Okay, I had previously indicated that I would stay out of the Radical v Reform LP debate, posting that, by definition, a political party has to make compromises and forge coalitions. But observing the LP candidates now falling over each other issuing statements either condemning anarchism or rebutting charges that they are anarchists has led me to reconsider. Less Antman posted an article Monday on LRC that addressed this issue, proclaiming The Dallas Accord is Dead. Antman was motivated by Wayne Allen Root invoking the Dallas Accord in his criticism of Mart Ruwart's anarchist views and LP Presidential candidate Christine Smith going on a radio talk show and essentially calling for a purge of anarchists from the LP. Smith was particularly vile in her comments, quoting Ayn Rand in calling anarchists "collectivist, anti-intellectual scum." Her tirade went so far as to proclaim anarchism was a collectivist virus within the LP.

I'm sad to see we've got enough of these people in the LP, they are trying to control it, they are trying to get a presidential candidate...

Well, I'm sad to see that we have a dolt like Christine Smith who is able to parade around passing herself off as an authoritative adjudicator of libertarianism. I would be remiss not to point out to Christine Smith that Ayn Rand virtually condemned everyone, with the exception of GOP presidential candidates, of Objectivist heresy. Indeed Rand's own opinion of the Libertarian Party fell somewhere between her opinion of anarchists and George McGovern.

This whole business started when it became apparent that late-entry Mary Ruwart, a self-admitted Rothbardian Anarchist, had a shot at winning the LP nomination. Ruwart was a late entry because she had been volunteering for the Ron Paul campaign. Indeed, both Ruwart and her husband are long-time Paul activists. Ron Paul had returned the favor by previously recommending Ruwart, a Phd biochemist, for the post of FDA commissioner to President Bush.

Ruwart's convention strategy is going to rely heavily on making the case that she is best poised, both from her past activist history and from her own Rothbardian leanings, to capture and galvanize the Ron Paul Vote. However, she is facing a more sophisticated candidate pool this go around that certainly is not above engaging in opposition research to dredge up old book passages to discredit her. And, without doubt, the attacks Ruwart has had to endure illustrates the perils of anarchists trying to run for political office. Market anarchist theory of law, security, and justice doesn't translate very well into political campaigns or the political arena. Ambitious political opponents will eat it alive. As with love and war, there is nothing fair about politics. Unlike Ruwart, Ron Paul--Ruwart's mentor-- leaves it up to the subjective onlooker whether in his heart of hearts he is actually a Misean Statist or a Rothbardian Anarchist. Paul, I suppose, is smart enough as a politician not to really address that distinction in writing.

This whole dust up only exemplifies a larger contextual question of whether a diverse political and moral philosophy, which is what libertarianism really is, should be organized into a political party to begin with. The fact is that libertarianism cuts a wide ideological swath and encompasses a diverse set of competing schools of historical thought. It is true that NAP can be used as a sort of unifying principle in theory, but in practical application, all kind of cracks and fissures begin to manifest themselves.

For example, Statist-Libertarians view the State as a necessary monopoly provider of retaliatory force to enforce NAP violations against person or property and to provide a small set of non-excludable public goods, such as a national defense. However, Anarcho-Libertarians counter that the State, by nature, is a Redistributionist Coalition, and will, by logical necessity, expand in scope and size. This is the De Jasay argument reached from a rational choice methodology. The same conclusion can be reached however from a more dialectical Libertarian Class Theory perspective as well. Therefore the State necessarily is a net violator of NAP, it's violations far outweighing it's enforcements. Since the behavior of the State can be predicted theoretically and verified empirically without fail, this is a scientific conclusion. Anarcho-Libertarians make the charge that Statist-Libertarians suffer from the Ought-Is fallacy when it comes to the State. Statist-Libertarians will usually attempt to counter the anarchist framework for NAP argument typically using a combination of logical fallacies, such as Burden of Proof, Appeal to Fear, and Appeal to Common Practice. Finally, Statist-Libertarians may attempt to escape their dilemma by advocating a principle of secession, but, as Less Antman has pointed out, this reduces to a de facto anarchist position.

It is precisely because of the type of argument that I made above that a truce was made between the Anarcho-Libertarians and the Statist-Libertarians back in the 70s. Otherwise, the LP would just reduce to a debating society. However, the "truce" hardly prevented the Rothbard/Cato divorce from eventually leading to both coalitions abandoning the LP. The Catoites walked out in 1983. The Rothbardians abandoned the LP after Ron Paul's run in 1988, concluding that the LP was "too libertine." In both instances, I'm not necessarily referring to the rank and file but to the intellectual vanguards.

I think it's safe to say since the 90s the anarchist membership in the LP has steadily dwindled to where it's at an all-time low now. It's readily apparent that the LP continues to move in a direction that values election success and results over the educational role as "The Party of Principle." That's all well and good, but to the extent that the Party emasculates it's platform in an attempt to achieve marginally better electoral results, it will actually be sowing the seeds of it's own demise. Abandoning principle, purging radicals and anarchists, will only divorce the LP from the greater libertarian movement. The first time I hear some LP candidate utter the slogan "Compassionate Libertarianism," that will be the cue to abandon the LP ship. The real impediment to electoral success is our plurality voting systems and the electoral college, which serves to enforce a 2 party system. Rather than eviscerating the platform, the LP will be better served by aggressively partnering with the likes of the Green Party to work toward voting reform.