Liberty Maven

I discovered a flashback article from the National Review Online on Harry Browne. It was an interview from the 1996 election cycle where Browne answered the question “What is the function of a third party?”.

“To win elections. We should be working to be one of the three major parties in the country, and eventually one of the two major parties. I believe . . . that the most likely outcome over the next five to ten years is that the Republican Party will disappear.” (source: NRO)

This was in 1996. Five years later came 9-11 and the somewhat irrational patriotism that followed. I know it because I was one of the irrational patriots. Could Harry Browne prove to be correct? Sure it hasn’t happened in 5 to 10 years, but 9-11 probably prolonged the change in the GOP he professes.
What is so fascinating about Harry Browne’s answer is that the election of 2008 has the rumblings of a GOP makeover at least and perhaps at most a GOP vanishing act. Consider the presumptive nominee at this time being John McCain. He consistently loses the conservative GOP vote in all of the elections thus far. It is the moderates who have put him over the top.

The simple straight talk truth for McCain is that conservatives don’t believe he is conservative and are considering voting for the Democrat so that McCain doesn’t transform the GOP more towards the left. Conservative radio talk show hose Glenn Beck laments about this on his show daily. Rush Limbaugh does so as well. Ann Coulter even suggests she would vote for a Democrat over John Mccain. These circumstance aren’t the only evidence of a coming GOP makeover.

Consider Ron Paul. He does nothing but tell the truth even if most conservatives stick their fingers in their ears and mutter “la la la la” when he speaks. If you couple what Harry Browne said in 1996 with what former assistant to President George W. Bush, Doug Wead says today about Ron Paul you get some red state fireworks:

And yet, the words and arguments of Ron Paul are still resonating. They still hang over this election. They are haunting and troubling. They are producing blogs and papers and books and like Goldwater’s revolution they will one day very likely produce their own Ronald Reagan. And when those heady days happen a small but hearty band of pioneers, who first had the nerve to join him and start shouting from the street, “They aren’t wearing any clothes,” will be able to say that they could see what the country missed. They were there when history was made.

John McCain and his poorly chosen words, of staying in Iraq a hundred years, have almost guaranteed that he will be the answer to the trivia question, who was the Republican candidate who lost to the ticket that claimed the first woman and black for the presidency? Another question may very well be, “What other candidate ran that year and launched the movement that has dominated national politics for the last generation?”

And the answer will be Ron Paul.

(source: Doug Wead’s Blog)

Are we seeing the crumbling of the Republican Party before our very own eyes? Only time will tell, and I for one, love that Ron Paul seems like he is going to be a part of it.