Letter to the Editor

Other viable candidates

In a front-page article of Jan. 3, Scott Moyers wrote, "So far, Bill is the only person, Republican or Democrat, to declare his candidacy for the 148th." The story made no mention that the Libertarian and Constitution parties can run candidates, or that political parties and any individual may petition to get on the ballot. The implication in the article is that there is no option to the Republican Democratic duopoly.

These are hard times. We need mainstream media discussion of alternatives to the two centrist parties. Our civil and economic liberties are abused, and, on balance, the results aren't good, despite the good intentions.

The Libertarian Party has waged a 40-year battle for individual liberty. Though we don't win majorities, we deserve representation, as do others.

There are ways to allow new ideas that come with allowing more people to be represented. One way is to elect all state representatives as if there were only one district. Each party would get members in the state house according to the percentage of the vote it gets.

I hope the owners and editors of this paper will encourage their journalists to regularly report the important facts about who can run for office and cover all the candidates. It's not much of an exaggeration to say that if there's no point in writing about candidates who can't win, then there's no point in writing about almost any of the races this newspaper covers.

GREG TLAPEK, executive director,

Missouri Libertarian Party, Cape Girardeau