If the GOP were to move to a more populist economic policy, they would just become blue dog Democrats. In fact, that's what Huckabee sounds like half the time.
Fortunately, though, the blue dog Democrats are mostly Republicans now.
And that's why the Republican Party is getting more of a populist direction AHDuke. All those old southern Democrats that were extremely conservative socially while being incredibly economically populist (remember, the South was much poorer than the rest of the country for a long time) shifted toward the Republican Party in the 1980s. What, you think they're not going to try and get their views out there as the party's guiding force?
Anyway, as a small-l libertarian myself, I'll agree that the anarchist/radical wing of the libertarian philosophy has a lot of nuts in it. There are certain things government does I could not fathom getting rid of cause I don't see a better alternative. Public education being one. I spent every day of my education in public school, from kindergarten to my bachelor's degree in college, partly cause I live in the South where private schools do not traditionally exist, partly cause my parents couldn't afford it anyway. And with the way the world is going nowadays with the global competition market, we need to have our children taught just to ensure businesses want to put their operations there, so they have a ready workforce they can call upon, which helps enrich the residents cause they have more money. Military is another cause I disagree with the idea of our country and the military being dependent on mercenaries, although that is the direction that the government has been doing for the last 20 years with having more military functions done by private contractors.
That said, my being a libertarian is more toward driving efficiency. We have a program that the government provides. What is its purpose? Is it performing its job well? And would it do the job better than a private company would? I am in my twenties and the country is severely f***ed in the future unless we either cut costs or raise taxes a ton. If you're around my age and you think there's a chance that your Social Security check will be any form of significant when you reach retirement, I don't know what to tell you other than I bet you failed 8th grade math. And yet we keep adding more and more expenses while we cut taxes. How does this make sense? I agree entirely with Mike Huckabee on this point:
If John McCain does not win in November, or if he has a bad presidency a la Hoover or Carter and draws primary opposition, 2012 is going to be very interesting. Cause in those circumstances, we all know Mike Huckabee will be back running for the Republican nomination, and he will be looked at as a major candidate this time. I personally enjoyed his candidacy this past time around. All those Republicans that pretty much told the libertarian wing of the party "to go f*** themselves, you're not wanted" and then got horrified that the members of their own party were voting en masse for a previously unknown Arkansas populist preacher got exactly what they deserve.
