Topic: Presidential Campaign 2008
Looking for Mr. Good Barr A look at Bob Barr's incipient campaign for the Libertarian Presidential nomination, and some pointed questions for Mr. Barr and his supporters.by David F. Nolan
(libertarian)
Monday, April 14, 2008
Many Libertarians, myself included, are cautiously excited by the prospect of former Congressman Bob Barr becoming our 2008 Presidential candidate. Since he announced the formation of his Exploratory Committee a little over a week ago he has raised more than $25,000 in contributions, has received considerable media attention, and has surged in various online polls where libertarians are asked to state their preference for the nomination.
There are legitimate reasons for Mr. Barr's appeal. After all, how many prospective LP candidates have worked with the ACLU, the NRA and the Marijuana Policy Project? His name recognition is higher than any other prospective nominee's (excluding, perhaps, Mike Gravel's), and a poll done for the Barr Exploratory Committee shows him drawing up to 7% in the general election.
And reportedly, the ex-Congressman has made sincere efforts to build the Libertarian Party during his year-plus on the Libertarian National Committee. No last-minute conversion here. All in all, an impressive list of credentials that add up to what could be called the Good Barr -- a prospective candidate everyone should be happy to support.
Right?
Unfortunately, there is another side to Bob Barr as well: a plethora of problems with past and current issue stances, actions and pronouncements that add up to real cause for concern. Cumulatively, they paint a strikingly different picture we can call the Bad Barr.
The Bad Barr was a leading Drug Warrior in days gone by, and while he says he now opposes at least some aspects of the "War on Drugs" he has yet to come out and state unequivocally that he favors a complete end to all government attempts to tell people what substances they may use, on the simple grounds that it's none of the government's damn business. That's the libertarian position, and Barr has yet to embrace it.
The Bad Barr voted for the Patriot Act, and while he is now one of the loudest voices decrying the Federal government's massive spying on American citizens, he has yet to come out firmly for a complete repeal of the Patriot Act and a rollback of all the powers it grants to the Feds.
In the area of foreign policy, Mr. Barr is disconcertingly vague on exactly how much intervention abroad he feels is necessary and appropriate. He has called for stepping up U.S. intervention in Latin America, and has not clearly enunciated his position on the Iraq War.
The Bad Barr says he favors some form of the misnamed "Fair Tax" proposal touted by his friend Neal Boortz. And while most libertarians feel that a tax on personal incomes is among the worst kinds of taxes, Mr. Barr has not indicated exactly what version of a national sales tax he favors in its stead. To pass muster with LP members, any national sales tax would have to meet at least three criteria: It would not take effect until after the 16th Amendment was repealed; there would be no new entitlement program (i.e. a "prebate") involved; the tax rate could be no higher than 15% - the current lowest-bracket income tax rate.
The Bad Barr was a sponsor of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which denies same-sex couples equal protection under the law. This will be a major sticking point with gay and lesbian Libertarians.
I could go on with other examples, but clearly if Mr. Barr is seriously seeking the Libertarian nomination for President, he needs to address these issues forthrightly and soon. He cannot talk around them or try to gloss them over with generalities and platitudes. As the nominating convention approaches, we need to know which Bob Barr we are dealing with: Mr. Good Barr or Mr. Bad Barr.
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Good points. Bob Barr has, certainly since he left Congress, done valuable work for freedom. But in some policy natters there are real questions about his current position as well as his past record which need to be addressed. I am glad that you have put this so clearly
"[a national sales tax] would not take effect until after the 16th Amendment was repealed"
I find it amazing how many people do not understand that the 16th Amendment did not make it legal to impose an income tax on salaries. Congress has had that power since the beginning. The 16th Amendment was ratified to remove the apportionment requirement of taxing income from property (stock dividends, rents from land, etc)
With the 16th Amendment repealed, an unapportioned income tax on salaries and wages would still be legal.
Posted By: Walt Thiessen
Date: 2008-04-14 13:15:58
I just want to take a moment to welcome Mr. Nolan to the Nolan Chart website. For those who aren't sure or don't know, Mr. Nolan created the original Nolan Chart (for which this website is named) nearly 40 years ago. This website would not exist in its current form if not for the great work this man did so many years ago and continues to do to this day. Indeed, the concept for this website is derived from his original work, which he has generously contributed to the liberty community at large. The idea of a chart that more completely represents the map of political viewpoints than the old left-right spectrum is his great contribution to political thought, and it has been copied, borrowed and built upon many times by many people.
As webmaster, I am honored to have him join our motley crew of columnists, and I urge you to give him your warmest welcome as well.
Thanks for all you have done and continue to do, David! You are a true leader for liberty.
Posted By: Steve LaBianca
Date: 2008-04-14 15:58:14
Excellent article, and even though congressman Barr has made some notable moves in the Libertarian direction, and has truly made efforts to help build the LP, he has a lot of 'splainin to do. After all, he is likely to run for the LP nomination.
That said, can a similar characterization be made about Dr. Mary Ruwart (an announced candidate for the LP nomination)? Without going into any specifics, as there are so many, I would challenge anyone to find where Dr. Ruwart's positions are at odds with any true libertarian position. She has books (Healing our World, Short Answers to the Tough Questions) a column with the Advocates for Self Government, and websites which all, to my knowledge are pure libertarian. No apologies, excuses, or dodging the issues with Mary. She is the REAL DEAL!
I completely disagree. Barr is a social conservative. He is NOT a libertarian and if the LP nominates him then I'll campaign for the abolition of the party. His antigay views are notorious. He still supports the war on drugs. He supports the rights of States not the rights of individuals.
Posted By: Jahfre Fire Eater
Date: 2008-04-15 06:33:54
Welcome Mr. Nolan. Thanks for your objective piece on Mr. Barr. It was informative but irrelevant; the 'good Barr / bad Barr' debate could only matter if he had a chance of becoming President.
I am not an LP member but I have voted for the LP candidate in every election since 1988. Voting for the LP candidate in a general election is a pure-play protest vote so it really doesn't matter to me if the LP nominates Barr or Ruwart or Porky Pig. Only LP members care about distinctions between LP candidates. To the rest of American voters all of those distinctions are moot.
Posted By: Steve LaBianca
Date: 2008-04-15 07:48:39
Jahfre Fire Eater, I appreciate your insight into voter perception. In the current situation, I think you are spot on. However, let's say, hypothetically, Barr is the LP nominee, and he gets lots of media, and his campaign, as a result gets lots of donations, and his campaign spends money on aggressive advertising. The result of all this (hypothetically, of course) is that Barr receives 1.4, maybe 1.7 million votes, a total way above the average LP presidential candidate of about 400,000.
I am suggesting, that much more scrutiny will come about from this "excellent showing", as would be the case with any candidate having such a showing. Barr will be hailed as the "Libertarian Extraordinaire". That in a nutshell becomes the problem. Closed borders, national sales taxes, keeping some provision of the Patriot Act, gays being lesser citizens than heteros, etc, will be, in the view of the media, and voters who care to pay attention (more than before) the "true" libertarian positions.
In my view, this is a scenario much worse than say, Mary Ruwart as the LP nominee, running a very principled campaign and getting 750,000 votes (BTW I am not suggesting that that is all a Mary Ruwart campaign could get). The reason for this being better is, there will not have to be an damage control on reiterating, over and over and over again, mabye for several years that the presidential campaign was only an abherration and the LP doesn't support Barr's positions., AND the integrity of the campaign holding true to libertarian principles will only help the party build a stronger, more committed voter base. The benefits of an LP presidential campaign isn't just vote totals. It is when we have improvement of prior election vote totals, educating the voters as to just what libertarianism is, and how it will benefit the voter.
Such a scenario almost came to fruition, until Howard Stern dropped out of the New York governor's race in 1994. Though Stern wasn't spouting non-libertarian rhetoric, he did turn a lot of people off, and the debacle was brought up over and over again. Press yes, bad press, absolutely. Damage control press . . . backpedaling on "what did you do" press... etc.
At a minimum, Mr. Barr should call for an end to all federal laws which restrict adults from manufacturing, using, selling or otherwise distributing drugs to any other willing adults and promise to pardon everyone who is now in federal prisons or may be put in federal prisons for so doing.
A call for the repeal of the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act and all other Bush "security" measures which are blatantly opposed to the Constitution is also necessary.
A promise to leave Iraq within 90 days as Ron Paul made this year and as Michael Badnarik did in 2004 is also a minimal requirement, as is a pledge not to go to war without a declaration by Congress.
Until 2006, our national platform endorsed the Liberty Amendment which would repeal the Sixteenth Amendment and bar all federal income taxes, whether or not they were legal before then.
He should call for the repeal of the unconstitutional, unnecessary and dangerous Federal Defense of Marriage Act.
Finally, he should endorse the reinstatement of our platform essentially as it existed before it was butchered in 2006.
These measures would alleviate our concerns. Failure to take them would intensify them.
Posted By: John Wayne Smith
Date: 2008-04-15 20:18:04
I fully agree with Mr. LaBianca. The question here are we here to promote real freedom or are we here just to win elections. Many may not remember but we had the same problem with Ron Paul in 1988.
His mixed message is still causing us pain 20 years later.
My concern with a NRST is that it would continue to hand over the reins of our economy to the globalists who seek to weaken our economy, standard of living and spirit by putting American labor in competition with third world labor wages.
Ending income taxes and replacing them with tariffs is the constitutionally provided means for federal revenue. A NRST taxes goods made and bought by Americans at the same rates as goods made in socialist/communist economies and that is why globalists prefer “free trade.” They can control our economy by pitting the American worker against whatever third world economy is in vogue or by propping up an anemic socialist economy with the American economy’s buying power. Tariffs would force socialist/communist economies to live and die on their own. Tariffs could also address any temptation by globalist multinationals to exploit third world labor for profits in the US consumer market.
Tariffs have the built in benefit of not being able to provide the revenue needed to fund a socialist welfare state like income taxes and a NRST would.
Tom Bryant:
I find it amazing how many people do not understand that the 16th Amendment did not make it legal to impose an income tax on salaries. Congress has had that power since the beginning. The 16th Amendment was ratified to remove the apportionment requirement of taxing income from property (stock dividends, rents from land, etc)
If congress had that power from the beginning, then the Supreme Court wouldn’t have overturned Lincoln’s civil war income tax in 1895, which lead to the 16th amendment in 1913.
With the 16th Amendment repealed, an unapportioned income tax on salaries and wages would still be legal.
The SC ruling, in 1895, declaring that an income tax is a direct tax and therefore unconstitutional, is what led to the ratification of the sixteenth amendment in 1913.
I think it is important that the Libertarian Party's nominee not confuse the public as to what it means to be a Libertarian.
One commentor stated that it does not matter whether we are dealing with Mr. Good Barr or Mr. Bad Barr since he has no chance of winning.
First of all, the Libertarian nominee does have a chance. If Jesse Ventura could become governor of Minnesota, coming out of nowhere in a matter of weeks, then anything can happen, especially when the electorate is upset with the two major parties. (And they are.) This is not a typical election cycle.
Second, if the Libertarian nominee truly has no chance of winning, that is all the more reason to run a campaign that will educate people. Unfortunately, right now, Mr. Barr's platform is half way between Ron Paul's and John McCain's. I would prefer somebody with a platform at least as bold as Ron Paul's.
While even the most radical libertarians would take a small reduction in government or a tiny cut in taxes if that is all that we can get, we should not settle for mediocrity in our message. We should be clear about our goals and our philosophy.
I don't think it will help the cause of libertarianism to have headlines which say things like "Libertarian Party nominee voted for Patriot Act."
Bob Barr is not making an issue out of monetary policy. When the Federal Reserve is inflating away the value of our money, that should be an issue. The Fed is Soviet-style central planning. There is nothing kooky about opposing that!
As far as what kind of campaign would get the best poll numbers or the most votes, we cannot be certain that a bold, purist Libertarian campaign would not capture the country's imagination more than a wishy-washy, "safe" campaign would.
Ron Paul caught on, I believe, because he had bold proposals, told the truth and was principled. Why would the Libertarian Party want to do anything less?
Lastly, to David Nolan -- thanks for everything you have done, and continue to do, for liberty and for the Libertarian Party!
It seems to me that there have been a few too many Libertarian Party candidates for president in recent election cycles, who joined the party more or less simultaneously with their announcement that they were running for president and seeking the LP nomination.
Perhaps we should consider a rule requiring potential LP presidential nominees to have had a minimum length of membership in the party before being qualified to represent our party, say two years or so. Our ballot access success makes us a target for opportunists who are not particularly libertarian. (I am not aiming this comment at Bob Barr, who I believe is sincere. I am referring to a handful of others who claim "life memberships" in the Libertarian Party. These are, curiously, "life memberships" which they have held for only a few months and which began about the same time as their campaigns for president. Where were they before?)
Posted By: Steven R Linnabary
Date: 2008-05-06 18:57:46
Jahfre Fire Eater says:
Voting for the LP candidate in a general election is a pure-play protest vote so it really doesn't matter to me if the LP nominates Barr or Ruwart or Porky Pig. Only LP members care about distinctions between LP candidates. To the rest of American voters all of those distinctions are moot.
In a sense, Jahfre Fire Eater is correct. It makes little difference to most voters who the LP nominee is. However, each nominee DOES bring new activists. Even the lackluster Marrou or Badnarik campaigns brought in new activists.
But at least these new activists had a clear idea as to what it meant to be a libertarian!
With such a prospective candidate as Barr, people that knew of him in Congress may well get the wrong impression of what it means to be a LIbertarian.
I don't want to spend the next few years arguing with people about what the future of the LP should be. Shoot, it is hard enough now!
Posted By: Keith Gardner
Date: 2008-05-20 23:05:36
I'm a supporter of the Fair Tax, primarily for the prebate. I'm a Georgist and believe in such documents as Agrarian Justice by Thomas Paine. I believe there is a justification for a prebate to give everyone an access to land and its resources. I believe the prebate should be equivalent in fact to land rent.
I'm a "reformer" and favor Bob Barr. I refuse to throw him under the purist bus. We already did that in 2002 when we reformed Bob Barr.
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