Chase Oliver wins Libertarian POTUS nomination

After a grueling seven ballots at the Libertarian National Convention, Chase Oliver won the party's presidential nomination, with >35% voting for None of the Above on the final ballot. 

Chase Oliver campaigning in Iowa, 2023. Photo by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons.

Chase Oliver Is the Libertarian Party's Presidential Pick | Reason | Eric Boehm: 

May 26, 2023 - "Two years ago, Chase Oliver burst onto the Libertarian political scene by forcing a runoff in the Georgia Senate election — a result that ultimately determined the majority in the U.S. Senate. Now he can aim to leave an even bigger mark.

"Oliver won the Libertarian Party's presidential nomination in dramatic fashion Sunday night, prevailing on the seventh round of balloting after running second in each of the first five rounds. Oliver received 60.6 percent of the vote in the final round, finally clearing the 50 percent threshold for victory against 'none of the above,' the only alternative that remained on the ballot after Oliver narrowly won a sixth-round showdown with professor-turned-podcaster Michael Rectenwald, who had led the count in each of the first five rounds [and was removed from the ballot for the seventh round - gd].

"'I am extending my hand. Take it, and be a partner with me in liberty," Oliver said in his victory speech, making a pitch to his opponents within the Libertarian Party, which has been riven for the past two years by a deep divide over tactics and principles. It was a fitting end to a tempestuous convention that saw Libertarian delegates loudly boo former President Donald Trump during an unorthodox appearance by the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

"Oliver, a 38-year-old gay man from Atlanta with socially tolerant and pro-immigration views, delivered a passionate response after Trump's speech to the convention on Saturday. Now, he will get to spend the next six months competing directly against Trump and President Joe Biden, two men more than twice his age.... 

"Oliver's victory on Sunday night was a blow to the Mises Caucus, the right-leaning faction that took control of the Libertarian Party at the 2022 convention and that had orchestrated Trump's appearance at the convention. That faction's preferred candidate was Rectenwald.

"For much of Sunday's lengthy balloting process, it seemed like Rectenwald might narrowly prevail — even after giving a rambling, somewhat incoherent speech on Saturday night, after which he admitted that he'd been high on an edible. No candidate got close to an outright majority in the first round of balloting, completed in mid-afternoon on Sunday.... The second, third, and fourth rounds of voting whittled down the field but were hardly decisive. Rectenwald maintained his lead over Oliver... 

"It was the fifth round that provided the first indication of the final outcome. With tech entrepreneur Lars Mapstead eliminated, Oliver and ter Maat swept up dozens of additional votes while Rectenwald's momentum faltered. After being eliminated in that round, ter Maat extended an endorsement to Oliver from the convention floor — in exchange for being Oliver's vice-presidential choice. (Unlike the Republicans and Democrats, the Libertarian Party selects the two positions in separate votes. But the winner of the presidential nomination typically has significant influence in the outcome of the second contest.).... ter Maat's embrace of Oliver seemed to tilt the outcome."

Read more: https://reason.com/2024/05/26/chase-oliver-is-the-libertarian-partys-presidential-pick/

Not much 'Covid Relief' in Biden bill

Senate Democrats eke out 50-49 COVID-19 relief bill victory | The Week - Tim O'Donnell:
March 6, 2021 - "President Biden is another step closer to signing his administration's COVID-19 relief bill into law. The Senate on Saturday passed the $1.9 trillion stimulus plan along party lines with a 50-49 vote."
Read more: https://theweek.com/speedreads/970690/senate-democrats-eke-5049-covid19-relief-bill-victory

The 'COVID Relief Bill' Is Mostly an Expensive Bundle of Politically Motivated Giveaways |  Reason - Eric Boehm:
March 4, 2021 - "As the Senate prepares to take a final vote on President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill, it's time to be honest about one thing. This isn't a COVID-19 relief bill. We should stop calling it that.... [T]he bill that the Senate is likely to pass this week is a larded-up bounty of mostly Democratic policy goals that will add $1.9 trillion to the federal budget deficit..... 

"Only about 5 percent of that total is funding public health efforts related to the pandemic, according to the nonpartisan number crunchers at the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB). There are a few other things in the bill that could be counted as 'relief,' like the $7 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and another $40 billion in emergency loans for restaurants, bars, music venues, airlines, and other industries.... Beyond that, however....

"$500 billion, is a bailout of state and local governments that for the most part do not need one.... But it's not just a bailout; it's a bailout in which the funding is allocated based on the size of each state's unemployed population. In other words, states that imposed draconian and unnecessary economic lockdowns during the past year are going to get a larger share of the federal cash than states that managed to balance public health needs and the economy....

"Another $400 billion of the bill's spending would provide an additional round of stimulus checks to Americans who haven't lost their jobs or income due to the pandemic. The version of Biden's bill passed last month by the House would fund $1,400 in direct payments to individuals who earned up to $100,000 last year and couples who earned up to $200,000.... There is no reason for Congress to be sending checks to families that earn six-figure incomes and have experienced minimal financial losses.... If putting more money in Americans' pockets is a priority for Congress, it should accomplish that goal by reducing income taxes (and cutting an equal amount of future spending) on a permanent basis, not by engaging in deficit-hiking games merely because 'free' money from the government is politically popular.

"The bill spends $129 billion on K-12 education — money that you might assume is being used to reopen schools quickly and safely. Wrong. A Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of the bill found that 'the bulk' of those dollars wouldn't be spent until 'after 2021.' Some of it won't be distributed until 2024.

"$480 million in the bill will be spent on 'miscellaneous' educational matters like 'grants to fund activities related to the arts, humanities, libraries, and museums, and Native American language preservation and maintenance. Even if those are items that might be worth spending federal tax dollars to support, it's difficult to understand  how they are 'COVID-19 relief' by any meaningful definition of the terms. The same is true for the bill's funding of a new subway in San Jose, California, and the new bridge connecting New York state to Canada — top priorities of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D–N.Y.), naturally, but not anything that belongs in a pandemic relief bill....

[T]he bill also includes a $14 billion provision creating a new paid family leave program—one that applies only to employees of the federal government.... Note that this special giveaway to federal employees is being funded with twice as much money as the PPP.... The bill spends another $86 billion to bail out multi-employer pension funds, which are retirement accounts operated by private sector unions.... Many of these retirement accounts are deep in the red — but even if there is a good reason for federal taxpayers to pick up the tab, what does this have to do with the pandemic?...

"Using the waning pandemic as an excuse for a spending free-for-all when the country is $28 trillion in debt is beyond irresponsible. And trying to pass off this bloated list of politically motivated handouts as essential to America's public health is dishonest and cowardly."

Read more: https://reason.com/2021/03/04/the-covid-relief-bill-is-mostly-a-expensive-bundle-of-politically-motivated-giveaways/

Ron Paul blocked from Facebook 'by mistake'

Ron Paul Says He's Been Locked out of Facebook | Reason - Eric Boehm:

"UPDATE: In an email on Monday night, a Facebook spokesperson told Reason that it had mistakenly locked former Rep. Ron Paul's page. 'While there were never any restrictions on Ron Paul's page, we restricted one admin's ability to post by mistake. We have corrected the error.'"

January 11, 2021 - "Shortly after reposting an article that criticized Twitter's decision to ban President Donald Trump, former congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul says he was locked out of his own Facebook page. The page is still active and appears to be functioning normally for other users, but Paul claimed in a Twitter post that he'd been blocked from managing the page. Paul says that Facebook said he had 'repeatedly' violated 'community standards,' though he disputes that claim and says the social media site never identified an offending post.

"Paul had posted only one item to his Facebook page on Monday: a link to the congressman's weekly syndicated column, in which he criticized Twitter's decision to ban Trump. That move 'was shocking and chilling, particularly to those of us who value free expression and the free exchange of ideas,' wrote Paul. 'The justifications given for the silencing of wide swaths of public opinion made no sense and the process was anything but transparent.'

"Those are valid criticisms.... Twitter's decision to ban Trump is well within the private company's rights, but it does raise some not easily answered questions about how the site will handle other world leaders' accounts in the future....

"Needless to say, the social media giant's decision to lock Paul's page is not censorship. The most recent posts made to Paul's Facebook page are available on the institute's website and have been disseminated through Twitter, YouTube, and other online platforms. Indeed, both posts are still available on Paul's Facebook page. Without more information from Facebook, we can only speculate about why Paul has apparently been locked out of his page.

"And that's exactly the problem. Facebook does not owe anyone a platform—but if it is changing its standards for what content will be allowed, it ought to explain the new rules in terms that are easily understandable and equally applied. The same is true for other platforms. Those that don't may find that they've only made themselves irrelevant in an online world built around openness and free discussion.

"Social media sites can and should be criticized when they attempt to limit certain voices—particularly when they do so without providing clear and objective reasons for ruling certain content out of bounds. Twitter's decision to permanently ban Trump seems to have set off a purge across multiple social media sites with broad yet vague criteria (to the extent that any clear criteria even exist) for shutting down certain sorts of speech."

Read more: https://reason.com/2021/01/11/ron-paul-says-hes-been-locked-out-of-facebook/

Libertarian polls at 38% in Arkansas Senate race

Tom Cotton Won't Debate His Libertarian Challenger. The Event Will Happen Anyway | Reason - Eric Boehm: 

October 12, 2020 - "Sen. Tom Cotton (R–Ark.) is ducking a chance to debate his Libertarian challenger, even as a new poll shows the race tightening in the final weeks of what could be a rough election season for Republicans. The debate, scheduled to be broadcast by Arkansas' PBS station on Wednesday night, will take place even without Cotton's participation. That means it will basically be an hour-long opportunity for Ricky Dale Harrington, Jr., to speak directly to the voters who will decide next month whether Cotton deserves another six years in the Senate.

"Cotton, who has emerged in recent years as one of the loudest voices in the GOP's ascendant authoritarian nationalist wing, appeared to be heading for an easy reelection bid when the only Democrat to enter the race dropped out late last year. Enter Harrington, a 34-year-old prison chaplain running a campaign that gives voters about as stark a choice as they are likely to find in any two-way contest this year. Where Cotton has claimed that America has an 'under-incarceration problem' and called for deploying more heavy-handed police tactics against protesters, Harrington wants to reduce mandatory minimums and demilitarize the police. That contrast would provide fertile ground for serious debate between the two men — if Cotton would agree to show up.

"Even before this week's debate, Harrington has made a splash. According to a poll released last week by American Research Group (a polling firm that FiveThirtyEight grades well), Cotton leads 49 percent to 38 percent. That's a comfortable enough lead — and every professional prognosticator has the race listed as a 'safe' Republican win, even as the tide has turned against the GOP in the presidential race and some key Senate battlegrounds. Still, Cotton is polling at less than 50 percent in a two-way race, and 13 percent of voters say they remain undecided....

"This week's non-debate is an opportunity for Harrington to appeal to those undecided voters. Failing to show up means Cotton stands to gain nothing.

"When Cotton rejected the invitation to the debate, his campaign released a statement saying he was 'spending time on the campaign trail when the Senate is in recess, and looks forward to making his case to Arkansans across our state before this November's election.' What Cotton won't do, apparently, is go head-to-head with a challenger that nearly four out of 10 Arkansans say they support."

Read more: https://reason.com/2020/10/12/tom-cotton-wont-debate-his-libertarian-challenger-the-event-will-happen-anyway/ 

Why it matters
by George J. Dance

I would love to see Ricky Harrington win, but I think that is very doubtful by the poll numbers. Even if the undecideds broke 11:2 for him, Tom Cotton wiould still win. On the other hand, for Herrington to get over 30% should be big news. Let's hope Libertarians get as much news out of it as possible. 

Libertarians may not have won that many elections in the USA, but they have been the most successful interest group fighting for free and fair elections in that country, and it is time to shine a light on that success. Harrington's candidacy shows two ways they do that.  

First, Libertarians counter the worrying trend in America of two-party elections turning into one-party coronations. As the country grows more polarized and campaigns get more expensive, both Democratic and Republican parties are finding it more and more necessary to stop contesting seats they are sure they cannot win. In those cases, all semblance of the voters having any say in who gets elected goes out the window. However, Libertarians — who run low-cost campaigns, not to win (at this time) but to recruit (so we can win later) — can provide one thing representative democracy needs in order to function, an opposing choice for voters dissatisfied with a single option.  

Second, if Harrington gets at least 25%, that will be more than 10 times the 2% threshold the state requires for major party status (including automatic ballot access). In all fairness, Harrington's vote should qualify the party.  However, the state counts only the governor's race, not other statewide races, which is unfair; and if the party loses its status this time, that unfairness will be manifest to all (or at least to all besides Cotton supporters).  

The Libertarians are often subject to unfair and arbitrary laws like this; and their success in fighting them, by both lobbying state legislatures and initiating court challenges, has given them a solid record of achievement over the past five decades. This year's election may give them a golden opportunity of adding to that record. 

Americans voting with their feet to end lockdowns

Lockdown Is Ending, Whether Governments Approve or Not | Reason - Eric Boehm:

May 4, 2020 - "Some states have lifted their COVID-19 lockdowns or announced plans to let more businesses reopen soon; others have extended stay-at-home orders into late May or even early June. But regardless of what officials dictate, data from Apple and Foursquare suggest the lockdowns are gradually coming to an end on their own anyway, as more people venture out of their homes and resume various levels of economic activity.

"'As officials begin the process of relaxing some business restrictions, we're starting to see upticks in foot traffic to various places,' Foursquare reported in an April 30 blog post. 'This is true across regions, regardless of state-specific policies.' Visits to fast food restaurants and gas stations have already returned to their pre-coronavirus baselines in rural regions, Foursquare reported. While suburban and urban areas are still below normal, those areas have seen 15 percent growth since the end of March.

"Gas stations have seen a rebound too. According to Foursquare, gas station visits were down as much as 11 percent from their national averages in the early weeks of April but down only 6 percent for the week of April 24. In some parts of the country — mostly in the Midwest, where the COVID-19 outbreak has been less severe — the visits had returned to pre-coronavirus levels. Apple's Mobility Trends, which is aggregated from Apple Maps users, shows a similar uptick.... While travel in the United States was still down 16 percent from 'normal' by the end of last week, there is an undeniable upward trend, one moving faster than in other countries hit hard by COVID-19....

"Needless to say, a great deal of economic activity is not back to normal. Bars, casual dining restaurants, gyms, and retail shops continue to be hammered by mandatory shutdowns in many states — and by consumer reluctance too....

"But the Foursquare and Apple data provide policymakers with some critical insights, if they are willing to look. Clearly, individuals have been weighing the risks of the coronavirus against the difficulties of the ongoing lockdowns and deciding to venture out a bit more often. That's good news for businesses that are still open, but it does nothing for those that the government has ordered to close. Those closures should be reversed as much as possible — though obviously with an eye toward social distancing and with limited capacity.

"The data also show something about the nature of the shutdowns. They might have been encouraged by executive orders, but they were always ultimately driven by voluntary behavior. Well before states started issuing stay-at-home orders in the final week of March, many Americans were voluntarily self-quarantining.

"Since officials had only limited influence over the beginning of the lockdown, they were always going to have limited influence over its ending. This was always unsustainable over the long term, and coronavirus policies need to be reconsidered in light of that. On the other hand, declaring states to be 'open' will be meaningless unless residents feel it is safe to venture out again.

"Nor is this proof that anti-lockdown protests have worked. Dozens of Americans have descended on state capitals in displays of politicized rage, but the lockdowns are coming undone mostly because millions of other people have simply started going about their lives again, at least as much as they can. They're voting with their feet — and their cars."

Read more: https://reason.com/2020/05/04/lockdown-is-ending-whether-governments-approve-or-not/

Libertarians speak out on coronavirus

What libertarians would do in response to coronavirus | The Week - Bonnie Kristian:

March 13, 2020 - "The novel coronavirus is a novel situation for modern libertarianism:... COVID-19 is forecast to be a unique situation in the last century. Realistically, there won't be a single libertarian view on the state's role in a pandemic. What we call 'libertarianism' is a big tent with significant division on issues including immigration, abortion, and whether the state should exist at all. (There are anarchists in the tent.) Nevertheless, pandemic-era libertarianism is emerging, and it remains distinctly libertarian. Here are the trends I'm seeing.

1. "Praise for the free market's role.... 'That gallon jug of hand sanitizer delivered to your front door less than 48 hours after you ordered it online? It didn't show up because Trump tweeted it into existence'... Reason's Eric Boehm wrote.... Libertarian author Jeffrey Tucker likewise explained how in 'a disease panic, the market is your friend,' and some libertarians have proposed tariff relief as a response to the pandemic's economic damage.

2. "Advice of personal responsibility. Rep. Justin Amash (I-Mich.) has encouraged voluntary social distancing. Reason's coverage has done the same, emphasizing the seriousness of the illness and offering tips for continuing education at home while school is canceled. A piece at the Libertarian Institute promoted conservative personal finance decisions to limit COVID-19's disruption.

3. "Condemnation of counterproductive regulations and lack of transparency.... For weeks, the FDA and CDC wouldn't let medical workers and academics move forward with COVID-19 tests they'd developed without lengthy processes of federal approval. In fact, these agencies actively discouraged independent testing until the end of February while offering a faulty test kit and too-strict guidelines for who could be tested.... While the testing situation is beginning to improve, the Trump administration has classified its coronavirus meetings.... Amash complained lawmakers weren't given enough time to read last week's coronavirus relief bill before it passed, and the Foundation for Economic Education slammed Beijing for repressing the message of heroic coronavirus whistleblower Dr. Li Wenliang.

4. "Rejection of corporate bailouts and price controls. Trump is exploring plans for corporate bailout loans and other economic stimuli which libertarians generally oppose. The Cato Institute has argued against 'big bailouts and ... throwing money at businesses that will not be viable in the new post‐​epidemic world'.... The libertarian take on targeted tax breaks like Trump wants for energy and travel-related industries will be more mixed: We disagree on whether tax cuts like this should be opposed as favoritism amounting to corporate welfare or supported because any tax break is a good thing. Not mixed is the opposition to price controls, as higher prices are a useful signal of growing demand that discourages hoarding and encourages increased production.

5. "Mixed feelings on emergency social welfare. Libertarians have a reputation for universal opposition to all social safety net spending, and many do take that position. But perhaps the most famous libertarian economist — Nobel Prize winner F.A. Hayek — supported a limited welfare state, including a universal basic income. This fault line will extend into libertarian stances on pandemic responses like state-provided testing, treatment, and income subsidies. (In my experience, most thoughtful libertarians get less worked up about real needs being filled in a way we consider non-ideal than about more egregious state overreaches like unjust wars or police violence.)...

6. "Skepticism of mandatory lockdowns, travel bans, and the like.... Some libertarians have categorically rejected forced quarantines, arguing the risk of infection is not a direct enough threat to justify impeding people's rights. Most have not taken that view, instead expressing skepticism of the effectiveness of broad quarantines and travel bans — a skepticism public health experts share, by the way — while conceding there could be circumstances where these measures are appropriate for a time. The legal uncertainty around state and federal powers to require quarantines and limit public gatherings has libertarians predictably worried about due process rights.

7. "Insistence on temporary changes. Fierce opposition to expansions of the surveillance state to fight the novel coronavirus is likely widespread among libertarians in no small part because privacy rights, once lost, are very rarely recovered. But the risk of this pandemic permanently expanding the power of the state will shape the libertarian view on every proposed solution.... For many libertarians, our worries about robust government responses to COVID-19 are less about the responses proper than the possibility that the changes they bring will never end, even after the disease is under control. There are libertarians in a pandemic, and we're as preoccupied by coronavirus as everyone else. We're just preoccupied by liberty, too."

Read more; https://theweek.com/articles/901738/what-libertarians-response-coronavirus

Private sector maintaining Yellowstone Park

Private Companies Are Paying to Keep Yellowstone Clean During Shutdown - Hit & Run : Reason.com - Eric Boehm:

January 7, 2019 - "Nearly three weeks into the government shutdown, some of America's national parks are starting to get a bit rank [with] no employees to empty trash bins or clean toilets...

"But at Yellowstone National Park, National Public Radio reports, local businesses are chipping in to make sure the bathrooms get cleaned, the roads get plowed, and the tourists keep coming. Even in the middle of winter, the park gets an estimated 20,000 visitors per month....

"Xanterra Parks and Resorts, which runs the only hotels inside Yellowstone that remain open during the winter, is leading the effort to cover the $7,500 daily tab for keeping the roads plowed and the snowmobile trails groomed during the shutdown, according to NPR. Thirteen other private businesses that offer tours of the park are chipping in $300 a day to help cover that expense....

"Xanterra has some of its own employees assigned to clean park bathrooms during the shutdown, and snowmobile tour guides are packing their own toilet paper for customers to use....

"According to the National Park Service, the 331 million visitors to national parks during 2017 contributed an estimated $18.2 billion to local economies within 60 miles of the parks. All that spending supported 306,000 jobs. The federal government spends about $3 billion on the National Park Service each year, but those private economies based in and around the parks [are] six times larger. That's a powerful incentive to keep things running even if the government isn't.

"There's also probably a useful lesson here about what the privatization of national parks would look like. Rather than the corporatized dystopia of environmentalist nightmares, removing the government from the equation would allow businesses that have a vested interest in maintaining and protecting America's natural splendor to do exactly that — and would prevent the parks from being caught up in the unrelated drama of whatever nonsense is happening in Washington, D.C."

Read more: https://reason.com/blog/2019/01/07/private-companies-yellowstone-shutdown?utm_medium=email
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PA Libertarian's debate invitation revoked

Pennsylvania's Libertarian Senate Candidate Gets Invited, Then Snubbed From Televised Debate - Hit & Run : Reason.com - Eric Boehm:

October 9, 2018 - "Dale Kerns says he was promised a spot in an October 20 senatorial debate in the Philadelphia media market — only to have the invitation rescinded as the debate neared.... Kerns, an electrical contractor from the Philadelphia suburbs, is the Libertarian candidate in a four-way Senate race that also includes incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D-Penn.), Rep. Lou Barletta (R-Hazleton), and Green Party candidate Neal Gale. All four candidates have qualified for the ballot in Pennsylvania.

"Emails obtained by Reason show that Kerns' campaign was twice assured of a spot in a televised debate by executives at the state's chapter of the League of Women Voters, which typically plays a role in organizing debates. In March, Suzanne Almeida, the then-executive director of the group, told Kerns' campaign manager that Kerns would 'certainly' be invited to 'participate in candidate forums after the primary.'

"In late August, the campaign again contacted the League of Women Voters seeking information about planned debates. Jill Greene, who had taken over as executive director in July, responded on August 29 to say that she was currently trying to plan a Senate debate with the League's media partners and that she would 'be sure to include Mr. Kerns and Mr. Gale.'

"Six weeks later, after the debate had been scheduled for October 20 on Philadelphia's ABC affiliate, WPVI-TV, Greene emailed Kerns' campaign manager John Odermatt to deliver the bad news. The League had asked to include Kerns and Gale in the debate, she said, but 'other organizers' did not 'feel as if current polling warranted an invitation'.... On Tuesday, Greene told Reason that any questions regarding the decision not to invite Kerns or Gale to the debate 'should be referred to WPVI, as it was their decision.'

"Niki Hawkins, director of community affairs for WPVI-TV, ... defended the station's decision on the grounds that Kerns had failed to meet eligibility criteria including 'significant voter support for the candidacy as reflected in polling numbers'.... It's true that Kerns has fallen short of the 10 percent threshold that serves as the only objective standard in WPVI's criteria.... But it's also true that Kerns wasn't officially on the ballot until August, so WPVI's decision to rely on polls conducted earlier in the campaign skews against the inclusion of third party candidates....

"'Make no mistake, this is cronyism: big media corporations colluding with big government political parties to keep out competition,' says Kerns. 'The mainstream media screams about Russia stealing elections, but behind the scenes they pull the strings to keep the duopoly in control.'"

Read more: https://reason.com/blog/2018/10/09/pennsylvanias-libertarian-senate-candida
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Mark Sanford loses primary to Trump pick

Mark Sanford Is a Libertarian Republican Who Took on Trump. He Just Lost His Primary. - Hit & Run : Reason.com - Eric Boehm:

June 12, 2018 - "A primary challenger backed by President Donald Trump successfully unseated incumbent Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) tonight just hours after Trump took to Twitter to attack Sanford for — of all things — the congressman's marital infidelities. First-term state Rep. Katie Arrington (R-Dorchester) defeated Sanford, earning more than 51 percent of the vote to Sanford's 46 percent....

"In an interview with Politico last weekend, Sanford suggested that a loss in his re-election bid could cause other Republicans to think twice before speaking out against the Trump administration.... 'I think it's entirely appropriate to say "I agree" when I agree and "I disagree" when I disagree,' Sanford told Politico's Alex Isenstadt. 'That's the American way. That's what our entire political system is based on, ... the fact that we can have dissent'....

"Sanford's dissent to Trump's takeover of the GOP dates back nearly two years.... Sanford has accused Trump of fanning 'the flames of intolerance,' criticized Trump's use of the word 'shit-hole' to describe some third world countries, and most recently called the president's plan to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum imports 'an experiment with stupidity.' He's also criticized Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) for not taking a hard enough line against the Trump White House.

"Trump appears to have taken notice. As voters were heading to the polls Tuesday, the president took a shot at the incumbent congressman.

Mark Sanford has been very unhelpful to me in my campaign to MAGA. He is MIA and nothing but trouble. He is better off in Argentina. I fully endorse Katie Arrington for Congress in SC, a state I love. She is tough on crime and will continue our fight to lower taxes. VOTE Katie!

"Yes, that reference to Argentina is the thrice-wedded president (who may have had an affair with a porn star) accusing Sanford of being bad at marriage, apparently without a hint of irony....

"It's true that Sanford's six-day disappearance during July 2009 — when he was ... having an extramarital affair with an Argentine woman, María Belén Chapur — changed the course of his political career.... Prior to [L'Affaire] Argentine, Sanford was regarded as a possible White House contender. Following Ron Paul's 2008 dark horse presidential run, he and [former] governor of New Mexico Gary Johnson (along with, of course, Rand Paul) were often identified as the heirs apparent to the libertarian wing of the GOP....

"Will there be a third act for Sanford? One can hope. Whatever you may think of his personal foibles, he's been a consistently principled voice for liberty and limited government. He opposes bailouts, loves Atlas Shrugged, and disdains political tribalism. And in the age of Trump, a history of adultery is hardly political suicide anymore."

Read more: https://reason.com/blog/2018/06/12/anti-trump-republican-mark-sanford-loses
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Opioid makers spend big to stop legal cannabis

Why Big Pharma is Spending so Much Money to Defeat Marijuana Initiatives - Hit & Run : Reason.com - Eric Boehm:

October 28, 2016 - "Legal marijuana will poison children and cause more Arizonans to die in car crashes, according to scary television and online ads running across the state in advance of Election Day. 'Edibles that look like candy, marketed to kids,' warns one ad, with a voiceover meant to sound like a concerned mother....

"The ads were created by Arizonans For Responsible Drug Policy, a group that's encouraging voters to reject Arizona's Proposition 205, which would allow people aged 21 and older to possess up to an ounce of marijuana and grow up to six plants in their own homes. Arizona is one of [five] states — along with California, Massachusetts, Maine and Nevada — that could vote to legalize recreational weed on November 8.

"Despite the voices and faces in the ads, though, Arizonans For Responsible Drug Policy and similar groups urging 'no' votes on marijuana legalization in other states are not funded by concerned parents and public officials. In large part, these groups are funded by pharmaceutical companies trying to protect their share of the market for painkilling drugs — and in Arizona, the biggest donor to the 'No On 205' campaign is a company that's been investigated for its role in overdose deaths.

"That company, Arizona-based Insys Therapeutics Inc., is best known for manufacturing a pain relief spray that contains fentanyl, an opioid that's been under heightened scrutiny for its role in several overdose deaths, including the high-profile death of Prince in April..... Insys Therapeutics in August made a $500,000 contribution to Arizonans For Responsible Drug Policy, the largest donation the group has received from a single source.

"It's not just happening in Arizona. According to a report from The Nation, Purdue Pharma and Abbott Laboratories, makers of the painkiller[s] OxyContin and Vicodin, respectively, are among the largest contributors to the Anti-Drug Coalition of America. Meanwhile, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, which advocates on behalf of drug companies, spent nearly $19m on lobbying in 2015, according to a report from The Guardian, which called PhaRMA 'one of marijuana's biggest opponents.' Federal lobbying data aggregated by Maplight shows that PhaRMA has spent more than $150 million on lobbying since 2008 — a total that only includes federal lobbying efforts, not similar work done in state capitals, where PhaRMA is also active....

"[I]t's worth asking why they would be so keen to spend millions of dollars fighting marijuana legalization.

"One big part of the answer is that states with legal marijuana — medical or recreational — have lower rates of drug prescriptions."

Read more: http://reason.com/blog/2016/10/28/why-big-pharma-is-spending-so-much-money
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Libertarian Johnson secures place on PA ballot

PA Independent: Libertarian Johnson secures place on ballot « Watchdog News - Eric Boehm:

Oct. 10, 2012 - "A state judge Wednesday ruled that Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson will remain on the Pennsylvania ballot for November’s general election.

"Commonwealth Court Judge James Gardner Colins determined that Johnson had collected 20,730 valid signatures, just above the threshold of 20,601 signature required by state law for third parties to get on the ballot.

"Along with Johnson, the Libertarians will [have] their candidates on the ballot for U.S. Senate, state auditor general, state attorney general and state treasurer.

"Tom Stevens, chairman of the Pennsylvania Libertarian Party, said the ruling was a victory in an uphill battle against the Republican Party of Pennsylvania.... 'Now the voters of Pennsylvania will have an opportunity to have a real choice in who to vote for in statewide and national elections this November,' he told PA Independent."

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GOP trying to boot Gary Johnson from PA ballot

Republicans trying to boot Gary Johnson from Pennsylvania ballot | PA Independent - Eric Boehm:

August 20, 2012 - "The Pennsylvania Republican Party has already booted one third-party candidate from the state’s presidential ballot and is making life difficult for Libertarian Party presidential nominee Gary Johnson.

"Republican voters acting on behalf of the state GOP this week officially challenged the signatures submitted by Johnson, the former governor of New Mexico, who is seeking an equal place on the November ballot beside major party candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.

"Ron Nielson, senior adviser for the Johnson campaign, told PA Independent on Wednesday that the campaign submitted more than 49,000 signatures — more than twice the amount required to gain access to the ballot in Pennsylvania.

"He said the campaign expected to survive the challenge from the Republicans."
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