Libertarians are Enemies of GOP -- With Good Reason -- says Sci-Fi Author

The Libertarian Alternative ^ | L. Neil Smith

[Commie Basher]

L. Neil Smith was the Arizona Libertarian Party's presidential candidate in 2000. Smith ran against Harry Browne in the primary, and the Arizona LP refused to go with the national party's endorsement of Browne.

[RJCogburn]

I have libertarian sympathies, to say the least, but Smith is a bit hyperbolic here.

[Uncle Miltie]

Senator Cantwell (D-WA) , Senator Johnson (D-SD) and many other tax and spend socialists owe their narrow elections to Libertarian candidates. I sure hope the Libertarians enjoyed the Senate run by Tommy Daschle, for they caused it.

[RWG]

I first heard about loserterians when their only talking point was that government doesn't work. Problem with this proposition is that government works and works good. Problem with this fact is that it works good for those who own it. No chance that loserterians will ever come close to making the government the property of the electorate ever again.

[mamelukesabre]

I thought the libertarians were stealing votes from the democrats.

[11B3]

I wouldn't characterize the losertarians as 'masturbatory' as much as I would 'politically transgendered' or 'nationalistically neutered'. They're not only enemies of the GOP, but of America in general. Giving us back our Constitution is a cause that all of us should embrace, but the pacifism is too far out of touch with current world events. If the US would follow the advice of the LP, we'd be screwed, big time.

[Commie Basher]

I sure hope the Libertarians enjoyed the Senate run by Tommy Daschle

I am told that control of the Senate shifted from Republican to Democrats in 2001. I am told this, so it must be so. I would not have known this otherwise, since the Senate's behavior didn't change.

I guess I "enjoyed" Daschle's Senate the same as I "enjoyed" Lott's Senate, or Dole's Senate. Sure felt the same.

[RJCogburn]

they caused it.

You and others give the Libertarians too much credit. The failure of Republicans in those elections to get more people motivated enough to vote is the cause. The Libertarians like to give themselves credit as being the 'difference' in elections but that is usually not the care, IMO. Even in SD, the LP candidate said that LP voters split evenly if limited to the R or D candidates.

[TopQuark]

And then he wonders why Medved calls their efforst "masturbatory." In this whole article he managed to say --- nothing.

But, if I say that they are against everything and are not for anything, the libertarians will become indignant and offended.

[x]

The best is the enemy of the good. That is, unfulfillable demands make positive, realistic goals harder to achieve. Throw open the doors to drugs, porn, prostitution, and abortion, and the result won't be a society that can maintain its freedom for very long.

[boris]

"Dornan was bitterly complaining that he'd lost the election because there was a Libertarian Party candidate running against him, depriving him of votes"

Dornan lost because of massive voter fraud--and massive illegal-immigrant voting.

As Smith--and Dornan must certainly know.

--Boris

[Steven W.]

what hurts is when Losertarians vote for dead people or somebody (in this past election) who had already dropped out of the race, rather than help a good Republican like Thune against a DemoncRAT of the likes of Johnson.

[Conservative til I die]

This is what I've never gotten about some of the Kool-Aid Republicans here (I'm a Republican myself). Why do they think Libertarian votes are somehow rightfully GOP votes that somehow have been hijacked? Libertarians BY DEFINITION are not Republicans. Libertarian voters BY DEFINITION are not Republican voters.

[Joe Bonforte]

Problem with this proposition is that government works and works good.

Well, here's evidence that at least part of the government (public schools) do not work well.

[Conservative til I die]

Let me add on to my last comment on Kool-Aid Republicans, the article is a bunch of crap.

[Kevin Curry]

Libertarian voters BY DEFINITION are not Republican voters.

Libertarian voters BY DEMONSTRATION are not conservative voters either.

They have helped to put three liberal democrats into the Senate: Cantwell, Reid, and Johnson. And they are proud of it.

[TheLion]

Well, just maybe, Republicans might have gotten some of these things done....except for the commie media and something called the DemocRat party, both huge roadblocks. It has been a struggle just to combat the massive voter fraud by the Rats. I haven't heard anything from a libertarian yet that makes much sense. Its like talking to a liberal.

[Conservative til I die]

No, they owe their victories to the fact that they got more votes than the Republican opponents. I wasn't aware that this country was legally a two-party system, with Green and Socialist votes going to the Democrats, and Libertarian and Constitution votes going to the Republican. Why don't we stop calling them hijacked votes! Why don't we just assign third party votes to the major party they most resemble!?!? Hell, why don't we just outlaw third parties outright. Some Republicans I think would be happy if we could outlaw the Democratic Party too, and have a system closer to Iraq's.

[Dominic Harr]

If Ls should back Rs when the L can't win, then R's should likewise back Ds when the R can't win, n'est pas?

Same logic holds . . .

If voting for a 3rd party candidate is a 'waste' of a vote because "they can't win", then is it ia 'waste' of a vote to vote for an R in a race where the D is certain to win?

Or perhaps -- both 'theories' are bunk?

[Revolting cat!]

Can we talk? (Doing my best Joan Rivers imitation here.)

I think the Libertarians are silly. That out of the way, lemme say than even sillier than the Libertarians is the constipated notion of a two party system where life long stalinists like Hillary Clinton are welcome with open arms into one of the parties (doesn't matter which, really,) allowing all of us to pretend that she's a "Democrat" (or maybe "a Republican") and not a CPUSA candidate. The Libertarians will continue to be the spoilers until political parties in the United States stand for something instead of, to use a cliche, falling for anything. B!tch all you want about it, fact of life and the future elections.

As for the South Dakota fiasco two weeks ago, a FReeper on the scene (SoDak?) informed us afterwards that the Pubbie candidate lost not because of the Libertarian vote. but because 20,000 Republican voters, too clever by half, voted for the RAT, calculating that more free moolah will flow their way from DC if they have two RATS in a RAT controlled US Senate!