The press release I mentioned over at “Thoughts on Freedom,” which was published in AFR’s “rear window” page, regrettably was spoiled somewhat by someone in that organization deciding to have a slap at Lisa Milat. They have been contacted by Peter Whelan and now know of our displeasure regarding their action. The press contains a number of good serious reporters; unfortunately I have met more intelligent hill-billys than some of the rest of them. Lisa’s candidacy brought out the worst in some of them.
I sometimes wonder if, when some of them go back and look at the stuff that they have done in the past, they shake their heads and ask; “Did I really write that crap.” On the other hand, I doubt that those who write it have the intelligence to see anything wrong with it. The executive will not tolerate further smears on Lisa, we will not ignore them, and we will fight back. Lisa is a responsible and respectable member of the community and does not deserve this.
While checking back on the controversy on the coverage of this I came across the post, “A Current Affair v Lisa Milat,” and looking through the comments it seems that we tend to get too tied down on minor details of fringe issues, to the point where we never seem to get the big picture across. At least half of the 124 comments seemed to be on the gay issue. Basically as long as they have equal protection under the law, and there is no state discrimination against them, gays are a non-issue.
Essentially there are two separate groupings in our political lives. The first is the ALS, with its blog, “Thoughts on Freedom,” which is the grouping for discussion of philosophy, and all the airy-fairy stuff, which is a vital part of what we stand for: the idealistic side of us, if you will. This is where we do our talking on “Libertarian with a capital L, gold standards, and all that other stuff that the public at large doesn’t understand, and cares even less about. This is not the LDP.
The biggest mistake that the LP in America makes, and the reason why it will always be a fringe group is that they have never separated the philosophy from the politics. While they continue to be a party containing groups within it who throw hissy-fits about candidates not complying with the standards of the “Libertarian Purity Test,” and hold their breaths until they go blue in the face about it in full public view, they will go nowhere. A political party needs to present an image of electability, while remaining sufficiently true to the basic philosophy to retain the support of most of this group.
The LDP is a political party, and our blog should be hard core politics, not libertarian pie in the sky. We are here to get people who support our values into a position to do something about it, by being elected. Some of you may have noticed we refer to the party’s core principles of small government, low taxes, personal freedom and responsibility,” not libertarianism. I see us as a classical liberal party, supporting all of those things and feel that is not in any way inconsistent with the ALS.
This should not in any way be interpreted as a rejection of the ALS by us they are an important factor. The point has been made in discussion on this subject: -
“One of the frustrations I find in getting people to sign up to join the LDP and commit to helping is that all the “airy-fairy’ talk about libertarianism is meaningless to most people. The potential members and voters need to know how we are going to fix their particular problem. That’s where the “small government, low taxes, individual freedom” comes in.
We need the ALS libertarians to discuss principles and philosophy, but then it needs to be re-worked into “LDP Policy on ….” as a saleable/bankable proposition. Even if not a fully endorsed Policy, it can still be presented as a “current position statement”, which may also encourage some input from the pragmatists.”
It is my contention that ALS members are welcome in the LDP if their beliefs are consistent with the politics of the LDP. If they are not able to lighten up sufficiently to join us, they are better off to stay on the sidelines at the ALS, giving advice while we do the heavy lifting involved in taking over this country and moving it in the direction of true freedom for the first time.
March 12, 2009 at 1:39 pm |
[...] The release was published in AFR’s “rear window” page, and aroused enough interest from the Australian for a reporter to follow up. Unfortunately they didn’t print it. Its nice though to get published somewhere, even if it was stuffed up somewhat. There is more in relation to this over at the LDP blog. [...]
March 12, 2009 at 4:39 pm |
Jim,
This attitude is stupid in my book, although you are certainly not the first to express it. To be sure the LDP is a political party that should exist to achieve political ends however the notion that libertarians should be actively excluded because they are “too idealistic” is daft. Why on earth would we be wishing for less members especially given that we are only registered in two juristictions?
The LDP should be open to all that agree with the parties objectives even if the contribution they make in political terms is purely philosophical. Why on earth would you want to hollow out and dumb down the rank and file of the organisation? To be sure those that hold the purse strings, choose candidates, stand as candidates, approve policies and run campaigns ought be the pragmatic political types but that is a separate matter. The LDP should make everybody that broadly agrees with the parties ideals feel at home and feel welcome to contribute, even if by no means other than personal recommendation to their friends or in making up numbers and flying the flag at LDP events. To create a deliberate rift with libertarian idealists seems counter productive. What harm do they do? Sure some idealists who have initiative might mess up once in a while (some pragmatists do also) however I’d rather see the bone pointed at those that do nothing at all rather than those that are misguided, poor at execution, naive or otherwise but who at least have a go. And those that do nothing at all are hardly a menace so why exclude them?
And more to the point the only person I know that is on the federal executive and an author at the ALS is you. So who the heck are you targeting?
The LDP should be talking about where it is succeeding, where it is progressing, where it is improving, what it is doing to win. It shouldn’t be introspectively trying to purge itself of imperfections, getting nasty with the weaker elements or turning people away at the door. That way lays failure. We shouldn’t be focused on weaknesses we should be focused on strengths. We shouldn’t be focused on failure we should be focused on success.
The thinktank brigade have a place within the LDP even if it isn’t necessarily at the steering wheel. It isn’t too many philosophers that will hurt the party but too much exclusiveness. Your article, coming from a member of the federal executive, entails a form of idealism far worse in my book than that of a few anachists in the rank and file.
Regards,
Terje Petersen.
Former LDP executive
ALS board member.
Slightly annoyed person.
March 12, 2009 at 6:18 pm |
Terje; I am stunned at the degree to which you have missed the point on this issue, possibly because in your impeccable pedigree you include your status as “Slightly annoyed person.”
We are fortunate to have a degree of separation between our philosophical base and our political party, giving each room to move. At the same time the Party cannot move very far from the attitudes of the majority of the ALS or we will lose their support, which would be disastrous for us. My mention above of Thoughts on Freedom as: ” which is a vital part of what we stand for: the idealistic side of us, if you will,” is hardly an indication that I want rid of them.
In following the US election I noticed considerable consternation among thinking Republicans at the potential damage the Barr/Root ticket could do to them, because of what was seen as their ability to attract mainstream voters. They had no cause for alarm as the ticket was attacked from within, by the libertarian pure thought police to the extent that it ended up yielding one of the poorer results in the parties history.
The ALS is a moderate libertarian group and is not likely to cause this problem in my opinion, and contrary to your view, I was not targeting anyone. I am at a loss to understand where you came up with that one from, you surely didn’t think it was you, did you? I have since joining in on the discussion years ago held you in high regard, I thought you would have woken up to that by now.
I hope that all ALS members as well as those who just look in supportively will find the will to join us, I don’t want a purge. The point is though that we need in the party, people who can support the party when we adopt a more moderate line than the ALS. We are unlikely to move far from the thinking of the ALS, after all we are in the main the same people. There is in fact significantly more chance of an LDP member to be an ALS supporter than vice versa.
An example of what I am talking about is that I as a member of the local Electorate Council of the National Party left the party when my views on free enterprise became so inconsistent with NP policy that I felt the need to fight them. I continued to support them from outside as they were better than Labor until the Progress Party was formed.
That is all I mean.
March 12, 2009 at 7:18 pm |
Jim,
Forgive me if I have read too much into your remarks. However they echo remarks made by others that seem to me to serve no purpose but to divide. Perhaps your view of the historical LDP context, in which you make the remarks, is different to my view of the historical LDP context in which I receive them. I agree with your characterisation of the purpose of the LDP and the ALS (the separation was after all by design) but I think the ALS should also welcome policy pragmatists and the LDP should welcome philosophers and thinkers.
My apology if I read you wrong. I’ll think on it some more and maybe email you privately if I have further comments to make.
Regards,
Terje.
March 16, 2009 at 1:26 pm |
As a complete outsider it struck me as a ridiculously divisive post. To be frank, the LDP is not in the position to be choosy.
March 21, 2009 at 3:13 pm |
I think I agree with the original post…
I think what Jim is getting at is “presentation” versus “ideas”. This is a few I espoused myself. While there’s room at the ALS for discussion of incest or gold standards there is no point in mentioning such things publicly or even entertaining the idea that there was discussion of such issues.
Every political party has a united front and that means, in my opinion, that party higher-ups debating with other party members in a public forum is not the way to go. Blogs like this are great, but in terms of LDP policy there should not be public discussion, there should be public statements.
This seems contrary to libertarian behaviour. But the fact of the matter is it’s how every successful organisation runs. The Catholic Church seldom voices disputes on theology. We never hear about boardroom arguments between executives of McDonalds. The Liberal Party policy room is pretty much closed except for occasional leaks.
Similarly while the LDP PARTY itself should be open, the presentation of policy should be a closed matter.
As Jim says “LDP policy is to X…”
I hope we stay more open than the other parties- because it suits us. But we do need to keep discussion to appropriate forums.
As for the original Lisa Milat post, well I was a major contributor and I felt it important to explain to Mike how a party CAN reconcile shooters and gays. It ended up drifting further and further off topic. But essentially my comments were focused on libertarian unity.
I think unity is important as Terje and Sam say. But I also agree with Jim- “there’s a time and a place” for discussion and a time and a place for unity.
April 15, 2009 at 6:42 pm |
I don’t think the gold standard is beyond discussion by the LDP.
I’m not sure exactly the purpose of this blog at the moment… but I might use it to ask a question. In the last newsletter I read:
“The evening was attended by a number of Victorian members and Whelan was able to engage them in healthy discussion on the history and background of the LDP.”
I would be curious about how the current exec is explaining the history and background of the LDP.