Love liberty but don’t want to vote for Trump or Clinton? Meet Austin Petersen
REASON #3 – Petersen is a classical liberal, more in line with our views than even Ron Paul
“I know a lot of people who, rightly appalled at the immoral political system we live under, conclude that it would be morally wrong to vote, or at least that they themselves will not do so, because they would thereby be consenting to the system. This includes voting for Ron Paul.
I think this is a mistake for two reasons.
- If you were stuck in a prison camp, and the guards let you vote on whether you were to have gruel or prime rib for dinner, would you be “consenting to the system” to vote for prime rib, or would you simply be doing the best you could under the circumstances to improve your material condition?
- Many Americans won’t consider even listening to a point of view that barely registers on the political radar screen. Whether out of intellectual laziness, cowardice, whatever, they just won’t. So it hurts us if Ron Paul gets 1% of the vote. But if he gets solid double digits, those people who might be faint of heart might realize they aren’t totally alone in supporting him, and will be more willing to do so. Yes, this is ridiculous and unjust, but that’s how it is. That’s why I think it hurts the cause of the free society not to vote for Ron Paul.”
-Tom Woods
Substitute the name Ron Paul with Austin Petersen. Even better, he’s young, he’s brash, but most importantly he’s more libertarian than even Ron Paul. Don’t believe me? Check out his platform at AustinPetersen2016.com. Keep in mind, this is the guy Judge Napolitano referred to as “the right side of my brain”.
Many of us were of other political denominations before 2008, and Ron Paul is one of the many common answers I get when I ask people how they came to be libertarians. Getting a libertarian candidate into the national spotlight offers a kid somewhere in a public school being fed statist pizza for lunch to maybe have a chance to be the next Murray Rothbard, Lew Rockwell, or Ludwig von Mises. We all know how the spiral of liberty starts.