Jeffersonian Libertarian Reform Caucus scores stunning victory @ LP convention

[AlanM]

read it and weep Tracy!

I had planned to vote Libertarian in the next election. Scratch that. Sorry to those who stand for the old platform.
Enjoy your hollow victory Frank.

hollow victory?

did you hear Jason's speech at the PorcFest?

a suggestion to endorse Charles Murray's "basic income guarantee" concept for NH as a way to attract the left...

Wasn't there. So Jason has sold out too? 

and endorsed the science behind global warming...

he is slowly morphing himself into a bonafide left libertarian!

Sorry to hear that. My respect for him is gone. Witness the death of the FSP.

[Caleb]

The FSP is bigger than any person.  I didn't move here because of Jason Sorens.  We are the FSP! 

[FrankChodorov]

The FSP is bigger than any person.  I didn't move here because of Jason Sorens.  We are the FSP! 

sounds kinda like one of those high school football cheers...

"we are the FSP"
"we are the FSP"
"we are the FSP"

[Incrementalist]

Thank God for this!  Now the LP will be included in all the debates and get major media attention!

The LRC doesn't pretend that there are no other obstacles in the path of libertarian political acceptance, but the LP DID play a large role in keeping itself out of the mainstream.  Hopefully these efforts by the LRC will enable the LP to move closer to the realm of rational politics and thus closer to eventually overcoming the remaining hurdles.

[Incrementalist]

don't vote ...... and live free

Yeah, just like the Browns from Plainfield.

[Caleb]

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is in prison. - Henry David Thoreau

[Incrementalist]

Sorry to hear that. My respect for him is gone. Witness the death of the FSP.

The death of the FSP will occur when the membership turns against itself and splinters.  Jason isn't saying that anarchists aren't welcome.  At every gathering and liberty dinner he's offered ideas that are compromises.  He's willing to work with anybody who wants to move the state and the nation in a libertarian direction.  It's the people who refuse to work with anybody other than those who think EXACTLY like them who are killing the FSP.  Perhaps these folk are content to live in tyranny, because working for freedom means having a big enough tent to actually bring about freedom.

[Caleb]

Perhaps some people have a little different version of liberty than you do.  Some of what passes for "liberty" sounds more like tyranny to my ears.

George Bush claims to be spreading "freedom" ... but I wouldn't call what he is spreading "freedom" at all.  Liberty is more than just a word.  Words mean things.

And as an aside, I think focusing on "liberty" is the wrong focus.  The focus should be "moral legitimacy".  Liberty is a natural consequence of a strong morality.  It is a byproduct.  Not an end in and of itself.  I see too many people focusing on their own "freedom" and not giving two sh*ts about people in the rest of the world who are suffering as a result of our imperialism.  The cart is before the horse.

Caleb

[tracysaboe]

Now what is it?  A joke that will also whore herself?

Caleb

LOL

TRacy

[Incrementalist]

Perhaps some people have a little different version of liberty than you do.  Some of what passes for "liberty" sounds more like tyranny to my ears.

Who cares?  All that matters is that those people want to move America in the same direction of an overall smaller and less intrusive government.  Let the fracture come when we reach a point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant.

[FrankChodorov]

Perhaps some people have a little different version of liberty than you do.  Some of what passes for "liberty" sounds more like tyranny to my ears.

Who cares?  All that matters is that those people want to move America in the same direction of an overall smaller and less intrusive government.  Let the fracture come when we reach a point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant.

btw, congrats on your "victory" in Portland...

[Caleb]

All that matters is that those people want to move America in the same direction of an overall smaller and less intrusive government.  Let the fracture come when we reach a point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant.

Well, we've already reached that point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant to me, Incrementalist!  You gutted the foreign affairs plank of the LP to the point where someone could support the neo-con agenda and still call himself a Libertarian.  I break at the point where moral legitimacy is lost.

Caleb

[Incrementalist]

All that matters is that those people want to move America in the same direction of an overall smaller and less intrusive government.  Let the fracture come when we reach a point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant.

Well, we've already reached that point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant to me, Incrementalist!  You gutted the foreign affairs plank of the LP to the point where someone could support the neo-con agenda and still call himself a Libertarian.  I break at the point where moral legitimacy is lost.

Caleb

Neal Boortz, a person who definitely belongs in any libertarian party that hopes to ever succeed in politics, supports certain wars.  I don't agree with him on that issue (and a few others), but he's closer to my ideology than he is to the average Republican.  Despite our differences on a few issues, we agree on most, and as such we align and compromise between us in order to work to elect candidates who best represent us.  Opening the LP platform to allow Boortz and myself to both belong is crucial to bringing in the numbers needed to elect people to political office, and electing people to political office is the number one priority for a political party.

As an aside, Carl Milsted makes an excellent libertarian defense of overseas intervention here:
http://www.quiz2d.com/essays/lfa/Warmonger.pdf

NOTE: I do not agree with Milsted's argument, so I won't defend it in this thread!!!!  I posted it because it is an intelligent, libertarian argument for that position and many libertarians agree with it.  I posted the link because I wanted you all to see how these people think.  Letting in a person who believes in this is a far cry from allowing a neocon to call himself a libertarian

[Incrementalist]

Perhaps some people have a little different version of liberty than you do.  Some of what passes for "liberty" sounds more like tyranny to my ears.

Who cares?  All that matters is that those people want to move America in the same direction of an overall smaller and less intrusive government.  Let the fracture come when we reach a point where our differences of opinion are politically relevant.

btw, congrats on your "victory" in Portland...

It's not my victory.  I'm not an active member of the LRC.

[Fluff and Stuff]

btw, congrats on your "victory" in Portland...

It's not my victory.  I'm not an active member of the LRC.

Yeah, and the most important thing is to get rid of that gawdie pledge crap and the LRC failed to do that