Ryan Sager of the Libertarian site Reason Online asks if Libertarians are being “driven” out of the Republican party. I say, being a Libertarian conservative myself, that’s hogwash. But Sager does have some numbers that show Libertarians less likely to vote for John McCain than they voted for George Bush in 2000. Those same number also showed that Libertarians ran toward John Kerry in 2004, which strikes me as a protest vote unless you beleive that Libertarians suddenly grew fond of higher taxes, more government intrusion into our personal lives, a larger overall nanny state – all things that Kerry promised to bring during his campaign.
Sager says that Libertarians are fleeing the Republican party because John McCain has hitched his wagon to the eeeeeeeevil Religious Right and is finishing the dreadful work of The Beast Rove. His proof of said evilness is pretty thin, though, and undermines anything smart thing he might have said.
The real McCain, whoever that is or was, may still believe that major swathes of the Religious Right represent “agents of intolerance” in our politics. But he has decided to stake both his election and the Republican Party’s future upon them—from the barely coded racial refrain of “Who is Barack Obama?,” to the rallies with shouts of “terrorist” and “kill him,” to the corrosive choice of pipeline-prayer Sarah Palin as his running mate and heir apparent.
Sager’s problem here is that he’s citing fiction as fact. The shout of “kill him” didn’t happen and the “terrorist” cry was prompted by the mention of William Ayers who actually is a terrorist. The question “Who is Barack Obama” has nothing whatsoever to do with race and everything to do with the fact that he is, by any objective measure, the presidential candidate least vetted by the media in my lifetime.
As for Sarah Palin, I object to the term “pipeline-prayer” as a pejorative the way that he uses it. Millions of Americans believe that they pray directly to God and that He hears them. That is hardly a controversial belief nor is it uncommon. I can only guess that Sager’s true objection is that he believes Palin is a Bible-thumping bigot who has pushed her religious beliefs on the people of Alaska. That doesn’t happen to be true and I doubt that he can find an single instance where she forced her personal religious beliefs into Alaska law. I, on the other hand, can point to at least one instance where she specifically did not. Oh, we have stories and rumors and whispered innuendo. What we don’t have is any actual history of Palin being the religious right zealot the left and assorted other Palin-haters claim her to be.
I would suggest to Sager an alternate reason that Libertarians are less likely to vote for John McCain. They’ve been listening to people like Ryan Sager who rely on debunked myths and sly innuendo about Sarah Palin to do their heavy rhetorical lifting for them. If he thinks that Libertarians are better served by the socialist nanny-stater Barack Obama and a Democratic Party that savages its own for holding unorthodox political beliefs, he’s deluding himself. The Republican party is more than willing to have all the conversations Sager wants about Libertarian issues. Indeed, they are the only party where those conversations take place. Heck, I would be more than happy to kick some of these ideas with him. It would be a much better use of his time than misleading his readers with old fables.
(via Glenn Reynolds)
Tags: John McCain, Libertarians, Nanny State, Sarah Palin, Taxes, William Ayers
