An Open Letter to Libertarian Candidates ... (Part 6)

Part 6. Big money, small change. 

Big money. Big business. Big government.

      What is the difference between them if they are all telling us what to do?

      And what use is liberty when others have power over you?

      Big money talks. Big money shouts. Big money sets the political agenda.

      Big money steals your voice, shouts you down, repeatedly in those one-sided commercials we all hate (no matter which side you’re on). And, in the form of robocalls that invade your privacy, intrude upon your time, demand to be answered.

      Big money steals the candidate’s voice too. It tells the candidate (like all the rest of us) what to think, and do, and say. Or, if you dare disagree, to shut up.

      Big business supplies the big money, looks out first for itself. Invest a billion, get back a trillion (by controlling the levers of big government). A great rate of return. A smart move. A good investment.

      Big government, for sale to the highest bidder. Bills written by lobbyists and big money interests. Gerrymandering, to discount the value of the vote. To replace democracy with the rule of oligarchs.

      It’s the Russian way. It shouldn’t be the American way too.
      By contrast, small is beautiful. Small government (of course). Small business (a job creator, an innovator). Small money. The voice of the people. The small guy.
      It is time to recognize that free speech is not always fair speech (just as free markets are not always fair markets). It is time to recognize that people can be smart without being rich. And that the rich can be rich for the wrong reasons. That they are not God’s chosen. Just rich. That we should not be afraid, that we can outvote them, that collectively we are even richer than they are.

      Hold a real debate. Address the public’s agenda. And let ideas hold sway, not advertizing dollars.

      So what’s a candidate to do? How do you counter big (big money, big business, big government) if, theoretically, you wanted to?

1.       Emphasize retail politics (the kind practiced in Iowa and New Hampshire, where the candidates have face-to-face time with voters, and first hand impressions count for more than campaign ads)

2.       Emphasize the internet and social media. TV is expensive and, to some degree necessary, but the Internet is free (nearly), and by relying on personal contact (at the level of friends talking to friends), potentially more effective.

3.       Make ‘Big’ itself the issue—in a limited TV campaign that contrasts itself with that of the better funded opponent, in interviews (where you have more time to talk), in debates (where the most people are watching), and everywhere else.

4.       Unite with other also-rans (money-wise) to gang up on the anointed one (the billionaire’s choice—call him that). Like small birds (more numerous and more determined) chase away a hawk.

5.       Be mocking, use humor, and be sharp and satirical, in contrast to the typically stodgy, heavy-handed, big-money approach. The way you get the news from the Daily Show. The way the Coen brothers lampoon Clean Coal in their series of mock ads (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFJVbdiMgfM). Make it cool to be an outsider. Make your supporters feel smart and superior to the opposition. Make the opposition want to be you.

6.       Push for simple, market-based approaches (the CCL Carbon Fee and Dividend immediately comes to mind) as an alternative to thousand-page bills that nobody reads, and EPA regulation (the big government approach)

7.       Convert the enemy. Bribe the oil and coal interests if necessary. Treat them like victims (as surely as are island nations, and people with oceanfront property, all their eggs in the wrong basket). It is not their fault that they invested so heavily in carbon fuels. It is our fault that they did, a response to demand. We help them (become energy companies in the broadest sense of the word), they help us (by accepting a carbon fee, etc.)

8.       Get your own billionaire. Someone who already agrees with you on the key issues, including (most importantly) the need for long terms measures to limit the influence of big money in politics and restore the democratic process (amending the constitution, leveraging the donations of small donors, offering free TV time to candidates while, at the same time, moving to campaign media [the internet] that are not bandwidth limited). More about this in a future post.

9.       Turn out the vote (in the end, this is all that counts—not the money spent, but the number of votes you get)

So take the money, run the commercials—if you have to, and if you can. Do it, but run a different kind of campaign, a campaign that emphasizes small. Do it, but demand a long term end to it. And mean it too. (Like Mayday, the PAC to end all PACS, embrace the irony).