Politically speaking, I think 2007 was my favorite year ever.  I had been active in my local Libertarian Party since 2003.  We would have some fun events such as protesting taxes at the Post Office on tax day, or handing out flyers on July 4th.  Although many in the party were not as radical as me, at least they were in the same ballpark most of the time.  I could generally have an intelligent discussion with people.

Still, the number of libertarians was small.  And then came 2007 with the announcement by Ron Paul that he was running for president as a Republican.  I was excited when I heard this news, as I had been following him for several years at that point.  I was even more excited when I heard that he would be in the debates.

I correctly never had any high hopes of Ron Paul winning the presidency or even coming close to getting the nomination.  However, I thought that if several million people could hear his message at the debates, that we would surely at least get a few converts towards libertarianism.

I was shocked to say the least at just how fast the momentum picked up after the first couple of debates.  All of a sudden, there were Ron Paul meetup groups forming, and signs and bumper stickers were starting to appear.  I went to a meetup and eventually started participating at least weekly.

My wife and I had just had our first baby, so it was a busy time for me, but I was fortunate that I could go out one or two nights a week to gather with other Ron Paul supporters.  A local businessman in my area volunteered his office building to be used as something of a local Ron Paul headquarters.  I was again fortunate that it was less than a mile from where I lived.

Once or twice a week, I would go and meet up with about 20 other people.  The numbers varied and not all of the same people were always there.  It was also a quite diverse group of people with a wide range of ages and very different backgrounds.  We all had one thing in common, and that was our support for Ron Paul and his message.  We would sit around and make up flyers, stuff envelopes, make banners, and a host of other things.  I have no idea if any of it worked to get out the message, but it sure was fun sitting around and chatting with other people.

The thing that still gets me is where all of these people came from.  I had been active in the Libertarian Party for nearly 5 years and the crowds were never that big.  Most of the Ron Paul supporters I had never met in my life.

I don’t know if these were closet libertarians who came out after Ron Paul’s campaign got up and running, or if Ron Paul convinced them to be libertarian.  I have a feeling it was somewhere in between for most of them.  I think most of them probably already had libertarian leanings, at least on some issues, and Ron Paul was able to articulate what they never quite could.  They had just never heard the message presented that way before.

Before we knew it, there was a Ron Paul blimp up in the air, there were money bombs, he was easily winning all of the online (non-scientific) polls, and he was attracting crowds of thousands of people who would chant things such as “End the Fed”.  All along, I knew inside that his chances of winning were still very slim going up against the Republican establishment, but this was a great opportunity to reach more people than ever.  And overall, I think that goal was accomplished.

There are some libertarians today (some of whom became libertarians due to Ron Paul) who will talk about how horrible everything is today, and how the people in this country are a bunch of statists.  However, I don’t think they realize that the libertarian population today, almost regardless of how you define that term, is far greater today than perhaps ever before.  It is certainly far greater than at any time in the last 100 years.

The crazy thing is that Ron Paul created a lot of hardcore libertarians.  Some of his previous supporters might not even call themselves libertarian any more because they have chosen another label.  Some of them have gone from a-political to Ron Paul supporter, and back to a-poliitcal again, but for different reasons.

It is important to recognize just how much progress has been made over the last 15 years.  I like to give credit to people who laid the groundwork before that, whether you go back to Mises and Rothbard, or a little more recent like Harry Browne.  But it was Ron Paul’s presidential run in 2007/ 2008, coupled with the Internet, that really sparked this change.  There are many multiples the number of people who are libertarian now than in, say, 2006.

With that said, I think many libertarians just don’t feel as positive today as they did back then.  Whether we like it or not, a lot revolves around the presidential race every four years.  In 2016, libertarians didn’t have someone to rally around.  Some people liked Rand Paul, but he did not have the radical message that his father brought.  Some people liked Trump for taking on the establishment, but he is obviously not a libertarian.  And Gary Johnson just didn’t make the cut either, as he did not carry a principled libertarian message and did not articulate his positions all that well.  It also didn’t help that he picked Bill Weld as his running mate.

I believe Tom Woods has similar sentiments that libertarians just haven’t had someone or something to rally around since the last Ron Paul presidential campaign in 2012.

After the 2007/ 2008 campaign, I knew a lot of Ron Paul supporters who wanted to stay within the Republican Party and effect change within the party.  It is hard to say how effective it has been, but I believe some people got frustrated after a while and left.  And while I think people should promote liberty doing things they feel passionate about (as long as it isn’t counterproductive), I was hoping more Ron Paul people would join the Libertarian Party.

The Libertarian Party was the obvious choice to me.  It wouldn’t have taken that large of a percentage of Ron Paul supporters to join the party and tip the scales toward a more radical (principled) libertarian message.  If people had immediately joined in early 2008, we could have had Mary Ruwart as the presidential nominee instead of Bob Barr.  And even if they had been too late for that, then we could have had a Ron Paul type person as the nominee in 2012.

This would have been a sight to see if Mary Ruwart had been the LP nominee in 2008.  She would have continued on with Ron Paul’s message.  I think Ron Paul would have gladly endorsed her instead of what he did do, which was just to encourage people to vote for a third-party candidate before eventually announcing his support for Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party.

I still wonder what could have been, but I also wonder what still could be.  In other words, it isn’t too late for all of the people who were inspired by Ron Paul in 2007/ 2008 (or 2011/ 2012) to join the Libertarian Party and make a difference.  The party has good ballot access for a third party, and it wouldn’t take that significant number of people to essentially overtake the party with a more radical message.

With that, now comes the news that Tom Woods and Dave Smith are joining the Libertarian Party.  This was done after speaking at an event hosted by the Mises Caucus of the Libertarian Party.  The Mises Caucus is what you might call the libertarian wing of the Libertarian Party.

Tom Woods, with his podcast, his one of the most influential libertarians there is today.  Dave Smith, a comedian and television personality, is also a rising star in the libertarian community.  With these two joining the party and letting others know about it, I am hopeful that many more radical libertarians will join the LP and make a major difference.

We don’t have to have Bill Weld in 2020.  We don’t need him campaigning against Trump (there are plenty of others).  We don’t need him adding any confusion on what it means to be a libertarian.  Instead, imagine an actual libertarian running on the LP ticket in 2020 and sending out a message similar to that of Ron Paul.

In 2008, Ron Paul received over a million votes.  In 2012, he received over two million votes.  But that was within Republican primaries.  In many states, you have to actually be registered as a Republican to vote in the primaries.  We know there were some Ron Paul supporters who didn’t go to the trouble of becoming a Republican so that they could vote for Ron Paul.

Maybe the 2020 election can be a good test of approximately how many libertarians there are out there.  We just need to have a candidate in the general election who is actually spreading a libertarian message.  With Tom Woods and Dave Smith joining the party, I have some hope that this scenario is possible.

Many people within the LP today think that the main purpose of the LP is to win political office.  But I think that is the wrong strategy.  The main goal should be to move society in a more libertarian direction.  And in order to do that, we have to educate more people on the moral superiority of liberty and the benefits of liberty.

I believe the LP should run a presidential candidate, but it should be someone who will stick to libertarian principles and is able to articulate the message to others.  It can be a rallying point for libertarians, and it can help continue to spread the message of liberty that Ron Paul started in 2007, along with others before him.