The Paucity of Hope? What to Learn for the Next 4 Years
Author's Note: Though relevant as ever, I wrote this right after the election in November, but it has not been posted till now because I was expecting Leonard to do it . I'll give him the benefit of the doubt; his cats probably scratched up his ethernet cables. Oh well, if you want something done well (or at all) you've got to do it yourself, and it's about time for me to get a user name for RichmondLiberty ;-)
[Publisher's Note: Mr. Morrison is correct, If you want a job right, do it yourself ;-) My only excuse is that life has been interfering and I haven't been able to devote the necessary time to this site. So let me take this time to ask for help. We need writers and editors and can find something for just about anyone.]
The performance on Tuesday was certainly disappointing. While the Libertarian Party would have done several times better if Ron Paul had decided to become the nominee, this election has convinced me that the LP needs to focus on lower level races to have any relevancy. In other words, let’s just run one statewide candidate once in a while to gain ballot access, and mostly run for local office and a few state legislature positions. When volunteering on Election Day, some Democrats told me we ought to build from the bottom up if we want to gain relevancy, and I agree. I mean just look at what the Vermont Progressive Party has done – they have gained six seats in the state legislature and on Tuesday their candidate for governor finished ahead of the Democrat. Personally I think there are too many inflated egos in the LP (hence the runs for higher office) as well as an obsession with gaining automatic ballot access, which is justified, but the number of times we try to achieve it is overkill. In Virginia for instance, four years ago we almost won the Virginia Beach mayoral election in a three way, partisan race. My good friend Matt Beato almost won a City Council seat in Williamsburg and ought to get it a year and a half from now if he decides to run again. Also we could try to convince some current independent county supervisors around the state to come over to the LP. County boards of supervisors are usually partisan but despite this independents can often find success. This sort of local strategy is basic common sense party building we still need to do. On the presidential level, I wouldn’t be upset if the LP got behind a solid generic third party candidate next time around (perhaps from the Modern Whigs???) If that's not allowed then I'm rooting for Steve Kubby, but let’s stop bickering over how many Ayn Rand books our nominees should have read and focus on running like hell on the local level! If you can’t get at least one volunteer at half the precincts on election day, that probably shows you’re running for too high an office – we just don’t have the resources, so let’s not waste time on fantasy races.