By Curtis Read

That's it! I'm voting Libertarian. I am a BYU student, and let's be honest - we have a reputation for being fairly loyal to the principles of the GOP (although I have to say here that, in spite of our reputation, I have observed plenty of student activity by both the Republican and Democratic parties on campus).

To my point, though ... I fall within the stereotype. I do typically agree with the GOP on most issues. Lately, however, I've been disappointed.

One of the most fundamental principles of the Republican Party is that, when in doubt, less government is better. Americans are in doubt right now. We are doubting our economy, we are doubting the current president's judgment (and have been for some time) and we are doubting whether the federal government is even responsive to what we really want to happen.

After eight years under an administration that claims to be conservative but expands the powers of the executive, Americans are yearning for less government, not more. In short, they are yearning for change. Democratic candidate Barack Obama has made the idea of "change" his platform, and has claimed a strong advantage over Republican candidate John McCain in pre-election polls. While Obama does promise change, he does not promise the change that we actually want - the change away from a dominant government, an entity that you and I think of as its own body, rather than the arm of the body that is the American people.

But neither does McCain. Attempting to spearhead the movement to fix a struggling economy, John McCain tried to show middle America - the average citizen - that he knows our struggles and that the government is there to help. Ronald Reagan, the father of modern conservatism, once said the most dangerous nine words in the English language were "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." John McCain represents the clamor, even among Republican constituents, for government intervention - a serious (and probably fatal) mistake among true conservatives.

So who do you vote for then? I realize voting for a third party is sort of like betting on a horse with two legs, but here's my rationale: by attempting to intervene as a would-be executive in economic dealings, John McCain has shifted his views toward the political middle ground, and in so doing, accepted the fact that as the Republican platform makes more room for the political middle, somebody else has to be pushed off the other side.

So I'm jumping off and taking my vote to the Libertarian party. I don't necessarily want a Libertarian president, nor do I agree with all of their ideas. I don't think we need to worry about that. I do, however, want John McCain to know that he lost my vote and maybe even the race, because voters like me wanted a true conservative and did not find one running on the GOP ticket. Sure, Obama will probably win. I've come to terms with that. In 2012, though, maybe the GOP will put a candidate on the ticket who understands "that government is best which governs least."

Curtis Read is a public health education student from Woodinville, Wash.

Copyright Brigham Young University 6 Oct 2008