Strategy for the Libertarian Party:

2004, of course, is a Senate election year. As in past election years, there will likely be a few very close Senate races in which the vote totals of the Libertarian candidate will threaten to be greater than the difference between the Republican and Democratic candidates. Republican strategists will call on the Libertarians to drop out and endorse the Republican. Most of the Libertarian candidates will refuse. One or more elections will be thrown to the Democrats, and mutual recriminations between Republicans and Libertarians will commence, with the Republicans accusing the Libertarians of aiding the more statist Democrats, and the Libertarians responding that Republicans have not earned libertarian support.

This scenario seems to occur every two years. I have a solution. What if the Republicans actually offered something tangible for Libertarian support, and the Libertarians accepted it? And what if that something tangible was influence over a discrete number of appointments to the federal appellate bench? Libertarians can’t expect the Republicans to nominate hard-core Libertarian activists, but they can, in return for support in close races, ask the Republicans to nominate libertarian-minded Republicans: Alex Kozinski and Buzz Arnold rather than John Noonan and Robert Bork; Jim Ely (of Vanderbilt) rather than Lino Graglia (of Texas); Janice Brown rather than Charles Pickering.

I see a win-win situation here. The Republicans ensure that Libertarian votes don’t cost them Senate elections; Libertarians actually accomplish something for liberty by boosting the prospects of libertarian-minded Republicans, something they don’t achieve by either throwing close races to Democrats or dropping out of races without compensation. And since the parties are repeat players, there will be a strong incentive for the Republicans not to cheat on whatever deal is reached (secretly, one would assume).
UPDATE: Matt Yglesias is skeptical that the Libertarian poobahs will think this is in their self-interest, but Yglesias commenter Bob McGrew is on my page.