Mike Gravel: Behind the Rhetoric

On Wednesday, April 9^th, the Penn Libertarian Association and the Penn Democrats co-hosted former Senator Mike Gravel to speak at Houston Hall. Senator Gravel has been the center of controversy ever since his decision to register with the Libertarian Party and seek the party’s presidential nomination. The Penn Libertarians and newly formed Philadelphia Forum for Freedom had a very strong showing at the event.

I want to take a moment to summarize my thoughts after this event as it helped clarify Senator Gravel’s positions for me and why he has made such a contentious move. He was a surprisingly powerful speaker that during Q&A was not only engaging, but persuasive. However, when you look past the rhetoric and the traditional maneuverings of an experienced politician, his claims to always being a “libertarian” don’t hold much water.

When pressed on how his positions with universal healthcare and government education fit in with a libertarian philosophy, Gravel was at the height of his political back and forth. On the issue of government education, Gravel argued against financing it with the property tax. He asked, how can impoverished neighborhoods be expected to fund schools from taxes in their area and compete with rich neighborhoods whose schools have more money from having wealthier individuals? Somehow, Gravel was trying to argue that a Robin Hood tax scheme was more libertarian than the current system. Great liberal ideas, but not libertarian.

On his support for universal healthcare, Gravel dodged the issue entirely. He spoke nothing of the government’s intrusion into private lives and mandatory support for the healthcare of all. Rather, he attempted to use his support for a national retail sales tax as the solution. His answer was more of an explanation as to how universal healthcare was a viable plan under his proposal rather than the merits of it being justified under libertarian doctrine.

What about that line he used to leave the Democratic Party, that it was “no longer the party of FDR?” When the PLA Treasurer, Josh Warren, pressed him on this, Gravel gave perhaps his most outrageous answer of the night. “FDR at least tried.” For Gravel, being a libertarian means that it’s OK for politicians to intervene in the economy, destroy the free market and take the U.S. to war just to “try” to do the right thing. Under this logic, one wonders why the current Bush is not his favorite President, because he has certainly tried many remedies to problems during his administration.

It was as though the Fair Tax allowed him to evade responsibility for any government policy. He seemed to think that if we just impose a sales tax, then the government has the right do whatever it wants because it acquires its revenue in a fairer way.

At one point during his speech, Gravel said “clichés don’t carry the day in any of this”, a consistent philosophy does. I cannot more heartily agree with him here. Gravel is filled with the right rhetoric of individual responsibility when he needs to, but he lacks the substantive positions to actually make him a libertarian. While he wears his sheep clothing most of the time, he became sloppy by the end of his speech: “I want capitalism. I want freedom to force competition.” Capitalism 101: force and capitalism contradict one another.

I respect Gravel for running for the LP nomination, but there should be no debate about whether he is a true libertarian or a liberal Democrat who is angry that he, personally, was not given the airtime he wanted. He even said so in his opening remarks, lamenting how he would only receive 4 minutes during the Democratic debates because Obama and Hillary were the chosen candidates. I am glad he takes the LP seriously enough to run for its nomination. But I will be severely disappointed if the LP gives him serious consideration as the presidential candidate.