In an article about the role that Barr will play as the Libertarian candidate for the office of President of the United States of America, Robert Stacy McCain says this:

The 2004 Libertarian convention rejected a media-savvy candidate—Hollywood executive Aaron Russo, who led in the first two rounds of voting—and delivered a third-ballot win for software engineer Michael Badnarik.

Badnarik went on to garner just 0.32 percent of the vote in November, a disappointing result that left many Libertarians dejected, feeling their party was doomed to obscurity.

On the first ballot this year at the Denver Sheraton, it seemed to LaBeaume that the LP was headed for deja vu all over again. The convention would reject the candidate with mainstream appeal in favor of a relative unknown who could be safely ignored by the press.

I suppose that it’s find to say that the late Aaron Russo was “media-savvy.” It would be even more accurate to say that he was as nutty as your typical G8 protester--he made wild accusations about our government, built impressive conspiracy theories about the Fed, and claimed that 9/11 was an inside job.

Hollywood director and documentary film maker Aaron Russo has gone in-depth on the astounding admissions of Nick Rockefeller, who personally told him that the elite’s ultimate goal was to create a microchipped population and that the war on terror was a hoax, Rockefeller having predicted an “event” that would trigger the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan eleven months before 9/11.

Rockefeller also told Russo that his family’s foundation had created and bankrolled the women’s liberation movement in order to destroy the family and that population reduction was a fundamental aim of the global elite.

Russo is perhaps best known for producing Trading Places starring Eddie Murphy but was more recently in the spotlight for his exposé of the criminal run for profit federal reserve system, the documentary America From Freedom to Fascism.
[...]
After his popular video Mad As Hell was released and he began his campaign to become Governor of Nevada, Russo was noticed by Rockefeller and introduced to him by a female attorney. Seeing Russo’s passion and ability to affect change, Rockefeller set about on a subtle mission to recruit Russo into the elite.

During one conversation, Rockefeller asked Russo if he was interested in joining the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) but Russo rejected the invitation, saying he had no interest in “enslaving the people” to which Rockefeller coldly questioned why he cared about the “serfs.”

“I used to say to him what’s the point of all this,” states Russo, “you have all the money in the world you need, you have all the power you need, what’s the point, what’s the end goal?” to which Rockefeller replied (paraphrasing), “The end goal is to get everybody chipped, to control the whole society, to have the bankers and the elite people control the world.”

There’s your media-savvy spokesman for the Libertarian movement. His crazy talk--hailed by truthers and happy fun conspiracy theorists all over the Internet--even managed to inspire conspiracy theories about his death (see the last comment by Jasmin Cohen). Because we all know that speaking truth to power is a dangerous thing, right?

Is this the guy that McCain thinks the Libertarian party should have nominated in 2004? They may not have ended up with the most media-savvy candidate or a landslide of votes, but I’m thinking they chose the right guy. Or, at least, they chose the right wrong guy;

Read the story.

One of the fun conspiracy theory blog posts. Do a Google search on Aaron Russo and Nick Rockefeller and you can find tons more fun stuff from places like Prison Planet. You’ll also find video of his interviews that are equal parts mesmerizing and absurd. The most generous explanation that I could possibly come up with would involve drugs or dementia.

McCain can be found blogging over here--and there is much to read and admire. My complaint is that name-dropping Aaron Russo in a positive way without dealing with Russo’s maddening conspiracy theories doesn’t do much to convince me that the Libertarians made a bad choice in 2004 or that Barr will be a significant improvement here in 2008. If the Libertarians had embraced Russo in 2004 and his conspiracy theories had started leaking out later, it may well have damaged the party even more than their poor showing in the last election--short term gains aren’t always what they appear to be.