A Libertarian's Declaration of Independence from the Republican Party

At Students for Liberty, UC Berkeley, Casey Given declares his independence from the Republican Party in a post entitled "The Myth of the Two-Party System."  He writes:
Having moved to a new place for the school year, I recently re-registered to vote for the upcoming election. Alongside my change of address, I also decided to change my party, switching from Republican to Libertarian, thus concluding my indecisive wavering for the last two years over which one to choose. . . . it seems now that whenever my “Big L” Libertarianism comes up in conversation, several of my friends seem to have the same punch line for me: “You shouldn’t have switched. Sure, Republicans are bad, but at least they’re lesser of the two evils, and they have an actual chance of winning!”
Given argues against siding with the lesser evil on the basis of the fact that they are admittedly still evil, and then asks whether there is indeed a difference in the degree of evil between the twin evils of the Democratic and Republican parties:
Perhaps I’m just blind, but I fail to distinguish any semblance of dissimilarity between Republicans and Democrats in modern politics. On the federal level, both parties have supported foreign interventionism in Iraq and Afghanistan, massive bailouts via the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), violations of our civil liberties via the PATRIOT Act, and secretive prisons overseas such as Guantanamo Bay. And, mind you, this is under both Bush and Obama. Similarly, on the state level . . .
The now-standard Republican rejoinder to this argument admits that the GOP "lost its way," but then pleads for "one more chance," and points to the rhetorical opposition of Republicans to the Democrats' evil agenda.  The association between American voters and the major parties resembles nothing so much as a violently abusive relationship.  The partisans of the two-party state rely on the voters' imaginary identification with their captors, the ideological prison guards of our political system, to force acceptance of an intolerable status quo and state of affairs.  Freedom and independence today begins with freedom and independence from the Democratic and Republican parties.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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pete healey said...

Casey, This is well-written. Great job! I usually prefer the term "gatekeepers" to your "ideological prison guards" but it certainly works. The multi-party proportional politics that are the hallmark of democratic institutions in the 21st century will be coming to a society near you soon, very soon.

 
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