You probably heard that Trump got booed and heckled at a Libertarian Convention yesterday. Before you get the impression that Libertarians suddenly grew some sense, let’s look at why they booed and heckled Trump.
Libertarians, who believe in limited government and individual freedom, blame Trump, a Republican, for rushing through the creation of a COVID-19 vaccine when he was president and for not doing more to stop public health restrictions on the unvaccinated during the pandemic.
Other than that, they’re fine with a neo-fascist who wants to make himself dictator-for-life and unaccountable to the law. So Libertarians are still, basically, arrested adolescents who don’t want to be told to eat their vegetables. Most of them, anyway, although the more extreme Libertarians are just fascists in denial about fascism.
RFK Jr. got a better reception from the Libertarians, I take it —
Addressing a few hundred delegates, Kennedy accused Trump of allowing the government to abuse individual liberty during the pandemic. He said: “I think he had the right instinct when he came into office. He was initially very reluctant to impose lockdowns, but then he got rolled by his bureaucrats. He caved in and many of our most fundamental rights disappeared practically overnight.”
Kennedy earned further applause when he asserted: “All of our constitutional rights were ploughed under. They closed all the churches but they kept open the Walmarts and the liquor stores.”
President Biden sensibly declined the Libertarian invitation to speak at their convention. From the Maha Archives: Libertarians Are the Enemy.
In the Truth Social Universe, Trump’s Libertarian address was a triumph. From Rolling Stone:
Although he received a less than friendly reception from Libertarians, you’d never know from Trump’s posts on Truth Social about the night. Trump reposted a video from GOP Rep. Mike Lee where Lee said, “Trump knocked it out of the park tonight at the #LibertarianConvention. Well done, sir!”
Trump posted at midnight after his address, “Everyone here tonight believes that we must fight for the same fundamental freedoms: Freedom of Expression. Freedom of Religion. Freedom to own a Firearm. Freedom from over-Taxation. Freedom from over-Regulation. Freedom from government Discrimination. And we believe that we do not have a FREE COUNTRY if we do not have FREE SPEECH!”
Don’t get me started on the famous Republican hypocrisy on free speech.
In other news: I’m so disgusted with the mess Loose Cannon has made of the Mar-a-Lago ducuments case that I don’t even want to think about it. I am just hanging on to faint hope that the case will be tried some day, even if it’s next year. Or the year after. But you’ve probably heard that Trump has claimed recently that the FBI had planned to assassinate him when they executed the search warrant in August 2022. In spite of the fact that the FBI knew full well Trump was in New York that day. Somebody should explain to Trump that if the FBI really wanted him dead, he would be.
Anyway, Jack Smith has asked Loose to place a gag order on Trump to keep him from talking about assassination. Marcy Wheeler wrote a good post about all this, and I direct you to her place.
Enjoy Memorial Day, everybody.
"So Libertarians are still, basically, arrested adolescents who don’t want to be told to eat their vegetables"
Exactly, I also like the description: "libertarians are just magats who want to smoke weed". Every one I ever met believes all the tea-tard fever swamp Q-nut shit that your typical Stump voter clings to. The only good thing about them though is I tend to think many of them will peel off support for Stump and vote for brain worm dude, which is a good thing for team normal!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOKn33-q4Ao
I'd agree with you, if one of their issues wasn't letting a private company rush a popular product to market, at a time when demand for that product meant it was a license to print money. If this had been a new way for rushing nicotine (or, to be fair, cannibinoids) into the bloodstream, they wouldn't have cared, and would have been furious if there'd been extensive "red tape" in the way.
But they hate him for the vaccine. I mean, that's not even sensible. That's a clear shibboleth, you're supposed to know that vaccine support makes him a bad person, and (this is the really dicey part) assume that makes a kind of sense.
I mean, seriously – how could they hate him for rushing a product to market, when (key point) *he* never put a mandate in place? Hell, he couldn't even give the right orders to get the right logistics to get vaccine delivered to where it was needed – how the hell could he have put a mandate in place? They should be thanking him for slow walking the acceptance of the vaccine, if the vaccine was so bad.
Plus, remember, a lot of people did, in fact, die from Covid-19. So it's howling, barking, mad to see the vaccine as a bad thing. Don't forget that part.
They don't just want freedom; they want power. With Trump, they thought they had a chance at real power, and he failed – or, that's my guess.
I mean, they could all be so stupid that they really do think the vaccine was bad, but, at some point, one must assume one's opponents (some of them, at any rate) are feigning stupidity.
Libertarians are indistinguishable from babies.
Ditto for Trump.
Magic though it was to hear dissent hurled at Trump for a change, it was magical thinking on the part of the Libertarians to attempt to use social pressure on Trump. Not the pot calling the kettle black but more the under socialized calling on the Old Dog to learn a new trick. More magical thinking when Trump argued they could win by voting for him. Libertarians know they chase the car for sport, not to catch it, or it seems that they might know, at least. They do know they do not like authority, and even they can sense Trump's authoritarian stench over the masking smell of his overpriced after shave. Libertarians are experienced at opposition and big on what they consider rugged independence to the point of self-mutilation. Trump is just too bossy.
Neither Trump nor the Libertarians seem capable of finding value in being part of a larger group. It was news to me that they went after the covid vaccine with a vengeance, but not a surprise. I had them as isolationists who abhorred taxation, but it does fit their mold for them not to like the vaccine. Oppose what might benefit the larger society if they want something out of me is the Libertarian way. With Trump it is more – oppose what might benefit the larger society- if it does not personally benefit me. You can see how they almost align but fail to fit politically.
Perhaps the Jury will provide a more correctional level of rejection for Trump. We will see.
I hope everybody had a nice Memorial Day and remembered those who paid the price for our freedoms. It's like they say: All gave some, and some gave all.
For an example of those who gave all, Eric Trump Slammed For ‘Particularly Disgusting’ Memorial Day Weekend Post (msn.com)
What a selfless family! We are so blessed to have them.
The cult of Libertarian thinking has its roots in the books and political philosophy of Ayn Rand. I've read a couple of her books, "Atlas Shrugged" and The Fountainhead" decades ago. I'm a writer, not great and certainly not successful, but I put the effort into trying to write well. Rand is (also) not a great writer. Her characters have no depth and the story is only a vehicle to advance her aversion to anything collective – that is, for the good of society as a whole especially when it's financed by taxes on the rich.
Reading her books had the same kind of benefit for me as (a liberal) as studying the methods of cheating at cards has for an honest gambler. Ayn rand did "cheat" by omitting a rounded and realistic picture of the ultra-rich. In none of her books (that I have read) is a rich person a lazy cad who inherited his wealth from a parent or grandparent who achieved wealth by exploiting a market illegally or unethically.
This provides a clue why Libertarians are so hard to talk to. They belive in a society of wealth according to the contribution of the individual. In the Rand books, it's evil liberals trying to exploit the achievements of the true "builders" of society – the rich. Somehow, bricks lay themselves and steel is welded by magic. Rand expects labor should revere the Gods of Commerce, the ultra-rich, as the source of jobs and all that is good.
There's a huge force of magical thinking behind Libertarianism (as it is taught and used in recruitment) wrapped in the deception that it's all very logical. Their big publication is called "Reason." However economic results usually run counter to the economic predictions of Libertarian philosophy – leading example: cutting taxes does not stimulate economic growth.
But Trump fails in two major areas with the "thinking" Libertarian. First, Trump wants to control and crush his enemies through the power of government. Libertarians see the power of government as evil by itself – and the use of that power for revenge and oppression complete blasphemy. Second, Libertarians sincerely believe in the freedom of the individual. Striking down Roe to turn state governments lose on women made Trump no Libertarian friends. Threatening to bring troops into blue cities to use force against protesters is an obscenity to them. Much as the average Libertarian dislikes the mandatory aspect of the vaccine, taking it is an individual choice. Likewise birth control. Ditto access to books.
Some Libertarians will like Trump, but he's never going to feel welcome with them at any convention where access by the rank-and file is allowed.
Jack Smith recently filed a motion for a gag order of Trump, after TFG pushed the lie that the FBI came after him with deadly force, when they "raided" Mar a Lago. Depending on what Aileen Cannon does with this, it could be the trigger Smith needs to get her kicked off the case.
When Trump is convicted this week, watch the rats start fleeing the ship. The RNC convention (July?) is going to be a civil war. It will spill over into the DNC convention, the following month, as the Rs blame the Ds for their implosion.
Be patient, karma is coming. It's over for the Republicans.
A Libertarian Convention is an oxymoron. They're so incapable of thinking of humans as a collective, that they can't pull together and get anything done.
Libertarians are always making a stink about something or other, but Krugman made a stink about something they seemed to ignore at their convention.
Great piece in the NYT today going with current weather events. Here is a tease