Bob Newland notes that, after 45 years of carrying the GOP card, Sioux Falls radio personality Rick Knobe has decided to abandon the Republican Party. Knobe makes no mention of the unnerving wingnuttiness of the Sioux Falls metro GOP theocracy clubs. Knobe points poxily instead to the paucity of practical policy purveyed by the poobahs of both parties:
Watching our elected leaders in Washington the past ten years has been frustrating. No budgets passed on time, constant finger pointing, no acceptance of responsibility for over spending.
The “fiscal cliff” mess is a microcosm of the larger ongoing problem.
Our elected leaders are not doing the job we elected them to do. Equal blame goes to both parties. There is no end in sight. I am sad for us, them, and the country. As much as I would love to fire all of them, I can’t [Rick Knobe, "They Left Me No Choice, So I Changed Political Parties," KSOO Radio, 2013.01.07].
I'm not sure why Knobe thinks he can't fire all of the failures in Washington. If we organized an effective political party with a serious agenda for winning elections and governing, we could do that.
Instead, Knobe gives up and joins the Libertarians:
Today I registered as a Libertarian. Their platform is short and simple. About eight pages. Basically it says, “Don’t spend money we don’t have. Let people make their own personal decisions.”
Makes sense to me [Knobe, 2013.01.07].
I'm trying to figure out if moving from wrong to irrelevant is a step in the right direction.
I could be wrong. Knobe, a former mayor of Sioux Falls, says he misses the "exhilirating" political work of "creating policy, debating, promoting, and getting beat up." Maybe he'll get the bug again and run for Legislature or House in 2014. Maybe he'll lend the Libertarians the sort of star power and sensibility they need to get their foot in the door, organize a serious campaign, and win themselves seats at the adults' table.
But unless Knobe can wreak some changes on the Libertarians of this state who call themselves a party, he's more likely consigning himself to the ranks of the Ron Paul pretenders who cloak their childish selfishness in fantasies of revolution.
"I'm trying to figure out if moving from wrong to irrelevant is a step in the right direction."
The problem is that Democrats and Republcian leaderships are both wrong and they are the only ones relevant. Rejecting pragmatism in order to honor correct principles makes it easier to go to sleep at night. You may be less popular during the day, but should politics be only about "me"? That is why both parties are wrong, it always what can the government do for me...whether it is Marxist based welfare or fascist based corporate handouts.
A Libertarian is nothing more then a Republican who wants to smoke dope. :)
"A Libertarian is nothing more then a Republican who wants to smoke dope."
That would also be a Democrat. Google up George Soros:
Soros has categorically denied receiving money from drug cartels or any form of criminal activity. The fact remains, however, that at least some of his financial operations have been based offshore, in banking and financial centers that are widely reported to be considered conducive to money-laundering. The Soros fund is based in the Netherlands Antilles, a self-governing federation of five Caribbean islands. A CIA factbook describes the region as “a transshipment point for South American drugs bound for the US and Europe; money-laundering center.”
Soros reportedly purchased a major stake in one of Colombia’s biggest banks, at a time when the Drug Enforcement Administration, in its study, “Colombian Economic Reform: The Impact on Drug Money Laundering within the Colombian Economy,” was documenting how major drug kingpins were taking advantage of the liberalization of the economy to put illicit drug revenue into legitimate businesses. The report stated: “U.S. and Colombian Government authorities have evidence of drug proceeds being deposited in every major bank in Colombia… A Colombian source indicated that many banks and businesses are owned covertly by principal members of the Cali cartel.”
His complex web of financial interests, companies and foundations makes Halliburton look like a Mom & Pop operation.
http://www.aim.org/special-report/the-hidden-soros-agenda-drugs-money-the-media-and-political-power/
Knobe certainly has a history of taking on the establishment as an insurgent candidate for mayor. If he really is feeling the itch to be active politically he might just elevate the libertarian cause to something approaching respectability. I think his best bet is to run as an Independent, though.
Knobe's time as mayor was an interesting time. It signaled the decline of a long-standing political elite in Sioux Falls. For decades an elite group of businessmen, including my grandfather, had pretty much selected who was going to be mayor and city commissioners. Knobe's win ended that forever. Still, Knobe developed good relationships with the business community.
He's not moving from wrong to irrelevant. He's still wrong laying equal blame on both parties for the failures in Washington. Republicans bear the lion's share of the blame for the nastiness, silliness, and lack of productivity in DC. The fiscal cliff debacle. The repeated debt ceiling debacles. Even fighting the President when he appoints REPUBLICANS to top positions (See Richard Cordray - Consumer Protection Agency, Chuck Hagel - Defense Secretary). Republicans are nuts! Nuts!!
Now, I didn't say Republicans bear ALL the blame in Washington. Democrats need to get serious about cutting spending. Simpson-Bowles is a good place to start. Another place would be to quit spending federal dollars for every state, county and city project around the country. Let taxpayers at those levels pay for their own non-federal roads, bridges, parks, infrastructure, etc. Democrats aren't Nuts like Republicans, but they can't ignore out-of-control spending either.
"Democrats aren't Nuts like Republicans, but they can't ignore out-of-control spending either."
The out-of-control spending is "Nuts".
Libertarian candidates have been missing from the major races on the ballot the last few years. If Knobe wanted to have a voice he would run for Congress or US Senate in '14 and rail against the system.
Knobe has struggled for a long time with this as his party has run deeper and deeper into a radicalized and intolerant abyss, both nationally and here in South Dakota. I've got my own concerns that with an open seat for the presidency that the Democrats will shrink wrap the party to weed out those who are not the Most Liberal Candidate Possible for President.
Right now, the Democrats are focused on governing ... and governing best for the constituencies who elected Obama as well as those in the House and Senate. Right now, the Republicans are ignoring how badly they damaged themselves with the primaries of 2012, and they appear to continuing on the same path to irrelevancy. But Democrats should not be smug about it. Given the right circumstances, they too can get sucked down the drainhole of hyperpartisanship.
Campaigns are all about winning. Serving is all about governance. The winner not only distinguishes between these two different realities, but can successfully juggle to make one work for the benefit of the other.
Well Sibby, at least the Democrats want to tax and spend. The Republicans want to borrow and spend. That's Nuts! And Republicans want to borrow from China and future generations to spend on the military and foreign wars rather than on Americans and America. That's double Nuts!
"Well Sibby, at least the Democrats want to tax and spend."
"The Republicans want to borrow and spend."
Right, both parties want to spend. Spending is the problem whether your borrow and covet from future generations or covet by taxing your rich neighbors. Both are based on greed and are immoral.
KB just put a new post on this very subject. Go say hi:
http://southdakotapolitics.blogs.com/south_dakota_politics/2013/01/social-security-carbon.html
Owen, well said! Although, I have an affinity for the Libertarian Party on some issues like their opposition to the Patriot Act. I will never understand why they run candidates for the PUC. Is that not the ultimate political oxymoron?
Right on, Winston. The Libertarians, like pretty much every political party, manages to take some correct policy positions. But they need to get serious about winning. Russell Clarke's PUC candidacy did nothing to advance the Libertarian brand in South Dakota. Nobody paid attention to him or to his party. If the Libertarians are serious about being anything other than armchair philosophers, they need to focus on winning. If I were in Lib HQ—oh, pardon me, I mean, if I were sitting at my crazy cousin Aaron's kitchen table folding John Birch pamphlets, I'd drop everything, call Rick Knobe, and say, "Rick! We hear you've joined our party. Welcome. What can we do to get you involved in helping us to organize a serious and visible campaign for House or Governor in 2014?"
@ the author
" If we organized an effective political party with a serious agenda for winning elections and governing, we could do that."
Boy oh boy have you got it wrong!
The GOP, as it sits today, is an intellectual void. They are simply a shadow of the Democrats. They are statists in that they think they can 'fix' the problems we have. This is where the entirely idiotic policy of bailouts comes from. And who started that mess this time around? None other than W. himself. It simply shows that the GOP does not understand free market principles, and I doubt 1 in 1000 people in this country do either. Who predicted the housing bubble? Who predicted the dotcom bubble? Who predicted the failure of the Bretton Woods agreement?
The GOP? Of course not!!
The free market economists did! The same people who have been cast out by the GOP.
You can see it in the authors comments. He thinks the GOP should govern! I wonder if the author also supported the bailouts? Even the Monetarist Milton Friedman and his Chicago School contemporaries would be doing back flips opposing any bailout! Especially one coming from the GOP.
I recommend that everyone reading this post also read a few other things.
First on the list should be Henry Hazlitts 'Economics in One Lesson'.
It's short and sweet and chock full of ideas the GOP has completely abandoned, once you read it you will wonder why.
Once you understand free market economic theory a little better you will understand that you cannot 'fix' the economy any more so than you can 'fix' the weather or 'fix' geology or 'fix' any other hard science! Free markets have a naturally occurring order and any effort to interfere with that natural order will most likely not achieve the desired results it will certainly cause undesired secondary consequences! The marketplace is such a vastly complex 'thing' you can not possibly gain enough knowledge (what Hayek calls 'perfect knowledge') to fully understand what any sort of manipulation will ultimately do.
Have any of you even heard of the Mises Institute?
John Maynard Keynes? (not a free market economist, but his lifes work has affected almost every part of your life!)
Friedrich Hayek?
Henry Hazlitt?
Ludvig von Mises?
Murray Rothbard?
Milton Friedman?
Thomas Sowell?