Choose loss, rather than shameful gains.
-- Greek proverb displayed at Colorado Libertarian convention

LEADVILLE -- While much of America was gripped by fear early this month when a someone planted crude pipe bombs in mailboxes across five states, Rick Stanley tossed some explosives of his own into the national dialogue surrounding the crime spree.

Stanley, the Colorado Libertarian Party's candidate for the U.S. Senate seat held by Republican Wayne Allard, issued a news release May 7 advancing this theory:

Maybe the government's doing it.

"It would be just like the government to plant bombs and ridiculous notes all across the Midwest to help further their domestic terrorist drive," wrote Stanley, who sends e-mails the way Federal Express sends packages.

But Stanley's theory appeared to collapse the same day his e-mail went out, when authorities arrested 21-year-old Luke Helder in the Nevada Desert.

Helder subsequently confessed, according to the FBI, to planting the pipe bombs.

Eight days later, on the first day of his own trial for openly carrying a loaded handgun in defiance of a Denver city ordinance -- a misdemeanor for which he was convicted Thursday -- Stanley was asked if he regretted having publicly advanced his unorthodox analysis of the pipe bomb case.

No, he didn't. Rick Stanley, 47, doesn't do regret.

"I still suspect that," Stanley said, during a break in the court proceedings against him. "I really have a bad opinion of the government."

While regret isn't a song in the Stanley repertoire, it was a tune heard with some frequency this weekend in Leadville, where Colorado Libertarians gathered for their annual convention and to select candidates for local and statewide offices.

Stanley narrowly defeated a late challenge from Colorado Springs software engineer Steve D'Ippolito. He had been pressed to run by Libertarians who, like Fort Garland Libertarian Sandra Johnson, didn't want to see the party linked to such a controversial figureas Stanley.

Protests over the Stanley candidacy had increased after it was reported early this month that Stanley recommended a treason trial -- and hanging upon conviction -- for Allard, in response to Allard's vote in support of the anti-terror Patriot Act following Sept. 11.

The depth of division within the party was manifest by the first balloting Saturday morning in Leadville: D'Ippolito 65, Stanley 63, none of the above, 19.

It was only after "none of the above" was eliminated as an option in the runoff balloting 30 minutes later that Stanley secured the nomination by a 78-67 vote.

"I thought a lot of those NOTAs would fall to Steve (D'Ippolito)," Johnson said. "I was wrong. Dead wrong."

The Libertarians walked out into the brilliant sun and thin air of America's highest incorporated town at 10,152 feet, facing an election season with their party banner in the hands of a man who believes the government would systematically bomb its own citizens.

One Libertarian in the hall Saturday less than delighted over Stanley's nomination was the party's choice to oppose Gov. Bill Owens this fall, 51-year-old Ralph Shnelvar of Boulder.

Moments after posing for triumphant photos with Stanley, the gubernatorial hopeful openly admitted that in the Senate battle he'd backed D'Ippolito. In 2000, D'Ippolito claimed 23 percent of the votes in an unsuccessful run for the El Paso County Board of Commissioners.

"I will work with Rick Stanley. I'm sure going to try," Shnelvar said. Later, he gave a short speech in which his enthusiasm appeared to have grown.

"I don't mind Mr. Stanley being inflammatory at all," said Shnelvar, owner of a small software house in Boulder.

"In point of fact I'm inclined to be inflammatory, myself. What I hope is that his inflammatory statements will be statements that are palatable to people passionate about freedom."

The Libertarians sure are -- but in numbers so modest one almost needs to hear them twice because they don't sound right the first time. This, despite the Libertarian Party being founded in Colorado in 1971.

Registration for the convention was 180. The number of people who voted for the party's Senate nominee, 78. Total party registration, statewide, about 4,800. The amount of operating surplus in the state party's budget at the end of its fiscal year, $3,950.36.

Their numbers are particularly small for a party that espouses many views shared by folks living on any street in any town: that the government has no place legislating private morality; tax laws are at the least repressive, often illegal; that a woman's right to choose should not be denied; and that hand gun control laws run counter to the letter of the law in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Their passion on gun control is underscored by memorabilia such as the bumper sticker available here this weekend, "I Don't Dial 911," graced by the silhouette of a handgun. Stanley's misdemeanor conviction stemmed from his decision to challenge the Denver gun ordinance that he, and many of his supporters, believe violate the Constitution.

Although half the conventioneers came wanting anyone but Stanley, the weekend concluded with them uniting behind him.

Some credited the speeches Stanley and D'Ippolito gave prior to the runoff vote for turning the tide in Stanley's favor.

Conventioneers thought D'Ippolito spoke like someone eager to get off the stage, while Stanley looked so comfortable before a crowd all that was missing was the easy chair and slippers.

He made no excuses for the barbed bravado that has become his calling card. "Ladies and gentleman, I am Rick Stanley," he said. "A lot of people want me to apologize for that, but I won't."

If Stanely is on one end of the spectrum in a party of extremes -- and many of its members proudly tell you that's what it is -- then the opposite pole is San Miguel County Sheriff Bill Masters, the Libertarian with the longest continuous tenure in elected office in Colorado.

Masters said that prior to Saturday's vote Stanley had sought his public backing. Masters declined, but not just because he avoids making endorsements.

"Stanley's got a style that is something, as a law enforcementofficer and a Libertarian, I can't endorse," said Masters, keynote speaker at the party's banquet dinner.

"I don't believe he should be getting arrested for deliberately violating the law," he added.

In remarks to Libertarians following the banquet, Stanley apologized for some of the past bluster he directed at his Libertarian peers.

With the convention winding down, Stanley said he'd told conventioneers he been "thumped" on by his father, growing up.

"I've been trying to explain to them that I'm like an attack dog. That's why they want to send me to the Senate.

"And I warned 'em. I warned 'em up front. Honest to God, I did."