In an otherwise thoughtfuland insightful post about what he saw on the Mall last weekend,Nick Gillespie makes the odd assertion that, despite being "in someways... proto-libertarian" "[t]he organizers and the attendees arenot part of the Leave Us Alone coalition."
The term "Leave Us Alone coalition" was coined by GroverNorquist as a discription of the coalitional structure of theright. The idea is that gun owners, economic conservatives,homeschoolers and so forth can support one another's goals becausethe common strand is a desire to have less government interventionin their lives, whereas the left is structured around a "Takingscoalition" that seeks to divide up government resources amongstthemselves.
Norquist has long argued that contemporary social conservatism emergedout of Leave Us Alone instincts:
The pro-family, traditional-values conservatives are animportant part of the "Leave Us Alone" coalition. The so-calledReligious Right did not organize in the wake-of the Supreme Courtdecision banning school prayer, or even after Roe v. Wade. Thedevelopment of a national grassroots conservative activism grew outof a self-defensive response to threats from the CarterAdministration to regulate Christian radio stations and remove thetax-exempt status of Christian private schools.
I've heard Norquist argue that social conservatism has been mostsuccessful when its goals meshed with the Leave Us Alone ethos, forexample when objecting to publicly-funded art that is offensive toChristians, and least successful when their goals deviate from it,for example with the push for a school prayer amendment. He arguesthat the right is divided on issues like immigration or abortion orforeign policy precisely because they don't fit easily into theLeave Us Alone formula.
Nick seems to assume that a desire for public religiositynecessarily implies government intervention, but that's far fromclear. JamesPoulos teases this out:
Gillespie goes off track in thinking that religion links up withthis basket of broadly shared interests in a self-contradictoryway. Beck's folks, he writes,
worry about an undocumented fall in morals, and they areemphatic that genuine religiosity should be a feature of the publicsquare. Which is to say, like most American voters, they may wellwant from government precisely the things that it really can'tdeliver.
A secular libertarian would confuse a longing for apublic air of genuine religiosity with 'more religion ingovernment'. But this, too, I think, badly misses the mark. TheAmericans who came out in droves for Beck's rally don't think thepurpose of government is to hand you the good life. Why would theythink the purpose of government is to hand you the right morals? AsGillespie himself puts it :"In some sense, the rally was a giant AAmeeting (I don't mean this snarkily), flush with the notion thatwhatever else is going on in the world, you can control someportion of your own life."
The religious convictions of Beck's fans, and the fact thatthey're not calling for explicit government intervention, suggestsa reinvigoration the traditionalist-libertarian alliance, whichbecame badly frayed in the past decade as Bush Republicans pushed"Big Government Conservatism" and social conservatism wasincreasingly driven by the explicit anti-libertarianism of people like Mike Huckabee. Insome ways this is a natural consequence of the left taking thereigns of government and the prominence of economic policyarguments -- it's easier in many ways to hold a political coalitiontogether in opposition -- but it's a tendency that should beencouraging rather than off-putting to libertarians.
I used to be an actual member of the Libertarian party, until Ifinally got tired of hearing about nothing other than legalizingmarijuana and prostitution. Right or wrong, those aren't going tobe issues that will ever land you in office. As for the Tea Party,I've seen more true libertarianism there than I have from professedmembers of the libertarian party. The Tea Party candidates I'veseen so far seem to be mostly pro-life libertarians. What's more,being pro-life IS a true libertarian position. If the governmentwon't protect your life than none of your other liberties matter awhit, and the government has lost its right to claim yourallegiance.
You are more overly-optimistic than one might suppose you are,if you think the state will protect unborn life in the future.That's almost like saying "Jesus will return".
Glenn Beck and the Leave Us Alone Coalition @ 2012 Presidential Election Year links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
I, too, have voted Libertarian (Ron Paul for president in, what,1988). Since then it's become more and more clear to me that somenational consensus in favor of traditional morality is necessaryfor a free republic. Religion provides such consensus better thanany other institution.
There's something that concerns me about pro-life: if Pol Potgot Susan Atkins or Patricia Krenwinkel pregnant, abortion wouldn'tbe such a bad idea. And don't write "its not the baby'sfault".If the baby is a bad seed, he or she is a bad seed.
I have only considered this a reasonable thing one time and yourmother wouldn't listen to me. I can see that the apple didn't fallfar from the tree.
You cannot claim a right for yourself which you will not grantto others. ..."ALL men are created equal, and are endowed by theirCreator with certain unalienable rights".... If the right exists,it is universal. If you deny it exists for someone else, then youcannot (logically) assert that it exists for yourself. Fault is notan issue; preservation of individual rights is the issue, elsewisewe become like Pol Pot ourselves.
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