Video at reason.com TV. H/T Robert Capozzi in IPR comments.
Youtube video description:
Sarwark sat down with Reason’s Matt Welch to discuss the post-election fallout and the future of the LP.
“Stop wasting your breath. Start working on your own parties. Start working on your own issues,” says Libertarian Party national chair Nicholas Sarwark, responding to criticism that Libertarians played a spoiler role and handed Donald Trump the election. “See if you can take my votes in the actual arena of ideas instead of trying to shame me.”
Sarwark sat down with Reason’s Matt Welch the morning after the election to discuss the performance of the Libertarian presidential ticket this year, which drew about 3.7 million votes, or slightly less than 4 percent of the national popular vote. He also spoke about the future of the Republican Party and directly addressed Democrats complaining that third parties “spoiled” the election for Donald Trump.
Interview by Matt Welch. Edited by Zach Weissmueller . Camera by Alex Manning and Justin Monticello.
“They underperformed when it came to votes, and they underperformed a whole lot more than this when it came to disseminating the Libertarian message to the public.
Getting votes for the sake of getting votes is pointless unless there is a strong libertarian message behind it.”
Exactly correct.
“They didn’t underperform for the money/resources raised/spent.”
In dollars per vote, iirc their spending went up by a larger percentage than their votes from 2012.
” Given the widespread disdain for both major-party candidates, this was a rare opportunity that probably won’t come along again for a long, long time.”
I disagree. I think the Democrats and Republicans will continue offering us horrible choices which will only get worse. The question is whether we will know what to do about it.
“For much of the year the country really was looking for an alternative, but Gary Johnson blew it.
If he had been sharp and reasonably well-informed during his media appearances, which were many compared to previous third-party candidates, who knows what might have happened.”
I agree. Also, he should have used Be Rational’s plan to target a few states.
Personally I ended up voting for Stein – not very enthusiastically, as I disagree with most of her economic views. I know other people who followed the election closely but ended up not voting or intentionally voting only down ballot.
“Even the final two RCP polling averages had him at 5.0 and 4.7 percent nationally.
By any reasonable definition the Libertarian ticket “underperformed” its own expectations.”
Typically third party candidates get about half of their final poll numbers, so Johnson actually overperformed from that standpoint. You’ll note that he beat the prediction made by you, me, and I believe a majority of those who made predictions on IPR just before the election.
However….
“There was a very real potential this year, due to all of the circumstances surrounding this election, for the Libertarian Party’s presidential ticket to get quite a bit higher than 3% of the vote, so I would say that Johnson/Weld did underperform.”
I agree; from that standpoint Johnson tanked.
” Turnout was pathetic. People just aren’t interested. ”
The second part does not necessarily follow from the first. There were unusually high numbers of votes in the primaries. Trump and Sanders turned out bigger crowds than what candidates got in the past. Libertarians had more people at the national convention than ever before, with one possible exception in 1979. Record numbers of people watched the debates. So, the lack of turnout wasn’t because of lack of interest, but because the choices that ended up being perceived as having a chance to win were so unsatisfying to so many. Particularly, Clinton had a hard time turning out voters who would have been overwhelmingly likely to vote for her had they voted.
Andy Dandy ” . . . . Any of the other main candidates for the nominations would have done a better job at spreading the Libertarian message to the public. . . . .”
. . . . To tens of thousands of fewer ears.
DFR, I suspect your and Andy’s prescription for HOW GJ could have done better are quite different. Or, how a different LP candidate might have done in an alternative universe.
I’m sure GJ himself believes HE could have performed better. Knowing Aleppo for starters.
Andy doesn’t seem to care about credibility and would have preferred a dogmatic candidate. Who was your preferred choice, and why?
33,
Did you listen to the actual audio of what he said?
“Electorally, there was a potential opportunity to do damage in 3-way race.” — Andy
Exactly. Given the widespread disdain for both major-party candidates, this was a rare opportunity that probably won’t come along again for a long, long time.
For much of the year the country really was looking for an alternative, but Gary Johnson blew it.
If he had been sharp and reasonably well-informed during his media appearances, which were many compared to previous third-party candidates, who knows what might have happened.
I like NIck a lot but I agree this line was over-the-top and a bit tone-deaf (and also a bit too canned). It isn’t reaching out to voters who are now looking for a force of opposition to President Trump… it’s rubbing their faces in it almost like the Trump supporters are. It also was probably aimed more at media elites and professional Democrats than Democratic voters… but on a night when there were a whole lot of very real tears from non-members of the political class, that probably didn’t come across like he intended.
That touches on what I think is one of Nick’s (relatively few) flaws as Chair. He has a sense of humor that veers towards sarcastic and juvenile. Which can be hilarious sometimes. He is genuinely funny and it’s part of why Libertarians like him so much. But sometimes he takes it a bit too far for messaging to the general public, when a more serious and somber tone is called for. It’s not anywhere close to Austin Petersen levels of talking in memes, and there’s plenty of method to his madness, but his calibration of it could use some work. Be funny, but don’t be a troll.
dL said: “They didn’t underperform for the money/resources raised/spent. Still, I think it was an opportunity wasted. Message-wise. Electorally, there was a potential opportunity to do damage in 3-way race. That being said, I don’t the LP featured anyone in the candidate slate who could actually pull that off.”
Any of the other main candidates for the nominations would have done a better job at spreading the Libertarian message to the public.
Forget about this interview. If you need a reason to be upset at Nick, consider the email I just received. It is apparently a transcript of the speech referenced above.
In it, he says, “It is an honor to stand here on this stage tonight after the two greatest candidates that the Libertarian Party has ever had! … I cannot tell you how proud I am of Gary Johnson and Bill Weld.” [Emphasis added]
Regardless of what one thinks about Johnson, Weld deserves nothing but contempt from anyone associated with the LP. It’s very sad to see that Nick is still kissing that backstabber’s worthless ass.
“I have been somewhat critical of aspects of Johnson’s campaigning, but ‘underperform’ appears to me to be incorrect.”
They didn’t underperform for the money/resources raised/spent. Still, I think it was an opportunity wasted. Message-wise. Electorally, there was a potential opportunity to do damage in 3-way race. That being said, I don’t the LP featured anyone in the candidate slate who could actually pull that off. To pull that off, you would have to raise 9 figures.
Still, the lessons from exit-polling are clear. You can win in 3-way way race even if the voters have only marginal agreement w/ your platform.
“Bondurant
November 10, 2016 at 23:17
I was hoping for better LP results but, honestly, I wouldn’t say they under performed. ”
They underperformed when it came to votes, and they underperformed a whole lot more than this when it came to disseminating the Libertarian message to the public.
Getting votes for the sake of getting votes is pointless unless there is a strong libertarian message behind it.
I was hoping for better LP results but, honestly, I wouldn’t say they under performed. The election remained rigged in that Johnson (and Stein) were banned from the debates. That is where most Americans would have an opportunity to see an alternative choice to the duopoly.
So many people claim they want to see a change but either don’t vote or still fall for the lesser-of-two-evils ruse. Turnout was pathetic. People just aren’t interested. Given the close result it was clear that Never Trump and Never Hillary voters made up the majority.
There was never a chance in the end for a disruption of the duopoly.
When I discussed the election at work and voting for Johnson one of two responses occurred. The Aleppo Guy? or Who?
There was a very real potential this year, due to all of the circumstances surrounding this election, for the Libertarian Party’s presidential ticket to get quite a bit higher than 3% of the vote, so I would say that Johnson/Weld did underperform.
“I have been somewhat critical of aspects of Johnson’s campaigning, but ‘underperform’ appears to me to be incorrect.” — George Phillies
Sorry, George, but I have to politely disagree. In the final two weeks of the campaign Gary Johnson kept saying, in interviews and other campaign appearances, that he and Weld were polling at 10% nationally. While he was obviously relying on out-of-date polling data, he said this on at least four separate occasions, including during his now infamous interview with The Guardian’s Paul Lewis on October 27th. In that exchange, Johnson claimed that he was polling at “ten percent plus.”
Moreover, on November 3rd — five days before the election — the Johnson campaign issued a statement citing a poll conducted by the Terrance Group and Lake Research Partners showing that he was supposedly polling 20% in key Central Plains states and was polling 12 percent in the mountain states. That same press release claimed that the Libertarian ticket was garnering 17 percent in Hillary’s home state of New York.
Even the final two RCP polling averages had him at 5.0 and 4.7 percent nationally.
By any reasonable definition the Libertarian ticket “underperformed” its own expectations.
After reading some of the “criticism that Libertarians played a spoiler role and handed Donald Trump the election,” of which the following is a typical example:
“Gary Johnson, a Libertarian nominee so baldly ill-equipped to win the presidency that his own VP Bill Weld semi-openly supported Clinton, has done his part—to the tune of a historic 4 million votes—to help ensure a Donald Trump presidency. Fuck you, Gary. We see you, and we won’t forget this.
“Oh, And Fuck Jill Stein Too”
http://theslot.jezebel.com/fuck-gary-johnson-1788736643
— I have nothing but respect for Sarwark’s response.
jp, one thing that might be useful is to get the archived writings of the “Radical Caucus” from the 70s and 80s. Bill Evers is on the short list for Trump’s Education Secretary, and he was iirc Chair of the “Radical Caucus.” I’m virtually positive that his writings from that era would be automatic disqualifiers, as Evers was MNR’s protege and an avowed anarchist.
I’ve been aware for a week or two that Trump might win the Presidency, so I’ve had a chance to mull over a possible strategy against him. I need to flesh out my thoughts more, but this is what I’m thinking:
We can probably reasonably guess which issues will become important in Trump’s presidency. For example, he’s going to have to deal with the mess we have by meddling in Syria, and he undoubtedly will be addressing the complicated issue of immigration. I suggest that we start a public relations campaign by issuing a press release, once a week, of what we consider to be reasonable approaches to immigration reform. We can put out maybe eight press releases in a row, every Tuesday, for example, with ideas of how immigration can be addressed without the awful (and, I think, impossible) idea of Trump’s to send millions of people back. Perhaps many of our lesser-thinking citizens have never thought about what would happen to local economies if thousands of people are suddenly gone. We can do this series as a way to educate people.
So, let’s say that happens, and Mr. Sarwark issues a press release every Tuesday. Many of us regular folk (or citizen journalists like me) can pledge to forward the press releases to their local news outlets in a Letter to the Editor. We do this routinely. If we issue a weekly problem-solving letter like this, just maybe we can get some attention.
Perhaps, then, our solutions can be looked at as a compromise by the two factions (Trump versus non-Trump), and it can become part of the country’s conversation.
I ran this idea by my group at our regional meeting last night. This strategy seems better to me than doing nothing.
Thoughts and comments? Please be nice. I feel beat up from the past few days.
Sarwark continues to impress.
People clamoring for decorum? The LP isn’t offered the same satisfaction from the corrupt duopoly. They’re not worthy.
Let’s hope their parties continue to crumble and we can dance upon their graves.
Fuck the GOP and fuck the Democrats.
dL, AND you’ve a wonderful sense of humor, too!
Yeah, when it comes to bullshit, I don’t have much patience or time for it.
I see that Williamson Evers, MNR’s former Lt., is on the short list for Secretary of Education.
Oy!
http://naplesherald.com/2016/11/10/gop-maintains-influence-legislatures-state-policy/
dL, you are just SUCH a sweetheart…I can tell.
Let me try again…the GOP’s nominee — most of his life a D — won the nomination and the presidency by taking many positions that were not part of the GOP’s brand. He used bullying and overt hater language. Many in the party would not endorse him, including Rs who pledged to during the primaries.
The Speaker was frequently having to distance himself from DJT’s haterade. DJT’s campaign CEO has some sort of vendetta against the Speaker.
On the surface, the Rs won big, but underneath what their brand is is not entirely clear to me. You may have a description. If so, I’d like to hear it.
The Ds lost despite the fact that the Rs fielded a bullying clown. In the process, the Ds were exposed as mostly in it for themselves, exemplified by the Clintons. I’m not sure what their brand is, either.
The Ls ran their best race by far, downplaying the fringe branding of the past 4 decades in favor of centrism and across-the-board lessarchism. To me, that indicates doing more of the same IF the goal is to advance liberty politically.
That may be “inane” to you.
To me, it makes perfect sense!
But thank you for your productive feedback.
And the electoral map did not change much either. Not a single state defected to the Democrats. Republicans picked up a small handful of states, primarily due to low Democratic turnout.
The GOP isn’t in tatters. Most Republican members of Congress, legislators and governors are still the same people. Many of the voters who voted for past Republican nominees also voted for Trump. Many of the expected Trump cabinet and administration members would have held those roles in any Republican administration. Many of the issues Trump ran on were the same ones any Republican nominee would have, although some were not.
I stand corrected. Don’t rely on CNN for historical pronouncements 🙁
So you define “tatters” for the GOP as deviation from ideological consistency. So even if the GOP holds all 3 branches, the party is still in tatters because it has not maintained ideological consistency.
Yet, you spend the majority of your time on this board arguing the exact opposite RE: ideological consistency for the LP, writing things like:
That’s called cognitive dissonance, a condition manifested by people who begin to proffer inane rationalizations when reality doesn’t conform to their sphere inside their own little heads.
Republicans controlled the Senate as well as the House and Presidency during the 108th and 109th congresses from 2003-2007. However, more broadly:
http://theweek.com/speedreads/660907/gop-now-controls-white-house-senate-house-supreme-court-pick-most-governorships-state-houses
“…It’s almost a footnote that Republicans tied a 94-year-old record of control of governor’s mansions Tuesday night; they now hold 34 of them. ”
“…In the Senate, Democrats are expected to defend anywhere from 23 to 25 seats (in 2018), while Republicans will likely have to defend just eight.”
dL: wishful thinking comprised of people who operate in their own little sphere of 1+1=3 delusion.
me: Perhaps. But you might read the rest of my paragraph explaining why I think the GOP is in tatters, that is, unrecognizable from where it stood just 4 years ago.
Dems controlled the Senate. R’s had 2/3
NOTE: obviously the exact wording would be 3 branches of the executive + legislature.
Wow.. I actually liked Mr. Sarwark as a leader for the LP. But this quote makes him sound like Emperor Palpetine during Return of the Jedi.
One of the reasons I left the LP was because I found too many members were condescending, high and mighty and pompous (note: not ALL members). This type of a quote from a guy who’s party just got 3% of the vote (though I was one of those 3%) just seems weird and unnecessary.
Duhbya had control of congress when he was first elected.
The GOP controls the Executive, the senate and the congress, the first time it has controlled all 3 branches of government since Calvin Coolidge. That’s not a party in tatters, LOL. Capozzi likes to throw the term “cult” around quite a bit, but it’s clear the primary cult operating in these parts is the cult of wishful thinking comprised of people who operate in their own little sphere of 1+1=3 delusion.
I have been somewhat critical of aspects of Johnson’s campaigning, but “underperform” appears to me to be incorrect. Of course, it depends how many new L voters can be converted to party supporters.
What ever happened to humility and modesty? I realize that this is the Age of Trump, but I totally agree with wolfefan and dL. Sarwark’s comments were certainly off-putting and unnecessary.
I mean, ignoring the fact that the Libertarian Party monumentally underperformed on Tuesday, especially given the unusually high negatives of the two major-party candidates and Gary Johnson’s much higher polling averages throughout the campaign, did Sarwark really have to describe the Green Party — a party that raised more than $3.5 million, managed to place its presidential ticket on the ballot in 44 states and the District of Columbia, and waged a fairly impressive campaign without anything approaching the kind of unprecedented mainstream media coverage provided to the Libertarian ticket — as “the other third party that, you know, sort of exists in this country?”
Sort of exists?
My, aren’t we full of ourselves.
iirc, voter turnout was down from 2012. This should be bracing, since this election caught people’s attention unlike any I recall except perhaps 1980.
Certainly the GOP seems in tatters. Yes, it’s candidate won, but DJT is a recent convert and many of his positions were not traditional R ones. That the Ds could not defeat this clown tells me that they are in trouble as well.
GJ’s 4MM votes seems more impressive in that context, although I thought more was possible.
Still, NS probably does overstate. The Rs and Ds are becoming more like Uber, conveniences more than brands. Every time one uses Uber, a different car comes to pick you up.
The Rs and Ds, in short, are becoming LESS ideological.
Whether the cult-challenging Ls can gain significant traction is an open question. This could easily just be a sort of high-water-mark for the Ls due to unpopular R and D candidates, and a reasonably credible and somewhat funded L.
I expect a rough 2017. We’re due for a recession, f’rinstance. That’s probably — oddly enough — good for Trump, as he should benefit from the recovery, like Reagan and Clinton did.
I’d like to hear a strategy that propels the Ls into the majors. With all the heavy ideological baggage, I’m not seeing it. Repeating tired dogma seems so 20th century to me.
Sarwark’s boast about the death of parties is about reliable as his claim a couple of weeks ago(in the immediate aftermath of grab-gate) that Trump had become irrelevant in the election. I’m aware that winners may gloat in the aftermath of victory, but a tradition of distant third-place participation trophy gloating is one that evades me. I agree w/ wolfefan above that it is tone deaf at best.
Well, now that Gary Johnson is out of the picture -despite being a former critic of him, I am going to be backing Austin Petersen in the L.P. presidential primary in 2020.
…unless another Paleolibertarian with more money & starpower decided to jump in then; we’ll see.
I haven’t watched the video yet, but if he actually said what is quoted in the headline that strikes me as extraordinarily unwise. I voted for Johnson, and I also reject the spoiler talk. But I think the way to respond to people expressing existential fear of a President who has pledged roving squads of immigration police and has aligned himself with the alt-right probably isn’t to tell them their tears are delicious. It doesn’t make Libertarians sound like a party or a movement that those who lost the election want to be a part of. It doesn’t make them sound like a party that understands the very real concerns of voters. As I said, I haven’t watched the video yet because the headline struck me as so off-putting. Perhaps he does a better job in the video.