Category Archives: Libertarian

RICHMOND, Va. -- Ten months ago, Princess Blanding launched a campaign for governor and a new political party in Virginia. Her name appears on Virginia ballots with fall, as the newly formed Liberation Party tries to make waves where no other third party has in recent Virginia history.

Blanding said her political efforts extend well beyond ten months, though. In fact, she easily quotes the exact date.

My spark started on May 14, 2018."

It was the day Blandings brother, Marcus-David Peters, was shot and killed by a Richmond Police Officer while experiencing a mental health crisis. The shooting was later ruled justified by the Richmond Commonwealths Attorney's office.

Since my brothers murder, myself, family members, and a continuously growing supporter base here in Richmond and beyond, have begged our local officials that we cant bring Marcus back, but we can at least enact legislation that prioritizes community care and safety, she said.

Blanding points to the legislation that bears her brothers name as an example of her frustration with the two-party political system.

Signed by Virginia Governor Ralph Northam in 2020, the Marcus Alert bill launched a system to ensure behavioral health experts are involved in responding to individuals in crisis, including by limiting the role of law enforcement.

Blanding and other activists said the bill was a watered-down version of the original, but said it is only one example.

What were dealing with is politicians who are delivering nothing but crumbs. Theyre making symbolic gestures, such as removing the Robert E. Lee monument, while we still have people with nowhere to lay their head, she said. After the unjust murder of George Floyd, I kept saying, its time for the rise of a strong, independent party and we must expand our fight from the streets to seats of the key legislative positions. But, in all honesty, I didnt think I was going to be doing that.

Blanding and other activists launched the Liberation Party of Virginia. On ballots across the state, the abbreviation LP appears next to her name. The Libertarian Party, a completely separate party with no statewide candidate in 2021, goes by the abbreviation L on ballots.

The Liberation Party is here to do just that. To ensure that Liberation is a human right, not a privilege, for all Virginians, Blanding said. When we say that, we mean ensuring housing security, food sovereignty, Medicare for all. What were fighting for is bare-bones equity and humanity.

Third-party candidates have not fared well in statewide races in recent political history in Virginia.

In 2013, Libertarian gubernatorial candidate Robert Sarvis secured the highest percentage of the statewide vote by a third party candidate in more than 50 years; his 6.5% of votes more than tripled any other third party candidate for Governor.

Blanding knows those numbers but also points out this data point: it has been decades since more than 50% of registered voters in Virginia participated in a gubernatorial election. She argues her campaign speaks directly to those voters who feel left out by the two major parties.

They feel that nobody is listening and that nobody cares. So it is a breath of fresh air when they see there is a candidate who is fighting for all of us, for all working class, for all marginalized community members, for all the oppressed people, Blanding said.

Blanding said they expect to win the governors race, but no matter the outcome, they plan to continue efforts to grow the Liberation Party and run candidates in further state and local elections.

You can read more about the Blanding campaign and the Liberation Party here. You can watch her live interview with Bill Fitzgerald on CBS 6 at 7 p.m.

Read more:

Why Princess Blanding launched the Liberation Party in Virginia - wtvr.com

There are nine other people in the room when Campbell Newman comes up to say a few words. The most conspicuous figure in Queensland politics in a generation is standing in an office building in Woolloongabba, selling his comeback to a special meeting of the tiny Liberal Democratic party.

The partys president and founder, John Humphreys, first talks about Thomas Hobbes and FM Hayek and the idea of individual freedom in a world of Covid lockdowns and closed borders.

Humphreys introduces his latest star recruit, the former army captain Newman, who some think has the profile in Queensland to catapult the niche political party to national relevance.

One small problem remains Newmans reputation as a fighter of illiberal governments is, frankly, complicated.

You had me as a party member until you signed up this arse clown, one LDP supporter wrote on the partys Facebook page this month.

Another said: NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.

That fascist arsehole should never ever be near a position of power ever again.

In 2012 Newman became Queensland premier despite not holding a seat until the election, leading the Liberal National party to the largest parliamentary majority in Australian history.

Three years later his government was turfed from office and the premier lost his seat; accused by the former president of the Queensland Council of Civil Liberties, Terry OGorman, of passing obscene, draconian and extremist anti-association laws that targeted bikie gangs. Humphreys says he rode a motorbike at a public protest against the measures.

Newman quit the LNP this year and, courted by Humphreys, is now running as the LDPs lead candidate for the federal Senate.

Im actually in the right party now, Newman says from his office, which is cluttered with mementoes from a lifetime in a different one. Theres a Young LNP life membership plaque on a shelf. The walls are covered in framed newspapers from 2012.

Newman a formidable political fundraiser and the son of two federal ministers is pitching himself as an anti-establishment candidate.

He jumps up from his seat, grabs a red marker pen and draws a rough map of Queensland on a whiteboard, then a 5km circle around the Brisbane GPO.

Thats where the wealthiest, the most well-educated, the leaders of business, the judges, the magistrates, the chiefs in the media and all the bosses and all the smart people live. The intelligentsia, Newman says.

(He doesnt mention it, but Newman lives and works inside that circle, too.)

The trouble is they control the narrative and no disrespect to your good publication they are more likely to be your readers and like what you talk about. Theyre not the target and they shouldnt be the target for the LNP either. [Outside that circle] those are people that I like and I can relate to. I share those concerns about the economy and jobs and the future of our kids.

If I get to Canberra I just want to hold the political class to account, because they need to be.

For consecutive Queensland elections, Labor has campaigned almost as if it were still running against Newman. Six years on, his face still features on attack advertisements about his governments public sector job cuts and asset sales.

The LNPs focus groups must tell them the same thing. Opposition leaders since 2015 have distanced themselves from Newman.

There is a view among party members that the Icarus narrative from the Newman years a tale of hubris and an electoral reckoning has created an environment where his successors are no longer able to make the case for fiscal restraint; and are not confident to offer anything but insipid criticism of Annastacia Palaszczuks government.

Newman has become a pariah of the battle for the political centre. A pantomime villain.

But being a pantomime villain hasnt harmed Pauline Hansons political career, says Graham Young, a pollster and executive director of the Australian Institute of Progress, a libertarian thinktank. Newman is a director of the AIP.

We did some polling immediately after the [2015] election, Young says. We found enough people in that sample that said [of Newman], I meant to give him a kick, but I didnt mean to kick him out.

When youre running for premier, youre running for 50% plus one, when youre running for the Senate, youre running for a quota. I know people who are going to vote for him who would be stalwarts of the Liberal party.

Newmans campaign for redemption has emerged from a coronavirus pandemic in which, with some arguments about the detail, mainstream political figures have mostly supported the need for public health restrictions and large-scale economic stimulus.

Some commentators, including Paul Kelly in the Australian and the Queensland political analyst Paul Williams, writing in the Courier-Mail, have dismissed the anti-lockdown movement as an absurdity on the rightwing fringe.

There is plenty of competition for that space in Queensland politics but the LDP clearly senses an opportunity. Humphreys has also recruited John Ruddick, a former prominent member of the Liberal party, to head the LDP Senate ticket in New South Wales. He says he has been searching for other high-profile candidates.

The economist (who taught the Nationals senator Matt Canavan at the University of Queensland) says the LDP is a party of principle one formed around classical liberal ideas about small government and individual freedoms rather than personalities or political expediency.

Lockdowns, he says, have presented the party with an issue where its ideology appeals to a potential bloc of disaffected votes. And, particularly since leaving the LNP, Newman has been beating the freedom drum harder than most.

[Newman] fits that quite small overlap in the Venn diagram of politicians with a high profile, and politicians who are libertarian enough to be in our party, Humphreys says. The fact he balanced the budget by cutting spending and not raising tax is quite rare. He was liked for that.

Some members have resigned in protest but overall the past few months have seen the strongest growth in membership in our partys history.

On net its clearly been a positive, Humphreys says.

I think its truly amazing that Campbell Newman is running as a libertarian, says Michael Cope, the president of the Queensland Council of Civil Liberties.

He passed the most extreme legislation that was introduced in Queensland in my lifetime. From our point of view, he was Joh Bjelke-Petersen 2.0. He behaved like a classic Queensland authoritarian.

Newman still defends the most extreme of those measures, the controversial anti-association Vlad legislation introduced after a brawl on the Gold Coast involving bikie gang members.

Thats probably the major one where some people in the Liberal Democrats would have been concerned about, Newman says, when asked about the apparent contradiction.

What I say is that it was something that had to be done in the time, in specific circumstances. It didnt happen because I decided one morning to go after bikies. It happened because bikies rioted.

Newmans government scrapped same-sex civil unions. He says the move was democracy and didnt reflect his personal position; that he had backed gay marriage publicly on national TV prior to Penny Wong.

I got into a lot of trouble over saying that. I think for a moment [the LNP] thought theyve got the wrong guy here.

Newman points to other policies opposition to lockouts in the Fortitude Valley nightclub district and removing a statewide mandate for local councils to put fluoride in the water supply as evidence of his liberal credentials. He has also spoken in favour of drug legalisation.

The former premier had been on the outer with the LNP for some time but a final straw came when the former president, Cynthia Hardy, attempted to install him as a party trustee a position that would tap into his fundraising network. He was appointed but the nomination was opposed by many, including the federal defence minister, Peter Dutton.

What theyve done is run away from their own record and where they are now is theyre in a deep dark hole because they dont stand for anything, Newman says of the LNP. He is ready for the interview with a printout of the Courier-Mails 2015 election editorial endorsing his government, which sacked 14,000 public servants and sold state assets.

The things we did when we were in government were all policy. So the people who were there they were their decisions as well. Contrary to the narrative theyd like to have, it was very democratic. The asset sales or asset leasing stuff was something I was very lukewarm about.

I think that its the case that the people who Im trying to attract will be LNP voters first and foremost, theres no doubt about that. Theres many who are really upset with the LNP and the Liberal party, theyre upset with Scott Morrison theyre still disappointed and concerned with where [Queensland leader] David Crisafulli is going.

On Morrison, Newman says: Ive gone from being a strong supporter 18 months ago, and I thought he got a rough trot during the bushfires, to a point where I honestly would really have no time for him whatsoever.

Newman is standing in his office, having a conversation with himself.

You can ask me anything what would you like to know? a recording of the former premiers voice says, through a smart speaker.

Do you have a dog? the real Newman asks aloud.

We have a two-year-old female dog named Sassy! he responds from the speaker. At that moment, Sassy herself is under the table, quietly nibbling at my shoelaces, before shes told off.

The speaker trick is a gimmick being prepared for the campaign; there are still a few bugs to be ironed out, he says.

At first the notion there are two Campbell Newmans in the room feels awkward. Then Newmans recorded voice announces that he doesnt do drugs but that I sure as hell like a drink! and the sentient version gestures wildly to a stocked liquor cabinet in the corner. Its clear the two Newmans are a double act; one that underscores his own set of contradictions.

Newman takes me through his garage to show off his Tesla battery. Upstairs in the office where he runs a capital investment fund, he has a binder full of decades-old articles about climate change, which he flips through to argue that past predictions have been wrong.

An LNP politician one who likes Newman says he believes his Liberal Democrats venture will come apart sooner or later.

The problem for any political party that builds its popularity on the back of a candidates personality or a leaders personality is that it becomes hostage to that personality, the LNP figure says.

That was the case when he led the LNP. With the greatest respect to the Lib Dems, Campbell Newmans brand and all of his baggage in this state is always going to be much, much bigger than that party.

Newman stops me as Im about to leave his office. He opens an audio file on his computer, cranks the volume to 72 and plays his new campaign advertising jingle, a Slim Dusty-style ramble about freedom and the Australian way.

Hi, Im Campbell Newman his voice comes from the speaker, partway through the song, as the real Newman sinks down in his office chair, puts his hands behind his head and nods along in agreement.

Excerpt from:

What Campbell Newman did next: the making of an unlikely Queensland libertarian - The Guardian Australia

Remington/MOScout Poll: GOP Fav/UnFav

Survey conducted September 28 through September 29, 2021. 822 likely 2022 Republican Primary voters participated in the survey. Survey weighted to match expected turnout demographics for the 2022 Republican Primary Election. Margin of Error is +/-3.2% with a 95% level of confidence. Totals do not always equal 100% due to rounding. Survey conducted by Remington Research Group on behalf of Missouri Scout. Find the full poll here.

Q1: What is your opinion of Mike Parson?

Favorable: 61%

Unfavorable: 20%

No opinion: 19%

Q2: What is your opinion of Mitch McConnell?

Favorable: 31%

Unfavorable: 37%

No opinion: 32%

Q3: What is your opinion of Donald Trump?

Favorable: 83%

Unfavorable: 14%

No opinion: 3%

Q4: What is your opinion of Eric Greitens?

Favorable: 34%

Unfavorable: 40%

No opinion: 26%

Q5: What is your opinion of Missouri Fraternal Order of Police?

Favorable: 60%

Unfavorable: 9%

No opinion: 31%

Q6: What is your opinion of Missouri State Council of Fire Fighters?

Favorable: 62%

Unfavorable: 7%

No opinion: 31%

TYPE OF GOP: Thinking about the various types of voters within the Republican party, which type of voter do you consider yourself to be? Traditional, Evangelical, a Trump Republican, Libertarian, or something else?

Traditional: 18%

Evangelical: 15%

Trump: 46%

Libertarian: 4%

Something else: 17%

MOScouts Hallway Index: Whos Going Places?

I asked lobbyists, which senator is most likely to be in higher office in January 2023? 29 replies

1. Eric Burlison 17.2%

2. Mike Moon 13.8%

3. Bob Onder 6.9%

4. Caleb Rowden 34.5%

5. Dave Schatz 0%

6. Brian Williams 13.8%

7. Someone else 13.8%

Sample of Comments

Try to get the right of Moon. To say nothing of the grass roots organization he will be able to deploy.

It was a tough call between Rowden and Burlison. I think they are both favorites in their seats.

Least amount of moving parts for Onder.

Eigel for second floor office.

Burlison has the conservative credentials and has proven to raise money. He can tout SAPA and Right to Work as key priorities he has championed in the legislature.

At the end of the day this game of musical chairs will sort itself out with the likely outcome being none of the above. Politicians tend to look in the mirror and see a statesman or who they want to be as opposed to who they really are. This causes them to overestimate their importance and command of the electorate. Ask every former Speakers who ran for state-wide office believing average Missourians knew who they were or even cared.

Rick Brattin

[Burlison] fits the make up of the 7th as good as anyone.

Bob Onder is pretty unstoppable in any primary, but is St. Charles Executive a "higher office?"

[Rowdens] the most politically adroit and will find a way to draw himself the best possible district.

Williams if he primaries Bush.

Parson To Toss First Pitch

As we near the end of the Cardinals regular season, Governor Mike Parson will throw out the first pitch at tonights game against the Cubs.

Who Won the Week?

Caleb Rowden Expectations are that hell be announcing his congressional bid soon, and Ryan Johnsons exit from the race weakens.

Tracy Henke Former Blunt staffer joins Greater St. Louis as their new Chief Policy Officer.

Dustin Backes Starts his own firm, Capital City Insights, and starts signing up clients.

Bob Onder Begins to make his move on Steve Ehlmann.

Medicaid Expansion advocates Its been a long journey with plenty of twists and setbacks, but enrollment finally started.

Daryl Duwe The veteran politico and long-time lobbyist is set to retire and go golf off into the sunset.

Find a downloadable version here.

$5K+ Contributions

Missouri Democratic State Committee - $5,900 from Antonia Grilikhes-Lasky.

American Dream PAC (pro-Kehoe) - $10,000 from Ameren Missouri.

American Dream PAC - $10,000 from Ameren Missouri.

Missouri Gaming PAC - $33,810 from Penn National Gaming Inc.

Missouri United (pro-Plocher) - $18,000 from Penn National Gaming Inc.

Missouri United - $12,500 from Charter Communication PAC.

Missouri American Water Company Employees Political Action Committee - $10,000 from Loellke Plumbing, Inc.

Birthdays

Happy birthdays to Sen. Eric Burlison, Reps. Jamie Burger and Jeff Knight, Tim Remole, and David Zevan.

Sunday: Sen. John Rizzo, Zora Mulligan, Josh Foster, and Maria Chappelle-Nadal.

Go here to read the rest:

MOScout Weekender: GOP Fav/UnFavs - Hallway on Most Likely to Succeed - Parson to Toss 1st Pitch - WWTW and more... Missouri Scout - Moscout

For almost 50 years, the Koch brothers have been the bte noir of the left. Their influence over conservative politics and policies has been significant, even if not to the levels they are given credit for by their opponents. But the Koch family, as a political brand, are aging out. One brother is gone, and the other seems more interested in philanthropy than in Trumpism. But there is a new kid on that block to fill the void: tech billionaire Peter Thiel

In this weeks WhoWhatWhy podcast, we talk with Bloomberg editor, reporter, and Thiel biographer Max Chafkin. He explains that from Thiels time at Stanford, as the creator of an early alt-right publication, to his mentoring of Mark Zuckerberg in the techniques of disruption and libertarianism, to his support for Donald Trump, he has been setting the stage for his own rise as a political Midas.

One of the first Silicon Valley executives to support Trump, he was the leader, years ago, of what has been called the PayPal Mafia: a group of his Silicon Valley disciples who have tentacles into everything from MAGA to Facebook, from Tesla to LinkedIn to dozens of other technology companies.

Chafkin draws a Venn diagram in which Thiel is linked with vast wealth, Silicon Valley power brokers, and a growing right-wing ecosystem.

According to Chafkin, Thiel found Trump appealing not only for his political views, but also because his anti-establishment attitude was right in line with how Thiel sees the world.

The man who took down Gawker and drove both the publication and its owner into bankruptcy is picking up where the Kochs left off. Except that Thiel is even further to the right and a lot meaner in how he does it.

Full Text Transcript:

(As a service to our readers, we provide transcripts with our podcasts. We try to ensure that these transcripts do not include errors. However, due to a constraint of resources, we are not always able to proofread them as closely as we would like and hope that you will excuse any errors that slipped through.)

Jeff Schechtman: Welcome to the WhoWhatWhy podcast. Im your host, Jeff Schechtman. When most of you think about who have been the key players in financing the rise of the right in America, the Koch brothers in their efforts to buoy the right and push all sorts of buttons on the left are front and center. But the fact is that the Koch brothers are aging out. One is gone, the other seems to be unsure of where he currently stands. The Koch family in many ways represented an old-school view of the world, just as their money was from an old industrial model economy, things like paper, plastic, pipelines, and textiles.

So as the Kochs fade away, who will carry the mantle? Who will represent funding for the modern right in the postindustrial economy? More and more the answer to this seems to be Peter Thiel. A legend in Silicon Valley, the man who took down Gawker, and one of the Valleys most important venture capitalists, with tentacles into everything from MAGA to Facebook to the military-industrial complex. Peter Thiel is already shaping elections in 2022 and 2024, even as he continues to move forward in Silicon Valley. But who is Peter Thiel, and why should we care?

The answer lies in the pages of a new book by my guest Max Chafkin entitled The Contrarian. Max Chafkin is a features editor and tech reporter at Bloomberg Businessweek. His work has appeared in Fast Company, Vanity Fair, and The New York Times, and it is my pleasure to welcome Max Chafkin here to the WhoWhatWhy podcast to talk about Peter Thiel, and his new book about Peter Thiel, The Contrarian. Max Chafkin, thanks so much for joining us.

Max Chafkin: Yes, thanks. Thanks for that intro, Jeff.

Jeff: Certainly, Silicon Valley is filled with iconoclasts, a lot of strange people that weve watched come and go over the years. Why is Peter Thiel different? Why should we care?

Max: Well, I think the framing that you just set up, the comparison with the Koch brothers, is a really smart one. Thiel has had this incredible impact on Silicon Valley. If you look around and say how did Silicon Valley go from being an economic sideshow, a curiosity, something that people were interested in, to being the economic focal point for the world? Where the worlds largest and most powerful companies are located. Where the global culture, to an increasing extent, is being created. Where even politically theres an increasing amount of engagement. I think you would say Peter Thiel is one of those guys, along with a very small handful.

Whats really interesting about Thiel, who co-founded the company PayPal, he co-founded Palantir, this surveillance company and military contractor, and was an early investor in Facebook, is that he also created what I think of as the dominant Silicon Valley ideology, and that is the ideology of disruption. Its what says companies, tech companies in particular, tech billionaires, are this privileged class of people that in order to make the future happen should be trying to grow as quickly as they possibly can, scaling their companies with no regard for the consequences, and should be willing to break the rules.

That breaking the rules, disrupting the status quo, isnt just something that happens by accident that youre allowed to get away with. Its something that you actually should do. And so all of those things make him a really interesting figure in the world of tech. But as you said in the intro, hes not just playing in tech. What hes doing is trying to create this new political movement and to play kind of a patron role to the far right; the Trump movement as it were. So he was in 2016 one of the first executive types to come out and support Donald Trump, he was a major donor to Trump, and post-2020 has really emerged as one of the key financial backers of far-right candidates.

Jeff: To your point about disruption and move fast and break things, and well come back to that and talk about Thiel and Zuckerberg, its interesting in reading your book that PayPal at the time and we forget about this was viewed, at least Thiel viewed it, as something akin to the way we view crypto today.

Max: Yes, absolutely. And PayPal in so many ways had this huge influence thats partly a credit to Thiels personality and the force of his ideas, but also to just the impact of this company. So, when Thiel was promoting PayPal in the late 1990s, he was talking about it not just as, Oh, this is going to be a way for you to buy stuff on the internet, which is of course what it is and how people understand it, but this idea of having digital money as a way to free people to get out under the thumb of government. Thiel talked about that this would help destabilize nation-states. That it would be the equivalent of a Swiss bank account in your pocket.

Its like libertarian sort of philosophy that I think now people are really used to hearing about crypto. But it actually began during those PayPal years, and the company never really got there but those ideas were influential. And they continued and Thiel continued to develop them. And the idea is basically just that rich people should have a way to shield their assets and to shield their lives from the regulations as they see it can help overly aggressive regulations of the US government. Which obviously can take you to some very out-there places when you take it to its logical extreme.

Jeff: Talk about PayPal in terms of the PayPal Mafia, the people that were involved with Thiel and that company, and the tentacles that they have today, the influence they have today, in Silicon Valley, and in turn in all of our lives.

Max: The PayPal Mafia, its not literal mafia, but it is this influence network where a bunch of early executives of PayPal, these are mostly people who were close friends of Peter Thiel at Stanford and who were ideologically aligned with him, although there are some exceptions to that, have now proliferated in Silicon Valley, and have invested in each others companies, have moved money around, and also moved talent around. So, its really common for people who work for one PayPal Mafia company to jump to another within this network. Loyalty is a huge thing. Loyalty both to Peter Thiel but also to these companies.

And these people have in general, again, worked together to promote each others interests. And the universe, the number of companies theyve touched, is just enormous. Elon Musk is attached to the PayPal Mafia, even though he and Thiel disagree on a lot of things. Hes the founder of Tesla and SpaceX, Thiels a major investor in SpaceX. Reid Hoffman, close friend of Thiels from Stanford, started LinkedIn. You got the YouTube guys. You have the guys who started Yelp, the rating site. And then you have a bunch of lesser figures who have ended up putting money into pretty much almost every Silicon Valley company that anyones heard of. So Thiel has his hooks in a whole lot.

Jeff: And of course, his hooks are also in Facebook as one of the first outside investors, and also was a longtime mentor to Zuckerberg.

Max: Yes, absolutely. So Thiel was the first outside investor in Facebook. Reid Hoffman is a close friend of his. Another PayPal Mafia member was involved in that, Thiel as well. And Thiel was really the first person, not just the first investor, but really the first person to see promise in Mark Zuckerberg. To realize that this little piddling company started by this guy from Harvard, who had gotten a lot of attention for basically hacking an aspect of the colleges software system, actually had something special. That he was going to be this force of nature. That somebodys going to run a really successful business.

Thiel is the one who sets up Mark Zuckerberg in the role that hes currently in. So, Mark Zuckerberg right now controls Facebook but does not own more than 50 percent of Facebook. But because of the structure that was set in part by Peter Thiel, controls the company. Hes essentially the absolute dictator of this media platform that is bigger than any media company in human history. Three billion users, just an enormous amount of reach and influence. And thats Thiel; thats Thiels work. And then Thiel became this mentor to Mark Zuckerberg, both as a business mentor.

And you can see the PayPal ethos and the Thiel ethos in the way that Facebook expanded, in the way that Facebook was willing to disrupt things and sometimes take a lot of flak for, say, not being careful enough with users data or whatever. And you also see it in the politics of it, which came out much later. But Zuckerberg seems to have absorbed at least some of Thiels libertarian values. And those, I think, we saw coming from Facebook, especially during the 2016 and 2020 election.

Jeff: What seems unique about Thiel? And you talked about this at the outset. About the libertarian streak that certainly has long been part of Silicon Valley. And Thiel to a large extent embodies that, and as you write about, has driven it. But theres also a cultural side to Thiels conservatism that is out of place and different from the Valley. Talk about that.

Max: So, Thiel is a cultural conservative, and somebody who has spent a lot of his career really focused on the problem as he sees it of political correctness. And by that what he means is the extent to which institutions have bent over backwards to cater to the needs and feelings of women and minorities primarily. So, Thiel wrote a book in the mid- 90s called The Diversity Myth, basically railing against Stanfords efforts to be more inclusive. And he has seen political correctness as this scourge. If you were to rank the biggest problems in the world that would be one of them.

And that seems really, as you said, out of step with the values of Northern California and the tech industry, which in general these companies are very inclusive and they include a lot of immigrants. But on the other hand, you can see why that might have happened. So, one thing is Thiel loves these troublemakers and this need to disrupt, and you could see political correctness again as being opposed to that.

And I think it also helps explain why did Peter Thiel back Donald Trump. There were a lot of questions asked in 2016 like, Why does this gay immigrant with two Stanford degrees, whos all about technology, embrace a nativist New Yorker who wears his crassness as a credential, who brags about not using technology, and whos putting forward a reactionary platform? And I think the reason is Trump was one of these people who was willing to say the unsayable.

Thiel has been getting close to and doing so himself, making these statements and promoting these statements that go right up to the line of what is considered racist or sexist, or many times cross that line. And Trump is the same thing. A key part of his appeal was he was the one whos going to stick it to the liberal establishment, say the unsayable things. Trump would rail against political correctness. So, I think that was a place where they connected, and thats ultimately why Thiel supported Trump, is because of that fact.

Jeff: Why didnt Thiel play a bigger role with Trump ultimately?

Max: Well, thats a really good question. So Thiel, because of the speech he gave at the Republican National Convention. Then he makes a donation in mid-October 2016, not long after the leak of the Access Hollywood tape where Trump was caught on tape seeming to endorse sexual assault. That support, which came at a really crucial moment for Trump, puts Thiel on the inner circle. Hes on the transition team, he has a huge portfolio during the early days of the presidential transition and has a lot of influence in the White House early on.

Now, what did he do with that influence? Well, he pushed for a lot of very far-right and were just really out there figures. I talked to Steve Bannon for the book, and Bannon said, If you thought we were crazy you shouldve seen what Thiel was doing. He was putting forward people who were really too far out there even for Donald Trump. And its easy to say, Okay. Well, that looks like a huge mistake, right? He totally screwed up. He wasnt able to maximize his influence.

On the other hand, despite not having a huge influence on the Trump administration, he did manage to get quite a lot of access, and access not just for him but for people in his inner circle. So there was this meeting in December 2016 where Thiel brings in the founders, CEOs of the biggest tech companies in the world. And its all the big names, all the companies youve heard of. And then one that you maybe havent heard of, which is Palantir, which was tiny compared to the other ones. But the Palantir CEO, good friend of Peter Thiels, Alex Karp, gets in the meeting and is able to pitch his services to Donald Trump.

And from there you cant draw a straight line. We dont know exactly what procurement decisions were made and why, but Palantir gets a huge series of government contracts, more than a billion dollars in government contracts, over the next few years. And that really propelled the company into a new class where its valuation soared, it goes public, Thiels net worth goes way up.

So, theres an extent to which yes, Thiel failed maybe politically, but he didnt fail in terms of business; his net worth went up. And I would even argue that what looks like a political failure may not be clearly so. And I say that because of course, the Trump administration didnt end super well for Donald Trump or for many of his allies, but Thiel, because he had sort of lost his juice in the White House a couple of years earlier, doesnt end up taking responsibility for any of that.

So, hes able to keep his credibility as this hard right, Steve Bannon-esque ideologue without taking any of the blame for the obvious failures of the Trump presidency, including the impeachment, the slow response to COVID-19, and then the January 6th failed insurrection. None of that stink really gets on Peter Thiel, and instead, he comes out of this as this very ideologically pure money man who is now promoting this new generation of candidates, spending more money than hes ever spent before.

And theres a real chance that Thiel could have four people. Hes got two candidates in Senate races right now, and then there are two candidates who hes done a lot to support who are already in the Senate: Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley. But he could be close to four Republicans in a Republican-controlled Senate after 2022. And I think if that happens, youre not going to say, Oh, it was a total failure, you would say, Well, he was setting himself up for this higher level of influence.

Jeff: Whats more important to Thiel, the money side of it or the political side of it?

Max: I really liked that introduction about the Koch brothers. When I was working on this book I read this book Kochland, which I recommend. Its a profile of Koch Industries, and it describes the way that Koch Industries, the business project was inseparable from the political project. These two things were working together. And I think thats absolutely how you should look at Thiel.

So, its not like, Oh, hes an idealogue who also does tech investing, or, Hes a tech investor who happens to just have some of these crazy right-wing ideas. These things are all connected. And his ideological standpoint, this hard libertarianism, the idea that tech billionaires are this privileged class, that ends up both feeding into the tech companies and supporting them. I think those two things are inseparable. Thiel is doing work in politics because it helps his business. Hes also doing business because it helps fulfill his ideological project.

Jeff: In many ways because of the libertarian side of it, because of the disruptive side, the one thing that doesnt always seem to fit neatly into the package is what he did vis--vis Gawker. Talk about that.

Max: Well, I think there are lots of ways in which Thiel is not really a libertarian. And as soon as the book has come out, Ive actually gotten some notes from other tenants like, Thank you for saying that because our honor is being Peter Thiel, he does have some libertarian values, but he is not a libertarian in the conventional sense. He started a major data mining and defense contractor, obviously not usually a libertarian thing to do to the extent you care about privacy, and he masterminded this litigation that ultimately destroyed Gawker Media. And in both cases, there is some justification.

There are people who defend Peter Thiel. And I think if you had Peter Thiel on the show, he would make the case that actually Palantir is consistent with libertarianism because even though theyre data mining, theyre doing a good job of it. And that the Gawker litigation is consistent with libertarianism because Gawker was a singularly bad actor. It had to be stopped, it had to be destroyed to keep the press free. Which I think is kind of an Orwellian argument, but it is the argument that he would make, which I think is interesting.

But I think its also worth saying that the Gawker litigation, it didnt just destroy Gawker. It created a new framework and a new playbook, where in addition to destroying this company that Peter Thiel regarded as a bad actor, it sends a message to anyone else whos going to try to write about Peter Thiel, or any source who is tempted to tell a journalist what theyve seen or what theyve heard, and not just with respect to Peter Thiel, but with any billionaire. People keep saying to me Are you scared of Peter Thiel? Hey, he destroyed Gawker. Hes not going to like the author of a book about him.

And I say, Well, yes. I mean of course, but Im scared of any billionaire because thats the Thiel playbook. Theres nothing stopping somebody else from doing the exact same thing that Peter Thiel did. Hes created both an example and a permission structure for anyone to pursue similar litigation.

Jeff: But in many ways the Gawker case reveals, I would think, Peter Thiels glass jaw, because what hes most unhappy with is being an outcast in that way. He wants to be an iconoclast, but he doesnt want to be an outcast, and theres a fundamental difference.

Max: Yes. So, I think its important to say that the inciting action that led to this litigation is blog posts that Gawker published that outed Thiel as gay. Thiel had been out to colleagues and to friends but not to the larger public. I think that post was bad, and I think most editors now would not have published it. Im an editor and it makes me uncomfortable as a journalist.

But I think we can say that while also saying that the destruction of a media outlet through secretive litigation that took eight years and that resulted in a judgment that was more than $100 million, that caused the personal bankruptcy of the owner of the company, that caused 100 people or more to lose their jobs, that that was not an appropriate response to what had happened. And then its a response that could have had really harmful side effects. And I also think youre right. There is a tendency where the crowd that is railing about cancel culture and political correctness and complaining that were catering too much to minority groups or whatever, theyre asking for their own safe space.

Theres something strange about it. And it starts to feel like theyre not actually railing against identity politics, theyre just talking about a different kind of identity politics, and its a white identity politics, which is not a phrase you see very often. But I think it does describe both Trump and Trumpism and use Trump as candidate, and to some extent, what Peter Thiels pushing, which is this fear that some central aspect of white culture is being destroyed by multiculturalism. And that I think can lead you to some really, really dark places.

Jeff: And Thiel has been on that same course, as you say, from the time he was at Stanford, and even worked for Bill Bennett in the Reagan administration.

Max: Yes, absolutely. Thiel was very early in recognizing the alt-right, this very extremely online group of far-right activists, was a force. And one of the reasons he was early there, one of the reasons he saw it as powerful, one of the reasons he supported it, is because those people were very similar to the kind of person he was in college. And really like Thiels newspaper and these political troublemakers that he funded at Stanford, some of whom are really some of the most influential people in Silicon Valley.

The editor of the Stanford Review rape issue, which does not express I think the views are pretty out of step with todays understanding of sexual assault hes a big-time venture capitalist now. David Sacks, hes an ally at Thiel. As I said, these guys were very far out there, and I think in many ways prefigured the rise to alt-right.

Jeff: Is Thiel in it for the long run? What do you think his longevity is?

Max: Well, there is some question there because, of course, anyone who was closely connected to Trump or closely connected especially to the events of January 6th has seen their star fall a little bit, including, of course, the former president. But I think Thiel has navigated this pretty well, and I dont think hes suffered much. I think hes definitely well set up to continue to play this political role, maybe to have even more power over the next decade than he had in the previous decade. Hes continuing to play this big role as an investor, as a behind-the-scenes player in the tech industry.

And one thing about that, its not just that Thiel is playing this role. There are dozens of people, more, hundreds of people who styled themselves, were like miniature versions of Peter Thiel, either because they work with him directly and theyre actually literally managing his money, moving his money around, or because they just have read his books and watched his YouTube speeches and drunk in this ideology.

Hes got a huge following, and so whether or not Peter Thiel himself continues to play this role, this Thiel-ism is not going away. And knowing Peter Thiel, having studied him and talked to 150 people whove worked closely with him or his friends or whatever, I really think that this is somebody who is incapable of not trying to be that provocateur, not being that bomb-thrower. So I think it would be very hard to see him just riding off into the sunset with his $10 billion now. Hes going to want to continue to be making waves, and then were going to all be reckoning with the results of that going forward.

Jeff: Max Chafkin. The book is The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valleys Pursuit of Power. Max, I thank you so much for spending time with us.

Max: Jeff, thank you for having me. It was a pleasure.

Jeff: Thank you. And thank you for listening and joining us here on the WhoWhatWhy podcast. I hope you join us next week for another Radio WhoWhatWhy podcast. Im Jeff Schechtman. If you liked this podcast please feel free to share and help others find it by rating and reviewing it on iTunes. You can also support this podcast and all the work we do by going to whowhatwhy.org/donate.

Link:

Peter Thiel Is the New Koch - WhoWhatWhy

Professor Louise K. Davidson-Schmich dissects the recent election in Germany and outlines the possibilities of a major coalition that may form.

On Sept. 26, Germans went to the polls for an election unprecedented in recent history. For the first time since the founding of the Federal Republic, an incumbent chancellor was not campaigning for reelection. Current Chancellor Angela Merkel decided to step down after serving 16 years in office.

Merkel left a wide-open field of parties with competing visions for Germany.

Her Christian Democratic Party (CDU/CSU) selected Armin Laschet as its lead candidate to succeed her. While Laschet promised stability, he undermined his own chances this summer when he was caught on camera laughing during a speech that honored victims of a terrible flood. Merkels vice chancellor and finance minister, Olaf Scholz, from the Social Democratic Party (SPD), also endeavored to portray himself as her logical and competent successor.

The Green Party, led by Annalena Baerbock, called for a new, more climate-friendly direction in German politics while the libertarian Free Democratic Party (FDP), led by Christian Lindner, pledged to modernize the Federal Republics digital infrastructure and promote innovation. In addition, the far-left party Die Linke promoted better pay for care workers and a higher minimum wage. The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD, under observation by the Germany Office of Constitutional Protection for antidemocratic tendencies) called for a return to a "normal," ethnically homogeneous, patriarchal Germany. Dozens of other much smaller parties appealed to voters with a host of other plans.

The results of the election represent a sea change in German politics. Merkels Christian Democratic party achieved its worst-ever showing, earning only 24 percent of the vote. Vice Chancellor Scholz was able to raise the Social Democratic Partys vote share to 26 percent. Together, however, these two peoples partiesthat jointly earned more than 70 percent of the vote between the 1950s and 1980sobtained support from only half the population.

Instead, the Greens experienced their best result ever, capturing 15 percent of the vote and winning seats in urban areas previously held by the peoples parties. The Free Democrats increased their vote share to 11 percent. Both the Greens and the FDP performed even better among younger, first-time voterstogether they won half the votes. Die Linke received a paltry 4 percent of the vote, down from 9 percent in 2017, and the AfD also dropped 2 percent to 10 percent. The remaining 9 percent of the vote divided among the multiple other parties not passing the 5 percent threshold for parliamentary representation.

The fragmented election results will make coalition formation quite difficult. The CDU/CSU and SPD have pledged not to continue their current government and no party will coalesce with the extremist AfD. As a result, only two possible coalitions remain, each requiring three parties. A traffic light coalition would involve the Greens, FDP (signature color yellow), and the SPD (colored red), while a Jamaica coalition would share the colors indicative of this countrys flag: Green, FDP (yellow), and CDU/CSU (black).

The Greens and FDPs are currently in negotiations to see if they can find common ground before approaching the larger parties to settle on a final coalition partner. Green/FDP negotiations will require considerable compromise; while both parties favor aggressive steps to combat climate change, they disagree on methods. The Greens campaigned on a platform of large-scale public investment in climate policy whereas the FDP has called for tax cuts to stimulate climate-friendly economic innovation.

If they can agree on how to proceed together, their next step will be to approach the former peoples parties to obtain a majority. The traffic-light option is preferred by the German public, who by large margins favor SPDs Scholz as chancellor over the CDU/CSUs Laschet.

Louise K. Davidson-Schmich is a professor of political science at the University of Miami College of Arts and Sciences and the author ofGender Quotas and Democratic Participation: Selecting Candidates for Elective Offices in Germany.

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Political scientist offers insight into the election in Germany - University of Miami

Last week, Clark County commissioners passed a resolution sponsored by Justin Jones declaring vaccine misinformation a public health emergency. We are seeing more and more jurisdictions across the country make similar declarations. Having divergent opinions is as American as apple pie. Our nations founding is based on the compromises of opinionated men. Somewhere along the way though, rather than disagree about what facts meant, there are those who began to throw out facts altogether and substitute their own.

Over the years, we had at least one family member who would read fringe conspiracy theories and spread them as gospel. It was an oddly endearing feature of Thanksgiving dinner and family gatherings. Everyone had a crazy relative who just thought differently, and then everyone would go home and that would be that. With the internet and social media, though, everyones crazy relatives could find one another, and with cable news, some gained legitimacy. (Its not a conspiracy theory; I saw it on the news!) Even that wasnt enough for us to delete family members and friends from social media or our phones, though. Folks got their news from different sources, but the facts stayed the same.

The television show South Park has dedicated many hours of programming to the idea that our nations critical thinking skills have gone off the rails. Whether its the lowering of the bar or the member berries story lines, the writers of this cartoon have asked an important question: What has happened to us? The spreading of misinformation is a plague on the United States. The inescapable truth is we are now a siloed nation; the information you believe can generally be tied to the political ideals you hold; and the gullibility factor does seem to be trending more toward one party than the other.

The Libertarian Party put out a tweet calling the Confederacy evil. A person who responded was adamant that while the Confederate States of America werent perfect, neither was the Union because General Robert E. Lee released his family slaves before President Abraham Lincoln released his. As I contemplated this reply, I found myself speechless (and anyone who has known me for longer than five minutes knows thats nearly impossible).

Anyone who has watched Clark County School District or Clark County Commission public comment at any time in the last several months can see things like this play out in real time. Anti-vax and anti-mask supporters of the Big Lie speaking for hours, hurling insults at our elected representatives as well as at speakers they disagree with share one very clear thing: These people who spread misinformation are manipulative predators seeking to derail the operating of our systems of government. They may not have been there on Jan. 6, but their motivations are no different.

Purveyors of misinformation are so adept at manipulating people that they have convinced ordinarily rational people that they are so entitled as to be immune from consequences. When they are escorted out of meetings, their microphones are cut, their favorite coffee shop wont let them in, they cant go see the Raiders, or they lose their job because of their opinion on masks or vaccines, they shout outrage and blame Communism rather than owning up to a decision they made with manipulated information.

President Dwight Eisenhower said, [t]he hand of the aggressor is stayed by strength and strength alone. I am heartened that the county commissioners and the Clark County School District Board of Trustees have borne the criticisms and threats and shown the strength to do their jobs. It will take nothing short of the collective strength of every rational thinking Nevadan to counter misinformation in our state. We can disagree on policy as we often have. That is America. I like to believe I have a healthy questioning of authority. I have disagreed with policies of elected leaders and the viewpoints of others, but I could never imagine abdicating reason and throwing my lot in with zealots. Fanaticism is not patriotism; threats are not civil discourse; and misinformation is deadly.

Nathaniel Waugh is a member of the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District Board of Trustees and the manager of Policy Advocacy and Training at the Nevada Homeless Alliance. He received his Master of Arts in Urban Leadership from UNLV.

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The misinformation wars - The Nevada Independent

Sentinel Staff| The Holland Sentinel

GRAND RAPIDS Grand Valley State University will hold its 11th annual Progressive/Conservative Summit this weekend. The event, presented by the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, will take place Friday and Saturday, Oct. 1 and 2.

The event begins at 7 p.m. Friday in the Loosemore Auditorium at the DeVos Center on GVSUs Pew Campus in Grand Rapids. It will continue with a full day of events Saturday, beginning at 9 a.m.

There will be four keynote addresses with libertarian, conservative and liberal speakers, panel discussions, a luncheon workshop and networking opportunities.

Topics of discussion will include the future of conservatism and liberalism, civic engagement and how the nation can unite on issues.

Subscribe: Receive 6 months of unlimited digital access to hollandsentinel.com for $1!

Speakers for this years event include Jane Coaston, David French and Matthew Yglesias.

Coaston was a former senior politics reporter for Vox before joining The New York Times in September 2020 as host of its opinion podcast, The Argument. French is senior editor at The Dispatch and a columnist for Time. He is also a former senior writer for the National Review. Yglesias is one of the co-founders of Vox, and its senior correspondent covering politics and economic policy and host of the websites The Weeds podcast.

The Hauenstein Center is partnering with the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation and the Progressive Womens Alliance to host the summit.

More here:

Grand Valley hosting annual political summit this weekend - HollandSentinel.com

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 2, and voters will face decisions in local and state races across Warren County.

This is a look at contested races -- in which there are more candidates than open seats -- for municipal and state government and school board. County Commissioner Director James Kern III does not face a challenger in the lone county race.

Click here for the full candidate lists for Warren County government and school board races.

New Jerseys deadline to register to vote is Oct. 12.

(vote for 1, 4-year term)

Philip Murphy (Democrat)

Jack Ciattarelli (Republican)

Madelyn R. Hoffman (Green)

Joanne Kuniansky (Socialist Workers)

Gregg Mele (Libertarian)

(vote for 1, 4-year term)

Sheila Y. Oliver (Democrat)

Diane Allen (Republican)

Heather Warburton (Green)

Vivian M. Sahner (Socialist Workers)

Eveline Brownstein (Libertarian)

Senate (vote for 1, 2-year term)

Michael J. Doherty (Republican)

Denise T. King (Democrat)

General Assembly (vote for 2, 2-year term)

John DiMaio (Republican)

Erik Peterson (Republican)

Nicholas F. Labelle (Democrat)

Hope Kaufman (Democrat)

Senate (vote for 1, 2-year term)

Steven V. Oroho (Republican)

Frederick P. Cook (Democrat)

General Assembly (vote for 2, 2-year term)

F. Parker Space (Republican)

Harold J. Hal Wirths (Republican)

Scott P. Fadden (Democrat)

Georgianna Carol Cook (Democrat)

Borough council (vote for 2, 3-year term)

Peter Pettinelli (Republican)

Jodie Smith (Republican)

Michael Schwar (nominated by petition)

Committee (vote for 2, 3-year term)

Rob Moorhead (Republican)

Charles Makatura (Republican)

Samuel Bolshoi (Democrat)

Committee (vote for 1, 3-year term)

Brian Tipton (Republican)

Manuel Manny Escaleira (nominated by petition)

Town council (vote for 3, 4-year term)

Robert W. Fulper (Republican)

Mark S. Lutz (Republican)

Peter J. Marino (Republican)

Lee M. Clark (Democrat)

Derick J. Lewis (Democrat)

Keith A. Kennedy (Democrat)

Committee (vote for 1, 3-year term)

Bryan Vande Vrede (Republican)

Arnold G. Hyndman (nominated by petition)

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Abigail Abby Christmann

Harriett Gaddy

Francis Gavin

Lisa Marie Strutin

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Thomas Ackerman

Robert J. Czopoth

Laura Kennedy

Kathryn Pell

(vote for 1, 2-year term)

Robert A. Blum

Sean Johnson

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Michele Benigno

Sotie Hambos

Kathryn Hawkswell

Jennifer Leach

Sam Scocozza

Shanna R. Sikkes

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Giovanni Falco

Molly Fraumeni

Kevin Iaione

Diane Margolin

Constance B. Quinn

Linda Watters

Blairstown Township (vote for 2, 3-year term)

Taylor Casey

Wen-Ling Lai

Courtney Matash

Lauren McQuown

Tara Prezioso

Jennifer Unick

Christopher Zwarych

Knowlton Township (vote for 1, 3-year term)

Don Biery

Mary Ann Boyd

Lorielle DeRomo

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Robert Case

Donald T. Kophazy, Jr.

LaDean Mitchell

James Shelly

(vote for 3, 3-year term)

Patricia Babcock

Joseph Delesky

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Warren County elections: Here are the contested races on Nov. 2 - lehighvalleylive.com

Even as our nations capital remains stuck in the post January 6 dysfunction of a failed insurrection that lingers on in GOP obstructionism, there are signs that the anti-immigrant racism that Donald Trump used to mobilize his troops is running out of steam.

Four years ago, the Trump induced hate fever, that put migrant children in cages and relished tearing apart families, was potent enough that it completely infected the brain stems of the 2017 Virginia andNew Jersey Republican campaignsfor Governor.

With just 24 hours to go before voters headed to the polls formerLieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno and Virginias GOP standard bearer Ed Gillespie used their final push to link their Democratic opponents to MS-13, the violent El Salvadorian drug gang. The GOP line of attack linked both Phil Murphy and Lt. Gov. Ralph Northams support for so called sanctuary cities as the equivalent of endorsing the harboring of violent illegal aliens.

The linkage between undocumented immigrants and a propensity for criminal behavior had been widely debunked and yet Trump rode that hobby horse all the way to the Oval Office. In a 2015 report from theNational Academy of Sciencesresearchers concluded that immigrants are in fact much less likely to commit crime than natives, and the presence of large numbers of immigrants seems to lower crime rates.This disparity also holds for young men most likely to be undocumented immigrants: Mexican, Salvadoran, and Guatemalan men.

TheCato Institute, a libertarian think tank, reached similar findings in a 2017 report. Empirical studies of immigrant criminality generally find that immigrants do not increase local crime rates and are less likely to cause crime than their native-born peers, and that natives are more likely to be incarcerated than immigrants, Cato researchers concluded.

Yet in 2017, the Trump tractor beam had New Jerseys GOP locked in its anti-immigrant position.

Scroll forward to the fractious Sept. 28 debate between Gov. Phil Murphy and his opponent former Assemblyman Republican Jack Ciattarelli and the under reported consensus the two rivals espoused on the subject of New Jerseys hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants.

We are not going to deport 14, 15 or 16 million people that came to this country and are undocumented, said Ciattarelli. We need to put them on the path to recognition. We need to do thatI voted for the Dream Act. I was one of the few Republicans that did that. We are not going to deny young people who came of no power of their own the opportunity to pursue their American dream.

And as far as the Murphy and Democratically controlled legislatures 2019 decision to permit New Jersey almost half a million undocumented immigrants to be able to get a drivers license, Ciattarelli was on board.

The former Assemblyman described the controversial measure as a great security measure that lets us know who they are while ensuring all of the states drivers are licensed and not driving around uninsured.

I celebrate New Jerseys diversity, Ciattarelli proclaimed. We are the most diverse state in the union. Theres power and beauty in that diversity.

I will seize on a moment of common ground and echo on the celebration of our diversity particularly given this question which has a disproportionate impact on our Latino communities, Murphy responded.

In that fleeting moment the earth shifted. Our state was inching toward a more harmonious and generous, life affirming place, but that hopeful moment was largely missed because it came amidst the clanging cacophony of our partisan calliope.

The Governor went on to describe the State of New Jerseys 2018 Immigrant Trust Directive issued by then Attorney General Gurbir Grewal which directly challenged the Trump administrations anti-immigration policy that expressly targeted so-called sanctuary cities which prohibited their local police from assisting federal authorities in arresting residents based on their immigration status.

New Jersey police officers cannot participate in federal immigration raids, according to the NJ Attorney Generals online explainer. They cannot stop, question, arrest, search, or detain an individual based solely on actual or suspected immigration status. And they cannot ask an individuals immigration status except in rare cases when it is relevant to a specific criminal investigation.

It continues. The Directive sends a clear message to Washington: we will not allow you to drive a wedge between New Jerseys law enforcement officers and our immigrant communities. And we will not allow federal authorities to stop us from ensuring the safety of all nine million New Jersey residents.

During the recent debate the 2021 GOP standard bearer didnt use his rebuttal time to push back but only to make a direct appeal to the states immigrant business owners suggesting their ambitions for prosperity were better entrusted with another self-made businessman.

Back in 2017, GOP strategists were making a different calculation that in off year elections, when turnout was likely to be lower, it was key to activate the most angry and fearful in your base. So, the Guadagno campaign, running double digits behind, thought it had no other play than to make other than to run ads linking Phil Murphy to Jose Carranza, an undocumented immigrant whose 2007 brutal murder of three New Jersey students in Newark outraged the entire state.

It did not matter to the GOP back then in urban places like Newark, Paterson and Camden, where a high percentage of New Jerseys 500,000 undocumented residents live, overall crime wasactually down. It was precisely that influx of immigrants that helped to stabilize neighborhoods as well as staunch a steady state population decline that has seen our Congressional delegation shrink from 15 to 12 over the last 30 years.

So, whats different in 2021?

Could it be our collective soul has shifted after a bit after a mass death event that killed close to 700,000 Americans, many of them people of color and no doubt many of them undocumented immigrants who in life were essential workers who lost their lives serving us?

Perhaps, you can only fuel your existence with hate for so long. Its love that goes the distance.

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Ciattarelli Tries to Negotiate the Trump Hate Fever - InsiderNJ

Former U.S. treasury secretary and chief economist at the World Bank, Larry Summers, says cryptocurrency will do better regulated in a sound way instead of being treated as a libertarian paradise.

Lawrence Summers, who served as the Secretary of the Treasury in the Clinton administration and director of the White House National Economic Council in the Obama administration, talked about cryptocurrency regulation during an interview with Bloomberg Friday. A former chief economist at the World Bank, Summers is currently Harvard Universitys President Emeritus.

He was asked why regulators worldwide are deeply skeptical about cryptocurrencies. China, for example, has been cracking down on crypto activities. Summers began by stating that the word crypto suggests a desire for secrecy with respect to large financial sums, elaborating:

When you have large financial sums happening in secret, you have risks of money laundering, risks of supporting various kinds of criminal activities, risks of innocent people being ripped off.

The truth is that we wouldnt have a viable airplane industry if we werent regulating airline safety, he continued. We wouldnt have the transportation system we do if we didnt regulate automobile safety.

He added that the blockchain-based payments industry is going to do better regulated in a sound way, rather than trying to be some kind of libertarian paradise, noting:

I think the crypto community needs to recognize that, and needs to work cooperatively with governments and if they do that. I think that this innovation can be one of the important innovations of this period.

The former IMF chief economist pointed out that some people believe in the idea that cryptocurrency is going to be some kind of a libertarian paradise where we are not going to be able to enforce bank rules, like knowing your customers [KYC], where we are going to be able to move money freely and avoid paying taxes.

Summers opined, I think its a recognition that all industries need to come to that are systemic in their importance, adding:

Its not entirely unlike the discussion of big tech companies. They need to have a regulatory framework. They dont just need it for the protection of their consumers, they need it for the protection of themselves.

In conclusion, he said, We wouldnt have the New York Stock Exchange as the center of the worlds stock market if we didnt have a strong SEC, emphasizing, Even if people didnt like the rules some of the time.

What do you think about Larry Summers comments? Let us know in the comments section below.

Image Credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a direct offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation or endorsement of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

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Former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers: Cryptocurrency Will 'Do Better Regulated' Regulation - Todayuknews