Chances are you remember Clint Eastwood in addled conversation with an empty chair, the now legendary laugh-out-loud moment from the last great gathering of Republicans in America.

Nationally televised and virally mocked, the Hollywood actor’s unscripted attempt to upstage an invisible President Barack Obama backfired colossally at the Republican National Convention in Tampa three years ago.

Eastwood’s bizarre turn in the klieg lights gobbled up all the political oxygen at a gathering designed to reintroduce a flagging Mitt Romney to the world.

It wasn’t just Team Romney that rued the day. For those who reported from the convention, it was apparent the Eastwood disaster had all but buried the single most fascinating subplot at the RNC — the systematic and blatantly undemocratic shunning of America’s libertarian movement.

Ever since, much of America’s conservative political class has wondered aloud whether the GOP may be ripe for a tide-turning “libertarian moment” — a full embracing of the young, ideologically charged activists who were so unceremoniously turned away in Tampa. Yet as a new electoral cycle ramps up toward 2016, the question remains wide open, as we shall see.

But first, let’s revisit what went wrong in Tampa in those last days of August 2012, when libertarian standard-bearer Ron Paul came to town as the last candidate standing against Romney — improbably, he had a volunteer army of deeply committed millennials in tow.

Though the nomination was beyond his reach, Paul’s thousands of mostly college-age true believers were confident they had the delegates to finally win a place of prominence at the Republican table. What they coveted most was a prime-time speaking slot for candidate Paul’s libertarian message of minimal government and maximum freedom.

But the Republican Party promptly pulled the rug out from under them. Rules were changed in the 11th hour to deny seats to many of Paul’s hard-won delegates. And Paul himself was given an ultimatum — no speech, unless he would provide the text in advance, replete with a full-throated endorsement of Romney. The former obstetrician flatly refused, telling the New York Times “that would undo everything I’ve done for the last 30 years. I don’t fully endorse him for president.”

The manipulations worsened as the convention unfolded. Multiple times, as the state delegations read out their endorsements one by one, the microphone was muted just as Paul’s name was spoken aloud. In one instance, Paul’s backers were drowned out with chants of “U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A.” to ensure no name other than Romney would reach TV viewers.

Here’s the thing, though: Young Republicans were in short supply in Tampa. And what young people we did encounter in the sea of grey hair spoke glowingly of Paul’s ideas — small government, low taxes, an end to wars, foreign and otherwise (including the war on drugs) and the restoration of liberties Paul argued had been ripped from Americans by post-Sept. 11 security laws.

In a final speech to supporters at a packed University of South Florida Sun Dome — the last speech of his political life — Paul assured his youthful audience they would eventually find a home beneath a Republican tent.

“We will get into the tent, believe me, because we will become the tent,” said Paul, igniting a huge ovation.

Fast-forward three years and it remains unclear whether the libertarian movement is any nearer to changing the GOP from within. As they track the changing times, hyper-tolerant libertarians argue that political momentum is with them now more than ever, as Americans coalesce for the first time around extending marriage rights to gay couples and the decriminalization of marijuana. Despite the ongoing angst over the Islamic State, they contend young voters remain sharply opposed to U.S. military adventurism and state surveillance.

But there remains the question of a standard-bearer. Paul’s ideological heir happens also to be his blood heir. But Sen. Rand Paul, despite flashes of libertarian-leaning brilliance — most famously a 13-hour filibuster in 2013 over the confirmation of CIA director John Brennan — has yet to awaken anything approaching the groundswell of excitement that encircled his often audaciously blunt father.

And in place of Eastwood, Donald Trump is now the GOP’s oxygen-consuming gorilla — a gorilla so strong that Rand Paul literally walked away from his flagging campaign in August, taking his skills as an ophthalmologist to Haiti on a humanitarian mission to restore vision to impoverished Haitians.

But the Haitian interlude, Rand Paul promised, would be followed by a no-holds-barred campaign to reclaim the libertarian mantle from the “buffoonery” of Trump, whose improvised, all-over-the-map policy outbursts include more than a passing nod to libertarian activists.

“(Trump’s) candidacy is an insult to the intellectual movement that has called for small government for decades,” Paul said, vowing to lead the anti-Trump charge “until he fades away.”

Who’s who in libertarian circles

Libertarianism includes a wide range of subcategories but as a whole confounds the conventional left-right spectrum, attracting everyone from social liberals seeking legal marijuana to corporate conservatives seeking unregulated resource extraction, all under the mantra of less government, more freedom.

David Koch — The most visibly libertarian half of the oil-rich Koch brothers actually ran for vice-president on the Libertarian ticket in 1980. But as the Republican Party shifted rightward toward lower taxes and deregulation, the Kochs began pragmatically favouring the GOP. “The Libertarian Party is a great concept. I love the ideals, but it got too far off the deep end and so I dropped out,” Koch told reporters at the Republican National Convention in Tampa.

Nick Gillespie — Writer, editor and “intellectual godfather” of Reason, the libertarian movement’s leading journal, Gillespie found his voice after an early career in trade magazines, including Teen Machine. In 2011 he co-published The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian Politics Can Fix What’s Wrong With America. The Daily Beast counts him among American conservatism’s top 25 journalists.

Justin Amash — An up-and-coming libertarian hero, 35-year-old Amash is a two-term Congressman who founded and leads the Liberty Caucus in the House of Representatives in Washington. Born in Grand Rapids, Mich., Amash is a second-generation Arab-American. In 2010 he was named one of Time magazine’s “40 under 40 — Rising Stars of U.S. Politics.” He is especially active on Facebook, explaining each of his votes in Congress.

Lisa Kennedy Montgomery — A former MTV veejay, LKM goes by the stage name “Kennedy” and hosts a program of the same name on Fox Business Network offering a blend of political commentary and satire. She once self-described as a “Republitarian,” staking out a conservatism that favours same-sex marriage, abortion rights, an end to the war on drugs and the privatization of social security.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Dave Barry — When not mocking South Florida — he once argued America’s problems could largely be solved by sawing off and disowning the panhandle from the U.S. mainland — humorist Barry has long identified as a libertarian. He admits “that’s kind of an easy stance to be if you’re a humour columnist, because you’re tending to make fun of the government and the powerful.”

Drew Carey — The Libertarian price is right for TV host Carey, who routinely articulates his disdain for Washington. A vocal opponent of war in Iraq, Carey has long been aligned with the libertarian Reason Foundation as a member of its board of trustees. He has contributed mini-documentaries for the group on topics ranging from private highway ownership to eminent domain and medical marijuana.

Clint Eastwood — Go figure. When not speaking to empty chairs or adding to his now legendary film catalogue, Eastwood self-identifies as libertarian. An advocate of gay marriage, gun control and small government, Eastwood once described his politics as too individualistic for the left-right spectrum. “I don’t see myself as conservative, but I’m not ultra-leftist — I like the libertarian view, which is to leave everyone alone.”

Read more about: