Alphecca

I certainly understand the frustration of trying to find a good qualified candidate. I plan to vote for Bush, but he sure can piss me off. As to the issue of the gay marriage ammendment, I think I would also agree with you. I don't believe that most people want the constitution messed with. I am still a bit conflicted about the issue in and of itself. I know that my knee jerk reaction is negative. I am trying to keep an open mind concerning this issue.

I love these ideological spectrum quizzes. Thank you!

This was my score on the quiz:
"The highest possible rating is 700.

The highest possible rating, given the importance you assigned each issue, is 450.

You rated the Democratic stances 215. Democratic Platform

You rated the Green stances 290. Green Platform

You rated the Libertarian stances 400. Libertarian Platform.

You rated the Republican stances 285. Republican Platform."

I would vote for you in a flash! Maybe I will write you in. I also love your Glenn Reynolds-Rachel Lucas ticket (or Rachel Lucas-Glenn Reynolds). I'd vote for just about any of the people on my blogroll. Or my friends Robin Georg Olsen or Jeanine Ring.

I'm really debating with myself on this. The only election in my lifetime that was as dismal was that of 1988 in which I didn't vote for either Dukakis or Bush Sr.. What I'm thinking I may do is vote for Bush just to keep Kerry out, and then vote for Democrats for Congress to keep him in check. Gridlock is good. I hope the two parties block each other's legislation and, especially, judicial appointments, as much as possible. The government governs best that governs least.

Rather than waste your bandwidth, I've posted a lengthy reply to you here:http://posseincitatus.typepad.com/posse_incitatus/2004/07/replay_to_alphe.html

I register in the center idologically, with a 25% bias toward the Libertarian. There are no good candidates this year, and there's little we can do about it at this point. The Libertarians are the party of "reducto ad absurdum", capable of taking perfectly reasonable ideas, and carrying them to their last logical extreme. Their problem stems from their being a small party, and as such, populated by only the extreemists. A large influx of moderates would improve their chances immensley. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Bush will do me far less damage than Kerry, so he gets my vote. Poor way to pick a candidate, but there you are.
Since my first election, (Nixon-McGovern) I've only voted _for_ a major candidate once.

I extoll Badnarik. I supported Nolan's nomination before the convention. Rainbough supported Badnarik's nomination before the convention.

Badnarik's "different". So what. You're different and I love you for it. I'm probably more "different" than you. ;-) I'm bisexual, polyamorist, objectivist, anarcho-captitalist, libertarian, extropian, transhumanist, singularitarian, have committed myself to a psychiatric hospital because of bipolar-induced psychosis, have had a mystical experience, am erisian, etc.

Your gay and your a "gun-nut". (I know that shouldn't be considered that "different", but imagine that you were running for office...)

Anyone who runs for political office out of conviction is already, by definition, different because a majority of candidates don't. Add to that the choice to run under a third party's banner and I personally consider the pick of a "quirky" candidate incredibly more honest than any other choice.

He sincerely holds my core political principle, the "non-coercion" principle. It is from that that the Libertarian Party derives it's platform positions.

Badnarik is a good guy with the integrity to defend my rights. I don't consider him any more nutty than anyone else that would actually run for president on a platform that mostly agrees with me politically.

He is an intelligent person. He won the nomination because he won the debates at the convention. I've been a member of the Libertarian Party for awhile now and right after the convention there is always this kind of doom-and-gloom presentation by the people who thought that someone else was a better candidate.

I think such issues are best dealt with before a nomination rather than after it. (Rainbough put up a post a while back explaining why she thought Russo was the worst possible candidate for the LP nomination.) The LP picked the right guy for the right reasons. He has visited gay pride festivals during his campaign. He has been on foxnews and he was able to not look bad to the average audience of each. (Which is a tough thing to do if you think about it.)

If you met him, I know that you would probably vote for him, too. He does have that effect on people.

Don't let the sour grapes of a Russo supporter that doesn't like Robert's Rules of Order unless it gives him the results he was expecting ahead of time.

That was one whiney article and I found it quite petty. It seemed to both admire Russo for being quirky-charismatic in ways (like wanting to close the border to immigration) that rubbed most libertarians the "wrong way" while it looked down on Badnarik for being quirky-charismatic in ways that don't (like running afoul of the IRS because of opposition to taxation, driving without a license because the state requires drivers to provide their fingerprints and Social Security numbers, or thinking that Congress needs a refresher on what the Constitution actually says).

The more I learn about Badnarik, the more I like him. Finally, we're large enough to have candidates run for our nomination expressing issue positions from a seemingly "extreme" position and then moderating their presentation after being nominated. I see this as a good thing not a bad thing.

Thanks for letting me vent. I'm glad I came across this article through your blog. That seemed to keep me from letting it get to me as much. If I had read it while reading one of bloggers with an "anti-voting" political position, it would have likely bugged me even more.