America’s Two Major Parties and why lower case l libertarians should become capital L Libertarians
Each and every election and elections cycle, Americans get to choose a list of Democrats, Republicans, and sometimes Independent/Third Parties to be elected to government. Democrats and Republicans have various factions in their parties, but the factions in charge tend to be Progressive borderline Socialist for the former and Conservative borderline Authoritarian for the latter. Lowercase l libertarians who vote for either party, ultimately wind up supporting the non-libertarian factions, by supporting either party.
We have two parties, the Republicans and Democrats. The problem is that neither party’s platform is perfect or their libertarian factions are able to change that. The Political Compass charts for the Presidential Elections, 2004 and later, show the positions of primary candidates in the two parties and third party and Independents in the general show how the two party system limits political choices. Just imagine if Michael Badnarik, Bob Barr, Gary Johnson, or Gary Johnson (again) were allowed in the debates, much less elected, how different American politics would be by now.
The 2018 Midterms just ended a month ago, so 2020 will be soon. Adam Kokesh, Vermin Supreme, Zoltan Istvan, and Arvin Vohra are the declared Libertarians. Laura Ebke, Jeffrey Miron, Mary Ruwart, Nicholas Sarwark, Peter Schiff, and Bill Weld are the speculated Libertarians. Patrick Byrne, Gary Johnson, John McAfee, Darryl Perry, and Larry Sharpe are the declined Libertarians even though John McAfee wouldn’t be opposed to a Draft Campaign to get him to run.
Will Donald Trump read libertarian literature and have a political enlightenment? Extremely unlikely borderline impossible. Will a libertarian Republican primary him and get the nomination? Even less likely and possible? Will the Democrats nominate one of the very short list of libertarian Democrats who are speculated or shown interest in running? Somehow even less likely and possible than the previous two scenarios.
I Side With measures the platforms of parties and candidates running based on their political quiz and math. It’s too soon to know who the Democrats or the Libertarians will ultimately nominate, but Donald Trump is the incumbent Republican who intends to run again in 2020 barring impeachment and Mike Pence running in his place instead.
So how do we get any or several of the Libertarians enough media buzz to be discussed in the media and well known? Spread the word about them in person and on social media. Zoltan Istvan (as Transhumanist Party) and Vermin Supreme (as an Independent) have run for President before. Mary Ruwart has run for the Libertarian nomination in the past. So has John McAfee. Arvin Vohra was Party Vice Chair and Nicholas Sarwark is the current Party Chair. Bill Weld was the candidate for Vice President in 2016.
Libertarian Presidential choices will help Libertarians down ballot as well. This is not to focus exclusively on the President, but that is where media focus will be on, which will help media focus on down ballot Libertarians in Gubernatorial, Statewide, Senatorial, and Congressional races as well as other local races due to possible coattail effects.
I assume a strong libertarian candidate will ultimately win the 2020 nomination for the Libertarian Party. I Side With percentages of a person who 100% aligns with the Libertarian Party platform is a good way to rank how libertarian, all candidates across all parties are. Even if somehow anarchist Vermin Supreme or transhumanist (halfway between libertarian transhumanist and techno-progressive possibly) Zoltan Istvan gets nominated, they will still be better options than either Donald Trump or any Democrat in 2020.
Bill Weld is the choice for people who like Gary Johnson was the 2016 candidates. Adam Kokesh or even John McAfee himself is the candidate for people who wanted John McAfee. Mary Ruwart is a perennial candidate for Libertarian nomination. She is the choice for people who wish Mary Ruwart and Steve Kubby were the 2008 ticket. It’s still early for preparing for who will be the nominee, but part of me wants to prepare ASAP for Zoltan Istvan 2020 due to my libertarian transhumanist leanings, but part of me wants to wait for other Libertarians to declare their run.
Let’s say generic Libertarian candidate, since I don’t want to speculate who will be nominated in future elections and because I want people to think of the party in general as well. People need to so know about the Libertarian Party and support it so much, that people will be able to say they are interested in a generic Libertarian candidate as a poll option when polled. This will get polling result up and media attention and debate inclusion as well. Generic Libertarian needs to be America’s number one talked about politician for people to know and talk about libertarianism and voting Libertarian.
