Doug and UC have been fairly intolerant of so-called “paulites” and “conspiracy theory” people.

I’m intolerant of “Paulestinians” because most of them have nothing more to offer than personal attacks and are incapable of debating Paul’s platform rationally. I’m intolerant of “truthers” because “the government ran 9/11″ conspiracies are complete bullshit and the people who propagate them are liars and fools who possess not a shred of concrete evidence to back their position and, being a military veteran and a former intel worker who is offended by their baseless accusations (which are usually directed at me personally once they find out my background), I don’t consider myself obligated to be courteous to them or to take anything they have to say seriously.

The sad thing is that in the end they all pretty much want the same thing.

No, I want an honest debate. The Paulestinians and “truthers” want to lash out with personal attacks, ignore actual issues, and stifle dissent to make themselves feel better. We don’t want the same thing at all.

The problem is that all we talk about is where we disagree, not agree.

Those who debate honestly with us will often find that we’re willing to concede points or discuss common ground. Those whose arguments are based on fallacy and lies will usually find the insults and mockery they’ve asked for. That said, it’s unrealistic to expect that anyone will agree on everything all the time. If we did, blogs and comment threads such as this wouldn’t exist. Sometimes debate and discussion get messy and involve large amounts of disagreement, even among people with much common ground, and that’s okay…that’s how consensus is eventually reached.

This site is very indicative of that. Doug and UC have been fairly intolerant of so-called “paulites” and “conspiracy theory” people. While at the same time some of the “paulites” have been quite intolerant of them. It comes down to name calling on both sides. The sad thing is that in the end they all pretty much want the same thing. The problem is that all we talk about is where we disagree, not agree.

If we want to move ahead we need to talk about the places where we agree more, and less about where we disagree. The problem with this, however, is that people just don’t get all that emotional until they are backed into a corner. If we focused on areas where we agree, but disagree with the other parties, we can stop chewing ourselves up but use that energy to try and chew the other parties up.

Rocinante saddle up !

Then of course, the honeymoon ended. To be blunt, the infighting, backstabbing, and elitist nature of many of it’s supporters has turned me off. Not to the idea, the idea is good. I’m just not sure about the party. They make the GOP look tame when it comes to cannibalizing their own.

Sure, they want Ron Paul supporters to come out and support their candidate. The thing is, Ron Paul is the person who brought awareness to a lot of people to get interested in libertarianism. When these people were fired up with the idea of libertarianism, and flocked to boards like this one, they were slapped in the face. Repeatedly. They weren’t good enough, Ron Paul wasn’t pure enough. Both were making libertarianism look bad.

Then, of course, the newsletters broke. More libertarian’s freaking out about appearances. Of course, this was when my education about paleos and cosmos would emerge. Sigh. The Libertarian Party might like to have the numbers that Paul supporters could provide. I just don’t think that they’d be able to hide their contempt for them.

I don’t foresee the LP ever getting more than about 10% of the libertarian vote, and no more than 1 or 2% of the overall vote. But that doesn’t make the LP without value. Indeed, I suspect that its very existence performs a valuable educational function just by keeping the word “libertarian” in the public eye, in however small a fashion. Merely by existing, it gives people who have a generally freedom-oriented philosophy but who may not be well-read in libertarian literature an ability to label themselves, and – as importantly – realize that there is an ideological movement that exists beyond just conservatism vs. modern liberalism.

I’ll admit, this is kind of an amorphous sounding role, but I have little doubt that it is a role nonetheless.

Third parties face a big structural problem to electoral success, however. The types of people that join them are ideologically driven, but any successful third party would have to be fairly moderate. Moderates by nature are not the type to found new political movements.

I believe that there is a political opportunity for a centrist party, taking the best of both D and R: fiscal responsibility, smaller government, avoiding unnecessary wars, and respecting civil liberties as required by the Bill of Rights.

Since members of Congress represent geographical areas rather than groups of like-minded individuals, the only chance that pro-liberty voters (or other ideologically driven groups) have of exerting political influence in Congress is by moving to a single state, as the Free State Project is working toward in New Hampshire. From Ron Paul’s primary results, Montana might have been a good choice as well.

Until this is changed all 3rd parties are just going through the motions. The public wants a strong 3rd party to emerge. They are sick of the current two parties hence the low approval rating of Congress. But they never vote 3rd party because of the spoiler effect.

All 3rd parties need to come together and drive this point home. If the US electorate wants true change and critical evaluation of the issues then we must change to a ranked ballot system.