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Going in the Wrong Direction
According to the Wall Street Journal/ Heritage Foundation “Freedom Index,” the United States’ economic freedom score dropped to 76.3, which puts us in tenth place worldwide. The score is 1.5 points lower than last year, “reflecting deteriorating scores for government spending, freedom from corruption, and investment freedom.” In the Cato Institute’s Economic Freedom of the World index the United States also placed tenth. Cato noted that the United States “has suffered one of the largest declines in economic freedom over the last 10 years.” In other words, if you like small government and a free economy, we’re going in the wrong direction.
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When most people think of a “libertarian” they think of . . . I don’t know . . . a cult of hippies who barter their heroin for prostitutes. In other words, people tend to not take them very seriously. Part of the problem is that many Americans just don’t understand what it means to be a libertarian. If they did, they might quickly come to the realization that they’re actually one of them.
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ADULT CONTENT
Yes, we all know that libertarians also understand a thing or two about irrelevance and unelectability. I’m sure you can visualize a typical libertarian presidential stump speech: “Ladies and gentlemen, if you elect me president I swear on my sacred honor to do absolutely nothing for my fellow Americans. I want you to do it all for yourselves!”
Of course, that’s not the reality. While liberal policy works great for bumper stickers (“I Support Teachers, Not the Koch Brothers”), libertarian policy works great in the real world. Unfortunately, you can’t put a libertarian’s view of foreign policy or the government safety net on the back of your Prius—and that makes it a lot harder to break through the “gotcha!” world of sound bites and tweets that we now live in.
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CNN has run a poll for nearly two decades asking Americans the same question: “Some people think the government is trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses. Others think that government should do more to solve our country’s problems. Which comes closer to your own view?”
In 2011, a record number of people reported that they believed government is doing too much. That number has been tracking higher and higher—from around 40 percent in 2000 to over 60 percent today. Another recent poll, this one by Rasmussen, found that a majority of likely voters are worried that the federal government is doing too much rather than too little when dealing with economic troubles.
Of course, simply having a desire for Washington to “do less” doesn’t automatically make a person a libertarian. Far from it. But when you dig deeper into the polls, you realize that a majority of voters have, economically speaking, very strong libertarian beliefs. For example, among all voters in the Rasmussen poll, 77 percent say they want government to cut deficits. Seventy-one percent say they want government to cut spending. Fifty-nine percent say they want the government to cut taxes.
That’s a nice start.
Though long-term polling shows that there was a temporary spike in the public’s acceptance of government intervention after 9/11, concerns about the police state and antiterror measures have recently reached all-time highs. More voters seem to be turning toward the idea of individual freedom in almost every category they were asked about—from the police state to the government being the arbiters of morality.
But the most visible sign that libertarians are entering the mainstream isn’t a poll, it’s a person: Texas congressman Ron Paul, quite possibly the most popular libertarian politician in modern American history. Congressman Paul has raised millions of dollars and has deeper support from young, enthusiastic voters than perhaps anyone else in America. And, no offense, but I doubt we can attribute his success to his electric personality or political skills. No, it must be something else, like his ideas, his message, or his love for, and unwavering defense of, the Constitution.
Young people are getting excited about liberty. But I think it’s even more than that. I think voters are also looking for something pure, something real, something consistent—something outside the partisanship we see every day.
And these voters are different from most. Blind allegiance to a party or the “presumptive nominee” is not part of their equation. For example, fewer than 50 percent of Republicans who voted for Ron Paul in the 2008 GOP primary ended up supporting John McCain in the general election. It turns out that Ron Paul is pretty popular among those who consider themselves independents—and that also happens to be a pretty good place to find libertarians.
Since the last presidential election more than 2.5 million voters have decided that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are making much sense. I think the only thing shocking about that is that it took them this long to figure it out. When USA Today analyzed the trend, it found that the number of registered Democrats had declined in 25 of the 28 states where voters have to register by party. Republicans lost voters in 21 states and the number of independents has increased in 18 states.
This trend becomes even clearer when you look at eight swing states where party registration is required. These are the battleground states that hold the key to elections—and they’re changing. The USA Today report shows a decline of 800,000 in registration for the Democrats, while Republicans’ dipped by 350,000. Voters who identify themselves as independents have increased by 325,000.
I’m giving you all of this data to make a simple point: the two parties just aren’t doing the job—and people are finally beginning to realize that there’s got to be another way.
There is.
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Small-Tent Ideology
It’s odd that people instantly acknowledge that the Democratic Party, for example, is a “big tent” under which people with views of all stripes can reside. You can have a “Blue Dog” right next to a radical—and no one blinks an eye. Same thing on the Republican side—Jim DeMint can share the stage with John McCain and everyone gets it. Unfortunately, that same perception doesn’t seem to translate to libertarians.
The reality is that there are “small l” libertarians and “big L” libertarians. Small l libertarians believe in the basic tenets of liberty and try to make those ideas work within the framework of political reality. Let’s make it easy and call them “commonsense libertarians.” A “big L” Libertarian, on the other hand, is a purist who demands the most stringent interpretation of libertarian thought. They are, you might expect, what the media focuses on most—and they are also completely irrelevant when it comes to politics.
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NO, YOU DON’T HAVE TO SMOKE CRACK TO BE LIBERTARIAN
I can hear it now: That’s all wonderful, Glenn, but I am definitely not a libertarian! Libertarians believe in legalizing crack and prostitution, they’re isolationists and crackpots, and conspiracy theorists—not to mention antiwar activists and apologists for Islamic radicalism. Like you said, Ron Paul is a libertarian and he basically wants to shut down our army!
The key to understanding the libertarian argument is to realize that most libertarians don’t believe simply in personal freedom at all cost; they believe in personal freedom at a very significant cost: responsibility.
Take alcohol, for example. Libertarians would not be in favor of banning alcohol, of course, but just because they don’t want to ban it does not mean they think that drinking every night is a great idea. Put it this way: there are few things I love more than freedom of speech, but that doesn’t mean I love everything (or anything, actually) that someone like Van Jones has to say. Just because you want something to be legal does not mean you have to personally embrace it.
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Agree to Disagree
Republicans Jim DeMint and Marco Rubio disagree on how the United States should approach immigration policy, but no one doubts that they are both “conservatives.” Conservatives argue about gay marriage, economic policy, defense spending, and just a
bout everything else under the sun. We’ve all seen how contentious the Republican primaries can be (and have listened to the media tell us how the Republican Party is fighting itself to the death). If there are pro-choice Republicans and pro-life Democrats, why can’t there be libertarians who disagree on some policies but agree to concentrate on the fundamental issues that actually matter?
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Most people hear this argument and immediately go to the worst possible examples, like black tar heroin or underage prostitution. That’s because we’ve all been conditioned by the media and the two-party establishment to think that way. When you hear “Republican” you don’t immediately think of “banning abortions even in the case of incest.” While that is a view that some Republicans may have, it is neither prevalent enough, nor important enough, to be allowed to define the entire party. Yet we allow that to happen with libertarians.
So, let’s get this out of the way right up front: Yes, some libertarians want to legalize drugs. Within that group some want to legalize every drug that man can create. Others would prefer to focus on a narrower list. But the truth is that none of that matters because legalizing drugs is not an important part of the libertarian agenda. In my mind, it’s not even a small part of the agenda. It’s irrelevant, inconsequential—a diversion.
Of course, legalizing drugs gets a lot of attention because it makes for great sound bites and helps to make the entire party look insane—but it’s not at all relevant to the larger cause of freedom. Deciding you don’t want to be a libertarian because some sliver of the party wants to be able to smoke weed is like deciding that you don’t want to be a Republican because some sliver of the party wants to outlaw alcohol. Who cares? Neither has any relevance to the future of America and, by the way, neither is going to happen.
Regardless of where you stand, legalization of fill-in-your-vice-here is not anything that we should be debating. It not only does a disservice to the country, but it also helps continue the false media narrative that has been built about libertarians over the years. Surely we have more vital things to talk about, anyway. Things we can agree on. We have watched so many liberties evaporate over the last few decades that it’s almost embarrassing to hear people give any time to the “should we legalize heroin?” nonexistent debate.
What we should be giving time to are issues like the government takeover of health care, restoring religious and market freedoms, reducing regulations that prevent people from starting and growing businesses, getting monetary policy under control, and cutting the growth of the welfare state.
We should also be explaining to Americans that libertarians offer the only real alternative to a system that has been completely infected by progressivism. Democrats offer virtually no policy idea that doesn’t expand the welfare state or the regulatory burden or give Washington more control over our everyday lives. Republicans usually aren’t far behind.
When Newt Gingrich was asked about Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan’s efforts to reform entitlement programs, he didn’t say it was “about time we got rid of socialistic programs and replaced them with market-based alternatives.” Instead he attacked them as “right-wing social engineering.” John McCain has cosponsored bills in support of “cap-and-trade” and against gun rights. Plenty of Republicans have supported bailouts and higher taxes and hordes of new regulations—the very things that used to be supported only by Democrats.
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Where’d You Put My Drugs?
A recent Gallup poll asked Americans about the things they believed were important for the president and Congress to deal with in the next year. Here are the issues that people believe are “Very” or “Extremely” important:
The economy—93 percent,
Unemployment—89 percent,
Federal budget deficit—84 percent,
Corruption in government—83 percent,
Education—79 percent,
Health care—78 percent,
Terrorism—76 percent,
Social Security—78 percent,
Medicare—71 percent,
Situation in Afghanistan—71 percent,
Gas and home heating prices—68 percent,
Illegal immigration—64 percent,
Taxes—66 percent,
Situation in Iraq—62 percent,
Environment—59 percent.
You’ll notice that there is no item called “crack consumption” or “heroin needle exchange program” that makes it into the top 15. My guess is that they probably don’t make it into the top 100, either.
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All of this has provided libertarians with an opportunity to cut through the nonsense and take their message directly to the people. The drug “debate” is nothing but a red herring; let’s not get distracted.
YOU DON’T HAVE TO BLAME AMERICA TO BE A LIBERTARIAN
I’ve already mentioned how popular Ron Paul is, but have I mentioned what a lost opportunity Ron Paul is for the libertarian cause?
First, the good: If I were president, the first thing I would do is name Congressman Paul as my Treasury secretary. For me, he’s the only candidate who’s run for president in recent years who is completely serious about slashing spending, reducing the size and role of government, and taking on the Federal Reserve.
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The Two-Party Train
Just in case you’re the kind of person who needs actual data before you’ll believe an argument, here are some statistics from the Heritage Foundation’s 2012 Index of Government Dependence. If this doesn’t prove that the two parties are taking us to the same place at different speeds, I don’t know what does. Here are some of the lowlights:
The number of people dependent on some federal government programs grew by 7.5 percent in two years under the Obama administration. That’s the largest increase since the Carter administration.
67.3 million Americans rely on some federal program.
Spending on dependency programs now eats up more than 70 percent of the federal budget.
In 2009, 49.5 percent of Americans paid no federal income taxes, up from 14.8 percent as recently as 1984.
34.8 million Americans were not represented on a federal taxable income return in 1984. Today that figure is 151.7 million.
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And, man, would it be a fun ride. A Beck administration would lean heavily on Ron Paul to make numerous decisions regarding the economy—and as a bonus, Secretary Paul would drive everyone else nuts. As you can imagine, the Fed would be audited or shut down entirely on day one. Departments would be slashed. The establishment would be in hysterics. Good times.
But, as much as I absolutely love Ron Paul’s views on economic policy, I can’t stand his positions on foreign affairs. In fact, I believe most of what he proposes is downright dangerous—and, more important, it is not reflective of how most libertarians think. And for commonsense libertarians that should be pretty exciting: if you can combine real libertarian thought with smart and precise foreign policy, you’d have a candidate who might actually have a chance at the Oval Office.
Two weeks after 9/11, while Americans were still grappling with grief in the wake of the worst attack on U.S. soil in our history, Ron Paul was on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives blaming the United States for terrorism. Paul claimed that the Muslim world had seen our defense of Kuwait during the First Gulf War “as an invasion and domination by a foreign enemy which inspires radicalism” and that terrorists “react as some Americans might react” if a foreign country had invaded them.
And his mind didn’t change much with the passage of time. Six years later he was at a presidential debate when this exchange occurred:
PAUL: Have you ever read the reasons they attacked us? They attack us because we’ve been over there; we’ve been bombing Iraq for ten years.
Q: Are you suggesting we invited the 9/11 attack?
PAUL: I’m suggesting that we listen to the people who attacked us and the reason they did it. . . . If we thin
k that we can do what we want around the world and not incite hatred, then we have a problem. They don’t come here to attack us because we’re rich and we’re free. They come and they attack us because we’re over there.
That’s obviously a ridiculous stance, but since I’d prefer not to get ten thousand emails from Ron Paul supporters claiming that I’m trashing their guy (I’m not; I’m just trying to illustrate the difference between him and true, small-l libertarianism), I want to be precise about his foreign policy. Paul describes himself as a noninterventionist, not an isolationist. In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, he explained: “An isolationist is a protectionist that builds walls around the country. They don’t like to trade. They don’t like to travel about the world. And they like to put sanctions on different countries. . . . Nonintervention is quite a bit different. It’s what the Founders advised to get along with people, trade with people, and to have—practice diplomacy, rather than getting—having this militancy of telling people what to do and how to run the world, and building walls around our own country.”
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