Don't Play the Politics Game

Ryan McMaken put up an insightful post on LRC blog today. People in the freedom movement sometimes have a tendency to "project" libertarianism onto politicians (and TV talking heads) who agree with them on a few issues.

As McMaken points out,

"So, Paul knows what he’s doing, but the gullible within the freedom movement fall all over themselves making friends with any politician who isn’t 100% vile. These are usually political activist types who are always thinking in terms of alliances and strategies and elections and compromises.

But no thanks, I have no desire to play that game, and I have better things to do than pathetically try to convince myself that secret libertarians are hiding in every corner of the US Capitol."

I think this is a key point because it at least partially explains why libertarian political activism/lobbying/campaigning efforts often go awry. People have a dangerous tendency to compromise principles for the political alliances. But as Ron Paul pointed out at the C4L's Northeast Regional Conference recently (I paraphrase), if you compromise on 1% of the bill, you've compromised on 100% of the principle. The same can be said of political alliances and strategies.