A little bit ago I wrote about Bob Barr, Libertarian candidate for president. Well, earlier this week he made the front page of the LA Times (both print and web). There's even a few sentences about what he and the Libertarians stand for ("My philosophy is much smaller government, much greater personal freedom, and start dramatically reducing the size of the federal government," Barr said.). But, mostly it discusses the political (how he might screw McCain in Georgia) and the wackiness of any 3rd party candidacy.
The only part of the article that pissed me off was, "Part of his challenge as he stakes out the electoral map is his party's hard-to-define ideology. Libertarians line up with liberals on privacy issues and with conservatives on gun rights." The truth is just the opposite. Libertarians believe in less government across the board, where as the democrats believe in less government in your bedroom, but more in you wallet, while the republicans believe the opposite. You tell me who's harder to define. The mainstream media just has a hard time with something that doesn't fit into their preconceived buckets.
What's frustrating overall is that Barr (and other '3rd party' candidates) would probably attract more votes if the mainstream media actually printed their positions on things rather than run funny little articles. I'm not suggesting that there's a 3rd party candidate who would win this year's elections, but a bit more competition in the marketplace of ideas can only help our democracy.
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