I have to agree with John on this. The platforms that I have seen for the LP spend and awful amount of time telling the reader all about why a lib solution is best without actually addressing the issues themselves. And then there is the tendency to address issues that only Libertarians care about.
What does the man or woman in the street think about? Transportation; health care (insurance), water, environmental issues, crime ... I personally don't give a rat's ass what the folks at national are thinking about, or what they think the voters are thinking about. Our focus is here. In my own thoughts about all of this I believe that I have finally come up with the one platform issue that pisses me off the most. Government land grabs. Theft of real property and property rights by the government. I mean any government (fed, state, local). While I am passionate about this, I can't very well spill my guts in a platform statement, because my solutions would be to confining to any candidate. So I will have to write and rewrite until it gets down to a short statement that is flexible. Knowing myself and my tendencies to spell things out six ways from Sunday, this will be hard work. I will start, but I will look to others for help in keeping it short and loose. paul -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of John A. Lappart Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 10:45 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: my def of platform All , I am not well at the moment, with tinnitus,dizziness and nausea, it's hard for me to concentrate on this, and I need to get some work done outside. I believe that the main thing that the writers of the platform in the past fail to realize is that a platform is ment to present solutions/positions to current election issues in a manner that will entice sympathic (that means they hold simular ideas) voter to support our candidates. It seems that the writers of past campaign platforms are all wound up in the sophomoric activity of defining what a Libertarian is and isn't. Perhaps there needs to be a preamble to the platform that states basic Libertarian philosophy and the planks define libertarian positions to issues, without over dinifinition and carefully constructed to avoid giving the opposition a handle to spin and twist the it. In the past we have seen candidates haveing some sliver of the platform split off and crafted to assert that the candidate under attack wants to abandon starving babies or something. A good example doesn't come to mind. There are ideas that some Libertarians find enormously important to themselves, that the general voter doesn't even think about, and, is not a issue that is relevant to any issue presently occuppying the elctorial debate. These things detract and confuse the voter. The platforms purpose is not to massage the masturbatorial desires of sophomoric, know-it-all, Libertarian monks. jal [|>] snip
