The Budding Liberal-Libertarian Alliance

Sometime in 2006, a little noted but potentially seismic shift occured in American politics. Many libertarian-minded voters suddenly concluded for the first time in a generation that they might have more in common with the Democratic party than with the GOP.

Their list of grievances was long: a bungled nation-building project in Iraq, torture, expanded federal powers, warrentless wiretapping, record spending and a ballooning federal budget deficit, mushrooming earmarks with an expanded farm bill and an energy policy centered around corporate welfare, steel tariffs, airline bailouts, attempted federalization of marriage laws, Terri Shiavo, an international drug war that harms our interests in Afghanistan and South America, a hostile immigration stance, and an embarrassing coziness with lobbyists, not to mentioned outright, rank corruption, …..just to name a few.

Sensing the disillusion, Markos Moulitsas at the Daily Kos actively courted voters who favor limited government by suggesting that they vote Democratic in the November 2006 elections. And, while his policy vision was not exactly doctrinaire laizze-faire, it is still significant that one of America’s most notable young progressive bloggers sees the future of the Democrats as following a freedom-oriented trajectory.

The 2006 elections themselves may have heralded just such a shift, or even a permanent realigmment, as northeastern “Rockafeller” Republicans migrated to the Democratic party, which also made significant inroads among Goldwater types in the mountain west. In December, Brink Lindsey writing for the Cato Institute, joined the conversation with his “Liberaltarians” piece which pointed out the obstacles to a Liberal-Libertarian alliance, but also considered it potentially fruitful, and maybe even inevitable. As Lindsey pointed out, libertarian leaning voters have been trending Democratic over the duration of the Bush Administration.

Is such an alliance possible for the long haul? And, if so, will it benefit both parties involved? Yes and Yes. But first some clarification. If by “libertarian” we mean those who steadfastly support the Libertarian party, want to abolish the IRS, and keep an ever watchful eye out for black helicopters, then were talking about 2% of the electorate. A Democratic wooing of this constituency would bring more harm by association than it would yield in votes.

If we take a broader definition of “libertarian”, however, and consider self-described libertarian-leaning votes, then we’re talking about 13% of the electorate according to Lindsey via Boaz and Kirby. A broader definition still, would take in all who consider themselves generally freedom loving, socially moderate and market-oriented: a huge slice of independents, and a big chunk of Republicans. Adding these voters to Democratic ranks could help the party to build a durable governing majority, not to mention helping them make more policy sense on certain policy issues.

For libertarian voters, there are benefits as well, as Lindsey points out eloquently. They need a home, and right now the Democratic party is just as amenable as the GOP, if not more so. Moreover, the table has already been set. Since the Clinton era, the Democrats have been less hostile to markets, trade and commerce in general as evidenced by Ellen Taucher’s New Democratic caucus. It was this caucus that actually gained the most new members in percentage terms in the recent 2006 election – 32% compared with 19% more for the blue dogs and 11% more for the progressives – (according to this article from mid-November)

And for libertarian types, what’s the alternative? Continuing to dance with the populist, fiscally irresponsible, know-nothing party the Republicans are slowly becoming? As a libertarian blogger, that means having to live in denial about your sins of your dance partner. The Club for Growth, for example, rejected all this talk of an alliance with Dems on the grounds that Democrats enable “rent-seekers”. Did these people hibernate through the last six years?

Keeping this dance going also means entertaining your dance partner’s ridiculous obsessions, like having to read story after story in Tech Central Station about the appeal of intelligent design theory. Like here and here. This is a revealing, giddy quote from one of those pieces, (their language, not mine) “ID will win because it's a religion-friendly, conservative-friendly, red-state kind of theory, and no one will lose money betting on the success of red-state theories in the next fifty to one hundred years. Eventually, the social right will have the sheer manpower to teach ID wherever they please.”

Is that really what the centuries old tradition of classic political liberalism, flowering during the enlightenment, means for its standard bearers today? Glomming onto “red state kinds of theories”, regardless of their validity? Then shoving them down people’s throats through the use of state power? Andrew Sullivan is maybe right when he describes today’s conservatives as having a whiff of Christian Socialism. Time for a new dance partner, folks.

For all its promise, though, there are clearly barriers to a budding “Liberaltarian” relationship. More than a few in the Daily Kos community reacted with hostility to Kos’s Democratic-Libertarian post. And, many GOP-wedded libertarian types scoffed as well. Others, like William Niskanen, may have supported Democrats only provisionally, as a means for achieving a temporary and useful gridlock. They may be less inclined to support a Democrat for the White House in 2008. After all, these two group have some serious divisions from trade to guns, and from wage controls to entitlements and heath care. A lack of pragmatism from the libertarian types also makes this alliance more challenging.

We’ll learn a lot about where things are headed with this relationship over the next two years. If the situation in Iraq worsens with the U.S. becoming more embroiled, the Republican’s refuse to nominate McCain or Giuliani and choose a more reliable social conservative instead, and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid can stay reasonably pragmatic – then we may be off to the races. If, on the other hand, Iraq fades as an issues, Sherrod Brown and Lou Dobbs become the voice of the Democratic party, and the GOP mends its ways, then a lasting alliance may not emerge.

Taking up Brink’s challenge, this blog will make the cultivation of Democratic – Libertarian alliance its central theme. And its author is well positioned to encourage these nuptials having been taught graduate public policy analysis by Peter Van Doren, now of the Cato Institute, but also inhabiting the same Berkeley world as Markos Moulitsas.

Here we go………