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LP files Suit To Stop State Funding Of 3rd Debate
Mike Oliver writes "Arizona Libertarians have filed a lawsuit that could stop Arizona State University from sponsoring the third presidential debate between George Bush and Sen. John Kerry, scheduled for Oct. 13. The lawsuit maintains that by spending up to $2 million to sponsor the event in Tempe, the university is making an illegal campaign contribution to the Republican and Democratic parties."
Hopefully they'll include Badnarik... but will Bush and Kerry debate if they have to face a third candidate?
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
If this works, maybe I should sue the state to stop financing primary elections. Why should all the taxpayers registered as independents finance any party's nomination process?
I'm all for making sure elections are fair, of course... but shouldn't the state at least bill the parties for the costs?
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
No, because they've never claimed that they wish to abolish the court system. The government (and by extension the court system) is there to prevent coercion and/or the use of force against its citizens.
In a libertarian world (at least as I understand it), the republicrats would be able to exclude anyone they wish from their debates, though. And I would expect that the campaign contribution rules would be laxer, so this is somewhat weird in that regard, because as far as I can see, this would all be legal if the Libertarians got their way...
But, I suppose that I'm not bored enough, so maybe it all cancels out.
Frankly, I'd rather that both parties wise up and take notice of an ever increasing minority vote that is willing to vote for an good candidate that truely reflects the will of the people of the USA.
I still honestly don't see a difference in policies between voting for Gore or Bush in 2000, I see very little difference in voting records of Bush and Kerry. About the only difference is how they spin their very similar records.
So given a lack of choices between the two primary parties, my choice is to either not vote (giving the power to who ever happens to win) or voting my concious (and hope that enough other people are willing to buy into this rather than the old "wasted vote" mentality).
Why must everyone vote for the winner ?
PS. Pop quiz, who had a larger percentage of the popular vote, Bill Clinton in either 92, or 96 or Bush in 2000 ?
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
Pure libertarian campaign finance laws would look something like this:
If you have the right to vote, you can give unlimited amounts to any canidate you choose, a transaction between you and someone you support.
If you can't vote (legal or illegal alien, corporation, political party, children, special interest groups), you can't donate to politicians in money or gifts.
Sounds fair to me, how about to everyone else?
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
If the Libertarians stay true to their principles, they would not accept a spot in the debate under those circumstances. On the principle of it, taxpayers are still supporting views they don't agree with. All the non-D/R/L taxpayers obviously, but also the Democrat taxpayers would still be subsidizing the Rep/Lib views, etc.
Campaigns are a way to get your word out, but you should pay for it yourself, not force others to pay your way. Public financing of election campaigns is the worst possible solution. You end up with gov't itself playing a major role in its own future, by deciding who qualifies for finances, etc. Gov't shouldn't be in the business of deciding which political views to support and which to suppress.
Constitutionally Correct
If the Commission on Presidential Debates can set the bar to admission such that a 15% showing in the polls is required, can they not also set the bar at 51%? Is it true that an agency can spend public funds to organize and support a single party?
This seems even more ripe for judicial review.
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
The Libertarian party EXACTLY aligns with my ideals, why would I choose a party that "closely" aligns with my ideals!?
... that is "insightful", now I am convinced to switch parties. hehehe
You also stated. "Yes, it is so much easier to want other people to come around to your point of view than it is to dirty yourself and compromise your ideals by joining a party that has a chance of winning."
I find this incredibly funny, you think it is a cut that he chooses to voice his opinion and yet you think it is good to "dirty yourself and compromise your ideals".
Wow
:-( --- argh. Despair, I owe again.
You're right about the Libertarians not doing this if they were in the debates. If the CPD wasn't set up to exclude third parties we wouldn't be having this problem at all. So while you may be right about their motivations, you've totally dismissed the fact that there is a problem. Redirection and specious reasoning is a habit that comes with the campaign stickers, I understand.
First, read some history about why we two so extremely dominant parties. I know there have nearly always been two main parties, but the amount of exclusion enforced by them now is just scary.
Something to remember about any third parties (or is that 4th, 5th, 6th, and etc.) is that they have been wholly responsible for every change reflected in one of the two dominant parties. Social security, desegregation, Southern succession, welfare, abortion, emission standards, prohibition... all these things came about because there were third parties pushing these ideas, for better or worse. (Go ahead and pick a few more novel ideas out of political history and trace their origins. Pay attention not to who ratified it but to who first pushed it.) To say that they remove themselves from the main political process because they don't compromise principles is the exact opposite of what they've proven themselves capable of doing. Third parties can grow and change a lot faster than a main party and when the main parties see that that change is approved of by so many people only then do they consider that change themselves. The two main parties do nothing *but* compromise their principles, especially when it runs counter to the other party.
The two main political parties represent the bargain the United States has accepted in order to make things simple enough that most everyone can decide on one of them. Third parties represent the change that is needed that is only understood by the few who bother to care about politics while standing up for what they really believe is true despite what the rest of the country has accepted.
Sadly, all political parties are looking for complete control over the government. Think monolithic versus modular and think about how unstable and vulnerable most OS's are compared to any *BSD. (I'm sure you love analogies.) Until we can individually assign cabinet positions, judges, and all the other move makers in Washington, we're just going to have to jump on one of the two bigger bandwagons until something really important comes along that needs our attention. Right now that's the exclusive debates and ruinous ideas of federal healthcare, and my wagon happens to carry a Libertarian bumper sticker.
Direct away from face when opening.
So on the November ballot is an Initiative to change to a Top-Two style primary--all candidates are listed, the top two vote-getters advance to the final ballot, without regard to what party they are from.
Damn parties don't like how we do nominations, we'll do it without them, thank you very much.
He decided to just watch the government, and kind of scale it down to size, and run his life that way. --Laurie Anderson
The libertarian party wouldn't be doing this if they were in the debate, even if all the other 'third' parties were excluded.
That's a bogus argument for several reasons. First, as someone pointed out above, Arizona (the government involved in this case) has approved one third-party candidate, the Libertarian. So none of the other third parties has a role there for this election (that's another, ballot access, problem). Second, various of the third parties have a history of joint efforts at ballot access. Third, IANAL, but it probably takes a wronged party (one that is on the ballot yet not invited to the state-sponsored debate) to have standing in a lawsuit. If, in your scenario, the Libertarian party was invited but another third party, on the ballot, was not, the best the Libertarians might be able to do is to offer some kind of friend-of-the-court argument (and I would not be surprised to see one).
I believe that your idea that third parties have a negative impact on the state of politics (from a response of yours below) is also bogus. It sounds like you are alluding to the Nader-nuked-Gore argument. If indeed that argument is true (and there is plenty of dispute on that), the only serious negative impact is on the losing 2-party candidate, certainly not politics. Even the winner must deal with a more limited mandate. On the contrary, it forces the dominant parties to be more responsive the next time; that is a positive impact on politics as a whole. And such responsiveness is extremely unlikely when attempted from within today's primary parties; alternate ideas tend to get quashed.
Couldn't you say that the Green parties solutions are "more government, less free enterprise?"
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
The libertarian party wouldn't be doing this if they were in the debate, even if all the other 'third' parties were excluded. That much seems self evident. Since that's likely the case, this means its less about what the two main parties are getting and more about what the libertarians are not getting. Which makes the whole thing bullshit from an ethical standpoint.
What brings you to this opinion? Speculation? Anyway, you're dead wrong. The LP qualified for federal matching funds in 2000 and sent the check back. That's how strongly libertarians believe in their ideals, and no Libertarian candidate would participate in a debate funded by public funds.
Seems awfully hypocritical to me, since Cornel accepts public money and runs a 2-tier tuition scheme for in-state and out-of-state students. But the libertarians were happy to attend a debate there. Hmmm...
"Wow. Now THAT'S a lot of angry Indians." - Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer
The problem isn't the RNC convention scheduling, it's the idiots in the IL legislature that can't figure out how to hold an election in under 90 days. No other state seems to have this problem.
You're certainly welcome to dissagree with the law, to say that it is a stupid law, or even to suggest new laws be passed for future elections. However you have in no way claimed it is an invalid law. You have in no way suggested Bush has any right to violate laws he dislikes.
This can in no way come as a surprise to the the Republican party. They have professionals employed in every state, expert in local election laws. This is either pure incompetence in complying with the law or or pure hubris expecting to be above the law. Are you suggeting that the Libertarian party, or even the Satan-Worshipers-for-Freedom party, that they should be permitted to simply ignore election law and expect to place any candidate they like onto the presidential ballot?
Seriously, I want an answer. Would you support some wack-job party that attempted to do the exact same thing? Anything less is undeniable hypocisy.
A signifigant point is that there is no plausible way this could impact the election anyway. Kerry has an 18 point lead in Illinois. The only possible way Kerry would lose Illinois would through a massive shift which would give Bush a land-slide in the battleground states anyway. If Bush fails to get on the Illinois ballot it would amount to no more than a national comedy.
Bush failing to get onto the Illinois ballow might even have a beneficial side-effect. It could prompt a nation-wide cleanup of bad election laws. Laws created by and for Republicrats primarily to keep anyone else off of the ballots. I for one would love to see an entire overhaul of election law to best represent and serve the people, rather than a system designed to by the republicrats to serve the republicrat parties. The current political polarisation is harmful and paralizing. Abuses are rampant by both parties.
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