Mission Statement Should Brand LP as Not Left, Not Right

To Susan Hogarth at http://lastfreevoice.wordpress.com/2008/12/11/mission-statement

Again, I'm not a fan of what the LNC seems to accept as its current mission statement.  I just don't think that the best way forward from here is to insist that an LNC-adopted mission statement has to be a cut and paste of the Bylaws Purposes statement.  For example, I think the Judicial Committee would laugh such a "usurping" complaint about the current mission statement right out of its virtual court.  This mission statement has been appearing in LP News for quite a while, and if it were a big problem for the NatCon delegates, then they could have addressed it through the LNC elections.  As far as I know, you were the only LNC candidate who made an issue of this, and that message didn't seem to resonate with the delegates.

I still prefer the following mission statement, in part because of how it reminds us to seek Left/Right balance in our outreach:

“The mission of the Libertarian Party is to unite voters who want more personal liberty and more economic liberty behind the electoral choices that will most effectively move public policy in a libertarian direction.”  

The Chair's recent LP birthday message demonstrates the risk of diluting our neither-Left-nor-Right branding by trying to appeal to voters who want more of just one kind of liberty.  In my own outreach efforts (at LibertarianMajority.net and in my campaign materials) I'm obsessive about Left/Right balance, all the way down to the color scheme.  20% or more of Americans reject the Left/Right false dichotomy.  The LP's mission should be to turn on the landing lights and guide them home.