Photo that accompanied McAfee’s post (below)
From John McAfee’s Facebook page, May 31st, 2016 (via ATPR):
IS THE LIBERTARIAN PARTY TAKING ITSELF SERIOUSLY?
Unfortunately, yes.
The Libertarian Party leadership is desperate for recognition, acceptance and respect. This need for perceived validity is the decay that is destroying the Party. In order to be accepted, the Party has traditionally attempted to conform to the existing political structure – that same, power and force based structure that we are all fighting against. Look at the mimicry within our Party: Our debates are indistinguishable in form from the two major parties; the only difference being that when a candidate in a major party talks about taking office there is actually a chance they can do it. When we say it, it looks and sounds ludicrous, as if we are steeped in self delusion.
The format of our conventions looks and smells like the conventions of the major parties. The only difference is that the LP format allows for far more corruption. State chairs pass out plain index cards to be filled out and returned- nothing numbered, nothing stamped . Some even allowed voting by text messages. The delegates could have been anywhere or anyone could have had the phone. It is a comic shadow of the system that the LP is trying to imitate.
And what has been the price of this desperate urge to be respected? It has created the willingness to compromise. Even more debilitating, the fear of not being accepted has killed the soul of joy that grows naturally in Liberty. The Spirit of liberty is missing.
When James Weeks stripped at the LP Convention last Sunday there were widespread boo’s and general disapproval of Mr. Week’s exuberance. Rather than enjoying a respite from the grey blandness of the convention, people were muttering that the world would think that Libertarians were fools. Well, if we care about such tivialities, then we are indeed fools.
For me, I was far more ashamed of those who turned their heads in disgust than by anything Mr. Weeks did. In the photo above, it is the bottom half which has disgraced the LP.
Select comments below the post, with responses from McAfee:
Phil Hermanas It’s hard to call James Weeks an embarrassment for the party when Trump and Hillary are the major party candidates.
But if the Libertarian party wants to grow, it needs to stick to its values and make in road on state and local ballots rather than just keep pushing for President. Right now we’re the party of failed republicans and Never Trumps rather than liberty.
John McafeeIndeed!
Anastasiya Stooch MaslovaThe disgrace is that the party sold out for corporate money and democratic ideals. The delegates booed and screamed against Weld and then nominated him for VP. And now the same people are cheering for the ticket that has openly stated that this is their Johnson campaign, not the Libertarian Party campaign.
John Mcafee votedifferent.us
Nick Buriegi McAfee, Petersen, Perry: appealing to libertarians, welcoming to all seeking true freedom.Johnson: welcoming to democrats and republicans since he espouses their values. A huge turn off to libertarians.The future of the party is bleak. The days of free people, free markets, small gov’t are over.
John McafeeYou are, sadly, correct.
John Culkin The Libertarian Party is extremely hard to get behind.John Mcafee Certainly hard for me.
Matthew Day-Holloway And what is the point of liberty if you can’t have fun, same issue I have with anarchy-punk, no one can take a jokeJohn McafeeWe have to learn. Maturity is frequently gauged by how graciously we are able to make fun of ourselves.
McAfee reminds me of Maher, who is always annoyingly offended by people being… offended.
Someone turning his head away in disgust, in this instance, suggests that his instincts are working properly. That’s all.
Well, he is not used to losing. Money does that. It is too bad because he was an arresting speaker.
I’ve been disappointed in the sour grapes from McAfee, but maybe he really didn’t know what he was getting into.
First, it was a whale John McAfee appeared to be interested in. We can interpret this as ‘colorful imaging to elicit attention,’ and not to be taken seriously.
Second. It is far from Radical for a Libertarian to dress oddly, wear sexually explicit clothing and act outside of what is considered to be mainstream. But how they dress and what ethical values they live within can be very different. Libertarians like Ed Crane dressed conservatively but engaged in behavior so bizarre as to shock those who dressed unconventionally.
The LP is being taken seriously. Now, Johnson and Weld have to get serious about positioning themselves and presenting working solutions to the pressing problems confronting us. We need to move beyond talk to leading the dialog with demonstrations of how Libertarians solve problems. If I were Gary Johnson I would be naming my cabinet and making choices which reflect serious consideration for building a team competent to lower costs by following the many working examples where compassion has saved taxpayers money. One example of this is Utah’s Housing First, which lowered the cost of social services around 30% by providing housing before anything else. Homelessness was a growing problem in Utah in 2005, now 91% of the homeless are both in housing and moving on with their lives.
Many of the homeless today are Veterans suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). The Veterans Administration maintains protocols which intentionally leave Veterans on the street to die. This cuts their costs and also eliminates militarily trained men and women.
Time is short and they need to get started.
FDS, You can say fuck and shit here
The LP is quite serious.
It’s McAfee The Elephant F***er that’s nuts.
Radicals embarrassed themselves over the weekend. They simply do not get that pink hair and cleat raincoats and G-strings and stripteases by fugly fat guys does them no favors.
Libertarians still have voices and if we don’t like what the candidates are doing or saying, then tell them. Loudly and publicly. That will elicit media attention, too.
We did that during the run up to the South Carolina Debate. Ron’s Campaign did not want to pay the $20,000 to participate, provided by the R3VOLution, and we made them write the check. It was a close thing, too. If it was not for that outpouring Ron would never have arrested so much public attention. “We just walked in; we can just walk out.”
Just a thought, but maybe some Libertarians don’t want to be thought of as kooks and a joke. Maybe they want to be taken seriously so when they run for a local office voters don’t laugh and say “Hey, it’s the fat naked guy party!”
Just because McAfee likes nuts, doesn’t mean the party has to.