier U.S. intervention in Iraq, in the 1991 Gulf War, under the elder President Bush, which was not justified as vital to U.S. interests. (If it were truly “blood for oil,” as some leftists claim, it would have been justified as a valid use of the military for the “common defence,” albeit under an uncomfortably broad definition of self-defense.) Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq was more than just a rogue state defying international law; it posed a serious threat to U.S. security because of its ties to terrorism: for example, by offering sanctuary for Abu Nidal and for one of the bombers of the World Trade Center in 1993, plus financial support for suicide bombers in Israel, and by secretly negotiating to buy North Korean missiles. As president, George W. Bush was entitled to rely on the intelligence he received from the CIA, the British Secret Services, and other sources – as well as the bipartisan consensus support he received from Congress – to regard the probability of Saddam Hussein’s regime developing biological, chemical, and/or nuclear weapons and the potentiality of that regime making those weapons available to terrorist groups intent on attacking the United States, as serious enough threats to justify preemptive action to depose Saddam Hussein’s regime. And Congress authorized President Bush to use the U.S. military to do just that. (The Duelfer report, released last week, really does vindicate the Bush administration and Congress for the decisions they made in 2002-2003; for although no WMD arsenals were found, the report clearly shows Saddam Hussein’s clandestine efforts to revive his weapons programs as soon as possible. If his regime were still in power in Iraq today, there’s little doubt that it would be developing nuclear weapons, in response to Iran’s efforts, as well as chemical and biological weapons – and that it would be making those weapons available to America’s enemies.)

Pundits might second-guess the wisdom of President Bush’s (and the Congress’s) decision to depose the Iraqi regime, but that action was done to further U.S. security, in the context of our global war against Islamic terrorism. After 9/11, the U.S. president is duty-bound to attack our enemies before they attack us. As noted above, the enemy today isn’t simply Osama bin Laden and his rag-tag group of al-Qaeda outlaws hiding in some caves on the Afghan/Pakistani border; rather, it’s all Islamic extremists who are intent on destroying the U.S. (and the Western civilization it represents) and all those governments or groups, anywhere in the world, who harbor or support them. Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq topped the list of the latter, and for good reasons. It may very well be necessary to go after other regimes on that list (such as Iran or Syria); that’s a critically important decision the president elected in 2004 will have to make, in consultation with his advisors and, of course, with Congress.

Each of the four parts of what pundits have dubbed “the Bush doctrine” in foreign policy is justified, under limited-government principles, if the United States is to fight effectively against Islamic fundamentalism. The first part, the repudiation of moral relativism in international politics, recognizes that America’s enemies aren’t simply people from a different culture: they are evil because they are bent on murder and destruction. The second part, treating terrorists not as criminals to be prosecuted under normal judicial procedures but as war enemies to be fought militarily, recognizes that the United States truly is at war and that protection of Americans from our external enemies is a legitimate function of our national government. The third (and perhaps most famous) part of the Bush doctrine asserts our right not merely to respond when attacked but to pre-empt those who would attack us, taking the battle to the enemy rather than waiting for another 9/11. Again, libertarians misled by pacifism need to be reminded that self-defense is legitimate for nations as for individuals, and that to act preemptively to protect oneself from imminent violence is not to initiate the use of force. Finally, the fourth part of the Bush doctrine, the commitment to help nations friendly to us (like Israel) and to oppose those that are unfriendly (like the regimes mentioned above), again recognizes the reality of World War IV: as President Bush has said, “nations are either with us or against us in the war on terrorism”; and in fighting that war, the U.S. is entitled to regard as its enemies all nations that aid, abet, or shelter all Islamic terrorist networks, including not only al-Qaeda but also Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Hezbollah. In our international fight against such terrorist groups, the United States must hold other nations accountable for their policies.

Contrary to the assertions of the pacifists, the world definitely is a safer place today without Saddam Hussein’s lawless regime in control of Iraq. Libya’s capitulation speaks volumes about the success of President Bush’s Iraq policy. Bush’s re-election will signal to Islamic terrorists that the United States has renounced its past policies of appeasement – policies that encouraged the terrorists to greater crimes, culminating in 9/11 – and is determined to fight the war to its necessary conclusion: the complete capitulation or destruction of radical Islamic terrorism. The alternative, John Kerry’s election as president, would tell the world (including the terrorists) that the United States is not serious about defending itself or its interests. (Kerry’s recent proposal to furnish Iran with nuclear fuel, in the hopes that it would dissuade the Iranians from developing nuclear weapons, is so purely an example of appeasement that one can imagine the ghost of Neville Chamberlain taking possession of Kerry.)

The new (November 2004) issue of Reason magazine asked several prominent libertarians (along with “other policy wonks, journalists, thinkers and other public figures in the Reason universe”) whom they intended to vote for in 2004, and why. Dave Kopel, research director of the Independence Institute in Golden, Colorado (and a prominent gun-rights scholar), gave what I regard as the best reason to vote for George Bush: “We’re in a war in which the survival of civilization is at stake, and Bush is the only candidate who realizes the gravity of the danger we face and who is determined to win World War IV.” Kopel’s got it exactly right!

If the need to keep a steady hand on the wheel of the ship of state during a time of war isn’t enough reason to support George W. Bush this year, further justification can be found in domestic policy, where Bush and the Republicans in Congress offer real differences in public policy, compared to Kerry and the Democrats. In domestic policy, libertarians especially (more than “average” Americans) ought to understand how absurd it is for Democrats to portray themselves as the party of “change,” when in fact they seek to maintain and even to expand the status quo of the 20th-century regulatory/welfare state. As I’ve noted above, although President Bush and the Republicans in Congress fall far short of libertarian ideals, in fact they do propose a number of reforms that would finally begin moving U.S. public policy in the right direction. I’d add that, pragmatically speaking, a second Bush term would be the best opportunity we libertarians would have to begin bringing into practice the kind of reforms we’d like to see.

Many libertarians fall into the trap of valuing philosophical purity over practicality when it comes to politics. As a result, they fail as political activists, for they’d rather be right than to win! Political change, especially in democratic societies like the United States, does not happen suddenly; it happens slowly, with incremental changes, as “public opinion” (meaning the sum total of the opinions of all individuals in society) evolves. That’s how the modern regulatory/ welfare state (which libertarians justifiably abhor as a betrayal of the fundamental principles of the American Revolution) came into being. It wasn’t suddenly a product of FDR’s “New Deal,” although the 1930s saw perhaps the most dramatic expansion of government powers (especially national powers) in American history. The so-called “New Deal revolution” really began in the early 20th century, during the so-called “Progressive era,” when activists began pushing for a greater regulatory role for government, at all levels. (Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt ought to be blamed for the rise of “Big Government” in America as much as Franklin D. Roosevelt.) And the “New Deal revolution” didn’t stop with World War II; it continued into the 1940s and `50s (during the Truman and Eisenhower administrations), the `60s and ‘70s (with not only JFK’s “New Frontier” and LBJ’s “Great Society,” but also Nixon’s unnamed yet huge expansion of both so-called “entitlement” programs and the regulatory state), and beyond (why the “Reagan Revolution” wasn’t, and why Bill Clinton’s famous declaration that “the era of big government is over” all depended on how you defined big government!)

History teaches us that it will take at least as long to dismantle the regulatory/welfare state as it did to create it – and probably even longer, because of the corrosive effects it has had on people’s moral character. Not only have welfare programs made the recipients financially dependent on government “entitlements” such as Social Security, but they have undermined significantly the ethos of self-responsibility which is essential to a healthy, free society. As David Kelley so nicely demonstrates in his splendid little book published by the Cato Institute, A Life of One’s Own: Individual Rights and the Welfare State (1998), the notion that people have a “right” to things such as Social Security benefits or medical insurance is not only destructive of the concept of rights, properly understood, but also is fatal to the principle that each individual is responsible for his or her own life – a principle that’s an absolute prerequisite in a free society. To inculcate that principle (which means, in a very real sense, reviving the American Revolution), will require not only a change in American public policy, but a change in the law – indeed, far-reaching changes in both substantive law and the legal system as a whole – but also, ultimately, a radical change in public opinion, in (John Adams’s words from the time of the Revolution) “a change in the minds and hearts” of the people.

Perhaps the best practical way to begin making such a change possible is to push for free-market solutions to major public-policy issues like tax policy, Social Security, environmental policy, and the like. In this, despite President Bush’s unfortunate “compassionate conservative” rhetoric (which really identifies him as a “moderate” rather than a conservative) and his administration’s deplorable record in actually expanding the welfare state, in some respects, there’s also room for hope that a second Bush term would bring some much-need reforms in the free-market direction.

Perhaps the most important liberty-enhancing action taken by President Bush during his first term has been the tax cuts that he helped push through Congress, for the easiest (and arguably the most effective) way government can give individuals greater freedom is by allowing them to keep more of the wealth they’ve produced. Congress already has extended for an additional five years the popular cuts in middle-class rates; in a second Bush term, and with continued Republican majorities in both houses of Congress (real Republicans, that is, not counting the quasi-Democrat RINOs like Senators McCain, Snowe, or Voinovich), those cuts would be made permanent, along with the economically more important cuts in capital gains and dividend tax rates (the tax reductions that really help fuel economic growth). Moreover, there’s a real chance that, encouraged by President Bush, Congress would consider even more far-reaching reforms in the Internal Revenue Code that would simplify it (by removing Congress’s attempts to use the tax laws to influence people’s behavior), make it fairer (by eliminating the so-called “progressive” rate structure and instead taxing all incomes at the same, flat rate), and, perhaps, even replace it altogether, with a national sales tax – making it possible to eliminate the IRS and all the government apparatus needed to enforce the intrusive income-tax laws.

During the 2000 campaign George W. Bush took the courageous political stand of proposing a dialogue about Social Security privatization. Before he and several other Republicans broached the subject, most pundits regarded Social Security as the “third rail” in American politics – the kiss of death for any politician who even hinted at any kind of real reform in the program; but after Bush and other Republican politicians talked about it and survived (and in fact were elected), the issue finally became debatable.

Significantly, in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention this year, President Bush identified as a major part of his program for a second term the creation of what he called an “Ownership Society,” in which the American people are not dependent on government largess (which means, of course, dependent on government’s use of force to transfer wealth from those who create it to those whom the government deems “entitled” to it) but instead own their homes – and their retirement accounts. Bush’s partial privatization plan is quite modest compared to the thoroughgoing reform of Social Security done by the government of Chile several years ago (the Chilean experience being the best model for total Social Security privatization in a politically feasible form), but by introducing market features – and particularly the critical element of giving younger workers the option of investing a portion of their Social Security taxes in private accounts of their own choosing – the plan will help transform Social Security “as we know it.” That is, it would move away from the current system (which flies in the face of actuarial reality) and toward one, like Chile’s, in which each worker who pays taxes decides how to invest those taxes. Privatization, by encouraging people to be more self-responsible, is a necessary step toward the eventual abolition of Social Security and the full restoration of individual responsibility for our lives.

Another aspect of President Bush’s “Ownership Society” concerns health care. The new medical law Congress passed in December 2003 has both minuses and pluses – including a huge (and to libertarians, an obviously bad) negative with the expansion of Medicare coverage to include prescription drugs. Although virtually all media coverage and political commentary focused exclusively on this unfortunate feature of the new law, other provisions in the law – particular the expansion of heath savings accounts or medical savings accounts (HSAs and MSAs), as well as flexible spending accounts – mark an important shift away from socialized medicine and toward a free-market, patient-driven medical care system. Reforms such as MSAs pose real threats to Medicare socialism – which is why Democrats in Congress are so opposed to them. (Even a little bit of free-market competition can undermine government monopolies: consider school vouchers’ effect on the public-school monopoly, and why teachers’ unions and other defenders of government schooling are so adamantly opposed to vouchers or to other reforms giving poor parents real choices for their children’s schooling.)

Just as with the partial privatization of Social Security, the introduction into the medical care system of such market-oriented reforms will restore, at least partially, individual freedom and responsibility, helping preserve Americans’ freedom of choice of doctors, hospitals, therapies, and medications – and making it more difficult, politically, for Americans to accept a Canadian- or European-style “universal care” scheme that would deny them these freedoms. And as Madeline Cosman observed in her lecture at this summer’s Objectivist Center Summer Seminar (“Free Market, Patient-Centered Medicine”) MSAs and other market-oriented reforms in medical care not only help preserve the values of a free society – especially individuals’ self-responsibility and ownership of their own bodies – but also foster innovative achievement, integrity, and excellence in medicine itself.

Other areas where a second Bush term promises market-oriented reforms are in national energy and environmental policies. President Bush deserves credit for many of the things that his leftist critics have assailed him for: for example, for giving businesses that produce energy a greater voice in shaping national policy than radical environmentalists who oppose it; or for rejecting the Kyoto treaty’s accords on global warming, which are based on “junk science” theories and the implementation of which would be disastrous to the American economy.

Yet another area where incremental change, in the right direction, is absolutely crucial, for the future of liberty and of limited government in America, is in the legal system, including legal reform and the composition of the federal judiciary and particularly the U.S. Supreme Court.

One important change desperately needed in the American legal system is reform of tort law, the abuse of which has devastated American businesses (including professions such as medicine, where skyrocketing medical malpractice insurance costs have pushed many doctors out of practice in a number of states). Many of the most urgently-needed reforms must be made at the state level, where the substantive law of torts may be changed by legislative action, to correct the injustice of the current system which tends to make defendants liable not because of fault but simply because they have deeper pockets than the plaintiffs. At the federal level, among the most urgently-needed reforms – supported by President Bush and the Republicans in Congress but adamantly opposed by the trial-lawyer lobby and the Democrats who represent them – are changes in the federal law of civil procedure, to limit the availability of class-action suits, which have become vehicles for injustice (and the enrichment of savvy forum-shopping plaintiffs’ attorneys).

As for the federal judiciary, most Court watchers agree that the president elected in 2004 will appoint at least one new justice to the Court. The current nine justices on the Court have been together since 1994 – longer than any other Court in U.S. history. Indeed, the next president is likely to appoint a new head for the Court, for Chief Justice Rehnquist, who recently turned 80 years old, has been on the Court since 1973 and has been Chief since 1986. Currently it’s only a precarious five-justice majority on the Supreme Court that recognizes the fundamental feature of the U.S. Constitution: that it creates a national government of limited powers, enumerated in the Constitution. In the Court’s most critically important decision of the past half-century, in United States v. Lopez (1995), those five justices held that Congress did not have unlimited powers, under the rubric of the Commerce Clause, to control all aspects of Americans’ lives, against the four “liberal” justices in the majority who, remarkably, held that Congress did have such plenary power. As I have written (see my essay on “Interpreting the Constitution Contextually”), the ideal new justice for the Court would not only follow the reasoning of the majority in Lopez (and particularly the approach of Justice Thomas’s concurring opinion, which recognized the importance of the Tenth Amendment as a limit on Congressional power) but also would take a broad, libertarian view of rights protected under the Constitution. Neither jurisprudential “conservatives” nor “liberals” are fully consistent in upholding all the Constitution’s provisions; but if faced with a choice between “conservative” justices (who at least recognize limits on federal powers) and “liberals” (who do not), clearly it’s vitally important to increase the majority of justices who’d take the correct position in cases like Lopez.

In sum, with George W. Bush in his second term as president, and with real Republican majorities in Congress, there’s a good chance that the following pro-liberty reform measures will be adopted:

2) market-oriented reforms in our health-care system, including HSAs and MSAs, to strengthen individual self-responsibility and help move away from socialized medicine and toward a free-market, patient-driven system

3) permanent reductions in federal tax, particularly the tax rates on capital gains and dividend income

4) reforms in the federal income tax, including simplification and further reductions in rates, as well as the possibility of replacing it altogether with a national sales tax

5) common-sense national energy policies that would emphasize exploitation of our natural resources (including drilling for oil in Alaska’s bountiful reserves) over the irrational demands of radical environmentalists

6) reforms in the legal system to prevent abuse of the tort laws and class-action litigation

7) the appointment of new justices on the Supreme Court who will recognize and enforce constitutional limits on federal government powers

With John Kerry as president, there’s virtually no chance that any of the above reforms will take place. (Indeed, one of the few issues on which Kerry has taken a clear, consistent position is his refusal to consider any reform of Social Security: he adamantly opposes privatization. It’s equally clear that a Kerry administration would oppose any attempt to infuse market principles into the health care system or any attempt seriously to reform federal income taxes.) Even if real Republicans hold a majority in both houses of Congress, Kerry could use his presidential veto – as Clinton did – to thwart reform.

For a minimal-government libertarian like myself, the Libertarian Party and its candidates have not been viable choices, at least not since the 1980 election. (Ed Clark, the LP’s candidate in 1980, was both a principled libertarian and a pragmatist who knew how to package the libertarian message in a form acceptable to mainstream audiences: he knew, for example, that he couldn’t talk to seniors about abolishing Social Security or to anxious parents about decriminalizing hard drugs. Not surprisingly, Clark was the most successful LP presidential candidate, with his one million votes in 1980 – a record yet to be matched by the party in subsequent years. Ron Paul, perhaps the best LP presidential candidate since 1980, is a fine Congressman but wasn’t qualified to be president; Harry Browne, the LP candidate in 2000, was better at promoting himself than at promoting libertarianism.)

The problem with the LP itself is that it continues to define itself fundamentally in terms of the party’s membership pledge, which requires one to renounce force altogether as a social tool – a pledge that excludes conscientious minimal-government libertarians like myself. (What makes government necessary and legitimate is the need to use force – indeed, to initiate the use of force – in certain contexts, in order to secure individual rights. See, for example, the Declaration of Independence and John Locke’s Second Treatise on Government. The LP’s membership pledge requires one to be an anarchist, to reject legitimate exercises of governmental power such as taxation or the subpoena power. As former LP vice-presidential candidate Nancy Lord put it in a debate over the party’s membership pledge several years ago, the pledge excludes people whose political views accord with those of Thomas Jefferson, Ayn Rand, or Milton Friedman.)

The LP’s presidential candidate this year, Michael Badnarik, is particularly flawed. The libertarian publication Liberty magazine, not surprisingly, offers the most complete coverage of the LP and its national conventions. In a revealing article written by Liberty editor Bill Bradford in the August issue (“Dark Horse on the Third Ballot”), Badnarik is described as a man “who willfully refused to file his federal tax return for years, refused to get a driver’s license but continued to drive his car despite having been ticketed so many times that he couldn’t recall the exact number, proposed to blow up the United Nations building, wanted to force criminals in prisons to stay in bed until their muscles atrophied, and planned to force Congress to take a `special version’ of his class on the Constitution.” Remarkably, Bradford reports, “the overwhelming majority of delegates” at the LP national convention didn’t know any of this about their nominee. That’s perhaps not all that surprising, considering the LP’s open system that allows almost anyone to run and makes it quite feasible for a darkhorse candidate like Badnarik to win when equal support for two more popular candidates cancels them out, which is what happened this year. In past years the LP has come close to nominating anti-tax anarchist nuts (believers in the false ideas that the Sixteenth Amendment is not legitimate and that federal tax laws do not require anyone to pay income taxes); this year, unfortunately, it succeeded. Moreover, as the interview with Badnarik in the same issue of Liberty demonstrates, although he purports to be an “expert” on the Constitution, he has no training in law or history (indeed, he doesn’t even have a college degree), misunderstands the Supreme Court’s famous 1803 decision in Marbury v. Madison and the principle of judicial review (the most important distinguishing feature of American constitutionalism), and doesn’t understand how the principle of separation of church and state relates to the First Amendment religion clause. (Probably neither Bush nor Kerry understand the latter point, either, but neither purports to be a constitutional expert.)

To be taken seriously as a third party, the LP needs to abandon its anarchist principles and instead embrace pragmatic limited-government policies. It also needs to stop nominating nuts like Badnarik as its candidates. Someone who does not take seriously the rule of law is not qualified to run as a candidate for President of the United States, whose chief power (and duty) under the Constitution is to see that the laws are faithfully executed.

As a lifelong Republican (well, at least since 1964, when I at age 8 was an enthusiastic supporter of Barry Goldwater’s presidential candidacy) and a Jeffersonian optimist, I continue to hope that the Republican Party – the last remaining true descendent of Jefferson’s Republican party (for the modern Democratic party has betrayed its radical Jeffersonian/Jacksonian roots) – is the best vehicle for advancing libertarianism. As I suggested above, that requires compromise (not compromise on essential principles but a willingness to support incremental changes) as well as a willingness to form alliances with non-libertarians to achieve political success on particular issues (like tax reform) where such alliances are possible without compromising principle. (That includes forming alliances with social/religious conservatives, who in many ways are more naturally the allies of libertarians than so-called “moderates” who really ought to leave the Republican party and instead join the Democrats, the party of the regulatory/welfare state.) As a historian, I also believe that the United States is long overdue for a realignment of the two major political parties; that the Democratic party (given temporarily renewed life by Clinton’s “centrist” politics that co-opted Republican free-market policies like free trade and welfare reform) is doomed to extinction because of its embrace of failed welfare-state policies; and that in the two new major parties that emerge from the realignment, limited-government conservatives and libertarians will join in the new Republican party while the “moderate” paternalists from both parties will join in creating a new party on Democrat remains.

In a February 1963 article, “The Lesser of Two Evils,” reprinted in the September 2004 issue of The Freeman: Ideas on Liberty, Leonard Read (the founder of the Foundation for Economic Education) maintained that it was irresponsible to vote for one of the major party candidates when both were “trimmers.” He defined a trimmer as “one who changes his opinions and policies to suit the occasion,” “any candidate whose position on issues depends solely on what he thinks will have most voter appeal,” and someone who “ignores the dictates of his own higher conscience, trims his personal idea of what is morally right, tailors his stand to the popular fancy,” and generally sacrifices integrity to expediency.

To anyone who has been following the Bush vs. Kerry presidential race, it is obvious that John Kerry is a trimmer but that George W. Bush is not. Kerry is a leftist masquerading as a centrist, willing to take any political stance that the Democrats’ consultants tell him will score points against President Bush and the Republicans. President Bush, for all his faults, is the real deal.

I’ll reiterate what I said about my reasons for selecting George W. Bush over his Democratic opponent, Al Gore, in 2000: for again this year, I’m choosing Bush, not because he’s the lesser of two evils, but because his principal opponent, the Democrats’ candidate, is the evil of two lessers!

Pulling in the Coalition for BUSH in 2004! This is a great summary of why we need to have President BUSH Re-Elected. This is a great argument for Libertarians to consider, but it also is a better explanation of why Republicans and people of faith and supporters of Constitutional Government, rule of Law, etc. all need to pull together as a Coalition to support our President, GEORGE W. BUSH.

"David N. Mayer, Professor of Law and History at Capital University Law School in Ohio, has posted his own compelling case for the re-election of George W. Bush, also on libertarian grounds. Very much worth reading and digesting."

-- Robert James Bidinotto

I agree 100%. Check out the following open letter to Libertarians as it is also a great explanation of why all conservatives, Libertarians, People of Faith, Women Voters, Men Voters, Others, need to vote for George W. Bush.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1258905/posts

Joy! ([: ^ )

RamS

Actually, the areticle was written by a Libertarian who knows what a Treasonous Traitor John F. Kerry has been and will be in the future if ever given a position of real power.

Kerry demonstrated recently just how much contempt he has for our military when he jumped on the now highly questionable NYT/CBS Attack story concerning the Weapons stored at Al QuaQua. (SP??) His behavior demonstrates once again that his post Vietnam War activities (while still a commissioned US Navy Officer) was intentionally that of a Treasonous Traitor.

We do not want to see this great country turned over to such a person ever, much less during what the Most recent Terrorist Tape refers to as the "GLOBAL WAR ON AMERICA"

RamS

the areticle was written by a Libertarian

Yes, but recently there's been a rash of "libertarians for Bush" articles posted on FR. Many doubtless posted (if not written) by Bushies.

We do not want to see this great country turned over to [Kerry],

Yes, but even so, why are Bushies so desperately courting libertarians? After all, we're the guys who "hold conventions in phone booths." How can us ineffecutal "dopeheads" with a "0.0000001%" of the votes possibly affect the election's outcome?

Or are the Bushies suddenly realizing that we libertarians are more important than they gave us credit for?

There is actually a very significant "Libertarian Wing" of the Republican Party. They think that Bush is too big of a spender and that he is for too much government. However, they recognize that Kerry is EVIL. There is no honor in John Kerry and he must be defeated.

I am personally an "Incremental Libertarian" and did, in fact, run for State Representative as a Libertarian in 2000. I got my token 4.5% of the votes and went back to my seat!

I posted this article as well as another article by a Libertarian because I liked and appreciated their well thought out logic and I thought the content would be useful to other Libertarians who read Free Republic.

I am not a "Bushie" who is posting and the articles are most certainly not written by Bushies. You seem to be insulting Libertarians as people who must all think like Harry Brown rather than continuing to develop winning strategies to advance the ball. I personally believe that the Libertarians can do more to advance our causes such as Concealed Carry Rights by working as Lobbying Groups and using the Internet than we can do by LOSING Elections for President.

Also, while we are at it, I will admit that I personally was responsible for William Jefferson Clinton getting elected in 1992 since I voted for Perot, another 3rd party loser rather than voting for Bush 41 due to his Asset Forfeiture Law.

I don't intend to make that mistake again. That's why I am now most proudly a LIBERTARIAN FOR BUSH!

RamS

I don't intend to make that mistake again. That's why I am now most proudly a LIBERTARIAN FOR BUSH!

And I voted for Bush in 2000, and I don't intend to make that mistake again either.

My first presidential vote was for Ed Clark in 1980, but most of my votes over the years have been for the GOP. So I've already tried incrementalism. Been there, done that, didn't work.

(FWIW, I was asked by the California LP to run for assembly in 1992, but I declined.)

Fellow Libertarians should not vote with the party this year. "Libertarian" Michael Badnarik is a dangerous fraud. Badnarik--who is Lebanese and has taken tons of cash from the American Muslim Alliance (the group from which even Hillary returned the contributions!) has disturbing ties to supporters of Islamic terrorism. The Muslims are using the "Libertarian" label to hurt Bush. Badnarik is a total phony. Libertarians should not be fooled by this Wahhabist stooge!

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