Thursday, September 10, 2009

Bob Barr, DOMA and the LP's Big Tent


There are many members of Libertarian Party who don't hold to all of the positions in their platform, particularly on the issues of abortion and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Bob Barr, their 2008 presidential candidate, voted for the Patriot Act and the 2002 Authorization to use force in Iraq. Though he has changed his mind about these two issues, falling in line with LP platform (sort of). But the former Republican congressman is still at least nominally pro-life which goes directly against it. But what I recently found out that was most stunning of all is that Bob Barr actually authored DOMA! That's really weird to me that they would specifically say that they are against a particular piece of legislation and then nominate the author of that legislation to be their presidential candidate. That's even more incredible than the fact that Bill Clinton signed it into law. What strange bedfellows!

Many LPers think that they will be perceived as so much more "libertarian" by saying that DOMA is big government. They are just trying to make themselves look like they are better than the Democrats when it comes to "civil rights". They think that DOMA will lead to federal agents pulling down couple's pants to make sure that there is only one of each gender. (Its been thirteen years and it hasn't happened yet.) Come on, guys, it's about state's rights, not an expansion of federal power or "victimless crime" legislation.

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