The problems with the Libertarian Party are almost to innumerable to do justice with a brief post. But let me try:
1) They make the perfect the enemy of the good;
2) They are unduly obsessed with drug legalization - to the extent that for a good portion of LP members, it appears to be the only bit of liberty they really care much about;
3) A good chunk of them (maybe a third or so) are anarchocapitalists in the Murray Rothbard mold who hold a philosophy that can ONLY work in a world where it is shared by 100% of the population;
4) They refuse to deal with the fact that until Libertarian Nirvana has descended upon us, nation-states DO exist, and therefore, such functions of the state as managing borders and providing a national defense are liberty-advancing, not liberty-diminishing activities;
5) They embroil themselves in interminable rambling debates on such wonderfully useful subjects as privatizing the military and the private ownership of nuclear weapons;
6) Too many of them fail to understand that there are some areas of public policy (e.g., abortion and the death penalty) with respect to which a libertarian framework of analysis simply isn't dispositive. That is, libertarians can properly take either view depending upon their personal and religious views.
7) Lots of them smell bad.
LNGOP'r
WORD