McDonald: Crashing the party, running the party

“My personal aim is that I want to wipe the Republicans off the Travis County map.” That was what Libertarian Party of Texas Executive Director Wes Benedict told Newsdesk in January, and it seems that the libertarian wing of the GOP is wreaking internal havok by taking over the Travis County Senate District 25 convention on Saturday.

Supporters of sometime Libertarian and GOP presidential wannabe Rep. Ron Paul managed to take over the convention committees and appoint Paul supporter Robert McDonald as new permanent SD-25 convention chair. Applauding the “libertarian Ron Paul Republicans” that managed this, Benedict points out on his blog that McDonald was the Libertarian candidate for Travis County Justice of the Peace, Precinct 3, in 2006. (This comes after Paul-booster and GOP tax assessor-collector candidate Don Zimmerman turned up at the Libertarian’s convention to ask them not to run against him. They responded by nominating Mike Burris.)

Just FYI, in the March 4 GOP primaries, Paul came third in Travis County with 17%, behind John McCain (52%) Mike Huckabee (27%).

This article appears in March 28 • 2008.

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The Chronicle's first Culture Desk editor, Richard has reported on Austin's growing film production and appreciation scene for over a decade. A graduate of the universities of York, Stirling, and UT-Austin, a Rotten Tomatoes certified critic, and eight-time Best of Austin winner, he's currently at work on two books and a play.