A Libertarian Journey: Why The National Party Needs Mark Rutherford.

It must have been around October or November of 2008.  My cell phone rang.  It was Republican Indianapolis City Councilor (at-large) Ed Coleman.  I had only met Ed a few times and never missed an opportunity to give him grief about introducing a Fireworks ban for Marion County (basically Indianapolis).  Ed, a veteran employed in the medical industry, whom I shared a couple of mutual friends with is a boisterous and gregarious kind of fellow who can tend to wear on people a bit, but as near as I've ever been able to tell he has a well-meaning heart of gold.

I thought it was a little odd that I got the phone call as I wasn't an official with the Libertarian Party of Indiana, but I had just months earlier come off of a great third party campaign for Indiana's 7th Congressional District where the Honorable Julia Carson (D), beloved by Democrats and reviled by Republicans, had passed resulting in a Spring "special election".  Julia was ultimately replaced by her grandson, now Congressman Andre Carson, after he had been swiftly moved up through the party while news of Ms. Carson's fading health was kept quiet from the media.

Flashback to the year 2000.  My first Libertarian Party event was a visit to Indiana by then Presidential candidate (the late) Harry Browne.  I had been prodded in years prior by a few co-workers that as a small government fiscal conservative who really didn't care what adults did in the privacy of their own homes that I was basically a libertarian.  After listening to some news clips in 2000 of Gubernatorial candidate Andy Horning I decided to show up for a few Libertarian events and put a Horning for Governor sign in my yard.  The result was that I got introduced to (then) State Party Chairperson Mark Rutherford, an Indianapolis attorney and a few other people, like current chairperson Sam Goldstein.  Mark sat down with me, at the Rathskeller if memory serves, and we talked about possibly running for school board or town council or something.

This meeting was critical because without being pushy, Mark explained a lot of things to me and planted important seeds.  I wouldn't volunteer for my first political campaign until 4 years later or run for office myself until another 4 years had passed.  But, in late 2008 I had gotten my feet wet and actual voting records and philosophy had become more important than who said mostly the right things, sounded good and had nice hair and teeth.  I had learned about Austrian economics, the philosophy of Liberty, read the work of Frederich Bastiat and spent hours listening to the wisdom of very smart people like Andy Horning, Mark Rutherford and Travis Cross.

But, back to 2008...

The conversation with Ed was, essentially this (paraphrased and condensed)...  "Sean. This is very confidential and I need to trust you; but, I'm thinking about switching parties.  I'm tired of being threatened, talked down to and told how to vote.   Can you arrange a meeting?"

My first response was along the lines of, "Sure, Ed.  I can set something up with the right people.  How much have you thought about this? You do realize it could make re-election very, very difficult."

Ed acknowledged that he understood and so a meeting commenced several days later at a pub/eatery in Park 100 near 71st Street and I-465.   Then exiting LPIN Director Todd Singer, new Executive Director Chris Spangle, former LPIN Chairman Mark Rutherford (affectionately referred to as "The Godfather"), Sam Goldstein, myself and one or two others attended and discussed things with Councilor Coleman.  The fact that Ed was surrounded by a group of professional individuals who were not promoting their own self-interest was probably a relief to him.  And, I swear, we darn near tried to talk him out of it.  Why?  Because, if somebody is going to make that kind of change you want to make darn sure they know what they are doing and that they REALLY want to do it.  There wasn't going to be any talking him into it, it had to be his choice.

No decisions were made at that meeting, but on the evening of February 16, 2009 word started to leak out and on Tuesday, the 17th we held a press conference at the prestigious, private downtown Indianapolis Columbia Club to announce that Ed was joining the Libertarian Party of Indiana.  Ed was the elected representative of somewhere around one million people and he was joining the Libertarian Party?!

Evaluating Ed's votes on the council over the following 3 years shows that he consistently opposed tax increases, opposed restrictions on people's rights, opposed corporatism, opposed government sponsored monopolies and was willing to ask sometimes unpopular questions.   People who truly, honestly believe in small, cost-effective government that minds its business had a friend in Ed and those he surrounded himself with for advice and council.  I was honored to be one of those people from time to time and wish life and circumstance had allowed me to participate more.

When it came time for Ed's re-election campaign in 2011 a wise decision was made to run him as a district candidate rather than try and cover the entire county of somewhere in the neighborhood of a million people.  Knowing that resources would be limited it made a lot more sense to try and win one of the 25 district seats.  It also helped that the sitting councilor for that district had been appointed to replace Republican Mike Speedy who had gotten himself elected to the State House.

The Coleman campaign was better funded and quite possibly better organized than any other council race, and although Ed garnered around 26% of the vote and didn't win, the Republican challenger was forced to send multiple mailers targeting ... the Libertarian. At least one of the mailers was blatantly dishonest and misleading and, rumor has it, they hired a private investigator to try and dig up dirt they could use.  Hey, if you can't win on ideology and voting record, mudslinging will have to do, eh?   The bottom line is that the money and organization moved the bar.  This was a fruitful endeavor.

This campaign was coming off of a 2010 election year that saw Libertarian candidates state wide nearly double previous vote totals - threatening major party status in one race.  And in 2008, a higher percentage of votes went for the LP's presidential candidate than in any other state.

Let me say, without question, that Ed's campaign was the absolute best organized Libertarian race I have seen to date, although to be fair, I haven't observed up close one of the great Rex Bell statehouse campaigns.  

I showed up that morning to get my poll location and materials and was handed an organized packet including Google Map directions to my location, a snack bag with bottled water, yard signs to place at the polling location and instructions on how to conduct oneself and who to call if there is any trouble.   Allison Maguire gets major credit for organizing things so well, and I hope I'm not slighting her husband, Tim, in any way. He was there that morning and I'm sure he helped.

At my poll location, the Democrat volunteers didn't even have handout materials for around 90 minutes after the poll opened and they were not especially enthusiastic or political.  The Republican volunteer bragged about how she had been doing this for 20 years and was a Precinct Committeewoman, yadda, yadda ... but she was surprised to be educated, by a Libertarian supporter no doubt, that people could actually run, in an election, for the position she had been appointed to.  I still don't think she believed me.  And, best of all, the Libertarian Party of Indiana had EVERY poll location in Ed's district staffed.  It's my understanding that has never happened before.  And, resulting from that, there are now many more dozens of trained Libertarian poll workers for the next cycle.

So what is the point to all of this?

None of  this was possible without Mark Rutherford's leadership of the Libertarian Party in Indiana over many years.  Mark worked very hard to build up the Indiana organization and make it one of the top handful in the country.  He did this by putting a smart, strategic, professional face to the party that attracted other, like minded individuals.  He made it "okay" to be a Libertarian.  And because it was okay, there continue to lots of new people joining great folks like Sam Goldstein, Chris Spangle, Jerry Titus, Dan Drexler or long-time (often unthanked) treasurer Dale Wedel who continue to grow the party and enhance its credibility.  In fact, in a recent visit to the Marion County meeting I realized that half of the people there were new in just the past 2 or 3 years.

As I write this, Mark Rutherford is running to become the National Chairman of the Libertarian Party when they hold their elections in Nevada this week.  Mark Rutherford would make an excellent choice and it might say something about the party's overall interest in being successful if it decides to ignore the great success that Mark, by way of the legitimacy he helped build in Indiana, isn't given a chance to do the same at the national level.  

Given the success of ideological libertarian candidates like Republican Ron Paul; the increased level of interest in candidates like (former) Governor Gary Johnson who is seeking the LP's nod for President; businessman, celebrity and community activist Rupert Boneham who is seeking the Indiana Governorship; and the massive influx of young voters interested in liberty, honest money, free markets, Austrian economics and the philosophy of liberty I think it is fair to say it is time for the Libertarian Party to take things to the next level.  I have to think Mark could help do that.  He certainly did it in Indiana.

Calm in the Face of Danger: Out of Control Government Agent Accosts Young Men

These young men do a great job staying calm and being respectful in the face of an out-of-control agent of the government who threatens and accosts them, and apparently illegally confined them, without cause.   People should always have the right to defend themselves against being, without cause, illegally threatened, assaulted or kidnapped no matter who is claiming the authority to do it.  

Writing In Ron Paul's Name Would Be a Wasted Vote.

There are a lot of Ron Paul supporters out there who are saying that they will "write in" Ron's name in the general election if he is not the GOP candidate.   I'm going to plead with you not to and here is why.

1. Most ballots are electronically scanned.  The machine counting the votes could care less what you scribbled outside the little circles and you risk invalidating your ballot if the marks confuse the machine.

2. Write in votes are often not counted.  You'll write in a name that nobody will ever tally up anywhere.

3.  Because write-ins aren't counted or are ignored by the volunteer vote counters, your protest vote goes unheard, unseen and is ineffective.

Now, that doesn't mean vote for some status quo, tinker-around-the-edges, will probably keep everything mostly the same nominee if that's who ends up on the ballot.  

Instead, consider voting for whoever wins the Libertarian nomination.  You'll most likely be voting for someone who probably believes 95% or more of what Ron Paul does, the vote totals get reported which allows the two old entrenched parties to see how many people opposed their candidate(s) and it will be easier to tabulate how much better the Republicans could have done with a more libertarian leaning, Ron Paul candidate.

In May, the Libertarian Party will be meeting in Las Vegas for their national convention and nominating their presidential candidate.  Former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson is probably the front runner to win the nomination, but there are other candidates including, but not limited to, R. Lee Wrights and RJ Harris.

Most Republican Voters: Well Meaning Hypocrites? Santorum, Romney and Ron Paul.

Are most Republican voters well meaning hypocrites or just useful tools? That's a brutally honest question and here is why I ask it. If you ask a Republican, Conservative or a Tea Party person what they believe about government they will most often tell you they believe in some things like the following:

Small government, personal responsibility, low taxes, strong national defense, balanced budget, government that minds its own business

If you get into specifics you may often hear:

Getting government out of doing things not authorized by the Constitution, returning education to the states, reducing regulation, reforming the tax code or cutting tax rates, shrinking spending, reforming entitlements, free markets, state's rights. You may get someone who tosses in social issues like opposing abortion or opposing gay marriage.

Okay. So, if you are for all or most of those things and you do not vote for Ron Paul in your GOP Primary or Caucus that makes you one of two things (A) someone who lies about what direction you want things to take in Washington or (B) a big, giant HYPOCRITE. You pick.

Even if you have concerns about Congressman Paul's foreign policy positions, have you really heard what he has said? Just that, according to our Constitution, the President doesn't decide when we go to war against another country. The Congress decides and then the President has a duty to direct the military to win it and get home - not drag it out for decades. He just says that, unless we are attacked and immediately defending ourselves, that the Congress must make the declaration of war. And, really, who in the world is more afraid of Iran right now than they are the U.S. Congress? Not me. He has said we should talk to and try to resolve differences with countries before we go in and start bombing them, resulting in the deaths of not just combatants, but women, civilians, families.

Oftentimes, the media in combination with the political class and the usual crop of insider talking heads tell us who can or can't win in our elections. Then most people, who don't pay attention to anything but talking points walk in and vote based on who sounds good, looks good or is perceived as the person the media told them can beat the evil bad guy on the other team – who often agrees with the somehow less evil opposition on 93% or more of the policy positions anyway.

This is why NOBODY wants Mitt Romney, but he keeps winning states. He's got nice hair, nice teeth, cleans up well, doesn't have a whiny voice, has had some business success … it's almost like people are voting for the actor to play the President in a movie. If so, Mitt's your guy. I'm not saying he's a bad guy; but, seriously what kind of significant change to the size and scope of government is he talking about? [crickets chirping]

Santorum has come out of nowhere by pandering to religious conservatives and anyone opposed to people with brown skin overseas who also happen to hate the U.S. Government just as much as, well, most Conservatives. And those same religious conservatives will still tell you they want most of those economic policy points mentioned above. Do those voters understand how that comes across? It comes across like this, “I want someone who will bomb foreigners and who hates gay people more than I want the economy fixed, less government intrusion in our lives, lower taxes, balanced budgets, educated children, free markets, competitive health care pricing and a dollar that isn't plummeting in value. Yep, I'll forgo all of those things so long as the bozo we elect hates Muslims and gay folk.”

SERIOUSLY?

This is why thousands of people who are paying attention show up at a Ron Paul event but only a couple or few hundred show up a Romney or Santorum event. The politically aware, voting record checking, history understanding folks who are sick of being sold a bill of goods every 4 years and not seeing the results are overrun at the voting booth. Younger people are looking at their future prosperity being spent, taxed and regulated away and they want that stopped. Like now.

Let's just compare Santorum and Ron Paul. Mostly because I completely don't understand the support for Santorum other than people allowing themselves to be fooled because he's religious and therefore must not have actually violated his oath of office by making so many unconstitutional votes. Or, maybe, he's religious and therefore must have a deep understanding the economy and monetary policy? [blank stare]

Eliminate Federal Departments:

Santorum – 0 (actually voted to DOUBLE the Department of Education with NCLB)
Ron Paul – 5
    (note: Rick Perry wanted to cut 3 departments, but couldn't remember which ones)

Cut the budget/spending :

Santorum - reduces budget growth but doesn't really cut anything.
Ron Paul – proposes, with specifics, cutting $1 trillion cut the first year

Favoritism/Cronyism/Economic Distortion:

Santorum - wants special tax rates for manufacturing .
    (So many things wrong with this it would have to be a separate article)
Ron Paul - reduce taxes for everyone, no favoritism , take as little as possible from the people.

Regulation:

Santorum - Talks a little bit about tinkering, but doesn't come across aggressive in this area.
Ron Paul - Eliminate Dept. of Education (restoring control to the states), Dept. of Energy (President Carter started this department also – it's a massive failure 16,000 employees and tens of billions a year in budget later), Dept. of Commerce . No enforcement of unconstitutional regulations . Regulations must be enacted by Congress, not unelected bureaucrats.

Taxes:

Santorum - Roughly maintain the same level of theft. Believes the government has a first right of claim to the fruits of your labor – what you receive when you trade the precious moments of your life, which are yours to trade, in exchange for income.
Ron Paul – Reduce Federal Taxes as much as possible. Long-term goal of eliminating the income tax completely.

Who Can Win :

Santorum - NO CHANCE to beat Obama. ZERO. Most recent poll currently shows him losing to Obama.
Ron Paul - Shown recently in same poll as beating Obama by 7 percent nationally. Widely ignored by the media,this was the highest ranking among the GOP candidates. Ron can pull in Democrats like Reagan did, the anti-war crowd, independents, Libertarians and lots of 1st time voters. TONS of people that will reject Santorum or Romney will vote Libertarian, will write-in Ron Paul (a wasted effort – most of those aren't counted – you should vote Libertarian instead so that your protest vote actually gets tallied) or just plain will stay home.

Monetary Policy:

Santorum – Comes across as having absolutely no interest in his area. Doesn't understand it.
Ron Paul - Reduction in government spending and deficits will make dollar stable. Wants to allow Constitutionally based gold/silver backed currency - return to commodity back dollar and get the Fed, which has had a big hand in creating market bubbles that eventually pop, out of meddling I nthe economy.

Even if you're getting snookered by Santorum's religious rhetoric - and I'm not saying he's not a good Christian/Catholic guy - but, he still voted to give money to Planned Parenthood. He excuses it by saying, “Oh, well, it was buried in with a bunch of other spending.” (that probably should have been voted against) and then he tried to make it okay by creating another big government program (Title 20) related to Federal funding for abstinence education. Huh? Fiscal conservative my left foot. And, if you're a small government conservative why in the world would you want the Federal government forcing anyone's religious opinions on everyone else or passing laws to restrict or regulate your religious rituals anyway?

So, Republicans can vote for someone who walks the talk and really means it OR they can vote for just another tinker around the edges, big government, same as it always is do-nothing political opportunist.

This may be harsh, but it's reality. At what point do people get tired of being disappointed by the lack of progress every 4 years? I want to ask every Republican, "Like Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown – are you going to take another kick at the ball or wise the hell up this time?" Wake up! Quit being lemmings, liars or worse … hypocrites.  Don't tell the world all about how much you want small government and then vote completely against getting it.

Vote to fix the country or get out of the way of those that will.

Is Economic Freedom in America on the Wane?

Great (and short) video discussing some chilling facts about the decline of economic freedom in the United States and the connection between economic freedom, economic growth and our standard of living.

Dear Republican Party Regarding The 2012 Presidential Election

"The End of Liberty" Movie

This (slightly more than an) hour long video is excellent and well worth watching. It makes some excellent points and, fascinatingly to me, my home state of Indiana gets mentioned twice as being a place where laws are getting out of control. One mention regarded the requirement to show ID to buy alcohol no matter one's apparent age, the other mention was slightly more ominous.

Beauchamp

A self-centered person, usually male, who compensates for an inferiority complex by promoting an air of superiority in the belittlement and condemnation of others while employing an arrogant, showy peacock-like behavior that attempts to impress those around them with false bravado, pretentiousness and material possessions.

Uncomfortable with his less than impressive penis, the owner of the cab company became a real beauchamp treating his male and female love interests with arrogant condescension and laughable attempts at sophistication. Scott had money, however, it was not enough to keep his partners from seeking affection and sexual gratification in the arms of their other lovers.

Liberty Political Systems Announces the Advanced PAULBOT 2012!

Liberty Political Systems of America has announced it's latest amazing piece of engineering. The Paulbot 2012.

The "Paulbot" has an advanced operating system that replaces the old "Garbage In / Garbage Out" (GIGO) problem of information processing with an advanced "Knowledge In / Liberty Out" (KILO) software system. It is a much more advanced system as the 'Bot is specifically programmed to question and analyze all data fed into it rather than to just accept that data which leads to incorrect answer formulation. The 'Bot also seeks to maximize its operating environment with special Anti-Tyranny, Anti-Central Planning and Advanced Freedom sub-routines.

The Paulbot can have trouble interfacing with other company's products because the Paulbot has Advanced Foreign Policy Subroutines that require a very large database. This can cause buffer overflow and seg-fault in most other company's 'bots. Those 'bots can generally only database events back to 2001 or sometimes 1979 whereas the Paulbot has massive capacity allowing its special Middle East database tables to be indexed back to at least 1953 and in many cases the 1920s or earlier.

The Paulbot is economic too. Advanced cost reduction processes allow LPS to provide the Paulbot at a lower cost than any of the other, less advanced, political 'bots.

Supporting The Constitution and Pro-Liberty Candidates = Good For Business!

Tired of Being Told You "Blame America" ?

In a foreign policy discussion with some supposed Tea Party members where I engaged with lots of historical facts, information and philosophy I got one of those Hannity told them to say this responses like, "you just hate and want to blame America" and your only purpose is to "...tear down America."

I've written before on America's interventionist foreign policy missteps and ensuing blowback with "A Message For Pro-Interventionist Conservatives and Liberals" and at the beginning of "Ron Paul, CPAC and Loathing by the Ideologically Unprincipled and Intellectually Dishonest"

But, that "blame America" retort is just smarmy and usually thrown out by someone working their hardest to either be willfully ignorant of the facts or to ignore them in favor of endorsing the idea of being the world's bully. Of course, the people who argue these points will always be the first to tell you that government ruins nearly everything it touches (it does), can't do anything right, can't do anything cost effectively, etc. But, they somehow always exclude foreign policy or military activity from their laundry list. It is somehow, magically immune?

So, the next time this comes up with a so-called Conservative ... ask some simple questions. Maybe like this.

You suggest I blame (the) America(n government) for a lot of our trouble with overseas nations and people. So, let me ask you ...

Do you "blame America" for high taxes?

Do you "blame America" for high regulation?

Do you "blame America" for ignoring its own Constitution?

Do you "blame America" for our sour economy?

Do you "blame America" for our jobs going overseas?

Do you "blame America" for theft to bailout corporations like banks and auto companies?

Do you "blame America" for its $15 trillion debt?

Do you "blame America" for threatening your right to self-defense?

Do you "blame America" for crony capitalism?

Do you "blame America" for screwing up the healthcare system?

Do you "blame America" for dishonesty in government?

Do you "blame America" for electing idiots, socialists or worse?

Do you "blame America" for insecure borders?

Do you "blame America" for not drilling for oil?

Do you "blame America" for the welfare state?

Do you "blame America" for lots of other of things?

Do you "blame America" for Fannie and Freddie?

Do you "blame America" for ignoring state's rights?

So, let me get this right ... you are upset with me and call me anti-American because I "blame America" for just one more thing than you do?