Does The GOP Have A Libertarian Problem?

Chait nods:

Romney’s anti-government dogma left him unable to propose any concrete solutions for things most people regard as problems. It’s fine to believe that market outcomes are inherently just, and redistributing resources from rich to poor is inherently wrong. Over the last 30 years, though, a vastly disproportionate share of economic growth has accrued to the richest one or two percent of the population. And so a political ideology dead set against redistribution is going to have to force the vast majority of the electorate to accept meager rises in living standards while the most fortunate enjoy spectacular increases. It’s not an easy sales pitch.

Larison counters:

A Republican ticket that pursued an economically libertarian agenda might not be very popular, but it’s important to distinguish between what Romney and Ryan ran on from libertarian policies. It is extremely difficult to look at the campaign that Romney and Ryan ran and conclude that their failing was an excess of libertarianism. Some libertarian policies are unpopular, and others aren’t, but one thing that we can say with some certainty is that Romney and Ryan advocated for none of them during their campaign. Before the GOP can have a “libertarian problem,” it needs to have more than a handful of libertarians among Republican candidates on the national stage.