Mike Gravel has a fairly large entourage of leftists who followed him into the Libertarian Party and managed to get credentialed as delegates. Not large enough to make a serious run at the nomination, at least not on the first ballot, but enough diehards to give him the loudest applause at multi-candidate events. However, tonight Gravel received two of the biggest ovations from the general libertarian audience, and both times were in response to comments made earlier by Wayne Allyn Root.
First, Root made the argument that the immigrants today were not like the immigrants of ages before. Root’s own parents were immigrants, but they came here to work, he says. Today’s immigrants come to America in order to collect welfare.
Gravel fiercely attacked this position. “Show me a single immigrant who came here to collect welfare. They don’t exist. These people come here to work!”
The crowd erupted with applause.
Secondly, Root compared himself to Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan, and while admitting that Reagan did not govern as a libertarian, Root said Reagan ran as one.
Gravel pointed out how Reagan increased the debt, built up the military-industrial complex, and raised taxes on the poor. “We don’t need Ronald Reagan, we need liberty!”
Barr is definitely a right-libertarian, but I really don’t get the impression from him and his camp that he wants to purge the party of all who disagree with him. I do get that impression from both Root and Gravel. Neither one of them really seems to care that what they’re proposing is in many ways directly opposed to even the broadest definitions of libertarianism- particularly Gravel’s quasi-socialist majoritarian nonsense. At least Root has the sense to try and cover some of it up.
I think Barr groks and can work with “principled” libertarians in much the same “big tent” way Paul did, and I think he really is committed to staying in and growing the party. Even if I disagree with a lot of his “unprincipled” stances, I have no doubt that he’s an ally and not an enemy.
Root is a Republican. He is not a Libertarian. He’s just another opportunistic leech who couldn’t get anywhere with his own party, so he suddenly decided he was a Libertarian.
We get a lot of those, as you have probably noticed.
Mr. Root, There was another inspiring presidential campaign in 1980 besides Ronald Regan: ED CLARK.
Don’t you think it would have been wise to push Clark over Reagan? After all, Clark was the LIBERTARIAN nominee. I mean, really now….make up your mind which is more inspiring to you, Mr. Root, the GOP or the LP.
I must have been running back and forth from the Barr event during the immigration question… but I did notice that Root hit a flat note when he cited Barry Goldwater as his personal political hero, and said that the LP can take inspiration from the Ronald Reagan campaign. Gravel followed up two spots, and the crowd went wild when he took Root to task and spent his alloted time ripping into Reagan.
Oh well, so much for that.
Any other speculations on VP pairings? That almost interests me as much as the Presidential selection to be honest.
I think Gravel would not want to be associated with Barr in any way. Feelings are probably mutual.
Think he’d be a serious contender for VP? If Barr wins the nomination, would he even want Gravel?