They say all politics are local. Those of you who invested the effort, money and time to come and be a part of our Arkansas State Convention got to see, hear and feel what that means. You were able to “press the flesh” and personally get to know some of the folks listed above. Sadly neither time nor decorum allowed us to bring you a more complete or even consistent set of politicians. I hope that you manage to set aside the resources for the National Convention and take that opportunity to actually feel out the other serious Libertarian National Committee contenders. Everyone one of them has their good parts and bad. None of them even comes close to the political caliber of Jim Holt.
Let me explain.
Jim Holt is a true, reasonably honest politician. Just like Boozman and Lincoln he can take a diverse group of people and make them his friends. You have never meet the others but if you ever get the privileged to “know” these people you would understand that even though you may not like everything they say or do they, just like Holt, can convince both atheists and liberals that having a particular born again Christian or whatever as THEIR united States Senator may not be so bad after all. And just like Holt those two have and are willing to take a stand on unpopular issues even if it means they loose a few votes. If citizens would spend an hour or so researching and reading the back story behind their public votes both of them might seem more like heroes then villains. Indeed given the same set of circumstances and depth of knowledge most of the people reading this personal opinion piece would probably end up marking their ballots the same way.
Trevor Drown may be a better person. He may even become a better politician but just like me he lacks that gift of gab or at least has yet to polish its style. That was plainly obvious when I heard him speak at the Second Amendment Rally. To his credit he is on the ballot but that is more the mechanics of hard work then it is voter appeal. With a crowd of several thousand or at a staged televised event whatever personal advantage he might have will get lost in the two dimensional translation. Bottom line: he aint quite ready for prime time. Yes in these strange times he might actually win but it is at best a long shot.
WaR! belongs in the same group as Gilbert Baker and Jim Halter. Baker and Halter are far more polished politicians and Wayne Allen Root is a better used car sales person. What causes me to group these together are that none of them believe in their message. In the case of the two US Senate wanna bees they are just preaching whatever “party line” they think will get them past May 18th. For them it, their platform, is just part of the current job description. Quite honestly I am not sure Root even understands what the Libertarian National Chair does or realizes that whatever campaign bluster he has will wear off faster then those energy drinks and pain pills.
When it is all said and done, the question we must ask ourselves is will those whom we elect have the skill sets and experience to do the real tasks before them. Boozman and Lincoln have both been in Congress and at least know where the bathrooms are. Holt understands that on a state level. Drown hasn’t even been there locally.
Likewise, Hancock and Phillies have shown that they can organize and motivate Libertarians in their respective state organizations. They have run effective internal and external political campaigns at both the local/state and national party levels. Root has possibly co-written a book and sold a few cars.
