Losing something we never had

Radley Balko over at the Agitator posts about Libertarians losing the Right and the Left where our positions align with theirs.

We are losing the Right on the free market, and the Left on personal liberty.

Thing is, I don't think we ever had them. The key difference between Libertarians or Classical Liberals and Republicans and Democrats: Non Statists vs Statists.

Republicans and Democrats, first and foremost, are Statists. They may disagree on what the State should be doing, but they absolutley agree that the State should have more power, not less. We can talk all we want about winning the hearts and minds of Republicans with a free market, less regulation, more economic freedom position, but they don't really want to be free. Democrats love to hear about decriminalization of drugs, and civil liberty protections, but they want the government to take care of them.

You can clearly see this any time you talk to a Republican or a Democrat. Ask them where their rights come from, and almost without fail, they will say 'The Constitution'. Which is wrong. They all think they get their rights from the state, from their luck in life of being born in the US, or having met some arbitrary requirment to gain citizenship. And this is where we need to start winning them. Explain that our rights come from our humanity. That the Constitution simply explains what the government is allowed to do, not what we are.

Then move to the places we agree, and then explain how that leads to the places we don't, but why another option might be better than theirs.

I think it can be done. It'll take a while.