The View From Here

As some of you know already, I am something of a tightrope walker politically and have good friends both staunch and true, who are nearly every political stripe there is. Many times these people would not even be comfortable in the same room together. The exception was early on in the Ron Paul presidential campaign when we bonded as antiwar, pro-Constitution, pro-civil liberty Paul-promoters. A unique and wonderful phenomenon it was, too.

Now that "the R3VOLUTION" is passing on and morphing into something else entirely our friend Laura at Red State Eclectic has issued a thoughtful analysis from a libertarian-GOP point of view. Take a look.

QUOTE My hope would be that people who are truly serious about liberty could form up as a coalition under the banner of the Campaign for Liberty--but that they could respect one another as they go about pursuing liberty in different ways. There is little (I speak from experience) that is more disheartening than to pour your time and efforts into changing things, only to be told by people who supposedly agree with you in principle that it's a waste of time because it's impossible to change that system, and that the system that you're working in--and you, by extension, I guess--are irreparably corrupt. Human institutions are all capable of changing. Political Parties are human institutions. Hence political parties are capable of changing.

Make a choice--work from within one of the two major parties, or from without. But how about we give our brothers and sisters fighting for liberty the benefit of the doubt? If they believe they can make change from wherever they are, let them have at it, without having to fight off criticism from other liberty lovers. Isn't following the path of your choosing sort of what liberty is about? Criticism from your own "family"--from the people whose respect and admiration you most want--will only reduce the resolve to make a difference; celebration of even small successes will encourage the continuation of the effort. UNQUOTE
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