http://www.ballot-access.org/…

One of the scandals of elections in the United States is that the Democratic and Republican Parties field so few nominees for state legislative posts. This year, there are 5,773 regularly-scheduled state partisan legislative elections. In 2,281 of those elections, either the Democratic Party, or the Republican Party, has no nominee. That means that 39.5% of the legislative races have no Democratic-Republican contest.

This is the worst competitive posture since 2000. The percentage in previous even-numbered years has been: 2006 37.6%; 2004 38.7%; 2002 36.9%; 2000 40.6%; 1998 41.1%; 1996 32.7%; 1994 35.8%; 1992 32.8%; 1990 35.9%; 1988 36.6%.

Of course the major parties ought to be free to decide to skip running candidates in districts in which they feel they can’t win. But, given the large number of districts with no contest between the two major parties, it is infuriating that ballot access laws in many states keep minor parties and independent candidates from contesting legislative seats and giving the voters a choice.

The Ds and Rs work together to keep power. They carve up new districts so those voting party line outnumber everyone else and create convoluted election laws to keep outsiders from having any chance.

http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/…

In the November issue of Liberty magazine I write about one factor that I think reduces the political impact of libertarian-leaning voters: the fact that they’re all over the map about which party or faction represents the lesser of the evils:

One reason why libertarians underperform politically is that they are politically split, not just between radicals and incrementalists, as can happen in any political movement, but also among various political movements — while being too small to influence any of them very much.

It seems to me that libertarians come in several political groupings:

(1) Those who care primarily about free markets and thus support conservative Republicans. Given the candidates on offer, that means helping to move the GOP to the right on social issues (and war and civil liberties) as well as on economic issues. This group would include the Club for Growth, Republican “Leave Us Alone” activist Grover Norquist, many donors to free-market thinktanks, and probably most libertarian-leaning politically active people.

(2) Those who want to make the GOP more socially tolerant and thus support moderate Republicans, which effectively means Republicans who aren’t very free-market. This would include Log Cabin Republicans, pro-choice Republicans, and lots of Wall Street and Silicon Valley businesspeople.

(3) Those who think the GOP is irredeemably bad on social issues and civil liberties and thus support Democrats. This would again include some Silicon Valley businessmen who are pro-entrepreneurship and fiscally conservative but just can’t support a party that is opposed to abortion rights and gay rights. A dramatic example is Tim Gill, the founder of Quark, who calls himself a libertarian but has contributed millions of dollars to Democrats because of Republican opposition to gay rights. There are also broadly libertarian people involved in the ACLU, the drug-reform movement, and other civil libertarian causes.

(4) Those who support the Libertarian Party. They don’t get many votes, but they include a large percentage of libertarian activists.

If only some candidate or movement could bring them all together.

There was/is one. His name is Ron Paul and the movement is now called the Campaign for Liberty. Too bad Cato and Reason and many other libertarians bashed the most libertarian candidate ever to have a real possibility of being nominated to a major party. Making a deal breaker things which happened decades ago and while not always thoroughly explained away for some should have been no more harmful to the campaign than anyone else’s skeletons.

At Paul’s rallies you’d find Democrats and Greens, independents, Republicans and Constitutionalists, voluntarists and anarchists. He has/had broad support. While the support of those described above may not have won Paul the nomination it would have put him far closer. Boaz has only those nitpickers to blame.

Part 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Hi Res Download

There is obviously some leftist, anti-capitalism stuff and violence by some of the protesters which obviously can not be supported but the police state stuff is important.

http://www.ballot-access.org/…

On October 6, Survey USA released a poll for the New Hampshire U.S. Senate race. It shows: Shaheen (Dem.) 48%, Sununu (Rep.) 40%, Blevens (Libt.) 7%, undecided 5%.

If Ken Blevens polls as much as 4%, the New Hampshire Libertarian Party will once again be ballot-qualified. It was ballot qualified between November 1990 and November 1996, back when the vote test was 3%. In 1997 the New Hampshire legislature raised the vote test to 4%, but expanded the vote test so that U.S. Senate would count, instead of just Governor. In the entire history of popular elections for U.S. Senate in New Hampshire, no independent or minor party candidate for U.S. Senate ever polled as much as 4%, except that Blevens himself polled 4.53% for U.S. Senate in 1996. However, the 1997 law change was written so that Blevens’ polling over 4% in 1996 did not count toward making the party ballot-qualified.

In the entire nation, the best Libertarian showing in a U.S. Senate race with both a Democrat and a Republican in the race was in 2000 in Massachusetts, when Carla Howell polled 11.9%.

The reason I post this story at all is due to what I emphasized above. Many many people think that political rules are uniform and that the reason third parties don’t do better is purely due to lack of interest by the public.

As one can see here, likely as a result of Blevens doing well enough to make a significant impact on an election, the rules were made more strict. The Ds and Rs do their best to keep third parties as insignificant as possible by making asymmetrical laws which are completely biased in favor of those already in the majority. Worse still is the biased enforcement of those laws. Should the Ds and Rs break them the courts rule in favor of them. Should a third party, more often than not, they are ruled against. Take for instance the issues in Texas where the Ds and Rs submitted candidates after the deadline. The Barr campaign took it to court and lost. In West Virgina where the LP was unable to get enough signatures in time for the deadline but did within a few days was disallowed from the ballot. Then you have places like Pennsylvania where the Rs are suing to keep Barr off the ballot and Louisiana were the Socialist party and Libertarian Party were just bumped off. The former not being able to get back on.

http://www.connietalk.com/…

Martial arts pro and actor Chuck Norris used to be a Mike Huckabee supporter. But appearing on the Alex Jones Show this week, Norris revealed that there is only one politician left that he trusts: and it’s not Huckabee.

I am so worried - like so many people in America are - about the future, about the direction our country’s heading…The founding fathers had a vision for America, and it was not corrupted by greed and power. And the politicians are so disconnected from the will of the People. We’ve got to do something about it.

Truthfully, when the Republicans were in control of the Congress…they ran us into the ground. So the Democrats said, ‘Well, we’ll change everything. We’ll make everything better.’ So now the Democrats have control of Congress, and they run us deeper into the ground. I don’t know who to trust. I don’t trust any of them. Ron Paul is the only guy I trust.

If I had one wish…one wish…I’d like to line up all the members of Congress, and have Ron Paul walk with me down the line and say, ‘Okay, which one’s corrupted? Which one’s corrupted?’ And the ones he points to…I will choke them unconscious. And stick them into a pile.

Part 2

It’s a shame he didn’t come around till now. It couldn’t have hurt Paul to have had his support.

The Wanna-Be Vice Dictators
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:12 PM

They both want more regulation, more totalitarian “oversight,” more national socialism. So far, the only debate is centered around a lie perpetuated by both sides: That the Republicans are for smaller government.

McCain Is a Socialist, Too!
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:15 PM

Palin argues that McCain is anything but laissez-faire. After all, he’s for campaign finance censorship and tobacco nanny statism.

She’s Getting Away With It
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:19 PM

The key for McCain is to somehow run against the status quo, to run against his own party’s recent legacy. Palin says that we shouldn’t trust national health care, unless we have been happy with the way the feds have been handling things lately. Of course, she is right. Those who hate the Bush legacy — meaning, total statism — should logically oppose socialism too. But the McCain/Palin administration would be more of the same, more Bushism, more socialism. This severe ideological confusion helps both parties, and creates the illusion that there is a difference between the two.

Biden is getting away with it too, blaming the Republicans for shrinking the state. I can’t stand either one.

The Elephant in the Room
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:23 PM

They both support the fascist bailout. They both support a trillion-dollar foreign policy and a multi-trillion dollar corporate/entitlement state. They are debating over millions when the state they wish to run spends trillions. Even assuming the greatness of mass democracy, this is a grave injustice. They should be debating big, real issues. Not this trivia.

Meanwhile, the McCain campaign continues to campaign on the fact that for a few days they nominally stopped campaiging.

The GOP’s Embrace of Autarky
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:30 PM

When, by the way, did the Republicans and almost all conservatives come to champion the frightening and economically ludicrous concept of “energy independence”? What they mean, of course, is autarky and socialism: All energy produced within America, and every single form of energy — solar, coal, oil, nuclear, wind, etc. — subsidized massively by the federal government. Even the Alaska drilling issue isn’t conceived of with anything approaching market reasoning. “We,” as in the federal government, should drill.

(Although the Republicans are more skeptical of the global warming zeitgist, they seem willing to champion big government programs such as carbon emissions limits to address climate change. Hey, environmentalists, with all the Republican leaders and corporate state adopting this line, you know it’s wrong.)

Biden Just Admitted It
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:39 PM

Obama’s Iraq withdrawal plan is the same as Bush’s. Biden does say, however, that the Dems will end the war, eventually. Palin doesn’t even make this much of a promise. On foreign policy, the Dems still seem slightly better than the Repubs.

On the other hand, “Pakistan already has nuclear weapons,” Biden points out, and so, I guess, we should be at war with them.

A Relief
Posted by Anthony Gregory at 08:54 PM

Well, at least both say Israel must be protected at all costs, that nothing is more important, and that Iran is the greatest threat ever. Indeed, they both accuse the other of being insufficiently determined to keep the Persians in line.

They also agreed on gay marriage, just as Bush and Kerry did: More equality under the law but no marriage for homosexuals. Same exact position. Different emphasis.