Republican Liberty Caucus

Why should one be excluded from the Republican Party for believing and always voting for:

• Limited government power
• A balanced budget
• Personal liberty
• Strict adherence to the Constitution
• Sound money
• A strong defense while avoiding all undeclared wars
• No nation-building and no policing the world

How can a party that still pretends to be the party of limited government distance itself outright from these views and expect to maintain credibility? Since the credibility of the Republican Party has now been lost, how can it regain credibility without embracing these views, or at least showing respect for them?

READ MORE from Dr. Ron Paul: GOP should ask why U.S. is on the wrong track

A draft of the 2008 National GOP Platform has been made. Bloomberg.com provides a good analysis of the platform changes. I have broken down the issues with very brief summaries of proposed platform changes, as follows.

ABORTION: The platform committee was unwilling to compromise on its abortion plank to accommodate John McCain’s view of the issue. Instead, the language was kept the same, which supports banning abortion in all cases without exception.

GAMBLING: What was a great victory for the online poker industry yesterday, became a telling defeat for the industry today. Poker advocates berated language in the Republican platform that called for a strong prohibition of Internet gambling. And yesterday, that language was removed from the platform and the industry fell at ease once again with the Republican Party. Today, the language was put back into the platform.

GAY MARRIAGE: The platform draft still calls for a federal constitutional ban on gay marriage.

GLOBAL WARMING: While the 2004 platform did not mention global warming, the draft document Republican delegates took up today in committee includes a one-page section “addressing climate change responsibly.” For the first time, the platform acknowledges that human activity has contributed to global warming: “The same human activity that has brought freedom and opportunity to billions has also increased the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. Increased atmospheric carbon has a warming effect on the earth.” The plank also says: “Republicans caution against the doomsday climate-change scenarios peddled by aficionados of centralized command-and-control government.” It calls technology and markets the keys to reducing carbon emissions without damaging the economy. McCain has said addressing climate change would be a top priority if he’s elected. He supports mandatory limits on greenhouse-gas emissions and a cap-and-trade system to help bring that about.

HOUSING CRISIS: In a reference to the housing crisis, the document supports “timely and carefully targeted aid to those hurt by the housing crisis” without encouraging people to borrow more than they can afford. There is no mention in the draft of the current credit crisis or turmoil in the financial markets. The document was altered in committee to add language opposing government bailouts of private institutions: “Government interference in the markets exacerbates problems in the marketplace and causes the free market to take longer to correct itself,” the text now says.

IMMIGRATION: The draft platform states opposition to any plan that would provide amnesty for people in the country illegally. This is a change from the 2004 document, which endorsed a guest worker program. “The rule of law suffers if government policies encourage or reward illegal activity,” the new platform says.

STEM CELLS: Like the 2004 document, this year’s text opposes the use of embryonic stem cells for medical research.

American Solutions, an organization founded by Newt Gingrich in 2007, is now pushing its agenda on state Republican Party delegates. The “solutions” focus little on reducing the size of government, but on American popular opinion. The top ten issues of the platform are listed here.

According to NolanChart, “In the week leading up to the convention, a coalition of Ron Paul Meetup group activists and members of the Republican Liberty Caucus of Michigan came together to examine the document. The conclusion by the membership of these groups was that this ‘Platform’ was both anti-liberty  and in direct conflict with the principles of the Republican Party. The members of these two groups took it upon themselves to inform the approximately 2000 delegates that this proposal should be opposed.”

In the end, the proposals were rejected. Unfortunately, delegates at GOP Conventions in Virginia and Wicsonsin accepted over 70 planks of the American Solutions Platform.

Congratulations to the Utah RLC!

The below flyer outlines their slate for GOP National Committee, National Delegate, and Alternate Delegate.

To become involved in the Utah RLC, contact Lowell Nelson.

UPDATE: Larry Meyers and Brian Jenkins both won a delegate seat at the National Convention. Don Guymon, who is listed as a candidate for National Committeeman on this slate, also won a delegate spot at the National Convention.

The Associated Press takes an interesting look at the upcoming GOP National Convention. GOP pollster Whit Ayres predicts, “The Republican Party is going to undergo a fairly extended fight for its new identity. There are going to be contentions between the social conservatives and the libertarian wings of the party. And between the fiscal conservative and economic growth wings of the party.”

So what will become of the GOP? For the good of our nation, let us hope the GOP returns to its limited government principles.

Rather than have a principled libertarian Republican representing them against incumbent Congressman David Wu (D), Republican voters in Oregon’s first Congressional district instead decided to nominate Joel Haugen, a supporter of Democrat Barack Obama.

As Oregon Politicker reports, Haugen, who defeated RLC-endorsed William Chappell in the May primary, believes he is “a traditional Republican” who “looks at Obama in a greater context.”

William Chappell, the RLC-endorsed candidate, supports
balanced budgets, reduced spending, school choice, and
less foreign meddling. Joel Haugen supports nationalized
health care and efforts to control world population growth.

Haugen’s endorsement of Obama wasn’t a secret. It was published in The Willamette Week at the end of April. Despite Haugen’s support for Obama, local Republicans let him continue his candidacy.

From my perspective, Haugen is entitled to support Obama or any other candidate. The problem here is that a better candidate more in line with GOP values was defeated by the voters as a result of the county party’s inaction.

Republican officials in Oregon’s first district need to re-evaluate their beliefs. Platform and principles should matter in deciding which candidates are endorsed to represent the party.

“When the Republican Party issued a clarion call last week for its grassroots supporters to submit ideas online to build the party’s platform, Republican National Committee officials probably weren’t expecting a concerted push for the dismantling of the Federal Reserve and a return to the gold standard,” writes Wired.com.

However, “Ron Paul supporters have made themselves at home on the the GOP platform site, sounding many of the themes that turned the Texas congressman’s doomed run for the Republican presidential nod into an internet cause célèbre. ‘Get rid of the unconstitutional Federal Reserve, and go back to a sound gold and silver based currency,’ wrote Cathy, a contributor from Stevensville, Montana, in a post to the ‘Jobs and Economic Growth’ section of the site.”

Cathy’s comment is just one of pages and pages of comments submitted by users complaining about the Federal Reserve, the USA Patriot Act, REAL ID, NAFTA, and No Child Left Behind. The RLC encourages you to use the automated search tool at the site to see exactly what Republican voters want their platform to say. And, believe it or not, their wishes don’t include a whole lot of meddling government.

The RLC is interested in documenting the impact that grassroots RLC members have had any on the platform debates at state GOP conventions in 2008. Across the nation, county Republican Parties have had their platforms amended to oppose the PATRIOT Act’s warrantless wiretapping provisions, the Iraq War, the Federal Reserve, the federal income tax, and REAL ID, among other changes. What impact have these local changes had at the state level, and to what extent was the RLC involved?

In March at the Alaska GOP Convention, delegates supporting Ron Paul were able to amend the state GOP platform to include a provision affirming Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights against the USA Patriot Act and REAL ID Act. They also added a plank supporting fully informed jurers. Among the resolutions that passed: Abolition of the IRS, repeal of the federal income tax, abolition of the Department of Education, and against implementation of REAL ID in Alaska.

In Idaho, where libertarian-friendly Norm Semanko was elected Chair, Ron Paul supporters (many of whom are members of the Republican Liberty Caucus) were able to add a provision to the state GOP platform demanding the abolition of the Federal Reserve bank.

In St. Charles County, Missouri, the largest Republican County caucus in the state, libertarian-leaning Republicans won 128 of 137 slots. According to The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Ron Paul delegates “snagged roughly a third of the 2,137 Republican delegates” in the state. Similar events took place in Jackson County and Greene County. In Jackson County, delegates changed the county platform in fourteen distinct ways, including abolition of the Department of Education and affirming that Congress only can go to war with a declaration from Congress.

In Oklahoma, the candidate endorsed by the libertarian-leaning faction of the GOP for National Committeeman, attorney James Dunn, was also selected by the majority of Convention delegates.

In Texas, RLC Board member Dave Nalle was able to stop two proposed resolutions, one condemning homosexuality and one opposing any form of gay unions.

Last May in Spokane at the Washington state GOP Convention, delegate Bruce Morton was able to pass a resolution affirming the that the GOP supports a formal declaration of war passed by Congress.

Attempts to change the platform in some states, such as Hawaii, Maine, and Nevada, were diffused by the establishment Republicans ‘leading’ the Convention.

In short, the RLC’s active grassroots membership is having an impact. Please let your voice be heard in the National GOP platform debate.