THINK THERE'S NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CHARLES JAY AND THE LIBERTARIANS?
You'd be mistaken - read this and find out for yourself


October 26, 2004

In a recent interview on the website AboveTopSecret News, Personal Choice Party presidential candidate CHARLES JAY was asked the following question:

I SEE NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER BETWEEN YOUR PLATFORM AND THAT OF THE 
LIBERTARIAN PARTY. WHY ARE YOU RUNNING SEPARATELY?

Here was his answer, excerpted from the interview:

Primarily, because it was my personal choice to do so, and didn't see any reason not to. While it may be true that our party would appear to be a philosophical "brother" of the Libertarian Party, my platform is not designed with the intention of being similar to that of the LP, but because it represents what I think is the right thing to do, the right way to view things, the right way to govern. 

Yes, we both promote individual rights, liberty, freedom of choice, independence. But the more appropriate question might be, why would anyone be any different? Why doesn't everybody have that same philosophical foundation? Why don't Democrats, Republicans, Greens feel people have the right to make more decisions about their own lives? Is there something inherently wrong with that philosophy? If there is, I'd like to hear it. 

That having been said, I think elections are less about parties and ideologies than about the candidates themselves. The specifics of my platform are there for the benefit of the people who ask me about it; some do, some don't. Mostly, they're concerned about the level of trust they can have in you and how far-reaching and ambitious your vision is. 

But as long as we're talking about it, there are in fact very real differences between our platforms. I know that Libertarians would abolish a wide range of federal agencies, and so would I. But I would feel compelled to reinvent some of those agencies, rather than junk them. The Department of Education is one example. I am interested in being helpful in delivering the tools of education, while staying away from delivering the content of that education itself.

I look upon a national consumption tax as something that can fill some of the vacuum left after I help eliminate the personal income tax, accompanied by massive cuts in government spending. That's just based on a realistic view of the national budget. Of course, that might mean we keep a scaled-down Internal Revenue Service around, not to collect income taxes and harass individuals but instead to administer the consumption tax. 

One place I would increase the budget is in the area of veterans affairs, because that is one group of public servants we owe something to and who have not been treated like human beings. They are part of an important constitutional function of the military - national defense - and they can not be neglected. As I pointed out before, I look at the War on Drugs as a war on many fronts, and know that we need to deal with all those fronts; we need more than one specific solution. 

I probably place a stronger emphasis on the so-called "touchy" issues - things like drugs, prostitution, adult entertainment, and of course, gambling, something I feel can be used to fulfill a vital function of my program, which I hope to expand upon later. Libertarians in recent years have had a tendency to shy away from those issues because they figure it makes candidates look less viable.

The Libertarian platform opposes anti-trust laws. I know better. From my own experiences in business and through investigating professional boxing for my three books, I have seen the effects of restraints of trade and other anti-competitive practices, and I know that the artificial restriction of competition almost never does anything to benefit the consumer. In fact, just the opposite. And it is usually tied into some kind of corruption, often among public officials. No - anti-trust laws are the consumer's friend. It's just a matter of applying them wisely.

Also, the Libertarians are against insider trading laws. I don't see that practice as something harmless. When somebody uses inside information, not available to others, for his own self-enrichment, there are invariably going to be some people who lose as a result. It also can be used to manipulate the market, and not only is that artificial, it's not in the public interest.

I am naturally an advocate of limited government, but under my administration I would not hesitate to consider utilizing a government solution if (a) there is very little or no downside; (b) there is no intrusion on individual liberty; (c) there is no unfunded mandate to the states; and (d) there is no additional coercive expense to the taxpayer. 

Now, let's talk about the subject of "approach". It is important to point out that there is no Personal Choice Party "platform", per se, meaning that some of the planks I described above may in fact not be consistent with what the majority of Personal Choice Party members think. But the party allows for candidates to construct their own individual platforms. I see that as a major plus. Libertarians are much more consensus-oriented. With very few exceptions, there is more or less a requirement to agree with them on everything that is policy-related. When I was in the party, I can't tell you how many times I expressed an opinion on an issue, and was told, "Well then, you can't be a Libertarian." I don't feel the need to take an issue and fit it into a libertarian "box"; my approach is that if common sense dictates it, I will expand the box, or move outside of it. 

Don't get me wrong, because I think Libertarians are good people who really "get it" when it comes to the issues, but there is a tendency to exist for the sake of arguing. What I liked about the Personal Choice Party's approach is that it was very much like my own - that is, it is founded not on seeking out something to disagree with somebody on, but finding an area where we agree and figuring out how we can cooperate. This is part of the new kind of politics I talk about - I call it "anti-politics" because it is not based on pure partisanship but on building strength behind causes that reflect mutual interest. I think it's a great blueprint for governing as well.

Offhand, I would say that the approach of most Libertarian candidates I know is more ideological, academic, even professorial than my own. I'm more conversational in the way I go about this. I'm more comfortable talking WITH people, not talking AT them. That's why I'm better in one-on-one situations than speeches. I have a tendency to think a little more like an activist. I don't pose. I like to take the fight to the opposition - within this context, the "opposition" meaning corrupt and inept public officials. I am much more of an "in your face" type of guy, and I will play hardball, because that's the only language a lot of politicians seem to understand. At the same time, I am one of those people who is always willing to be convinced, if you have an argument that makes sense. I'll give you an example. At the debate I just went to, one of the socialist candidates mentioned that the answer to the health care dilemma was to take the profit motive out of medicine. Well, you're not going to do that for all doctors, and all hospitals, but how about some of them? Is that maybe a proposition that needs to be explored? And so how do you plug that into a situation that is feasible? Is there at least a partial solution in there somewhere, and how could various political groups cooperate toward finding that solution? 

I don't exactly feel it is incumbent upon me to complain about being left out of the debates. I'm from the school where I'd rather create my own opportunities in that regard. We have exhibited more commitment, I think, in the area of freedom of speech than the Libertarian Party. When I was at the Personal Choice Party convention, I had made my presentation speech in pursuit of the nomination, then someone came literally out of the audience and ran as a write-in candidate. That's democracy. The Libertarian Party, in the 47th month of a 48-month election cycle, sent a communique that suddenly outlined a number of criteria for candidates to qualify for the debate at the convention. They wanted to know how much money the candidates raised, how much they spent, how much media they had received, how many state conventions they had attended, etc., and then, since there was no provision for it in the party's Constitution, the Convention Organizing Committee was going to make the arbitrary decision as to who was going to be included in the debate. In other words, they were applying essentially the same criteria Republicans and Democrats might apply to them when determining inclusion - or exclusion, as it were - in the debates, and they were doing it very late in the game. Understand also, that there were no binding primaries, so theoretically, all seven candidates who went to the convention went in with the same number of committed delegates. They also imposed a "dress code". And it was funny - one of the first Libertarian state chairs I ever talked to told me he was going to keep one of the presidential candidates off his state's primary ballot because "he didn't bother wearing a suit to our convention". Sure enough, that's exactly what he did.

The bottom line is, the process that was proposed, seemingly in ad hoc fashion, whittled the field down to three from the original seven. And none of the three candidates who were in the debate seemed to complain about it. I started hearing a lot about who the "serious" candidates were. Well, maybe the Republicans and Democrats don't consider candidates to be "serious" when they can't crack one-half of one percent of the vote in the previous election? See what I'm getting at?

One of the reasons for the shutout at the convention was that it was being televised on C-SPAN and they wanted to keep the more "erratic" types out. So if the party gets more and more attention, right alongside the "majors", what principles go out the window next because, in the words of Geoffrey Neale, the LP chairman, "We want America to take us seriously"? To me, you've lost all of your moral authority to complain about Republicans and Democrats keeping you out of the debates if you have, in effect, done the same thing to your own. And isn't it interesting that the Citizens' Debate Commission, which is supposed to be running "open debates", has shut certain parties out of their events? That's somewhat hypocritical, isn't it?

I guess it's what you call "Freedom of Speech - that is, if you qualify".

I think one of the big problems with third-party movements these days is that they're looking to get from Point A to Point Z right away. Operating on the assumption that we're not going to be elected this year, there is a distinction to be drawn between the kind of change we would like to see Congress implement over the next four years and the kind of change we would implement if elected. It's the difference between incremental change and sweeping change. Yes, we do want sweeping change, but we have to allow for the fact that going from Point A to Point B, Point C, etc. is a step in the right direction, and that it will make it easier to get to Point Z down the road, without it being as much of a culture shock. At the recent Multi-Party debate, I was talking about "government", and David Cobb, the presidential candidate of the Green Party, was saying, "We're talking about government as if it were an abstract thing. WE (meaning the people) can be the government." Yes, David, that's true, but we aren't NOW. We need to recognize the way things are, while continuing to work toward nudging people over to our idea of what SHOULD be. It's not an easy thing to do - to be able to communicate the ideal while simultaneously shifting public opinion gradually. But the third-party movements able to do that best are the ones that are going to gain a foothold.

There are some influential people within the Libertarian Party who think part of their solution is for candidates to integrate themselves into a formula that, in their view, makes them more "electable". That represents their idea of what a professional politician looks like, acts like, and sounds like. I am not interested in being a watered-down Libertarian, a quasi-Republican or quasi-Democrat. If you run like that, you're always going to lose to the candidate - and the machine - that has more money and more organization. My objective is not to fit into a formula that seems to already exist, but to CHANGE that formula, or take steps toward achieving that end. And if you notice, as a country we're moving slowly but surely in that direction. I go back far enough to where I remember Social Security and the income tax as "third rail" issues, that politicians didn't want to touch. Now you will hear candidates from the two major parties campaigning on reform of both Social Security and the tax system. The subject of legalizing marijuana is not so far out of the mainstream. The internet is spawning more independence on the part of people, especially in the way they get their news, opinion and commentary. The votes are there. The question is, how are we packaging ourselves?

Maybe I'm also different in the respect that experience has taught me I don't necessarily have to be elected to "win" in some way. If I can convince someone to become more active in their community; if I can help people think about taking more responsibility for themselves; if I can be successful in urging more people to go to the polls as a way of eventually affecting change, I can claim victory on some level. 

I am not committed to the idea that this has to end on November 2nd. I've seen this less as a four or five-month campaign but more like a four-year proposition. There is so much that can be done over the next four years, and I can get an early start on it if I ultimately choose to move in that direction. If there are Libertarians out there who want to join in that kind of effort, that's fine. But it must be clearly understood - I come to the table with my own independent mindset. 


Those interested in the rest of the interview can find it at http://www.atsnn.com/story/90673.html