[Lnc-business] Additional verification of Nov 2014 Libertarian electoral wins

Tue Nov 25 04:57:27 EST 2014

    Einstein famously defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results this time.  The majority of the activists in our party, including most of the members of LNC, are insane by his definition.  For 43 years, you have insisted that the main purpose of our party should be to elect a majority of libertarians to office, and then change the world for the better.
    And, for 43 years, we have run more and more candidates for more and more offices.  Over and over again, we say "this time it will be different" because we will be more professional, or we have published a new pamphlet, or we have a training program for candidates, or we have a new national headquarters office,  or....  This time, many of our hundreds of candidates campaigned really hard ,a lot of people were exposed to a lot of good ideas about liberty, and, together, they may have received more than a million votes. 
     But Scott gave us a reality check:  all that effort, money, and time produced one minor office won by a decision of the voters. Not exactly an indication of overwhelming success.  Remember that the Republican Party elected Lincoln as President less than six years after they formed. 
    So, let's put our thinking caps on and figure out what we can do differently next time to ensure that we will win a majority. (remember, there are local elections in many places next spring)  We've got to do that, because nobody else is crazy enough to do it for us.  Besides, we have a reputation to uphold. Or, would any of you be willing to consider, even briefly, a more rational paradigm?
    What if we chose our main purpose as making the world better NOW by promoting liberty NOW and influencing the people who are in office NOW and who will get elected next time? (thank you Sharon Harris)  This would not abandon running candidates for office, because that is an effective way to promote liberty and influence politicians.  But winning should not be our main goal, changing the world for the better NOW should be.
    Ron Paul and Gary Johnson showed us that the most effective way for libertarians to get votes is to run as a Republican or Democrat.  They both got elected to high offices by running as Republicans.  It is a legal, moral, and sensible thing to do.  You just fill out a form for the government, there is no statement of principles or pledge of non-violence.  The platforms of both parties contain many positions that are similar to ours.  I personally have gone to many state and one national convention as a delegate for the Republicans while holding true to my libertarian principles.  I helped rewrite their platforms with a more libertarian bent.
    Here's an approach I have been promoting for many years.  Its just one of many things that we can do to promote liberty NOW.
  Wherever it is permissible, state Libertarian parties should arrange to choose their candidates in conventions held after the primaries, but before the deadline for the general election.  The Libertarian party would not participate in the primary, but many of their candidates would run as Democrats of Republicans.
    In our nominating conventions, we would place our best demonstrated vote getters into the most important close races where they would be a spoiler threat.  We would also nominate a candidate (even if they are only a placeholder) in races where one of the major parties is missing. (If one of our candidates accidentally won another party's nomination, we would leave them in place and not run a candidate against them)
    Our candidates would approach both of their opponents with this negotiation:  

    "You have my sympathies. (I feel your pain)  It looks like you are facing a really tough race, with the polls, or the primary results showing you in a dead heat (or whatever) with so and so.  As the Libertarian candidate, I am unlikely to win this three way race, but I don't need to.  I just need to receive three percent of the votes to maintain our ballot access, or I just want to get my ideas about liberty before the voters (or whatever motivation they have) 
     I demonstrated that I could draw seven percent of the total votes in the primaries, but I don't care whether my three percent in the general comes from Republican or Democratic voters.  My libertarian platform contains all the good issues from the Republican and the Democrats. I could target my campaign to focus on out gunning the Republicans on the Second amendment or out smoking the Democrats on legalization (substitute other issues as appropriate)  I could get what I need by emphasizing either side of my platform.
    You can help me choose my campaign focus by looking at this list, and see if you can help my party.  By the way, in fairness, I will make the same offer to your opponent.  Whichever one of you offers the most cooperation with us will receive the most cooperation from me. Whatever my choice, I will not ignore the other issues, just downplay them."

    The wish list should contain 6-10 items, with the first ones extremely easy to go along with and even the strongest ones should not expect either side to go against their principles.  They would include things like helping our candidates be included in debates, easing the rules for ballot access by third parties, and appointing libertarians to advisory boards and minor position.  None of them should even hint at being unethical.
    At first, we may not have much control over where our votes come from, because what we say in our campaigns gets so little attention, but it is not effect, rather the perception of effect that we are striving for.  No matter who wins, tell both sides afterwards that we helped them to win or loose by the way we slanted our campaign.  Even if the winner said "no" to our whole list, tell them that they said "no" politely, while the looser said "Hell, no!!!"  Obviously, we shouldn't tell either side what our decision was (or even if we actually made one).  Even if our choice to slant in favor of the looser is known,  we can claim that they would have lost by more points without our help.
    If many of our candidates practice this approach, after a few elections, we will be able to get both sides offering to sponsor libertarian bills to earn our cooperation.  The winners will still be Republicans and Democrats, but freedom will have more influence.  The alternative is more of the status quo, with the winners being Republicans and Democrats, and liberty having no influence.
    This plan is not unethical.  Most politicians believe that we are spoiling some races and we are just encouraging that belief for the benefit of liberty.  All of our candidates will make many mistakes during the campaign.  No matter what they actually said, they can always claim afterwards that they could have made any statement stronger or weaker to help or hurt the other side, but they said what they intended to say.

Ron Windeler
rowindeler at aol.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Scott L. <scott73 at earthlink.net>
To: lnc-business <lnc-business at lp.org>
Sent: Mon, Nov 24, 2014 8:48 am
Subject: [Lnc-business] Additional verification of Nov 2014 Libertarian electoral wins

The name of the article says it all.

Is this a good result for a political party that has beenin existence for 43 years?

   http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2014/11/libertarians-won-8-partisan-elections-on-114-but-all-but-1-were-by-default/

     Scott Lieberman

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