Bob Barr Defects

Well, the Libertarian Party has announced that Bob Barr is now a former Republican and a new member and officer of the Libertarian Party.

(Washington, D.C.) On Tuesday evening, former Congressman Bob Barr, a Life Member of the Libertarian Party, was offered the position of Regional 4 Representative of the Libertarian National Committee.

I can't say that I find this a pleasant happening from my particular point of view. While I admire Mr. Barr's stance on the 2nd Amendment, privacy issues and a few other things he has some major baggage that is blatantly unlibertarian. Since the article states that he is a card carrying, life member I will assume that he has read the Non-Aggression Principle and understands it. Then again there are a great many Neo-Libertarians who have signed it and have no clue as to what it means, so court's out on this one.

Mr. Barr also has not, to the best of my knowledge or anyone else's repudiated his stance on the Drug War. This is the clincher for me. Unless he can stand up and say he is 100% against the War on Drugs and People then he definitely cannot be counted as anything other than a paper libertarian who was courted by the Reformista in a misguided attempt to garner votes in the 2008 election. While many can accept some folks who are 80% libertarian there are, and must be cut off points and the War on Drugs should always be a major one.

Barr is exactly what they have been preaching for as their dream candidate. A defector who has been lured away in order to garner votes but who is not really a libertarian in any true sense of the word. Here's my prediction. The Reformista are going to attempt to run him as the LP candidate in 2008, pushing aside real libertarians with a history in favour of someone they consider more electable. This would pretty much be the final nail in the LP's political coffin and would serve to drive even more people from the Party.

The LP and Bob Barr have a great many questions to answer and they'd best get to answering them quickly. Given the recent events in Portland this is something the LP can ill afford to let slide.

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