Buckley on Dean

William F. Buckley Jr., in a short article about Howard Dean's appeal and possibility for election, throws something out that is similar to a thought I've had swimming around in my head for a while now. Of course, he articulates it far better than I could.

If Dr. Dean decides to go it alone, he is free to run on a third-party ticket. If he did so, he would of course damage the Democratic party. But the damage would go further. There is much to be gained from the two-party system. If the second party is reduced to true impotence, the republic suffers. A good working majority is better than a majority so heavy as to eliminate opposition.

I will continue to hope for Republican dominance in politics--it would be a lie to suggest otherwise--and I think it wonderful that the American political body has begun to lean to conservatism. Opposition is necessary, though, to keep the worst of each party at bay.

The question is, and the problem that I have with Buckley's statement, whether the Democrats are the opposition that America needs for Republicans.

Democrats, on the whole, seem to lack the will to act as grown-ups on both foreign affairs and tax policy. Current Republican thought (not really conservative in other than a social sense--and less conservative now socially than two decades ago), while better on tax policy and foreign policy, is still failing to handle either current spending issues or long-term fiscal issues like Social Security.

What the US needs is not a stronger Democratic party, but a new opposition. Libertarians are the logical choice. Where Greens might make a case for themselves, their path would lead to the financial ruin of the country and is seen as being more than a little bit loony to most Americans. Libertarians, on the other hand, have the capacity to act far more grown-up than the Democrats on foreign affairs and far more responsibly than Republicans on spending.

A strong Libertarian party could serve to pull the GOP back from the spending frenzy while offering a reasonable alternative on foreign policy issues. Most young Republicans are a touch more fiscally conservative and socially libertarian than current Republican leadership; to keep their audience when faced with a strong Libertarian party, the GOP would by necessity need to address that disparity.

The problem, of course, for Libertarians is the apparent lack of a cohesive party or message. Where I consider the Republican party to be a pretty big tent these days (larger, certainly, than the lock-step Democrats), the Libertarian tent is more like a high rise with a lovely little adjoining parking garage. How does the party make a strong presence with such a diverse following?

I'm back to liking Walter's idea (expressed at the Blogger Bash if not on his blog) that Libertarians should work to take-over the Democratic party. If the current Democrat leadership can't be good care-takers of their party or their constituents, then maybe someone else can.

As much as I like President Bush, as much as I love my party, and as much as I think that the President that we have is the President that we need for the next four years, America will need a change in 2008. While I will urge you to vote for Bush now, I'll urge you just as strongly to support someone who will address our economic issues in 2008.

I agree with Buckley that this nation needs a strong opposition party. The Democrats aren't it, though. With their arrogance and lack of vision, the party is drifting toward the Nancy Pelosi wing of the political spectrum. Faced with that option, I'll take Republican dominance any day. That dominance is not, in itself, the best thing for the country, it's simply the only reasonable choice left for most of us.

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Posted by zombyboy at January 6, 2004 10:45 AM | TrackBack