McFreedom

Robert James Bidinotto posts this morning a letter from John Hospers, the Libertarian Party's candidate for President in 1972. It's a powerful letter. Some of the highlights:

The election of John Kerry would be, far more than is commonly realized, a catastrophe. [...]

Today's Democrats have been out of majority power for so long that they are hungry for power at any price and will do anything to achieve it, including undermining the President and our troops in time of war; for them any victory for Americans in the war against terrorism is construed as a defeat for them. [...]

In [Kerry's] thirty-year career he has demonstrated utter contempt for America, national security, constitutional republicanism, democracy, private property, and free markets. [...]

When the stakes are not high it is sometimes acceptable, even desirable, to vote for a "minor party" candidate who cannot possibly win, just to "get the word out" and to promote the ideals for which that candidate stands. But when the stakes are high, as they are in this election, it becomes imperative that one should choose, not the candidate one considers philosophically ideal, but the best one available who has the most favorable chance of winning. The forthcoming election will determine whether it is the Republicans or the Democrats that win the presidency. That is an undeniable reality. If the election is as close as it was in 2000, libertarian voters may make the difference as to who wins in various critical "Battle Ground" states and therefore the presidency itself. That is the situation in which we find ourselves in 2004. And that is why I believe voting for George W. Bush is the most libertarian thing we can do.

The whole thing is lengthy and good. While I don't agree with every word he writes (he seems a bit elitist in the passages where ne notes that "most Americans...labor under a plethora of economic fallacies and political misconceptions"), it's nice to read a one-time light of the Libertarian Party who seem to think basically the way I do on this stuff - that fighting over exactly how big the Federal budget is doesn't matter in the slightest if we lose this war. Libertarians looking for a reason to vote Bush (or not vote Kerry) should read this whole letter.