As Reason’s Brian Doherty explains in this fairly long and thoughtful post-mortem on Libertarian Party candidate Bob Barr — who raised only $1.2 million and only got about 510,000 votes, about the same percentage as less well known and more “fringey” candidates have gotten — it’s hard to see much but disappointment there. Ilya Somin, writing on Eugene Volokh’s law prof’s blog (often very interesting at http://volokh.com) , argues that it’s time to “admit that the LP is a failure and spend our precious time and money elsewhere.”
I never joined the LP (being a devout non-voter certainly played a role in that decision) but I saw some value in the organization as a way to put libertarian ideas into public discourse in a way that could not be accomplished in any other way than running for office. I wonder, however. Is it time to give it up? Should it focus on running candidates for local offices, where it has had some modest successes at various times? Any LP members out there (and others of course) who want to weigh in on this?
Wrongly or rightly the American winner take all political system precludes the viability of third parties. I think it is questionable under the current voting system if they should even be allowed to run candidates in the general election. If they can’t be one of the two parties to win the most votes in the primary they have almost no chance of winning and the presence in the general election serves at best to distort the outcome.
I’d like to see an instant runoff system in the general election to eliminate the problems caused by third parties in the general election. I doubt that something like that will ever happen. The two major parties in the US are unlikely to do anything that would provide an opening for the rise of a successful third party.
As the Libertarian Party itself: It would probably never be a significant force in the US even if the political system was changed so that additional political parties could become viable. If a viable third party did arise in the US it probably would be a party that would reside ideologically someplace between the Democrats and the Republicans. It would probably be more secular than the Republican Party, more free market oriented than the Democratic Party and less hawkish than the Republican Party. But a viable political party will never arise that is as narrowly focused and ideologically driven as the current Libertarian Party.
Dues paying membership in the National Libertarian Party is up 22% over one year ago. This is primarily due to the Barr/Root campaign. That is a much more important measurement for the long-term success of the Libertarian Party than the vote percentage.
Here in Silicon Valley on Election Day the LP elected party members to a City Council, and a Water Board.
Mr. Bock is corect that the LP should focus on local offices. The only reason LP members should run for State Legislature and higher offices right now is to recruit more Americans to become dues paying members of the Party.
Scott Lieberman
Alternate Representative for Region 2, Libertarian National Committee
What the Libertarian Party needs to do is to concentrate on winning elections at the local and state levels. Gain some name recognition and political record, and then move on to the U.S. Congress.
As it is, the LP seems to nominate candidates that, for the most part, have weak or non existant political backgrounds (Bob Barr excepted), whose names are unknown to the voting public. Couple that with a campaign budget of 67 cents and you can easily understand why the LP has become the party of ridicule.
In my opinion, it would be in the Party’s best interests to run candidates ‘up the ladder’, instead of trying start at the top.