Howard Dean continues to strike me as probably the Dem. candidate most dangerous to the President in next year’s election. Unlike the other Dem hopefuls, Dean recognizes that he cannot win the presidency with only the Dem’s traditional constituencies. So he’s going after a number of traditional Republican constitutencies as well. Last week I stated that one of these would be the Libertarian vote. I’m not the only conservative to make this prediction. In fact, I’ve mostly been following the lead of my friend and fellow Enter Stage Right writer James Antle.
Last night I happened to catch one of Howard Dean’s ads on the television. He appeared to attack the President over the Patriot Act and the tightening of civil liberties. Dean was obviously aiming for the Libertarian vote by exploiting their discontent with the Bush administration. James Antle does an excellent job discussing the current troubled relationship between conservatives and Libertarians in this week’s American Conservative.
That being said, at a time when we’re making serious inroads into traditional Dem constituencies, what does the President need to do to protect his own? (Admittedly, if Dean were pro-life I would not be asking this question.) First, I think the President must continue to remain firm on abortion and other life issues. As a politician, W’s main strength is his character. This is why I generally trust W, even if I don’t always agree with his decisions. Secondly, I think W needs to dump his neo-con international policy wonks and put forward a good exit strategy for Iraq. Thirdly, I think he should ease up a little on the Patriot Act as well as the Drug War. This will go a long way toward blocking Dean from making further inroads into the Libertarian vote.
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…and how many self-identified libertarians are there? They might be a vocal minority, but to my knowledge there is only one congressman who calls himself a libertarian, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who is a Republican. I’m not sure how important this constituency is from an electoral standpoint.
You’re making a false distinction between the “neo-con international policy wonks” and the president, Pete. They aren’t puppetmasters; Bush, rightly or wrongly, considers a range of views and chooses the ones he finds convincing. The exit strategy for victory is a pacified Iraq. The president has made that clear time after time, and we can only assume he means it.
What do you mean by “eas[ing] up a little bit on the Patriot Act as well as the Drug War?” I can’t recall the president, or anybody else, referring to the “War on Drugs” recently. That was an ill-chosen metaphor, just like the “War on Poverty” under Lyndon Johnson. Specifically, what do you think Bush should do? Disallow roving wiretaps? Send out fewer interdiction missions off the Florida coast?
I’d say the last thing Bush should do is weaken the war on terrorism to gain the votes of a few cranky libertarians. Middle America doesn’t like drugs or terrorists, and they like a chief executive who fights both.
On principle, don’t Libertarians dislike big government and excessive taxation which accompanies a governmental machine?
These are both things Dean stands for, given his record.
As far as Bush and the Patriot Act go, the Act has never been invoked so far as I know (and recent declassified information has shown). The Drug War is still being fought but obviously isn’t on our minds, and I don’t think a sane Libertarian expects Weenie Deanie to be any more lapse on drugs than Clinton or Bush.
Those conservatives that wholehartedly support the Patriot act in its entirety don’t seem to realize that Bush won’t be president forever. Do you guys really want Hillary having those powers? Do you really want Hillary looking at your library books? You know she’d abuse those powers because her “husband” triggered so many political tax audits when he was in office.
The Patriot Act grants subpoena power for library records. The requests are reviewed by a federal judge and are either accepted or denied. This is not a new thing — the Unabomber’s borrowing habits were subpoenaed, for example. It simply extends this power to cover terrorist investigations.
I agree that we should always be mindful that bad men will continue to cycle through our elected offices, but that’s not necessarily a reason against strengthening a law. The feds won’t be able to snoop withot due process — and that’s fine with me.
Libertarian views are actually pretty strong among New Hampshire voters, and conservative-Christian views weaker. This is as you’d expect in a state reported to be the most unchurched one east of the Mississippi (according to the NH Bible Society).
But Pete was talking about the general election, not the primaries — and again, I’d like to see how many self-identified libertarians there are in N.H., and how many will be voting in the Democratic primary.
When I was growing up in New Hampshire, the attitude was called “Yankee individualism”, not “libertarianism”.
Ever since W.’s 2000 nomination acceptance speech (think “No Child Left Behind”), it’s been clear that he is not a 100% small-government Republican. I like him for the same reasons as Eric, and will vote for him as often as possible, but I can understand why libertarians would vote for him as the best available candidate, not one they really endorse.
You’re absolutely right that Bush isn’t committed to reigning in the size of the government, not even the 75% of the federal government that has nothing to do with national defense or law enforcement. However (and I’m assuming the antecedent in “vote for him” is Dean), you don’t just elect a president, you elect his entourage and a large number of the people who voted for him. Bill Clinton had a lot of political debts when he entered office, as you’ll recall from the huge trouble he encountered when he started paying them off to the gays, feminists, and unions. Dean would immediately move to increase the size and intrusiveness of government. Bush would merely let it continue to expand at a moderate rate. Both situations stink, but at least the president isn’t ideologically committed to government as a solution to all problems.
Then again, the libertarians I know are a grumpy bunch, and they might vote for a Democrat out of spite.
RALPH NADER IS THE ONLY LIBERTARIAN LEFT!!