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#1 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 20 November 2002 - 02:46 AM


Libertarians believe that government should be limited to protecting the life, liberty, and property of each individual. It should not be empowered to influence our opinions, improve our moral character, or impose legal penalties on people who engage in immoral behavior that does not violate the rights others. Actions are virtuous only when they are freely chosen and that the improvement of character should be left to the voluntary sector of society.

#2 Bruce Klein

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Posted 20 November 2002 - 07:17 AM

Ehh, Ken..

How do you feel about the Libertarian Candidates taking away potential Republican votes when it's clear that of the two parties Libertarians lean more Rep. on most issues...

For example we just had a Gov.'s race in Alabama, my home state, where the margin of victory for the Rep. Candidate, Bob Riley, was just over 3,000 votes... You guys may have heard about this race.. but, our Libertarian candidate, John Sophocleus received 23,242 votes, or 2 percent of the vote total...

Would you not agree that those 23,242 votes cast for Sophocleus were really votes for the Democratic Candidate in that they took likely Republican votes away from the Republican candidate?

With the margin of victory so close across the country, maybe the Libertarians should somehow conceded elections on the day of the race that look hopeless in favor of giving those votes to a candidate that has at least a fighting chance of winning.

#3 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 20 November 2002 - 08:35 PM

Ehh, Ken..

How do you feel about the Libertarian Candidates taking away potential Republican votes when it's clear that of the two parties Libertarians lean more Rep. on most issues...


The quick response, Libertarian values are very distinct from both current major parties. I support Libertarians running, even if it takes potential votes away from the Republican party. I used to be a Republican. Anyway, this is really the quick response, I'll go into much greater detail in the future, hopefully the near future.


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#4 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 05:41 AM

How do you feel about the Libertarian Candidates taking away potential Republican votes when it's clear that of the two parties Libertarians lean more Rep. on most issues...



The federal government has gotten out of hand. It has abused at least three clauses of the Constitution in order to expand its powers beyond its intended limitations. These are:

(1) The "general welfare" phrase in Article I, Section 8.
(2) The commerce clause in Article I, Section 8.
(3) The due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment. Because I take the Tenth Amendment seriously, I cannot in good conscience vote Republican or Democrat. Each of the two most popular parties competes with the other to violate the Constitution more flagrantly. The Libertarian party, on the other hand, seeks to stop the abuse of the Constitution, and to confine the federal government to its proper functions.

How can I vote for the lesser of two evils when I have the opportunity to vote for good? Not that the Libertarian party is perfect; I do not necessarily agree with every plank of the Libertarian platform. But the basic principles of the Libertarian party are correct, while the basic principles of the two leading parties are corrupt.

You may object that we Libertarians waste our vote by throwing it away to a third party that cannot prevail, and siphon votes so a party of greater evil will win.

But I Always vote for principle, even though I may vote alone,
and I cherish the sweetest reflection that my
vote is never lost.

An unprincipled vote is the only wasted vote.


#5 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 06:03 AM

More later, B)

#6 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 01:28 PM

"Some men change their party for the sake of their principles; others their principles for the sake of their party."
- Winston Churchill

#7 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 01:39 PM

"Some men change their party for the sake of their principles; others their principles for the sake of their party."
- Winston Churchill

#8 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 01:58 PM

Everyone knows that the United States has a two-party system. Sure, there are other parties, but they can't possibly win, so to vote for a third-party candidate is to throw your vote away. Worse still, by not voting for one of the candidates who can win, you take a vote away from one of the legitimate candidates and potentially throw the election to the other one. The only practical thing to do, then, is to grit your teeth and vote for the lesser of the two evils, and try to make the best of a bad situation.

We hear this in every election and, superficially, it seems logical: Candidate A is bad, but Candidate B is worse. Most of the people who support the third-party candidate, Candidate X, would prefer A over B, so their votes for X take votes away from A. If enough people do this, they will split the vote opposed to B, ensuring B's victory. Simple.

In the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore and George W. Bush were the accepted candidates, bouncing up and down in the polls, making powerful and moving speeches in support of children and doing other typical politician things. Harry Browne was the Libertarian candidate, fairly well known on talk radio and on the Internet, while fighting an uphill battle to get noticed by the mainstream media. Conventional wisdom, when it noticed Browne at all, assumed that he would take votes away from Bush, assuring Gore's victory. People who made this argument generally considered Gore to be worse than Bush, so it's clear that voters who supported Browne were callous traitors who could give us four years of Al Gore when it was within their power to save us from this fate. If Gore was elected, it would be all our fault and we would have willfully sold the country down the river, we selfish bastards.

#9 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:02 PM

All of Browne's votes would come from Bush.

Why did we assume this? Did all of Ross Perot's votes in 1992 come from George Bush? It's commonly thought that they did. However, voter participation in 1992 went up by about ten million. It seems unlikely that all these people, who had not bothered to vote for Bush in 1988, now found him so inspiring that they decided to vote for his re-election. It seems more likely that almost all them went to Perot, meaning that about half of Perot's support came from new voters, and was not pulled from either major candidate. Perot probably did receive some votes that would otherwise have gone to Bush, but it's hard to imagine that Bush would have received 57% of the popular vote in the absence of Perot's candidacy. (In 1996, voter participation went down by ten million, and Perot received ten million fewer votes.)

In general, the more support a candidate has, the less likely it is that all his support is drawn from a single source. A candidate with very little support may have a narrowly defined constituency, but a candidate with very little support is less likely to make an impact anyway.

Libertarians, in particular, tend to draw support from both left and right.

In addition, nearly half of the voting-age population doesn't vote. That's a huge constituency -- far bigger than all the third-party voters combined -- available for anyone who can win their support, without taking a single vote away from any other candidate.

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 05 December 2003 - 09:24 PM.


#10 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:06 PM

Bush had first claim on these votes.

What made Bush the legitimate candidate, while Browne a mere pretender? Only the assumption that he was, which was used to prove that very point. It's hard to imagine a purer example of question-begging, not to mention a more elitist and condescending viewpoint.

A candidate can't "take votes away" from another candidate. The votes don't belong to the candidates...




...they belong to the voters.

#11 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:16 PM

The outcome of the election.

The obvious assumption was that Browne would carry the margin of victory, otherwise none of this would have ben worth worrying about. But this assumed that Bush would otherwise win, ignoring two other possibilities:
That Bush would win anyway.
That Bush would lose anyway.
These are not outrageous scenarios, particularly if Browne drew support not only from Bush, but also from Gore, Nader, Buchanan, and people who would otherwise not vote.

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 05 December 2003 - 09:24 PM.


#12 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:17 PM

Counter-balancing effects of votes for other candidates.

There were several other presidential candidates in the 2000 election: Pat Buchanan, Ralph Nader, John Hagelin, and a handful of others. Discussions of Browne's effect on the race tend to be based on the assumption of a three-way race, but that's an oversimplified view. Any votes Browne pulled from Bush could be counteracted, with respect to the two major candidates, by the votes that Nader pulled from Gore. Conversely, any votes that Browne pulled from Gore are balanced by the votes that Buchanan pulled from Bush. Votes that Browne pulled from potential non-voters, of course, have no effect on Gore's or Bush's totals.

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 05 December 2003 - 09:25 PM.


#13 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:19 PM

Your vote would make a difference for Bush, but not for Browne.

This one is actually fairly subtle. Your vote wouldn't help Browne win because it's an individual vote, and one vote wouldn't put Browne over the top. Very true. Then why would this pitiful little vote be so valuable to Candidate Bush? Because when we talk about Bush, the discussion shifts to the presumed effect of all Browne's votes in aggregate. Your vote has been magically transformed. No longer a single voter, you now control the hearts and minds (and voting levers) of Browne supporters everywhere. It's a heady feeling, and it might be a powerful argument if it made any sense. Unfortunately, though, your vote remains one vote, whether you vote for Bush, Browne, or anyone else.

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 05 December 2003 - 09:25 PM.


#14 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:25 PM

A vote is valuable only if cast for a winner.

What is the value of a losing vote? In part, it depends on how much you enjoy voting. But it also depends on how much support the candidate receives, and how readily this support can be translated into future party growth or influence over other parties or organizations. A candidate who carries the margin of victory in an election will carry a certain amount of clout with other parties, since to win those voters, the parties must try to accommodate those voters' views, or at least pretend to. All of which meant that Browne, if he doesn't was likely to have had the most positive influence if he did exactly what proponents of this argument fear -- if he swung the election.

The impact of a vote can extend beyond a given election. Ross Perot received 19% of the popular vote in 1992. He came in third. He didn't carry a single state. Yet his campaign has had a significant impact on American politics. Far from wasting their votes, his supporters made the federal budget deficit a major issue, at least for a while. Whatever else you might say about Perot, that's a noteworthy achievement. What did the Bush and Clinton supporters achieve?

But what do we accomplish by voting for the winner? He would have won anyway, and he doesn't get any bonus points for adding your vote to the pile. A losing candidate can benefit from a higher vote total -- through increased ballot access, a stronger constituency, and greater influence -- but a winning candidate gets nothing more at all.

It's also worth considering what it means to "win". The candidate you vote for may win the election, but if that candidate doesn't represent your views, or at least move things in the direction you want, what have you really won?

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 05 December 2003 - 09:26 PM.


#15 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:33 PM

Voting is a way of conveying information. A vote for a candidate announces that you prefer that candidate and support his positions. If you vote for one candidate merely to keep another one out of office, you're doing just as much for that candidate as his most enthusiastic supporter. A vote is a vote. By associating yourself with a lesser-of-two-evils, your vote gets lost in the noise. How can anyone possibly know what you want? Even if the candidates wanted to accomodate you, there's nothing in your vote that makes your views clear.

If you vote for the lesser of two evils, you ensure that what you consider evil will continue to win. It's easy to become desperate, to think that the best strategy is to get rid of the worse evil before trying to make things better. But by supporting a particular type of candidate, you create an incentive for similar candidates. If the major parties are successful doing what they've been doing, why on earth would they change? They have a winning strategy. There are always plenty more candidates waiting in line who are just as bad as the one you worked so hard to get rid of. And millions of other people are voting for the candidate you oppose because they consider him to be the lesser of two evils. And it's exactly the same in every election. Even when you succeed, things continue to get worse. And you don't always succeed.

If you want something, you have to let people know it. This is really the only reason to vote: to express what you believe. Voting against a candidate is not a belief, it's the lack of a belief. You can tell people what you don't want by simply staying home. It's rare enough to find a candidate you can honestly support. When you do, vote for him. Even if he doesn't win, you will have helped create a common bond -- and a constituency -- among people who aren't satisfied with the major parties. At the very least, you'll know that other people are on your side, and you may be taking the first steps toward real reform.

Seems to me that's worth it.

#16 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:41 PM

The biggest objection by allies to voting for a Third Party is the "wasted vote" argument, the idea that if you vote for someone who will not win, then the vote does not count. Join any third party and merely suggest that another person consider voting for a third party candidate and you will hear, ad nauseum, "I don't want to waste my vote." What is a Wasted Vote? An unprincipled vote is the only wasted vote.

Voting for a third party, contrary to popular belief, is not a wasted vote. What is voting? It's a chance to tell the country, and perhaps even the world, what your vision of government and society really is.

But how do most of us vote? Do the majority of those who believe in a third party as the best candidate, most in tune with our own feelings, actually vote for them? No. Instead, most of us vote the "lesser of two evils" -- a defensive vote, rather than an offensive one. The lesser of two evils is still evil.

So what happens after you vote the defensive vote? Well, then you have sold out your personal beliefs. You have become a political prostitute. You aren't standing up for what you believe in by voting "the lesser of two evils". I don't know about you, but I'm tired of being a political hooker.

If you think the Republican or the Democrat really does best mirror your beliefs, by all means, vote for that candidate. But if you don't, and you still vote for them, you're helping to preserve the status quo you probably despise.

Remember, You Never Decide the Winner in any race (larger than city council races), there is a single important point to remember: You as an individual will never cast the deciding ballot! Hence there is no reason to vote for the lesser evil.

Most of the time we hear the wasted vote argument most in precisely the races where it applies least. For instance, the Presidency of the United States. A Presidential race will never be decided by one vote. And if, by some mathematical chance it got that close, it would be decided politically by Congress.

If you go to the polls to cast the deciding ballot in major races and you value your life, you are making an irrational decision. The chances of dying en route in a car, plane or meteor accident are far greater than the chance of casting the deciding ballot. So What's the Point of Voting? We as individuals don't vote to select the winner. As a practical matter, we vote to tell everyone else which choice best represents the direction which we want the country to go. When you vote, you gain a certain power that a non-voter doesn't have; the power to change America. Hence voting lesser evil sends the wrong message; it's sending a message of compromise. In effect, a defensive vote says "I will settle for a good America, not the best America possible."

I urge you not to settle. Remember, if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten. In other words, if you want change, then create change. Even if once in your life you missed the chance to cast that mythical deciding ballot, the harm from selecting the wrong person in one election is more than offset by a lifetime of giving voter support to the lesser of two evils rather than standing up for what you believe.

The history of third parties in America is that they serve as the vanguard for new ideas. It is these ideas that make the world go round. If a Third Party begins to draw votes, one or both of the two big parties steal their ideas.

Socialists Can Teach Us Something The most successful third party in the 20th Century was the Socialist Party. While never winning any significant elections, their small but growing vote totals were a threat to the Democrats. Thus the Democrats, and then later the Republicans, adopted piecemeal every major tenet of the 1916 Socialist Party platform.

Libertarians are the opposite of the Socialists, but they find their success instructive. The radical ideas about liberty that began 200 years ago are now being seriously debated or, in some cases, implemented by the other parties. An increasing number of Libertarian votes is indeed noted by the politicians as well as the media. So rather than waste your vote on Democrats or Republicans, cast a meaningful ballot that clearly says what you believe.

#17 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 02:47 PM

How do you feel about the Libertarian Candidates taking away potential Republican votes when it's clear that of the two parties Libertarians lean more Rep. on most issues...


If you want a smaller government and lower taxes, you certainly won't get either by voting Democrat or Republican.


#18 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 03:07 PM

Your vote will be as clear as mud. if you waste it on any Republican or Democratic candidates.

If you vote for either of the status quo parties, the message you're sending will be as clear as M.U.D. Murky, Useless, and Disregarded. No one will know what you're really voting for, or what point you want to make.

The bottom line: A vote for a Republican or Democrat is a W.A.S.T.E.D. vote -- Worthless, Ambiguous, Squandered, Trite, Emasculated, and Disregarded.

Which is more of a waste? Voting for one of two popular, yet nearly identical candidates that you dislike? Or voting for a candidate that you agree with? How is voting for what you want more of a wasted vote than voting for what you don't want?

Unless you're just placing a bet, the idea is not to pick the winner; the goal is to vote for who you agree with the most. The point of voting is to have your say and voice your opinion to try to get what you want. You'll never get what you want by voting against what you want.

When you vote, you're not voting for who you think is going to win, you vote for who best represents your beliefs. A wasted vote is voting for someone who says one thing and does another. If you want a smaller government and lower taxes, you certainly won't get either by voting Democrat or Republican.

The swing vote forces the dominant parties to listen to, and conform to, your beliefs. It's a way of voicing your opinion that you're entirely fed up with both Democrats and Republicans.

#19 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 03:09 PM

Either the government is in chains, or the people are in chains. Today, the government is no longer in chains, so that means you-know-who is.

#20 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 21 November 2002 - 03:23 PM

It seems that whenever I have ever suggested to somebody that I might be voting for a third party candidate, I have experienced the rolling of eyes, and some rude comment meant to impugn my intelligence.

Some of us allow ourselves to be bullied into choosing "the lesser of two evils" - the Democrat or the Republican. The truth is, most of the arguments against third parties are based on popular myths or outright lies.

My purpose here is not promote any one "third" party. It is not an argument for going Green, or Libertarian, or Reform, or whatever. It is meant to call into question your loyalty to the major parties, and how well they represent your views.

The first thing most people will tell you when you say you're voting for a "third" party candidate is that you are "wasting your vote."

But how can voting for the candidate you most closely identify with be a wasted vote? Isn't compromising your beliefs on important issues really the wasted vote? Isn't settling for second best, or the lesser of two evils really the wasted vote?

The point of having a representative democracy is for each citizen to be able to effect the future of their community. Elections are the main mechanism for "we the people" to tell our representatives how we feel.

It is vitally important that when we make that statement, it is accurate. Sending the wrong message by compromising your vote lessens your ability to influence the direction of public policy.

Again, I ask you, which is the wasted vote - A vote for a major party candidate you despise because you despise the other guy a little bit more - or - A vote for a candidate who says what you'd say if you were running for office?


If we are to have leaders who truly represent us, we have to be willing to stand up for what we believe in, and not be afraid to make some unpopular statements.


Many of us who have voted for third party candidates have been unfairly blamed for electing the candidate we would least like to see in office.

The [il]logic goes like this: "If you vote Green, you're taking votes away from the Democrat, and helping the Republican win. If you vote Libertarian, you're taking votes away from the Republican and helping the Democrat."

If you assume that my "third" party vote is taking away from the Democrats or Republicans, you're assuming that those two parties somehow have a right to my vote. They do not.

My "third" party vote does not come from either major party, it comes from me.

#21 thefirstimmortal

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Posted 26 November 2002 - 03:46 AM

This past Saturday in The New York Times, John J. Miller condemned Libertarians for taking votes away from Republicans and allowing Democrats to win important elections. His article is at http://www.nytimes.c...ion/16MILL.html

He cited three recent U.S. Senate races in which Libertarian candidates won more votes than the margin of victory for the Democrats. And he said: ...Libertarians are now serving, in effect, as Democratic Party operatives. The next time they wonder why the Bush tax cuts aren't permanent, why Social Security isn't personalized and why there aren't more school-choice pilot programs for low-income kids, all they have to do is look in the mirror.

Perhaps it never occurred to him that Libertarians are more interested in reducing government than in "Bush tax cuts" that simply redistribute the burden of ever-growing big government. Libertarians want complete freedom from a bankrupt, compulsory retirement scheme -- not some campaign-pledge sop from politicians who have done nothing to set them free.

And as for "school-choice" programs, most Libertarians have no desire to give the federal government the power to control private schools -- the way it now uses vouchers and grants to control government schools and private colleges.

Let's Look at the Record Mr. Miller cites John Thune's loss in the South Dakota U.S. Senate race this month. Thune lost by just 524 votes, while the Libertarian candidate won more than 3,000 votes. To Mr. Miller, this is a disaster. But if you examine John Thune's record, you can see it was no disaster at all.

At Mr. Thune's website, http://www.johnthune...Accomplishments he details some of what he calls his
"accomplishments" as a Congressman:

"Since he has been in office, federal spending on special education funding has more than doubled."

"John's seat on the Agriculture Committee enabled him to secure millions of dollars in dedicated funding for value-added ventures,
such as ethanol plants and other processing facilities."

"John led the fight for and secured House approval of $500 million in Community Development Block Grants for South Dakota, North Dakota and Minnesota to respond to the devastating blizzards and floods of 1997."

"As a result of his work, the state is receiving approximately 60 percent more annually [in highway subsidies] than prior to his service in Congress."

These are just some of his "achievements" that Libertarians are supposed to be grateful for. And, of course, not one of them is a constitutional function of the federal government. So why should Libertarians be ashamed of not voting for John Thune?

In the same way, we're told that George Bush almost lost the Presidency because Libertarians didn't vote for him.

But why should we have voted for him?

Do you have any idea what kind of bills he has been signing -- new laws that take away more of your money and more of your freedom, while shredding the few remaining tatters of the Constitution?

Take a look at a website http://libertyvault.com/gwb.html that lists some of W.'s "accomplishments." And don't try blaming these on the Democrats. I'm not aware of a single bill that George W. Bush has vetoed.

Bush & Thune are not atypical. In fact, they could be poster boys for the "Republican revolution" -- which is about speaking in favor of freedom while doing everything possible to take it away, talking about fiscal responsibility while voting for every spending bill that comes down the pike, speaking reverently of the Constitution when campaigning and violating it when in office.

We're told that, with all their faults, the Republicans are the "lesser of two evils." But where Republicans and Democrats are concerned, there is no lesser of two evils.

The Democrats talk about civil liberties and peace, but vote for any monstrous new invasion the Republicans want. The Republicans talk about economic freedom, fiscal responsibility and gun rights, but vote for every new boondoggle the Democrats want -- as well as the Brady Bill and other restrictions on your ability to defend yourself from thugs.

There's only one difference between them:

When Democrats are in control, the Republicans at least make noises about the dangers of big government (even while they're voting for it).

When the Republicans are in control, all_political opposition to big government ceases.

Where's your Self-Esteem?

Do you realize what you're voting for when you vote Republican or Democratic?

Obviously, John J. Miller doesn't. He probably doesn't see the problem when he looks in the mirror. He probably doesn't even realize that his support of the John Thunes and George Bushes of the world has turned him into a Democratic Party operative.




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