Ever since the past year’s campaign, I’ve been realigning myself with the political landscape or, maybe what I am actually doing, is realigning myself with who I am.
I’ve been registered as an Independent, in four states, for about 20 years. It started in the 1980’s when I first realized that the Democratic Party, that I had been a member of my entire life, was no longer the party that I grew up with. My parents were first generation, working class folks. Dad was a union man working in a tire making factory in Ohio. The unions were strong and important back then; dad was able to support his family quite nicely and his kids went to college.
There was no question I was a Democrat; I grew up on it. Then, in the 1980’s things started to change. Most of the blue-collar guys went for Ronald Reagan; in other words, the Democratic Party started losing its base and gaining a bunch of special interest group-type of people. Eventually, the party was eviscerated; no more meat and potatoes, instead it became the party of white wine and arugula.
Even after changing my registration to Independent, I still voted mostly Democrat. That is until this past year. As a Hillary supporter, I saw first hand what the Democratic Party had become and I sure did not want to be a part of it.
Since the election (I voted straight Republican for the first, and probably last, time in my life), I’ve found myself listening to all the conservative talk radio hosts and going to Fox News for MSM stuff. I also follow Ron Paul and a variety of other conservative and Libertarian websites. (Recently, I had someone tell me I should read the Huffington Post for more objective news; needless to say, I almost barfed).
What I have come to understand is that I have always been a libertarian in some way. If I think back to my hippie days, well, we always said, “do your own thing”. We went back to the land to grow vegetables, heat with fire wood, make our own clothes or recycle others, and generally live a self-sufficient lifestyle. I remember ordering my cast iron skillets from the Mother Earth News, which I still recommend for all of you survivalists, and Libertarians, out there.
So, I guess you can say I’ve always been leaning towards libertarianism with a bit of social compassion thrown in. Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina recently defended libertarianism in a response to Senator Lindsey Graham’s put down of the ideology. Sanford said, “Liberty is the Hallmark of the American experiment.”
I have to say I agree with him. Below is a video of Sanford responding to a question about libertarianism.
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