In the end, we will be politically successful when we win elections, elect our candidates to office, and put a libertarian direction on the country's political agenda.
Political success demands a series of elements. All the elements are needed at once. The libertarian political movement that will bring us to victory is the movement that takes responsibility for assembling all those elements. A libertarian political movement that refuses to develop some of those elements is a libertarian political movement that is foredoomed to failure.
What are those elements?
Voter Base. Most Americans choose their political party once, or perhaps twice, in their entire life. They choose their party, for the most part, because it is the party that they trust to make the right decisions for them. In building a voter base, issues are not unimportant, but they rarely win elections. To win, we need a strong voter base.
Candidates. We need people who can and will win elections for us. Those people are candidates who are credible and who can discuss major issues in a credible way. A successful libertarian political movement will implement Libertarian Centrism to provide credible libertarian discussion of major issues. I'll disucss Libertarian Centrism as embodied in the Liberty for America movement in a future article.
Activist Mobilization and Training: A successful political party is built by its feet on the ground, its volunteers. A successful libertarian political movement will motivate supporters to become activists, and will give them the tools they need to make a success of themselves.
Local Organization: To elect the local, county, state, and Federal officials we need for victory, we need libertarian political organizations that cover every front door in America. A national libertarian political movement won't organize your ward for you. It will worry that there are effective state and county parties everywhere, and that your state party is doing real political work rather than being co-opted by the Republicans.
Fundraising: Money really is the lifeblood of politics. To raise money, you need a solid fund raising effort, and you not a credible record indicating that you will spend money well. A successful national libertarian movement will focus its spending on doing politics. An unsuccessful national libertarian movement will concentrate its resources on real estate and paid central staff. There are only so many dollars out there; a successful libertarian political movement will ensure that the national, state, and local fund efforts are in balance.
Marketing: Advertising can't win elections for you. Most people made up their minds where to vote, oh, years and years ago. Advertising can make sure that people know you are there, so that when they want our answer, they know we are the people offering it.
Youth Outreach: It is no longer true that young people do not vote. Furthermore, young people are extremely open to our message of social tolerance and fiscal prudence. A successful libertarian political movement will have a strong youth and student outreach effort.
Think Tanks: The Libertarian political movement needs effective think tanks, bodies that do the hard work of fleshing out proposals for credible changes in a libertarian direction. A successful libertarian political movement will ensure that those think tanks appearing, rather than piously claiming that the lack of think tanks is not their problem to solve.
Affinity Groups: It is not true that the NRA and NARAL are the National Republican Association and the National Anti-Republican Action League. They each represent a particular set of opinions on a particular issue. However, as the strategy deployed to create that representation, they very much tend to act by supporting a political party that is inclined in their direction. Affinity groups mostly don't switch parties. We need our own affinity groups, affinity groups open to all Americans, while almost always finding good reasons to support libertarians. A successful libertarian political movement will develop its own affinity groups, just as the Democratic and Republican parties do.
Media: Crying about press coverage will not give us media support. What the libertarian movement needs are libertarians who are willing to do the hard work (which, incidentally, will create paying jobs for themselves) of developing legitimate press outlets that do a fine job of covering reality, while ensuring that the hidden assumptions used to choose which news is important and what it means are libertarian assumptions. A successful libertarian political movement will help those libertarians develop their media skills and outlets.
Reader Comments:
Posted By: Walt Thiessen
Date: 2009-05-03 06:15:10
I notice that you ignored the most important factors: electoral college, ballot access laws, campaign finance laws, and other legal restrictions that insure that only a two-party system (really, one party with two camps) can thrive. Merely focusing on the points you raised (although they are certainly important) cannot by itself overcome these other factors.
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Posted By: George Phillies
Date: 2009-05-03 18:32:42
The electoral college is a plus, not a minus, in that it means we can win the Presidentcy with a plurality of the vote in states having a majority of the electoral vote, rather than needing a majority of the vote. Ballot access, in a considerable number of states, is relatively straightforward. For example, in several states given that we have the required ballot access we can *nominate by convention*; you can't get much better than that. The two-party system cuts the other way as well: Once we are the #1 or #2 party, the other party becomes a minor party, withers up, and fades away.
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Posted By: Ben Kalafut
Date: 2009-05-05 02:37:11
This is very clear-headed and sober.
You didn't mention "quit being ideologues", "pull heads out of rear ends", and "stop pretending that the LP is a church that is to 'maintain a definition' of libertarian", but this isn't that kind of article.
I'll link this from a couple of 'blogs, soon, and bring printouts to the next meeting. One printout will be on heavy cardstock so I can beat Nolan over the head with it.
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Posted By: Chris Baker
Date: 2009-05-07 00:23:02
I noticed that you didn't mention anything about the infiltrators and saboteurs of the Libertarian Party. As long as people like Bob Barr and Wayne Root are involved, the LP will continue its record of being a total failure.
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Posted By: randy
Date: 2009-05-07 10:37:58
I know of only one way, privatize schools. Stop the indoctrination of our children that government is good and knows what is best, because capitalists are greedy and corrupt otherwise. But it is a Catch-22, how can we privatize schools without first having a libertarian in office?
I think its fair to say that until the republican party either dies or stops laughing and start listening to the ideas of people like Ron Paul, libertarians will be looking from the outside-in on the 2 party system.
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