tbone717
02-27-2012, 07:18 AM
I wanted to address a point that I am concerned about, particularly for newer folks that may have joined this movement sometime over the last five years. There are some here who are ready to burn the entire house down if Paul does not win the nomination. "Screw them all" is the mantra that some hold to. But I think what many do not understand is that it takes time to build coalitions, it takes time for our agenda to become part of the mainstream of thought, and it takes effort on our part to establish the conditions where we can be successful in what we are trying to accomplish. It has taken decades for our country to get in the shape we are in today. It has been 41 years since the Nixon Shock which eliminated the direct convertibility of the United States dollar to gold, 47 years since Johnson implemented the Great Society programs, 79 years since the implementation of the New Deal Programs, and 99 years since the institution of the Federal Reserve. We cannot expect that all of this monstrosity can be undone overnight. It takes time to change the political climate in this country, and we have been doing a nice job so far at getting there, but it will take a lot of work if we want to see things move forward.
I like sports analogies, and since the Daytona 500 will be run today (if it doesn't rain again) I will use that to illustrate. In order to win Daytona it takes a lot of planning, training, preparation and people. You need a great car, a skilled driver, a well trained pit crew, a knowledgeable crew chief, great teammates and quality equipment. One man doesn't simply hop into a car, floor it for 500 miles and win the race. If someone were to do so, their tires would blow out and they wouldn't finish.
Politics is much the same. If you want to see this country return to its founding principles of limited government and individual liberty, we need many people in place to help do the work for us. But we need to be cautious that we do not label everyone who doesn't agree with every single point we espouse as an enemy. There are many fine individuals that are in office, and that are running for office that can aid and assist us in getting to the place we want to be. This large, intrusive federal government did not happen overnight and we will not be able to undo it overnight either. It just won't happen, and anyone who thinks it can is delusional.
I am speaking primarily here about House and Senate candidates and elected officials. There is a tendency among some to hold everyone up to the standard of Ron Paul and if they fall short on even one point, then they are an enemy, they are evil, they are part of the establishment. But in reality they are not, they are our allies and they will be the people that will help move our agenda forward rather than us being relegated to the political desert like our friends in the Libertarian & Constitution Parties.
For example, the Fed is a major issue for us. It wasn't that many years ago when Paul would introduce a bill to audit the Fed that there would be no co-sponsors to the bill. But now, the issue has moved forward and he was actually able to get over 300 co-sponsors and the bill was brought to the floor for a vote in 2010. The bill failed to pass, but when you look at the roll call vote you will see that every single GOP member of the House voted for it. Yes, that's right - those "war mongering neo-cons" voted for a bill that we support. Why is that? Because while we may disagree with them on a lot of issues, there is also a lot of common ground. Who voted against it? The Democrats, including 117 of them that were co-sponsors but jumped shipped when it came time to vote. A few years ago it would be unthinkable that a Fed audit bill would even get out of committee, and last year it was brought to a vote. That is incrementalism in action.
I bring all this up because as we look at the 435 House races and the 33 Senate races are that in 2012, we need to be prudent in what we do as a movement. There are a lot of great libertarian-leaning candidates running in the primary elections. We should wholeheartedly support them. But what if they lose? What do we do when it comes to the general election? Do we dig our heels in the ground and say "we aren't voting for the lesser of two evils" when one of those candidates simply disagrees with us on a few issues? Do we cut off our nose to spite our face? That would be silly. Because if it wasn't for those "war mongering neo-cons" in the House, Paul's bill would have never seen the light of day. You have to ask yourself when it comes time to make that voting decision - is it better to have candidate A over candidate B? Who is the candidate that is more likely to advance our agenda as we move forward and incrementally change the culture in this country for the better?
The PA Senate race is a good example. There is a fine libertarian-leaning candidate running for the nomination, Marc Scargini. His positions are sound, and would fall right in line with the type of guy we are looking for. However, he has never ran for an elected office before, and he is currently polling in the low single digits. I'll vote for the guy in the primary, but the chances of him winning are nil. The winner will more than likely be Sam Rohrer. Now is Sam a died in the wool liberatarian? No, but he is a heck of an improvement over our current Senator, Bob Casey Jr. If an Audit the Fed bill moves to the Senate floor who is more likely to support it, Rohrer or Casey. The answer is simple. So while I would love to see Scargini win the Senate seat, is voting for Rohrer in the general election voting for the "lesser of two evils"? Not at all. While he many not support 100% of the issues that we do, he will likely be with us on 80%, where Casey has proven to vote with our side less than 20% of the time. Casey is our enemy, Rohrer will be our ally.
So whether the issue is regulation, tax reform, foreign policy or states rights - we need to be able to keep moving our agenda forward. And the way in which we do so is by creating allies in Congress. Finding people we can work with so that in the years down the road, we will find ourselves celebrating the fact that we no longer give trillions in foreign aid to other countries, that we no longer have bases all around the world, that we no longer have a massive tax system that cripples our country, that we no longer are under the burden of federal regulation. To get to this point it will take time, we will need to change the hearts and minds of the people of this country, and we can be successful at doing so. But we will fail if we take this all or nothing approach. That's what the LP and CP have done, and we all know they have had absolutely no effect on the national dialogue. If we want to move forward with this movement, we need to realize that this is not a sprint, but a long 500 mile race that requires many people and many elements working in our favor.
I like sports analogies, and since the Daytona 500 will be run today (if it doesn't rain again) I will use that to illustrate. In order to win Daytona it takes a lot of planning, training, preparation and people. You need a great car, a skilled driver, a well trained pit crew, a knowledgeable crew chief, great teammates and quality equipment. One man doesn't simply hop into a car, floor it for 500 miles and win the race. If someone were to do so, their tires would blow out and they wouldn't finish.
Politics is much the same. If you want to see this country return to its founding principles of limited government and individual liberty, we need many people in place to help do the work for us. But we need to be cautious that we do not label everyone who doesn't agree with every single point we espouse as an enemy. There are many fine individuals that are in office, and that are running for office that can aid and assist us in getting to the place we want to be. This large, intrusive federal government did not happen overnight and we will not be able to undo it overnight either. It just won't happen, and anyone who thinks it can is delusional.
I am speaking primarily here about House and Senate candidates and elected officials. There is a tendency among some to hold everyone up to the standard of Ron Paul and if they fall short on even one point, then they are an enemy, they are evil, they are part of the establishment. But in reality they are not, they are our allies and they will be the people that will help move our agenda forward rather than us being relegated to the political desert like our friends in the Libertarian & Constitution Parties.
For example, the Fed is a major issue for us. It wasn't that many years ago when Paul would introduce a bill to audit the Fed that there would be no co-sponsors to the bill. But now, the issue has moved forward and he was actually able to get over 300 co-sponsors and the bill was brought to the floor for a vote in 2010. The bill failed to pass, but when you look at the roll call vote you will see that every single GOP member of the House voted for it. Yes, that's right - those "war mongering neo-cons" voted for a bill that we support. Why is that? Because while we may disagree with them on a lot of issues, there is also a lot of common ground. Who voted against it? The Democrats, including 117 of them that were co-sponsors but jumped shipped when it came time to vote. A few years ago it would be unthinkable that a Fed audit bill would even get out of committee, and last year it was brought to a vote. That is incrementalism in action.
I bring all this up because as we look at the 435 House races and the 33 Senate races are that in 2012, we need to be prudent in what we do as a movement. There are a lot of great libertarian-leaning candidates running in the primary elections. We should wholeheartedly support them. But what if they lose? What do we do when it comes to the general election? Do we dig our heels in the ground and say "we aren't voting for the lesser of two evils" when one of those candidates simply disagrees with us on a few issues? Do we cut off our nose to spite our face? That would be silly. Because if it wasn't for those "war mongering neo-cons" in the House, Paul's bill would have never seen the light of day. You have to ask yourself when it comes time to make that voting decision - is it better to have candidate A over candidate B? Who is the candidate that is more likely to advance our agenda as we move forward and incrementally change the culture in this country for the better?
The PA Senate race is a good example. There is a fine libertarian-leaning candidate running for the nomination, Marc Scargini. His positions are sound, and would fall right in line with the type of guy we are looking for. However, he has never ran for an elected office before, and he is currently polling in the low single digits. I'll vote for the guy in the primary, but the chances of him winning are nil. The winner will more than likely be Sam Rohrer. Now is Sam a died in the wool liberatarian? No, but he is a heck of an improvement over our current Senator, Bob Casey Jr. If an Audit the Fed bill moves to the Senate floor who is more likely to support it, Rohrer or Casey. The answer is simple. So while I would love to see Scargini win the Senate seat, is voting for Rohrer in the general election voting for the "lesser of two evils"? Not at all. While he many not support 100% of the issues that we do, he will likely be with us on 80%, where Casey has proven to vote with our side less than 20% of the time. Casey is our enemy, Rohrer will be our ally.
So whether the issue is regulation, tax reform, foreign policy or states rights - we need to be able to keep moving our agenda forward. And the way in which we do so is by creating allies in Congress. Finding people we can work with so that in the years down the road, we will find ourselves celebrating the fact that we no longer give trillions in foreign aid to other countries, that we no longer have bases all around the world, that we no longer have a massive tax system that cripples our country, that we no longer are under the burden of federal regulation. To get to this point it will take time, we will need to change the hearts and minds of the people of this country, and we can be successful at doing so. But we will fail if we take this all or nothing approach. That's what the LP and CP have done, and we all know they have had absolutely no effect on the national dialogue. If we want to move forward with this movement, we need to realize that this is not a sprint, but a long 500 mile race that requires many people and many elements working in our favor.