| abstract
| - Dear Neighbors, The winds of change are blowing; freedom is in the air. The people are tired of choosing between misguided socialists and corrupt neocons. They are ready for a new political party. Even the mainstream media are telling this story. I wonder if Libertarian Party candidates catch the breeze and sail into power. As things now stand, the Libertarians, Greens nor others -- like the REFORM or Constitutional Party -- unfortunately, are not going to sail into power in Harrisburgh and on Grant Stret. Despite the currents of discontent, the American people are not ready for borderline anarchy. But now is the time to give bits of power to others to see if they can govern and demonstrate the benefits of smaller government -- with arguments from the floor of the PA Senate and every podium on the campaign trails. Fortunately, there are millions of people who are ready for substantially smaller government right now. They are tired of prisons and pork barrel politics, scary deficits and scarier losses of civil liberties, ridiculous lawsuits and unreadable regulations. Do these people get a voice and service to the media to share views now -- later -- or never? I would hate to wait and have Pennsylvania government grows ever larger and more corrupt. Too many have left our city, region and state already. I believe it is time to turn a new leaf and make an effective political party with some elected representatives and some serious advances in the polls on election days. A party designed to win partisan elections that can begin to shrinking government waste and hype is about to sprout to action now -- throughout Pennsylvania and with deep roots in Pittsburgh as well. We are talking about an organized INDEPENDENT Party. We can play by the rules of the American political system and push to a majority to win serious gains in the November 7, 2006 general election. Fringe politics does not work, and will never work as long as we have district based elections in this country. I understand this well. I ran in the city as a REPUBLICAN in 2001 -- for mayor -- in a 'contested primary' because I hated the way Tom Murphy and his administation was treating the city. With a lot of help, we got TOM MURPHY out of office, finally. He didn't have the political capital to run again in 2005, thankfully. In 2005 and in 2006, I ran in special elections for PA Senate and Pittsburgh City Council as a Libertarian. There is a lot of poison in the political landscape that comes with labels, sadly. A platform feature at Platform.For-Pgh.org/wiki/index.php/poision explains this view. Victory means viable opposition needs to appeal to a much broader coalition of freedom lovers: somewhere between 20-30% of the population nationwide. This article is a . You can help My English Wiki by expanding it. It means recruiting activists from all over the libertarian quadrant of the Nolan Chart instead of restricting ourselves to the tiny minority who agree with our current membership pledge. It means having a platform that entices, not terrifies. Admittedly, such a fundamental change in strategy has unsettling implications. We who are pure libertarians will have to work side by side with people whom we disagree with on many issues; we will have to do much of our voter education within the party instead of only admitting those who are over- fully committed to total liberty. We will have decades of struggle ahead keeping the Libertarian Party on track, ever moving our nation in the direction of more liberty. But in return for these new challenges we get wonderful benefits over those same decades: smaller government, simpler laws, more prosperity and justice. And as we shrink government step by step, we will gain hard evidence in favor of taking the next steps toward the libertarian ideal. Please read the enclosed materials on how to turn our party into an effective force for liberty. There are essays on effective libertarian politics and polling data to back them up. We have much more on our web site, www.ReformTheLP.org. And please read the existing LP platform as well. Ask yourself if it is really productive to the cause of liberty to call for such things as zero taxes [II 2], defaulting on the national debt [II 2, II 5], and allowing children to buy sex toys [III 5]. How many people are persuaded to be more libertarian by having such positions in the platform? How many people are turned away? How many elections are jeopardized? And please keep in mind that the LP platform need not take a stand on every issue. There are issues which deeply divide the broader libertarian movement. On such issues it is better for the platform to be quiet, and let individual libertarians voice their own opinions. To have a group declaration where the group is deeply divided is to invite rancor and schism. To achieve significant political victories, we need the support of all libertarians. Let's decide to make effective politics work in Pittsburgh.
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