Greetings. It has been quite a while since the last newsletter, but not due to lack of news. I have been too busy making major upgrades to the web site to be able to write. During this month we passed the 50,000 visits mark and now have over 900 members! In fact, membership growth has picked up in the last month because a) Michael McNeal has been promoting the site effectively on facebook.com, and b) quiz2d.com traffic has jumped dramatically due to referrals on stumbleupon.com.
In this issue:
A new voting system for ReformTheLP.org, and why.
A new approach to the LP Platform –- Please read & vote on the new submissions!
And more, including an essay that asks “the unthinkable question.”
Going into the 2006 LP convention, we had a very strong consensus that the membership pledge had to go. We also had strong consensus on which essays to push. Unfortunately, we did not have a very strong consensus on which changes to the platform we wanted to make, so we focused our efforts on just getting rid of what was bad.
Our lack of consensus on the platform can be traced to three factors:
Going through the old platform was a lot of work. Few were willing to take the time to look at hundreds of pages and vote on each.
Many disliked the old platform as a whole, stating that we should start from scratch.
The approval votes that we did get were not as expressive as the essay ratings.
After a great deal of recoding of the web site, these issues have been addressed.
A New Voting System
One thing that became apparent leading up to the 2006 convention is that we had stronger consensus on the favorite essays than for the favorite platform proposals. The 1-5 rating system seemed to be working better than the approval voting used for platform proposals. At the time I did not know why.
Then, Devin Freeman wrote a series on voting systems. His
first essay pointed out how third party activists are making a huge mistake by supporting Instant Run-off Voting (IRV). In practice, IRV leads to two-party dominance the same as plurality voting. He concluded that Approval Voting was superior, but then in subsequentessays looked at the weaknesses of Approval Voting and suggested remedies.
These essays got the attention of the Range Voting
community. Daniel Ong pointed me to their web site and the light bulb went off. Our essay rating system was an example of Range Voting!
So, it was time to do a range vote for platform proposals as well as for essays. Taking into account the advice of the Range Voting experts,
I increased the fidelity, going to a -5 to +5 system, reduced the number of button clicks down to one, and allowed abstentions. The result is the widget pictured above.
But don’t worry, your old votes have been preserved. Your old proposal votes and essay ratings have been mapped into the new system as follows:
For Platform Planks
For Essays
Old
New
Approve
+3
Disapprove
-3
Old
New
5 (Love it)
+4
4 (Like it)
+2
3 (It's OK)
0
2 (Dislike it)
-2
1 (Hate it)
-4
Some of you might want to revisit some of your old votes and do some fine tuning using. Give a +5 to your very favorites, give a -5 to ideas you truly hate, and so on.
And all of you, please read Clay Shentrup and Warren Smith’s
Why Alternative Parties Must Get Range Voting, or DIE. Range Voting is the key to getting third parties taken seriously, while preserving the stability accountability of district based elections.
A New Approach to the LP Platform
One message we got repeatedly leading up to the 2006 LP Convention and at the Convention was that the old platform was too long and clunky. Many Caucus members expressed that they wanted to simply scrap the old platform vs. fix it plank by plank. Due to our victory in getting most of the old platform removed, we are now in a much better position to do just that.
But how? How do we effectively debate both the format and the content of the new LP Platform?
Two approaches have arisen so far:
An ad hoc platform committee convened on our
Yahoo Group. After a great deal of work involving hundreds of posts, they have produced the report that follows. Please read it and then follow the instructions for voting on these new submissions!
The layout for platform voting has been updated to accommodate multiple formats.
First, Number 2. For new format planks, we have tightened the layout. Under the old system we had platform->subject->plank. That is, we had a separate page for each plank proposal with subdirectories grouping the subjects. Under the new system we have platform->format->subject. That is, for a particular format, all of the planks for a subject are on the same page. This makes it easier to compare proposals without all that excessive paging.
Combine this with the new one-touch voting widget, and voting should go much faster.
An ad hoc subcommittee of the Libertarian Reform Caucus (LRC) has developed a new approach to the LP Platform. Since the LP National Convention in Portland in July 2006, it has become clear to many that the Platform needs an entirely new approach. With most of the Platform being rejected by the Convention, now seems to be an excellent time to ask the basic questions about the Platform: What should it be? Who is it for? How should it read?
The LRC s operative premise is that the LP should stand for libertarian change that can plausibly be enacted in “the next term in office.” The current and old Platform did not and does not do that. Most of the Platform explicitly prescribes radical social change. While most Libertarians would like to see such changes – sooner rather than later—the LRC believes it would be far more appropriate for Libertarians to advocate nearer-term, practical solutions. It is simply inappropriate for a political party that wishes to win elective office to suggest radical changes in government that non-Libertarians neither endorse nor even understand.
Further, there are any number of issues on which Libertarians are divided, even on a theoretical basis. Abortion, for example, is an issue that many Libertarians take different positions on. There are various brands of Libertarians: moderates, radicals, constitutionalists, greens. The current platform exposes old differences, and attempts to mollify both radicals and moderates by including both long term visions and more moderate, incremental changes. The net effect is a document that the LRC ad hoc platform committee believes is tortured and confusing for the general public and even for Libertarians.
The current Platform is, in short, a millstone for Libertarian candidates. Libertarian candidates who may get serious attention in a campaign often find themselves being asked questions about whether the candidate supports some of the more radical views in the Platform.
This LRC ad hoc committee believes there is a better way to approach the Platform. Rather than having a long, ponderous Platform, why not have a short and simple one?
more...
It's quite a surreal and hostile world we minor parties live in. Confronted with the latest missteps by our elected officials, we shake our fists in the air, engage in passionate discourse to find solutions, and ultimately send our best and brightest into the political cauldron. But the result is that, when our candidates affect elections at all, it is almost invariably to harm the mainstream candidate most similar to ours. It seems we are gluttons for punishment, much like the 97,488 Floridians who voted for Nader in 2000, only to help secure the victory for Bush.
I recently read an article by a nationally syndicated columnist, in which he suggested that Libertarians (and ostensibly Greens et al.) close up shop as a political party altogether, and focus their efforts to form an interest group like the National Rifle Association or the League of Women Voters. In his words they are currently little more than a "high-school-level debating club". While his remarks drew the ire of Libertarians far and wide, any among us with an ear for reality knows he has a point. America's minor parties can talk all day about their great ideas, but our number one priority is to find a way to win a significant number of contentious elections. If we can't do that, then this columnist's point sticks. Hence the question: how do we break out of two-party duopoly? We must find an innovative way to do that, because nothing we've tried so far has worked. more...
The more I read the hard-core purist blogs and responses to the 2006 convention or “Portland Purge” as they call it, the more I wonder if we can ever work alongside these people. There is no room for compromise between the purist and reform camps of the libertarian movement. One group wants ideological purity at all costs. The other group wants a broad, coalition style party that can start winning elections and changing the system, even if in small increments. Purists, it seems, would rather win the battle of philosophical purity even if it means losing the war for increased liberty. Furthermore, the party’s bylaws make it very difficult to implement a new policy or stance.
I’ve heard the 2006 convention touted as a major victory for the reform movement, and in a way it was. We were able to tear down a lot of the old platform and remove a great deal of its “crazy” elements. However, we were not able to implement our own vision. The LRC was a wrecking crew in ’06, but we were not able to construct anything to take the place of what we demolished. This is largely due to the bylaws that make it quite difficult to add or revise planks of the platform. Of course, this is by design to help maintain the ideological purity of the party.
What we have now is a party with sharply drawn lines between the two camps. We can expect the purist elements to redouble their efforts to maintain control of the party. So now we face a determined foe. What sort of party will emerge out of this conflict, even if we win? I’d imagine a lot of the old guard will leave in protest. In fact, we should do everything we can to encourage the hardliners who refuse to compromise to pack their bags and go. Their continued presence will only serve as a distraction and a drag on the party. So the question is what sort of party will we be taking over? One with a 35 year history of electoral failure. One with a reputation for fringe politics and whacko positions. One with a depleted membership. The only upside is that we don’t have to go through the process of building certain party structures from scratch. Is it worth the baggage?
more...
And wait! There’s more!
Tim Crowley has been cranking them out in the last couple of weeks. He has three new essays up now, and more in the queue.
Live Free, Grow........ Or Die? Presently, purists have been at the top of the hierarchy since the days of the smoke-filled Ayn Rand / Mike Wallace interview. In the name of internal consistency, they have dominated the doctrinal aspects of the party. They have created a hothouse flower environment for themselves at the expense of the Pragmatists and the nation. Purists trivialize the notion of compromise, even though that is the essence of politics.
Take the Keystone Quiz. One way to break up the purist monolith would be to have all 50 state LPs create their own statewide version of the Nolan Quiz. If every state did this, then it would hasten the development of statewide Libertarianism. We are looking for converts, not heretics.
Take The Islamo-Fascist Keystone Quiz!! Who says Libertarians should have a monopoly on short political quizzes. Here is a Pennsylvania specific quiz for a somewhat different ideology, based on LPPa's Keystone Quiz. (Warning: politically incorrect humor.)
