The Young Americans for Liberty (YAL), the nations largest libertarian student-led activist organization, recently hosted their regional convention in Austin, Texas, from Friday, Sept. 6, to Sunday, Sept. 8. This years attendees included Travis Kieff ([emailprotected]), rising junior, mechanical engineering major, and President of UNOs YAL chapter. Guests for YALCON Austin 2019 included, among others, Ron Paul, author, libertarian, and retired politician; Nick Freitas, Republican politician from the Virginia House of Delegates; Chip Roy, Republican representative for Texass 21st congressional district; and Dave Rubin, a self-identified classical liberal, political commentator and YouTube personality.

Kieff, who has headed the local chapter for the past year, expressed interest in attending the convention to develop a closer working relationship with other YAL members in the Great Plains region and to converse with leaders of non-profit organizations or interest groups focusing on different intellectual and social issues. The convention, held in the Sheraton Austin Hotel at the Capitol, featured discussion tables by a number of such organizations, including the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), conservative Christian Foundation devoted to, according to their official site, religious freedom, sanctity of life, [and] marriage and [the] family; the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a non-partisan organization dedicated to protecting free speech rights on college campus around the country; and the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank focusing on domestic economic and political issues.

Because were still a newer group on campus, Kieff explained, elaborating on his position as President, its mainly been a process of figuring out how to do things; thankfully the Executive Board has been graciously helpful.

Though Kieff laments that his major doesnt tie in well to his political activities, he emphasized the excitement with which he met Great Plains Regional Director Ian Brennan and networked with other student activists, attending even a live taping of Dave Rubins The Rubin Report, a politically themed talk show broadcast regularly to Rubins official YouTube channel.

The convention also motioned Kieff to discuss upcoming events for the UNO chapter with other members. Events for the fall 2019 semester include Constitution Day, Sept. 17, in which pocket-sized copies of the US Constitution are handed out to students and discussed at a public table, and Change My Mind open discussion tables on the following topics: the First Amendment, the Second Amendment and the Electoral College.

I want to make it easy for [UNO] students to disagree on these things, Kieff expressed, to dissuade them from hiding their political views.

In addition, Kieff hopes to increase membership in the local chapter and participate in YALs second annual Operation: Win at the Door campaign, in which members of the organization knock on doors in their local neighborhoods, engaging with voters directly, to sponsor a candidate of their choosing. YAL has stated its goal for this campaign is to elect 250 legislators who share [their] commitment to liberty by the end of 2022. Last year the group secured 39 of those 250 legislators in 14 states.

Though all members attending YALCON are by invitation only and require prior registration, registering as a member for life, Kieff reassured, only takes a few moments and costs no more than $10. Please contact Kieff or campus advisor David Manry ([emailprotected]) for information on upcoming meetings.

Go here to read the rest:

YAL Updates: Fall 2019 - Driftwood

Glossary in the entrance area of the exhibition The Alt-Right Complex On Right-Wing Populism in the Net at HMKV in Dortmunder U (photo by Hannes Woidich; image courtesy HMKV in Dortmunder U)

DORTMUND, Germany The lexicon of tyranny has a long history, but perhaps an even more complicated present.An exhibition, The Alt-Right Complex: On Right-Wing Populism Online, at the Hartware MedienKunstVerein (HMKV) in Dortmund, attempts to shine light on the verbiage of alt-right movements, including 12 projects by 16 contemporary artists that unravel the ethos, ideology, terminology and aesthetics of contemporary right-wing extremism. Crucially, the exhibition also contains a glossary of 37 entries that offer a window into the alt-rights cryptic language, including words, symbols and phrases that members of this nebulous group use to promote an intersection of xenophobic, racist, libertarian, and ethno-nationalist ideas online.

The curator of both the exhibition and glossary, Inke Arns, admits that defining the alt-right can problematic. The term Alt-Right itself is controversial because it seeks to mask precisely these political beliefs; namely, Islamophobia, antisemitism, racist nationalism and contempt for the constitution, Arns writes in the edited text and glossary accompany the exhibition (available for free online).

Entering the exhibition, one is confronted with the glossary of terms and symbols printed on the walls of a transparent, illuminated tunnel. Words like transhumanism, cuckservative, and accelerationism describe the vocabulary the alt-right uses to promote ideas closely linked to their extremist political beliefs.

The word cuck, for example, from the old French word for cuckoo (cucu), has become a go-to insult that captures toxic masculine behaviours and incel anxieties that define the alt-right today. In online porn, a cuck is short for cuckold, a word from the same root referring to a man who allows his female partner to have sex with someone else (often Black). The term has evolved to encapsulate a political meaning, one that now equates mainstream conservatives with effeminate values, with the term cuckservative used to denote someone who willfully absorbs conservative values with a liberal/centrist bent.

The symbiosis of words, symbols, and visual culture at the heart of alt-right discourse is sometimes difficult to discern one case in point being the numerology of 168:1. The number is code for the Oklahoma City bombing in which 168 people died, identified in the glossary of the exhibition. When used on message boards like 4chan and 8chan, image message boards frequented by right-wing trolls, 168:1 gives fodder to would-be extremists who support mass murder, the same macabre glorification of neo-Nazi ideology promoted by the Oklahoma City bombings perpetrator, Timothy McVeigh. (The numerical code also appears on some of the poster motifs for the exhibition, embroidered on the collar of a black jacket wearing mouthpiece.)

The exhibition prefaces how the alt-right became an internet subculture dripping with irony by making use of techniques like trolling, meme-making and pranking. Using a combination of strategic words, symbols and memes, the alt-right disseminates extreme right-wing ideology first through forums like 4chan and 8chan, then through broader platforms like Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook, which sometimes then make it onto more mainstream conservative blogs, websites, and even newsrooms like Fox Newss. The trolls discovered that the best way to get lulz was to employ politically incorrect rhetoric and/or subject such a position and so raid existing online communities, Arns writes in her exhibition text.

Entering the exhibition, walking through the illuminated glossary, 12 projects and art works look into the rise of the alt-right not only in the US, but also in Germany and Europe more broadly. One project by the artist duo DISNOVATION.ORG, by Maria Roszkowska and Nicolas Maigre, presents a large scale cartography of alt-right memes in the form of a political compass, wallpaper, and poster. The graphic interface presents about 100 symbols and figures on a four-quadrant, horizontal and vertical axis divided between authoritarian and libertarian, economic-right and economic-left. Entitled Online Culture Wars (2018-1019), the work graphically interprets how brands, celebrities, and symbols become linked along an ideological spectrum.

Alongside the political compass, a hacked version of the immensely popular board game, Life, by the artist Simon Denny, offers a speculative post-national future in which colonies at sea and in space vie for supremacy on a planet in which the welfare state has collapsed. The goals of the Silicon Valley entrepreneur and investor, Peter Thiel, which the exhibition leans on heavily, include the idea that transhumanism mixed with temporary libertarian autonomous zones can facilitate a future society in which the individual reigns supreme. In Dennys apocryphal board game, Game of Life: Collective vs Individual Rules (2017), the end-game of Theil and others like him are inscribed into the rules itself, offering a speculative scenario in which players are tasked with disposing of nation states via Cloud Lords who utilize tools like deregulation, optimism and R&D (research and development) to fight against unadaptable monsters like legal systems beyond the expiry date, transparency, democracy and fair elections.

In a work by the Canadian video artist Dominic Gagnon, a montage of censored amateur videos from YouTube is interspersed with footage of conspiracy theorists known as preppers, people who live in perpetual fear of an eventual doomsday scenario. Like Peter Thiel, preppers project a fundamental mistrust of the current political and social system. Informed by an intense wave of paranoia, rage, and suppressed anxieties, preppers tend to espouse views deeply critical of migrants and a fundamental distrust in mainstream narratives, using these ideas to give fodder to post-apocalyptic near future scenarios in which only the rich will survive.

In a dual-channel video work by the Hungarian artist Szabolcs KissPl, From Fake Mountains to Faith (Hungarian Trilogy) (2016), the focus shifts beyond preppers to understand how grand narratives and national symbols of authoritarianism intersect. Looking into his native Hungary, KissPl posits how quickly democratic societies can devolve into illiberal democracies, often under strong-man leaders, such as Hungarys current Prime Minister Viktor Orbn. The docu-fiction brings to light an imagined scenario involving a museum that seeks to counter the ideological foundation of race and nation. It deconstructs how forms of ethno-nationalism manifest in supposedly neutral institutions, but also how this becomes a romantic myth that supports political references in support of the nation state, and with it forms of political belonging and social communities therein.

Not far from these ideas, a project by Vanja Smiljani examines how religion and nationalism are used to reinforce one another based on a comparative investigation into the internet-based movement of the Cosmic People and the Flag Nation Society, a Christian community that bases its ideology around allegiance to an ominous flag. Taking up the mantle of a Minister of the Cosmic People for the countries of ex-Yugoslavia, Portugal and the former Portuguese colonies, the lecture performance and documentation offers a buoyant and timely criticism responding to dangers of worship, albeit here in a dystopian, cyber-ruled world.

In Jonas Staals 10-channel video installation Steve Bannon: A Propaganda Retrospective (visual ecology) (2018), the artist presents a visual encyclopedia of visual tropes taken from Banons work as a Hollywood filmmaker. The work consists of 10 separate screens Staal filmed and edited between 2014-2018. In them, we see how the cacophony of right-wing ideology is filtered from fringe groups and message boards all the way up to the mainstream media. It narrows in on Steve Bannon, the veritable architect and propagainst-in-chief of US President Donald Trumps successful campaign in 2016, who prior to that served as executive chairman of Breitbart News. Staals work offers a timely and potent examination of Bannons ideology through the prism of film and cinematic editing and references, it is very Eisenstein or Michael Moore-esque, with the end result being scenes that employ visual references to themes and mythologies long since debunked. One of these themes involves the false and often cited narrative of the triumph and former golden age of Western white civilization. Here, we encounter how Trumps problematic narrative feeds into alt-right groups who often attempt to prolongate a false ancient mythology in order to reinforce ethno-nationalist and xenophobic world views today. (The pseudo-historiography of white erasure and Western civilization has been debunked numerous times, including in the annals of Hyperallergic by the Classicist scholar Dr. Sarah Bond, whose recent article The Origins of White Supremacists Fear of Replacement argues that the fear of being replaced can be traced to the French far right, but racist fears regarding supposed White genocide, and invasion by varied ethnic groups, go back centuries). In Staals work, we encounter how Bannons scripted ideological narrative continues to obfuscate the truth, with the purpose of furthering a highly divisive political ideology.

Leaving the exhibition, I was reminded of the unnerving parallels between the alt-right online and in real life. 8chan, the image and message board modelled after 4chan, has recently been in the news after the revelation that the El Paso shooter used the forum to post his far-right manifesto moments before his killing spree, which marks the third time a right-wing mass shooter has posted plans and/or manifesto on the site. Hence, the title of the exhibition, The Alt-Right Complex, is an exhibition that draws nuanced parallels between hateful ideology and imagery online, bearing in mind the psychological minefield that transcends the internet and enters into mainstream consciousness and into real life political events.

The Alt-Right Complex: On Right-Wing Populism Online continues at HMKV Dortmund until September 22, 2019.

See the rest here:

Entering the Echo Chamber of the Alt-Right - Hyperallergic

Dishwasher makers themselves dispute that dishwasher performance has gotten worse because of environmental regulations and they say they arent looking for weaker standards. A study from Consumer Reports said this year that todays dishwashers use roughly half the water and energy of 20 years ago. In fact, using a modern dishwasher tends to be more energy- and water-efficient than doing the dishes by hand.

Its confounding, its hard to explain, this blanket attack on regulations, said Jason Hartke, president of the Alliance to Save Energy, a bipartisan nonprofit organization that represents businesses, environmental groups and consumer advocates. I dont think theyre listening to industry, he said. Theyre trying to put out-of-date, inefficient products in American homes.

Much of the support for these rollbacks has come instead from a small group of conservative, free market organizations, many allied with the fossil fuel industry. For example, a secretive policy group financed by corporations, the American Legislative Exchange Council, worked alongside the gasoline producer Marathon Petroleum to urge legislators to support weakening the clean-car rules.

The Washington-based Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group that disputes that climate change is a problem, has promoted the effort to roll back dishwasher regulations, filing a petition that directly prompted the dishwasher review. As a nonprofit organization, the Competitive Enterprise Institute isnt required to disclose its donors, though a recent gala organized by the institute showed that the institute counts among its donors groups that have long been aligned with fossil fuel interests.

Sam Kazman, the groups general counsel, said its policies are based on our principles, not on what our supporters think about specific issues. He added, We wouldnt be surprised if they support this initiative especially if they do their own dishes.

The FreedomWorks regulatory policy manager, Daniel Savickas, said the Competitive Enterprise Institute had flagged the dishwasher issue and the groups had decided to combine their efforts. We try and roll back burdensome regulations and make life easier for consumers and manufacturers, he said.

The dishwasher in my apartment is absolute garbage, and I have to run cycles multiple times, Mr. Savickas said.

Go here to read the rest:

Inside Conservative Groups Effort to Make Dishwashers Great Again - The New York Times

Education, transportation and drainage are among the issues of thecandidates running to fill the open seat in House District 70.

The five contenders three Republicans, one Democrat, and one Libertarian are vying to succeed longtime GOP Rep. Franklin Foil, who is in his third four-year term and is now running for the state Senate in District 16.

District 70 extends from the edges of LSUs campus down to south Baton Rouge. Sixty-nine percent of its nearly 30,000 registered voters are white and 24 percent are black. Early voting will last from Sept. 28 to Oct. 5, except Sunday, Sept. 29. Election Day is Oct. 12.

An inordinate number of current and former state lawmakers are squaring off for seats in the Louisiana Senate in the Oct. 12 primary, putting

Democrats are hoping for a potential pickup of this district. Of the 22 contested House districts currently held by Republicans, District 70 is where President Donald Trump under-performed the most relative to Mitt Romney four years earlier, according to an analysis by Mike Henderson, an assistant professor who directs the Public Policy Research Lab at the LSU School of Mass Communication.

Three of the candidates in the District 70 race have separated themselves from the pack in fundraising upwards of $45,000: Barbara Freiberg, Michael DiResto and Belinda Davis. The two other candidates, Mallory Mayeux and Ricky Sheldon, have each reported raising less than $1,000.

Freiberg, 70, a Republican, has represented District 12 on the Metro Council since 2016. The retired educator pointed to her 30 years as a public school teacher and experience on the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board.

Neither of the two other major candidates has held elected office, though they both highlighted their extensive work in the public sector.

It may sound counterintuitive, said DiResto, but as a first-time candidate, Im running on my experience.

DiResto, 48, a Republican, spent nearly two decades in the public sector, first as press secretary for Congressman Richard Baker and later as assistant commissioner at the state Division of Administration. DiResto is now the executive vice president at the Baton Rouge Area Chamber.

The Advocates records show that DiResto was arrested twice for driving while intoxicated, first in 2008 and later in 2013. In an emailed statement, DiResto said he had made mistakes in his past and he took full responsibility for his actions.

In the years since then, I have been all the more focused on strengthening my faith and working hard to make a positive difference in our community, he wrote.

The sole Democrat in the race, Davis, 48, is an LSU political science professor whose research focuses on evaluating the effectiveness of public policy.

DiResto and Davis said part of what motivated them to run is the desire to make Baton Rouge a better place for their children. DiResto said hed work to make the state friendlier to businesses, while Davis said shed focus on increasing state investment in education.

A portion of District 70 extends into the boundaries proposed for the city of St. George which, if approved, would convert a large part of southeastern East Baton Rouge into the parish's fifth municipality, with a population of more than 86,000. DiResto and Davis both said they were personally opposed to the incorporation. Freiberg would not offer an opinion for or against the measure.

Education topped the agenda for these three candidates. Freiberg said she would work to expand industry based certification programs and college-credit programs in high schools. DiResto, who helped champion the BASIS Baton Rouge charter school while at BRAC, said hed work to make sure that state government has sustainable funding for higher education.

Davis, who heads up the One Community, One School District public education advocacy group, said she would work to reduce reliance on standardized testing and increase state education investment.

She emphasized her commitment to the issue by pointing to testimony she gave at the legislature for teacher pay raises. Im doing that as a mom in my free time. Think of what could be accomplished if I was in the legislature, Davis said.

The three major candidates also all said transportation is a top priority, citing Baton Rouges infamously bad congestion. Freiberg and DiResto both said they would work to identify funding for a new bridge over the Mississippi River. Davis said she would focus on policies that lower insurance rates and invest in infrastructure.

DiResto highlighted his role in establishing CRISIS the Capital Region Industry for Sustainable Infrastructure Solutions a business-led coalition that has advocated for congestion-relief projects.

Both Freiberg and DiResto also said they want to focus on reforms that allow greater flexibility in how the states budget is allocated.

The race also features two less prominent first-time candidates. Mallory Mayeux, 34, a Libertarian, said shes running to give a voice to the third party. The HR manager said shed focus on lowering taxes, which she said are too high and unfair for what we get.

Ricky Sheldon, 28, who describes himself as a progressive Republican, said he decided to run because hes dissatisfied with the partys national leadership in President Trump. The LSU graduate student said hes mainly interested in improving the states healthcare policies.

Success! An email has been sent with a link to confirm list signup.

Error! There was an error processing your request.

See the rest here:

Five candidates vie for open seat in House District 70 in East Baton Rouge - The Advocate

Campus of Columbia University in New York City(Mike Segar/Reuters)There is much that is in need of reform on campus. But there also is much that is wonderful, inspiring, and enriching.

One of these days, I will make a list of all the people who have been right when they have told me: You should know better. There will be a couple of priests, several editors, and at least one police officer on that list, but I am afraid our friend George Leef must be excluded, at least for the moment.

Leef, who does excellent work excoriating the failures and excesses of American university life at the Martin Center, wrote yesterday on the Corner: Lots of people who should know better claim that our higher education system is the envy of the world, but it isnt the best by a long shot. Whats needed, he writes, is ... libertarianism. If we would only implement that, Leef writes, then we would get the optimal system. I do not know if he had me in mind when he wrote that, but given that I have used exactly those words to describe our universities on many occasions, Ill deputize myself to respond, if only because the words optimal system always give me the willies.

I am a libertarian myself, and a few years ago I wrote a book about how many things (including education and health care) might be radically improved by taking a more market-oriented, spontaneous-order approach to them. The title of that book, The End Is Near and Its Going to Be Awesome, refers to the decline of the dominance (often monopoly dominance) of government-based and politically managed programs at the most sensitive pressure points of American life: education, health care, retirement, etc. The book also contains a critique of lazy libertarianism of the sort Leef offers above, treating some variation of the free market will take care of it or private philanthropy will take care of it like the ultimate abracadabra. The free market will take care of health care for the poor? Okay what does that actually look like? It is not that I do not think that we could and should radically improve health care for everyone (providing an especial benefit to the poor in the process) but I want something a good deal less vague than Let markets work.

Some libertarians are conservatives and some are not. Some libertarians are utopians or quasi-utopians, who offer the same answer to every question laissez faire! as though such a thing possibly could be dispositive. What Leef offers is really a kind of variation of the familiar progressive approach. He begins with a study says indictment (A new study by AEI scholars Jason Delisle and Preston Cooper looks at 35 nations higher ed systems and concludes that no nation is the best, he writes) and then follows up with an ideologically satisfying promise: If we (or any other country) would take government out of higher education and allow the spontaneous order of a free society to work, we would get the optimal system.

For the ideologue, take government out is a self-recommending policy. The conservative might take a different view, as I do. There is a lot that is silly, meretricious, distasteful, and genuinely destructive going on in American universities, especially at the second-rate institutions and in second-rate programs. (The thing about second-rate schools is, theyre second-rate.) But there also is much that is splendid, productive, admirable and, indeed, the envy of the world.

And if you do not believe that American universities are the envy of the world, ask the world. The number of students from abroad who travel to the United States to study dwarfs that of any other country: The United Kingdom, whose top universities have for centuries attracted the best and brightest, doesnt have half the foreign students the United States does. France has about a third the number; Germany, a quarter.

And top academics from around the world flock to American campuses, too for good reason. If you are among the worlds best in any significant intellectual field, chances are excellent that an American university is the place you want to be. For a rough indicator, consider which universities have the most Nobel laureates associated with them. What do you imagine that list looks like? The top ten includes the two British universities youd guess (Oxford and Cambridge) and eight U.S. universities: Harvard, Berkeley, Chicago, Columbia, MIT, Stanford, Cal Tech, and Princeton. You wont find a continental European university on the list until No. 13 (Humboldt) and only four more in the top 20 (University of Paris, Gttingen, Munich, Copenhagen). You wont find a single Asian, African, South American, or Middle Eastern university on the list.

Envy of the world? No question.

Libertarianism in action? No, not really. But we ought not to let our ideological commitments blind us to the fact that these splendid universities do a great many wonderful things that enrich our lives and our national life in important ways. There is much to criticize about my alma mater, the University of Texas. But whatever it lavishes on Jim Allisons work is money well spent.

Germany would love to have an MIT, a Berkeley, a Stanford, or a Cal Tech of its own; having all four would be beyond its dreams. (Yes, Berkeley comes with some hippies life is full of tradeoffs, and thats a good one.) American educational excellence has consequences far beyond the college campus: Quick, whats the hot new technology startup in Germany? (Dont worry, Ill wait.) Whats the big innovative Internet company in France? In Italy? More than half of the worlds most valuable firms are domiciled in the United States, according to PwC. China has twelve, the United Kingdom five, Germany four, France four, Switzerland three. Japan, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark each have one. And Europes big companies are big, old-fashioned conglomerates such as Unilever and Nestl, while the United States has enjoyed the growth and innovation of Apple, Facebook, Alphabet, and Microsoft.

Thats nothing to harrumph at.

Conservatism is, at its foundation, a creed of love a love of real things and people as they actually exist, defects and all, rather than a longing after more-perfect glories promised by this or that theory. To love is not to love blindly, but the conservative can only take the world very much as he finds it.

Fallen as he is and imperfect as his works must be, we love man for who and what he is, and so we abhor the inevitably inhumane schemes to produce New Soviet Man, or whatever this years model of progressive perfection is, because such programs of transformation are based on reducing and mutilating man, suffocating his endless inventiveness, forcing conformity and homogeneity upon him, and stamping out the infinite variety of his communities.

This is not to be confused with a creed of sentimentality. Conservatives, as Russell Kirk put it, feel affection for the proliferating intricacy of long-established social institutions and modes of life, as distinguished from the narrowing uniformity and deadening egalitarianism of radical systems. (Harvard, founded 1636, is about as long-established a social institution as this country has.) At the same time, Kirk writes, conservatives understand that to seek for utopia is to end in disaster. ... The ideologues who promise the perfection of man and society have converted a great part of the 20th-century world into a terrestrial hell.

Libertarians can be utopians and ideologues, too. Theirs may be a less destructive and bloody kind of utopianism than that of the nationalists and socialists and national socialists, but it can cause them to undervalue wonderful and productive institutions right here in the real world, right here under our noses, while they dream of theoretical optima.

The United States is the worlds financial capital (sorry, London), the worlds technology capital, and the worlds cultural capital, but conservatives detest Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood, along with the Ivy League and other elite universities, Broadway, publishing, the media industry, the fashion industry, the architecture and design industry, New York City, Los Angeles... Apparently, Americas dominant military position and its world-beating oil-and-gas industry are the only commanding heights to which conservatives believe it to be worth aspiring. There is something wrong with that. Make America Great Again, But Burn It All Down If Mark Zuckerberg and the Chairman of the Princeton English Department Dont Share My Politics! is a funny kind of way to look at the world.

There is much that is in need of reform on campus and in the church, in the state, and everywhere else in American life. But there also is much that is wonderful, inspiring, and enriching. For that, we should be grateful. A conservatism without gratitude and grace is not one worth having.

The rest is here:

American Universities Are the Envy of the World - National Review

It was the largest donation in the history of the Virginia House of Delegates half-a-million dollars from a mystery mega-donor deposited into Culpeper Republican Delegate Nick Freitas war chest.

Who was the secret money-bags donor?

In March 2018, Politico called billionaire Richard Uihlein the biggest Republican mega-donor youve never heard of, and profiled the man who had been dumping millions into Libertarian campaigns:

[Uihlein has emerged] as one of the most influential, but still little-known, political donors in the country. His early six- and seven-figure contributions to emerging Republican candidates, and penchant for disruptive politics, have been crucial to building a raft of anti-establishment Republicans seeking to emulate Donald Trumps formula for success during this years midterm elections. [emphasis added]

In addition to donating to tea party groups and the Club for Growth, which Uihlein has supported in the past, hes given several million dollars to super PACs backing specific candidates in Senate races.

his stable of candidates during [2017-18] consisted mostly of conservative bomb-throwers like [Illinois gubernatorial candidate Jeanne] Ives, anti-establishment state Sen. Chris McDaniel in Mississippi and Roy Moore in Alabama.

The investigative piece concluded by re-emphasizing the disruption of the Republican Party by candidates who have been backed by Uihlein:

Skeptics of Uihlein and [Illinois Policy Institutes] approach worry theyve left the Republican Party fractured and they wish hed taken a less combative approach. And they look at Ives inflammatory campaign as a prime exhibit.

If [Uihlein] wants to pull the party to the right, Im all for that. I want people to participate. I want more Republicans, said Pat Brady, former chairman of the Illinois Republican Party. He could support candidates who are conservative that could probably win if they werent the fringe right, homophobic bomb-throwers that these people had convinced him early on to support. [emphasis added]

So Virginia Republican politics may be about to get rockier because now Uihlein has waded into the Commonwealth by way of the 30th District House seat just as Freitas is being forced to mount a write-in campaign after missing the filing deadline. So in November the incumbents name will not appear on the ballot.

If Freitas wins re-election, then what? Freitas who campaigned against fellow Republican House member Christopher Peace in the dumpster fire that took place in the 97th House District earlier this year (see here, here, here, here, here, and here), and whose wife at the same time was running a campaign she lost primarying Valley State Senator Emmett Hanger with a Libertarian mega-donor of her own a wealthy California Libertarian named Chris Rufer who dropped $50,000 into her campaign knows how to rock the Republican boat. But for a weary party that has seen in-fighting for the past decade and that may be ready for less rocking and more stability, his rabble-rousing timing could be off. That, however, remains to be seen in the months ahead as it becomes clear what higher office Freitas is eyeing.

During the just-finished fundraising period, in addition to the half million dollars from Uihlein, Freitas fundraising brought in an additional $13,040.

For now the Freitas campaign is gearing up to educate voters to write in the incumbents name on November 5. In the dominant red district, that should be an easy task.

Background:

Bearing Drift: The Freitas Gambit by Matt Hall

The Star Exponent: Illinois billionaire donates $500K to Freitas campaign; Spanberger endorses Ridgeway by Allison Brophy Champion

Lynn Mitchell is Editor-in-Chief of Bearing Drift.

Continue reading here:

The Mystery Mega-Donor Behind Freitas' $500K Campaign Donation - Bearing Drift

Race relations is now a political issue all its own at the highest level. Annoying as it may be for libertarians and Republicans, the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates are rapidly securing home-field advantage on this increasingly relevant topic.

When a big government politician says, We need to do something! its a sure bet there will be bad policy. Add racial tension, and theres a spicy recipe for chaos, just the sort of thing bureaucracies feed on.

Libertarians and a few good Republicans understand this power dynamic. So, why does it seem like the Democrats are free to draw the parameters of any debate on race, most treacherously at the presidential level?

Consider the premises laid out during the third Democratic debate. Racism is systemic, they say. Its in gun violence, health care, education, the economy, the environment, the hospital, and the courtroom. White privilege is ingrained in society, were told.

Is it really sufficient to rebut this ideology by telling black voters that Democrats founded the KKK and Republicans passed the Civil Rights Act? Obviously, that boomer argument will never work.

Or how about the suggestions humbly offered by writers Tim Carney and Bonnie Kristian that conservatives and libertarians create ecosystems that dont welcome racists. In fairness, their articles were written days before this latest Democratic debate. But just as the no, actually, the left are the real racists argument fails, so too do their pleas for movement soul-searching.

The correct response matters. This issue is not going away and is no longer a fringe issue for liberals. Debate moderator Linsey Davis of ABC News said several recent polls indicate that the number one concern for young black Americans is racism.

I found a May 2019 poll of young people, aged 18-36, that asked them what is the most important problem facing the country today. Fourteen percent of African-Americans said racism. That was a plurality, with gun control at 11 percent and health care at 10 percent, and every other issue at or below 7 percent. Among Latinxs, the polls word for Latinos, 14 percent said immigration, while 9 percent said racism.

Presidential candidates are promising reparations for slavery in 2020. Is it not feasible that could be a mainstream proposal come 2024? The political consequences arent what they once were a generation ago, when it was only Jesse Jackson urging government payouts to descendants of slaves.

Screaming racist or white supremacist is almost always about shutting down debate. It happens on the left and the right, but more often the right cedes ground to the left.

But instead, we should remember Tom Woods. Does he try to rewrite or draw lines on the 35 card of allowable opinion? Of course not, he sets fire to it!

Todays primary debate is tomorrows general election debate. Libertarians ought to prepare now, while they still have time.

Go here to see the original:

Racism a Top Issue at Democratic Debate, So How Should Libertarians Respond? - The Liberator Online

Two giants in the libertarian and Libertarian world fought in Manhattan this week. The capital L is for the political party; the other represents the ideology. It wasnt a fight for leadership or voting control of the party that will come next year. This battle at the SoHo Forum was for the very soul of the party. Are the people in the room about winning political offices, or winning people to the cause, or, perhaps, both?

The Libertarian vs. libertarian war broke hot after the weekend of the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, VA, back in August of 2017. After that infamous weekend which featured the murder of progressive activist Heather Heyer Nick Sarwark, Chairman of the Libertarian Party (LP), took the opportunity to sign a statement disavowing fascism and imploring Tom Woods to do the same. Woods is an Ivy League-educated Ph.D. historian and prominent libertarian author and podcaster, as well as a senior fellow of the Mises Institute. He was also the target of thinly veiled accusations of racism by establishment Libertarians, including Mr. Sarwark, over his involvement in the League of the South, an organization that participated in the Charlottesville rally.

Mr. Woods responded to the petition with scorn. Having made no racist claims or statements, Woods has proclaimed the petitioners drama queens who had no right to a disavowal of a position that couldnt be credited to him.

Sarwark sent out a tweet calling the Mises Institute the preferred choice of actual Nazis. The attack on Woods and his allies aligned as an attack against an entire wing of the LP the Mises Caucus, which values fidelity to core principles over much else, including electoral success becoming a formalized group within the party. They aligned not just in support of Woods but in opposition to an LP that chose Gary Johnson and William Weld as Presidential and Vice-Presidential nominees, respectively, in 2016.

As they were both former Republican governors, Johnson and Weld were hard for many libertarians to swallow this writer included, who contributed a piece critical of the pair and their fidelity to libertarian ideas. From support for drug war proposals to praising Hillary Clinton, the duo gave rise to massive opposition. While Sarwark has control of the party and improved it in the first election after the controversy erupted his position and that of his allies is far from secure. He came to state his case for the future of the party inclusive of candidates like Bill Weld, who, Sarwark argues, raised money and gained members for the LP something Ron Paul and many small l libertarians do not do.

Nick Sarwark

If you were a neo-Nazi, it would be a curious choice to name your think-tank after a Jewish economist who fled the Nazis march across Europe to come to the United States. Dave Smith likes to point that out, as well as how so many from this branch of libertarians approach with worship the works of another Jew, Murray Rothbard. Woods was not present to debate Sarwark, but his side was well represented by a kind of anti-Woods in background and training. Smith has been to many of the Soho Forum events as a pre-show comedian. The series, run by economist Gene Epstein for the Reason Foundation, features debates of special concern to libertarians and free marketeers.

While Smith has little formal training in policy, law, or economics, his razor-sharp intellect, enthusiasm for libertarian ideas, and penchant for slaying statist ones with precision all while being very funny made him a formidable opponent for Sarwark. Ron Pauls presidential bit brought Mr. Smith to libertarianism, and he had the home-field advantage against the LP Chairman.

Mr. Sarwark was introduced to libertarian ideas as a very young man by his father and is an attorney who has been involved in LP leadership at the state and national levels since he was an undergraduate. He now sits as the first LP Chairman to hold the office for three consecutive terms, and he has not said whether he will seek a fourth. Bill Weld praised Hillary Clinton during the campaign as the Libertarian nominee how libertarians reacted to that is indicative of where they think the party should move. Read part two to hear about the debate, its results, and the fight in the green-room before the debate about John Bolton.

~

Read more fromScott D. Cosenzaorcommenton this article.

View post:

A Battle for the Soul of the Libertarian Party Part 1 - Liberty Nation

David H. Koch Theatre, home of the New York City Ballet, is pictured July 12. The original New York State Theater was built state funds as part of New York State's participation in the 1964-1965 World's Fair. In July 2008, Koch pledged $100 million over 10 years for renovation and to fund an operating and maintenance endowment. (Wikimedia Commons/Ajay Suresh)

In 1980, American politics witnessed a candidate for national office who took visionary stands that should have had the hearts of progressives gratefully beating as rarely before. A sampling of the candidate's proposed reforms:

Which candidate was behind all that nearly 40 years ago? President Jimmy Carter? No. Sen. Ted Kennedy? No. Gov. Jerry Brown? Sen. Edmund Muskie? Gus Hall of the Communist Party of the United States of America? Barry Commoner of the Citizens Party?

No to all of them. It was David H. Koch, the vice-presidential running mate of Ed Clark on the Libertarian ticket, which earned 1.1 percent of the popular vote. Instead of a President Koch, the nation put into office the fog-headed Ronald Reagan, a one-time screen actor in forgettable films. With right-wing ideologues as his White House advisers, his military spending soared to new heights $1.6 trillion over five years by one estimate, or $34 million an hour, by another. His disdain for poverty programs like legal service aid and the Food Stamp Program matched his contempt for labor unions, as when he fired 11,000 striking air traffic controllers in 1981.

Covering Climate Now: NCR joins more than 250 news outlets in a weeklong collaboration of climate change coverage. Learn more

At his death at 79 in late August, David Koch was scantly remembered for embracing policies that were part of the political gospel of the American left. Instead, critics remembered him as a conniving and greed-driven billionaire who, with his twin brother Charles, schemed to twin their wealth with stealth to move the Republican Party further to the right.

Trouble is, the brothers were Libertarians, not Republicans, and a different breed altogether that kept them from being seduced by the serial lies and hatefulness of Donald Trump to whom they donated not a nickel in 2016. In July last year, Trump, the ever addicted counter-puncher, called the brothers "a total joke in real Republican circles" and having a political network that was "highly overrated. I have beaten them at every turn."

Demonizing the Koch brothers reached a fever pitch in 2014 when Sen. Harry Reid blasted them by name 134 times on the Senate floor, including: "It's time that the American people spoke out against this terrible dishonesty of these two brothers who are about as un-American as anyone I can imagine."

It's a rare campaign speech in which Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders doesn't shout out: "Our great nation can no longer be hijacked by rightwing billionaires like the Koch brothers."

What rankles Reid, Sanders and other nattering Democrats is how Koch Industries, the Wichita-based multinational corporation with a workforce of 130,000 in 60 countries and annual revenues of $110 billion, lavished money on rightwing candidates as if members of the Senate past and current, like Robert Dole, Sam Brownback, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney and Joni Ernst, and such groups as Heritage Foundation, the Reason Foundation and Cato Institute are threats to the nation. Sorry, I'm not buying that one.

David H. Koch in 2015 (Wikimedia Commons/Gage Skidmore)

I've long admired the Koch brothers for their decadeslong support of causes and non-profits that I also see as worthy. Let's start with their opposition to American militarism. It was such pseudo-liberals as Sens. Joe Biden, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton who favored the invasion of Iraq in 2003, not David Koch, in what has become a shameless, endless war.

I've looked on David Koch as a kindhearted and caring citizen well aware of his obligations to share his wealth, said to be about $40 billion. In 1991, he came close to dying in an airplane crash in Los Angeles that killed 33 fellow passengers. "This may sound odd," he told a reporter for New York Magazine, "but I felt this experience was very spiritual. That I was saved when all those others died, I felt that the good Lord spared my life for a purpose. And since then, I've been busy doing all the good works I can think of."

His generosity saw the flow of billions in grants to non-profits in education, medical research, the arts and criminal justice reforms. He gave a total of $134 million to establish a cancer research institute at the Massachusetts Institute for Technology, from which he graduated. At a meeting once with professors and science researchers, it was asked what is needed to enhance the worksite. Mothers in the group answered: child care. Touched "I got a tear in my eye" Koch said of the moment it led him to donate $20 million to double the school's capacity for on-site child care.

As he did in 1980 in supporting prison reform efforts, Koch remained consistent on the issue. Much of it came about through the work ofMark Holden, who has worked in prisons and later became the general counsel of Koch Industries. In December 2018, hetold an intervieweron NPR's "All Things Considered" that "the whole criminal justice system needs to be revamped from beginning to end. In a lot of ways, it's really a poverty trap, and it disproportionately impacts people of color." That was when, with the support of the Koch brothers, The Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act theFirst Step Act was signed into law.

In aspeech last monthin South Carolina, Sanders praised "the Koch brothers [for] getting involved in criminal justice for some of the right reasons. What the Koch brothers understand is that it costs a lot more money to send somebody to prison than to send them to the University of South Carolina."

The David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, or MIT Building 76, is pictured in August 2017 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts. (Wikimedia Commons/Beyond My Ken)

Sanders hailing the Koch brothers can mean only that hell has finally frozen over. The ice was already thickening when, in July 2018,Sanders said: "Let me thank the Koch brothers, of all people, for sponsoring a study that shows that Medicare for all could save the American people $2 trillion over a 10-year period."

Aside from the Koch's donating to Republican politicians, a major rankle of the hate-Koch hordes is that the brothers' $110 billion industries, which market everything from textiles and processed crude oil to toilet paper and Dixie cups, are privately, not publicly, owned: They are secretive, therefore most likely dishonest, they say. How much can that really matter to the 130,000 workers getting paychecks from the Kochs?

The brothers' companies have made mistakes they were fined for and sought to rectify. Yet more than a few liberals' knees continue to jerk wildly at the mention of their names. A recent flail was in an August piece in The Nation headlined "Even David Koch's Philanthropy Was Toxic" and sub-headed with "Like other plutocrats from Andrew Carnegie to Jeff Bezos, the late billionaire used charity to legitimize inequality." It's one thing to go after David Koch for supporting pols and their voting records on deregulating environmental edicts or opposing climate change, but it's something else to accuse him, as The Nation article does, of using benevolence "a substitute for and a means of avoiding the necessity of a more just and equitable system and a fairer distribution of power."

It's a baseless accusation because it is based on judging David Koch's motive for his generosity. We are asked to believe that David Koch's motive for signing checks to groups like theUnited Negro College Fundis that the money will help "legitimize inequality."

Can't buy that one either.

[Colman McCarthy directs the Center for Teaching Peace in Washington, D.C. His new book isOpening Minds, Stirring Hearts.]

Editor's note:Sign up hereto get an email alert every time Colman McCarthy'sIt's Happeningcolumn is posted.

Read more here:

Charles Koch: kindhearted, caring citizen, obligated to share wealth - National Catholic Reporter

Fox News host Jesse Watters this week slammed the mainstream media for allegedly reporting inaccurate news and claimed that "conservative media is basically saving this country."

In March, several media outlets, including the Washington Post, reported that counties that hosted a 2016 Trump campaign rally saw a 226 percent rise in hate crimes compared to counties that did not. The outlets cited a paper written by three academics, Ayal Feinberg from Texas A&M University-Commerce, Regina Branton from the University of North Texas and Valerie Martinez-Ebers from the University of North Texas.

During a segment on Fox News' The Five, host Greg Gutfeld said Reason magazine independently "analysed the effects of Hillary Clinton's rallies using the framework" and found that "her rallies led to an even greater increase in hate crimes than Trump rallies."

"Right there, Reason just exposed what happens when junk science marries the media. It creates really stupid offspring," he claimed. Reason, an American libertarian monthly magazine, is published by the Reason Foundation.

The original study "had compared counties with rallies to others without them," Gutfeld explained. "Political rallies are usually held near large populations where raw crime numbers are higher. Big cities where rallies took place also had a few incidents of hate crimes, unlike smaller towns without rallies who reported no such crimes."

Later in the segment, Watters weighed in. "Professors actually aren't that smart," he said. "We hold them in this big, high esteem, and yes, some of them are doing groundbreaking work."

"They're mediocre minds and in this case, they're not even that book smart," Watters said. "Also, look how easy it is for fake news to go mainstream. You take a professor... the Washington Post gave them the opportunity to write this under the hard news banner as a legit article. And then everyone reads it. And then it gets on cable TV. And then politicians start talking about it. Very, very slick."

"Also, extrapolate this out for a second," he continued. "How many junk science studies have they done on global warming, on guns, on Russia. Think about all the other fake things that have gotten mainstream but a simple fact-check proves them wrong."

"Lastly, conservative media is basically saving this country. They're doing God's work. They are fact-checking The New York Times, CNN, they're constantly poking holes. It's exhausting," Watters added. "I think 75 percent of conservative media... all they're doing is rebutting the lies told by Democrats and the mainstream media."

Visit link:

'Doing God's Work': Fox News' Jesse Watters Says 'Conservative Media is Basically Saving this Country' - Newsweek

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming continued their verbal war on Sunday over the direction of Republican foreign policy. Dont expect this ongoing debate between the libertarian senator and the hawkish congresswoman to end anytime soon because they didnt start it.

Back when George W. Bush ran for president in 2000, he believed the United States should be humble on the world stage, warned against nation-building, and even said, Im not so sure its the role of the United States to go around saying this is the way its gotta be.

Yes, this is the same George W. Bush who later launched the Iraq War.

But in 2000, after almost eight years of President Bill Clinton and his adventures in Somalia and Yugoslavia, many Republicans had soured on U.S. intervention abroad. Four years earlier, Pat Buchanan had enthralled the conservative base in the 1996 GOP primaries running explicitly as an anti-war Republican. Buchanan even won the New Hampshire primary, before frenzied GOP elites worked overtime to secure the nomination for Bob Dole. Still, given the climate of his party, Bush had good reason at the time to make himself out as the anti-war candidate.

It wasnt to last, unfortunately.

A year after his election, President Bush would kickoff Americas longest war in Afghanistan, followed by arguably the worst mistake in U.S. foreign policy history: the invasion of Iraq. The tragedy of 9/11 gave the hawks that lined Bushs cabinet a justified reason for routing the Taliban in Afghanistan, but playing on Americans fear, they also dishonestly finagled the country into Iraq, a long-time goal of the neoconservative movement.

Bush might have been president, but the premiere hawk of that era was Vice President Dick Cheney. Support for his War on Terror defined the Republican Party for most of the Bush era. During that time, the national debt more than doubled and the federal government exploded. But nobody cared it was all about war.

So much so that the conservative establishment tried to push the small band of anti-war libertarians and paleoconservatives such as Buchanan out of the movement. Bush speechwriter David Frum even denounced them as Unpatriotic Conservatives in the pages of National Review. Frums goal was to use war fever to establish neoconservatism as conservatism proper. Frump wrote, War is a great clarifier. It forces people to take sides.

The paleoconservatives have chosen and the rest of us must choose too, Frum declared. In a time of danger, they have turned their backs on their country. Now we turn our backs on them.

Frums message was clear: Being a conservative meant being pro-war, period. If you disagreed, hawks like Frum wanted you out of the movement. And back then, unfortunately, few Republicans disagreed with their assessment.

This rigid orthodoxy wasnt challenged in any significant way within the party until former Rep. Ron Pauls Republican primary presidential campaign caught fire in 2008. Like Buchanan before him, the libertarian-leaning Paul was a strident anti-war candidate who took on Republican hawks in no uncertain terms.

When Paul tussled with hawkish candidate Rudy Giuliani over 9/11 during a debate, it was the beginning of Giulianis campaigns implosion, and helped Paul attract fans by the thousands. Giuliani dropped out after the Florida primary and received less than 600,000 votes. Meanwhile, Paul got over one million votes, and even millions more in dollars donated.

That night, however, Paul was roundly booed and Giuliani was cheered. Possibly for his foreign policy heresy, Paul was even excluded from the next debate. As Barack Obamas popularity grew as the anti-war Democrat, the GOP doubled down on its war identity, a brand the partys selection of a perpetually hawkish presidential nominee that year, the late Sen. John McCain of Arizona, only reinforced.

When McCain lost in 2008, the Obama era was also the beginning of the Tea Party movement, where the conservative grassroots began turning its focus away from war and toward runaway spending. A 2010 poll found Tea Party members split between Ron Paul as their leader, while many others admired McCains former running mate, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, who was not uniformly hawkish.

2010 was also the same year Ron Pauls son, Rand Paul, was elected to the Senate, but not before two high-profile Republican hawks injected themselves into the Kentucky GOP primary in an attempt to stop him Dick Cheney and Rudy Giuliani. Meanwhile, Palin broke ranks and endorsed Paul.

Despite hawks efforts, Paul trounced his hawk-backed primary opponent 59% to 35%. In response, Frum lamented, How is it that the GOP has lost its antibodies against a candidate like Rand Paul? The old, Bush-Cheney pro-war GOP was beginning to stumble. In 2016, conservatives would abandon them completely, and eventually turn their full attention to Donald Trump.

Trump is as popular today with his base as Bush was in 2003, however, Trump has not only denounced the Iraq War, but once even called Bush and Cheney liars for starting the conflict. Trump has openly mocked the hawks in his midst, and has said he wants to end the war in Afghanistan.

Trumps foreign policy impulses are clearly closer to Rand Pauls, even if his policy has been a mixed bag. This bothers Cheney so much that he needled Vice President Mike Pence in March for the Trump administrations apparently insufficient hawkishness.

Its ironic, then, that the son of Ron Paul and daughter of Dick Cheney are now battling it out over foreign policy, much of it hinging on who truly stands with President Trump. Various pundits have mocked them for going out of their way to prove whos Trumpier or who loves Trump more.

But Paul and Cheney do this for a reason: It matters to Republican voters.

When David Frum sought to excommunicate anti-war conservatives from the movement 16 years ago, he did so through the narrative of standing with George W. Bush. Similarly, neoconservatives have long tried to appropriate Ronald Reagan for their own agenda because of his enduring cache with the GOP base, despite the fact that hawks in Reagans day came to loathe him for reaching out to the Soviet Union.

Frum employed this method because it works standing with the president of their own party matters to most Republicans. But now, what they stand for has changed.

Today, it is the neoconservatives and camp Cheney who are on the outs with the current commander-in-chief. A Rand Paul might not have been elected in the Bush era, and he certainly wouldnt have the clout the senator has with Trump today if we had a President Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, or any of the other hawkish candidates that ran in 2016.

The Cheneys are used to being in the drivers seat when it comes to Republican foreign policy. Pauls are accustomed to being on the outside looking in.

This has reversed, a shift that was always going to lead to conflict.

"If theres a better metaphor for the GOPs current foreign policy transformation and crossroads, its tough to do better than a Paul scion feuding with a Cheney scion, observed the Washington Posts Aaron Blake, adding, (I)ts clearly the Paul-ite, noninterventionist approach that is ascendant in the Trump administration."

The decades-old debate between anti-war conservatives and ideological hawks endures as arguably the greatest divide on the Right. Fighting over the GOPs future is Rand Paul and Liz Cheney, who both claim to stand with Trump on foreign policy.

Yet only one of them is actually in line with the president, and this time, it isnt a Cheney.

Jack Hunter (@jackhunter74) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner's Beltway Confidential blog. He is the former political editor of Rare.us and co-authored the 2011 book The Tea Party Goes to Washington with Sen. Rand Paul.

The rest is here:

The Rand Paul-Liz Cheney foreign policy feud is the latest battle in a decades-old GOP civil war - Washington Examiner

Debt consolidation is a commonly used term in the world of finance that refers to combining multiple debts into a single payment. Individuals with high debt are often overwhelmed and confused because of their financial turmoil. Debt consolidation is one of the many options they may consider to get out of their present condition. However, before accepting a debt consolidation offer, there are several factors they must consider.

Like any other financial decision, an individual may or may not pursue debt consolidation based on his her financial context. However, there are certain common factors to look into while considering debt consolidation.

Better Interest Rates: Oftentimes, people go for debt consolidation because it allows them to make a single monthly payment for all their debts. However, this is not the core objective of debt consolidation. The primary objective is to reduce the amount they pay as interest in their debts. If fact, the interest rate should be the foremost deciding factor while choosing your debt consolidation loan provider. Many of you would be surprised to know that it is possible to find out debt consolidation options with interest rates as low as 5%. On the other hand, some others may come with hefty interest rates of above 30%. However, most of them fall between these two extremes.

Problems with Multiple Payments: If you have a number of debts to different lenders, it can be extremely difficult and stressful to keep up with numerous minimum monthly payments. The consequence of failing to keep so many amounts and dates straight on a monthly basis can be quite devastating. Debt consolidation can be a good option for individuals suffering from this problem. With just a single monthly payment, there is no need to worry about many different payment dates and amounts.

The Last Alternative: Before taking a debt consolidation loan, please be completely sure that you have already tried out everything that you could have done to get rid of the debt. If you havent done anything of that sort, before thinking of debt consolidation, make a sincere attempt to pay off all the debts you have.

The first step towards paying off your debts is to make a budget. Allocate a part of the leftover money at the end of the month for this purpose. Your next step is to create a strategy for debt repayment. The debt avalanche and debt snowball are two excellent strategies focused on the faster payment of specific debts. According to the snowball, your extra fundsshould be spent on the debt that has the lowest total balance. On the other hand, the avalanche strategy focuses on the highest interest debt first.

If you try these techniques, but fail to make any headway, or dont have adequate earning to pay off the debt strategically, then you may seriously start exploring debt consolidation options.

Understanding Your Debt: Before taking a debt consolidation loan, it is important that the borrower clearly understands why and how he or she ended up in a debt. .This awareness is extremely important because debt consolidationis only helpful to borrowers that are prepared to lead a financially responsible lifestyle without relying on credit. Unfortunately, individuals that cant hold themselves back from excessive spending end up in even worse debtafter seeking debt consolidation.

Finally, if you really feel that debt consolidation is the solution to your financial troubles; make sure to conduct detailed research to find out a legitimate vendor. Instead of relying on just any provider, it makes sense to put your trust in renowned companies such as National Debt Relief or any other provider of similar stature.

Read the original here:

Points to Consider before Opting for Debt Consolidation - The Libertarian Republic

Keith Komar is a Barrie resident representing the Libertarian Party for the York-Simcoe riding in this election.

Originally from British Columbia, Komar is a bricklayer by trade, travelling in between BC and Ontario, depending on where the work may be.

Theres two places where I call home and this is one of them, he explained.

He has been back in Ontario for just over a year now and is hoping for change in this federal election.

His start in activism started in the early '90s, fighting for gay rights. His brother was gay and one of the first men to be married in Ontario.

Since then, he has become an advocate for equality and human rights and joined the BC Libertarian party in 2016.

He believes its time for the government to look at the root cause of the problems in our country.

Thats the problem with politics today, no one talks about the root problems. Were talking about these surface issues, he said.

He is aware that his party may not have the numbers to win the election, but his goal if for their message to be heard among the politicians in power.

I dont have the money to back a campaign or crowd support, so I have no delusions about winning, he explained. I don't have to win the election, as long as Im winning in the hearts and minds of the politicians and they see that people are responding to what im saying.

In terms of voting, he says there is a lot of information circulating on social media that makes it difficult for people to sift through and investigate the real issues.

Because there is so much thrown at you, and most people dont have the time to do hardcore investigations, they have to accept what they hear as truth which is unfortunate. Which I think is done by design, he said.

The Libertarian Party was founded in 1973. The ideal role of federal government for the Libertarian Party would be a small one.

We believe the federal government is upside down, he explained.

There is no reason to have that extra layer of bureaucracy, we would shrink them down to be the referee.

The partys platform focuses on eliminating the need for government control, and balancing it back into the people.

Ive often said the difference between what I do and what the other parties are doing is they want to take power and I want to hold the public trust, he said.

Prioritizing it (power) in the proper way, he added.

Military, currency and trading within the provinces are the only issues the Libertarians believe the federal government is needed for, with everyhing else being handled on a provincial and municipal level.

In terms of the economy, Komar says there are too many layers of government that need to be taken out in order to give people more control over their money.

We are lacking accountability and responsibility. We have to find responsibility and accountability in our own lives, he said.

We have less and less buying power with our money. Its heartbreaking, he said. We can do better for ourselves. And the direction were heading for our children is the wrong direction. I want my kids to be able to buy a home.

The family unit has been smashed. There was a time when you didn't have to ( work so hardto have the basics) and its not that far in the past.

Komar says Canadas reputation is not what it used to be.

Were peacekeepers but were not anymore, when did we start selling weapons and why? We have that world image of being the peacekeepers but were losing that, he said.

If elected, the Libertarian Party would withdraw Canadian armed forces from international wars and refocus them on maintaining Canadas defence and eliminate all forms of government foreign aid.

If we stop attacking countries like Syria and Afghanistan, we wouldn't have a big flow of refugees coming here.

The Libertarian Party would also re-evaluate victimless crimes and in the federal criminal code: sex work and the war on drugs.

Their plan would be to repeal the cannabis act.

It makes it more illegal now than it was when it was illegal, he explained.

Privacy rights are another pillar of the Libertarian platform. They believe the government has no right to be in the bedrooms of Canadian citizens.

They would put an end to warrantless searches and repeal Bill C-51, which gives the government authority to share private information about individuals in order to protect them from harm.

Everyone has their rights. If you arent willing to stand up for your rights, theyre privileges. And the minute someone decides to take them from you, youre not willing to stand up for it then its no longer a right, he said.

Regulatory agencies are also a point of contention with the Libertarian Party. They would like to repeal the powers of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) and reduce the restrictions from the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) to encourage more tourism.

In their platform, the Libertarians would make responsible gun possession legal for hunting, self defence and recreation.

Im all for gun rights, said Komar.

The criminal doesnt care. Hes going to get the gun anyway.

Why are we being restricted on defending ourselves?

Healthcare is an issue on all party platforms and the Libertarians believe it is something that should be handled on a provincial level.

Komar says having privatized healthcare in addition to public health care would help to alleviate wait times and help those who need urgent care.

I understand people here are Conservative because they want that basic freedom but they (the Conservatives) dont provide it anymore, theyre basically what the Liberal party was eight years ago, he said.

Environmental issues are also a major concern for the Libertarians. They would enforce property rights so owners would be made responsible for all the land and natural resources on and below it. And any damage done to property through pollution would be dealt with in the judicial system.

Aborigianl rights for the First Nations, Metis and Inuit Peoples are important to the Libertarian Party.

They would like to end all restrictions and obligations on indigenous territories and replace the Indian Act with a guarantee of sovereignty for all indigenous people.

I believe that we as people can look after ourselves. We dont need that government layer. Strip it all done, put it back to its base and put the power back in the hands of the people throughout the municipality.

Komar is confident that he will be the leader of the Libertarian Party of Ontario. He is currently the Chief Financial Officer for the provincial party and is running against two other candidates for the title. The vote takes place on Nov. 2, 2019.

Our concern is opening minds and getting people to understand a different way.

To learn more about the Libertarian Party, check out their website here.

The rest is here:

York-Simcoe Libertarian Party candidate Keith Komar says "government is upside down" - BradfordToday

Even the most right-wing of American citizens probably have those moments where they think that a hint of sanity and normality from the Democrats might offer a welcome change of pace after the exhausting past few years and provide a tempting alternative vote next year. So we must survey what the left has to offer, and then be reminded its nothing but ever more totalitarian schemes for social controlcompletely unacceptable, and for a libertarian, unthinkable.

WitnessBeto ORourke with his yelps of enthusiasm for gun confiscation. Witness, too, his Twitter spat with Texas State Rep. Briscoe Cainin which ORourke accused Cain of making a death threat merely because Cain said hed defend himself if ORourke came to confiscate his guns. ORourkes hysterical-sissy reaction suggests hes either the most passive-aggressive person alive or cant even understand the childhood playground concept of Who started it?which I regard as the bedrock principle of all morality. Left-liberals dont like concepts like guilt and innocence, I suppose, let alone complex notions such as assailant and self-defense. Never, never again give such people political power.

Its not just guns, though. Consider ORourkes ill-thought-out insistence you somehow have aright to live close to your job. How does he plan to enforce that? No, dont tell me, please. I dont want to spend the night shuddering in horror at the thought of the mass relocations.

You might think Joe Biden provides a moderate, albeit doddering, option. But then, in last weeks debate,Biden at one point (in a healthcare segment) basically accused Bernie Sanders of not being socialist enough. Biden should attend to his teeth and leave Americans to attend to their own dental and health plans privately.

Andrew Yang continues his nerd-niche attempt to look cool offering to buy votes and, once elected, to decide whether companies are operating in a human as opposed to merely capitalist fashion. This distinction is essentially meaningless, but it reveals Yang thinks government makes things human whereas buying and selling in the marketplace doesnt, as if there were no humans doing the buying and selling. Not surprisingly, Yang recently bailed at the last minute on a debate at the libertarian Soho Forum, where he would surely have ended up receiving UBIan Unambiguous Beatdown Intellectually.

Elizabeth Warren is just as nuts, wanting what sounds like a Yang-ish but even more strictly enforced set of benchmarks for corporations to obey each year if they want the federal government to do them the great favor of allowing them to continue to operate. That way lies socialism, pretty quickly and not in a good way. She also opposes school choice, though no intellectually honest person thinks trapping people in bad schools is the way to get those schools to perform best.

Thats how a kidnapper thinks. The kidnapper swears youll eventually learn to like it in the basement, so theres no reason to let you wriggle out through the back window. Pardon me: thats how kidnappersand teachers union headsthink. Same thing, really.

Meanwhile, a book out this week claims that a DC non-profit head claimed to recall that back at Yale, at one naked college party, friends of Brett Kavanaugh pushed his penis onto a womans hand, but the non-profit head recounted that back before Kavanaughs Supreme Court confirmation, doesnt want to comment now, and has not had his story confirmed by the woman who supposedly had the penis shoved onto her (a penis that is also perhaps being victimized in this account). Indeed, her friends say she has no memory of any such incident. Thats good enough for some Democrats, though, and presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Julian Castro have called for Kavanaughs impeachment.

I could go on, but you get the idea. The Democrats are so awful and so detached from reality that they have no grounds for complaining about things like the mild hyperbole in thatwonderfulanti-Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ad from theNew Faces GOP PAC. With historical photos, it depicts the bodies and piles of skulls that tend to result from the communist philosophies with which AOC and others on the left are now openly flirting.

Such a simple, emphatic ad and yet it clearly got under the socialists skin, with their allies in media and tech declaring the ad offensive and graphic. It wasnt all that graphic, but was a rare reminder in an anesthetized republic how high the political stakes really are, which is itself shocking. Good. More of this, please.

Or you can hypocritically condemn such comparisons between democratic socialism (as if the commoners will be calling all the shots) and nightmarish really-existing-socialism, then go right back to likening all non-leftists to Nazis.

Weve reached the point where even self-proclaimed liberal (but largely libertarian) Nobel Prize winner Friedrich Hayek, deceased for two and a half decades, is condemned as semi-dictatorial by the loathsome French economist Thomas Piketty, who appears to have decided to join the Nancy MacLean school of history, smearing libertarians as radical anti-libertarians to avoid having to grapple with their (potentially appealing) real messages. She tried to make milquetoast libertarian economist James Buchanan out to be a de facto Klansman. Others tried a similar attack on economist Ludwig von Mises afterwards (even though he actually fled Continental Europe to escape the Nazis).

Then they came for Hayek, and there were far fewer libertarians left to defend him than there should bebecause so many libertarians were busy trying to find something nice to say about liberals and Democrats instead of defending their own core principles. Give it up. The Democrats know our love of freedom makes us their natural enemy. Its high time we were as clear-eyed about the situation, hard as it may be to keep ones eyes open during another Democrat debate.

Todd Seavey is the author ofLibertarianism for Beginners and is on Twitter at @ToddSeavey.

See original here:

Democrats Threaten You - Splice Today

New York Times climate reporter Hiroko Tabuchi went to war against secretive...conservative" free-market groups that are fighting counter-productive regulations in Wednesdays edition: Warriors Against Environmental Rules Champion the Dishwasher.

Environmental reporter Tabuchi found herself in the strange position of embracing corporate public-relations-speak from dishwasher manufacturers, in the cause of defending regulations. Its not a new concept. Large corporations often embrace regulations knowing they keep smaller less-capitalized competitors out of the market.

Of all the conservative efforts to persuade the Trump administration to weaken the nations environmental rules, the dishwasher lobby might be the most peculiar.

Dishwashers used to clean a full load of filthy dishes in under an hour. But now they take an average of two and a half hours and STILL leave dishes dirty! reads one online petition promoted by FreedomWorks, a libertarian offshoot of a group co-founded by the late David H. Koch and his brother Charles Koch, who made their fortune in fossil fuels. The decline of American dishwashers, the site says, is all thanks to crazy environmentalist rules.

The petition, titled Make Dishwashers Great Again, is just one part of a broad campaign coordinated by conservative organizations with ties to fossil-fuel companies. Trump administration emails made public as part of a lawsuit filed by the Sierra Club shed new light on the effort, designed to persuade the Trump administration to weaken standards on a long list of home appliances.

....

The weakening of dishwasher rules is just one of many cases where a Trump administration regulatory rollback is in fact opposed by the very industry the White House claims it will help.

We appreciate the sentiment, Jennifer Cleary, an executive at the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, wrote in a 2018 letter to administration officials. But weakening the standards would incur additional costs for manufacturers and, ultimately, consumers.

So did the initial regulations. But the liberal press dismisses those kind of arguments. Tabuchi portrayed the Trump administration on defense.

In an interview, Daniel Simmons, assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy, defended the departments actions.

Peoples time is a nonrenewable resource. People get frustrated when their appliances take longer, whether its dishwashers or washing machines, he said. The department, he said, had received an overwhelmingly positive response from consumers who were tired of waiting for their dishes to dry.

Its not our job to meet industrys wishes, he added. At the end of the day, were answerable to the American people and not any particular interest group.

Suddenly, companies are reliable truthtellers, at least when they favor regulation of their industry (which again, favors established companies that can afford to abide by regulatory costs).

Dishwasher makers themselves dispute that dishwasher performance has gotten worse because of environmental regulations and they say they arent looking for weaker standards....

It's no shock that dishwasher makers would defend their products performance.

Its confounding, its hard to explain, this blanket attack on regulations, said Jason Hartke, president of the Alliance to Save Energy, a bipartisan nonprofit organization that represents businesses, environmental groups and consumer advocates. I dont think theyre listening to industry, he said. Theyre trying to put out-of-date, inefficient products in American homes.

Because when one is fighting for the climate, one should always listen to industry?

Tabuchis reporting took on a familiar paranoid tone.

Much of the support for these rollbacks has come instead from a small group of conservative, free market organizations, many allied with the fossil fuel industry. For example, a secretive policy group financed by corporations, the American Legislative Exchange Council, worked alongside the gasoline producer Marathon Petroleum to urge legislators to support weakening the clean-car rules.

Tabuchi has a history of peculiar and biased reporting on environmental issues.

In July 2019 she used another leak from liberals to aggressively label"deniers" of drastic climate change. The paper's headline was "As Carmakers Balk, Warming Deniers Seek to Gut Emissions Rules." Online, the headline was "Climate Change Denialists Dubbed Auto Makers the Opposition in Fight Over Trumps Emissions Rollback."

A January 2019 story carried the online headline: A Trump County Confronts the Administration Amid a Rash of Child Cancers. It was the old cancer cluster concept she used to protect regulations from repeal, implying a link that isnt proven or even substantiated.

In January 2017 she found a left-wing environmentalist to smear as racist the effort by libertarian industrialists Charles and David Koch to convert minorities to their viewpoint on energy issues.

Read the rest here:

The Horrors! NY Times Frets Over The Diabolical 'Dishwasher Lobby!' - NewsBusters

An exhaustive survey of the Presidents of the United States and everything they did wrong while in office.

Building Tomorrow explores how tech and innovation are transforming culture while creating a freer and more peaceful world.

In its dealings with the broader world, has the United States been a force for liberty? Check out Christopher A. Preble's new book.

columns

by Aaron Ross Powell on May 9, 2019

Engaged buddhists too often lean progressive because they dont understand the fundamental nature of the state that they rely on.

columns

by Steven Horwitz on May 8, 2019

There are two sides to every economic exchange, and regulations that affect one necessarily affect the other.

columns

by David S. DAmato on May 7, 2019

Sidney Parkers thoroughgoing Stirnerite individualism set him outside and against all political and moral ideologies.

Featured Guide

Preble explains the need to question the assumptions that drive American foreign policy in the modern eraespecially the assumption that American politicians can and should forcibly remake the international order to suit their desires. He asks readers to consider whether America and the world would be safer and freer if U.S. foreign policy incorporated libertarian insights about the limitations of government power.

Read more:

Libertarianism.org | Exploring the theory and history of liberty

[ lib-er-tair-ee-uhn ]SHOW IPA

/ lbrtrin /PHONETIC RESPELLING

maintaining the doctrine of free will.

Dictionary.com UnabridgedBased on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Random House, Inc. 2019

I agree with you, but the youthful energy in the libertarian movement foresees a tipping point.

Had there not been a Libertarian in the race who received over 8,000 votes, Shumlin likely would have lost.

Some Tea Party types who felt that Republican Scott Milne was too moderate supported the Libertarian.

Healey describes his politics as "libertarian in some aspects, Jacksonian, Jeffersonian, socially liberal, fiscally conservative."

Sure, you could end up with a Congress that consists solely of libertarian veterinarians, or elderly communists, or whatever.

So far I concede the Libertarian contention as to the demoralising effect of Determinism, if held with a real force of conviction.

The case has been conceded to him in advance, and the libertarian can only flinch from his logic.

It is chiefly on the Libertarian side that I find a tendency to the exaggeration of which I have just spoken.

At the same time, the difference between Determinist and Libertarian Justice can hardly have any practical effect.

SEE MORE EXAMPLESSEE FEWER EXAMPLES

libertarian

/ (lbtrn) /

a believer in freedom of thought, expression, etc

of, relating to, or characteristic of a libertarian

C18: from liberty

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

libertarian

1789, "one who holds the doctrine of free will" (opposed to necessitarian), from liberty (q.v.) on model of unitarian, etc. Political sense of "person advocating liberty in thought and conduct" is from 1878. As an adjective by 1882. U.S. Libertarian Party founded in Colorado, 1971.

Online Etymology Dictionary, 2010 Douglas Harper

See the original post:

Libertarian | Define Libertarian at Dictionary.com

These examples are from the Cambridge English Corpus and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

Behind global economic rationalization is an emphasis on libertarian freedom and efficiency, not equality or democracy.

But surely, so this libertarian contends, we may not benefit some persons at the expense of others.

From the libertarian perspective, such self-deception is naturally understood as an expression of our freedom.

In the libertarian view, the institution has a legitimate right as well as a responsibility to view this issue from a marketplace, libertarian perspective.

The libertarian can hold that every choice you make may be motivated by desires and, to some extent, explicable through reasons.

Although by no means as important as the left-right dimension, they are at least as important in contemporary voting behaviour as the libertarian-authoritarian dimension.

Deontological libertarians tend to be fairly confident about their political stance - they think it rests on secure, deontological foundations.

Ageing reverses these libertarian possibilities in producing a contradiction between the fixedness of the body and the fluidity of social images.

The role of tort compensation schemes within libertarian, liberal egalitarian, and utilitarian theories of distributive justice is discussed.

She herself has a divided response to that ideal, as is indicated by her rejection of hard libertarian antipaternalism.

I call into question this strategy for defending a libertarian order.

There are few libertarians who believe free will is not central to the meaning and character of human life.

In other words, many libertarians have believed that the exercise of free will extends to most of the actions of free agents.

In its detail, however, the government's strategy was a mixture of libertarian economic ideology and inherited policy instruments.

It leads to the more libertarian conclusion but it does not justify it - it is ad hoc.

Go here to read the rest:

LIBERTARIAN | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary

If you free-form a report, we're just going to ignore it. Possibly without even looking at the post/comment you reported. There's been times where a post does break the rules, but it has been approved until a proper report is filed, and then it is removed.

This is much like the court trying you for a crime. They need to specify WHICH crime you are being tried for. If they can't, you go free. Same concept. You need to accuse them of something, which breaks the rules, then we decide if it breaks what you accused them off. And free-form reports are not rules.

While we cannot disable free-form reports for app and mobile users, we did disable it on desktop. If you cannot point out which rule it is breaking please use the pre-recorded "Other" option.

It doesn't actually break the rules, it just hurts my feelings and I want to super downvote it.

Go here to read the rest:

/r/Libertarian: For a free society - reddit

Libertarians are nothing more than economicconservatives (Privatize all government services, end public schools,screw the poor) who are simply not religious fuck-tards. They can beanywhere from mainstream christian to atheist, but the only thing theyhave in common is that they do not want to pay any taxes for anything,and they would rather have the government just cater to business.

A typical libertarian is someone who doesn't care about religious ormoral issues, but who wants to eliminate public schools, becauseeducation is "not a right under the constitution", and who wants toeliminate all government regulations on business, because "businessescan just police themselves"

In other words, they are amoral sociopaths who don't give a fuck abouthumanity, or about using government to build a fair, just, equitablesociety that serves all the people equally.

I bought into the whole libertarian thing a while back, but when itcame down to regulations, I realized they had a serious disconnect.Most of the libertarian literature I've seen, and most of thelibertarians I've talked to believe in "business self-regulation" likea religion. They seem to think that businesses always have the bestinterests of the people in mind, and that we don't need minimum wages,zoning regulations, safety regulations, or any regulations, because"the market must be free to go in whatever direction it goes in", "letworkers decide which businesses have the best policies by not workingfor bad companies", and "taxes only inhibit growth and prosperity".

It's all total bullshit. Everyone knows that self regulation isbullshit -- it ALWAYS has resulted in corporate aliances thatdeliberately screw customers. Just look how the self-regulation of thestock brokers and auditors, and energy companies ended up -- MCI, Tyco,Enron, Anderson-Little, and others. If a company has an opportunity toget away with screwing it's customers without accountability, THEYWILL. If a company is allowed to operate a facility with dangerouspractices that endanger workers or the surrounding community, IT WILL.

Regulations were invented for very good reasons -- to protect workers,to protect communities, and to make people and companies accounatablewhen things go horribly wrong. Libertarians want us to forget our pastrun-ins with monopolies and industry self-regulation.

Read this article:

Urban Dictionary: libertarian