Cops Gone Wild: Brutal attack on teen girl not uncommon police behavior

By now, unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve seen the video of the 15-year-old girl who was violently attacked by a Seattle (Kings County) cop while being booked, because she kicked her shoe off at him and called him a name.

For said cave dwellers, here’s the video in question from a news report.

The teen had been arrested when she and some friends were seen driving erratically; the car belonged to a friend’s mother, and had been taken without permission.  The girls were arrested and charged with stealing the car.

Bear in mind, I do not condone that behavior by any stretch of the imagination.  No one ever has the right to take someone else’s property without permission, and they were also a serious danger to everyone else on the road since their erratic driving along with their age suggests they had no training or experience driving a motor vehicle.  I therefore have absolutely no problem with the girls being arrested.

I do, however, have a very, very serious problem with cops violently attacking suspects in this manner.

In a nutshell, the 15-year-old girl (Malika Calhoun, who has since given media interviews so her name is in the public record) angered officer Paul Schene, age 31, by calling him a “fat pig” and kicking her shoe off at him (though the shoe was not kicked hard, so it could not have harmed anyone), and Schene reacted with a shocking level of violence.  As you can see in the video, Schene ran into the room in full attack mode, slammed her head against the wall, threw her to the floor, punched her in the head several times, then picked her up by her hair (don’t get me started on what the hair-pulling says about this cop’s psychological problems).  She complained of having trouble breathing after the attack, which I do not doubt.  If nothing else, she may have had a panic attack following the shockingly violent attack against her.

Should she have called him a “fat pig” and kicked her shoe off at him?  Obviously not, and it’s pretty clear that she is a troubled teen based on her being involved in auto theft.  At the same time, that kind of behavior in teens is not unusual, as many parents find out the hard way, and many teens engage in that kind of behavior but grow up to be perfectly respectable, law-abiding adults; in fact, that’s why the criminal records of minors are sealed, since they lack the maturity of adults and do many times make extremely poor choices.  Either way, her disrespectful actions toward Schene do not explain Schene’s reaction, and in fact his reaction says far more about him than her behavior says about her, given her age.  I therefore can’t say her portrayal of him as a “fat pig” was necessarily incorrect.  Why should anyone respect the authority of a cop like Schene, who acts like a violent criminal himself?

Even in light of the video evidence against him, Schene has only been placed on paid leave pending the investigation.  Yet it is very clear that he engaged in brutality, since even his defense – that she called him names and kicked her shoe off at him – does not in any way explain, much less excuse, his violent actions.  So why are taxpayers being forced to fund what amounts to a paid vacation for him?  Clearly he is a danger to the public, and thus should have been fired as soon as his actions came to light.  Steps must be taken to protect the public from Schene.  Pure and simple, this is a man who should never have been given a badge.  Paul Schene didn’t just snap and attack a suspect this one time, that much I can guarantee.  He merely got away with it until now, because he’s a cop.

While the various television talking heads are quick to point out that this is an unusual situation, they’re both completely right and horribly, terribly wrong.  This kind of violence toward suspects actually happens all the time, but is almost impossible to prove since the average person tends to believe cops over the people they arrested, so the public doesn’t hear about it.   The only thing truly unusual about this situation – not unlike the infamous Rodney King beating by the LAPD - is that the attack was caught on videotape.  In this case, the prosecutor who was assigned to examine the criminal complaint (filed by the cop against the girl, not vice versa) pulled the surveillance tape to see what happened.  Had Schene not charged the girl for kicking her shoe at him, the public would never have even known about this shocking instance of police brutality.  The truth is, few if any people would believe a 15-year-old girl over a cop, even if she went public with the allegation.  Schene was counting on that, too.  The fact that he knew there was a surveillance camera there, but still filed the assault charges against her, suggests that he was counting on the prosecutor looking the other way as well.

The other cop in the room, a trainee, never reported the incident even though he had an absolute duty to do so since a violent crime was committed in his presence.  Is this trainee really so stupid that he doesn’t recognize assault when it’s right in front of him?  Does that trainee believe that cops are allowed to brutalize suspects?  Was he afraid of getting into trouble for being there?  Or did the trainee not report it because he feared for his career, and possibly even his life since in the field he has to depend upon other cops to cover his back?

The trainee cop has not been disciplined, and has not been charged.  However, he should have been fired immediately for failing to report the assault.  It’s easy to fire a trainee, since they can be relieved of duty for any reason, or no reason at all.  Chances are he was not fired because he cooperated with the investigation into Schene’s actions, but that still does not excuse his actions (or lack thereof) insofar as his employment is concerned.  At most he should be granted immunity from prosecution, since he does not appear to have assaulted the girl himself (but could still be charged with conspiracy); however, he still should lose his job for not reporting Schene’s assault.

Schene, on the other hand, would be harder to fire because he almost certainly has the Fraternal Order of Police backing him up.  While the FOP is extremely powerful when it comes to defending cops who have been fired, it would also be extremely hard for them to successfully argue that Schene should not be fired in light of the video and his pathetic excuses for his actions.  Yes, it would cost the department quite a bit of money to defend against a union challenge, but that’s their mistake and they now need to correct it.  They obviously didn’t screen either cop very well, or else they would not be in this predicament at all.  They need to fire the trainee, fire Schene, fight any FOP challenge to the decision, and learn from it by more carefully screening their officers.  Either way, take the badge and gun away from this uniformed thug before he kills someone else.

Yes, you read that right.  Schene has been a cop for only eight years, but has already been investigated for two police-related shootings, one of which resulted in death.  He was cleared both times, which is also not at all surprising.  Cops are rarely found at fault in shootings, even when they acted improperly, because the cop’s claimed perceptions are given greater weight than the actual reality of the situation.  Schene’s shootings should be reinvestigated by an independent panel outside the law enforcement community and outside the area, given his actions in this case which clearly show that he has extremely serious impulse control problems which render him dangerous to others, as well as the failure of everyone within the department to report his assault upon the girl – though obviously numerous people knew, including the trainee and the medics – which suggests there may have been a coverup in the investigation of the shootings as well. 

This brings me to another issue, with regard to the complaint made against this girl which resulted in the discovery of this surveillance video.  Simply stated, charges of obstruction of justice and assault on a police officer are rarely legitimate charges.  More likely than not, they are used to pad other charges.  Sometimes, as in this case, a charge of assault upon a police officer is filed only to cover up violent behavior by the cops.  Those kinds of charges are also used as a trump card by the prosecution, to make defendants think they’re getting a deal by having some charges dropped in exchange for a guilty plea on other charges, when in reality there is rarely any evidence to back up the dropped charges beyond than the cop’s word.  That the girl would be charged with assault upon a police officer at all, given what is shown in that video, is disturbing at best.

What I find most disturbing of all, however, is the number of people who are defending Schene for committing a violent crime against a minor.  The internet is overrun by those making excuses for him, from “maybe he had a bad day” to “the girl had it coming because she stole a car”.   I hate to tell them this, but “having a bad day” is not an excuse for attacking anyone, or else it would be an affirmative defense for everyone accused of assault, murder, and other violent crimes; and there is no law in this country which states that the punishment for being accused of car theft is a violent beating by someone much larger than you, and trained to attack others. 

Those who claim to be law-and-order types are strangely the first ones to suggest that violent crime is acceptable, as long as it’s committed by a cop.  Those with the same mindset defended the animals-with-badges on the LAPD who nearly beat Rodney King to death (they claimed he was resisting arrest, though the video shows otherwise), and the NYPD cops who shot Amadou Diallo a shocking 41 times (they claimed they thought his wallet, taken out to show ID as he did not speak English well, was a gun), so making excuses for completely out-of-control cops is not a new phenomenon, but it never fails to be an extremely disturbing reflection upon our society.

At any rate, the US Department of Justice is now investigating Schene’s actions in brutalizing the teenager.  While normally I don’t approve of the feds intervening in local affairs, it is the best thing which could happen in this case since local authorities (and local juries) rarely take appropriate action in cases of police brutality, even when there is clear and convincing evidence and high public/media interest.  Even in this case, in which Schene was criminally charged, he was only charged with misdemeanor fourth-degree assault.  Chances are he will get probation at most if convicted of that charge, and based upon the long history of cops being acquitted for even more heinous acts against the citizenry, it is not even sure that he will be convicted despite the video evidence.  However, if convicted in federal court, he will likely be sentenced to federal prison, and caged like the animal he has proven himself to be.

LPNY Chair Eric Sundwall to appear on “Break The Matrix”

From http://www.breakthematrix.com/node/31103:

• BreakTheMatrix

Join us tomorrow for a Splitscreen show on Wake Up America Show channel 1

9am eastern Join us for an interview with Eric Sundwall http://ericsundwall.com/ to discuss the Libertarian Party, its principles and the direction of the party.

http://www.breakthematrix.com/content/Eric-Sundwall-NY-Libertarian-Party…

10am eastern Join the BTM Book Club as we feature Thomas Woods and Murray Polner a Transpartisan team who have written a great new book “WE WHO DARE TO SAY NO TO WAR”

http://www.breakthematrix.com/content/Thomas-Woods-Murray-Polner-Book-of…

These interviews will be conducted on the splitscreen so don’t miss it and we will see you in the chat room

Be a Leader in Liberty!

Kurt Wallace

Call to Arms: Resolution of Discipline against Angela Keaton

The charges against Angela Keaton have finally been disclosed (well, leaked, LOL) and Stewart Flood is behind them.  He wrote it, and he plans to present it on Saturday.

Grab your popcorn, folks, because this one is a doozy.  Strangely, it reflects far more upon Stewart than it does on Angela.  After reading it over, it’s my opinion that Stewie needs both a humor implant, and a life.  It must have taken him forever to dig up all this crap on Ms. Keaton, and most of it obviously was just a joke on her part, an exaggeration on his part, and/or taken completely out of context.  The rest I’ll have to check into, but as far as I’m concerned, just glancing over it based upon what I have seen, the charges are a joke.

Of particular interest is the allegation that Ms. Keaton provided material support to another political party (assumably the BTP).  What exactly was Bob Barr doing, both when he sat on the LNC and was the LP’s presidential candidate, while his PAC contributed thousands to Republican candidates, if not providing material support to another party?  Why wasn’t he brought up on disciplinary charges? 

The resolution is to suspend her, but the suspension will be rescinded if she submits a written apology to millions of people within seven days, on about 20 differerent alleged “offenses”, to be published in LP News.  This is clearly in my opinion nothing but an attempt to humiliate her, given the very weird nature of the charges, and force her to bend to the demands of the reformers.  

So, here’s your assignment, LFV contributors and readers.  Dig up all the dirt you can on every single person she has allegedly harmed, according to the resolution.  I know there’s a lot out there, because I have received a lot of it over time.  I’m talking everything, from Stewart allegedly claiming to have been a Unabomber suspect, to men on the LNC calling Angela a “fucking bitch”.  Post it in comments.  

Here’s the “Resolution of Discipline”:  resolution-of-discipline-for-angela-keaton

LNC member Scott Lieberman urges factions to compromise for the greater good

Scott Lieberman, LNC Alternate Representative, posted the following to the LNC discussion list today.

As I mentioned a while ago, 98% of all of the elected offices in the United States are at the local level. The majority of those are non-partisan.

That means that your constituents can run for those local, non-partisan offices, or apply for a Board or Commission, regardless of how effective the National LP is.

And yet, the LNC is at war with itself over – basically – who was (or will be) our Presidential Nominee, and, to a lesser extent, the National LP Platform.

Why are we fighting so hard over what are basically outreach tools? Although I disagree with these statements, even IF Bob Barr ran a “conservative-libertarian” campaign, or IF the National LP Platform just barely makes it to the 70-70 point on the Diamond Chart – do either of those conditions make it impossible for you or your constituents to serve as elected or appointed officials in local offices? Are all of our anarchist/Radical members going to all of a sudden govern or advise their City Councils in a socialistic or fascist way just because the National LP Platform is not an Anarchist Manifesto?

My point is – after you watch the live web-telecast of next weekend’s LNC Meeting (which I assume will be done by an audience member due to the nature of this Meeting), I suggest that your constituents surf the Internet, look up their town’s or county’s list of Boards and Commissions, and download an application form. And then – fill it in, and send it to your Town Clerk. You don’t need any permission or any help from the National LP to do that.

In the meantime, I am going to see if the Town and Country Resort will let me sell peanuts and popcorn in the LNC meeting room, because it looks like we are going to have a sell-out crowd.

Scott Lieberman LNC Alternate, R2

LNC hires parliamentarian in Keaton removal bid

The LNC has hired a parliamentarian to help in its seemingly neverending quest to remove At-Large Representative Angela Keaton.  The report in question (see below) states that there is no provision in the Bylaws for removing an LNC member, as there is only a provision for suspending LNC members.  Then, it makes the leap of logic that a suspension (which is by definition temporary) will turn into a removal (which is by definition permanent) should Angela not appeal to the Judiciary Committee, or should her appeal be denied.

That is incorrect.  If there is no provision for removing an LNC member in the Bylaws, then she cannot be removed.  She can only be suspended.  Furthermore, a loss at the Judicial Committee level would mean only that the suspension had been upheld, and not that she had been removed.

While this may seem like nitpicking, since the term of suspension could technically be for the rest of her LNC term, it is not.  There is a huge difference between a suspension and a removal.  It is the difference between being suspended from school for three days, and being expelled from school.  It is the difference between showing up at work drunk and being told to go home and sleep it off without pay, and being fired for it.  There are many real-world examples of the significant difference between suspension and removal.  

In this case, there is yet another significant difference, and that is whether someone else will be permanently appointed to her position on the LNC, and whether that person would change the balance of power on the LNC.  

The report also states that the LNC needs 12 votes to suspend her.  Are there enough LNC members willing to vote against her for her to actually be suspended?  Perhaps, perhaps not.

Here is the document.  opinion-removal-lnc-at-large-1

Now, for a poll.

Change in meeting time for LNC meeting

The LNC meeting in San Diego on Saturday, December 6th, has been changed to start at 8:00 am, rather than the original starting time of 8:30 am.

Anyone planning to attend needs to make sure they note this time change.

LNC Financial Report leaked

Though as always I will not reveal my source …. since everything which goes wrong on the LNC these days seems to be automatically blamed on Angela Keaton, I’d like to be very clear in saying that Ms. Keaton was not my source for this leaked document, nor to my knowledge did she have any part in it having been leaked.

lnc-financial-package-2008-10-31-version-2

LNC Attorney Bill Hall’s memo to LNC

The LNC’s own longtime attorney, Bill Hall, seems pretty much fed up with their shenanigans according to his latest memo.  Here, read it for yourself.

bill-hall-lnc

The LNC shows its true agenda

The Agenda for the December LNC meeting – which looks like someone has quite an agenda indeed – has listed 30 minutes for “Discipline of Angela Keaton”.

How strangely interesting that Angela Keaton was unaware of this item until the agenda was released. Quite the contrary, in fact, since she was under the impression that the “discipline” discussed at the last meeting was now moot.

There are several theories floating around about that agenda item, and one of them is that Angela is being disciplined for wearing a Boston Tea Party t-shirt. It appears that at least one LNC member snooped around her Facebook until he found the allegedly incriminating photo.  Why on earth would someone do that, unless they had a predetermined agenda?

Problem is, though I had seen the picture numerous times, to the point that I knew exactly which photo was in question even before I saw it, even I didn’t know it was Angela in the t-shirt, since the photo doesn’t show her head or face.  Honestly, I thought it was Miche modeling the t-shirt.  That being the case, how could it possibly be a breach of duty even if, arguendo, it is Angela?

The other theory is that during the last LNC meeting, Angela was given ten days to apologize, but she has not done so; and as a result, rather than the item being moot, it is being revisited.  I did not believe then that the LNC acted professionally or with the best interests of the LP at heart in their behavior during the last LNC meeting, and I still do not believe they acted appropriately.  

One thing is abundantly clear, and must not be forgotten: Angela Keaton is a two-term elected member of the Libertarian National Committee. She is the most active LNC member by far with regard to keeping the membership apprised of party actions and business.  As such, she is irreplaceable.  To even attempt to remove her yet again, will cause irreparable damage to the morale of many libertarians at a time when the LP can hardly afford to spread ill will.  

Last but certainly not least, this silly vendetta makes the LP look grossly unprofessional to those who are outside looking in.  We don’t see the major parties comporting themselves in this manner regarding strictly internal questions, because they know how damaging it would be not only to their personal reputations, but the reputation of the party they represent.  The LP doesn’t have a built-in constituency like the GOP and the Democrats.  The LP cannot afford behavior which makes them look like they’re coming apart at the seams from the inside, yet that’s exactly how this appears.

It is one thing when libertarians fuss and fight with each other.  It is something altogether different when the elected governing body is engaging in that behavior.

This is not how such internal problems – assuming it is a problem at all, and in my opinion it is not – should be handled.  Furthermore, I don’t understand why 30 minutes is being set aside for the LNC to publicly humiliate an elected representative, while far less time is set aside for far more substantive matters.

Frankly, I am disappointed.  I was under the mistaken impression that the LNC is comprised of adults. Instead they appear to be perpetually in kindergarten, where they put people in “time out” for alleged offenses, then keep badgering them until they apologize even when they don’t believe they did anything wrong.

Seriously, LNC, is badgering Angela Keaton worth 30 minutes of your meeting time, when your presidential candidate fell so far short of his pre-nomination promises that the end result was nothing short of humiliating? Is it worth it to burn up that time when you should be discussing the fact that your presidential candidate gave money to Republicans running against Libertarian candidates? Is it worth it so you don’t have to discuss your VP candidate’s racist comments in Reason Magazine?  Is it worth it to burn up that time when the LP is, financially speaking, the rough equivalent of the Titanic?  Or is burning up time the whole point, since “disciplining” Angela Keaton will eat up time more enlighteningly spent analyzing and discussing what went so terribly wrong with the Libertarian Party this election season, and what part the LNC played in that failure?

The LNC already ate up a great deal of its only pre-election meeting with “disciplining” Angela Keaton, when they had far more important things to discuss; and perhaps if they had spent their time doing what it is that they were elected to do, the election would have fared far better. How long is this vindictive agenda against Ms. Keaton going to continue? Why wasn’t this discussed on the LNC talk list, rather than dragged out into full public view? There is really only one possible reason for that, and that reason is to publicly humiliate Angela Keaton.

Why should anyone take the LNC seriously, when they repeatedly waste precious quarterly meeting time trying to remove an elected LNC member, rather than discussing the important issues which affect the party as a whole?  I find the LNC’s behavior on this subject to be extremely distasteful, and downright embarrassing.  

Nevertheless, Angela Keaton has every right to appear at that meeting fully prepared to refute the charges against her.  However, that will prove difficult since she has not been formally apprised of the specific charges against her, nor has she been apprised of the identity of her accuser(s).  

What kind of kangaroo court does the LNC plan to hold in San Diego?  Again, it disgusts me, as it should disgust all libertarians.  It is an act of aggression against a woman elected by the membership, through its delegates.  This is not Ms. Keaton’s first term, so it’s not as if they didn’t know exactly who they were electing, or why they were electing her.  Ms. Keaton was elected to do exactly what she has done to get her into this predicament, which is to represent the voiceless within the LP through whatever means necessary.  That was the will of the membership.  Now, she is paying a heady price, and to what end?  What does the LNC stand to gain from her departure?  That is a question best posed to the LNC member behind the agenda item in question, as well as for any other LNC member who supports this action.

One thing is for sure.  This insistence by the LNC to continue its vendetta against Ms. Keaton will only harm the Libertarian Party, its members, and the libertarian movement as a whole.  Longtime respected libertarian activists are rebelling already; and without the activists, the LP may as well not even exist.

For the above reasons, I respectfully suggest that those who keep pushing this anti-Keaton agenda should be the ones disciplined, for openly engaging in a public vendetta against a fellow elected representative, thus causing serious harm to the party they are duty-bound to protect.

LNC Meeting Agenda

Libertarian National Committee, Inc.

December 6-7, 2008 Meeting Agenda

San Diego, California

 

Saturday, December 6, 2008 & Sunday, December 7, 2008
Call to Order	8:30 AM
Moment of Reflection	1 minute
Opportunity for Public Comment	10 minutes
Credentials Report and Paperwork Check (Secretary)	5 minutes
Report of Potential Conflicts of Interest	5 minutes
Approval of the Agenda	5 minutes
Standing Reports
Chair’s Report	20 minutes
Treasurer’s Report	30 minutes
Secretary’s Report	10 minutes
Wayne Allyn Root to Address the LNC	30 minutes
Discipline of Angela Keaton	30 minutes
Staff Report
Staff Reports	60 minutes
Counsel’s Report	15 minutes
Action Items Previously Submitted in Writing
	0 minutes
Reports Previously Submitted in Writing
Campus Organizing Report (Lark)	5 minutes
Various Regions	5 minutes per
Action Items Not Previously Submitted in Writing
Mission Statement (Hawkridge)	60 minutes
Goals (Lark/Dixon)	60 minutes
Executive Director Search (Colley)	10 minutes
Budget 2009 (Starr) (already submitted in writing)	120 minutes
Convention 2010 (Colley)	15 minutes
Convention Electronic Voting Demonstration (Mattson)	30 minutes
Bylaws Committee Report (Karlan)	10 minutes
LNCC Report (Hawkridge)	10 minutes
Policy Manual Amendment—Authorization of Lawsuits (Lark)	20 minutes
Policy Manual Amendment—Mail Ballot Reporting (Karlan)	10 minutes
LNC Meeting Video Recording & Archiving (Keaton)	15 minutes
Executive Session Minutes/Confidentiality (Fox)	15 minutes
LP News Content (Keaton)	15 minutes
Set LNC Meeting Dates for July orAug. & Nov. or Dec. 2009	15 minutes
Opportunity for Public Comment	10 minutes
Adjournment

LP Platform Committee Candidates

Barber, Chris
Carmany, Michael
Carpenter, Corey
Gordon, Stephen
Green, Stephen
Hauptmann, Joe
Hogarth, Susan
Holtz, Brian
Howell, John
Jacob, John
Mattson, Alicia
Mayer, Adam
Oakson, James
Power, Rob
Roland, Jon
Sink-Burris, Rebecca
Starchild
Stewart, Richard
Stewart, Scott

 

Do LFV readers have any thoughts on the candidates with regard to how well they would function in that capacity?

Jason Gatties resigns as Boston Tea Party Chairman

Dear Freedom Fighters,

I would like to thank those who have expressed concerned over the illness in my family. Trust me, it does help. I also want to thank everyone who in this brief period of serving as chairman, supported my efforts. However, sometimes in life, there are more important battles and I’m at that stage right now. When I decided to run for the Chair seat, I could not foresee the issues that have popped up in my life personally over the past two weeks.

The Boston Tea Party deserves a Chairman who can dedicate 100% towards the cause. I’m simply unable to do that at this time. Family comes first and politics will always take a back seat to that. It is for this reason that I must officially resign as Chairman of the Boston Tea Party. I need to tend to family & more importantly, my pregnant wife. There is nothing more important to me than her health and I want to make sure that I can be there to hold her hand during this stressful period. She is very close to her family, but they live an ocean away, so hearing about someone she was close to dying of cancer is just a bit much right now. I’m all she has and I must be there for her.

I’m sure there will be those who will rip me for this decision and that is within your right to do so. However, I will never put politics ahead of family.

It was an honor to be elected your Chairman and I’m confident Douglass Gaking will be a fantastic Chairman, as he takes over my duties on a full time basis. The timing is just bad. I wish I could stick around and help this party grow, and perhaps I can in the future in some capacity, but right now just isn’t that time.

Thank you all so very much. Take care and keep fighting the good fight.

Jason Gatties

GM plans to invest $1 billion of US bailout money in Brazil

From Latin American Herald Tribune:

By Russ Dallen
Latin American Herald Tribune staff

General Motors plans to invest $1 billion in Brazil to avoid the kind of problems the U.S. automaker is facing in its home market, said the beleaguered car maker.

According to the president of GM Brazil-Mercosur, Jaime Ardila, the funding will come from the package of financial aid that the manufacturer will receive from the U.S. government and will be used to “complete the renovation of the line of products up to 2012.”

“It wouldn’t be logical to withdraw the investment from where we’re growing, and our goal is to protect investments in emerging markets,” he said in a statement published by the business daily Gazeta Mercantil.

Meanwhile, he cut the company’s revenue forecast for this year by 14% to $9.5 billion from $11 billion, as the economic crisis began to cause rapid slowdowns in sales. 

GM already announced three programs of paid leave, and Ardila added that GM Brazil “is going to wait and see how the market behaves in order to know what decision to take” with regard to possible layoffs.

For Ardila, the injection in Brazil’s automobile sector of 8 billion reais ($3.51 billion) recently announced by the federal and state governments of Sao Paulo “has already begun to revive sales,” which fell by 12% in October.

The executive said that the company will operate a “conservative” scenario in 2009 with an estimated production of 2.6 million units, and another more “optimistic” that contemplates sales of 2.9 million.

This year sales will reach 2.85 million vehicles, which represents a growth of 15% over last year.

Russ Dallen with EFE in Sao Paulo

Hat tip Brad Spangler

Cheney and Gonzalez indicted in Texas

From Houston Chronicle:

McALLEN — A South Texas grand jury has indicted Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on state charges related to the alleged abuse of prisoners in Willacy County’s federal detention centers.

The indictment, which had not yet been signed by the presiding judge, was one of seven released Tuesday in a county that has been a source of bizarre legal and political battles in recent years. Another of the indictments named a state senator on charges of profiting from his position.

Willacy County District Attorney Juan Angel Guerra himself had been under indictment for more than a year and half before a judge dismissed the indictments last month. This flurry of charges came in the twilight of Guerra’s tenure, which ends this year after nearly two decades in office. He lost convincingly in a Democratic primary in March.

Cheney’s indictment on a charge of engaging in an organized criminal activity criticizes the vice president’s investment in the Vanguard Group, which holds interests in the private prison companies running the federal detention centers. It accuses Cheney of a conflict of interest and “at least misdemeanor assaults” on detainees because of his link to the prison companies.

Megan Mitchell, a spokeswoman for Cheney, declined to comment on Tuesday, saying that the vice president had not yet received a copy of the indictment.

The indictment accuses Gonzales of using his position while in office to stop an investigation in 2006 into abuses at one of the privately-run prisons.

Gonzalez’s attorney, George Terwilliger III, said in a written statement, “This is obviously a bogus charge on its face, as any good prosecutor can recognize. Hopefully, competent Texas authorities will take steps to reign in this abuse of the criminal justice system.”

Willacy County has become a prison hub with county, state and federal lockups. Guerra has gone after the prison-politician nexus before, extracting guilty pleas from three former Willacy and Webb county commissioners after investigating bribery related to federal prison contacts.

(Click link above to read entire article)

Liberty for America critiques spending, announces PAC

George Phillies’ Liberty for America newsletter (November 08 issue) discusses and critiques spending by the Bob Barr campaign, as well as by the LNC.

liberty-for-america-nov08

Liberty for America says that it is “not currently” a political party, and does “not currently” run or endorse political candidates, but is “preparing to offer positive political alternatives not available elsewhere”.  

The organization is currently accepting donations, as well as memberships at the rate of $15 per year, though currently its PDF-format newsletter is available free of charge.  Free newsletter subscription information is contained in the newsletter.

According to the newsletter, the Liberty for America PAC will soon be in place to financially support liberty-minded candidates.

The Liberty for America website is here.

Antiwar.com: Just Say No to Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State

Antiwar.com Action Alert         Say ’NO’ to Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State                      Quick Links                    Originial Antiwar.com Column by Justin Raimondo       Newsletter        Take Action  Donate          Dear Antiwar.com Supporter,   Please let the incoming presidential administration know that you demand real change in our interventionist foreign policy. A Secrectary of State Hilllary Clinton is not change but tacit approval for someone who supported the bombing of Kosovo, the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and a renewed cold war with Russia.    Demand President Elect Barack Obama make a stand for peace by not appointing Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. You can easily let the transition team know your thoughts on this matter by calling 202-540-3000 or pasting the letter below into this form.     Dear President Elect Obama:   You sailed to victory on the promise of change and hope. For those of us who love peace, a change in foreign policy cannot come about by rewarding those who support and argued for the continued occupation of Iraq. You said we must not ”to bully it [the world] into submission – we must lead the world, by deed and example.”  Please allow your administration to reflect those values you so eloquently expressed.    President Elect Obama, we want change in the White House. We ask you to not to appoint Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.    Respectfully,       [Antiwar.com Reader] For more information about this action item, media requests, donations or other information, contact Angela Keaton at 323-512-7095 or angela@antiwar.com.

Antiwar

BTP Chair Jason Gatties steps back from duties due to personal issues

I wanted to make everyone aware that I’m going to step away from my
duties as Chairman of the Boston Tea Party National Committee to take
care of some personal issues. There’s an illness on my wife’s side of
the family and we have very few details at the moment.

My wife, who is pregnant, is pretty stressed out and rightfully so.
She deserves my love and attention right now, as any good husband
would provide.

Vice Chairman Douglass Gaking will take over my duties for the time
being. Right now, there is no set time line for my return, but I hope
to resume my duties in the very near future.

Please keep my family in your thoughts.

In Liberty,

Jason Gatties
Chairman
Boston Tea Party National Committee

 

Positive thoughts and best wishes go out to Jason and Cilla Gatties (and their family) from everyone at LFV.  Please do not hesitate to let us know if there is anything we can do to help.  In the meantime, we’ll keep your place on LFV warm for you, until you are in a position to return.

Brian Doherty: Where the Libertarian Party went wrong

 With the nomination of former Republican Congressman Bob Barr, many in the Libertarian Party anticipated the LP’s most successful presidential campaign to date. In his definitive postmortem, Senior Editor Brian Doherty explains where the Barr campaign went wrong.

Read all about it here.

Knapp address 2012 candidacy on MySpace

Fellow libertarians,

I initially planned to announce my 2012 candidacy for the presidency of the United States on April 6th, 2009, from the steps of the Old St. Louis Courthouse (history buffs shouldn’t have too much trouble figuring out why), and I still intend to conduct a campaign event of some kind at that time and in that place.

I see, however, that others are already lining up with formal announcements or at least clear indications of their own intent … and when a fight’s brewing, I prefer to get in early.

It is therefore my distinct pleasure to announce that I will seek the 2012 presidential nominations of the Libertarian Party and the Boston Tea Party.

Why run for president — and why, especially, for the presidential nominations of two parties which together usually account for less than one percent of the popular vote in presidential elections?

I could give you lots of reasons, but I’m going to stick with three for the moment: There are some hard truths that need to be told, I’m interested in telling them, and they’re most effectively told from a bully pulpit.

Among those those hard truths are that the political wing of the libertarian movement will never make substantial progress toward its goals so long as it clings to the apron strings of the failed movements and parties of the past, remains in orbit around the present political “center,” or falls prey to cargo-cultish notions of what constitutes “serious” politics.

If we want a libertarian future, we must create that future, not hope that our political opponents drag us along to it. They won’t. They’re not going in the direction we want to go in, they have no desire to go in the direction we want to go in, and to the extent that they’re interested in us at all, they regard us either as fuel to be consumed or ballast to be dumped overboard at the earliest opportunity. I don’t blame them. We haven’t yet given them reason to regard us as a true threat to their power. It’s time to change that.

As my friend and mentor L. Neil Smith once observed, “great men don’t move to the center, they move the center.” It’s a big center, folks. Moving it will require a long lever, with us at the far end. I don’t claim to be a great man … but I hope to be part of a great movement, and to help that movement get further out on the lever and put some weight on it.

Insofar as cargo-cultism and “seriousness” are concerned, rest assured that I have nothing against suits and ties, friendly media interviews and the other requirements of realpolitick. What I do oppose is the absurd notion that waving around “mainstreamism” like some kind of voodoo fetish will magically boost us to competitive stature versus our older, more established opponents. It won’t.

The future of the libertarian movement, if it is has one, requires a principled populist approach rooted in class theory. Not the theory of the socialists (labor versus capital) or of the liberals and conservatives (ad hoc identity politics adjusted to appeal to society’s phobias du jour), but rather the theory of the productive class (those who make their living through work and voluntary exchange and cooperation) versus the political class (those who siphon off as much of that productive activity as they can get away with, using the coercive apparatus of the state, for their own ends).

For these reasons, the first phase of my campaign will largely be internal to the parties and the movement; as we move on, it will become more outwardly focused, of course, but first things first.

My fundamental goal in seeking the nominations of the LP and the BTP is not to achieve those nominations or to be elected President of the United States. It is to help the libertarian movement outfit itself for a journey yet to begin — a journey which that movement has stood stock still at the starting point of for nearly four decades now. If I achieve that goal, the nominations and the election results are of secondary importance, as I’m certain others are at least as qualified as I am to march at the front of the column. If I do not achieve those goals, then the nominations and the election results will resemble John Nance Garner’s description of the importance of the Vice Presidency of the United States: “Not worth a bucket of warm spit.”

I look forward to an exciting campaign, and I humbly request the support of all who value the future of freedom.

Yours in liberty,
Thomas L. Knapp
Knapp2012.Com

Tom Knapp to seek 2012 LP/BTP Presidential bid

You heard it here first, folks, when LFV posted about the Knapp2012 domain. 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
11/11/08
POC Thomas L. Knapp
admin@knapp2012. com
314-750-6993

WHEN THE GOING GETS WEIRD, THE WEIRD RUN FOR PRESIDENT
Knapp announces 2012 candidacy

While most Americans are still catching up on their rest from a
hard-fought presidential election, one group of individuals is already
on the march: Those who aspire to election in 2012.

Among them is Thomas L. Knapp, who announced his candidacy for the
presidential nominations of the Boston Tea Party and the Libertarian
Party Tuesday evening.

“I initially planned to announce my 2012 candidacy for the presidency
of the United States on April 6th, 2009,” said Knapp in a
Internet-distribute d announcement. “I see, however, that others are
already lining up with formal announcements or at least clear
indications of their own intent … and when a fight’s brewing, I
prefer to get in early.”

Citing ideological drift in the Libertarian Party, Knapp, 42, founded
the Boston Tea Party in 2006 and served as its vice-presidential
nominee this year — while also running for Congress in his home state
of Missouri as a Libertarian Party candidate. He hopes to bring the
two parties closer together with his presidential campaign. “The LP
has a lot of installed plant — ballot access, seasoned activists, the
things that any party requires to be successful,” he says. “What we
lost track of were our principles — but the BTP has been keeping
those alive and will hopefully be happy to share them back.”

Knapp’s campaign organization is embryonic but already in existence.
He’s appointed Darcy G. Richardson, a noted political historian and
veteran of numerous third party campaigns, as his campaign’s chief of
staff. Also on board is Nick Galindo, an experienced campaign
treasurer.

His chances? He’s realistic: “We’ve got a tough row to hoe before we
reach political success,” he says. “Much of my campaign will be about
correcting mistakes the freedom movement has made in the past and
positioning us to move forward further and faster.”

-30-

Campaign Site:
http://www.knapp201 2.com

Boston Tea Party:
http://www.bostonte a.us

Libertarian Party:
http://www.lp. org

Keaton/Shinghal to seek presidency in 2012

Gawd (sorry-was home in NOLA all last week), I didn’t want to do this but the timing may be perfect and I want to show that I can be as opportunistic as Barr/Root.

I’d like to officially announce the Keaton/Shinghal 2012 ticket. We already have some support on our Facebook page and we have BIG fundraising plans. The unofficial plan is called ‘Stripping across Texas’ but we’re not like most strippers; we know we’ll have neither diploma nor presidency in the end and we don’t plan to sell it that way. With that plan in place alone, we guarandamntee that we can out raise Barr/Root by at least $100k. 

Now, I know that y’all might be worried about qualifications. Well, I haven’t any except the abilities to balance a checkbook, drink like a fish and well, never mind. Let’s just say that of all the men in my past I only count on 3 not voting for me. Keaton has a Masters in Poli-Sci and a law degree. (That’s why she’s the top of the ticket- that and Knapp came to our room in Denver and found her awake before I.) As far as media goes I think that perhapsreason might do us a solid and cover us in a non-judgmental way. Angela does have some rather racy pics on the web and , I have the support of many from the cult of Ron Paul. (Disclosure crap makes me admit that I’m part of that cult…)

There are 3 things about Keaton/Shinghal 2012 that set us apart from many others who might seek your delegate vote. They are: 3) We’re both married to reputable men who are fastidious about their standings in the eyes of their peers and government. In other words, there will be nothing of substance to block our run in the eyes of the state. 2) We’ve no small children- retarded or otherwise- to occupy our thoughts on the campaign trail. 1) We’re fucking Libertarians and we can make the most hostile people friendly in a face to face because we follow the guiding light of our political philosophy and all religions and that’s the Golden Rule.

Antiwar.com: You have a choice!

They’re Bailing Out the Banks
With Your Tax Dollars.
But you have a choice!

Nobody asked you if you wanted to bail out the banks. The powers that be in Washington, D.C., just went ahead and did it. They wrote a check for almost $1 trillion to the biggest financial institutions in the country, saving them from their own disastrous investments. Andyou get the bill.
But it doesn’t have to be a total loss. You can direct some of your tax dollars to a worthy cause. Instead of rewarding the greed and hubris of “businessmen” whose only assets seem to be their friends in Washington, you can send your tax dollars to work for peace. 
Unlike the hundreds of billions going to the banks, yourtax-deductible contribution to Antiwar.com is a good investment: it will keep you informed about the world you live in, warning you of the dangers to peace just around the bend. 
Since the mid-’90s, Antiwar.com has been the place to find out what’s really going on in hotspots around the globe. And since our beginning, we’ve depended on the generosity of our readers to keep us online.
Now hard times have hit all of us, at the very time when Antiwar.com is most essential. Our fight for a noninterventionist foreign policy is making some real gains, for the first time in years. But with charitable giving down, we are feeling the pinch. We need your help, and we need it now.
The choice is yours: would you rather give your hard-earned dollars to the big banks and the war profiteers, or to Antiwar.com?

Don’t delay.

Sorry for the interruption.
Continue to Antiwar.com

 

Contact akeaton@antiwar.com or call 323-512-7095 for more information.

Deadline looming for Platform Committee applications

According to LNC At-Large Representative Angela Keaton, the Platform Committee will be chosen at the San Diego meeting.

It is very important that interested parties send their applications to both Robert Sullentrup (rwsully at att.net) and Rachel Hawkridge (LPWA.com1 at gmail.com) so that they will be forwarded to the entire LNC list, which includes Kraus and any other relevant staff. You may also copy Angela Keaton as well, and she will check in by the end of the week.

The original announcement:

The Libertarian National Committee is looking to appoint ten people to serve on the Platform Committee in preparation for the 2010 Libertarian National Convention.

Committee members will be expected to expend an appreciable amount of their time in the months leading up to the Convention; and due to the anticipated amount of work, they will be expected to incur considerable travel costs, at personal expense, for meetings prior to the Convention, in addition to attendance at the Libertarian National Convention in 2010.

So that members of the Libertarian National Committee can determine who might best fill seats on the Platform Committee, each applicant is requested to draft and submit via e-mail three proposed or modified platform planks to platform@lp.org no later than November 16, 2008.

War, oil, economic chaos, enriched uranium, and more war

Donate to Antiwar.com
Today at 2:57pm

Thoughts on What’s Coming

Dear Friend of Peace,

My name is Michael Seebeck. I’m a happily married father of two, dedicated peacemonger and libertarian activist. My wife and I are the Legislative Analysts for the Libertarian Party of California. We recommend courses of action for lobbying, a role can be referred to informally as ”Team Seebeck, Bill Monkeys.”

Part of that role also means being able to connect events and courses of action to determine the consequences of legislation on the public. It also carries over into how I view the news, and lately I really don’t like what I see:

Economic Chaos. Potential War with Iran. Energy Prices. Recession. Russia. Pakistan. Iraq.

What do these all have in common? A pretty grim picture.

Let’s examine the links between these things. You may want a scorecard for this.

Consider the following facts:

Oil had peaked at $147 (7-11-08), and now is at $61 (as of 11-10-08). That’s a 51% drop in three months, and the drop had no end in sight.

World stock markets have tanked in the past four weeks, with trillions of equity and investments being lost.

Iceland faced default on its national debt. (Iceland???)

Iran is still enriching uranium, and the West still claims they are working towards a nuclear bomb. IAEA says otherwise.

Israel is bleating the war drums loudly.

The now multi-trillion-dollar bailout did nothing to help the market or the consumer.

Russia is on the rise from being flush with petroleum money and is revamping their army, navy, air force, and infrastructure.

The Pakistani people are getting agitated against U.S. efforts to track down and kill al-Qaeda in Waziristan.

Iraq is supposedly winding down, but troops aren’t coming home yet.

Afghanistan is heating up, and there is little chance of improvement there.

Unemployment and foreclosures are still on the rise in the U.S. as the recession continues and takes its deepest dive yet.

What does this all mean?

In a word, war.

Yikes!

What can we do?

We must be an organized and concerted effort to pressure our leaders to exercise proper leadership, not to just beat the drums of war because of campaign dollars or market profits for cronies, but instead to work with the world to forge peace as a means to develop prosperity, to turn around the negative attitudes and get nations to work on peaceful mutual interests and trade without foreign entanglements.

That effort starts with the grassroots of the world, from the bottom up, to get the leaders, elected or not, to do the right thing, not only for their own people, but for all people.

It starts with US: We, the people, who opposed war with Iran by a 4-1 margin a year ago and by an even more resounding 93% in June.

Antiwar.com is leading the charge to educate and inform the public, to get our leaders to actually lead, to wage peace and work for a better tomorrow.

With your donation, they can continue this fight, and help us avoid the economic and political destruction of America, and possibly the world.

For more information on how you can help, please contact Development Director Angela Keaton at akeaton@antiwar.com or 323-512-7095.

Won’t you join me in donating to help promote peace? It’s for our future.

Sincerely,

Michael Seebeck

Donate to Antiwar.com

Source: www.antiwar.com

Your contribution will ensure a voice for peace. Antiwar.com is a 501(c)3. All contributions are tax deductible. Below are the many choices for donating via credit card, check, monthly deduction, Paypal or by phone.

 

 
Angela Keaton
Development Director
Producer, Antiwar Radio
Antiwar.com
Office: 323-512-7095
8am-6pm (Pacific)
323-512-7095
Cell: 310-729-3760
Fax: 602-801-2659

LFV Exclusive! Steve Kubby “Our Time Has Come”

Our time has come
By Steve Kubby

This weekend, the leadership of the Republican Party will be assembling at a secret location in Virginia, to try to decide what to do with the shattered remains of their party.

Conspicuous in his absence, Congressman Ron Paul, who holds many of the answers his party is seeking, was never invited.  Dr. Paul believes the GOP lost because it has lost the trust of their constituents, many of whom chose to stay home rather than vote.

Ron Paul tells us that the Republicans are unwilling to deal with the basic issues that have derailed their party.  Those issues, like ending the wars, downsizing government, cutting taxes and more personal freedom, are fundamentally Libertarian issues and the leadership of the GOP to unwilling or unable to embraces such a Libertarian platform.

Some conservatives like Richard Viguerie, understand this and have made sincere efforts to absorb and promote Libertarian views, but as Viguerie admitted privately to me, the GOP leadership has led the party astray and refuses to be replaced.

So the stage is set for the Libertarian Party to receive a stream of refugees from the GOP.  These Recovering Republicans have already been washing up on our shores and even former GOP operatives like Bob Barr have found a new home with the LP.

Unfortunately, many of our new friends from the GOP have insisted that we tone down the Libertarian message and water down our platform to make it more appealing to mainstream voters.  That’s the same nonsense that destroyed the GOP.

The Recovering Republican view prevailed at the LP presidential convention and the majority of delegates backed two GOP refugees as their ticket.  The Libertarian wing of the party may have suffered a defeat, but the results of this election show that the Recovering  Republican wing of the party was a dismal failure at delivering the numbers or outcome they had promised.  Thus, instead of $30 million, they raised just over  $1 million.  Instead of 5% of the popular vote, they delivered no more than past campaigns.

In contrast, Obama succeeded because he used the Net to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, one hundred dollars at a time.  Using the lessons of Howard Dean, Obama broke away from conventional political fundraising and created his own ground game.  Is there any reason the LP cannot do the same?

Of course our GOP refugee friends have their own reasons why things didn’t go right for them, but they had their chance and the results are clear.  Now it is time for the LP to adopt a truly Libertarian platform, elect a seriously Libertarian Executive Committee and sponsor real Libertarians for office.

Liberty works.  It’s time for the LP to make a real commitment to real Liberty and give people what they want and deserve: Smaller Government, Less Taxes and more Personal Freedom.  If our party can just focus on these simple but powerful ideas, we can overtake the GOP and replace it with what people really want and need.

Our time has come.  Are we prepared to show real leadership and stand up for our Libertarian principles, without excuses or  watered down language? The choice is ours.

__________

Steve Kubby is a respected longtime libertarian activist, and one of the world’s leading experts on medical marijuana.  His newest project is a publicly-traded company, DYMC, which is developing cannabinoid medications; you can read more about that exciting project here.

Gawker points and laughs at Wayne Allyn Root

From Gawker:

Columbia Remembers Obama, Even If Libertarian Loser VP Candidate Can’t

Here’s a satisfying post-election shakeout of one of the rumors that Obama detractors stirred up: remember that accusation Libertarian VP nominee and Columbia alum Wayne Allyn Root made about Obama padding his resume with a fake Columbia University degree? “I think the most dangerous thing you should know about Barack Obama is that I don’t know a single person at Columbia that knows him, and they all know me. I don’t have a classmate who ever knew Barack Obama at Columbia. Ever!.” (He also told Reason that he would bet a million dollars that, if Obama had in fact attended Columbia, he had made a better GPA.) Well, Root can STFU because Columbia is making a big fuss about their grad, sending out an e-mail to their community about how Obama is the first Columbia graduate to be elected President.

An excerpt from the e-mail sent out by Columbia’s President:

Dear Columbian,

Yesterday’s election was historic, of course, and all of us who have graduated from Columbia have special reason for excitement. We note with pride that Barack Obama ‘83CC will be not only the first African-American but also the first Columbia degree-holder to occupy the Oval Office.

At Columbia we think continually about our role in helping to prepare remarkable men and women for leadership. With one alumnus, David Paterson ‘78CC, now serving as Governor of New York and another elected to the nation’s highest office, we are reminded of the University’s core commitment to public service and its tradition of producing outstanding leaders for our nation and our world…

All the best,

Lee C. Bollinger ‘71LAW
President
Columbia University

[via Lux Nightmare]

Oh, and here’s what Root told Reason about the million-dollars thing:

Root: And I’d be willing to bet every dime I have in the world, a million dollars I’ll put, I’ll put a million dollars cash on the fact—

Welch: This is on the record—

Root: —that my GPA was better than Barack’s—

Welch: Oooooh.

Steve Kubby: Healing our world, one patient at a time

The following was provided to LFV by Steve Kubby, and is being published with his permission.  Steve is a longtime libertarian and longtime medical marijuana activist.  He is also one of the world’s leading experts on medical marijuana.

Dear Friends,

Million of people die each year from diseases that could be largely prevented or minimized by cannabinoid medicines. The science is irrefutable.  We now have thousands of peer-reviewed, scientific studies that have emerged and clearly show how cannabinoids can be used to treat, reverse and even prevent many of our worst diseases.

What’s worse, we are only now beginning to understand how just deadly conventional prescription drugs actually are.  For example, one brave pioneer, Dr. Barbara Starfield of the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health, wrote an article for the July 26, 2000 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), volume 284, no. 4. She entitled her article, “Doctors and Their Drugs Could be the Number One Cause of Death in America, Causing Almost 500,000 Deaths Every Year.”

Watching people die needlessly is not an option, so my friends and I have formed a publicly traded company to research, develop and license new cannabinoid medicines that are safe, effective and far less expensive than the dangerous, toxic and synthetic pharmaceuticals in current use.

Unlike most publicly traded companies, we have a mission that goes beyond our bottom line.  That mission is to force governments to license cannabinoid medicines NOW, so we can start saving lives and helping to improve the quality of life for million of suffering patients.

So what can YOU do to help heal the world?  Simple, learn more about what cannabinoid medicines have to offer, then join us in demanding that these lifesaving, nontoxic medicines  be fast-tracked for emergency approval and use by patients.

Right now, we have or are developing cannabinoid lozenges and creams that can provide effective, safe and inexpensive treatments for a long list of diseases, including diseases that we are told are untreatable.  There is no excuse for any further delay in getting these lifesaving, non-smokable, lozenges and creams into the hands of patients who so desperately need relief.

We looked into forming a non-profit organization to accomplish our goals, but we decided upon a public company instead, so that we could provide our fellow patients with a unique opportunity to participate directly in the coming boom in cannabinoid medicines  Our publicly-traded company, DYMC, was recently featured on Money TV and is currently being broadcast to over 150 million television viewers.  If you haven’t taken the time to view this video, please do so, because in addition to describing what our company is doing, our Chief Science Officer, Dr. Melamede, provides valuable health information that could save or prolong your life. Links to this video are provided below.

If you’d like to get involved, please drop me a line at steve@kubby.com.  You may get an automatic response from my spam blocker asking if you are really a human.  If you do get such a response from me, just hit your reply button and the spam filter will clear you and your message to get through.

I look forward to working with you to heal our world, one patient at a time.

Let freedom grow,

Steve Kubby

MoneyTV Discusses Cannabinoid Medicines, part one
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrckW0XB634>

MoneyTV Discusses Cannabinoid Medicines, part two
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VyXuyGEyeg>

To view it on a cable tv station in your area, please see:
<http://www.moneytv.net/tvguide.htm>

To view a CNNMoney.com report about us see:
<http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/prnewswire/200810221425PR_NEWS_USPR_____LA40899.htm>

Libertarian rumor mill item: Tom Knapp

An interesting little domain factoid:

Domain Name: KNAPP2012.COM
  Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
  Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
  Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com
  Name Server: NS421.HOSTGATOR.COM
  Name Server: NS422.HOSTGATOR.COM
  Status: clientDeleteProhibited
  Status: clientRenewProhibited
  Status: clientTransferProhibited
  Status: clientUpdateProhibited
  Updated Date: 05-nov-2008
  Creation Date: 24-jun-2006
  Expiration Date: 24-jun-2009

Does this mean that Tom Knapp is considering a presidential run in 2012? 

He certainly has respect within the libertarian movement, and of course he is the founder of the Boston Tea Party.  Could he be looking toward a possible LP/BTP fusion candidacy?  Only time (and Tom) can tell.

LPNY Chair Eric Sundwall encourages voting for third parties and Libertarians

Robert Milnes gets an early start on 2012

This is to announce my candidacy for President of the UNITED STATES of America in 2012. I plan to run as an independent on a ticket to be called Progressive Libertarian Alliance Independent. I will also seek the Libertarian and Green party nominations and any other state ballots I can secure. I have learned from my campaign for 2008. The party nomination process is unreliable. The third parties and independents are almost certain to fall into the same old losing pattern of niche tickets and short ballot access again for 2012. An Independent candidacy will guarantee a fusion ticket and maximum ballot access. I will establish a website and organization for vote coordination for progressive independent, Green and Libertarian downticket candidates. I seek a woman libertarian to complement the ticket. It is an interesting coincidence that I believe Teddy Roosevelt was a progressive left libertarian in his campaign of 1912. He came closest to winning as a third party or independent in the past 100 years with a second place finish at 27% in a close three way race with his newly formed Progressive Party. I will need campaign assistance including manager, media coordinator, webmaster, legal counsel and others as well as interested volunteers. Presently my main website is www.robertmilnes4president2008.com also www.robertmilnes.net but I will be putting up a new campaign website for 2012 soon. I look forward to the campaign and your interest and support.

Libertarian Activist Eric Sundwall interviewed by WAMC

HUDSON VALLEY, NY (2008-10-27) Many of us are burned out by constant news from the presidential campaign but Hudson Valley bureau chief Susan Barnett reports that supporters of third party candidates say that the Internet is the reason they’re not totally invisible this election season.

 

You can hear the Eric Sundwall interview at WAMC Public Broadcasting.  You can view their coverage area, which encompasses much of the northeastern US, here.

You can see Eric Sundwall’s website here.

Great job as always, Eric!

Dr. Tom Stevens health concerns

Tom Stevens, former BTP Vice Chair and current Objectivist presidential candidate, has apparently suffered some extremely serious health problems requiring emergent medical care, but is refusing further treatment.

Since word is getting around, I do wish to confirm that on Thursday night, I was rushed to the hospital on an emergency basis. I may have suffered a small stroke and had a massive infection exacerbated by uncontrolled blood sugar levels. Since I had to teach two classes this morning and in light of the fact that I am an idiot, I signed myself out of the hospital against medical advice. You should have seen the statement I had to sign where the doctors warned me of “coma, inpending death, further stroke, etc.”

 

I have been in extreme pain and even oxycodone has not relieved it. The left side of my body is numb.

 

I appreciate the good wishes I have received and I apologize if I am not in a position to take phone calls at the current time. It is quite difficult for me to speak.

 

I always thought it odd that when crisis occurs in some people’s lives, they withdraw from their commitments and involvements. I will not take that course. I will do what I can to get better and will continue to be involved in the fight for liberty until I can no longer do so.

 

Things are serious, to say the least, and my spirits are not what they should be.

 

Thanks to all who have expressed concern.

 

Respectfully,

 

Dr. Tom Stevens

Best wishes for improved health (and improved spirits) go out to him from all of us at LFV.  

Multiple BTP NatComm candidates not even old enough to drive

Earlier today, I covered the ongoing BTP convention.  Checking into some of the National Committee candidates with whom I am unfamiliar, I ran across an admission on the BTP site that Matty Grossman, candidate for Vice Chair, just turned 16 years old within the last few days (if he’s even 16 yet).  Looking closer I discovered that Andrew Martin, candidate for At-Large Representative, has admitted that he is only 13 years old.  There may be others who are also that young, as I don’t know most of the candidates.

Normally I would never name anyone under the age of 18.  In this case, however, I feel I have no choice because these boys are on an election ballot for a national political party, and those voting have a right to know they are that young.

I cannot support anyone that age seeking a National Committee position, because they simply don’t have enough life experience to make the types of decisions necessary at that level of responsibility.  Even if, for the sake of argument, they are the most mature young teenagers on earth, they are not old enough to legally enter into any kind of contract.  They also are completely dependent upon their parents’ authority; and their parents may not even know, or approve, of their candidacy since this is all being done online.  

This could cause some very serious problems for the BTP.  Who knows how their parents may react, if they are opposed to the idea but didn’t know about it until it was too late?  Who knows what someone that young may be interested in next month, much less next year or two years from now?  The truth is, at their ages even they don’t know.  There’s nothing wrong with that, because it’s normal for young teenagers.  However, it is problematic if they are running for an elected office in a national political party, with a two-year term.

It also raises another extremely serious concern. Very recently, a woman contacted Todd Andrew Barnett, in his capacity as BTP Vice Chair – the same position now sought by Matty – regarding alleged childhood sexual abuse which she thought needed to be brought to the party’s attention.  I really don’t think a 16-year-old, much less a 13-year-old, should be exposed to details of such an obviously adult subject.  Furthermore, to discuss it with someone that young may even be viewed by authorities as abuse, thus opening up a whole other can of worms.  In some states, having a sexual conversation of any type with a child online is a felony, and it doesn’t matter whether you knew they were a child.

I also do not believe that lady (or any other responsible adult) would ever intentionally share adult conversation of any type with someone that young. However, had Matty or Andrew already been elected to BTP NatComm, there would be no reason for anyone to even suspect they were talking to a child.  It simply would never occur to anyone that National Committee members of any political party are young teenagers.  It makes absolutely no sense that someone that young would ever hold such an office, or even be permitted to become a candidate.  It makes absolutely no sense that adults would place these boys in a position where they are likely to be exposed to harassment and abusive behavior from disgruntled and angry adults, as we all know happens regularly in third parties, and especially online.

Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against these boys.  I don’t even know them, though I wish them only the best as with all young people, and strongly encourage them to follow their dreams.  However, at this point in their lives, they cannot possibly be mature enough or experienced enough to hold that kind of position.  It is not in their best interests, and it is not in the party’s best interests.  And frankly, it worries me for their sake that they are being allowed to get themselves into a situation which is definitely not for children.

This brings me to my final point.  Unless someone has actually met these boys, how do you know it’s not someone just messing with the BTP, trying to make the party look ridiculous just because they can?  It wouldn’t be the first time that happened, after all.  During the BTP Presidential nominating convention, the site was invaded by a group of teenagers intent upon skewering the election results.  While the damage was undone by quick recognition and intervention, there is absolutely nothing to stop someone from perpetrating a hoax intended to harm the party, if they simply take the time to become accepted on the site.

Boston Tea Party convention starts this evening

The Boston Tea Party starts its online convention this evening (Friday, October 24th) at 9pm ET.  The party will be voting in new officers, as well as voting upon various proposals.

The convention continues for 24 hours, and ends on Saturday, October 24th at 8:59pm ET.  If candidates and proposals are not resolved pursuant to their Bylaws, futher polling cycles will start, each running 24 hours, until a final candidate / proposal decision is made.  

I am excited to note that some of our most respected LFV contributors – including George Donnelly and Thomas Knapp – are running for BTP office.  

Tom Knapp is of course also the founder of the Boston Tea Party, and in my opinion showed excellent logic, temperament, and leadership ability in his handling of a controversy which recently resulted in the resignation of multiple BTP officers and officer candidates.  I therefore very highly endorse Tom Knapp, as he has proven his ability to handle any situation which may arise, no matter how delicate or controversial.

Additionally, a couple of other BTP candidates are also well known to LFV readers, including Jason Gatties (a longtime contributor who took a break to work on his local political campaign) and Steve Newton (”Delaware Libertarian”, whose writing has regularly appeared on LFV with his permission).

The current Chair is not running for reelection, and the Vice Chair recently resigned along with multiple At-Large Representatives.  Interestingly, as a result, the only incumbent is Michelle Luetge for Secretary.

Both Chair candidates have BTP blogs, which you can read to get a feel for both candidates.

You can read Jason Gatties’ BTP blog.

Here is George Donnelly’s BTP blog.

I was especially impressed to see that Jason Gatties actually nominated George Donnelly to run against him, in the belief that competition will only make the party stronger.  What a great attitude!  Either Jason or George would be excellent as Chair, in my opinion, so the BTP is lucky to have them as candidates. 

In the meantime, here is the election information from the BTP website, which (thanks to Tom Knapp!) LFV readers are the very first to see.

Per the bylaws, each member may vote for one candidate for each office; polls repeat as necessary until either one candidate, or NOTA, receives a majority. Each polling cycle runs 24 hours, beginning at 9pm Eastern, October 24th, 2008. Human candidates listed in alphabetical order by last name.

Chair
George Donnelly
Jason Gatties
None of the Above

Vice-Chair
Douglass Gaking
Matty Grossman
None of the Above

Secretary
Michelle Luetge
None of the Above

Election of At-Large National Committee Members

Per the bylaws, at-large national committee members are elected by “approval voting.” Each member may cast one vote for each candidate whom that member supports; the four candidates who receive the most votes are elected. Because of technical issues (no “approval voting” module available for this version of the site’s software), each candidate appears in a separate poll. YOU MUST VOTE IN A SEPARATE POLL FOR EACH CANDIDATE WHOM YOU SUPPORT IF YOU WANT THAT SUPPORT TO COUNT. These polls remain open for the duration of the convention. Human candidates listed in reverse alphabetical order by last name.

Candidates
Steve Trinward
Neil Kiernan Stephenson
Darryl W. Perry
Steve Newton
Andrew Martin
Thomas L. Knapp
Bill Jones
Matty Grossman

Bylaws Proposals (from committee)

This space will link to bylaws amendments recommended by the national committee/bylaws committee for polling. Each member may cast one vote (”yes” or “no”) on adoption of each proposal. Per the bylaws, polling on these proposals will last 24 hours, beginning at the opening of the convention, with with 2/3 or more of voting members’ support required to adopt an amendment.

Committee Bylaws Proposal #1

The Bylaws Committee proposes a change to Article 9, Section h, which states,

“Any action of the National Committee may be appealed by Party members comprising 5% or more of the membership, said appeal to be transmitted or called to the attention of both the Chair and the Secretary. In the case of such appeal, the appeal shall be published to the Party’s web site and the Party’s membership shall be polled on the question of whether to sustain or uphold the Committee’s action to suspend. The poll shall open within 10 days of the appeal’s publication, and shall remain open for 10 days. The National Committee’s action shall be overturned by a vote of 2/3 or more among voting members.”

The change would be the section which says “5% or more of the membership” to “5 or more party members,” so that the complete section will be as follows:

“Any action of the National Committee may be appealed by Party members comprising 5 or more party members, said appeal to be transmitted or called to the attention of both the Chair and the Secretary. In the case of such appeal, the appeal shall be published to the Party’s web site and the Party’s membership shall be polled on the question of whether to sustain or uphold the Committee’s action to suspend. The poll shall open within 10 days of the appeal’s publication, and shall remain open for 10 days. The National Committee’s action shall be overturned by a vote of 2/3 or more among voting members.”

(the changed section is in bold)

Committee Bylaws Proposal #2

The Bylaws Committee proposes the addition of Article 8, Section i:

“Officers of the National Committee may serve no more than two consecutive terms in the same national party office.”

Committee Bylaws Proposal #3

The Bylaws Committee proposes the addition of Article 9, Section i:

“National Committee members, under any circumstances, are strictly prohibited from working for the party’s nominated Presidential or Vice-Presidential candidates in a public, official capacity while serving their terms on the National Committee. Officers who wish to engage in such activity shall either resign their seats from the National Committee or recuse themselves from an official public and political capacity while serving on the Board.

“1) Official capacity is defined as any campaign officer, manager or coordinator of campaign activities, any person listed in campaign web sites or documents as member of the campaign, and anyone otherwise involved with the national campaign in a paid or voluntary capacity.

“2) Other activities such as assisting with ballot access in a voluntary capacity, donating personally to a campaign, and promoting the campaign as an individual supporter are acceptable.

“3) Members of the National Committee may run for the party’s nomination for President or Vice President. While running for the party’s nomination, National Committee members must recuse themselves from all voting in any National Committee decisions until after the nomination is complete. If nominated to run for national office, a member of the National Committee must resign from the committee.”

Bylaws Proposals (from the membership)

After the adoption or rejection of the national committee/bylaws committee’s proposals, bylaws proposals shall be solicited from the membership in a post linked to from this space. Proposals shall be submitted via the appended comment form, and polls shall be linked to from this space. Each proposal moved and seconded in this manner, within 24 hours of the solicitation posting, shall be considered concurrently with all others, with proposal polls open for 24 hours. Each proposal receives the support of 2/3 or more of the voting members shall be deemed adopted.

Program Proposals (from committee)

This space will link to program points recommended by the national committee/program committee for polling. Each member may cast one vote (”yes” or “no”) on adoption of each point. Per the bylaws, polling on these points will last 24 hours, beginning at the opening of the convention, with 2/3 or more of voting members’ support required to adopt a program point. If fewer than five program points are adopted, the floor will be open for member proposal of additional points.

Committee Point Proposal #1

Foreign Policy: The Iraq War must end as quickly as possible with removal of all our soldiers from the region. We must initiate the return of our soldiers from around the world, including Korea, Japan, Europe and the entire Middle East. We must cease the war propaganda, threats of a blockade and plans for attacks on Iran, nor should we re-ignite the cold war with Russia over Georgia. We must be willing to talk to all countries and offer friendship and trade and travel to all who are willing. We must take off the table the threat of a nuclear first strike against all nations.

Committee Point Proposal #2

Privacy: We must protect the privacy and civil liberties of all persons under US jurisdiction. We must repeal or radically change the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, and the FISA legislation. We must reject the notion and practice of torture, elimination of habeas corpus, secret tribunals, and secret prisons. We must deny immunity for corporations that spy willingly on the people for the benefit of the government. We must reject the unitary presidency, the illegal use of signing statements and excessive use of executive orders.

Committee Point Proposal #3

The National Debt: We believe that there should be no increase in the national debt. The burden of debt placed on the next generation is unjust and already threatening our economy and the value of our dollar. We must pay our bills as we go along and not unfairly place this burden on a future generation.

Committee Point Proposal #4

The Federal Reserve: We seek a thorough investigation, evaluation and audit of the Federal Reserve System and its cozy relationships with the banking, corporate, and other financial institutions. The arbitrary power to create money and credit out of thin air behind closed doors for the benefit of commercial interests must be ended. There should be no taxpayer bailouts of corporations and no corporate subsidies. Corporations should be aggressively prosecuted for their crimes and frauds.

Program Proposals (from the membership)

In the event that fewer than five committee-proposed program points are adopted above, this space will link to a member proposal space and polls on proposed points. Points will be polled in the order proposed and seconded, with no more polls running than would cause the program to exceed five points if all were adopted. Each proposal will be polled for 12 hours, with 2/3 or more of voting members’ support required to adopt a program point.

Resolutions

At the opening of the convention, this space will link to a resolution solicitation post. All members may move resolutions (statements of the party exclusive of its platform, program or bylaws). All resolutions moved and seconded within 24 hours of the opening of solicitation space will be polled. Polls will run for 24 hours; resolutions supported by 2/3 or more of voting members will be adopted.

LFV readers, what do you think of the candidates and proposals? Please note your endorsements, as well as any concerns, in the comments section.

December LNC meeting details

Here are the details for the LNC Board Meeting 12/6-12/7 in San Diego CA:

The location is the
Town and Country Resort
500 Hotel Circle North
San Diego, CA 92108
www.towncountry.com

To make a reservation, please call 800-772-8527 & ask for the $99 special
“Libertarian National Committee” Room Rate (effective 12/3-12/9). On line
reservations are available this link:
https://resweb.passkey.com/Resweb.do?mode=welcome_ei_new&eventID=72453

This is a major convention resort with 1,000 guestrooms and suites, over
205,000 square feet of meeting and exhibit space, 5 restaurants, 3 lounges,
4 pools, 27 hole golf course, 15,000 sq ft day spa and fitness center,
connected to Fashion Valley, with easy access to San Diego’s light rail
trolley station.

If you have any problems or special requests, contact:
Rosa I. Myhra
Convention Sales Manager
Phone 619-297-6006 x 4886
Fax 619-725-5233
r.myhra@towncountry.com

We will most likely have a walk through tour for our convention committee
and any one else that is interested from 5:30-6:30 pm on Fri 12/5. Please
meet us at 5:30 pm by the Tiki Pavilion next to the gift shop across from
the Terrace Café.

Thanks!

Robert

George Phillies: “In Support of Angela Keaton, Part 4″

The following was written by George Phillies, and is posted with permission of the author.

In Defense of Angela Keaton, Part 4

In a prior post, I reminded readers that the Libertarian National Committee had voted to ask Angela Keaton to resign. They then considered a motion to expel Keaton from the LNC. It is inescapable that Keaton will soon need a coherent defense against the forthcoming motion of expulsion. In this and following messages, I offer such a defense.

In the prior post, I proposed that Keaton’s acts were far less serious than the acts of Bob Barr, who while on the LNC had through his PAC supported Republican Federal candidates.Here I turn to actions of National Chair William Redpath. When Redpath was not penalized for his acts, it is transparently unjust to penalize Keaton.

Acts of William Redpath.

1) Redpath is and was the Chief Executive Officer of the Libertarian National Committee. As such, under LNC Bylaws Article 7, Section 4 “The Chair is the chief executive officer of the Party with full authority to direct its business and affairs…subject to express National Committee policies and directives…”

In accord with its authority Under Article 8 of the Bylaws, the LNC has voted a series of policies. These National Committee policies from the current LNC Policy Manual, are listed in part below as Appendix A. The next several articles will examine what are in my opinion failures to follow these requirements, failures for which Redpath has not been sanctioned, leading to the conclusion that Keaton should not be sanctioned for her less serious actions.

We first turn to Policy Manual

ARTICLE III

B. The Chair serves as chief executive officer of the Party, reporting to the LNC, and in that capacity:

1. is responsible, along with the LNC, for ensuring the direction and management of activities, affairs, properties, and funds of the Party is consistent with the Party Bylaws and LNC policies;…

The most important of these bylaws statements is of course the Statement of Principles, eschewing the use of theft and fraud for political gain.

I begin with what is in my opinion an attempted use of theft and fraud, broadly defined as intended by the original authors of the statement of principles, for political gain, by the LNC, an attempt that in my opinion could not be continuing if Redpath had discharged his duties under B1. However, Redpath has not been sanctioned for what appear to me to be his failures here, so Keaton should also not be sanctioned.

I refer to the LNC lawsuit attempting to steal my ballot status in New Hampshire.

1. In my opinion there can be no reasonable doubt that this is an LNC action, even though the LNC is not yet named as a plaintiff in the suit.

First, the non-local attorney in the suit represented himself to me as having the LNC as his client. Furthermore, I am assured by eyewitnesses at an LPNH meeting after the suit was filed that LPNH state committee members did not know who the non-local attorney was, and, if this is true, it is scarcely credible that he was retained by LPNH. Also, the LPNH vote to adhere to the suit reads

From: Brendan Kelly
Date: Wed, Aug 27, 2008 at 2:59 PM
To: Seth Cohn, babiarz@endor.com, “Sandy C. Pierre”, Faith Cook, Avens O’Brien

At about 2:00 PM Aug.27th 2008 I’m calling a meeting of the LPNH E.C. for the purpose of addressing the question of our joining with national LP in their substitution suit. This meeting will be open until 2:00 PM on Aug. 28th 2008 or until an unbeatable up or down vote with a quorum has been reached.All internet response should be sent by reply all.

I Brendan Kelly as chairman call this meeting to order. I’d like to make a motion that the LPNH join the LP substitution law suit to be filed as plaintiff’s. Do I have a second.

That is a motion purely and entirely to join ‘the national LP’ suit. No attorney, presented with this motion, could have added LPNH as a plaintiff, as has been done, unless this was a national LP suit.

2. Point 15 of the LNC suit as filed reads

15: Upon information and belief, anticipating that he might win the nomination but have insufficient time to obtain the 3,000 valid nomination papers required for access to the New Hampshire ballot, Phillies caused the requisite number of nominating papers to be circulated and filed on his behalf prior to the convention.

These claims are false. Presenting them was an act of fraud in the sense of the statement of principles, though perhaps not as a matter of law. The National Chair was not sanctioned for allowing this act of fraud to go forward, and therefore Keaton should not be sanctioned for her alleged acts, which were clearly less serious.

Why are the claims false? In Spring, 2007, LPNH staged a nominating convention. You can read about it in the LPNH newsletter Libertarian Lines, Volume 32, Issue 3

http://www.lpnh.org/LPNH/Libertarian_Lines_files/LibLines_June07.pdf.

I didn’t attend the convention, but my campaign Treasurer Carol McMahon did. Liberty Lines page 1, bottom, “Nominations” says in part “The main item for the convention was candidate nominations for President down to Executive Council. We made nominations for each of these offices…In the end, our final list of nominees were: President: George Phillies,” Having identified me as a candidate, Liberty Lines then twice says “please start collecting petitions for our candidates.”

It was the LPNH State Convention that asked its volunteers to collect signatures for me. The claim that I caused nominating papers to be circulated and filed is a baldfaced lie. However, our National Chair has not been sanctioned for allowing these false claims to go forward, and therefore Angela Keaton should also not be sanctioned for less serious acts.

3. Point 21 of the LNC lawsuit claims “The plaintiffs have sought to substitute the Barr candidacy for the Phillies candidacy and to have Barr listed on the November ballot as the sole Libertarian candidate for President.” Point 22 claims in part “The Secretary of State has refused to permit such substitution…”

These claims are also false. Presenting them was an act of fraud in the sense of the statement of principles. The National Chair was not sanctioned by the LNC for allowing these false claims to go forward, and therefore Keaton should not be sanctioned for her alleged acts, which were clearly less serious.

Why are these claims false? First, Barr is already on the ballot, and therefore the proposed change is not “substitution”; it is my removal from the ballot. Furthermore, at no time prior to the LPNH ExComm vote to join the lawsuit did the LPNH ExComm vote to ask Secretary Gardner for anything of the kind.

4. Point 23 of the LPNH lawsuit claims that failure “to list Barr on the Libertarian ballot as the sole Libertarian Party candidate for President” would “unduly burdens their rights to cast their votes effectively” and “to associate for the advancement of political beliefs”.

The claim that you cannot vote effectively because someone else is on the ballot is absurd on its face. In fact, if this suit were to succeed, the right of attendees of the LPNH State Convention, not to mention my petitioners and supporters, to associate for the advancement of their political beliefs, would be stolen. This taking would be an act of theft in the sense of the statement of principles, if perhaps not in the legal sense. The National Chair was not sanctioned by the LNC for allowing this attempted theft of freedom of association to go forward, and therefore Keaton should not be sanctioned for her alleged acts, which were clearly less serious.

You may correctly assume that I could go on at great length about this suit, but I think I have made my point.

We’ll return in Part 5 to other LNC member acts whose actions were more serious than Ms. Keaton’s.

Appendix A. Segments from the LNC Policy Manual.

I first quote from the Policy Manual as to the duties charged by LNC vote to the LNC Chair:

ARTICLE III. OFFICERS

Section 1: POSITION DESCRIPTION OF NATIONAL CHAIR

A. The Chair serves as the presiding officer of the LNC and of all National Conventions and, in that capacity:

1. guides the deliberations and activities of the LNC according to Party Bylaws, convenes an LNC meeting according to the Party Bylaws, serves as a full voting member of the LNC and serves as a nonvoting member of all committees appointed by the LNC;

2. guides the deliberations and activities of National Conventions according to the Party Bylaws and adopted Convention Rules.

B. The Chair serves as chief executive officer of the Party, reporting to the LNC, and in that capacity:

1. is responsible, along with the LNC, for ensuring the direction and management of activities, affairs, properties, and funds of the Party is consistent with the Party Bylaws and LNC policies;…

C. The Chair represents and serves as the chief spokesman of the Party as appropriate, including: representing the Party to the public, including the business community, media, other political and educational organizations, government agencies, and elected officials;

not to mention

ARTICLE VII. LP NEWS

Section 1: LP NEWS EDITORIAL POLICY

Article VII.1.C.2 The selection of articles, their layout and the graphics for LP News, the relative amount of space assigned to articles, advertisements, Party announcements, and regular features shall be the responsibility of the Chair except as detailed in this Policy Statement.

The exception for the LP News Editor makes clear that the responsibility of the Editor is for production, so that VII.1.A. 2. provides

Final responsibility for the production of LP News must rest with one person: the Editor. It is the responsibility of the Editor to produce the best possible publication within the guidelines of these policies.

Among the LNC policies that the Chair is responsible for carrying out are

Article VIII. Section 3: LIMITATIONS ON PARTY SUPPORT FOR PUBLIC OFFICE

Party resources shall not be used to provide information or services for any candidate for public office prior to the nomination unless: (a) such information or services are available and announced on an equal basis to all Libertarians who have declared they are seeking that nomination, (b) such information or services are generally available and announced to all party members, or (c) the service or candidate has been approved by the state chair.

Article VIII. Section 4: LIMITATIONS ON PARTY SUPPORT FOR PARTY OFFICE

Party resources shall not be used to provide information or services for any candidate for party office unless: (a) such information or services are available and announced on an equal basis to all Libertarians who have declared they are seeking that office, or (b) such information or service(s) are generally available and announced all party members.

and

ARTICLE IV. NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS

Section 3: EMPLOYMENT POLICIES

A. Employees are bound by the Bylaws and the policies adopted by the LNC. A statement to this effect shall be included in all employment agreements and contracts between the Party and its employees.

D. Except as otherwise noted in this Policy Manual, no employee of the Party shall:

1. endorse, support, or contribute any money,

2. use his or her title or position, or

3. work as a volunteer, employee, or contractor

to aid (1) any candidate for public office prior to nomination, or (2) any candidate for Party office.

US Supreme Court agrees that incompetence, not hurricane, caused Barr’s late Louisiana filing

From TheTownTalk.com:

BATON ROUGE — The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld Secretary of State Jay Dardenne’s decision to not allow the Libertarian Party candidate on the presidential ballot in Louisiana because the party failed to meet the required deadline.

The court denied a request for a stay filed by the Libertarian Party, thereby upholding Dardenne’s decision that the party had not filed its qualifying papers in a timely manner.

Under Supreme Court rules, the case was presented to Justice Antonin Scalia who referred the case to the entire court. The Court denied the application in a one-sentence decision.

“Obviously we’re pleased that we will not have to reprint the presidential ballots, which already have been mailed to military and overseas voters.” Dardenne said. “Reprinting would have resulted in confusion, increased expense to the taxpayers, a setback in the absentee-by-mail voting process and, potentially delayed election results.”

Testimony at the hearing before U.S. District Judge James Brady in Baton Rouge established that a party representative forgot to submit an affidavit before the deadline for getting names on the ballot..

“This omission, not Hurricane Gustav, was the reason that the papers were not filed by the deadline,” Dardenne said.

A sample ballot for the Nov. 4 presidential election can be found on the secretary of state’s Elections Division Web site at www.GeauxVote.com.

Allen Buckley campaign “down and dirty” radio ads focus on incumbent Saxby Chambliss

Send this porker packing, if you hated the farm/welfare bill you can’t like this hog. 

 

    

US Senator Saxby Chambliss is by far one of the worst Republican Senators in the history of the Republic. He has never met a lobbyist he did not like, and has voted in “lock-step” with the current administration. Bloated defense & farm bills and a total disrespect for the Constitution is what this crotchety old Republican is all about.    

OUR ATTACK ADS ARE WORKING !!! ( and funny )

 
Because independents, fiscally conservative republicans, and Ron Paul types can’t stand this guy !

Progress: Libertarian U.S. Senate Candidate Allen Buckley initially polled 3%. Later, he polled 4%. A later poll (an independent poll) had him at 8%.

Help us run more ads on AM talk radio in Republican Areas !

Listen to the ads and judge for yourself.  We are down and dirty now…… but we vow to sink even further into the gutter if that’s what it takes to oust a porker!

Go ahead and google… “Imperial Sugar Plant Explosion”… now ask yourself, “who collects from big sugar?” 

You see where we our headed, help us change history, listen to the ads.

We need your support to air “the dirtiest for last”

 To contribute, please click the Donate button above,

or click and follow the text links below.

-

Contribute to Allen Buckley for U.S. Senate Campaign

 

Links not working?

Copy the following text to your browser’s Address Bar:

http://www.buckleyforsenate.com/contributions.asp

 

 

Thank you for your support. 

Buckley for Senate
P.O. Box 7641
Atlanta, GA 30357 

Website: http://www.buckleyforsenate.com

Forums: http://cms.buckleyforsenate.com

Email: buckley@buckleyforsenate.com

 

Paid for by Buckley for Senate

 

 

LP starts radio campaign

Our First Radio Ad

posted by Andrew Davis on Oct 06, 2008

Dear Libertarian Supporter,

Last week, we asked you for ideas on radio ads for the Libertarian Party during the 2008 presidential election. 

We had a massive response with really terrific ideas. 

Please check out the final cut of a radio ad that will be playing across the country this month.

Because of the success that we expect, with so many Americans angry with Republicans and Democrats, we want to expand our campaign with more ads.

We are already committed to 2000 spots per week over the next 29 days—but hope to do many, many more with your help.

Please help us sponsor ads at $1 per spot.  Each dollar will purchase approximately one radio spot, so we’re asking everybody to help sponsor at least 50 spots!

Your $50 will go towards helping spread the message of liberty through our national ad campaign.  If you feel you can donate more, please consider donations of $100, $1,000 or whatever you can afford!

You gracious donations will help all Libertarians running for office, and help make 2008 the best year in the Libertarian Party’s history!

Thank you again for all that you do for liberty in this country. 

Live Free,

Andrew Davis
Director of Communications
Libertarian Party

PS – If you are receiving this email, and have not yet become a member of the Party and wish to do so, please click here to sign up to become a member of the only political party dedicated completely to cutting taxes and maximizing liberty.  If you need to renew, please do so by clicking here. 

PSS – If you have not yet contributed, please consider a donation right now of $25, $50, $100 or $1000 to the Libertarian Party.  Your contribution will be used to grow the Party and expand the message of liberty.  From ads to outreach, every dollar goes leading the liberty movement in its fight to restore the Constitution and maximize freedom.

LPNH lawsuit finally served

You can download the lawsuit for your own records here in PDF format: lpnh-lawsuit

Note that it was dated September 4th, over a month ago.  It is unknown why service of process was delayed for so long.

George Phillies: In defense of Angela Keaton, Part 3

The following was written by George Phillies, and is reproduced with permission.

In a prior post, I reminded readers that the Libertarian National Committee had voted to ask Angela Keaton to resign. They then considered a motion to expel Keaton from the LNC. It is inescapable that Keaton will soon need a coherent defense against the forthcoming motion of expulsion. In this and following messages, I offer such a defense. [With thanks to Elfninosmom for some text that I am borrowing.]

In the prior post, I proposed that Keaton’s acts were far less serious than the acts of Bob Barr, who while on the LNC had through his PAC supported Republican Federal candidates. However, the LNC did not subject Barr to any penalty. When Barr was not penalized for far more serious acts, it is transparently unjust to penalize Keaton.

Of course, for this defense to be valid, there is one key question:

Did Barr’s PAC actually support real Republicans?

Search the Bob Barr Leadership Fund filings for the current Congressional cycle. A list of Republicans running for Congress as incumbents and supported by Barr’s PAC includes the names Gingrey, Ros-Lehtinen, Flake, Hayes, Hensarling, Kingston, Pryce, Rehberg, Jones, and Shays. Barr’s PAC also supported incumbent Republican Senators, including Chambliss, Specter, Coleman, Craig, Graham, Hagel, Sessions, Smith, and Sununu.

Yes, that is the same Sununu who is running against my good friend Libertarian Ken Blevens for U.S. Senate in New Hampshire.

Every one of these Republicans was elected from a state with an organized Libertarian Party. A loyal Libertarian would want every one of those Republicans to face a Libertarian Party opponent. A loyal
Libertarian would never have dreamed of supporting Republicans, all of whom would hopefully have Libertarian opponents.

In fact, while Bob Barr sat on the LNC, Barr through his PAC supported every Republican I named above, yet faced no penalty from the LNC for his acts.

One might try to argue that some of these Republicans turned out not to have Libertarian opponents. If they had no Libertarian opponents, you might try to argue that support for the Republican made no difference, because the support did not cause a Libertarian to lose.

In 2007, you couldn’t predict which Republicans would not have Libertarian opponents.

Besides, when you donate to a candidate, your money counts twice. It counts once for that candidate. It counts again for the candidate’s party. When Bob Barr through his PAC donated to Republican candidates, he was strengthening his Republican Party, at the expense of our Libertarian Party.

The LNC did not respond to Barr’s actions by imposing any penalty, so therefore it would be unjust for the LNC to impose a more serious penalty on Keaton when her deed was less severe.

Finally, you might seek to argue that those Republican Congressmen were libertarians in disguise, flying a false flag to enhance their chances of election. Such a claim is devoid of merit.

Nine of those ten Congressman opposed leaving Iraq. Nine of ten supported military kangaroo courts. Eight of the ten voted to give Federal Courts jurisdiction over the Terry Schiavo case, voted to support warrantless wiretaps on your telephone, and voted to pervert the Constitution to install a ban on burning the flag. Torture is supported by a majority of these Congressmen.

These Congressmen were in no sense Libertarians. See Appendix B for more detail.

Every Senator I list as being supported by the Barr PAC voted to allow warrantless wiretaps and monitors of virtually every form of communication in America. Every Senator listed voted to reauthorize the Patriot Act. Every Senator listed voted for a Constitutional Amendment to ban flag burning. Eight of the nine voted to fund the war. Seven of nine voted against an antiwar withdrawal motion. Six of nine voted to advance a constitutional amendment blocking gay marriage.

These Senators were in no sense Libertarians. See Appendix C for more detail.

However, the LNC did not take punitive action in Barr’s case, so therefore it would be unjust for the LNC to take punitive action in Keaton’s less serious case.

APPENDIX A. Here, name by name, are the Congressmen Barr supported and a table showing their individual votes on some critical issues

Flake 1 2 3 4
Gingrey 1 2 3 4 5 6
Hayes 2 3 4 5 6
Hensarling 1 2 3 4 5 6
Jones 5 6
Kingston 1 2 3 4 5 6
Pryce 1 2 3 5 6
Rehberg 1 2 3 4 5 6
Ros-Lehtinen 1 2 3 5 6
Shays 1 2 3

(1) Vote 836: S 1927: The bill gives U.S. spy agencies expanded power to eavesdrop on foreign suspects without a court order. Civil liberties and privacy advocates argue the bill jeopardizes the Fourth Amendment privacy rights and allows for the warrantless monitoring of virtually any form of communication originating in the United States.

(2) 7/12/07 Vote 624: H R 2956: This bill would require the president to begin reducing the number of U.S. troops serving in Iraq 120 days after its enactment and would require most troops to be withdrawn by April 1, 2008.

(3) 9/29/06 Vote 508: S 3930: Military Commissions Act

(4) 12/14/05 Vote 630: H R 2863: Supported a ban on cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of detainees held by U.S. forces

(5) 6/22/05 Vote 296: H J RES 10: This vote approved the proposal of a Constitutional amendment to ban the desecration of the American flag.

(6) 3/21/05 Vote 90: S 686: Gave federal courts jurisdiction in the Terri Schiavo dispute.

APPENDIX B: Here are Senators the Barr PAC supported with a table showing individual votes.

Chambliss 1 2 3 4 5 6
Coleman 1 3 4 5 6
Craig 1 2 3 4 5 6
Graham 1 2 3 4 5 6
Hagel 1 2 4 6
Sessions 1 2 3 4 5 6
Smith 1 2 4 5 6
Specter 1 2 3 4 6
Sununu 1 2 3 4 6

(1) Vote 309: S 1927: This amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 passed 60-28 on August 3. Civil liberties and privacy advocates argue the bill jeopardizes the Fourth Amendment privacy rights and allows for the warrantless monitoring of virtually any form of communication originating in the United States.

(2) 5/24/07 Vote 181: On the Motion: Fund the war. This $120 billion dollar package was passed in the Senate by an 80-14 vote on May 24.

(3) 3/29/07 Vote 126: H R 1591: This $122 billion war spending bill calls for combat troops to begin withdrawing from Iraq this summer.

(4) 6/27/06 Vote 189: S J RES 12: This vote would have given Senate approval to a proposed constitutional amendment that would give Congress the authority to ban “desecration of the American flag”.

(5) 6/7/06 Vote 163: On the Cloture Motion: A Senate cloture vote on the gay marriage amendment failed, effectively killing the amendment.

(6) 3/2/06 Vote 29: H R 3199: Reauthorized a slightly modified version of the 2001 USA Patriot Act.

LEAP Press Release: Three in four Americans believe War On Drugs is a failure

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: October 2, 2008

CONTACT: Tom Angell: (202) 557-4979 or media@leap.cc

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Three out of four U.S. voters see the war on drugs as a failure, according to a Zogby poll released today. More than one in three voters believe that the single best way to fight drug traffickers and drug abuse would be “legalizing some drugs” or “ending the war on drugs.” That’s more than those who think “stopping drugs at the U.S. border” or eradicating drugs in their countries of origin would be more effective. It is also more than those who think that reducing the demand for drugs in America is the best tactic.

The poll results come as no surprise to Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a group of police, judges, prosecutors, corrections officials and FBI and DEA agents who fought on the front lines of the war on drugs and who believe that ending prohibition is the only way to begin solving drug abuse and drug market violence problems. “Voters are ready for reform of our nation’s failed drug prohibition policies,” said Jack Cole, a former New Jersey State Police undercover narcotics officer and LEAP’s executive director. “But when will lawmakers get the message?”

“With the 75th anniversary of the repeal of alcohol prohibition coming up in December, now seems like a perfect time to put gangsters, terrorists, and cartels out of business through legalized regulation, just like we did in 1933,” Cole continued.

Cole and other LEAP members from across the United States are available for print and broadcast interviews. Please contact Tom Angell at media@leap.cc.

Complete data on the Zogby poll’s drug questions can be found on pp. 43-49 of this PDF: http://www.zogby.com/news/X-IAD.pdf

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition’s mission is to reduce the multitude of unintended harmful consequences resulting from fighting the war on drugs and to lessen the incidence of death, disease, crime, and addiction by ultimately ending drug prohibition. See www.CopsSayLegalizeDrugs.com for more. 

Palin’s minister drives out witchcraft, makes Obama’s minister look completely sane in comparison

Thomas Muthee is a minister from Kenya who has repeatedly preached at Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin’s church (Wasilla Assembly of God).  This is not some long-past connection, nor is it a situation where the church one time invited a visiting minister who they didn’t know was a wackjob.  Muthee has been a visiting minister there since 2005, and most recently preached at Palin’s church this past weekend.

From Wikipedia:

Muthee and his wife returned home to Kenya from Scotland, where he had finished his graduate studies, in 1988.^[3][4] They soon felt that they were “called by God to Kiambu” and after six months of prayer, research, and “spiritual mapping,” they came to believe that a witch known as “Mama Jane” was the cause of crime and spiritual oppression in the area.^{[1][3][4][5][6]} Muthee alleged that “top government and business leaders [were] afraid to do anything without her approval,” that at least one person per month would die in a car accident in front of her “divination house” (otherwise known as Emmanuel Clinic), and that she harassed his congregation.^[3][4][7] According to Muthee, soon after his followers began to pray that God would either save or oust Mama Jane,^[3][4][7][8] three young people died in another apparent accident in front of Mama Jane’s clinic.^[3][4][7] The angry townsfolk wanted to stone her in retaliation, and when the police entered Mama Jane’s home to intervene, they were apparently startled by what they believed to be a demon and shot her pet python to death.^{[3][4][6][7][8]} Mama Jane was then questioned by police, after which she left town.^[3][4][8] Since then, Muthee has frequently referred to his witch-hunt as an example of successful spiritual warfare.^[6]

The event was depicted in two videos by George Otis, Jr.,^[9][10] in which Muthee claimed that the crime rate in Kiambu dropped drastically after Mama Jane left.^{[1][3][5][7][11][12]} However, Workgroup “Back to the Bible,” headed by Pastor Rien van de Kraats of Kamperland, Netherlands, found no police reports or any other sources that backed up this claim.^[12]

In the video below, after enumerating how religious people should take over the entire country, he drives witchcraft away from Sarah Palin.

Whoo-boy.

TitaniumGirl gives birth to world’s smallest Paulian

Let’s all give a nice LFV welcome to TiGirl’s newborn daughter – isn’t she absolutely adorable?!   I understand she’s quite strong-willed, just like her mom!

Only 18 years until she can vote ……

George Phillies Blasts Debt Takeover

The following was written by George Phillies.

Phillies Blasts Fed Debt Takeover

“It’s the biggest rip-off in the history of the world,” said Libertarian Presidential candidate George Phillies. Phillies is on the November ballot in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. “Treasury Secretary Paulsen wants prudent Americans to be billed trillions of dollars to pay debts of their spendthrift neighbors. Trillions? Yes, trillions. Nine hundred billion to date. Far more in the future.

“Do you want to stop with paying your own bills?” Phillies asked. “Or do you want to be stuck paying the bills of every neighborhood wastrel who took a HELOC loan they couldn’t afford? Do you want to save the Lexus SUV of the billionaire banker dimwit who approved that HELOC loan? If you want to keep the money you worked so hard to earn, you have only one choice: Vote Libertarian! Throw Republican rascals and their Democratic toadies out on their ears.

“The Republicans?” Phillies wondered. “You don’t have to ask if Republicans choose competent candidates. Republicans nominated George Bush, whose gave us trillions in debt, secret wiretaps of your phone, a pointless War in Iraq, and the worst financial crisis since 1932. Democrats are no better. Senators Biden and Obama rolled over on Republican issue after Republican issue. For real change, vote Libertarian.”

–30–

George Phillies is on the ballot in New Hampshire and Massachusetts as the Libertarian Party candidate for President.

Paulsen says
http://treasury.gov/press/releases/hp1149.htm

Trillions? 900 billion so far, as totaled by CNBC
http://www.cnbc.com/id/26751385

Another 1.2 trillion, give or take?
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2008/09/us-taxpayer-giant-dumpster-for-illiquid.html

Stuber email: It would take a miracle for Barr to win – Quick, send money!

This is the latest email from the Barr campaign, written by Robert Stuber.

Dear Friend,

It has been several weeks since you’ve heard from me and I’ll bet you were wondering what had happened to me.

Well, for the time being I’m still here at Bob Barr for President national campaign headquarters in Atlanta. If you’ve bothered to open any of my more recent diatribes, you know that I’m the campaign’s fundraiser and I have a deal with people who support the cause with a financial gift of as little as just $5.

That deal? Send a gift and you’ll never hear from me again.

You see, according to our database records – and those are never wrong, right? – we show that you have been receiving our emails (presumably indicating your support for Bob Barr) and we have yet to record even a $5 gift in support of this history-making venture.

I figure you must be one of four types of people.

A.) You are an official with the media trying to catch the Bob Barr campaign making some stupid, outrageous or erroneous statement. You can’t wait to say “gotcha!”

B.) The McCain or Obama campaign has hired you to similarly monitor our statements – (of course, they would have to hire you because they have no real volunteer support willing to do such mundane tasks and they have a gazillion dollars between them and can afford to hire you.) Those dollars have either come from special interests or, in the case of the McCain campaign, MY TAX DOLLARS, which I deeply resent . . . but I digress.

C.) Thirdly, you are unemployed, or too young to have a job, and can’t afford to part with a few bucks. I understand that and am cool with it. I hope you find my musings informative, educational and perhaps entertaining and please know that I hope your financial condition improves in the near future. That said, if Obama or McCain are elected, I’m not optimistic about the future economy of our nation . . . but then again I am biased and believe that ONLY Bob Barr as President will improve our economy by enacting meaningful reductions in government spending, eliminating wasteful and counter-productive regulations and programs, and reducing the tax burden you will eventually be stuck with.

D.) You are a great American and true believer who like me admires Bob Barr and wishes he “had a chance of winning.” You share my sentiment that neither McCain nor Obama will bring any real change to Washington. You recognize that the so-called “two party system” is corrupt and broken and special interests have too much power. You are in independent thinker and may be relatively new (after all we are adding thousands of new readers to this message every week) to the Bob Barr email list. But you still don’t think Bob Barr’s campaign is worth your investment. You worry that votes Bob captures will divide our country or possibly lead to a win by a candidate you really don’t care for.

So if you are in category “D,” the rest of this message is for you (But everyone else is welcome to read along . . . as if I could stop you . . . )

Here’s the reason you should get off the dime and drop a $5 bill on Bob Barr. You see, I may be a bit idealistic, but I’m not stupid. I realize that unless a miracle occurs (and I do believe in them and pray for one daily), the chance that Bob Barr is elected President on November 4 is slim.

So why waste time and resources supporting him? It’s simple, really. I will no longer settle for the lesser of two evils, I will no longer put up with government as usual, I will no longer accept that the status quo is all we can ever hope for.

In our nation, change comes very slow In some ways, that’s good. But today our federal government is almost totally out of control. There are a few good elected officials in Washington, but they are indeed scarce. The corrupt are teamed with the ones who want socialism, and that’s the direction in which we are headed.

A decade ago I had hope that the GOP might win out over socialism, but I was wrong and they have gone over to the dark side of big government and more spending just like the Democrats.

Do you find yourself nodding as you read this? I’m sure you are.

As they say on TV, “but wait, there’s more . . .”

Let’s talk about our privacy and the nature of big government to spy on its citizens. Let’s talk about your fundamental civil rights – like those guaranteed in the Second Amendment.

When the Bush administration recently went to Congress for re-authorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), it wasn’t good enough for them to pay off the telecom industry with legal immunities for their misdeeds, no . . . they had to expand the government’s capacity to spy on you and me for barely any reason what so ever. That scares me and it should you, too. Both Senators Obama and McCain supported this bill (could it be because both receive huge campaign contributions from people with telecom industry connections?) and because of that, your privacy is NOT a big issue in this campaign. This is an outrage.

Next, on the issue of gun control, there is no question that Barack Obama would work closely with his allies in the Democrat party to add restrictions and ban both certain guns, and certain ammunition. For the guns he can seize, he would make it difficult and expensive to own and use them. On the issue of the Second Amendment, Obama is a very dangerous person, which perhaps explains why the National Rifle Association has hitched their horse to the McCain campaign. But it seems that the leaders of the NRA are willing to overlook an important fact about the McCain record. It has been only nine years, but they seem to have forgotten that John McCain was the primary mover behind the McCain/Lieberman legislation that would have effectively ended the practice of private gun sales and gun shows Defeating McCain/Lieberman and its successors was the NRA’s top agenda item less than a decade ago. Are we to believe that John McCain has changed his tune on gun control? If someone can logically support an end to gun shows, then why not a ban on so-called “assault rifles” like the AR-15s and M1s we collect? Or a ban on semi-automatic handguns like the Colts, Glocks, and S&Ws we own to protect our homes? Or even a ban on the semi-automatic shotguns like the Beretta’s, Mossbergs, Winchesters and Remingtons we own and use for hunting?

Like me, you probably don’t trust the “new” pro-gun John McCain that the NRA is in love with.

Bob Barr’s record on privacy, gun control and our civil rights in general is impeccable. NRA members have recognized this several times by electing him to their Board of Directors.

You and I both know Bob Barr is the most honest, experienced and qualified candidate to occupy the White House in 2009. But there’s still that nagging thought that he “doesn’t have a chance of winning.”

After all the media almost totally ignores the campaign. And, then there’s my greatest gripe of the week. As you know, Bob Barr and his running mate, Wayne Root, are the only candidates who complied with the law for filing to be on the ballot in Texas. It is an open and shut case of Texas bureaucrats ignoring the law, but it is none-the-less a reality that only this campaign complied 100% with the law. Yet, the establishment has taken it upon themselves to ignore the law and certify McCain and Obama. If you or I were to break a Texas law like this, there is no way we would be so protected and favored.

Anyway, today I ask you to turn off those inhibitions that are keeping you from doing the right thing. I ask you to invest in this campaign Win or lose, we will make history and significantly impact Washington. Your gift of just $5 will get you off the list of people who hear from me with these nagging rants. But I sincerely hope you will invest more; $25, $50, $100 will make a big difference. Click here to donate.

Your gift will help us buy time for Bob Barr television and radio ads. And with those ads will come a significant boost in his poll numbers. And with that boost will come more media attention and participation in the national political debates. This is the beginning of that proverbial snow-ball gaining momentum.

So, please, you won’t hear from me again with just a $5 gift, but I ask you to consider even a larger gift to help. Together we can make a miracle happen. Thank you.

Thank you.

Sincerely,
Robert Signature
Robert Stuber
Finance Director
Bob Barr for President

Press Release: Mike Munger responds to Public Forum Education Debate

Libertarian responds to Public Forum Education Debate

RALEIGH (Sept. 19) — Mike Munger, Libertarian candidate for governor, responded to the Public Forum for North Carolina Education gubernatorial debate held today:

The Democratic and Republican candidates held another alleged debate today, sponsored by a supposedly non-partisan group, which excluded the third candidate in the race. Predictably, their answers focused on how they are going to fix the problem by using government power.

The event was ironically held under the banner: “Education: Everybody’s Business.” Everybody, that is, except those who challenge the status quo, including a professor with nearly 25 years as an educator. Compounding the irony was the fact this “public” forum was held on private property and attendance was by invitation only. The program was recorded by the NC Telecommunications Association, another supposedly non-partisan group, and will be aired by WUNC on cable systems across the state.

News14 Carolina aired the debate live, but to their credit they interviewed me afterward. I hope that the follow-up interview will be distributed along with the main debate.

Public Forum for North Carolina Education President John Dornan opened the event by saying this was the third time his group has sponsored this event. He failed to mention, of course, that it is also the third time they have excluded the Libertarian Party candidate.

Also conspicuously absent was any apparent involvement of parents. Dornan mentioned the teachers, education administrators, government officials and business leaders were among the 400 people attending, but did not say anything about parents.

Lt. Governor Perdue said there shouldn’t be only one paradigm for education. Mayor McCrory claimed he wanted to change the “culture of education.” Yet both talked only about one paradigm and one culture — that of having bureaucrats in Raleigh choose the curriculum, restrict the selection of teachers, and dictate the process of licensing.

The truth is that nothing will change if either of these folks are elected. Perdue believes the “responsibility of education rests with the governor,” a statement that shows her contempt for the parents and teachers of our state.

McCrory said he’d put more business leaders on the state Board of Education. Take away the political sloganeering, and both are telling the insulated and hidebound education establishment: “Vote for me, and I will give you other people’s money.”

My platform calls for a real paradigm shift, and a truly new culture. I believe the responsibility for each child’s education rests with two groups: the parents of that child, and the highly motivated teachers that the parent chooses. And I’ll let you keep more of your own money, money you yourself have earned. I would offer each parent in the state an education voucher, financed by lottery proceeds, of $1,250 per child in their household. This voucher could only be spent at a state-accredited school, or be credited to the household in the case of home-schooling.

And by the way, vouchers don’t “cost” anything, as Perdue claims, because it’s your money, not the government’s. If anything, vouchers would save money in the long run, as the average costs of education would fall.

Competition and school choice will be the central premise of the Munger Administration’s education policy, to give parents more control over their children’s education. I would streamline and simpilfy the accreditation process, lift the cap on charter schools, and foster the growth of charter schools, religious or theme schools, or any other kind of innovative educational program that can attract the children of parents who want to exercise their choices as parents.

I know charter schools work because my son attends Raleigh Charter High School, ranked as one of the top ten high schools in the nation. The cost per student is just over half that of the average for NC high schools. Facilities costs are less, administrative costs are less, and janitorial services are either provided by the students (they take out their own trash), or by contracting out to private firms that clean the bathrooms and mop the floors.

Last, but not least, I would put a floor on public school spending at its existing level, for a five year adjustment period. Our schools need basic infrastructure work, from physical plant improvements to textbooks. So those of you worried about my voucher program should rest assured: the money will come from the payments already owed to education, by statute, but taken by the General Assembly for pet projects. No program cannot work by starving the traditional public schools of revenue. And I don’t want the General Assembly to be tempted to cut education dollars and use them for pork barrel spending in their districts, hoping lottery money will make up the difference.

-30-
_______________________________________________________________________________________________

LIBERTARIAN PARTY OF NORTH CAROLINA
PO Box 28141 Raleigh NC 27611 * 877.843.5762 * www.LPNC.org
Brian Irving, Communications Director, 919.538.4548

Barbara Howe
Campaign Manager, Munger for Governor
www.munger08.com
919-690-1423 (h)
919-475-2371 (c)

Bob Barr’s Emergency Stay in Texas denied very quickly

From Russ Verney email:

Late last night, I returned from Texas where we had just filed for an emergency legal stay to prevent the Secretary of State from mailing ballots until our case is resolved.

Before I could even unpack, I received word that our emergency stay had been rejected.

While I am disappointed, I am more alarmed by the opposition brief submitted by Texas’ Attorney General. Rather than address this issue on its legal merit, the Texas AG is politicizing this issue under the guise of protecting troops stationed overseas.

Can you believe this, the opening paragraph of their brief?

“Undeniably the Constitution of the United States protects the right of all qualified citizens to vote.” In that spirit, the State of Texas opposes any threat to the rights of military service members to receive, case, and return ballots from abroad. The Motion for Emergency Stay filed by Relators Bob Barr, Wayne Allyn Root, and the Libertarian Party of Texas presents precisely this threat, in asking this Court to stop the mailing of ballots to our men and women in uniform around the globe. This Court should deny the Motion and protect the constitutional rights of military voters.

Yes, Russ, I can indeed believe it.  In fact, I’d guess it’s unbelievable only to you.

Take that any way you wish.

Angela Keaton to appear on Liberty Cap Talk Live tonight

LNC At-Large Representative Angela Keaton, who has been under attack by some members of the LNC for her investigation into former LP Executive Director Shane Cory’s severance pay and for going public about the matter and her views of the governing board, will be on Liberty Cap Talk Live tonight at 7:35 p.m. EST/4:35 p.m. PST. She will come on after the show’s commercial break and spend approximately 8 minutes talking about the LNC’s attempt to remove her from the Party’s recent meeting and the Barr campaign snubbing Ron Paul.

At 6 p.m. EST panelists Wendy McElroy, Toby Iselin of Free Minds TV (http://www.freemindstv.com), and LewRockwell.com blogger and writer Karen Kwiatkowski will also be on the air for 90 minutes before Keaton appears. Topics fielded on the show are the Fed bailing out the American International Group (AIG) for $85 billion and the world banks crashing, the Sarah Palin phenonemon and her family, Barack Obama’s tax plan vs. McCain’s plan, and the Rand Corporation’s recent study on the use of military force in the Middle East.

Here’s the show’s profile page: http://www.nowlive.com/libertycaptalklive. The call-in information to
dial into the show and the show’s widget to listen to the program are available on the page.

Please tune in. It will be an exciting show tonight.

Yours in Liberty,

Todd Andrew Barnett
Host, Liberty Cap Talk Live with Todd Andrew Barnett & James Landrith, Jr.

“Manning’s Fierce Prayer for Bristol Palin”

This is one of the most unintentionally funny political rants I have ever seen.

Libertarian Alliance Essay Contest Announced

From Libertarian Alliance:

The 2008 Chris R. Tame Memorial Prize
£1,000 to be Won

In honour of Dr Chris R. Tame (1949-2006), The PROMIS Unit of Primary Care has established a yearly prize of £1,000 for an essay on a subject to be announced by Dr Sean Gabb, Director of the Libertarian Alliance.

By the 10th October 2008, contestants are invited to submit essays to Dr Sean Gabb, Director of the Libertarian Alliance.

Essay Title: “Can a Libertarian Society be Described as ‘Tesco minus the State’?”
Essay Length: 3,000 words excluding notes and bibliography

Explanatory Note

Many socialists and conservatives regard libertarians as cheerleaders for big business. Our belief in free enterprise is understood as support for the bigger, and therefore the more successful, corporations – General Motors, Microsoft, HSBC, Tesco, and so forth – and for an international financial system centred on the City of London.

Some libertarians are happy to be so regarded. They dislike the way in which big government provides opportunities for big business to acquire privileges that shelter it from competition. Even so, they believe that a world without government, or a world with much less government, would be broadly similar in its patterns of enterprise to the world that we now have. It would be much improved, but not fundamentally dissimilar.

Other libertarians disagree. They regard big business as fundamentally a creation of big government. Incorporation laws free entrepreneurs from personal risk and personal responsibility, and allow the growth of large business organisations that are bureaucratically managed. These organisations then cartellise their markets and externalise many of their costs. The result is systematic distortion of market behaviour from the forms it would take without government intervention. These libertarians often go further in their analysis by denying the legitimacy of intellectual property rights and ownership rights in land beyond what any individual can directly use.

Where do you stand in this debate? Are you broadly comfortable with a global capitalism that is raising billions of people from starvation towards affluence. Or are you a radical with a vision of a society that has never yet been tried and is as alien and even frightening to most people as anything promised by the Marxists.

You tell us.

Rules

*  Essays must be original and previously unpublished works.

*  Essays must be submitted in English and typed and in hard copy by sending to The Libertarian Alliance, Suite 35, 2 Lansdowne Row, Mayfair, London W1J 6H, United Kingdom.

*  Essays must also be submitted by e-mail and in MS Word format to Sean Gabb – sean@libertarian.co.uk .

*  Essays must bear the name and full address of the author, including his e-mail address. The name does not need to be genuine, but work submitted under what Sean Gabb considers an absurd pseudonym may be rejected. Certainly, the prize money will be by cheque, and so must be made out to a real person.

*  Essays must have been received ain both hard and soft copy no later than Monday the 13th October 2008.

*  The winner will be announced on the evening of Saturday the 25th October 2008, at the banquet of the Libertarian Alliance Conference, to be held at the National Liberal Club in London.

*  The winner will be required to make a ten minute acceptance speech on Saturday the 275th October 2008, at the banquet of the Libertarian Alliance Conference, to be held at the National Liberal Club in London. This speech may be made in person, or by pre-recorded video, or may be read out by Sean Gabb.

*  The prize will be £1,000, made out to the winner and payable in Sterling by cheque drawn on one of the United Kingdom clearing banks. No other form of payment will be considered.

*  The winning essay will be published by the Libertarian Alliance. All essays submitted will be published by the Libertarian Alliance.

*  In all matters of deciding the winner of the Prize and in all associated matters, the decision of Sean Gabb shall be final.

*  The act of submitting an essay shall constitute full acceptance of these terms

*  This prize competition is not open to any Officer of the Libertarian Alliance.

For all questions, please contact Sean Gabb

Details for December LNC meeting

The following is an email from LPHQ regarding the December LNC meeting.

Here are the details for the LNC Board Meeting 12/6-12/7 in San Diego CA:

The location is the
Town and Country Resort
500 Hotel Circle North
San Diego, CA 92108
www.towncountry.com

To make a reservation, please call 800-772-8527 & ask for the $99 special “Libertarian National Committee” Room Rate (effective 12/3-12/9). On line reservations are not yet set up for our event.

This is a major convention resort with 1,000 guestrooms and suites, over 205,000 square feet of meeting and exhibit space, 5 restaurants, 3 lounges, 4 pools, 27 hole golf course, 15,000 sq ft day spa and fitness center, connected to Fashion Valley, with easy access to San Diego’s light rail trolley station.

If you have any problems or special requests, contact:
Rosa I. Myhra
Convention Sales Manager
Phone 619-297-6006 x 4886
Fax 619-725-5233
r.myhra@towncountry.com

We will most likely have a walk through tour for our convention committee and any one else that is interested from 5:30-6:30 pm on Fri 12/5. Please meet us at 5:30 pm by the Tiki Pavilion next to the gift shop across from the Terrace Café.

Thanks!

Robert

Robert S. Kraus – Dir of Operations
Operations@LP.org
Libertarian National Committee
2600 Virginia Ave NW #200
Washington, DC 20037
Ph: 202.333.0008 x 231
Fx: 703.935.8015

Bob Barr gets Libertarian Party some publicity!

From CQ Politics:

Barr Misfires As a Libertarian

by Craig Crawford

It is too bad the Libertarians blew it in nominating Bob Barr for president. Too bad because a party that truly believes in personal freedom and limited government is worth hearing from in these days of major parties that equivocate and prevaricate on those principles.

But in Barr, a former Georgia congressman who once accidentally fired a revolver at a fundraiser, Libertarians have ended up with a loose cannon whose record isn’t even that strong on the party’s ideals. For instance, how can someone who claims authorship of the Defense of Marriage act now claim to be a libertarian?

In recent days Barr has further burnished his nutty reputation and made his newfound party look like a joke. He appeared in federal court as part of a ridiculous lawsuit against Michael Bloomberg, charging the New York mayor with defamation against a gun club. He is in court in Texas promoting a bogus claim that John McCain and Barack Obama should not be on the state ballot in November.

And lately Barr has been publicly inviting former GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul, a onetime Libertarian nominee himself, to join him as running mate — even though Barr has already chosen one, internet gambling entrepreneur Wayne Allyn Root. (Apparently, Paul never returned his call.)

Combine all this with Barr’s pathetic fundraising and poor polling performance (which will cost him admission to the presidential debates) and you can see that Barr probably won’t even have a spoiler effect anywhere in this race.

The Libertarian gambit to raise the party’s profile with a better-known nominee than usual simply failed. The party ought to stay focused on building its base from the ground up, such as running stronger candidates for lesser offices, and one day its natural appeal to independent-thinking voters could really catch on.

Anonymous hacks into Republican VP Sarah Palin’s email account

From Gawker:

Did the internet just cause Sarah Palin to destroy evidence? The potential Veep is in a bit of trouble for conducting state business using her personal, unarchived email address (gov.sarah@yahoo.com) instead of her official account (which is, of course, subject to laws requiring the retention of government records). Emails from that Yahoo account are already being sought in connection with the Troopergate investigation. Now comes word that Anonymous, the fun-loving Internet trouble-makers based loosely around the message board 4Chan, gained access to another Palin email account: gov.palin@yahoo.com. It looks legit! The offending posts, screenshots, heretofore unseen family photos, and emails have all been deleted from Imageshack and 4Chan. But we have them. You want to read Sarah Palin’s email?

Ok, sad thing first: a good Samaritan reset the password and tried to alert Sarah. But he also posted the new password, causing multiple people to try to log in at once, freezing the account for 24 hours. And now, the account has been deleted! Which is, as we said, maybe destruction of evidence? So for now this is, we think, all we’ll get to see from this email account (if anyone finds evidence of saved emails, let us know.)

View the the rest of the article, including screenshots and other information, on Gawker.

Why Bob Barr really offered to replace Wayne Allyn Root with Ron Paul

According to an excellent source, LNC member Stewart Flood made a resolution to remove Wayne Allyn Root as the LP’s Vice Presidential nominee, as a result of Root’s bizarre (and some believe racist) interview with Reason Magazine.

While the resolution failed, it explains why Bob Barr felt free to offer the Vice President position to Ron Paul even though, in actuality, he has no such power.  It also explains why the Barr campaign inexplicably called the LNC and asked that LNC member Angela Keaton not be removed, since she would be more likely than most on the LNC to support such a radical measure.

Press Release: Barr files suit to remove McCain and Obama from Texas ballot

BARR ‘08

For Immediate Release – Sept. 17, 2008

Bob Barr Files Suit in Texas to Remove McCain, Obama from Ballot

Suit alleges that McCain, Obama knowingly missed filing deadlines

Atlanta, GA – Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party’s nominee for president, has filed a lawsuit in Texas demanding Senators John McCain and Barack Obama be removed from the ballot after they missed the official filing deadline.

“The seriousness of this issue is self-evident,” the lawsuit states. “The hubris of the major parties has risen to such a level that they do not believe that the election laws of the State of Texas apply to them.”

Texas election code §192.031 requires that the “written certification” of the “party’s nominees” be delivered “before 5 p.m. of the 70th day before election day.” Because neither candidate had been nominated by the official filing deadline, the Barr campaign argues it was impossible for the candidates to file under state law.

“Supreme Court justices should recognize that their responsibility is to apply the law as passed by the Legislature, and the law is clear that the candidates cannot be certified on the ballot if their filings are late,” says Drew Shirley, a local attorney for the Barr campaign, who is also a Libertarian candidate for the Texas Supreme Court.

A 2006 Texas Supreme Court decision ruled that state laws “does not allow political parties or candidates to ignore statutory deadlines.”

Orrin Grover, attorney for Bob Barr and Wayne Root, said that he believes that the Texas Secretary of State is bound by Texas law to remove the Republican and Democratic nominees from the November ballot. “Either we have rules and deadlines, or we do not,” Grover said.

The Chairman of the Texas Libertarian Party, Pat Dixon stated, “Libertarian principles require personal responsibility for your acts and failures. Obama and McCain failed to meet the deadlines. They must follow the law like everyone else.”

The petition also alleges that the Democratic Party’s late presidential filing falsely claimed under oath that Senator Obama had been nominated hours before the nomination actually occurred.

“The facts of the case are not in dispute,” says Russell Verney, manager of the Barr campaign. “Republicans and Democrats missed the deadline, but were still allowed on the ballot. Third parties are not allowed on the ballot for missing deadlines, as was the case for our campaign in West Virginia, yet the Texas secretary of state’s office believes Republicans and Democrats to be above the law.”

Barr will be holding a press conference this Thursday at the Texas Supreme Court at 11:00 a.m.

Libertarian Party presidential candidate Bob Barr represented the 7th District of Georgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003.

Federal Reserve taking over troubled insurance giant AIG

According to the New York Times, the Federal Reserve is close to a deal bailing out insurance giant AIG.  In exchange for an 80% stake in the company, the Fed will provide AIG with an $85 billion loan.

The Starr Resolution

The following is the letter Aaron Starr proposed the LNC send to Ron Paul, offered in response to the letter of apology suggested by Rachel Hawkridge.

September 13, 2008

The Honorable Ron Paul
Committee to Re-Elect Ron Paul
837 W. Plantation
Clute, TX 71531

Dear Dr. Paul:

The Libertarian National Committee is disappointed to learn that you have recently urged those in the freedom movement to vote for the likes of Ralph Nader, Cynthia McKinney and Chuck Baldwin, none of whom truly grasp the meaning of Liberty.

More than before, we remain committed to our nominees for President and Vice President, Bob Barr and Wayne Root. We believe both of them boldly present the ideals of limited government, lower taxes, lower spending, and more freedom to the American people.

We invite you to restore your commitment to Liberty by supporting the only candidates on the ballot this year who understand the Constitution and are prepared to restore our republic to what the Founders believe

Toward Liberty,

The Libertarian National Committee:

Not at all surprisingly, disgruntled PA Republican loses lawsuit to remove Barr from ballot

Victor Stabile, Chair of the Cumberland County (PA) Republican Committee, filed suit to remove Bob Barr from the Pennsylvania ballot.  Stabile’s argument was that the LP engaged in fraud, by substituting Bob Barr for the stand-in candidate, and by collecting petition signatures under the name of the stand-in even after Barr was nominated.

Predictably, the judge didn’t buy that argument:  pennsylvania-court-opinion

“Forget Jason” Money Bomb on 10/1

The following was written by the Committee To Elect Jason Gatties.

St. Joseph, Mi- The Committee To Elect Jason Gatties would like to announce a fund raising effort for the month of October. The only catch is, it isn’t for Jason. On October 1st, the campaign will launch a “Forget Jason” money bomb. A dedicated page will list several top libertarian candidates, with a direct link to their donation page. Some of the libertarian candidates to be listed include: Scotty Boman, Allen Buckley, Michael Munger, Thomas Knapp, Daniel Grow, Eric Schansberg, Tyler Nixon, William Parker, Wes Upchurch, Andy Horning, Rex Bell, Bill Hall, Eric Larson, Charles Jay, Chris Cole & Susan Hogarth.

“It is important that libertarian activists show their support for candidates who are the front lines of the freedom battle. I want to do my part to help these fine people succeed in November.”- Jason Gatties

The fund raising drive will last through out the month of October via www.VoteGatties.org. If you have a candidate you would like to see listed, please contact the campaign at VoteGatties@yahoo.com.

LP validity rate in Connecticut only 54%, 500 short of requirement

From Ballot Access News:

Connecticut elections officials say the Libertarian presidential petition lacks approximately 500 valid signatures. Libertarian activist Andy Rule will be reviewing these findings. The party submitted over 12,000 signatures to meet a requirement of exactly 7,500 signatures, but elections officials say only 54% of the signatures were valid.

A 54% validity rate?  Who was petitioning in Connecticut?

LPNH lawsuit

Click here to read the lawsuit filed Friday by LPNH, Bob Barr, Wayne Allyn Root, Brendan Kelly, and Hardy Macia:  lpnh-lawsuit1

According to George Phillies, the candidate they wish to remove from the ballot, the lawsuit lacks authority because the LPNH Executive Committee voted to merely join a suit by the LNC, yet the LNC is not listed as a plaintiff.

Press Release: The Liberty Agenda

The following is a news release from Brian Irving, Communications Director for the Libertarian Party of North Carolina.

Libertarian Candidates Propose Liberty Agenda

RALEIGH (Sept. 15) — Ending the state’s power to seize private property by forced annexation and eminent domain, improving public education through competition, restoring free, fair and open elections, and cutting off corporate welfare, will be the top legislative priorities of a Libertarians elected to the General Assembly.

Thirteen candidates announced the Liberty Agenda for North Carolina today. They are: Kira Howe (Senate 7), Brian Irving (Senate 17), David Rollins (Senate 20), Richard Evey (Senate 44), Jesse Mignogna (House 2), Sean Haugh (House 30), Barbara Howe (House 32), Susan Hogarth (House 38), Robert Richmond (House 71), T.J. Rohr (House 87), Jeffrey Ober (House 95), Lawrence Hollar (House 96), and Keith Calvelli (House 108).

“I originally ran for council because my property was involuntarily annexed and have vigorously opposed any future involuntary annexations,” said second-term Lenior City Council member Rohr.

“After the U.S. Supreme Court incorrectly allowed the practice of eminent domain for purely economic development purposes, I proposed a city resolution condemning that decision and calling for an amendment to the NC Constitution abolishing such practices,” he said. “The resolution passed unanimously.”

Improving public education is as much a priority for the legislative candidates, as it is for Mike Munger, Libertarian candidate for governor.

“There are many good things happening in North Carolina education,” Munger says on his website. “And the path to continued improvement is to foster choice.”

“We expect Governor Munger will get strong opposition from the education lobby and teacher’s unions,” said Irving. “So he’ll need all the allies in the General Assembly he can muster.”

Irving agrees with Munger that it’s fashionable to bash public education, rather than sincerely seek ways to improve it. “The problem is that anyone who proposes thinking out of the box when it comes to education is beat over the head with the supposed public school mandate in the state constitution,” he said.

“This selective devotion to constitutional principle is curious, since the legislature freely ignores other parts of the constitution, including the part that says ‘all elections shall be free, fair, and open’ by restricting the right of people to vote for anyone other than Democrats and Republicans,” said Irving.

The Liberty Agenda candidates also oppose economic incentives to businesses, more properly called corporate welfare, as an immoral tax on individuals for the benefit of corporate profits. Recent news reports that the Dell computer company may sell their three-year old Winston-Salem plant, built with nearly $300 million in corporate welfare, demonstrate corporate incentives are ineffective as well as immoral, said Irving.

As proof that Libertarians will do what the say when elected, Rohr said, “I was the only local elected representative to vote against the infamous Lenoir-Google government handouts.”

“Ending property theft by government, improving education, restoring fair elections, and cutting off corporate welfare — these are just our top four issues” said Hogarth. “We will then go on to work to reduce the size, scope and power of government at all levels and on all issues, and
will consistently oppose increasing the size, scope and power of government at any level, for any purpose.”

-30-
The Liberty Agenda for North Carolina

Here is the text of the Liberty Agenda

We, Libertarian candidates for North Carolina General Assembly, pledge that our priority while in office will be to put Freedom First for all the state’s citizens. This Agenda fully supports the campaign agenda of Mike Munger, Libertarian candidate for Governor of North Carolina.

1. Ending forced annexation and stopping private property seizure under the power of eminent domain by amending the state constitution.

Forced annexation and the seizure of private property for ostensible “public purpose” is a violation of the fundamental rights of all Americans. Forced annexation is not about providing services, or controlling growth. Forced annexation is about money. Communities should only be annexed with their consent. No government, at any level, should have the power to take or seize private property for any purpose, without the express consent of the owner and without just compensation..

2. Improving public education through school choice and competition.

We agree with Mike Munger, Libertarian candidate for governor, that it has become fashionable to bash public education rather than sincerely seek ways to improve it. There are many good things happening in North Carolina education, and the path to continued improvement is to foster choice.

The problem is that anyone who proposes thinking out of the box when it comes to education is beat over the head with the supposed public school mandate in the state constitution.

This selective devotion to constitutional principle is curious, since the legislature freely ignores other parts of the constitution, including the part that says ‘all elections shall be free, fair, and open’ by restricting the right of people to vote for anyone other than Democrats and Republicans.

3. Restoring free, fair and open elections to North Carolina by removing barriers to ballot access.

North Carolina has arguably the most restrictive ballot access laws in the nation. These barriers are specifically designed by the Democratic-Republican duopoly to restrict the people’s freedom of choice, prevent independent and third party candidates from getting on the ballot. Elections laws also are used to restrict free speech, by limiting how much an individual can contribute to the candidate of their choice. The people should have the unregulated and unrestricted right vote for and support candidates of their choice.

4. Cutting off all corporate welfare and subsidies.

Economic incentives and subsidies, more properly called corporate welfare, are an immoral tax on individuals for the benefit of corporate profits. Recent news reports that the Dell computer company may sell their three year old Winston-Salem plant, built with nearly $300 million in corporate welfare, demonstrate that corporate incentives are ineffective as well as immoral.

Conclusion

Ending property theft by government, improving education, restoring fair elections, and cutting off corporate welfare only the beginning of the Liberty Agenda. Our goal and our pledge is to reduce the size, scope and power of government at all levels and on all issues, and consistently oppose any increase in the size, scope and power of government at any level, for any purpose.

/signed/

Kira Howe, Senate 7

Brian Irving, Senate 17

David Rollins, Senate 20

Richard Evey, Senate 44

Jesse Mignogna, House 2

Sean Haugh, House 30

Barbara Howe, House 32

Susan Hogarth, House 38

Robert Richmond, House 71

T.J. Rohr, House 87

Jeffrey Ober, House 95

Lawrence Hollar, House 96

Keith Calvelli, House 108
——————————————————————————–
LIBERTARIAN PARTY OF NORTH CAROLINA
PO Box 28141 Raleigh NC 27611 * 877.843.5762 * www.LPNC.org
Brian Irving, Communications Director, 910.987.5844

New Hampshire lawsuit filed, seeks to remove Phillies from ballot

A reporter for the Nashua Telegraph has been calling libertarians today about a lawsuit filed in US District Court.

Bob Barr and the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire Executive Committee are named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit.  However, this is not a typical ballot substitution action; instead, it is an action to remove George Phillies from the New Hampshire ballot.  This therefore appears to be the expected lawsuit previously discussed on Last Free Voice.

Bob Barr is the Libertarian Party’s presidential nominee.  George Phillies was nominated as presidential nominee at the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire state convention.  Currently, both Barr and Phillies are ballot-qualified in New Hampshire as Libertarian presidential candidates.  The state does not allow substitution of candidates, and the New Hampshire Libertarian Party began collecting signatures for Phillies before Barr announced his candidacy.  Phillies has declined to remove himself from the New Hampshire ballot, citing his belief that he has an ethical obligation to those who signed the petitions to place him on the ballot.

As of this afternoon, New Hampshire Secretary of State William Garner had not yet been served with said lawsuit.

Motion for Removal of Bob Barr as LP presidential nominee

The following is a draft Removal Motion for the LNC’s consideration. Please feel free to suggest changes or improvements in comments.  Incidentally, I didn’t personally write it.

Should the LNC remove Barr from his position as LP presidential nominee?

REMOVAL MOTION

WHEREAS, Article 12, Section 5 of the Libertarian Party’s bylaws provide for the suspension of the party’s presidential candidate by the Libertarian National Committee; and

WHEREAS, said bylaws provision requires a 3/4 vote of this body;

BE IT KNOWN that Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party’s 2008 presidential nominee, is hereby suspended on the basis of the following causes:

- Failure to appear, with little or no notice, at a major media event to which he had been invited and to which he had committed to appear;

- Vicious public attacks by his campaign staff on the character and reputation of the event’s host (1988 Libertarian Party presidential nominee Ron Paul) and sponsor (Campaign For Liberty);

- The disrepute and discredit which the aforementioned misbehaviors have brought upon the Libertarian Party.

The committee advises Barr that he has seven (7) days to appeal this action to the party’s Judicial Committee. Absent a successful appeal, his nomination will be deemed null and void and he will be replaced as the party’s presidential nominee.

Jason Gatties supports the removal of Bob Barr from the Michigan ballot

Press Release: Gatties Supports The Removal Of Bob Barr From The Michigan Ballot

For Immediate Release

St.Joseph, Mi- Lake Michigan College Board of Trustees candidate and Libertarian Party member Jason Gatties announced on Thursday night that he is in support of the removal of Bob Barr and Wayne Allyn Root from the Michigan ballot this November. Bob Barr is a former congressman who gained the Libertarian Party’s presidential nomination in late May during the Party’s national convention in Denver. Wayne Allyn Root was a former Libertarian Party presidential candidate who ultimately won the Vice Presidential nomination.

“Bob Barr continues to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is not a libertarian and not a friend of the freedom movement” Gatties said in a written statement. “Barr shows no respect towards libertarian activists or down-ticket libertarian candidates.”

Bob Barr has recently become the center of controversy within the libertarian movement due to “no-showing” a unity event hosted by long-time libertarian & former presidential candidate, Congressman Ron Paul and ignoring party by-laws when, after insulting Ron Paul with the no-show, offered the Congressman a spot next to him on the Libertarian Party ticket, replacing Wayne Allyn Root.

“Bob Barr turned his back on the Libertarian Party the moment he accepted the nomination. Disrespecting Ron Paul should be the final straw. I encourage the Libertarian Party of Michigan’s Executive Committee to remove Bob Barr from the Michigan ballot. If they are unable to remove Mr. Barr, I encourage Michigan citizens to cast their vote for Chuck Baldwin or perhaps, write-in a freedom candidate who will not appear on the Michigan ballot. Your write-in vote may not count, but at least you will be able to sleep at night knowing that you made the right decision. I support our Michigan Libertarian candidates and I encourage people to cast their vote for these fine defenders of liberty. However, I refuse to support Bob Barr and his anti-freedom agenda.”

For more information regarding this story, please visit www.IndependentPoliticalReport.com or LastFreeVoice.wordpress.com.

“Liberty For America” offering memberships

The following is a membership offering for Liberty For America, sent to LFV by George Phillies.  Please note that LFV is not affiliated with, and has no financial interest in, the Liberty For America organization.

Liberty For America Now Offers Memberships

$15 per year

For more information see the Liberty for America Web Pages at http://LibertyForAmerica.com

Also, the September issue of Liberty for America magazine is now out.  You can read it on the Liberty for America web pages.

Note in particular the Libertarian Centrist manifesto

Libertarian Centrism

How are we to tell Libertarian Centrism apart from radical anarchism, Republican-lite conservatism, or conspiracy theorism? I offer a few thought.

Libertarian centrism is about real politics. We libertarian centrists do not agree about everything. Here are litmus questions. The fact that an issue is a litmus test does not make it an important issue. Some important issues are not litmus tests. Warning: Some centrists will disagree with some of my answers. What do most Libertarian centristsbelieve?

We are 100% pro-choice, because government has no valid business running women’s lives for them.

All Americans are entitled to equality in marriage, adoption, divorce, and access to military service.

Slavery was the American Holocaust. Confederate apologists are rightly grouped with Holocaust deniers, and are shunned by all decent people.

Thomas Jefferson correctly wrote: “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men’. It is only through government,limited government, that men and women will stay free.

The so-called ‘States Rights’ doctrine, claiming that states may keep African-Americans from voting and women from having abortions, is un-American. Politicians who say ‘leave it up to the states’ are an
opposite of libertarian.

While there have been conspiracies, the incoherent mutterings of conspiracy theorists, including 9/11 truthers, central banking foes, and 16th amendment deniers, offer nothing to the Libertarian political
movement. They should be politely ignored.

More important, what does Libertarian Centrism offer America? What is the clear, positive, uplifting message we send about the American future? How will Libertarian centrism advance the Libertarian political
movement?

We’ll get to that in the future.

Here’s your chance to SHOW the Barr campaign what you really think

From Bob Barr’s Deputy Campaign Manager Shane Cory:

Don’t be a Party Puppet

Dear Friend,

Maybe it’s the kid in me, but a great Libertarian in Washington State, Bruce Guthrie, ran my all-time favorite political ads during his 2006 senate run.

The production of his commercials was simple enough: Lunch bags, glue, yarn and construction paper put together with very entertaining voiceover.

Bruce’s theme was brilliant: “Don’t be a party puppet!”

If you have a minute to enjoy, here are two spots that aired: the Party Puppet Girls and Party Puppet Rick.

Now that only 53 days remain before the election, I think it’s about time we kicked off our advertising campaign!

While we sill have ongoing ballot access battles going in many states and funds are still very tight, only three weeks remain before early voting begins in some states! Despite our challenges, I don’t want to delay our media campaign any longer.

We need your creative help to get the ball rolling.

Rather than produce stuffy, standard political ads, we want to get your concepts or even full commercials.

If you’re the creative type or want to spend some quality time with a few friends and a video camera over the weekend, we sure could use the help. Please keep them to 30 seconds, leaving about 3 seconds at the end for the government mandated, “I’m Bob Barr and I approve this message.”

Once you have a concept or finished product, just send us your videos! Here’s a drop box where you can upload your videos and concepts.

Not very creative like me? No worries, you can help just as much by making a donation today. I’ll throw in the first $100 and if you can match or contribute $25, $50 or more, we would greatly appreciate the help. Click here to donate.

Thanks for everything that you do!

In Liberty,

Shane Cory
Deputy Campaign Manager
Bob Barr for President

If anyone reading LFV decides to make a video, be sure to post it on YouTube and leave a link here.

George Phillies continues New Hampshire campaign with signs idea

George Phillies, who is ballot qualified as a Libertarian presidential candidate in New Hampshire, has come up with an idea to use his candidacy to support all Libertarian candidates in that state.  Click below to see his fundraising brochure in PDF format.

phillies-new-hampshire-fundraising-letter

LP founder David Nolan: “The Barr Campaign Is Over”

David Nolan is an original founder of the Libertarian Party and, it goes without saying, an expert on Libertarian politics. Mr. Nolan created the “World’s Smallest Political Quiz” and regularly posts on nolanchart.com, where he shares his views on politics and the libertarian movement. The following is an excerpt from his excellent article, “The Barr Campaign Is Over”, posted on his website today.

Why has the Barr campaign has gone so badly awry? The simple answer is that the two men running it — Russ Verney and Shane Cory — are not Libertarians, do not understand what motivates Libertarian activists, and have no interest in building the LP. Verney is a gun-for-hire of no discernible ideology. Cory is a Republican who left his former job at LP headquarters in disgrace, after abusing his authority prior to the Denver convention. (Just today, Verney posted a Campaign Update on the Barr ‘08 website, praising George W. Bush for his “leadership” during the days following the 9/11 attacks seven years ago. Any true Libertarian would have instead pointed out that Bush has USED the 9/11 attacks as an excuse to erode our civil liberties!)

With these two running the campaign it will continue to embarrass Libertarians and waste our resources. Bob Barr will never qualify for inclusion in the phony “Presidential debates.” He will not get the 5% of the vote that would qualify the LP for future matching funds — which it should not accept in any case. Indeed, at this point it seems likely that Barr will not get even 1% of the popular vote. (Bettors on intrade.com are currently betting 2:1 against Barr receiving 1%.)

Click here to read Mr. Nolan’s article in its entirety.

Voices from the anti-Barr petition

As previously noted, a petition has been started to remove Barr/Root as the LP nominee. In glancing through the hundreds of petition signatures, I found a number of comments, including many stating simply that they absolutely will not vote Libertarian unless Barr is removed. Some even said they are leaving the LP. Here’s a sampling, in no particular order:

The LNC is once again showing a failure in leadership in not bringing forth a motion to remove Barr/Root. It only takes one LNC member with courage to bring the motion and another to second it. I am getting KILLED by my Ron Paul associates for my association with what they see as an arch-enemy of liberty, the disgraced LP.

Bob Barr is nothing but a Neocon

Bury Barr

Barr = CIA Schill (Shame on you for the 90s)

My support for Barr ended when he went before the cameras and lied to the nation. The lies continued today from Russ Verney. These people are pathetic and are destroying the LP.

Why snub RP?

This is what happens when you make a deal with the devil.

Barr has shown by his actions he is still a neo-con at heart. He is a disgrace to himself and the Libertarian Party.

Barr is not a Libertarian. The delegates who voted for him did not vote with principle.

I have voted Libertarian in the past. I was planning on voting Libertarian again. Not Now. I will not vote Libertarian as long as Barr is on the ticket. I will never vote Libertarian again if Barr is allowed to get away with his actions without any consequences.

ex-LP member after the “Party of Principle” became just another “Party of Compromise”. Good luck, LP.

You have shamed yourself and made known to all just who and what you are! I will never vote for such a scoundrel

Bob Barr cannot be trusted!

Thank you to Bob for continuing to make American politics a bigger sham than it already is. goodbye!

Pack your bags and go home.

I knew something like this was going to happen from the moment he was nominated. Kick this neo-con off our ticket.

Bob Barr has nothing to do with the pure ideals of liberty. It is a disgrace to the Libertarian Party the way he has treated Ron Paul, the true soldier of Liberty.

As a libertarian candidate, I am appalled by the continued anti-freedom actions of Bob Barr.

More and more the LP continues to sell out. It will not get my votes or money anymore.

Russ Verney says Bush showed “incredible leadership”, makes excuses for Barr’s no-show at Ron Paul event

Yet Verney still fails and refuses to recognize that Barr has absolutely no authority to replace Root with Ron Paul, or anyone else.  By the way, where’s Osama bin Laden?  We can see a quarter on the sidewalk from space, but we can’t find a strange-looking human giant?

Dear Friend,

Before I move forward with an important report for today, I would like to recognize and remember the 2,819 men and women who lost their lives seven years ago. As a result of the attacks of September 11th, Americans came together, setting aside differences in order mourn our shared losses and assist our neighbors in need.

May we never forget . . .

In times of crisis, strength in leadership requires boldness of character, clear direction and firm resolve. As we witnessed after the attacks of September 11th, President George W. Bush showed incredible leadership as he stood atop a fire truck amidst the rubble of the twin towers to rally America.

While the quality of leadership is rare enough, principled leaders are few and far between. Those who do appear to posses the traits necessary to lead, for reasons only known to themselves, frequently choose not to stand on principle.

Yesterday, our vice presidential candidate, Wayne Allyn Root, offered to step aside to allow Congressman Ron Paul an opportunity to serve on the presidential ticket of the Libertarian Party and move the agenda of Liberty forward.

On the surface, a simple offer was extended. In fact it was principled leadership at its finest.

Wayne Allyn Root showed his deep commitment to the principles of our cause. Without hesitation or regard to the effort, time and personal funds he has committed to the issues of freedom, smaller government, less taxes and the Libertarian ticket, Wayne offered to step aside to allow another leader to step up.

I could not be more proud of his actions and selflessness.

As America is hurling towards crisis on many fronts, we need principled leaders like Bob Barr and Wayne Allyn Root. We have no time to waste on anything other than spreading the message of smaller government, less taxes, and more personal freedom issues across this nation.

That brings me to my next point.

Today our campaign is being criticized by a few people for my decision to not attend a press conference sponsored by Ron Paul’s political action committee. I thought I would take a minute to explain to you why I made that decision.

It became evident to me after meeting with Ron Paul’s staff that this media event was not about promoting the liberty agenda; it was about promoting a man. That’s not what we’re in this for.

After rumors were spread in advance of the news conference that Bob Barr was dropping from the race – just to hype the event – I became even more hesitant to attend. Those tactics were unacceptable and when asked about it, Ron Paul’s staff simply smiled and said it would attract the press.

When I was provided a copy of Ron Paul’s prepared remarks just hours before the start of the planned news conference it became clear to me that the message Ron Paul intended to deliver was essentially to scatter the votes for the liberty agenda to the four winds.

His remarks not only encouraged anyone listening to support any one of four candidates, he also applauded ‘non-voters’. To me encouraging people not to vote is not principled leadership for the Liberty agenda.

I made the decision that attending that news conference was not consistent with Bob Barr’s principled leadership for the Liberty agenda.

Once I informed Ron Paul’s staff of my decision I was rudely informed that my decision would have permanent ramifications, I was personally threatened and Bob Barr was politically threatened. That’s a far cry from principled leadership.

One thing that did occur as a result of yesterday’s events is a clear separation of certain factions. Up until now, we have been dealing with two groups, those who want to advance the issues of liberty and those who have been drawn into a cult of personality.

There are those who support a specific politician and then there are those who support the liberty agenda regardless of standard-bearer.

Bob Barr, Wayne Allyn Root and the Libertarian Party stand for the issues of personal freedom and responsible government. As they have proven, both Bob and Wayne are willing to lead or follow for the advancement of our issues.

Now is their time to lead.

As we move into the final 50 days of the campaign we are in place to make a strong impact on the future of our country.

At the end of the day, the number of votes cast in support of the Liberty agenda in the General Election will influence the national political agenda of the next four years.

If we do our jobs, work hard and give us much as possible until Election Day, our voices will be heard and our agenda of smaller government, lower taxes, more personal freedom and government accountability will be on the table for years to come.

I appreciate your commitment and dedication.

Sincerely,

Russ signature

Russell Verney
Campaign Manager

Petition to renounce and remove Barr/Root

A petition has been started, urging the LP to renounce its support of Bob Barr and Wayne Allyn Root, and to ask Barr to step down.  If interested you can sign the petition here.

We, the supporters of freedom and liberty hereby petition you to immediately remove Bob Barr as the Libertarian Party nominee for President of the United States. Furthermore, we request that he not be replaced by the current vice presidential nominee Wayne Allen Root, but by another, less divisive candidate.

This request is not made lightly, but with much seriousness. The actions, track record, and history of Bob Barr has divided libertarians and other liberty leaning individuals across the nation.

WHEREAS the primary goal and purpose of the Libertarian Party is and has always been not conservatism but liberty,

WHEREAS Robert Barr has, not only refused to participate in the 10 September 2008 press conference of Rep. Ronald Paul of Texas and the Campaign for Liberty but has deliberately sabotaged this event with a false RSVP,

WHEREAS Robert Barr’s campaign has simultaneously called for Rep. Ronald Paul of Texas to be its vice presidential candidate and called him a thief, demonstrating either gross incompetence or a deliberate attempt to undermine the drive for liberty,

WHEREAS refusal to participate in a promising avenue for the enlargement of the party and the advancement of the cause of liberty is not in the best interests of the Libertarian Party, and

WHEREAS the Libertarian Party was not founded and does not exist for the aggrandizement of Robert Barr,

WE THE UNDERSIGNED hereby affirm that we are registered voters in the several United States of America, and do petition Robert Barr to step down from his position as candidate of the Libertarian Party for President of the United States; we do petition the Libertarian Party to renounce its support of Robert Barr’s candidacy for the office of President of the United States; or both.

LPMass residential elector Art Torrey withdraws support for Barr substitution

The following was written by Arthur Torrey, and sent to attorneys for the Massachusetts substitution lawsuit as well as the Massachusetts Secretary of State. It is reproduced with his permission.

I am one of the Presidential Elector Candidates for the Libertarian Party of Massachusetts (LPMA). As such I feel that it is necessary and appropriate that I express my feelings concerning the ongoing litigation concerning the right of the LPMA to substitute the names of the National Libertarian Party nominees for President and Vice President for those of George Phillies and Chris Bennet whose names currently appear on the LPMA petitions for the offices.

I wish it to be known that as a Presidential Elector Candidate, while I support the RIGHT of the LPMA and it’s electors to make a substitution, I am no longer willing to do so in the case of Bob Barr and Wayne Allen Root. I will NOT pledge to vote for Barr / Root in the event that their ticket wins the vote in Mass. and I will NOT sign any agreement to authorize the substitution of their names on for those of Phillies / Bennet on the presidential ballot.

This decision is due to actions taken by the Barr / Root campaign subsequent to this litigation being filed and, in my opinion, does not impact the basic facts of this case. While it is very true that there are considerable differences between Barr / Root and Phillies / Bennet as the Secretary of State alleges in the defense document, this is properly a matter for the members of the Libertarian Party to decide, not the Secretary.

I firmly believe that the basic circumstances of the case, which are that the LPMA initiated its petition drive with Phillies / Bennet under the advice of the Secretary of States Office that *IF* the LPMA desired to make a substitution, then this would be permitted. It is manifestly unfair for the Secretary’s office to change the “rules of the game” in the middle of the petitioning process.

As both a voter and taxpayer I would pray that, while I do not support substitution in THIS instance, the Court will see fit to rule that the electors have the right to substitute a candidate if they so choose, and direct the Secretary of State to develop fair and consistent rules for doing so. This would help to avoid the trouble and expense of future litigation on this topic.

LP Acting ED Robert Kraus responds to criticism of Barr non-attendance at Ron Paul event

The following is a statement posted on the LP website, signed by LP Acting Executive Director Robert Kraus.  Despite his claim that people need to rely on facts and not blogs, the LP and the Barr campaign are still ignoring the extremely significant fact – pointed out only on blogs at this point – that neither Bob Barr nor Wayne Allyn Root have any authority whatsoever to ask Ron Paul to replace Wayne Allyn Root as the LP Vice Presidential nominee.

For those unfamiliar with the LP nomination process, the Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates are chosen separately by the delegates.  As such, unlike in major parties, Barr has absolutely no right to replace Root with Ron Paul, or anyone else.  Furthermore the LNC, which may have the authority to make that substitution, was not apprised of that offer to Ron Paul prior to it being publicized today.

To our supporters and volunteers
posted by Andrew Davis on Sep 10, 2008

I have been hearing a lot from many LP Members about concerns over Bob Barr not attending Ron Paul’s press conference.

However, before you form an opinion, perhaps you may want to consider the facts and not rely on blogs for your news.

First, the Barr campaign met with Ron Paul’s staffers yesterday afternoon to deliver the offer of the LP’s VP slot to Ron Paul and to discuss the details of the event that Bob Barr was invited to attend. More details were to be submitted to the Barr campaign but did not arrive until nearly 3 a.m. the morning of the event. At 9 a.m. Barr’s campaign manager, Russell Verney, informed the Paul campaign that Bob would not be attending however he would still give his backing of the four principles highlighted by Dr. Paul.

Second, read the press release by the Barr Campaign you will see why Bob’s own press conference (attended by many members of the press) was so significant:
http://campaign.blog.bobbarr2008.com/2008/09/10/bob-barr-shows-leadership-to-unify-liberty-movement/

Third, as CNN and others reported, Ron Paul’s press conference was more about him not endorsing McCain and less about Dr. Paul’s non-sanctioning of other candidates running for president.

The Barr campaign chose not to attend in order to make a very valid point, which was expressed, in their following press conference. Bold leadership is needed right now! Scattering support for the liberty agenda to the four winds as Dr. Paul is proposing will not serve liberty.

Ron Paul deserves respect and credit for what he has done over the last year in rejuvenating so many people across this nation, however either him or possibly his staff have made the bland decision to remain ambiguous with their intent and direction for liberty.

Personally, I will say that I do not appreciate the treatment that LP personnel received today by Ron Paul’s staff and the games they have attempted to play over the past year. This morning, our volunteer coordinator was rudely ejected from the press conference before it even started. This was followed by Ron Paul staffers and supporters close to the staff disrupting Barr’s press conference.

This pattern is something that we never wanted to disclose but holds true to previous treatment where staff members for Paul’s campaign tried on more than one occasion to have Bob Barr uninvited from events, including Bob’s gracious introduction of Ron Paul at last year’s CPAC conference.

I do doubt that Dr. Paul was aware of these antics.

I hope this answers some of your concerns and questions. Our staff, volunteers and the Barr/Root campaign are totally psyched up and ready to work very hard for all Libertarians through November and beyond – including ballot access, in as many states as possible, which will benefit all Libertarian Candidates!

We hope you too will continue to support those candidates that support your views, even if just on a local or state level. Please fill out the volunteer form here if you are: http://www.lp.org/action/volunteer.shtml and please do not forget to donate so we can continue to “send a message” between now and November: https://www.lp.org/contribute.

In Liberty!

Robert Kraus
Acting Executive Director

Barr’s website says he invited Ron Paul to be his VP

The following was posted today on the Bob Barr website by Shane Cory. It is of particular interest given that Barr did not show up today at the Ron Paul third party press conference, thus causing a major rift with the Ron Paul camp.

It is unclear why Barr thinks Ron Paul should be his VP candidate, and not the other way around when Ron Paul has far more support both in and out of the LP, and far more experience in Congress. Furthermore, Barr’s current VP Wayne Allyn Root was nominated by the delegates at the Libertarian Convention, so Barr doesn’t have the power or authority to replace him.  Root seems to think it’s a fine idea, but he doesn’t have the power or authority to overrule the delegates either.

Many thanks to LFV reader Bubbu Blanco for bringing this link to LFV’s attention!

Bob Barr Shows Leadership to Unify Liberty Movement

September 10th, 2008 by Shane Cory

Asks Paul to Run as his Vice President

Atlanta, GA – Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party nominee for president, has invited GOP Congressman Ron Paul to be his running mate in the upcoming election. In a letter sent to Paul, Barr called Paul one of the “few American patriots” who exist in today’s society, and asked him to “seriously consider this final offer as an opportunity to show true, lasting leadership beyond party politics.”

Barr cited Paul’s 1987 letter to then-GOP Chairman Frank Fahrenkopf, in which Paul stated that, “after years of trying to work through the Republican Party both in and out of government…[Paul] concluded that [his] efforts must be carried on outside the Republican Party.”

Though recognizing Paul’s personal investment in the Republican Party and his recent attempts to reform the party from inside, Barr said he disagreed with Paul’s strategy. “Better options remain that will carry a message of liberty onto the ballot in November and beyond,” Barr stated, adding at a news conference called today at the National Press Club, that “change in politics and public policy in America cannot and will not be done from within the current, two-party system.”

Barr continued, “‘The status quo will not change the status quo’ and impact comes entirely from gaining votes in the General Election.” That is why Barr said he would remain focused on the Libertarian Party’s electoral effort and clear message, and why he invited Paul to join him.

“While you declined my offer to seek the Libertarian presidential nomination many months ago, I ask that you seriously consider this final offer as an opportunity to show true, lasting leadership beyond party politics,” Barr stated in his letter to Paul.

Barr’s running mate, Wayne Allyn Root, expressed support: “As the Libertarian Party vice presidential nominee, I believe in one thing above all else—principle. There can be no compromise on the ideals of limited government, lower taxes, lower spending, and more freedom for the American people. Those are the principles to which I’ve dedicated my life. The GOP and Democratic candidates only give lip service—at best—to these ideals and principles. It is only an act at election time every four years.”

“I want to end the charade once and for all,” Root continued. “I am willing to sacrifice anything to advance the cause of liberty, freedom, smaller government and to enable the American taxpayer to keep more of their own money and property. Understanding Dr. Ron Paul’s reputation and name recognition in the freedom movement, I am willing to step aside as Libertarian vice presidential candidate if he would be willing to take my place. I will pledge to work day and night, just as I have as the vice presidential nominee, to support Dr. Paul. I believe this is a wonderful opportunity for the Libertarian and freedom movements. I encourage Dr. Paul to accept Congressman Barr’s offer. The campaign is making this offer because we believe there is no sacrifice too large when it comes to improving the lives of the American people and American taxpayers.”

Barr’s letter to Paul can be found here.

Paul’s letter to the GOP can be found here.

Libertarian Party presidential candidate Bob Barr represented the 7th District of Georgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003.

Andrew Davis responds to accusations re Barr no-show

The following is a statement by LP Media Director Andrew Davis, with regard to Bob Barr’s failure to appear at this morning’s press conference.  The original LFV post on this controversy are here and here.

The real question is why Bob, who is a major player in this election, want to be on stage with people like McKinney, who stands against everything the LP does, and Baldwin, who is barely on enough ballots to have a statistical chance of winning.

Barr is not a minor party candidate. Barr is a major player this year.

He is holding his own press conference right now.

Statement from Don Rasmussen re Bob Barr

What follows is a statement from Don Rasmussen, Events Coordinator for Campaign for Liberty.

“The following reflect my personal feelings and is not endorsed by Dr. Paul or Campaign for Liberty.

I am deeply disappointed by Bob Barr’s decision not to participate in today’s press conference just as I have been disappointed with the Barr campaign throughout this election cycle.

The idea that he was busy is absurd. I am sitting in the National Press Club right now waiting for his hastily called press conference to begin. This is the same building where Dr. Paul’s presser just ended. Barr committed to participate, but had his campaign manager call us minutes before it started to tell us that Bob thinks “it just isn’t worth it.” I look forward to hearing him explain how breaking a promise to Congressman Paul constitutes a wise campaign strategy.

It is my great hope that the alternative parties will present the American people with quality candidates that offer a real option. Clearly the Libertarian Party has failed to do so. Bob Barr has
repeatedly broken his promises to Dr. Paul, showed up uninvited at C4L events, and made statement contrary to Dr. Paul’s beliefs while still claiming the mantle of heir to the R3VOLution.

Hopefully, the LP will find a way to reject this candidate without rejecting the idea of engagement in practical politics.”

Don Rasmussen, Events Coordinator for Campaign For Liberty

LPMass Resolution: Leave LSLA, encourages removal of Stephen Gordon as LSLA head

The following is a resolution from the Libertarian Party of Massachusetts

Whereas State Chair Phillies received an apparently legitimate advertisement “We’re giving away 100,000 signs to support every campaign in America”, and

Whereas State Chair Phillies out of the generosity of his heart took time out of his busy schedule to forward this opportunity to his fellow State Chairs via the Libertarian State Leadership Alliance (LSLA) email list, assuming that the average Libertarian candidate could find out how to divert this opportunity to her or his own benefit, and

Whereas without giving an opportunity to defend himself, LSLA State Chair Stephen Gordon took punitive action against Phillies, and

Whereas the nature of the complaint and the identity of the complaintant have been kept secret so that there was no opportunity for Phillies to defend himself against the unknown complaint, and

Whereas, contrary to the false claim of Gordon, a claim that would have been refuted if Phillies had been given a chance to defend himself, Phillies as of this writing as a result of Libertarian National
Committee action is the National Party’s choice of candidate in Massachusetts, then

Be it resolved that the Libertarian Party of Massachusetts State Committee in accord with its authority under Party Bylaws orders and directs that all ties of LPMass with the LSLA are severed, and furthermore

Orders and directs that its officers under their ex officios may not invoke their ex officios to join or participate in the LSLA, and

While recognizing that each individual Libertarian is free to do what they see as best for the Libertarian Party, nonetheless encourages individual party members to seek activism opportunities otherwhere than the Libertarian State Leadership Alliance, and

Encourages the State Chairs remaining in the Libertarian State Leadership Alliance to seek, forthwith, the removal of Stephen Gordon as their head, and

To the extent useful, the Libertarian Party of Massachusetts will operate on its web site LPMass.org a forum for State Chairs and State Party leaders to participate and communicate at no cost to them.

Resolution passed 4-1, State Chair Phillies not voting.

CALL TO ARMS: LNC at it again, voting on whether to ask Angela Keaton to resign

This is a follow up to Angela’s liveblog for today, as well as the statement re Cory.

The LNC has removed Angela Keaton from the room, and are voting on whether to ask her to resign.

I have spoken with Angela, and she has stated that she will not resign.

This is the second day in a row that the LNC has attempted to remove this elected representative from the LNC.

Twitter updates from Angela Keaton:

Sitting in exile with Gene Hawkridge. Will I be excommunicated? You get better due process when three rabbis or the holy see meet.
14 minutes ago from web

Then it got really WEIRD…the Barr campaign sent message to Redpath to request to keep me on the LNC.
5 minutes ago from web

**********

Lee Wrights and I spoke in the hall.

He asked me to that if the offer is made for me to apologize to do it b/c he needs me.

Shane Cory sent me a text telling me not to step down.

**********

Updates from Twitter:

Meeting adjourned. Told by Redpath after the fact that the motion was that body should ask me to resign. That’s all. 9 minutes ago from web

Have no idea what the wording is or how anyone voted. Stewart Flood is out of my life. 8 minutes ago from web

**********

From Twitter:

Knapp: please report. My hotmail is done. I may owe Cory an apology. He may never have said those things. Curious. 21 minutes ago from web

Cory scapegoats Angela Keaton to get out of entering into contract between LNC and Barr campaign

The following is part of Angela Keaton’s Day Two liveblog of the LNC meeting. However, due to its importance, it rates a post of its own.

Then it got weird.

I left an executive session. I had no idea this was coming.

Said in ExSession. I’m within my rights to reveal this:

We don’t have a contract b/t the Barr Camp and LNC b/c….Cory asserted to both Carling and Redpath that
they were afraid that someone would reveal data. I didn’t know what the hell they were talking about until
it was further explained that Cory was afraid that I would misuse “data.”

Why this is ExSession? No idea. To Redpath’s credit, he, Ruwart and several other believed that this was an excuse. That I am a scape goat.

Well, doesn’t that beat all?

**********

(Later message from Angela)

Kafka? Oh for the love of G-d! I’m about to be censured for blogging about the accusations against me.

I’ve been kicked out of the room b/c I blogged about the Cory accusations against me.

Oh, Afghanistan Res passed easily! While I sat in exile along in the hallway, the Admiral took his bags to the airport. “Hang in there,” he smiled.

UPDATE: The LNC is taking a vote on whether to ask Angela Keaton to resign.
From Twitter:

I was allowed back into make a brief defense. They are now going to vote to ask me to resign.

Angela Keaton: Day 2 LNC meeting liveblog

This is Day Two of LNC member Angela Keaton’s liveblog of LNC meeting. You can see Day One here.

Same disclaimer applies as yesterday. If you want a goddamn transcription, make it yourself.

These are my words and mine alone. –Keaton

—————————————————————————
8:10am Agenda

Carling on Audit
Boring monotone. Explains the audit co purpose. They are happy with …/Wilcock (sp?)

Asked Kraus to negotiate K. Saved 1k. Reviewed by staff.

Starr: What is cost per year? 11k for 2008 plus 2k for midyear review.

Redpath: Any sort of mang report w/ comments, will there be one issued?

Carling: yes. Unlike last audit, “big thumbs up.”

———————————————————————————
Report from Barr/Root Campaign

Carling: Obv media is doing great for Campaign. Barr is getting more and better and root is getting better than our past Pres. Fund Raising is sig better than past campaigns, but not nearly as good as the media coverage. Several people have vol to make calls including Root, Carling. Promised by Shane Cory a list of names. Did not get it. Told by Cory that Carling was not needed since they had “plenty of money.” (Carling quoting Cory.) Claims that Root, Bruce Cohen and others received similar treatment.

Redpath: That is contrary to what Cory said.

Flood: That’s not what Russ (Verney) told me.

Starr: Is there any particular agreement with the Barr/Root campaign and us?

Redpath: There is not. Spoken to Cory several times. Better with me to talk to Shane. There seems to be no interest in such.

Lark: Seemed to remember in Denver such was agreed upon. Need to flesh out.
Was this an “F-U”?

Carling: It was polite.

Redpath: if we explore it further, we have to go Ex Sess

Wrights: I want to hear it.

Lark: not subject guests to ExSess again until later

Jingozian: Why is there is no mention of Libertarian party on signs, bump sticks, website, carries more
recogn than the name Barr. Link it to something to some clout.

Carling:would have to get back to you.

Redpath: Wants answer to that question ASAP.
Asks Carling to call Cory.

Sullentrup: my sign says both Barr and Lib.

Wrights: It is a concern for website but not as important stickers/signs.
Everyone knows Obama is a dem. If we are running the campaign to mirror big two…

Starr: Agreement with Wrights.
Typically pols will put on signs and website that which get them votes.
Will focus on name and party where party will not help.

Jingozian: Now most americans don’t like two parties, they would find LP a pleasant alt.

Starr: The premise is that they would be more happy with us.

Redpath: Verney wanted to run campaign that would appeal to independents. We can stand to benefit by appealing to independents. 3% to retain ba status. If we get 3% we would get ba in many places.

**********

Ruwart: LNC vote for law suit.
First heard of it when Phillies told me about it. Haugh reported it to last term but not new. Should we be voting for entering lawsuits? Always potential for backlash. I would like opp to discuss any lawsuit in any case where I am a plaintiff.

Dixon: The co should vote unless it is urgent and EC then can vote on it. Aware in Tx that
Obama/McCain lawsuit over missed deadline.

Starr: 2 issues. Question of size. If it is the equiv of small claims, no reason. Budget line item,
do I use cts to change public policy? (Starr’s voice like Carling’s is lower than usual. Can barely hear.)

Lark: Tech speak
Policy manual that the very requirement of budget and spending is part of the Co. LNC should vote.
Anytime LP takes legal action, at least EC.

Dixon: How many lawsuits per year? Do we need to stream line?

Kraus: report from Hall.

Hall: We pay for some law suits where we are not the plaintiff (LP Ohio, example)

Dixon: how many?
Hall: 2 suits.

Starr: Should Lark work on resolution for next meeting on law suits?
(This is quite manipulative–AK)

Jingozian: Wait, Wrights is waiting to say something.

Wrights: The issue is not money. My butt is on the line. Trying to help, but there is anticipated suit. I had to get this info from a member while I sit on the board. What does our name go on?

Redpath: I want to apologize to anyone who did not know and if I contributed to it. I deal with it everyday. I apologize for any problems that caused. It is controversial for some people but not for me. There is one ticket for the LP coast to coast. I would do the same if it were Mary Ruwart or Daniel Imperato.

Is there is a move to extend for 5?

Starr: bring it back to next meeting.

———————————————————————————————————————————-
Open LNC list.

Can’t type this b/c it is my issue.

Starr, Karlin and Flood don’t want it.

Dixon wants to know if list can be divided b/t that is ExSess and other discuss.

Starr thinks that people won’t use the list b/c years ago someone used to forward the list.
No one will keep open discussion.

Wrights: we have two lists in NC. Read only one list. Everything on EC list is read only for any
member who wants it. Chair uses other list for confidential.

Karlin: everything should be treated confidential b/c accidents with scroll down lines one too many.

Hawkridge: blogs, members would be friendlier if they knew what was going on. It is a meeting.

Dixon: Does everyone use NC exclusive list because…?

Haugh: I have resentment b/c secret list was were my overthrow as NCED was plotted.

Hinkle: Basic problem. Perception of closeness and not enough information. If there is a perception
by members, we need each LNC member to solve that one on one to let members know what is going on. Solution in search of a problem. Two lists will not solve.

Starr: Would like to move on to next item of business.

Dixon/Hawkridge objection.

Move to extend.

Lark: Torn. I try to keep everyone informed. been both at large and regional. Too easy to make accidents. List is really for biz. Not sure how large a problem.

Dixon: Hinkle has it right. Self regulating. Regions can remove non-open members. At Large should not be reelected.

Starr: No win. We either don’t disclose or members don’t really understand the issues so you spend all your time justifying. People just bash you.

Folks, you are not going to get an open list. Your only solution is to stop reelecting the same people to the LNC. You elected these people. You are responsible.–AK

Flood: someone started meet up list to communicate with regions. These meeting would be much longer if we did not have the ability

Kraus: This would be an absolute burden for staff. You would have to pay to have someone do this. Who would stay in that job for more than a week?

Wrights: to Kraus, you are making something more complicated than it needs to be.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Tom Stevens.

Hawkridge: T.S. Member of Jud. Co. Stevens wants to funnel votes. He has no party loyalty. Was member of BTP. Hawkridge explains Stevens camp history.
Would like to ask him to resign?

(I don’t care about this issue. Some old kook is party hopping to from one fake party to another including this one. It’s just the LP, folks. Just the LP.–AK)

Starr has RR objection. Two types of offenses. One in meeting, one out of meeting.
In order to discipline, you have to give notice, have them show up….this motion out of order.

Debate b/t Wrights and Redpath over whether Carling can speak on the narrow parl issue.

Wrights make heroic stance by demanding that RR quotes come WITH citations.
Someone asks if the LNC even can remove someone from Jud. Co.

Starr suddenly decides that asking someone to resign is a big deal (unless you are me of course. These people are movement bottom feeders.)

Lark says it makes him queasy. Take it up in December.

Wrights: Jud. Co is indy committee which is elected by delegates. We have no ability other than ask (Hall nods head.)

Redpath: Why make a decision when we can punt? (That’s leadership, boys.)

Sullentrup: Send him a letter to find if he is a member of another party.

Postponed. Starr is beginning to run rough shod over Redpath.

End of tape.

**********

Starr wrote a “shut Keaton up” motion. It’s not actually going as far as he thought. Wrights and I don’t want any part of it.

Dixon, Hinkle, Fox, Jingozian, Hawkridge, Sink-Burris think it is either a.) overbroad, 2.) already addressed in RR, 3.) other ways of handling this.

**********

Bylaws Results

latham, karlan, moulton, h. scott, redpath, sarwark, oates, starr, bennett, hawkridge and manske

**********

Kafka? Oh for the love of G-d! I’m about to be censured for blogging about the accusations against me.

I’ve been kicked out of the room b/c I blogged about the Cory accusations against me.

Oh, Afghanistan Res passed easily! While I sat in exile along in the hallway, the Admiral took his bags to the airport. “Hang in there,” he smiled.

**********

I was allowed back into make a brief defense. They are now going to vote to ask me to resign.

**********

LPMass to consider severing all relations to LSLA

The following statement was written and distributed by George Phillies.

I received an ad “We’re giving away 100,000 signs to support every campaign in America.” followed by various html links on how every campaign in America can get signs. I have no idea whether the ad is real, or whether Obama or McCain has already ordered the 100,000, but http://www.buildasign.com/ appears to be real. I forwarded this to the state chairs list, assuming that the average Libertarian candidate can find someone who can cut through the mystery code and line up signs for their people.

I thought I was being generous and helpful.

I instead receive from Steve Gordon a message cutting off my access to the LSLA list, for advancing my Presidential campaign. His message follows.

At the moment I *am* the LNC’s choice of candidate in Massachusetts, because of a decision *they* made. Indeed, I have asked several LNC members to include as a discussion topic support for my campaign as their candidate, should our suit fail.

I observe that there is no identification of the complaint, the complainant in best Soviet informant style is anonymous, and I am given no chance to defend myself against the lack of accusation.

Instead of courtesy, I am given a response that in my opinion is more fit to have emanated from the Alabama KKK.

Accordingly, I will offer at tomorrow’s LPMASS State Committee meeting, under our bylaws, a motion ordering and directing that LPMass sever all relations with LSLA, calling upon all officers and members to do the same, and making clear that individual LPMass members pursuing Federal or LNC office are in no sense discouraged from attending LSLA meetings.

I will not take it amiss if our exact position relative to the substitution suit is called up for reconsideration.

RE: The e-mail correspondence below

Dear Dr. Phillies,

Due to complaints regarding your recent promotion of a political campaign, one which is in opposition to the campaign of a legitimately nominated Libertarian Party candidate, I am placing your access to this e-mail list on the “moderation” level until some time following the upcoming presidential election.

Should you have any questions pertaining to this communication, please feel free to attempt to contact me at any time.

Regards,

Stephen Gordon
Chairman, Libertarian State Leadership Alliance

ENM notes:  George can “attempt to contact” you for questions?  Does that mean you foresee that he will not be able to contact you?

LP membership dues = taxation without representation

Angela Keaton wrote in comments:

Sullentrup, Flood, Starr, Karlan voted to remove me from the room.  It failed.

The motion is to have me removed.

Sullentrup made a scene regarding my calling Knapp.

Referred to me as “swamp.” Or something.  MO has weird terms.

Since the LNC is trying to remove an elected member of the LNC, without the knowledge or consent of the people she was elected to represent, then ALL support should be removed from the LP. Stop sending money, stop volunteering. Do not support an organization which has a leadership that thinks they can overruled the vote of the membership.

Your LP membership dues are therefore nothing more than taxation without representation!

Let them pull their Gestapo tactics in the major parties.  There is no room for this kind of nonsense among the very group which runs the so-called “Party of Principle”.

Also posted on Adventures in Frickintardistan

CALL TO ARMS: LNC trying to censure Angela Keaton for writing on blogs

I just received a call from Angela Keaton, and the LNC is attempting as I write this to censure her for writing on the blogs.

I heard their bullying of her for myself, with my own two ears (well, one ear, it was on the phone).  They clearly didn’t want me to hear what was going on, but as she openly pointed out to them, she needs to protect herself.

Why should the LNC care what Angela Keaton does, unless of course they really are hiding something as many have suggested?

If Angela Keaton is censured for exercising her First Amendment rights in the so-called “Party of Principle”, the LP should be censured by its members.  No money, no support for the Gestapo organization that it has become.

I will keep readers updated.

Barr loses West Virginia ballot access lawsuit

The Honorable John T. Copenhaver Jr., judge in the United States District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia (Charleston) has ruled against LP presidential nominee Bob Barr with regard to the ballot access lawsuit.  Barr needed to collect and submit 15,118 signatures by August 1, 2008, but only submitted 13,171 signatures by that date.  The signature requirement is based upon 2% of votes cast in the 2004 general election.

Barr’s claim is that the petition requirements are unduly burdensome, and thus violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.  The campaign submitted 1,097 signatures on July 24th, and 1,866 signatures on July 31st (72.09% validity).  The campaign additionally submitted 10,208 signatures on August 1st, and 10,652 signatures on August 20th; however, since it was clear that the campaign had not met the requirement by August 1st, the August signatures were not submitted to county clerks for validation.

In its decision, the court ruled that the signature and date requirements are not unduly burdensome upon candidates, as multiple candidates have met the requirements, including the LP.  In 2008, it has been met by one third party for its presidential candidate (Constitution Party), and one independent presidential candidate (Ralph Nader).  Further, the court ruled that it would be unduly burdensome upon the elections office to expand the date by which signatures must be permitted, due to restrictions upon their time in light of their other duties, including the requirement that absentee ballots be mailed not less than 42 days prior to the general election, or in this case, by September 23rd.  Once the signatures are submitted, they must be validated by county clerks by comparing signatures on the petitions to signatures in their voter database, which is in itself a time-consuming process.

In ruling against Barr the court noted that, had the campaign started collecting signatures only two to three weeks earlier, the criteria would have been met, and also noted that the LP could have started collecting signatures at any time, since there are no time restrictions for ballot access petitions in that state.  Bill Redpath (LNC Chair) testified that it was a strategic decision to put off collecting signatures in West Virginia.  The court however noted that the Libertarian Party was well aware of the requirements, since the date requirement has been in existence since 1986, and the signature requirement has been existence since 1999; and that the LP simply chose not to collect signatures during a time frame which would result in a successful ballot petition process.  The court also noted that the LP started collecting signatures in a nearby state (North Carolina) in 2004, but didn’t start collecting signatures in West Virginia until 17 to 19 days prior to the deadline for petition submission.

Redpath also testified that the rural nature of the state impedes petition efforts, but the court disagreed, noting that there is no reason why petitioners cannot simply gather signatures in the 11 most populous counties, each of which has a major city, and which together comprise 50% of the state’s total population of 1.8 million.

The Court additionally noted that the pool of potential petition signers is unlimited in West Virginia, as anyone registered to vote can sign a petition, petitions can be circulated at any time, voters can sign as many petitions as they wish, and voters are not bound to the candidate whose petition they have signed.  Also, the court noted that the petition process itself is not unduly complicated, in that petitioners need not be West Virginia residents, and there is no notarization requirement.  Multiple third-party and independent candidates have met the requirements in 2000, 2004, and 2008; and the LP met the requirement in the last general election in 2004.

The court ruled that the failure of Barr/Root to be placed on the ballot for November was caused by their own lack of reasonable diligence, and not by the West Virginia state petition requirements.

The LP paid nothing for WV ballot access, as the entire cost was borne by the Barr campaign according to the Court’s decision.  It is unknown whether the LP paid for the failed lawsuit.

The 34-page decision has been uploaded to LFV, and readers are encouraged to read the decision for themselves as it sets forth quite clearly what went wrong in West Virginia.  The decision, in PDF format, can be seen and downloaded here: decision-in-barr-v-ireland-wv-ballot-access

Angela Keaton liveblog from LNC meeting

Angela Keaton is At-Large Representative to the Libertarian National Committee, and one of LFV’s favorite Libertarians. The following was written by Angela Keaton during the LNC meeting, and is reproduced here with her permission. Per her request, no changes will been made unless I see a spelling error. Readers will need to refresh the page to see updates.

Pre-show live drama:

Rachel calls me. I missed my wake up call so I can’t eat the wheat based junk that the LP serves. She wants me to come down ASAP. Rumor is that Dan Karlan wants to move to censure me over my work for Antiwar.com.

Then for what ever reason, not. Stewart has some other idea. My setting up for live blogging has already made for snide and nervous comments. Austin Petersen is going to tape the meeting.

After some comment Robert Kraus makes about Sullentrup, duct tape and me. I loudly comment that Brad Spangler is my twitter buddy. (I’ll cut Ferguson some slack but Keaton don’t like the Sullentrup play with the actual libertarians of LPMO.)

Announcing that I work for Antiwar is like Jolie and Pitt announcing they are fucking. Both pretentious and obvious.

Stewart will try to play both ends. What is it about me that makes Scott Lieberman and Bill Hall nervously twitter about me? Maybe they’ve never seen a part-asian or or something.

**********

The hand out is “electronic communications decorum.” (aka the anti-Keaton resolution, well not “the” anti-Keaton resolution, there will be many.)

Haugh and I discuss a Caucus with Mr. Wrights. None of yr business.

Kraus and I engage in assorted smart assery and cynicsm.

New staff piece of ass, Casey. Dark, young and easy prey for a cougar like myself.

Guests include two members of the “Snowbird” Caucus: Audrey Capozzi, Vicki Kirkland, and Audrey’s son Bob.

Chair of LPMaryland Bob Johnston (?), Party stalwart Gene Hawkridge, Jeff Dimit, the stunning blonde alt Heather Scott.

M Carling, Alicia Mattson are also here but we only cover the stars.

Donny Ferguson is here as well. I felt him up once when I was drunk. Reform Caucus people are so uptight.

The Admiral keeps staying hello. Must be the dress. Tomorrow, BTP tank top and thong…no I’ll will be wearing pants.

Meeting begins: Jingo introduces Ro Wilson’s “we better audit the hell out of the campaign” Kraus notes that that is required by law. Lee Wrights is a smart ass and one of my favorite patriots.

Conflict of interest: Lee makes some very funny comments about working ISIL but says that Dr. Mary and Dr. Jim have no influence over him. As if?

Since Karlan is about to make a fool of himself. I announce that I’m still married to Cato/Reason/and 5 other main player Golden Boy Brian Doherty and a professional toady for the Garris machine (Antiwar.com, webmaster LRC) but it is silly and if you don’t know that you are not keeping up with the movement.

Carling wants five minutes for Audit Co.

Dr. Mary wants to vote on the issue of voting to sue. You all know what this about.

Mark Hinkle wants to discuss list rental. Starr jumps “Executive Session! Executive Session!”

Rachel moves Nolan statement to December meeting. Good, then Nolan can be there in San Diego.

The “Doctah” Stevens controversy is being moved all over the place.

The meat of the meeting is about to begin.

It is revealed that M Carling is the official link between the campaign and the LNC. We promote people well beyond their level of competence as a rule in the LP.

Aaron Starr raises fit over Hogarth/Dixon Afghan Resolution. Doesn’t work. Since I’m a moron,I asked for division. Sullentrup: Do you still want division? Your side won.

Sullentrup: Let the record reflect that Keaton wants to multiply, not divide.

Redpath has been doing more radio and tv. We discover that he worked for NBC in the 80s and went to many Letterman tapings. That does improve my image of Redpath. Those were the good days of that show. He went to his first NASCAR race on July 5th. Redpath keeps on saying it was interesting. Sounds traumatized to me.

Redpath has made the rounds at several events. Met Rex Bell and Eric Shansberg. Fred Smith at CEI (yes, another place where Doherty worked. I could spend all day listing marital conflicts.) Redpath was in LA July to Beverly Hills Hotel for Team Grandparent. Odd since Redpath has no material issue. Art Linkletter is still lucid. Sort of. Social Security Reform.

(Damn I forgot to tell them I was at the MPP Playboy event. That was were Rachel Mills talked me into getting the grotto. I’m an idiot. Still hoping the pics don’t surface.)

Redpath did a German radio interview….I can no longer keep track but Redpath is going on like a Rick Steve’s travel log. Wright and Starr start mocking him. (”What’s your favorite color?”)

Ok, enough with the chair’s report.

**********

Treasurer’s Report:

Will scan. Starr claims that they will be 100,000 in THE BLACK. He then goes on to say that fund raising goes down in the year after the election.

Dixon asks about money spent on NASCAR and Rally for America. He says it is way over budget. Why was so much money spent? Kraus said it was for outreach. Starr says there are two theories on a budget.

Aaron, baby, spins. Pat ain’t buying.

Pat: Unless you really have an authorization, you really don’t have a budget.

Robert Kraus: Stuff happens. Stop micro managing. Raise money where you need to do it.

Pat: Budget should be annual.

Dr. Jim: Do you think that the LNC needs to be better informed on these matters?

Pat: Why do we over spend?

Julie starts combing over the budget. She ain’t screwing around either. Julie’s pretty hot. I love a women who grills the staff and officers about rent.

Aaron gives Redpath props for running up his FEC limit. Got to give Redpath that. He puts his money where his mouth is.

Rach starts asking Aaron some tech questions about different kinds of rent.

(Brian Miller calls me. Dude, can’t type and speak at the same time.)

Kraus is bitching about the copier lease.

My last quarter of Xanax is kicking in. I’m not going to be a bitch. Just type. You can all draw your own conclusions when you read the minutes.

**********

Sullentrup moves to eliminate the policy that we video tape the meeting.

Meeting stops. Austin is trying to reload the tape.

Aaron Starr believes that if the secretary needs to record meetings if he needs it but if he does not need it, we shouldn’t.

Dixon: very much in favor of having meetings recorded (either tape or video) so people can hear or see them. He would rather guests just bring their own equipment taking a DIY approach.

Sink-Burris thinks that legally it is bad idea (per Rutherford) to have anything other than minutes recorded as the GOP/DNC could use material against us.

Ruwart: Distressing that people don’t want this open if for no other reason than we all remember these things differently.

Wrights: We all remember things differently but notes Sullentrup is the best secretary we ever had. In what has to be the weirdest moment ever, Sullentrup kisses Wrights. Room breaks down. Redpath asks members from refraining from PDAs.

Starr than says that all meeting should be recorded by destroyed after the minutes are approved. Starr suggests that would be acceptable if the true motive is to only have good minutes. He then makes legal argument. (NOTE: Starr is neither a JD or a member of the bar.)

Kraus: costs of tape, plus staff member is too much. He doesn’t want to be responsible at meetings for tending to this.

Vote on Starr’s sub motion. Sub motion 9-5. Starr’s motion is now on the table.

Now: A No vote keeps policy as it is,

Starr, Colley, Karlan, Flood, Dixon, Sink-Burris, Hinkle, Jingozian vote to destroy records as soon as the minutes are approved. It passes.

**********

EXECUTIVE SESSION, be back in a few.

**********

During Exec Session, Wright and I take a cig break to discuss questions the Wall family and LPTN leaders have about Mattson, Carling and LNCC.

Haugh joins us. He hates wearing a suit and thinks we need to speed up our ExSessions so they don’t go off topic. (He’s right. They need to be very narrow.)

Quick: Dead guy gave us money. More than FEC allows. Sue to claim that dead people cannot be corrupted.

Patriot Alan Gura of the Heller Case (frm. IJ intern in his law school days) will on the cheap challenge the Fascist State on this issue. We are discussing on to whether to move forward.

Gura is offering to wave certain fees and cap others so the costs are about 15K. If the suit drags on for several years, he might charge UP TO an extra $7500 (Make sure you actually read the minutes b/c it is harder to type and keep track. Sullentrup may be a closet Republican but he does do something quite difficult very very well.)

(Note to Starchild: It is highly unlikely to challenge guests if they wish to live blog or tape no matter how much people may not approve.)

Dixon, Lark, Redpath and others are trying not to make a messy on the fly motion. Tabled so it doesn’t sound pulled out of the collective LNC ass.

______________________________

Staff Report by Kraus

I going to try to be fair to all concerned.These are not direct quotes.

1.) Acting ED report:

– refund reports re: pay pal. PP has some unusual security issues so check treas reports. They reversed some charges.

– Julie asked about Alexis. She’s in Latin America but will return to LPHQ.

2.) Davis on PR. Davis’ girlfriend is adorable. They are planning to marry December 27th. One LNC member suggests marriage is always a bad idea.

– He’s been in Atlanta the past two months assisting Barr campaign. These are roughly his words: LP proper ceased to be of interest to the campaign once the nominee was chosen. He thought he would just go there and work. It’s given him about 800 contacts including Lou Dobbs. He is very hopeful that he can make good use of this.

Congressman Barr has been so prolific in media. Membership is higher. (notice graphs in notes.)

Davis is still excited about the very nice article Redpath got in Playboy. Mrs. Hawkridge notes that some prefer Hustler.

He thinks that everyone is sick of two party politics.

Dr. Jim wants to know what is up with LP News. Kraus wants to go to a digest size. There have been problems. Audrey Mullins (isn’t she from the Barr campaign or was?) is going to edit this month’s paper. Rachel asks Andrew about what he can do to pr the FEC/BCRA. Andrew thinks he can blast it everywhere and get 15K very quickly. Dr. Mary asks about the amount of resources going to the Barr camp instead of the state candidates. Andrew says the states should handle their own but he adds that he does send press releases and he blogs about state campaigns like Munger. He can do more if you send him material.

He can’t send press lists to every candidate since it would take forever to filter it for each area but he can send something to the state chairs and the state chairs lists.

Jingo wants the OR lists. “We have 6 exciting candidates.” Karlan wants Andrew to discuss some of this at the LSLA.

3.) Louis Calise

– She won’t read whole report to keep it short. She would like to hire someone to help with major donations. Hired guy Casey (still can’t get his last name.) from San Diego State.

– House appeals. Holding strong with high ave gift. Post office mailings and returns are slow. P.O. problems but this is common with non-prof mail.

– Select in mailing lapsed donors to make sure we have a good reason to. Not to bug them.

– Prospecting did not do very well and costs money on the back end but can work out.

– (can’t here. Louise is trying to get through this quickly.)

– Telemarketing should begin in 2009.

– She really wants BOD members to raise money. She knows it is hard but she will work with any board member. She asks if you call people to let the office know so we can thank them from the office and track who made the solicitation.

– Hand out ASKING by Jerold Panas.

Apologize if did not get all of Andrew and Louise’s statements.

Pat Dixon wants to know if the RP prospecting list petition to AL did well. No. He wants to know if the RP lists are worth trying again. Did we approach them about the lists?

Kraus: we have gone to brokers to ask for more RP lists. Some people have very expensive lists. Dixon says but they gave so much money. Kraus notes that in many cases the same people gave over and over again…

Austin is changing the tape. Geez, this is hard.

**********

The very sexy Austin Petersen:

He’s going very fast but this is what I could catch: civil liberties and appeals to anti-corporatism get volunteers going. States were there is are strong volunteers in isolated areas should start meet ups. He also has them call talk radio. He’s working on DC org. He also have some graphs. He is also out in other organization (MPP, Reason, etc.) in his spare time to build up networks.

He’s representing us at various events. He said that 70% of people that came by the Rally booth will vote for Barr, 15% are Mises Institute, Anti-state anarchists who will not support the ticket and 15% for Baldwin.

He also using a technique to talk to Obama supporters. (”I used to support Obama but I am against war.” “I used to support Obama but I support civil liberties.”)

He has produced three videos for the party including one on Denver, an antiwar vid and a humor one for vol recruitment.

Set backs, he could not get vols to do Barr/Root petitioners in DC. He also had trouble dealing with Heller’s constituents.

He will be working on other videos.

Questions: Dr. Jim “What is an activist?”
Austin: letter writing, etc.

Dr. Jim wants central calendar or repository of liberty related events so we can push our speakers, wrangle invites. Can you do that?

Pat: What is the Heller mess?

Austin: An RP worker that Heller wanted to run. Bradley Jansen is the person in question. What people might have wanted was to piggy back off of Barr’s petitioners instead of getting their own. (Might not be a good idea to publish the rest.)

Moving on…

Jingozian has some media suggestions for Austin. (Folks should try to make use of Jingozian before he gets sick of us.)

I gave Austin my critiques of the booth. will forward them to George Donnelly but it simply it is very important to have a better frankly pretty display. It is worth the money to have an easy to assemble very attractive banner, pics, books and stickers. It is also important to be ecumenical in one’s libertarian approach at events that are freedom movement but not specifically libertarian.

Wright asked if Barr gave any money for the booth. Austin and Robert explained that the Campaign for Liberty would not take Barr money for ideological reasons. Austin thinks that the staffers are too tied to the CP and hence not friendly. Redpath asks why: We don’t believe in G-d (Wrights,) Homosexuality and gambling (Peterson), Choice (Hawkridge.)

————————
A very worn down Sean Haugh:

“I would not wish Ballot Access even on those who wrote the laws.”

**********

Pat Dixon wrote up a motion.

It passed.

Counsel’s report: Bill Hall (open session)

Any questions?

Dr. Jim: Status of Maine. Was at ME picnic.

Bill H: No, missed deadline.

BH would like to discuss in ExSession Fincher case, FEC comply, some convention committee report.

Dr. Jim: Let’s rejiggle to guests are shuffled in and out.

Campus Report, Regions, Barr/Root campaign, etc. will be up next.

————————————————————————————————————

Lark College Org report.

Will be speaking at Longhorn Libs (UT). Rumor that Dixon and Lark will play with Jimmy Vaugh. Lock up your daughters.

————————————————————————————————————

Written reports by regional reps. Redpath asks are there any questions or oral reports?

Stewart Flood uses bribes to get people to respond. (He’s been driving me crazy with the alligator pics. Yes, there was an alligator under the car. We got it.)

Meanwhile, Will Allen Buckley be in the debates. Looks like LPGA might pull it off. Very exciting.
LP Alabama will submit petitions shortly, will be able get Barr/Root campaign.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Lieberman/Hinkle. Had some trouble getting their state chair (CA) to respond so no news but Holtz applied for some seat that he got automatically. Somewhere in Palo Alto Hills some statists are really going to be very sorry…or bored. Actually, I support Holtz driving statist crazy.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Fox–Jesse Ventura is endorsing Krazy Kevin Barrett. Good for him. There are two law suits going on in IL which can really change things.

Lots of good things have happened to read the report. (Everyone is blowing through the material right now so I’m struggling to keep up.)

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Rachel is up. All states in Region 7 have Ballot Access. Thank Haugh and Kolhaas for all their help.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The Admiral Colley is on Convention Report. Bob Sullentrup, Rach, Stewart, the admiral, Pat are the new committee. Admiral apologizes for not getting this off the ground just yet. Look like 4th o’ July in 2010. They want to do something East Coast this time.

Yes, Mattson did the electronic survey. (What is this women’s official position? She shows up more than a yeast infection in my pants after a week with Starchild.)

DC–1st
Charleston, Austin came in much lower. (Please ask the admiral about the ranking b/c I already forgot.)

LAST Place—cruise ship! (Wrights and I laugh. Dirty looks prevail.)

1000 people responded.

I never get these surveys. Jingo didn’t get one either.

The Admiral gives up what is actually an ideal handout. It has all the different convention sites with figures. Very nicely done.

Admiral: The statists do fantasy land conventions. We pay for ours. Efficient but not fancy. He will still get one from the DC hotel as well. Not all hotels responded.

Pittsburgh: They treated us really well. They really want our business.

Give Colley this. He made damn sure he got all the details. Pittsburgh Hilton will comp all sorts of things including some hosp suites. Tried to get cont break and buffets deal. Parking is $20 though. Downtown area.

Jingo: How important is the availabilty of local volunteers?

The Admiral: Not the intent to saddle the vols with a big project but it’s a big load on the staff. Mentions Portland mess.

BetteRose and Michelle formed a corp and did a really great job in Denver and actually came in the black. Run by pros is probably best.

Aaron: Biz meeting is Friday and Saturday which is a prob since Monday is day off.

The Admiral: Memorial Day was not available.

Sent Sullentrup to St. Louis. Group rate is a little more expensive, but light rail and parking is much cheaper. Historical site. Under the street and hotel is where the actual convention hall. Each hotel has different model for big events. These are not the final contractual numbers. These can all be renegotiated.

Cleveland: 4-7 July which would allow Monday to be used as meeting day but meeting on Tuesday too. Comps have food and bev minimum. A/v kind of in house. Rapid transit train, parking $23 a day
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Costs and locations are important as well as the ability for the hotels to be able to keep to the committed rate.

Dr. Jim: Have you been given guidance from the LNC?

Redpath: Don’t really want event on the same holiday weekend every time. Rotate it. Afraid that we are going lose people if they are not closer to a weekend.

The Admiral: styled this as a 2.5 day event.

Redpath really wants it on Fri/s/S to keep delegates.

The Admiral wants input from the LNC.

Dr. Mary: No on 4th July b/c of campaigning by our candidates as well as petitioning. Earlier convention allows sigs up early. NH was having prob b/c of that.

Redpath: It doesn’t matter as much as people think. It is just tough to do it in NH no matter once.

Fox: Local libs do parades, etc 4th.

Starr: Can we do odd years? It gives pres candidate more time to campaign.

Dixon: This can complicate electors and delegates. Geoff Neale wrote memo about date change in 06. Pat will send it out.

Hawkridge: the 4th of July That’s my wedding anniversary. (Even my cold heart finds that romantic.)
What about Prez day? The Admiral: Not in Buffeo

Wrights: There are going to be conflicts no matter when we have it.

Starr asks for time extension. 20 more.

Calm down, the Admiral says, we don’t have to decide today. He wants more input from folks. He wants the priority list and goals.

Dr. Jim asks what are the goals and benchmarks?

Sean: Have it as late as possible. Legal reasons, substitution cases, etc. He thinks that odd year is capitulation. He notes that Ruwart and Barr got in the race late so he doesn’t see it as a prob. Both GOP/DNC have their convention late.

The Admiral: Yeah, but the GOP/DNC have circuses not conventions. We are having a meeting.

The cruise. Note that meals are all included. “6000 calories whether you want them or not.”

Oh god, Mattson is up.

Mattson says that concern that it appears to be to expensive. She hands out more detail. They are really trying to push this.

Hawkridge: people don’t have Ids, fall off the boat, no drop in locally, how the hell do get press on there. (All good questions btw.)

Keaton: Does this dock somewhere where the sex trade and drug laws are more liberal? That would make it more appealing to me.

Wrights: Can we even check this out?

Starr: OH HOLY HELL, he starts reading from Robert’s Rules to address the question of drop ins. How the hell did I work for this guy with out beating the living shit out of him? Wrights and others commence with eyerolling.

The Admiral cuts Starr off. G-d bless our service men.

Jingo: We are in a recession, foreclosures, this doesn’t look good.

Redpath: I like craps as much as the next guy….but…

The Admiral: I don’t want to pay someone to take me to sea…

Hinkle: We are a membership group. We should do what the members want. They want DC, they got DC.

Dr. Lark: if you want a cruise, do it as a seminar for a different LNC event

Starr: one of our main goals should to not lose money on these things.

——–
Redpath wants to know what each of the members thinks. Starr gets pissy. Starr is over ruled.

Folks have all different ideas but Hinkle, Wrights, Ruwart, Jingo and Keaton go with the members’ choice.

I’m feeling for Dixon b/c Austin would the best convention ever. Hippie rednecks, good pot, homosexuals, freaks and Wes Benedict.

Lark has no strong pref. Sullentrup of course wants St. Louis. (It does have Knapp and Spangler and that’s good enough for me.)

The Admiral is taking a very liberal laid back approach.

Starr starts again on the damn cruise. Dude, unless I can take mushrooms and fondle Shinghal in the hot tub, no dice.

Redpath and Wrights had enough. Coffee time.

Drawing for an afternoon with Bob Barr

Dear Friend,

My last message to you included an impassioned plea for help for the Bob Barr campaign. It may have been a little long, and I shared with you some fairly personal information regarding my decision to support Bob and work for him full time.

Well, one response to my appeal was that it was “annoying.”

If you were annoyed, I apologize. Believe me, the last thing I want to do is annoy you or any other Bob Barr supporter.

In my enthusiasm for this campaign and the history-making work we are doing, I may have gone “over the top.” Let me warn you, if you think my last message was extreme, you may not want to read on.

As I write this, it is well past midnight. On TV I have seen talking heads smiling and spewing out so much pro-McCain rhetoric it makes me ill. They seem to think that they can sucker in a lot of votes by convincing voters that McCain’s greatest attribute is that he isn’t Barack Obama. Little is said convincing us to be for McCain. Much is said slamming Obama. Nothing is said about the real issues of concern to you and me.

The Bob Barr campaign, however, has been busy pointing this out and calling attention to Bob’s position on virtually every issue. The result is that as people get to know Bob and where he stands on issues, they realize that he really does stand for meaningful change in our government.

They recognize Bob Barr as a man of integrity, courage and commitment. Bob Barr will never compromise on principle. And, his campaign will never resort to vicious personal attacks on his opponents.

I hope that as you have gotten to know Bob, you appreciate him more and more.

I further hope that you now know enough to consider investing in this historic campaign. (Maybe my appeal for financial support is what someone found annoying!)

Bob’s opponents are being funded by a combination of our tax dollars and gifts from special interests. You are all we have to get Bob’s message out. And your gift will help Bob get radio and TV ads out in the next few weeks.

You may recall that a few weeks ago I offered you a free bumper sticker in exchange for your gift of $5 or more. So many people responded that we have had to re-order more. Now I figure that pretty much everyone who wants a sticker has one.

That left me at a loss for how to motivate you to give – beyond your altruistic patriotism and love for the liberty we enjoy in this great nation. So, my boss, Campaign Manager Russ Verney suggested that we have a drawing among all new contacts in the month of September for a free “afternoon with Bob.” We figured some might enjoy lunch with Bob, others a day of quail hunting or a day at the shooting range, some might like to go to the movies, while others might want to take in a baseball or football game. Whatever YOU want to do (let’s keep it legal-and within reason) with our great candidate, Bob Barr, you are free to select. Of course this will be after the election and every effort will be made to accommodate the winner’s choice, but there are obviously some restrictions. (We can’t, for example, afford to pay travel expenses.)

So send us a few bucks, send us $50 or whatever you can, and your name will be entered into a special drawing to win this exciting prize.

Thanks so much for your loyalty and support.

Sincerely,

Robert Stuber
Finance Director

Angela Keaton’s report from Rally for the Republic

The following was written by LNC member and Antiwar.com Development Director Angela Keaton, and was provided to LFV by the author.  Thanks, Angela!

While stationed for Antiwar.com at an alternative to the GOP’s convention, I stayed at the Hotel Saloon, Minneapolis’ only gay motel. I highly recommend it and both the Saloon Bar and Pi, the lesbian bar. Didn’t make it to the Gay 90s a few blocks down but some Ron Paul supporters received some acceptable adult gay entertainment there.

The butch who owned Pi said it is acceptable to support Ron Paul just as long as you call him Ron Paul and not “Dr. Paul, cuz that’s creepy.”

The police and secret service were in full force. Pumped up on Starbucks, I foolishly challenged two police officers and two secret service agents much to the amusement of former Outright ex com member Mike Nelson. They were complaining about the presence of “anarchists” in their fair city. I asked if they had ever met an anarchist. “You just did, here’s my card.”

The LP had a presence there but unlike some of the published pictures, it was mostly staffed by two volunteers (Rich Paul and another man whose name I did not get.) The Barr workers and LP staff were nowhere to be found save when I bumped into too attractive to be a libertarian Austin Petersen.

Frankly, the booth was unremarkable bordering on unprofessional. The fact that the LP paid twice the price that Antiwar.com paid for such a sloppy display is why it was the right thing for me to discontinue raising money for the LNC.

People noticed the lack of quality and it reflected poorly. Image does matter. The bags were nice though.

An Antiwar.com donor was also staying at the Hotel Saloon for the Ron Paul event. He’s a Catholic lay leader and rebukes religious people who would vote for a mass murderer just to avoid gay marriage. Something that those who attended the “other” event should reflect upon.

Keaton, an anarchist, no hyphen

Press Release: LEAP becomes latest victim of government censorship

LEAP Becomes Latest Victim of Government Censorship

DATELINE: 8.26.2008

Arlington: Virginia – Retired police detective, Howard Wooldridge, representing Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) was ousted from the National Asian Peace Officers Association (NAPOA) Conference in Crystal City because he was representing a view contrary U.S. government policy.

LEAP is a 10,000-member organization of police, judges, prosecutors, DEA & FBI agents, and others who know ending drug prohibition will reduce death, disease, crime, and addiction, while saving billions of our tax dollars each year.

On Tuesday (8.26.2008) acting under pressure from unnamed federal officials, Reagan Fong, President of the NAPOA, insisted on the immediate removal of LEAP from the conference vendor roster. It appears that some of the event’s other exhibitors took exception to the LEAP message and put pressure on the event organizer to expel LEAP from the event. While the incident was civil and took place prior to the second day’s session it represents a serious violation of Constitutional rights as cited within the First Amendment.

Federal agency representatives manning booths at the conference included DEA, Federal Air Marshals, NCIS, and Coast Guard. The prior day LEAP’s spokesperson had visited the DEA booth and described the agent as “decidedly unhappy” with an opposing viewpoint. In sharp contrast at 37 national and international law enforcement Conferences where LEAP has been allowed to exhibit, 80% of booth visitors agreed with LEAP’s stance for ending this failed drug war.

As for the Crystal City NAPOA incident, the appearance of impropriety is almost as bad as the real thing. LEAP has attempted to establish contact with Mr. Fong, NAPOA President, to confirm the details of the incident but we have received no response so we can only conclude it is blatant censorship originating from a judgmental “Big Brother” mentality. LEAP believes that this group owes us an apology. We ask that Mr. Fong identify the individual, agency or group that lobbied for our eviction from the event.

If this was an independent effort then he or she was acting outside the scope of authority and should receive administrative punishment for unprofessional actions. If this action was sanctioned by upper level management then the managers need to explain their behavior in an open forum. If this was sanctioned official action by the U.S. Government it is a serious matter which requires serious and immediate attention.

Terry L. Nelson 817-573-6927
Jack A. Cole 617-792-3877
Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

Seth Cohn resigns over LNC’s NH lawsuit

Seth Cohn has resigned in protest from the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire Executive Committee, as a result of the committee’s vote to join the LNC in its lawsuit.

Breaking News: LNC NH lawsuit to be filed in the morning

According to an excellent source, the New Hampshire ballot lawsuit has been authorized by Libertarian National Committee Chair Bill Redpath, and will be filed in the morning (Friday 8/29).

As previously discussed, the lawsuit is expected to seek the removal of George Phillies from the ballot, and the placement of Bob Barr on the ballot. New Hampshire ballot law does not allow for substitution, and George Phillies is currently the LPNH presidential nominee.

Professor Phillies is already ballot-qualified, according to the New Hampshire Secretary of State. However, Professor Phillies says he will not step down, because he feels he has an ethical obligation to those who signed the petitions placing him on the ballot.

LFV will update as more information becomes available.

Last chance to submit agenda items for September LNC meeting

The next LNC meeting is in Washington DC on September 6-7.

LNC At-Large Representative Angela Keaton asks that members please make it a point to attend. It is the first and last meeting before the general election.

Anyone who would like their LNC representative to place an item on the agenda must submit those items ASAP to Bill Redpath ( wredpath at his dot com ) with the words AGENDA ITEM in the subject line.

Steve Kubby: Placer County Republicans whine over Kubby Vindication

The following was submitted to LFV by Steve Kubby.  The blogger notes at the end are part of what Steve sent us, and were not written by LFV.

Friends,

As most of you know, I had the court’s permission to move to Canada, I returned voluntarily to clear up an alleged probation violation, I was never extradited, and was I never convicted for “Narcotics production.”

Despite these facts, the Placer County Republicans continue to lie about me as well as their own criminal and dopey response to the passage of California’s historic Prop. 215.

It’s time the Placer County Republicans grow up and do what former Republican Congressman and now Libertarian Presidential Candidate, Bob Barr has done — declare that the drug war was a mistake and must end now.

–Steve Kubby

———————————–

http://blog.placer-cra.org/past/2008/8/23/auburn_journal_took_up_case/

Auburn Journal Took up Case of Celebrated Pothead
Posted by Aaron Park on August 23, 2008 at 06:32 PM

Remember Steven Kubby?

He was extradited from Canada to the USA when he ran to avoid prosecution for Narcotics production. (at least Rothe stuck around)

Before and after Rothe had his civil rights restored from his prior Drug Trafficking conviction – the Auburn Journal took up the cause of Stephen Kubby.

In 2003, Kubby’s felony conviction was reinstated as reported by the Auburn Journal

There was a follow-up story trumpeting Kubby’s plight as he applied for refugee status in Canada

And another in 2006 when his ‘stay’ in Canada was about to run out

And this is basically a commentary printed in the AJ taking Kubby’s side

And this year a follow-up story was run:

By Gus Thomson

Journal Staff Writer

A Mendocino County court has dismissed the remnants of a 1999 Placer County prosecution of medical marijuana proponent Steve Kubby.

The ruling – which sees Kubby’s misdemeanor convictions for possession of a magic mushroom stem and peyote buttons expunged under California law – came last week.

Full erasure of the conviction would take a governor’s pardon, but Kubby said Tuesday that the court decision to dismiss the case leaves him “fully vindicated and in possession, once again, of my inalienable, inseparable, non-transferable rights.”

Mendocino County Chief Probation Officer Wesley Forman issued a statement said that he had no objection to the dismissal by Judge David Nelson because Kubby had complied with the terms of his probation.

Kubby’s legal challenges started after a January 1999 raid on his Olympic Valley home in Placer County. The raid netted 265 marijuana plants from an indoor grow.

Kubby was a chief proponent of medicinal marijuana law Prop. 215 when it was passed by voters in 1996 and ran for governor as a Libertarian two years ago. He was also a candidate for Libertarian Party presidential nominee this year.

Kubby’s chief defense at the trial was that he and his wife had a doctor’s recommendation for medical use of marijuana and that his use kept a rare form of adrenal cancer at bay.

In one of the most contentious trials in Placer County legal history, a mistrial was declared after a jury leaning 11-1 for acquittal on possession-of-marijuana-for-sale charges remained deadlocked after
five days of deliberations and four months of testimony.

Kubby would eventually serve 20 days of a 120-day jail term in Placer County on the jury’s peyote and mescaline possession convictions, both misdemeanors.

Kubby, 61, now lives in Mendocino County. He said that he has fond memories of much of his life in the county but that he wouldn’t return as long as the district attorney who prosecuted the case – Brad Fenocchio – was still in office.

The Journal’s Gus Thomson can be reached at gust@goldcountrymedia.com.
A more detailed story will appear in a future edition of the Journal.

Blogger’s Notes – I can hardly wait to see the full story. What I have read thus far looks pretty biased in favor of the pothead. While Rothe didn’t write any of the stories, he has a responsibility to make sure his paper isn’t used to pimp an agenda.

Even worse – a reporter by the name of Ryan McCarthy wrote some of the stories. McCarthy was a known pot user himself. Given how Rothe and the journal have reported on crime over the years – why should anyone be surprised?

Seth Cohn: “A history of the LPNH, NH ballot access issues, and why this lawsuit is a mistake (part 1)”

The following was written by Seth Cohn, and is published on LFV with the permission of the author.

This is written for those with little or no background in this issue, which includes many LNCers, and perhaps some of the current LPNH Exec Comm.

I’m going to highlight important points with *this*.

Let’s start our timeline back a bit, but not too far back: 1997, a mere 11 years ago

Oh, wait, we must mention the Sec of State (SOS), Bill Gardner, in power for over 30 years now.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gardner

We’ll come back to him…

http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/rsa/html/LXIII/652/652-11.htm
652:11 Party. – “Party” shall mean any political organization which at the preceding state general election received at least 4 percent of the total number of votes cast for any one of the following: the office of governor or the offices of United States Senators.
Source. 1979, 436:1, eff. July 1, 1979. 1997, 253:1, eff. Jan. 1, 1999.

Note that date: in 1997 (effective by 1999), the percentage required was raised from 3 to 4 points. The LPNH lawsuit brought in 2005-06 has more details for those who want them… lots of juicy legalese, and lots of failure to make a dent, by legal means.

In 2000, Don Gorman, of NH, loses the LP nomination with 166 votes (19%) for second place, to a second attempt by Harry Browne at 56% of the convention voters.. The “Browne Cloud” affair ends up being both an ethical and financial sore point for the LP for many years to come. George Phillies, a professor of physics, would be the central force in excising the Emerling (aka Cloud) influence from his own state several years later. (Those wondering why George is the preferred target of certain people still in LP, your question is answered – if you name names and point out the dirty laundry, and those names and those who worked alongside them remain in the org after you’ve done so, they certainly will hold grudges in the future.)

The entire story of this part of this history can be pieced together from lots of googleable posts like this:
http://libertarianhistory.blogspot.com/2007/09/harry-browne-emerling-cloud-willis.html
http://www.carolmoore.net/4secretary/controversies.html
and quite importantly George’s own book,
http://www.cmlc.org/headerfundingliberty.htm
(Those interested in a ebook or paper copy should contact George.)

NH election results – http://www.sos.nh.gov/general2000/index.htm *Effect in NH: Due to Harry’s failure to campaign in NH (or much of any place else), Ballot Access as a party is lost, when the only qualifying downstream candidate, Governor candidate Babiarz gets no supportive bump from a active Presidential Candidate, in fact, Browne does worse than Babiarz by more than 2 to 1. As a result, party status is lost, and won’t be regained thru 2008, present day. *

2002 – http://www.sos.nh.gov/general2002/index.htm

Babiarz doubles his numbers to over 13K votes, but still short of 4% Senate candidate Blevens does over 9K, but also not enough.

2004 – Badnarik fails to make the ballot at all, due to short petition numbers. Blevens also fails to make the ballot for the other Senate seat, makes 100+ tallied write in votes.  *LP National complains, for years later, that Babiarz and others are solely responsible for the ballot failure (which should have ‘easy petition drive’, in part because Babiarz won’t run against Gov. Benson (who has friendly to libertarian causes, like the Free State Project).*

Benson loses, as well.

2006 – Gov candidate Kahn fails to make the ballot. Blevens, despite not being the convention nominated candidate for Congress District 2, petitions, and successfully makes the ballot as Libertarian. The ‘official’ LPNH nominee, Lapointe, FAILS to make the ballot. *The question of renaming Blevens from L to Indep is raised. The Sec of State, refuses to do so, saying there is nothing he can do… the petition said Libertarian, so that is what Ken will be listed as.* Ken makes 3K votes.

Post 2006 – In the light of past petition failures, and *National’s insistence that a post Denver convention group of local p