Showing posts with label Silicon Valley. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Silicon Valley. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 23, 2014

Lincoln Labs building liberty-oriented "hacker" network

The Kochs' nonprofit empire is building a network of libertarian hackers, coders and designers - Yahoo News - Chris Moody:

July 23, 2014 - "It was nearing 2 a.m., the AC had been shut off and the air in the century-old downtown office of Brigade Media, a tech startup that hosted a hackathon in conjunction with a libertarian tech conference here, was starting to feel heavy....

"The hackathon — an event in which teams compete to build new apps and programs within a short period of time — was part of the first inaugural Reboot, conference where hundreds of conservative hackers, coders, designers, tech entrepreneurs and conservative political activists joined some of the nation’s top Republicans to strategize and — ideally — emerge with The Next Great App. As an incentive, the conference organizers offered $10,000 in prize money to be awarded to the best ideas.

"The gathering was the first inaugural conference put on by Lincoln Labs, a year-old club of politically-minded technologists started by three millennials with backgrounds in Republican politics: Garrett Johnson, a former aide to Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; Aaron Ginn, who worked on Mitt Romney’s digital team; and Chris Abrams, who runs digital operations for Vanity Fair magazine. The group — which adopts the label “conservatarian,” a popular buzzword for the ideological coalition between conservatives and libertarians — was born in 2013 in the aftermath of the failed Republican attempt to regain control of the White House....

"For most of Lincoln Lab’s existence, the group has relied upon financial backing and support from the orbit of activist groups that are part of Charles and David Koch’s donor network. Last weekend’s conference was sponsored by an array of groups from the Koch network: Generation Opportunity, its youth outreach group; the Libre Initiative, its Hispanic organization; Americans for Prosperity, its lead political advocacy arm; and i360, which collects data on behalf of the Koch network. Microsoft, Google, and Stampede, a political consulting firm that provides campaign services to conservative candidates, also served as sponsors for the event.

"With Generation Opportunity doing most of the financial legwork, the Koch network has invested in Lincoln Labs hackathons around the country, holding similar, yet smaller, gatherings in California, Seattle, Chicago and Miami."

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/catching-up-to-democrats-online--one-hack-at-a-time-125724049.html

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Monday, July 21, 2014

Rand Paul keynote speaker at Reboot conference

Silicon Valley’s Libertarian revolution - Darren Samuelsohn - POLITICO.com:

July 20, 2014 - "Libertarian and conservative technology types huddled this weekend on Nancy Pelosi’s home turf making big promises about what they can do to help Republicans win more elections....

"Gathering in the swank W hotel, a confab of wealthy start-up founders, college engineering students, long-shot local GOP candidates and self-described political geeks professed their mutual disdain for heavy-handed government and declared allegiance to a Rand Paul-style of governing....

"Paul himself was in the house, delivering a 24-minute keynote that drew comparisons between Ayn Rand and irrational Washington behavior and also slammed President Barack Obama for advancing regulations and surveillance policies that Paul said are out of whack with what Silicon Valley is all about

"'I come out here and people say, ‘We loved President Obama. We’re all for President Obama. We’re from the tech community,' Paul said to a standing room only crowd of several hundred attending the Lincoln Labs conference. 'Why? Why would you be? He’s not for innovation. He’s not for freedom. He’s for the protectionism crowd. He’s for the crowd that would limit the activities of these companies.'

"Paul’s push into the Bay Area’s Democratic stronghold has a clear motive – drawing money from the region’s recently rich and tapping into some of the same engineering talent that Obama used to great effect in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns. Interviews here with more than two dozen conference attendees suggested the prospective GOP 2016 presidential candidate has made some conversions."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/07/silicon-valley-libertarian-revolution-109143.html
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Friday, April 25, 2014

Rand Paul courting wealthy libertarians for possible 2016 run

Rand Paul and Wealthy Libertarians Connect as He Weighs Running - NYTimes.com - Nicholas Confessore:

April 24, 2014 - "As he has risen in prominence as a Republican presidential contender, Mr. Paul is avidly courting a small but influential cluster of wealthy libertarians.... A tight-knit tribe of philanthropists and entrepreneurs, they have exerted enormous intellectual influence on conservative policy. But they have historically spent more on nonprofit groups and endowing college economics departments than they have on backing candidates."

"Now Mr. Paul is seeking to nudge them into the comparatively messier world of presidential campaigning.

"He has recruited libertarian-leaning financiers and money managers from across the country, including Kenneth M. Garschina, founder of a $5.4 billion New York hedge fund and a contributor to The Review of Austrian Economics, and Donald G. Smith, an investor and board member of the Cato Institute, a libertarian research organization based in Washington. Mr. Paul’s nascent finance team includes Joe Lonsdale, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist who helped start an organization [the Seasteading Institute] dedicated to building new sovereign cities on floating ocean platforms.

"In January, Mr. Paul was the star attraction at a fund-raiser for the Goldwater Institute, a libertarian foundation and legal watchdog based in Phoenix.... In February, at the Club for Growth meeting, held at the Breakers resort in Florida, Mr. Paul pitched a roomful of small-government true believers on the importance of reducing prison sentences for drug offenses."

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/25/us/politics/paul-and-wealthy-libertarians-connect-as-he-weighs-running.html?hpw&rref=politics
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Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Rand Paul hopes Silicon Valley can embrace libertarian Republicanism

Libertarian Senator Rand Paul Hopes Silicon Valley Can Love Some Republicans | TechCrunch - Gregory Ferenstein:

May 31, 2013 -  "'My general impressions of Silicon Valley and California, in general, is that Libertarian-style Republicans would do better out here, and that Bush Republicans haven’t been doing well out here in a long time,' the Senate’s uber-Libertarian, Rand Paul tells me, during his check-cashing good-will tour to Silicon Valley.

"Republicans desperately want better relations with Silicon Valley’s big-pocketed donors and top-tier programmers; the Senator’s solution is to show them that they can, in fact, love the small-government strain of conservatism....

"In fairness to Paul, I’ve been outspoken about dispelling the myth of the luddite Republican: in the House of Representatives, conservatives are more savvy on social media, trailblazers in open government, and designed the most innovative tools in online direct participation.

"Moreover, I think we can be sympathetic to Paul’s position of having to both appeal to the liberal bastion of San Francisco without alienating his base. As far as small-goverment conservatives eyeing the presidency go, Paul is as [geninuely] libertarian as one can be and still be a viable candidate.

Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/31/senator-pauls-tech-tour-to-argue-most-republicans-live-in-this-century/
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Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Rand Paul coming to Silicon Valley this week

Rand Paul coming to Silicon Valley for a libertarian lovefest | Politics Blog | an SFGate.com blog - Joe Garofoli:

May 28, 2013 - "There’s a huge libertarian vein running through Silicon Valley and Sen. Rand Paul ... is heading to the Valley this week for stops Thursday at Facebook and Friday at eBay.....

"On Friday, he’ll deliver the Reagan Forum address at a sold-out event at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library. He’ll be signing copies of his book released last September entitled Government Bullies: How Everyday Americans are Being Harassed, Abused, and Imprisoned by the Feds....

"Paul is also scheduled ... at the conservative Hoover Institution think-tank in lovely Palo Alto."

Read more: http://blog.sfgate.com/nov05election/2013/05/28/rand-paul-coming-to-silicon-valley-for-a-libertarian-lovefest/
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