Liberty Maven

Today, voters go to the polls in Massachusetts for a special election to replace the deceased liberal icon Senator Ted Kennedy. Everyone knew a Republican wouldn’t have a chance. Thanks to a poor Democratic candidate, major opposition to health reform, and a well-run campaign by Republican Scott Brown, everyone was wrong.

The last polling available before today’s election had Brown up by 5% and 9% in two different polls. A Brown win would not only mean the eternally blue stained seat long held by Ted Kennedy would turn red, it also means that Obama’s health reform efforts would take a serious hit. Last week Barney Frank (who lives up to his last name) said, “If Scott Brown wins, it’ll kill the health bill.” Those words became the battle cry for opponents of health reform.

The thinking is that if Brown turns Blue into Red other moderate Democrats will reconsider voting for health reform because it will signal to them that they may not get re-elected if they vote otherwise. Also, if Brown wins the Democrats no longer have a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. So there’s a lot riding on tomorrow’s election in Massachusetts, but as is often the case with these things, I’m conflicted.

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Glenn Beck moved from CNN to Fox early in 2009. He now proclaims without hesitation that he considers himself a libertarian. Many long-time, more purist libertarians scoff at that self-characterization. Also last year a new web-only show began airing on Fox’s online video site called “Freedom Watch”. This is where many of the purist libertarians hang out. Judge Andrew Napolitano is the host and he has regular guests that include Ron Paul, Lew Rockwell, Jacob Hornberger, Robert Higgs, Tom Woods, and many more.

Back in December 2009 ABC’s John Stossel switched to Fox and began his own hour long show on the Fox Business Channel. His show is probably somewhere in between Beck’s moderate form of libertarianism and Judge Napolitano’s purist libertarianism on Freedom Watch. Does this mean libertarianism is no longer a dirty word among establishment politicos? Not quite yet, I’m afraid.

The Judge’s show is still only available online and replays are aired on Fox Radio on the weekends. Beck’s claims of libertarianism are difficult to reconcile with his stance on torture and foreign intervention; although, to his credit he has softened his position on foreign wars in the last year. Stossel’s show is on the Fox Business Channel which isn’t the juggernaut in ratings the Fox News Channel has become. Still these three shows could signal a slow evolution toward making libertarianism more mainstream in America.

If you’ve never seen Freedom Watch you can check out all the past shows at FreedomWatchonFox.com. As for Stossel you can watch each of the four shows he’s had so far at the bottom of this article. His show is must-see TV for free marketers and libertarian-minded people every where.

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“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

Originally published January 18, 2010 at http://towneforcongress.com/economy/remarks-on-martin-luther-king-jr-day-and-new-radio-show-announcement

Today is a national holiday in recognizance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s efforts to promote civil liberties.  I have always enjoyed reading or listening to King’s speeches, but my favorite speech was not the moving “I Have a Dream” speech but instead a talk against the Vietnam War.  At the time, he took a lot of criticism for branching off to talking about foreign policy instead of focusing on the civil rights of individuals persecuted by the government and society for the color of their skin.  An excerpt and video from that speech:

“A time comes when silence is betrayal… The truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government’s policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one’s own bosom and in the surrounding world… And some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak…”

I too know about the ‘vocation of agony’ King spoke about and sometimes find it difficult to speak out.  In truth, placing my personal and professional career abroad on hold for 18 months and run for public office – especially as an independent private citizen instead of a Republocrat – was not an easy one.  I certainly do not have anywhere near the natural charisma or eloquence of Dr. King.  It has not been easy to explain why sending government aid to Haiti is morally wrong and even long-term harmful.  I have not enjoyed personally informing those fighting for their lives or in physical pain that the best answer to societies’ health care problems is not more government assistance, but instead to completely remove the government interventions – in part, these conversations affected me when I promised to only take the median household income and donate the remainder to local non-profit hospitals.

Some, no doubt, will not much like what I have to say about the incumbent’s stance on Guantanamo Bay later this week.  However, perhaps in part due to King’s influence, I have not found it difficult to speak out against either theIraq War or the Afghanistan War, and to point out the true madness of US military spending since we spend more than the rest of the world COMBINED and more than 12X more than the next highest spender.  As King said, the time came for me where my continued silence would be betrayal.  I will not remain silent for the consequence if I do is ruin for my country.

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Originally published January 16, 2010 at http://towneforcongress.com/economy/sound-money-and-jobs-plank-1

Sound money is the hallmark of a prosperous society.  Fraudulent money impoverishes and enslaves societies, and history teaches it commonly rips them apart in blood-soaked wars.  Sound money not only imposes fiscal discipline upon government, impeding reckless federal spending and imprudent warfare, but it also provides a stable unit of account, store of value, and medium of exchange for entrepreneurs, businesses, and individuals.

When the Federal Reserve inflates or deflates the money supply, there is no net benefit to society whatsoever.  Obviously, the key to prosperity does not like in running a printing press endlessly, like Zimbabwe, and it defies logic that America’s prosperity would increase if every American deflated the money supply by burning a $100 bill.

Inflation and deflation are simply methods to redistribute wealth.  It is easy to see that inflation benefits debtors and hurts savers on fixed incomes, like many retirees.  Conversely, deflation benefits savers and hurts debtors.  However, there is no net gain.  In large part due to the burden of the $12 trillion dollar debt, the American government chooses inflation to avoid insolvency.    Read More »

by Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital and author of Crash Proof 2.0: How to Profit from the Economic Collapse

Watching the world’s leaders stumble their way through the economic crisis, it often feels as if political success and economic understanding are mutually exclusive. Even the Chinese, who over the past generation have engineered a dramatic turnaround from their Maoist economic nightmare, show a remarkable willingness to pursue a monetary policy (a currency peg to the U.S. dollar) that yields no benefit to their citizens. Amid this morass of economic quackery, it is refreshing to see a clear ray of sanity emanating from one country: Poland.

Last summer, I was invited to speak at the Economic Forum in Krynica, a resort town in Southern Poland. I was amazed at the level of economic activity and civic spirit that was on display throughout the country. I also was fairly surprised that my economic views, which are routinely ridiculed at home, have much wider support among the Polish economic officials who presented at the conference.

This common sense understanding was showcased in an opinion piece published this week in the Financial Times by Polish Finance Minister Jacek Rostowski. Contrary to the public flogging of the free market currently underway in Washington, under the auspices of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, Rostowski explains how governments caused the Crash of 2008 by removing the necessary element of fear from the markets. He states that this was symptomatic of the “deep Keynesian project,” in which governments over the last half century have looked to smooth the economic cycle through periodic floods of monetary expansion and government spending. I couldn’t have said it better myself.

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Bear with me. This is going to be a long and random deluge of my thoughts on the state of politics in the USA as we begin the year 2010.

In 1773 it was Britain’s tea tax on the colonies that moved the American revolutionaries to protest by dumping tea into the Boston harbor. In late 2007 a tribute to that protest occurred on it’s 234th anniversary when $6.04 million was raised in a single day for Ron Paul’s Presidential campaign. In 2009 the Tea Party tribute reached some kind of critical mass with various protests all over America.

Did this happen because the U.S. citizens suddenly realized that their government no longer represented them? Or did this happen because they were just pissed that Barack Obama was elected President instead of Johnny “Maverick” McCain?

It’s important to look at the origins of this “movement”. It all goes back to Ron Paul, or rather, Ron Paul’s grassroots supporters. They were the nuts that commissioned a freakin’ blimp to fly up and down the east coast “advertising” their candidate. They were the nuts that littered America with signs (homemade and otherwise) in every city, town, and suburb. They were the nuts that organized following each debate to vote for their candidate in the post-debate text polls.

They were in your face and you either hated it, tolerated it, or loved it. No matter what your reaction, you can’t deny their dedication. I’m not sure I see that kind of dedication from the Tea Party movement yet. Even though they try to portray that they are angered at the growth of government, many seem to be dedicated to their dislike of Barack Obama and not much else. Bad-mouthing Bush now, comes off as merely lip-service or useless 20/20 hindsight.

Ron Paulers have been doing it since 2007 and are still doing it. The evidence is all around us. Ron Paul’s books are consistent best sellers. His Federal Reserve audit bill has 317 sponsors, including every House Republican and over 100 Democrats. That bill, in the form of an amendment, is contained within Barney Frank’s financial regulatory bill that passed the House and is now waiting for Senate action. Paul is omnipresent on main stream media outlets like CNN, FOX, and MSNBC. He’s a political celebrity that draws huge crowds for conferences and speaking engagements. Politicians seek endorsements from him. In a word, he is “hot” right now, politically speaking.

The best thing to conservatives was for Barack Obama to be elected President. It has galvanized and united many Republicans, libertarians, free market economists, and many independents disillusioned with America’s power elite. However, below the surface runs a very deep divide when it comes to foreign policy. This divide is between those like Ron Paul who support non-intervention and those that support our current policy, the Bush doctrine of preventive war.

Interestingly, this divide cannot be found between Democrats and Republicans. Fundamentally, both parties support the Bush doctrine of preventive war. They may disagree on the specifics of tertiary issues like which country to invade, but there is no difference on policy. This “invade or die” policy is the poison pill that will ultimately bring about our demise because we simply cannot afford it any longer.  Perhaps it should be rephrased, “Invade and die… eventually.”

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Originally published January 14, 2009 at http://towneforcongress.com/economy/aid-for-the-haiti-disaster

Words are not sufficient for the immense and unimaginable loss of perhaps 100,000 lives during the recent earthquake in Haiti.  The immediate question is what can be done to help.  I wrote recently in “Guns or Health Care?” that it wasClara Barton and a group of fellow Americans who founded the Red Cross and Red Crescent, and not the federal government.  The Red Cross has already begunoperations by contributing $1 million from their International Response Fund and sending stocks of tarps, mosquito nets, and cooking sets to Haiti.  I myself made a donation today to the International Response Fund, which can be done here or from the home page, redcross.org.  There are other charities working as well.

The federal government has also pledged assistance with our military.  While I certainly hope this assistance helps saves lives, Americans should not forget the Hurricane Katrina fiasco so quickly.  Our own country was wracked by a serious disaster, though smaller than Haiti’s, and the federal response of FEMA was famously ineffective.  Now, I will not question the government’s benevolent intentions to help, but we must recognize that they are incapable of even balancing their own budget, and was within 72 hours of a technical default last month.  They have failed for 8+ years, spending billions and billions, to locate the leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist group.

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D o w n s i z e r – D i s p a t c h

D o w n s i z e r – D i s p a t c h

With these regulations, the Obama Administration will bypass Congress entirely and implement their climate change agenda. The administration knows what is good for us. Why mess with Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution? Why worry about giving the people represenation?

DownsizeDC.org’s Write the Laws Act (WTLA) would prevent this bureaucratic “legislation without representation” and we encourage you to send a letter to Congress demanding that they pass the WTLA.

These regulations will be very harmful, as I explained in my letter to Congress . . .

The EPA’s proposal to regulate greenhouse gases is a prime example of the need for WTLA. The EPA’s “authority” comes from the Clean Air Act, though that bill was never intended to be used this way. As Steven E. Hayward of the American Enterprise Institute writes . . .
http://www.aei.org/article/101456

* Reducing conventional sources of air pollution in the Clean Air Act was mostly a technological problem–such as removing lead from gasoline.
* The intent and effect of the Clean Air Act was cleaner air, not reduced energy consumption (which has actually doubled)
* But the only way to reduce CO2 emissions is to burn a lot less fossil fuel because there are no add-on technologies to remove carbon dioxide from fossil fuel combustion
* Which means the EPA will turn into an energy regulatory agency

It gets worse . . .    Read More »

by Clyde James Aragon

The late 1960s through the early 1970s was the heyday of the muscle car in America. With names like Pontiac GTO, Plymouth Road Runner, and Ford Thunderbolt 427, these cars seethed power and performance and hedonistically guzzled gas as they wolfed down the asphalt flying down the road.

Alas, these days the automobile engineer will be more concerned with trying to fit bucket seats onto a lawn mower chassis than giving the public cars that scare the average deaf pedestrian. They can’t actually build a muscle car anymore due to high gas prices, crushing environmental restrictions, and, more importantly, liberal disapproval. But, while engineers may be realists, at heart they are dreamers. They cringe at the thought of entering a Toyota Prius into a NASCAR race. They aspire to the glory days of American motoring.

But how to turn their hopes into reality? You’d think it would be difficult but in reality it’s quite easy to bring back the age of the muscle car. Here’s how you’d do it:

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