Gov Dayton

[FM_Mike]

Has anyone else noticed that GOP candidates avoided using legalized marijuana and gay marriage as a wedge issue in the mid-term elections?

Election 2014: The State of Libertarian Ideas and Prospects for the Next Congress - A Special Online Event

http://www.cato.org/events/election-2014-state-libertarian-ideas-prospects-next-congress

I hope you don't equate that to their position on those issues have changed and it is some Libertarian accomplishment.

Mike

[Duffman]

[swamptiger]

Quote:

I hope you don't equate that to their position on those issues have changed and it is some Libertarian accomplishment.

What's your explanation?

[delcecchi]

What's your explanation?

There is a difference between libertarian ideas and the Libertarian Party wacko candidates?

[FM_Mike]

What's your explanation?

This election IMO, was about one thing, maybe two things, Number one was taking control of the Senate and replacing Harry Reid. Number two was to repudiate what Obama was been doing while in office. (Long list there, so pick your item)

You can't really believe that magically the Republican party has given up on Gay Marriage and Pot.

Just because they weren't at the forefront of this election doesn't mean they are not issues that concern the voters, just not this election, and hopefully not in future elections to point they have in the past. Bigger fish to fry as they say.

IMO, the Libertarians had more support from the Progressives on those issues than they'll ever have from the Republican base. So, if I look at those issues that you sighted, I would say that those supportive policies have done more raise support from the Progressives.

Definitely not a wedge issue for me or most Republicans I know.

Mike

[bobbymalone]

You can't really believe that magically the Republican party has given up on Gay Marriage and Pot.

They are going to have to sooner or later. Everyday more and more of the people that give a big rip about those issues die from old age.

And as far as gay marriage goes, it's clear that the conservative idea on gay marriage won't stand up in court. So that's fun and all to attract voters, but it's a huge waste of time. Give it up.

[FM_Mike]

So that's fun and all to attract voters, but it's a huge waste of time. Give it up.

[bobbymalone]

Maybe like the war on woman that the Liberals use.

Actually, no not at all like that. That doesn't even make any sense. You're just interjecting some sort of talking point.

[swamptiger]

On gay marriage and legalizing marijuana, the social conservatives haven't changed their beliefs, but it's quite clear that they lost, and are no longer in the majority.

[FM_Mike]

Actually, no not at all like that. That doesn't even make any sense. You're just interjecting some sort of talking point.

[Big Dave2]

No talking points here,

Now that's funny right there, I don't care who you are!

[Big Dave2]

Huh. Funny how the trend line turned upwards when the Tea Party came along... Coincidence, I'm sure.

Ride them coattails, Libertarians.

LOL.

Where'd the tea party come from again? Are you going to make me post it for a 3rd time?

[Big Dave2]

I'd be happy to see a migration by the GOP to some of the less extreme views held by the LP, or toward compromise versions of those more extreme positions. I think this is the only way we're going to see more liberty at the federal level. There's no way the LP will get the votes needed, with their extreme and black/white viewpoint on every topic -- e.g. "You can't just legalize MJ, you have to legalize any substance" type mentality.

I guess the alternative is that the LP migrates to a more moderate position on some of the extreme stances, so that folks will actually vote for them. But, that is probably less likely to happen, IMHO -- as illustrated by things like the "98% of the voters are wrong" post we saw earlier.

If it's a moderate position you want, keep voting for the Republicans and keep getting what you have been.

[Big Dave2]

They will also have to lose the crypto-racist "For voluntary dealings among private entities, parties should be free to choose with whom they trade and set whatever trade terms are mutually agreeable."

So you're against freedom. Duly noted.

[minky]

Dave your not so bad, just misunderstood!

[LMITOUT]

Where'd the tea party come from again? Are you going to make me post it for a 3rd time?

I can explain it for you, but I can't comprehend it for you.

Figure it out.

[Big Dave2]

Where'd the tea party come from again? Are you going to make me post it for a 3rd time?

[delcecchi]

Gee Dave, you have to go to the end of the article to find the truth. Ron Paul had little to do with it. It was Rick Santelli's viral rant on CNBC.

Quote:

On February 19, 2009,[116] in a broadcast from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, CNBC Business News editor Rick Santelli criticized the government plan to refinance mortgages, which had just been announced the day before. He said that those plans were "promoting bad behavior"[117] by "subsidizing losers' mortgages". He suggested holding a tea party for traders to gather and dump the derivatives in the Chicago River on July 1.[118][119][120] A number of the floor traders around him cheered on his proposal, to the amusement of the hosts in the studio. Santelli's "rant" became a viral video after being featured on the Drudge Report.[121]

Overnight, websites such as ChicagoTeaParty.com (registered in August 2008 by Chicagoan Zack Christenson, radio producer for conservative talk show host Milt Rosenberg) were live within 12 hours.[122] About 10 hours after Santelli's remarks, reTeaParty.com was bought to coordinate Tea Parties scheduled for Independence Day and, as of March 4, was reported to be receiving 11,000 visitors a day.[122]

According to The New Yorker writer Ben McGrath[116] and New York Times reporter Kate Zernike,[106] this is where the movement was first inspired to coalesce under the collective banner of "Tea Party". By the next day, guests on Fox News had already begun to mention this new "Tea Party".[123]

[Bureaucrat]

I didn't sign up for either of those reasons. But I still signed up. Also, there are moderate libertarians out there, of which I are one. You can have a libertarian lean by seeking less intervention, and still be uncomfortable with the idea of walmart selling crystal meth in the checkout lane.

[LMITOUT]

Gee Dave, you have to go to the end of the article to find the truth. Ron Paul had little to do with it. It was Rick Santelli's viral rant on CNBC.

Don't even bother.

Like I said before, they're so desperate for attention they'll grab onto anything in an attempt to show they are relevant...but it ain't working.

Meanwhile, in a matter of years the Tea Party has endorsed candidates (who were subsequently elected to office) and the Libertarian "party" soldiers on with their decades-old floundering ways while getting no where.

[LMITOUT]

Also, there are moderate libertarians out there, of which I are one. You can have a libertarian lean by seeking less intervention, and still be uncomfortable with the idea of walmart selling crystal meth in the checkout lane.

It would be nice if they were the ones leading the party.

[swamptiger]

The Kremlin was good at revisionist history too...

[swamptiger]

The Tea Party started out as a grassroots movement in the Ron Paul campaign and was later hijacked by the GOP establishment.

They realized their power was in jeopardy, and "jumped the shark", so to speak.

[delcecchi]

The Tea Party started out as a grassroots movement in the Ron Paul campaign and was later hijacked by the GOP establishment.

They realized their power was in jeopardy, and "jumped the shark", so to speak.

except nobody ever heard of the the Tea Party Movement, and they had no significant rallies or demonstrations until after the Santelli Rant.

And don't forget that even Saint Ron of Paul was a Republican.

[swamptiger]

Quote:

except nobody ever heard of the the Tea Party Movement, and they had no significant rallies or demonstrations until after the Santelli Rant.

Anyone involved in the GOP was well aware of it, and that's why the leadership decided to spend a lot of money to get Glenn Beck and others in the media involved to co-opt the movement before it gathered too much steam.

How do you think the Santelli rant and the "significant rallies and demonstrations" organized by Beck and others got on national television? They don't televise things like that for free.

The large rallies Ron Paul supporters organized barely made the local news - and certainly not because of a lack of attendance.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=995_1323880920

[swamptiger]

Quote:

And don't forget that even Saint Ron of Paul was a Republican.

Yes, a libertarian Republican, sometimes referred to as the Godfather of the Tea Party...

[delcecchi]

Anyone involved in the GOP was well aware of it, and that's why the leadership decided to spend a lot of money to get Glenn Beck and others in the media involved to co-opt the movement before it gathered too much steam.

How do you think the Santelli rant and the "significant rallies and demonstrations" got on national television? They don't televise things like that for free.

The large rallies Ron Paul supporters organized barely made the local news - and certainly not because of a lack of attendance.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=995_1323880920

The Santelli rant was live on CNBC, where he appears several times a day from the CME with comments about the bond market and occasional editorial comments related to monetary matters. It then went viral on youtube.

[swamptiger]

Yeah, then several "not so libertarian" Republicans decided to jump on the bandwagon about the same time.

But the Tea Party concept originated with the Ron Paul campaign a couple of years earlier.

No question about it.

[swamptiger]

The Santelli rant was alleged by Playboy magazine to be planned and orchestrated in advance. I don't know if this is true, or if Playboy was just out to get some attention.

It turns out that there may be more to the story then originally met the eye, according to (yes, really) Playboy magazine.

Excerpt:

“How did a minor-league TV figure, whose contract with CNBC is due this summer, get so quickly launched into a nationwide rightwing blog sensation? Why were there so many sites and organizations online and live within minutes or hours after his rant, leading to a nationwide protest just a week after his rant?

What hasn’t been reported until now is evidence linking Santelli’s “tea party” rant with some very familiar names in the Republican rightwing machine, from PR operatives who specialize in imitation-grassroots PR campaigns (called “astroturfing”) to bigwig politicians and notorious billionaire funders. As veteran Russia reporters, both of us spent years watching the Kremlin use fake grassroots movements to influence and control the political landscape. To us, the uncanny speed and direction the movement took and the players involved in promoting it had a strangely forced quality to it. If it seemed scripted, that’s because it was.

What we discovered is that Santelli’s “rant” was not at all spontaneous as his alleged fans claim, but rather it was a carefully-planned trigger for the anti-Obama campaign. In PR terms, his February 19th call for a “Chicago Tea Party” was the launch event of a carefully organized and sophisticated PR campaign, one in which Santelli served as a frontman, using the CNBC airwaves for publicity, for the some of the craziest and sleaziest rightwing oligarch clans this country has ever produced. Namely, the Koch family, the multibilllionaire owners of the largest private corporation in America, and funders of scores of rightwing thinktanks and advocacy groups, from the Cato Institute and Reason Magazine to FreedomWorks. The scion of the Koch family, Fred Koch, was a co-founder of the notorious extremist-rightwing John Birch Society.”

What is Playboy’s evidence of this?

“Within hours of Santelli’s rant, a HSOforum called ChicagoTeaParty.com sprang to life. Essentially inactive until that day, it now featured a YouTube video of Santelli’s “tea party” rant and billed itself as the official home of the Chicago Tea Party. The domain was registered in August, 2008 by Zack Christenson, a dweeby Twitter Republican and producer for a popular Chicago rightwing radio host Milt Rosenberg—a familiar name to Obama campaign people. Last August, Rosenberg, who looks like Martin Short’s Irving Cohen character, caused an outcry when he interviewed Stanley Kurtz, the conservative writer who first “exposed” a personal link between Obama and former Weather Undergound leader Bill Ayers. As a result of Rosenberg’s radio interview, the Ayers story was given a major push through the Republican media echo chamber, culminating in Sarah Palin’s accusation that Obama was “palling around with terrorists.” That Rosenberg’s producer owns the “chicagoteaparty.com” site is already weird—but what’s even stranger is that he first bought the domain last August, right around the time of Rosenburg’s launch of the “Obama is a terrorist” campaign. It’s as if they held this “Chicago tea party” campaign in reserve, like a sleeper-site. Which is exactly what it was.

[delcecchi]

I bet there was little commonality of membership between the post-Santelli Tea Party and the Ron Paul version.