Why Conservatives and Libertarians Shouldn't Vote Republican

Jack Kerwick gives us some wise advice on why conservatives and libertarians should not vote GOP, and he also responds to those who do defend this type of thing.

I particularly liked this comment from Kerwick when he responds to those who claim that we must choose between the "lesser of two evils":

While I’m unaware of them, perhaps there are some ethical traditions in the world that command their adherents to consciously select evil—even if the evil in question isn’t as evil as the alternative(s).  But the ethical tradition to which most conservatives subscribe is Christianity.  According to the latter, it is never, ever permissible to deliberately commit an act—any act—of evil.

Again, it isn’t “imperfection” per se that repels disenchanted conservatives, but intolerable imperfections that give rise to their repulsion.  The “lesser of two evils,” being still an evil, is, obviously, intolerably imperfect. As such, it should repel decent people everywhere.

And I particularly liked this section where he replies to the nonsensical claim that those who don't vote Republicans in effect vote for Democrats:

To this criticism, two replies are in the coming.

First of all, when the Republicans raising this criticism are those politicians and pundits who persist in their support of just those policies, like his foreign policy, say, that resulted in our last (Republican) president leaving the office with a 30% approval rating while his nemeses assumed command of both houses of Congress and the White House, it sounds more than a bit hypocritical, for it is they who have provided their opponents with more than enough support.

Yet no one is blinder in this respect than those Republicans who endorse amnesty, a policy that is sure to establish Democrat supremacy from this point onward.

Secondly, the conservative’s decision to refrain from voting may very well result in Democrats winning elections, but he is no more blameworthy for this than is a terminal patient blameworthy for suicide who refrains from availing himself of extra-ordinary measures that will buy him just a few more weeks of life—and suffering.  The patient knows that his decision to “do nothing” will hasten his death, but his intention is not to kill himself. In fact, his intention isn’t even to shorten his suffering but, rather, simply not to add to it.

In fact, as Samuel Francis reminded us, the GOP is the Stupid Party. Laurence Vance had it right when he said this: "The Republican Party is hopeless statist and interventionist at home and abroad. It cannot be reformed. It cannot be made libertarian. It cannot be re-branded. It cannot be trusted to form a coalition with libertarians. It is the enemy of the Constitution, fiscal responsibility, limited government, economic freedom, and individual liberty; that is, everything it claims to stand for. And why would anyone want to bring the party back to its roots? The roots of the Republican Party are intertwined with Abe Lincoln and his senseless war, bad economic policies, attacks on civil liberties, and violations of the Constitution. It is, after all, the Party of Lincoln." Tom DiLorenzo (see here and here) and Clyde Wilson also have some helpful material on this issue.

Thus, I have some tips on how to kill the Republican Party:

1. Evangelicals must leave the party in droves. When people think of the GOP, evangelical Christians come into mind. And some are so stupid as to claim that the GOP is the party of Christianity. Thus, the evangelicals must see through the fraud that the GOP is and leave it. They should read websites such as LewRockwell.com, Mises.org, Antiwar.com, FFF.org, LFB.org, LibertarianChristians.com, and ReformedLibertarian.com, real websites that teach true politics. They should ditch conservatism and become libertarians (see here, here, here, and here). I will post something soon as to why this is true.

2. Liberty lovers should leave the party. Yes, that's right. Limited-government libertarians and conservatives should leave the party. They need to recognize that the GOP was never a small-government party from the get-go. Their roots were in nationalist, interventionist, and big-government ideology. And don't forget the unnecessary Civil War, which was not needed to abolish slavery, as other countries ended slavery without a civil war. The work of Thomas DiLorenzo is vital in this area, particularly his two books The Real Lincoln and Lincoln Unmasked, which I have yet to read. And don't forget Joseph Stromberg's brilliant article in the Journal of Libertarian Studies entitled "The War for Southern Independence: A Radical Libertarian Perspective." The Civil War was the root of the evil doctrine known as American exceptionalism, as DiLorenzo has shown.  And if anyone brings up Reagan, I would direct them to this article by Murray Rothbard which was published after Reagan left office. For more, I would direct them to here, here, here, here, here, here,  and here.

3. Learn about the philosophy, theory and economics of liberty. There are many resources out there on the Internet through which one could learn about the ideas of libertarianism. I have listed some of the resources in a previous blog post of mine, such as LewRockwell.com, Mises.org, Antiwar.com, FFF.org, ReformedLibertarian.com and LibertarianChristians.com. And don't forget that the second website has a wealth of e-books, PDF articles, audio and video, and much, much more on the Austrian school of economics, libertarian political philosophy, classical liberalism and much more.

So there is it, readers: the three steps vital to the destruction of the GOP.