libertarians

[Blogger's note: I didn't know that TNR couldn't embed Javascript; I will embed the video once Reason makes it available on their YouTube channel - sorry for making you click away in the meantime; at least it will pop open in a new window, and you won't lose your place.]

I have been blogging pretty exhaustively about a fissure in a traditional center-right coalition comprised of libertarians and conservatives (see here and here). The folks over at Reason have finally made video available of the three-way debate between the Cato Institute's Brink Lindsey, AEI's Jonah Goldberg (also of the National Review), and FreedomWorks' Matt Kibbe:

I've been blogging as often as possible about this ideological spat because a) as a political scientist, it's a generally interesting phenomenon to observe, particularly when set against the backdrop of the rise of the Tea Party movement, and b) the extent to which this (hopefully temporary) rift gets smoothed over will have, I believe, a significant effect on the 2012 presidential election, if not this year's midterm elections. Of course, I don't have a wealth of empirical data on hand at this point to evidence my thesis - so we'll just have to call it a hunch.

Marc Ambinder at the Atlantic is smellin' what I've been cookin' for awhile:

Economic libertarianism is the message du jour, and Pawlenty's budget cutting in Minnesota may get some attention. But really, and he and none of the sober wing candidates have figured out exactly what the non-Palin wing of the party wants. There's no way to get social conservatives on board with Palin or Mike Huckabee in the race. So who's left to help you win primaries and caucuses?

Libertarians.

They are -- they could be -- to the Republican Party what the anti-war left was to Democrats in 2003 -- the out-of-the-establishment power center that can drive the narrative of the race. How do you get the attention of libertarians without losing conservatives? You could shift positions on the war in Afghanistan, or try to fashion a more realist foreign policy. That seems to be a non-starter; the consultants for these candidates are fairly covnentional and are risk-averse. Endorse medical marijuana? Legalized gambling? Something else?

After running across this piece in the Economist today, I was reminded of that timeless adage "You'll attract more flies with honey than with vinegar." That's a woefully good reminder for the Right as Election Day draws nearer.

Plenty of noise has been made in the past few weeks about the abrupt resignation/firing of Dave Weigel from the Washington Post blog "Right Now." I have been a defender of Weigel's, in large part because I think people's expectations of Weigel were too high - and that's not to disparage Weigel at all, whose work I have followed for a couple of years. The problem was, in my view, that lots of activists expected him to counter Ezra Klein's "Wonk Book" with an editorial style, using his platform at the Post to propel the Tea Party to the revery where so many believed it belonged. Another part of the problem is that, as Dan Gainor at the Media Research Center notes, the Post was never clear about why it had hired Weigel in the first place. Reporting? Check. Opinion? Maybe? I still think Weigel does a good job of reporting, and if he's guilty of anything, it's a preoccupation with man-bites-dog narratives. Aside from all that, I don't have much to add to the gallons of punditry sloshing around the Internet about Weigel-gate.

The reason I bring Weigel's short-lived stint at the Post back up for discussion is that the reaction from the activist community to Weigel's resignation - particularly on Twitter - was pretty vicious, with lots of "Good riddance" and "we told you so." Then came the announcement that Weigel would be a paid MSNBC contributor on Countdown with Keith Olbermann - and activists were once again a-Twitter with disgust. Thankfully there was an equivalent outpouring of support for Weigel. I disagree with Keith Olbermann frequently, particularly when it comes to his sneering punditry and progressive worldview. I appreciate that he was the first (and for a long time only) mainstream media personality to cover the devastating flooding in my hometown of Nashville earlier this year, and he and I share in New York Yankees fan-dom. But why the Weigel witch-hunt on the Right?

And then it hit me: the Right and center-right are still obsessed with (plagued by?) litmus tests that, unchecked, can be impossible to pass. And not normal litmus tests either - sure, nobody wants to see another John McCain presidential campaign - I mean the conservative base is so energized right now that it has become bloodthirsty, and it's beginning to feed on itself. Long-time allies to conservatives - the libertarians - have begun to take notice.

I urge everyone to check out this written exchange between Cato Institute's Brink Lindsey, AEI/National Review Online's Jonah Goldberg, and FreedomWorks' Matt Kibbe, a debate on where libertarians belong on the 21st century ideological spectrum, and how they can, should, and might play in the activist/political component of the Tea Party movement. Romantic libertarians like yours truly hope wistfully one day to inform a more rigorous social policy agenda - one that actually gets government out of people's lives, including their marriages and sex lives - to complement existing tenets of economic freedom upon which, for the most part, everyone right-of-center seems to reaching consensus. But because of these purity tests, many libertarians worry that the emergence of centrist rhetoric at Tea Party rallies is nothing more than a ruse to grab handfuls of votes on Election Day 2010 and 2012, and then Big Government conservatism does us all in - again.

I am sympathetic to Brink Lindsey's point in this respect. Libertarians - who often sacrifice opportunities to "get involved" in lieu of safeguarding transcendent philosophical values for the sake of practical virtue - should not compromise their core beliefs just because Sarah Palin said we need less government and more personal responsibility. But I also think Matt Kibbe makes great points - the Tea Party movement is as fascinating a paradigm shift in American politics as I will likely ever see in my lifetime. It has unbundled the Left almost completely, who has tried to use every tool at its disposal - from race-baiting in formal media outlets to unscientific opinion polling - to couch the Tea Party movement as garden-variety Republican, and quintessentially racist, xenophobic, and homophobic. Kibbe insists that many Tea Partiers don't know where to place themselves on an ideological scale, and notes that many have never been involved in political discourse before now. This groundswell provides libertarians with that romantic opportunity to inform the policy debate - especially issues like gay marriage, which Tea Party groups support, and like Kibbe, I think it's hasty to accept Lindsey's premise with open arms. So Lindsey's libertarian protectionism can be just as dangerous and self-defeating as the Gainor conservative witch-hunts.

The Tea Party movement is still today very fragile, despite the noise the movement has made and the support it has drummed up. If libertarians and conservatives can agree about anything, it's opposition to power-drunk Democrats; it's probably best that everyone focus on that for now, instead of running reckless with purity tests, and when Republicans win, it will be up to them to follow through on promises they're making to people getting involved for the first time. Those people don't know where they lie on the ideological spectrum, but they know that the government is screwing them.

The response to Ron Paul's CPAC straw poll win ranged somewhere between dismay and outright panic. Let me offer a contrarian take. 

I have written in recent years about CPAC being an insular affair -- a trade show for Beltway conservative groups, but little more. The vibe I picked up at this year's CPAC was a little different -- more students, more grassroots, more friends from outside the Beltway making the trip. Matt Lewis has an astute take on this shift: 

CPAC director Lisa De Pasquale told me: "Our pre-registration numbers were 20 percent above last year's. We're expecting over 10,000 attendees and more than half of them are college students. I think it really speaks to the excitement and energy in the conservative movement right now."

One seasoned CPAC veteran, who asked not be named, bluntly told me, "I've been coming to these for years. This used to be a convention of blue hairs; now it has youthful energy." If you're a conservative -- as I am -- it was nice to see fresh young faces, who attend at a greatly reduced price. "Blue dog" Democrats are one thing, blue-haired Republicans are quite another.

It shouldn't be too surprising then, that a group outside the normal circles of conservative influence was able to out-hustle and out-organize, and win the straw poll on dramatically increased turnout. Across the board, lots of new people are getting involved in the movement (see: tea parties), creating fertile ground for a seismic shift in the results. 

While I won't necessarily be rooting for a Paul 2012 candidacy, I *like* the fact that CPAC was shaken up, for two big reasons. 

First, it shows that Ron Paul and the Campaign for Liberty are engaging constructively in the conservative movement. In 2007, the Paulites were an oppositional force trying to submarine the GOP's commitment to the war on terror, thus threatening traditional conservatives. Today, libertarians and conservatives have come together against Obama's endless expansion of the State, with Ron Paul supporters supplying creative organizing tactics and boots on the ground. 

This leads into my second reason: in terms of grassroots organization, Paul supporters are some of the best -- if not the best -- that we have. The iconography of the tea party movement is heavily libertarian (think the Gadsden Flag) and that's no coincidence. If you broke down the organizers and even those in attendance, you'd find more than your fair share of Ron Paul supporters. 

This is a categorical shift that's happened in the last year. Remember when the image of conservatives in the political arena was that of dutiful salaried workers with families and limited time to engage in the kind of direct political protest perfected by ACORN and MoveOn.org? That image has been turned on its head by the tea parties and 9/12 protests. And I think that's due in no small measure to the influence of libertarians, who've been more willing to employ bold tactics conventionally thought of as leftist (but effective). 

In terms of organizing, conservatives can learn a lot from libertarians. Online, the moneybomb concept originally pioneered during the Ron Paul campaign has started to work for more conventional Republicans like Scott Brown. 

The 2008 Ron Paul campaign can be compared to the 1988 Pat Robertson campaign in helping a movement find its way into the Republican Party and thus establishing itself as a permanent fixture in the party. Like Robertson, Paul did not come anywhere near capturing the nomination, but the influence of Christian conservatives -- and now libertarians -- endures. 

Three years ago, Markos Moulitsas floated the idea of an emerging brand of "libertarian Democrats."   At Cato Unbound, Kos argued that the Democratic Party was "growing increasingly comfortable with moving in a new direction, one in which restrained government, fiscal responsibility, and—most important of all—individual freedoms are paramount."

And in fact, libertarians did swing from voting overwhelmingly from Bush in 2000 to overwhelmingly for Obama in 2008.

Recently, though, the people Kos once sympathetically and invitingly described as "traditionally Republican voters [who] simply want to live their lives in peace, without undue meddling..." have been protesting policies and politicians, both Republicans and Democrats.  The Democratic response to this widespread public concern has been...ridicule.  Thanks for the votes, now get lost.

The Democratic/libertarian alliance won't last long.

I tend to agree with Patrick Ruffini that Gov. Sanford should not be obligated to resign for having an affair (as distinct from his disapperance and deception of his staff).  While I think that resignation is a perfectly legitimate, even appropriate, path to take after disgracing oneself, a personal disgrace should not necessarily require resignation from one's job, whether in politics or the private sector.

Indeed, as I pointed out in the comments there, I've been trying to think of a prominent politician who resigned from their elected political office because of an affair (note: McGreevey and Spitzer resigned because of the major ethics/legal violations involved, not the affair), and the only one I can come up with is Rep. Livingston, who resigned his Congressional seat in 1999 after admitting an affair.  I'm sure there are others - probably more at the State/local level - but I can't think of them offhand.

On the other hand, I have to disagree with part of what Max Borders wrote here.

The Right is now reaping what it sowed. By making social conservatism central to its platform, it left no room in the GOP for sinners.

I don't think the backlash against Gov. Sanford has a lot to do with social conservatism.  Social conservatives do not have a unique position on adultery.  Pretty much everybody considers it immoral.  And the social conservative position on gay marriage (which Sanford shared) is not predicated on heterosexual people being uniquely faithful, either.  The appropriate criticism is not so much hypocrisy as it is failure.

Ultimately, there are no political or ideological lessons to be drawn from Mark Sanford's affair.  There are only human lessons.

I also think Max is wrong on a practical and logical level to conclude from this story that "it is time to purge the Right’s politics of social conservatism".  As a libertarian, I certainly favor the harm principle over the offense principle - that is, I think politics should focus on addressing force and fraud instead of things which are merely unpleasant.

I believe that libertarianism is a very internally consistent way of marrying the personal and political spheres, but I actually don't think it works. Or rather, it's wonderful in theory, but human nature has not adopted that theory for any large, sustained social group in history.

For my part, I've come to believe that libertarianism is a personal moral philosophy, not a political philosophy. It describes how we ought to behave individually, but it does not give us practical advice for how we can resolve social disputes in a political system.

The political system requires accomodation.  Libertarians can either disengage or they can find a way to work within a coalition.  Unprincipled?  Maybe.  But so is everybody.  That's human nature.

But there is one final, very important point: Social conservatism is basically a personal moral philosophy (or tendency), as well.  As Hayek said of conservatism, "It is that by its very nature it cannot offer an alternative to the direction in which we are moving. It may succeed by its resistance to current tendencies in slowing down undesirable developments, but, since it does not indicate another direction, it cannot prevent their continuance. It has, for this reason, invariably been the fate of conservatism to be dragged along a path not of its own choosing. The tug of war between conservatives and progressives can only affect the speed, not the direction, of contemporary developments."

Social conservatives also need to accomodate libertarians.  That does not mean they must minimize their objections to immorality, but it does mean they are going to have to accept fewer litmus tests and, if trends hold, a somewhat less decisive role within the Right's coalition.

Social conservatives and libertarians do have some common interests.  The Right's coalition has worked best when they have focused on those common interests and left the rest to the social and personal spheres.

I address this question to our Social Conservative and National Security Conservative brethren:

How will you advance the cause of liberty?

I have heard much about how we apostate libertarians have forgotten our natural allegiance.  Most recently, Mr. Soren Dayton posted on this subject.  Apparently, some still claim that allegiance to the Republican party, even in its current dismal state, is still the best vehicle for a liberal agenda. Some would even say that their is synergy between SoCon and Nation Security Conservative causes and libertarianism.

I beg to differ.

There is an old saying: "Put five libertarians in a room together, and you end up with ten factions." To a certain extent, this is true.  There are some libertarians who support the War on Drugs.  There are some libertarians who support border fences. There are some libertarians who support any number of things that most don't, and many have clear rationales based on libertarian philosophy.  Unlike some of our recent allies, we don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.  That is our (possibly only) strength.  Whatever our occasional differences, we do stand together on one non-negotiable concept: freedom.

Without acrimony, I will list what I believe are major aspects of Social Conservativism that are incompatible with libertarianism:

Support for the Drug War

Support for Anti-Gambling legislation

Support for Anti-Pornography legislation

Support for Anti-Alcohol laws.

Support for religious tests for public office (not sure anyone really overtly supports this, but people sure pay lip service to it.  "Oh my Lord!  He's a Muslim!  How did he ever get elected?!")

Support for school prayer, Ten Commandments legislation, adding "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance, and any number of other strictly Christian religious laws and sical changes. How can we say liberal social engineering is bad when "our" side engages in the same?

As to National Security Conservatives, I won't bother to list.  Almost their entire agenda has the unfortunate effect of decreasing liberty, sometimes to a staggering degree.    

So, I repeat the question: How will you advance the cause of liberty?

It has been said that the Republican party is now "in the wilderness."  Well, guess what?  Libertarians have been in the wilderness FOR A LONG TIME.  We were fooled by rhetoric and a few token sops to believe that we were part of a team.  We were wrong.

I know that some folks will point to economic policies as the great uniter.  Sorry, no.  To my mind (and I think I speak for many of my fellow libertarians), social liberty and economic liberty go hand-in-hand.  Increase freedom and I will naturally have many more opportunities to prosper.  Heck, just letting a guy smoke his joint instead of locking him in a cell gives him greater economic freedom.

Well, we are now at a place where we can really help each other out.  Tell us in clear, concise terms how you will support our causes. We understand that we can't have everything.  Even REAL compromises would be a great first step.

Help us, and we will help you.  We can ALL get out of the wilderness.

Received the following comment via email to a post over at Tapscott's Copy Desk. Just wondering what The Next Right readers think of the author's assertions:

"Having spent years organizing tech workers, make this comment. In the engineering fields (including computers) tech workers tend to be conservative with libertarian leanings. However, there has been complete disgust at the GOP.

"The GOP cannot distinguish tech voters from tech campagin cash. Every computer publication knows the two best ways to start firestorm is to run an article with any criticism of Linux or to mention H-1B visas. The idiots running the GOP simply do not get it.

"One of the best examples of this voter/money disconnect was the 2000 reelection campaign of the Senator from Silicon Valley Spencer "for sale" Abraham. Abraham's work to allow employers to replace U.S. tech workers with lower-paid foreign workers made him the face of the GOP for this voter group.

"Dittos to George Allen. I don't want to claim that his pissing off tech workers (not to mention Jim Webb's reaching out) was *the* thing that cost him reelection but it certainly was one factor.....one large enough to have made the difference.

"John McCain? Well his name is simply mud. As conservative as I am, I could not vote for him.

"Sen. Grassley is starting to become a here in the tech community for his efforts to look out for their interest. But for the most part, the GOP has done everything possible to alienate tech voters.

"Remember the Tech Contract with America the GOP came out with -- guarenteed to piss off tech voters?

"My phone rings and the e-mail starts flowing every night at 8 pm -- when the Lou Dobbs show ends. That's what the tech voters are watching. "I point out that the Democrats are no better. They are just not as "in-your-face" as the GOP is." 

Thoughts anybody?

We've seen a lot of social conservatives upset over today's intemperate attack by Kathleen Parker (Note: she was unnecessarily contemptuous, but her point that "the Republican Party -- and conservatism with it -- eventually will die out unless religion is returned to the privacy of one's heart where it belongs" is worth serious consideration).

Well, I am a libertarian, so let's talk about the Kathleen Parker of the social conservative crowd: Mike Huckabee.

This week, Huckabee called libertarians the "real threat" to the Republican Party...

In a chapter titled "Faux-Cons: Worse than Liberalism," Huckabee identifies what he calls the "real threat" to the Republican Party: "libertarianism masked as conservatism." ... "I don't take issue with what they believe, but the smugness with which they believe it," writes Huckabee, who raised some taxes as governor and cut deals with his state's Democratic legislature. "Faux-Cons aren't interested in spirited or thoughtful debate, because such an endeavor requires accountability for the logical conclusion of their argument." 

We've come quite some way since 1975, when Reagan said "I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism."  

Oh, and it happens that Huckabee does, in fact, take issue with what we believe. In May of 2008, Huckabee called blamed election losses on Republicans being too "libertarian" (this is obviously some strange usage of the word "libertarian" that I was previously unaware of), accused us of being un-American (my response to that is unprintable, but I would be glad to say it to his face if he wanted to repeat his comment to my face) and then proceeded to make the standard, cartoonish Democratic argument against libertarianism.

The greatest threat to classic Republicanism is not liberalism; it's this new brand of libertarianism, which is social liberalism and economic conservatism, but it's a heartless, callous, soulless type of economic conservatism because it says "look, we want to cut taxes and eliminate government. If it means that elderly people don't get their Medicare drugs, so be it. If it means little kids go without education and healthcare, so be it." Well, that might be a quote pure economic conservative message, but it's not an American message. ...

If you have a breakdown in the social structure of a community, it's going to result in a more costly government ... police on the streets, prison beds, court costs, alcohol abuse centers, domestic violence shelters, all are very expensive. What's the answer to that? Cut them out? Well, the libertarians say "yes, we shouldn't be funding that stuff."

Excepting the anarcho-capitalists (who basically aren't a part of the electoral equation, anyway), I don't know a single libertarian who says we shouldn't fund police, prisons or courts.  Most libertarians who are aligned with the Right or the Republican Party are less concerned about the few billion that Huckabee describes here than they are about the few trillion other dollars the government is spending, or the uncountable additional costs of unnecessary regulation and legislation. (This is a perfect illustration of my problem #3 with Mike Huckabee, noted below)

So, let me boil down my problems with Mike Huckabee.

• Huckabee is a Rawlsian liberal + social conservative: Mike Huckabee describes his political philosophy as (a) the Golden Rule ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto to you", and (b) a passage from the Bible ("Inasmuch as you have done to the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me").   This is not "conservatism"; it is basic Rawlsian liberalism.
• Huckabee makes little distinction between religion and politics: It's not that he's religious.  It's that Mike Huckabee appears to be incapable of drawing a meaningful distinction between religion and politics.  For instance, in 1997, Governor Huckabee held up a disaster relief bill for weeks because he objected to its description of floods and tornados as "an act of God".   He explained his position on another bill by saying "I drink a different kind of Jesus juice."  He has asserted a Christian duty to support other policies.  The Right desperately needs to remember that where the government intrudes, church recedes.
• Huckabee accepts the Democratic framing: Mike Huckabee seems to have far more complaints with Republicans than with Democrats.  Worse, he embraces liberal or Democratic caricatures to attack Republicans.  Whether it is his attacks on libertarians, business or the Club for Growth, Huckabee almost invariably misrepresents their views, portraying them in the same cartoon terms that Democrats like to use (see the examples quoted earlier in this post).

This is easily as contemptuous, as offensive as anything Kathleen Parker has written about social conservatives.  So, yeah, a columnist express disdain for social conservatives.  Cry me a river.  We libertarians had a social conservative Governor and Presidential candidate call us the "real threat" and "smug", and brazenly misrepresent our views before calling our message un-American.

Social conservatives have to realize that they need the fiscally conservative, socially moderate/tolerant voters if they want to be a part of a winning coalition.  The limited government message won revolutionary victories for Republicans in 1980 and 1994; it is the only viable organizing principle for the current Republican coalition. 

Huckabee may believe libertarians are the "real threat", but his God, Guns and Butter agenda would destroy the Right far more effectively than the libertarian cartoons that exist in Huckabee's head.

I have spent the last week recovering from the disappointment of election day. I have spent a lot of time talking to the mid-level operatives from the McCain campaign. (the top level are on TV playing the recriminations games, in undisclosed locations, or drinking their brains out in Vegas)  There are things that we can learn from this election.

The first is that John McCain won the primary because of an often neglected part of the coalition: military voters. Redstate's Erick Erickson said the point well on the night of the Florida primary:

Tonight was not a failure of conservatism, but a triumph of military voters who have made their home in the Republican Party because we are the party of a strong national defense.

In both South Carolina and Florida, they won it for McCain. In the grand coalition of the GOP, we've talked about social conservatives and fiscal conservatives. We've all ignored the military voters, except John McCain. And he won them big. His message resonated.

This is not a sufficient grassroots for the GOP in a national race, but it was a powerful one in the primary. We as a party should feel and water this part of the coalition better than we have done in the past. We will likely get a generation of candidates who served in Iraq and/or Afghanistan who will be powered by the volunteer work of volunteers who supported McCain. In addition, I wouldn't be surprised if this developed into a meaningful faction in GOP politics in the next couple of years.

Second, the GOP is good at managing the mechanics of GOTV. However, we are not very good at managing and empowering our grassroots. The Democrats are. Open Left's Mike Lux, now on the Obama transition team, said:

I am grateful that field organizing and working with grassroots volunteers is actually in fashion again, and in so much bigger a way than it has ever been in my lifetime.

At a time that technological and volunteer energy was at an all-time high, even on the GOP side, the RNC deployed a mythically small number of field staff, opened a mythically small number of campaign offices, and generally deprioritized grassroots. We simply didn't tap into that energy effectively. Often we failed because we were inept. Often, these were the product of intentional decisions by state parties (see below) who were afraid of new people (see above). More broadly, a whole number of volunteer engagement plans failed to materialize. I still have drafts of some of them.

Third, many of our state parties are completely dysfunctional. COMPLETELY. There have been some horror stories out of state parties that should have been able to pull their own weight but simply weren't. I won't name names yet, but it is not good. There is indeed a correlation between the states that have lost elections and the state of their parties. There are two solutions to this. Either someone needs to take them over from below or, much less preferably, they need to be fixed top-down from DC with new staff, bypassing and eventually surpassing the state parties.

Fourth, history will probably show that the mistake of squashing of the libertarian grassroots out west in the form of the Ron Paul campaign could resonate for years. Fewer activists, less money, etc. Many people will try to blame McCain and/or his campaign, but I do not believe that a single state party stood up for a significant part of their grassroots. Often, the parties were so weak that they ended up being complicit in tossing out Paul-supporting libertarians because they were afraid of new people coming in and taking over. These same parties were already in desperate places because of their inability to respond to the growing strength of latino voting blocs with outreach to bring them over. These are not the responses of healthy parties.

Hot Air's Ed Morrissey points out a new Rassmussen poll that suggests libertarians are a swing vote...and they're swinging to Obama.

Libertarian voters make up 4% of the nation’s likely voters and they favor Barack Obama over John McCain by a 53% to 38% margin. Three percent (3%) would vote for some other candidate and 5% are not sure. These results, from an analysis of 15,000 Likely Voter interviews conducted by Rasmussen Reports, challenges the conventional wisdom which assumes that strong support for a Libertarian candidate would hurt John McCain.

Contrast that with a Pew study in 2004, which showed libertarians "favored George W. Bush over John Kerry, 59 to 41 percent."   Note, also, that other polls show more libertarian representation in the general public: "9 to 13 percent libertarians in the Gallup surveys, 14 percent in the Pew Research Center Typology Survey, and 13 percent in the American National Election Studies..."  This is a very sizable swing vote.

Reasonable arguments can be made for libertarians to vote for Barack Obama, John McCain or Bob Barr.  So far, though, the only argument that stands out has been Robert Samuelson's...

So, vote for McBama. Though their differences on Iraq are clear, neither has forthrightly addressed some of America's obvious domestic problems—costly government retirement programs, immigration, our energy appetite. For me, McCain does have one provisional and accidental advantage. By most appraisals, the Republicans will get slaughtered in the congressional elections, and I have a visceral dislike of one-party government. It didn't work well under Bill Clinton or George W. Bush.

Divided government doesn't ensure good government, but it may limit bad government by checking the worst instincts of both parties.

Milton Friedman has also touted gridlock as the best way to restrain government.  In fact, even Howard Dean has made the pro-gridlock argument, saying in 2005 that "Do we want a Democratic Party that's in charge of everything? Well, you know, I suppose it's my job to say yes. But the truth is, as an American, it's better when parties share power."  

I understand the desire of many libertarians to punish the Republican Party, though I wonder if they are turning from the current battle to fight the last one.  I also understand the desire of many libertarians to explore a coalition with the Democratic Party, though I suspect that interest will fade after a few years of practical experience with Democratic power.   

There is, however, some undeniable libertarian value in gridlock.   Voting for Obama suggests a great deal of faith in one-party rule.  I'm not sure why that would work out better with Democrats that it did with Republicans.