ALEXANDRIA, Va., Jan. 20 (UPI) -- Politics is not a rational business. If it were, many people would understand that the "rational solution" to the problems posed by so-called bad Republicans would be to replace them with better Republicans rather than with Democrats who were far more liberal.
Such common sense political wisdom, however, appears to be completely lost on the Libertarian Party. They, alternatively, subscribe to the political strategy of burning the village down in order to save it.
Republican U.S. Rep. John Thune, R-S.D., came up 524 votes short in his fraud-tainted challenge to incumbent Democrat Sen. Tim Johnson in November 2002.
Thune has a respectable, though far from perfect, lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 83. Johnson, by contrast, has a 21. The race represented a clear choice between a pro-big-government liberal and a fairly consistent limited-government conservative.
Nevertheless the state's Libertarian Party put up its own candidate, Kurt Evans, who played the role of a spoiler.
Evans garnered 3,071 votes on Nov. 5, more than enough to change the outcome of this race if even just one out of five of his voters had thrown their support to Thune had Evans not been in the race.
To Evans' credit, he dropped out of the race and endorsed Thune, but not soon enough to have his name removed from the ballot.
Knowing this was likely to be a neck-and-neck race from the beginning, one upon which control of the Senate may have rested, it defies common sense for the Libertarian Party to have gotten into this one at all.
Evans never had a prayer of winning; his presence in the race might have kept Thune anchored toward the right but the only role he could have truly hoped to play was that of spoiler, which he did.
It makes little sense that 3,071 supposedly limited-government advocates living in South Dakota voted for a candidate who had dropped out of the race (and never had a chance in the first place), giving another six-year term to a guy who stands against just about everything they stand for.
A number of large "L" Libertarians always blow a gasket whenever they are accused of being politically naïve. They have every right to cast self-defeating votes as 3,071 of them did in South Dakota, but they don't have the right not to be criticized for them.
They have a legitimate point that some Republicans are not true champions of limited government. In fact, they excel at diagnosing the disease, but they are remarkably deficient in providing a cure.
In a column he penned before Election Day, the party's 2002 presidential candidate, Harry Browne, lamented, "The winning (congressional) incumbents (either Democrat or Republican) have never bothered to introduce a single bill to reduce government in any significant way, while they have been reliable supporters of all sorts of new big-government schemes."
Let's assume for a moment that this is true (and you'll be hard-pressed to get an argument over it from me).
It is also true that no Libertarian Party member of Congress has ever bothered to introduce a single bill to reduce government in any significant way.
Why not? Because not a single Libertarian Party candidate has ever been elected to Congress.
It is always easy to sit in the stands and criticize the players. It's not called the peanut gallery for nothing. It's also easy to take strong, no-compromise positions when you know you'll never get elected and actually have to govern.
If you want to change public policy, you have to change public officials. The Libertarian Party has been nothing short of a dismal failure from that perspective -- unless you are a limited-government advocate who considers throwing a close election of a decent-but-not-perfect Republican to a far more liberal Democrat a success.
Until Libertarians take seriously the responsibility to get candidates elected instead of just heckling from the sidelines, it will be hard to view them as a credible political party, no matter how sympathetic some may be to platform.
The key isn't to get more Republicans elected. The key is to get, from the standpoint of advocates of limited-government, better ones like U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, elected.
Libertarians can assist by abandoning their third-party "movement," and, instead, join with conservatives to ensure that more limited-government GOP nominees win party primaries.
More Libertarians inside "the big tent" would be enormously helpful in strengthening the spines of some of the weak sisters who are in critical decision-making positions.
The wisdom of such an approach is revealed in Massachusetts. Libertarian Carla Howell's 2002 ballot initiative to repeal the state's income tax received a hefty 45-percent affirmative vote but, as a candidate for governor, Howell herself received just 1 percent of the total vote.
The problem wasn't the message; it was the messenger and the vehicle used to deliver it.
The Libertarians have shot themselves in the foot year after year by running candidates who weren't serious and were, in some cases, outright kooks. This is not yet a fatal flaw. People still root for the Chicago Cubs even though no one really expects them to win the World Series.
It's time for rational libertarians to abandon the Libertarian Party in favor of a much more prominent role in the GOP, especially in the primary season. If they really want to have an impact on the direction of public policy as a result of the outcome of elections, they need to come and play in the big leagues with the big boys.
I'll leave the light on for you.
Chuck Muth is executive director of the American Conservative Union and president of the Goldwater Club. He can be reached at www.chuckmuth.com.
"Outside View" commentaries are written for UPI by outside writers who specialize in a variety of important global issues.
