tangent4ronpaul
01-09-2013, 05:51 PM
http://media.washtimes.com/media/community/viewpoint/entry/2013/01/07/Eric_Dondero_Ron_Paul_640_s640x427.jpg?73b8e216858 96c3f2859310aaa5adb253919b641
Asking Eric Dondero: Is Ron Paul libertarianism the GOP's future?
hxxp://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/conscience-realist/2013/jan/7/asking-eric-dondero-ron-paul-libertarianism-gops-f/
Joseph F. Cotto: Libertarianism is a philosophy with which most of us are familiar. Over the last several years, it has found serious support in the Republican Party. How did this come to pass?
Eric Dondero: Hard work by a bunch of libertarians who left the Libertarian Party and joined the GOP in the late 1980s and early 1990s. We formed a group called the Republican Liberty Caucus, starting in Florida. We started attending Young Republican conventions all over the country, Fla., the Carolinas, New England states like New Hampshire, California. We were rejected at first. Cast off as crazy "drug legalizers." But we scored some wins during the Republican Revolution of 1994, having done the shoe leather walking precincts work for some GOP congressman, and won grudging respect. By the late 1990s we were pretty much a welcomed, though not much respected, segment of the GOP coalition.
Cotto: Many political forecasters are saying that the future of the American center-right belongs to libertarians; specifically those of the Ron Paul variety. Do you share this view?
Dondero: No. Not of the Ron Paul variety. The Ron Paulists are in the doldrums right now. They lost all around. They've split up. The few left are flailing around, looking for something to latch onto. But the libertarian wing in general is doing well. It's the counter-Jihadist, pro-defense libertarians who are on the ascendance, those of us who align with the Tea Party folks on defense matters. The TEA-ers are uncomfortable with the Paulists. Always have been. But with us pro-defense libertarians, they find some comradeship, even if they still think we're crazy on drugs.
...
Cotto: National security is a subject on which libertarians are criticized due to their almost peacenik stances. From your standpoint, do libertarian Republicans differ from the stereotype?
Dondero: Yes. Absolutely. You must understand, our libertarian movement, specifically the Libertarian Party, was hijacked in the early to mid-1970s by a bunch of Peacenicks headed by Murray Rothbard, and Justin Raimondo publisher of AntiWar.com. They were extremely effective. So much so, that we pro-defense libertarians were sent out into the hinterlands. But we are the original libertarians. The libertarian movement in the 1960s before the Libertarian Party was stridently ant-Soviet, Ayn Rand, Barry Goldwater, even a young Californian named Dana Rohrabacher, who was Chairman of Libertarian Caucus of YAF in the late 1960s.
We pro-defensers are winning our movement back. We'd like to think its because of our wonderful activism. But in truth, it's just a matter of reality. Sharia Law is entirely inconsistent with libertarian beliefs. Simply put Islamists want to outlaw booze, jail marijuana smokers for life, hang gays from the nearest lamppost, and force our pretty wives and girlfriends to wear ugly black burkas from head to toe. Even the most diehard non-intervention Ron Paulist today will grudgingly admit that rising Islamism poses a threat to our personal liberties.
And surprise, surprise! We libertarians who oppose Islamism, end up siding with our friends in the Religious Right on this. Yes, we come about it from an entirely different direction, but we end up being in the same exact spot.
:rolleyes:
-t
Asking Eric Dondero: Is Ron Paul libertarianism the GOP's future?
hxxp://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/conscience-realist/2013/jan/7/asking-eric-dondero-ron-paul-libertarianism-gops-f/
Joseph F. Cotto: Libertarianism is a philosophy with which most of us are familiar. Over the last several years, it has found serious support in the Republican Party. How did this come to pass?
Eric Dondero: Hard work by a bunch of libertarians who left the Libertarian Party and joined the GOP in the late 1980s and early 1990s. We formed a group called the Republican Liberty Caucus, starting in Florida. We started attending Young Republican conventions all over the country, Fla., the Carolinas, New England states like New Hampshire, California. We were rejected at first. Cast off as crazy "drug legalizers." But we scored some wins during the Republican Revolution of 1994, having done the shoe leather walking precincts work for some GOP congressman, and won grudging respect. By the late 1990s we were pretty much a welcomed, though not much respected, segment of the GOP coalition.
Cotto: Many political forecasters are saying that the future of the American center-right belongs to libertarians; specifically those of the Ron Paul variety. Do you share this view?
Dondero: No. Not of the Ron Paul variety. The Ron Paulists are in the doldrums right now. They lost all around. They've split up. The few left are flailing around, looking for something to latch onto. But the libertarian wing in general is doing well. It's the counter-Jihadist, pro-defense libertarians who are on the ascendance, those of us who align with the Tea Party folks on defense matters. The TEA-ers are uncomfortable with the Paulists. Always have been. But with us pro-defense libertarians, they find some comradeship, even if they still think we're crazy on drugs.
...
Cotto: National security is a subject on which libertarians are criticized due to their almost peacenik stances. From your standpoint, do libertarian Republicans differ from the stereotype?
Dondero: Yes. Absolutely. You must understand, our libertarian movement, specifically the Libertarian Party, was hijacked in the early to mid-1970s by a bunch of Peacenicks headed by Murray Rothbard, and Justin Raimondo publisher of AntiWar.com. They were extremely effective. So much so, that we pro-defense libertarians were sent out into the hinterlands. But we are the original libertarians. The libertarian movement in the 1960s before the Libertarian Party was stridently ant-Soviet, Ayn Rand, Barry Goldwater, even a young Californian named Dana Rohrabacher, who was Chairman of Libertarian Caucus of YAF in the late 1960s.
We pro-defensers are winning our movement back. We'd like to think its because of our wonderful activism. But in truth, it's just a matter of reality. Sharia Law is entirely inconsistent with libertarian beliefs. Simply put Islamists want to outlaw booze, jail marijuana smokers for life, hang gays from the nearest lamppost, and force our pretty wives and girlfriends to wear ugly black burkas from head to toe. Even the most diehard non-intervention Ron Paulist today will grudgingly admit that rising Islamism poses a threat to our personal liberties.
And surprise, surprise! We libertarians who oppose Islamism, end up siding with our friends in the Religious Right on this. Yes, we come about it from an entirely different direction, but we end up being in the same exact spot.
:rolleyes:
-t