Senator Chris Dodd from Connecticut is now serving his fifth term and experiencing a major drop in his approval ratings. Scandals such as his involvement in the sub-prime mortgage catastrophe that caused the current economic crisis are causing him to be in danger of losing his next bid for reelection in 2010. For the new student organization, QU Libertarians, this has not gone unnoticed.
Junior Roberto Passaro is the president and founder of the QU Libertarians, which gained official recognition from Quinnipiac only last November. There are four other dedicated members, with 8 members total.
“The sooner we see Dodd out, the better.” Passaro said. “He was one of Freddie Mac’s biggest supporters and said a few months before they went under that they were doing excellent. Him having all that power and influence is very dangerous.”
The QU Libertarians are already involved with supporting another candidate to replace Senator Dodd. Peter Schiff is their choice. Schiff already has a lot of support even though he has yet to announce he is running yet.
The QU Libertarians are in support of Schiff because he is “an excellent business man,” according to Passaro, worked with the Ron Paul campaign during Paul’s presidential run and is very in tune with libertarian ideals. The biggest plus for Passaro is that Schiff’s stance on social issues such as abortion and gay rights is that the government should just stay away.
The election will not take place until 2010 but he will have to announce by August if he wants to run.
As far as future plans for the QU Libertarians, members will be implementing recruitment next week. Passaro will be in Spain for the fall semester and will lose another member who is graduating. Passaro plans to make flyers and get into controversial topics such as drug prohibition to get members to rely on for next year.
The Libertarians went to Washington D.C. this past February for CPAC, the Conservative Political Active Conference. Passaro said that the trip helped make the members more enthusiastic about libertarianism.
“We’re here to get rid of apathy,” Passaro said. They pride themselves on being open-minded and work with the QU Republicans and QU Democrats as much as possible. They even made a Relay for Life team called “Political Team” with QU Republicans and QU Democrats in the name of fighting apathy.
“It would be nice to see students concerned with more than getting drunk every night.” Passaro said.
