United Liberty

As the dust settles regarding the Palin selection, her speech, and the RNC, many pundits are starting to pick up on something many of us already suspected - the Palin choice has created a circumstance unprecedented in modern American political history - a situation where the party is looking to the VP choice for its future, even before he/she is elected. McCain was never the choice of the grassroots base or the party establishment and his nomination has created an “enthusiasm void” that gave special power to Palin when McCain surprised the world with her selection. While even knowing little to nothing about her, the term “Palin Power” practically sums up the feeling of many conservatives, feelings vividly expressed in a post-convention ABC poll.

I don’t think that anyone doubted that the surprising pick of Sarah Palin would have an effect on voters who were considering voting for a third party candidate - finding both McCain and Obama unpalatable.  But I hoped the effect would be minimal.  Though I personally admire many things about Governor Palin,her nomination as VP wasn’t enough to persuade to me to vote for John McCain.  I assumed that most libertarian-minded voters, specifically those who had supported Dr. Paul, would feel the same way.

After visiting my family in south Texas for just a day, I’ve learned diffferently.  If my own family is indicative of the intentions of other voters, we will see a drop in the polls for third-party candidates such as Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin.

I grew up in Ron Paul’s congressional district and most of my family still live here.  In fact, my dad works with Dr. Paul’s oldest son, Ronnie Jr., one of my cousins worked in his medical office, and Ron delivered her two children 30+ years ago.  I say this to show that there’s been a close connection between our families for years.  My sizable family were all supporters of Dr. Paul’s presidential bid, and I can honestly say that most of them have become libertarian minded, despite being life-long Republican voters.  They are unhappy with President Bush and the bloated federal government produced by years of Republican rule.  They are ready for change, but not for the brand of socialism that Obama is selling.

When Dr. Paul dropped out of the running, I had suggested that they consider voting for Bob Barr instead and had received a positive response.  Palin’s nomination has changed all of that- every single one of them is ready to vote for John McCain, despite not even knowing who Palin was before the announcement.

I hate to think that this is what will happen across the nation, but unless Barr and Baldwin manage to come up with something equally inspiring, they will not have the impact we all hoped they’d have.

I have Asperger’s syndrome, a high functioning form of autism.

I’ve written about dealing with the disability at great length already, notably in my articles “Coming to terms with Asperger’s” and “Can we trust the public schools?” I won’t go into what I have already written about, but I will illustrate why Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s support for her Down Syndrome son makes me warm up to her candidacy.

The current public education system is by design hostile to special needs children. It treats all students as one homogenous group that all have the same needs. As a result, special needs children find themselves in humiliating situations with faculty that are unprepared to deal with them. (An example being the Florida teacher who had her students vote a student with Asperger’s out of class.)

For all of you clever enough to make United Liberty your home page, you now know Senator Obama’s pick for VP.

Biden, the “safe liberal” (there’s a contradiction in terms) will do alot for the Obama ticket, but what will he do for individual liberty?

Hopefully - not too much damage.