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I just noticed that Carl Milsted and Tim West, responding in the comments on a recent blog post of West’s (on the Libertarian Reform Caucus) that I in turn posted about, had a bit more to say.

I’ll respond first to West:

OH, and Brad - good writing, but it’s the pledge, the platform, and the people who dont understand politics and political action that are the problems. Otherwise, the LP would be a majority party by now.

Well, personally, I favor the LP dumping its membership pledge. Although I happen to like the sentiments expressed, I’ve come to believe it’s not appropriate that a political party have a membership pledge.

Likewise, one will get zero disagreement from me on the assertion that the LP needs more people who understand the technical ins and outs of politics (although I suspect West, by “people who dont understand politics“, at least partially also meant people who just don’t happen to share his own political views).

I don’t know what to make, though, of a response, to a detailed explanation of why an assertion (that the LP Platform is the primary obstacle to LP success) is wrong and/or misses the point, which itself consists of just restating the original assertion. Maybe someone hadn’t had enough coffee yet. I don’t know.

What I was saying here:

Recognizing that a political party makes a damned poor educational organization and vice verse.

…and here:

It takes serious, hard educational efforts to produce something like that — and a political party isn’t necessarily the best tool to achieve it.

…and here:

…even if it means they have to let the party not be the focus of their libertarian activism for awhile.

…and here:

…I have advocated more educational efforts not necessarily conducted through the party…

…really seems to have gone over some peoples heads, in that they didn’t engage those points to either agree or disagree. Carl Milsted came tantalizingly close, yet seemed oblivious to it, when he said:

[the sort of thing that the Advocates for Self-government have been doing for years, I guess — CSM]

…in reference to a post by Tom Knapp, which as Knapp points out actually misinterprets what he was saying.

Let’s use the Advocates as an example.

During the time the Advocates have been in existence, how many libertarian activists have made that educational organization the focus of their activism versus how many have made the Libertarian Party that focus?

As I said before:

…a political party makes a damned poor educational organization…

Sure enough, despite the growing stature of libertarian ideas individually, the zeitgeist is assuredly non-libertarian. People who have strong political opinions currently tend to identify as either conservative or liberal, typically, not libertarian (regardless of how libertarian their views actually are). So long as that’s the prevailing paradigm that holds sway over the larger society, neither radical nor moderate libertarians are going to make a great deal of headway. You have to change that paradigm first before even a genuinely libertarian caucus in either of the two major parties would have a prayer — let alone a third party like the LP.

Yet Milsted apparently thinks he’s made some stunning discovery with this observation:

The problem: people were not enthused by our ideas.

Well, sure Carl — considering that most libertarians are trapped in a party-centric mentality that forces them to constantly burn themselves out in senseless disputes over what the party should be like, like it’s some sort of brass ring to grab for. Not much actual work to spread libertarian views ends up getting done that way.

With a focus on educational organizations instead, activists of whatever stripe (moderate or radical) could cooperate with those they have an affinity with to spread their particular version of the libertarian message instead of wasting themselves on party-internal conflict.

I’m not necessarily saying there’s no role for the party. It just shouldn’t be the center of the universe. The LRC is going to waste their time getting all bent out of shape over the LP Platform and trying to “fix” it. They’ll burn themselves out as well as those who think it’s worth working hard to oppose them — because what other people are like is what’s supposedly holding them back. I mean, hey, go tell it to a pro-life Democrat, for example. I’m sure they’ll have stories of platform woes for you that’ll make you weep with sympathy (and I’m pro-choice).

If you guys REALLY think the platform is simply THE issue, then the intelligent thing to do would be to rename yourselves the Libertarian Moderate Caucus, put together your own caucus platform and then — POOF! — no more worries about how you’re being held back by the big, bad LP platform. You’ll be free to concentrate on real politics instead of internecine battles. Sure, keep it on your agenda to modify the Party platform — but you’ll get further with that if it’s last on your list instead of first. Go build the political juggernaut organization you want and then just put on the shell of the party like a coat, so the tailor can alter that coat to fit you.

That’s pretty elementary stuff and it’s exactly what I was getting at when I said to pay attention to what Dean’s people did in the Democratic Party. Yet Milsted here chose to take my honest advice to the LRC as a group as a reason to get personally defensive about perceptions of not getting credit for what he had already done:

…like Dean I have gone out there and done stuff. I have busted my butt on many a campaign and experimented with what works and what does not.

And they say radicals aren’t politically astute. At the risk of sounding trite, it ain’t all about you.

Carl, buddy, you’re confusing a platoon on short-range reconnaissance with the Invasion of Normandy. Either radical or moderate libertarians will need the equivalent of a political “army” that’s just not going to be there yet without a lot more cultivation, including massive educational efforts that the party itself is not best suited to conduct. Although my vision is different than yours, I genuinely do wish you well. Let the army you’re going to need anyway “reform the LP” once they’re recruited, trained and on the march for your inspiringly moderate vision of a somewhat freer world. It’ll be effortless at that point, if your organization is big enough to take on the Democrats and Republicans, while it would be a challenge now. We all, moderates and radicals, have bigger, more immediate and pressing tasks before us.

Addendum: I’d like to add that this quote:

Educating the public is a secondary function for a real political party.

…is quite correct. It’ll take you down a dead end path, though, if you’re so enamored of using a political party as a tool that you fail to understand the need for educational efforts is the primary obstacle you should be looking for other tools to overcome. The quote is from Carl Milsted.

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