On March 31, Newsweek published this interview with former U.S. Senator Mike Gravel. Thanks to Darcy Richardson for the link.
On March 31, Newsweek published this interview with former U.S. Senator Mike Gravel. Thanks to Darcy Richardson for the link.
Still no explanation of why he sees himself as more of a Libertarian than a Green. I doubt that mainstream interviewers think to ask this question.
What Bob Richard and many others do not understand is that just about all of the political parties in the United States are under control of their respective Old Guard Leaders. That has been a very significant hindrance to progressive change in our country. Any person, generally speaking, has the right to join any party that he or she wishes and to attempt to bring that party closer to alignment of one’s own personal positions.
For the past eight years or so, this country has had a Revolution just waiting to happen. Unfortunately, there has been no mass, revolutionary, Party of the people to lead and organize that Revolution. As long as the existing political parties continue to forge ahead berefit of imagination and rational thinking processes, change that would benefit the people will be difficult to bring about, protect, and maintian.
“Progressive change” is not a phrase I would use to apply to a party that wants essentially to abolish the federal government, aside from that part of it responsible for providing a national defense. I saw the editor of Reason magazine on John McLaughlin’s show not long ago (can’t remember his name, he’s the guy who always shows up for TV interviews in a menacing black leather jacket) advocating for….don’t laugh…..the abolition of prescriptions for medicinal drugs. Heck, why should physicians have a government-assisted monopoly on determining who gets to use dangerous drugs? Ron Paul wants to bring back the gold standard and abolish the Federal Reserve. Last time I checked, so did the Libertarian Party platform. Goodbye, Food & Drug Administration, child labor laws, minimum wage, Occupational Safety & Health Administration, Medicare, Medicaid, public roads, public lands, public housing, public parks, public schools, etc. etc. etc. This is not a progressive party, folks, but apparently it’s A-OK with Mike Gravel.
Nobody’s claiming that Gravel does not have the right to join any party he wishes. Jesse Jackson has the right to join the Republican Party if he wishes, but one would certainly be tempted to ask him why he would choose to do so. The point is whether or not the decision to do so is rational or makes any political or philosophical sense, particularly when you’re asking people to vote for you to be president of the United States. Everything about Mike Gravel’s track record indicates that the Green Party’s long established political philosophy is a much better fit for him than the Libertarian Party’s even longer established political philosophy.
He has yet to explain, as far as I can tell, in any substantive way why a party whose most fervent adherents despise government as a concept and revere folks like Milton Friedman, Ludwig von Mises, and Murray Rothbard is such a nifty new home for him. I don’t think he’s spent a whole lot of time really learning anything about what libertarianism or the Libertarian Party are all about. And if he has, and can only come up with a list of vague, superficial, wishy-washy, pragmatic reasons for why he made his decision, then I suppose the Libertarian Party can stop calling itself “The Party of Principle,” as it does on its website and as it has done since I was involved 35 years ago.
People change. Parties change. Anyway, you are the one who used to be a Libertarian, David – so I guess you would know about resistance to change on the part of the Old Guard Leadership.