Category Archives: Libertarianism

House Bill 1134 is Exhibit A of why the Colorado General Assembly should adjourn earlier, much earlier. The bill isnt just one of those solutions-seeking-real-problems proposals that proliferate the docket; it is illustrative of a flawed governing philosophy that is as pernicious as it is seductive.

The legislation forbids restaurants to give customers plastic tableware or condiment packets without first obtaining their express permission. It contains six pages of detail differentiating the types of restaurants that must get permission to give away a napkin and which may give a fork sans permission. It determines who can proffer a lid to avoid spillage and who must first inquire of desire for said lid. It defines exactly which utensils and condiment packets are covered, omitting only pickle relish perhaps from oversight. The bill even provides a definition for spill plug, the plastic thingy in the coffee lid. Its also called a splash stick. Who knew?

The only ambiguity is the enforcement mechanism which presumably will be added in a committee hearing on the bill. Will there be fines for transgression? Which agencies will ferret out malefactors secretly slipping unsolicited straws at the drive-through? As if theres not enough real crime happening to keep law enforcement occupied right now, they wouldnt mind organizing a statewide sting: Operation Unsought Spork coming to an unsuspecting takeout counter near you.

The lawmakers spearheading this silly little bill must think restaurants are foisting unwanted sugar packets, plastic spoons, and splash sticks onto customers too weak-willed to refuse them. These products are filling up kitchen drawers, glove compartments, and landfills everywhere. The government therefore must intervene and rescue us from ourselves.

Over the past century, this government-must-help-us philosophy has become ascendant. If something is deemed desirable, the government must promote it, subsidize it, and even provide it free at taxpayer expense to all comers. If something is deemed undesirable, the government must regulate it, tax it, curtail it, or ban it. Its not just a philosophy of the left. Corporate and farm subsidies enjoy strong bipartisan support.

Congressmen and congresswomen of both parties seek to regulate social media tech companies for the sake of individuals who voluntarily use the services. Examples of paternalistic government displacing personal responsibility are too numerous to recount within this space. The fact that lawmakers here in Colorado are targeting soy sauce packets demonstrates there is no limiting principle to this government-to-the-rescue impulse.

Since outright bans tend to provoke a backlash among voters, as these same lawmakers will no doubt experience when their plastic bag ban goes into effect in 2024, politicians are discovering ways to manipulate their subjects, I mean constituents, in less noticeable ways. Its called altering the choice architecture to advantage certain choices over others.

In this case, customers can still get packets of strawberry jam, they just have to ask for them. Customers will be better off without a drawer full of plastic, restaurants will save money, and landfills will be a tiny, tiny bit less full of waste. Best of all, politicians show they care about the environment and are solution-oriented.

In this way, the enlightened can nudge the hoi polloi to do better without actually resorting to more draconian means that elicit resentment like when customers discover they cant get a plastic bag for that greasy rotisserie chicken. Some call this manipulation paternalistic libertarianism, but if they were honest, theyd leave off the noun. Theres nothing libertarian about using the full force of law to compel restaurants to ask customers if they want a straw with that.

Ostensibly free citizens can figure that tricky transaction out by themselves.

Krista L. Kafer is a weekly Denver Post columnist. Follow her on Twitter: @kristakafer.

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Kafer: When Do you want ketchup with those fries? becomes the law - The Denver Post

Early in the game, as Booker Dewitt is exploring Columbia and learning about the cloud city, he comes upon a raffle in front of a stage and takes a number, written on a baseball. It is revealed that the winner of the raffle gets to throw the baseball at an interracial couple, who is surrounded by racist imagery. While the scene can certainly be uncomfortable, up to this point it serves its purpose well. It shows the ugly side of Columbia in a single scene and it demonstrates that some people who live there don't necessarily agree with these ideals, in the form of the couple. What happens next is where things get problematic.

Players are presented with three options. To either throw the ball at the raffle announcer, throw it at the couple, or do nothing. Ultimately, all three options lead to the police noticing the "mark of the beast" on Booker's hand, preventing him from throwing the ball at anyone. The game, however, never reflects or discusses the player's choice. Instead, there is a situation where the "hero" of the story could have chosen to participate in a racist, hateful act, without any real consequences or conversation about it. There might be an argument that foreshadows a reveal at the end of "Bioshock Infinite,"but it seems more likely that this resulted from a need to have a choice in the narrative-driven game.

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The Bioshock Infinite Scene That Aged Poorly - Looper

Once upon a time when Knoxville was still a two-newspaper town, the Knoxville Journal sent me to Nashville to cover state government. I was expected to produce a couple of stories a day but wasnt given much guidance as to how to proceed. I arrived at the Legislative Plaza lost in the high weeds.

Then I ran into Carl Koella, whom Id met during the previous summer campaign season. I didnt love his politics, but found him smart, engaging and an endless source of interesting yarns. We had a cup of coffee and the next day I reported that he was fixing to introduce a bill to buy a desert island and turn it into a maximum-security prison for career offenders. This was, of course, preposterous, but I was pretty excited to get the scoop until I learned that every rookie reporter whod come to Nashville for the last decade had written about this bill of Koellas, which was more Fantasy Island than Devils Island.

Oh, well. I still liked Carl, who was considered the most right-wing member of the legislature. He was a Republican, but preferred to call himself a Libertarian, a label Id previously connected primarily to certain disciples of Ayn Rand Id known in college mostly born-on-third-base frat boys who considered her books about objectivism and enlightened self-interest affirmations of their own innate superiority. They bored me half to death, something I never said about the senator from Blount County.

My most enduring memory of Carl was an event I witnessed in his office late one Thursday after legislative business had ended. He hosted a weekly poker game in his inner sanctum at that time, and Id stopped by to ask him a question before I hit the road for Knoxville. The air was thick with cigar smoke and whiskey fumes. He came out to the reception room to talk to me, but our conversation was interrupted by a delegation of Blount County preachers bent on haranguing him about abortion. Their timing was as bad as their manners, and Carl wasted no time informing them that abortion was a matter between a woman and her maker not women and their lawmakers before he showed them the door.

That was a story I didnt write, much as I wanted to, and I remember walking down the long hall and thinking that maybe Libertarians werent just concerned with laissez-faire economics maybe they wanted the government to butt out of everybodys personal lives, too.

That was 30 years before I got to know my next Libertarian, a TV wrestling star who was running for county mayor. I was one of the few whod never heard of his alter ego, Kane, but Glenn Jacobs made a favorable impression on me. He was soft-spoken and much smarter than I expected a guy who wore a rubber mask and smashed people over the heads with folding chairs would be. I was further impressed that he visited local schools and talked to kids about being kind.

Whats not to like?

Well, I did have some misgivings when he bragged that hed been personally endorsed by U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, the highest-placed Libertarian in public office, then, as now.

Rand Paul and Glenn Jacobs

This was years before we anticipated a pandemic, which was when I came to know Paul as a sawed-off bully whod gone swimming in the Senate pool after hed tested positive for Covid. His lack of concern for the health of his colleagues was a whole new take on the virtue of selfishness. The PR photo of big old Jacobs and little bitty Paul is kind of a hoot, although I doubt it was intentionally funny.

The appropriation of the word liberty is another unfunny thing. Libertarians like Paul and Jacobs approve of it when it works to their benefit. They love the Second and 10thAmendments, but dont have any First Amendment willies when it comes to censorship or theocracy. Mask mandates during a pandemic are affronts to their pursuit of happiness; vaccinations a massive assault on their personal liberty. Teachers and front-line healthcare workers dont have any rights at all.

I am clearly in the minority here: Jacobs appears set to walk into a second term as county mayor on his way to a run at the governors office. More immediately, hes going to be donning mask, wig and tights and heading for Mississippi to throw down some choke slams, untroubled by the notion that we are all entitled to enjoy the blessings of liberty, regardless of gender or political bent.

In the interest of accuracy, perhaps theyd consider changing their movements name to something that evokes their leaders philosophy. Jacobites? Nah. Too Catholic. Jacobeans? Too anarchist and, well, French. Its hard to think of a label theyd consent to wear. Maybe we should just call them Authoritarians.

Betty Beanwrites a Thursday opinion column for KnoxTNToday.com.

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Give me liberty, but keep the Libertarians - Knox TN Today

Bill Maher says he's finding himself in a weird position these days ... a hero on the right and a villain on the left.

Maher, a libertarian who has been a reliable Democrat, skewered the Dems Friday night on "Real Time" for what he called "goofy s***," but he says it's not about embracing Republicans ... he says it's about teaching Democrats how to effectively fight them.

He seems amused members of George W. Bush's Administration -- which helped get him fired back in the day -- are now suggesting he run for President.

The message was laced with hilarity ... "I am still the same unmarried, childless, pot-smoking libertine I always was. Let's get this straight. It's not me who's changed, it's the left who is now made up of a small contingent who've gone mental and a large contingent who refuse to call them out for it, but I will."

And, then he did ... "People sometimes say to me, 'You know, you didn't use to make fun of the left as much.' Yeah, because they didn't give me so much to work with. The oath of office I took was to comedy. And if you do goofy s***, wherever you are in the spectrum, I'm going to make fun of you because that's where the gold is. And the fact that they are laughing at it should tell you something. It rings true."

Maher made his case by calling San Francisco "a shoplifter's paradise." He called out members of Congress who have advocated canceling rent and mortgages ... members who believe "capitalism is slavery."

Bill didn't mince words ..."It's not my fault that the party of FDR and JFK is turning into the party of LOL and WTF."

On the surface, it sounds like a Republican ad, but Bill's made it clear he thinks the Republican Party -- with its current configuration -- is a danger to the very existence of democracy. Buy it or not, he seems to be saying Dems need a course correction, or else.

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Bill Maher Amused the Right is Urging Him to Run for President - TMZ

America was founded on a belief in freedom and individualism. Many immigrants came here to escape persecution. Sadly, concurrently many people were also brought here under compulsion (African slaves) or treated with treachery and violence (Native Americans) by the very same people who sought to escape such conditions in the Old World. Despite being a land of contradictions, we have also been a country of evolving egalitarianism and opportunity.

I have always been attracted to libertarianism: a political and social philosophy that promotes individual rights, civil liberties, democracy, and free enterprise. This is the aspirational vision of what my America stands for. Our history has been the saga of evolution from its fledgling and flawed start to a better but still imperfect state today.

The operative terms are evolving, free and individual.

To promote those, the best course for our country is to limit the size of government and give as much freedom of choice and action to the individual. This includes both personal and financial considerations. The rules and regulations constraining our actions should be minimized consistent with good order and security for the community and country. Individuals should decide how to optimize their own happiness. Limit taxes both to maximize the wealth of the individual (give them as much freedom to choose how to spend their money) and minimize the resources allocated to government bureaucracy (to limit the size and scope of their authority over us).

Is this notion even possible in todays world?

First, individual freedom is a two-edged sword. If you get the liberty of action, you also assume responsibility for the outcomes. If you spend your money frivolously, it is still up to you to feed, clothe and house yourself. You do not get the right to be free and expect a system to compensate for your poor decisions. I am not sanguine that we can accept this relationship.

We have become addicted to the bailout. The past quarter century has been marked by an ever-increasing intervention by government when bad things happen in the private sector. Government bailouts of financial institutions deemed too big to fail set a dreadful precedent (although this type of policy has been around for over a century). These institutions received a significant opportunity when the Glass-Steagall Act was revoked in 1999, which allowed the wall between investment and retail banking to crumble.

Essentially banks used that opening to speculate, putting themselves (and our deposits) at risk then expected the government to fix their problems when things turned sour. Reward is predicated on risk-taking. They got the upside profit and pawned the downside loss off on the public.

We have buffered individual choices from the realities of a tough world. Someone who builds a house on the water now expects the collective (FEMA or some other agency) to (literally) bail them out in a natural disaster. Likewise, if I fail to save, the government should not only provide a safety net, it should outright support me in my retirement. The logical difficult outcomes of poor life choices are no longer a personal responsibility.

We want someone else to de-risk our environment. Rather than forcing the individual and the private sector to face the consequences of their actions, the government now aims to minimize their liability/exposure by mitigating the possibility of failure.

Are we more safe and secure today? Perhaps yes, when compared to the early days of our colonial heritage. Are some government regulatory actions successful (Clean Water Act for instance)? Yes, to a point.

The problem is that rules and constraints (even those designed to be temporary) never seem to retreat. Regulations always become more stringent. There is no reverse gear in governmental power. As Ronald Reagan once stated, No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Fundamentally, the ever-encroaching nature of regulatory interference has not resulted in a better society.

Perhaps we are more comfortable (on average), but what have we lost along the way?

I arrived in this region over 30 years ago and found a land of opportunity. Such is not the case today.

Between financial regulations (a byproduct of the bailouts) and ever-more-stringent development ordinances and building codes, I doubt it would be possible to start from scratch and create the businesses I have over that period. Certainly, something else would have opened up, but those specific operations that employed hundreds of people, facilitated growth for other businesses, and provided a living for my family would be foreclosed.

In the place of opportunity (to try and succeed or fail, then try again), we now want to make everyone equal (not give them an equal opportunity because that entails the possibility of failure and that is an anathema today).

We now demand that life be fair, and are engineering a society on that premise. However, that is not how the world works (neither by Gods divine hand nor by natures evolutionary nature). Life can be wonderful, but it is often a harsh mistress.

Our place in the world is defined by who we choose to become (or at least that is how it should work). We do ourselves no favor when we mitigate the consequences of poor choices and make everyone a winner. Life is not a participatory sport; it is a hard-nosed competition. Societies that dont play by those rules are ultimately destined to the ash heap of history.

Dave Clark is an entrepreneur and a former Kingsport alderman.

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Are we still the people we once imagined ourselves to be? - Kingsport Times News

Woundedas Boris Johnson is, it is worth remembering that his government still has plans for the most significant attack on human rights in twenty years.

By that I do not mean thePolice, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, or theJudicial Review and Courts Bill, bad as both are. I am thinking, rather, of the governmentsconsultationon watering down the Human Rights Act.

For sixteen years, Conservative MPs have been calling for that act to be repealed. Their voices have been amplified by the right-wing press, with stories blaming immigration on lawyers finding human rights defenses for their clients.

That campaign obscures the historic function of the act. Before it was passed in 1998, if a citizen wanted to challenge an act of government as unlawful, they would invoke our unwritten constitution and our common law (i.e., judge-made) tradition of the rule of law.

Essential rights such as the authority of a jury over a judge were established on a case-by-case basis without any agreement as to what the most important rights were whether it was the right to silence, or freedom from slavery, or freedom from torture.

The reason the Human Rights Act passed is that there had been one attempt to codify the common law tradition after 1945, when a group of Conservative lawyers had wanted to draw up minimum legal standards for Europe after the defeat of fascism. They had summarized the UK tradition into twenty articles for export: the European Convention on Human Rights.

In passing the Human Rights Act in 1998, a Labour government took the convention and chose to use it both as a statement of universal human rights principles and as the best starting guide to the common law. The UK constitutionalized the common law (i.e., recorded it in a single document), providing a degree of certainty for the first time.

It would, in principle, be open to any government to repeal the Human Rights Act and withdraw from the Strasbourg human rights court. We could start again and say that only domestically recognized rights matter. Two states in Europe refuse to accept the European Convention on Human Rights: the Vatican City and Alexander Lukashenkos dictatorship in Belarus. We could join them, but it would be such a defeat for British ambitions of soft power that not even Boris Johnson proposes that.

The Conservatives propose, rather, a pick-and-mix attitude toward rights, in which some rights would be enhanced and others would be diminished.

The governments central purpose in attacking human rights is to prevent illegal and irregular migration, by which ministers mean that refugees have the temerity to arrive in Britain on false travel documents. But that is the point about dictatorships: they jail or kill their critics they do not give them visas to help them make their protests from abroad.

The government wants to put obstacles in the way of human rights claims; for example, requiring permission before they can be brought, or preventing courts from enforcing certain rights contained in the convention, or reducing the power of the courts to strike down legislation intended to curtail rights.

But the Human Rights Act has been used by a wide-ranging coalition of interests and campaigners: the Hillsborough families, tenants fighting eviction, parents trying to challenge local authority proposals to take children into care. The new obstacles would not only harm migrants they would take rights from everyone.

What is most striking is the lack of ambition behind the governments proposals. It would not be difficult to take the existing Human Rights Act and bolster it to make certain rights overt that have too little protection in the law. A more ambitious government, seeking to increase popular rights, might constitutionalize the rightto housing, tobe fed, to the environment.

We are supposed to be governed by a generation of libertarian MPs. If so, then why not increase peoples ability to challenge the state by reducing the barriers to Human Rights claims, making them cheaper and easier to bring, and not restricting them to the High Court?

Instead, the consultation would work by taking away much that we have now, and in return only add two things a vague commitment to jury trials and a restatement of the existing defense of free speech.

Would a British Bill of Rights protecting trial by jury have shielded the Edward Colston jurors from ministerscriticisms of them? Indeed, how does the government have the cheek to pretend it supports trial by jury, when it is increasing the sentences magistrates courts can pass from six monthsto a year, thereby taking tens of thousands of trials away from juries?

Would a clause protecting free speech cause the government to pause for a moment, before implementing its Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, with its bans on noisy protests and its criminalization oftraveler encampments?

To ask the questions is to answer them. The Conservatives proposals will only strengthen the state: the partys libertarianism is skin-deep. Their changes to the Human Rights Act will only serve to make rights harder to enforce.

If the removal of Boris Johnson would make it harder for the government to press on with its plans to take away our rights, thenhis fallcannot come soon enough.

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The Tories Hate You - Jacobin magazine

What you need to know about Arkansas' 2022 Primary Elections

Updated: 2:28 PM CST Jan 28, 2022

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NEWS ON THE RECORD OVER THE LAST. FEW WEEKS. WEVE HAD THE CHANCE TO HEAR FROMUR O CANDIDATES FOR GOVERNOR AND LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR FOR THE MIDTERM ELECTIONS. THEYRE NOT COMING UP UNTIL NOVEMBER, BUT WE DO HAVE THE PRIMARIES COMING UP IN JUST A FEW SHORT MONTHS JOINING US NOW IS JENNIFER PRICE. SHE IS THE EXECUTIVE DIRECRTO OF THE WASHINGTON COUNTY ELECTION COMMISSION AND JENNIFER BEFORE THE MIDTERMS AND EVEN THE PRIMARIES WE HAVE THE FILGIN PERIOD COMING UP GIVE US A RUNDOWN OF HOW THAT PERIOD GOES WHEN IT IS DAN WHAT WE CAN SEE COME OUT OF THE FILING PERIOD SO THE FILING PERIOD STARTS FEBRUARY THE 22ND AND IT RUNS FORNE O WEEK. IT ENDS ON MCHAR 1ST AT NOON. SO WE HAVE SEVERAL DIFFERENT PLACES FOR CANDIDATES TO FILE ANYONE WHOS RUNNING FOR A FEDERAL OR STATE OFFICE OR NON-PARTISAN JUDICIAL OFFICE WI LL FILE IN LITTLE ROCK SO THEY HAVE THEIR OWN PROCEDURES IN LITTLE ROCK, BUT IF Y'ORE RUNNING FOR A COUNTY OFFICE OR A SCHOOL BOARD OFFICE, YOU ACTUALLY WILL FILE IN YOUR LOCAL COUNTY CLERKS OFFICE. DURING THAT SAME WEEK PEODRI AND IS THERE A FEE FOR THE FILING PERIOD TREHE ARE FEES FOR THE FILING PERIOTHD OSE ARE SET BY THE POLITICAL PARTIES AND IT DEPENDS ON THE OFFEIC YOU RUN FOR AND SOMETIMES IT EVEN DEPENDS ON THE COUNTY THAT YOU RUNN I AND THE POLITICAL PARTY THAT YOURE RUNNING FOR. SO EACH OF THOSE CANDIDATES ARE PLANNING ON FILING. IM SURE HA,VE YOU KNOW CONSULDTE WITH THEIR POLITICAL PARTIES AND UNDERSTAND WHAT THOSE FILINGEE FS ARE NOW FOR NONPARTISAN JUDICIAL OFFICES. THEY DO HAVE AN OPTION TO PAY A FILING FEE OR THEY HAVE AN OPTION TO ACTUALLY GATHER. PICTURESND A TO FILE BY PETITION HI, JENNIFER, WHEN ARE THE MIDTERMS AND HOW DOES THAT WORK IN ARKANSAS? RFO EXAMPLE, CAN SOMEONE VOTE FOR BHOT THE DEMOCRATIC AND REPUBLICAN PRIMARIES AND PKIC THEIR CANDIDATES FOR BOTH PARTIES? SO THE MIDTERM ELECTION IS MAY 24TH. WE ALSO HAVE TWO WEEKS OF EARLY VOTING WHICHTA SRTS MAY 9TH WE DO HAVE WHAT IS CALLED AN OPEN PRIMARY SYSTEM, WHICH MEANS THAT YOU DO NOT HEAV TO BE REGISTERED AS A DEMOCRAT OR PUBLICANR O AN INDEPENDENT OR WHATEVER OTHER POLITICAL PARTY WILL HE AAV PRIMARY WHICH ALLOWS YOU TO SECTLE WHICH BALLOT THAT YOU NT OWAN ELECTION DAY, BUT YOU DONT HAVEHE T OPTION OF VOTING FOR A OSCRS BALLOT. SO FOR INSTANCE, YOU HAVE TO CHSEOO A DEMOCRATIC OR REPUBLICAN BALLOT, WHICH MEANS YOU CAN ONLY VOTE ON THOSE PRIMARY CANDIDATES AND THEN OF COURSE IS THE NONPTIARSAN AND THE OR CANDIDATES ON THE BALLOT AS WELL, BUT THOSE ARE ON BOTH POLITICAL BALLOTS AS WELL AS THERES A NONPERSON BALLOT WHIT JUST THE NON-PARTISAN CANDIDATES AND THE SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATES. SO ITS IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER YOU KNOW THAT YOU DONT HEAV TO BE REGISTERED WITH A POLITICAL PARTY THAT ON ELECTION DAY. WE ARE ASKINGOU Y WHAT BALLOT YOU WANTOT N HOW YOUR REGISTERED TO VOTEND A MOST VOTERS ARE ACTUALLY REGISTERED ASPT OIONAL WHICH MEANS THAT THEY HAVE NOT DECLARED A POLITICAL PARTY. OKAY, KNOW WHEN YOU ASK FOR A BAOTLL YOU CAN DO IT ELYAR VOTING ABSENTEE VOTING OR THEYRE ON ELECTION DAY, CORRECT? THAT IS CORRECT. SO WE HAVE ABSENTEE VOTING AND YOU KNOW, WEAW S A LARGER INCREASE OF ABSENTEE VOTING THAN 2020. WE DO EXPECT TO SEE, YOU KNOW, A LARGE NUMBER OF ABSENTEE. IN 2022 NOT QUITE THE SEAM NUMBERS. WE SAW IN 2020 AND THEN OF COURSE WE HAVE THE IN-PERSON VOTING FOR TWO WEEKS FOR EARLY VOTING AND THEN ON ELECTION DAY, BUT YES, YOU MUST DECLARE WHICH BALLOT YOU WANT. WE ARE NOT ASKING WHICH PARTY BELONG TO AND IN FACT ONCE THIS SELECTION IS OVER WHEN YOU GET TO THE GENERAL ELECTION, THATS WHERE YOULL SEE THE CANDIDATES ATTH WON THEIR PRIMARIES ON ONE SINGLE BALLOT NOW. YOU TALKED ABOUT THE RISE IN ABSENTEE VOTING. IS IT BECAUSEF O COVID-19 OR MAYBE SOME CHANGES TO LAWS? WHY ARE WE SEEING THAT SURGEON ABSENTEE VOTING AND DOE W EXPECT IT TO CONTINUE ON? SO WE DEFINITELY SAW RISE IN ABSENTEE VOTING DURING 2020 BECAUSE OF COVID-19, YOU KNOW, WE HAD ABOUT A 12% OF NUMBER FOR ABSENTEE VOTING WHICH IS MHUC LARGER THAN THE TYPICAL ONE TO VEFI PERCENT THAT WE HAVE FOR PRIMARY OR GENERAL ELECTION. NOW BACK TO 40/29 NEWS ON THE RECORD ORVE THE LAST FEW WEEKS. WEVE HAD THE CHANCE TO HEAR FROM OUR CANDIDATES FOR GOVERNOR AND LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR FOR THE MIDTERM ELECTIONS. THEYREOT N COMING UP UNTIL NOVEMBER, BUT WE DO HAVE THE PRIMARIES COMING UP AND JUST A FEW SHORT MONTHS JOINING US NOW IS JENNIFER PRICE. SHE IS THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE WASHINGTON COUNTY ELECTION. STATION AND JENNIFER BEFOREHE T MIDTERMS AND EVEN THE PRIMARIES WE HAVE THE FILING PERIOD COMING UP GIVE US A RUNWNDO OF HOW THAT PERIOD GOES WHEN IT IS AND WHAT WE CAN SEE COME OUT OF THE FILING PERIOD SO THE FILING PEODRI STARTS FEBRUARY THE 22ND AND IT RUNS FOR ONE WEEK. IT ENDS ON MARCH 1ST THAT NOON SO WE HAVE SEVERAL DIFFERENT PLACES FOR CANDIDATES TO FILE ANY. IS RUNNING FOR A FEDERAL OR STATE OFFICE OR NONPARTISAN JUDICIAL OFFICE WILL FILE IN LITTLE ROCK SO THEY HAVE THEIR OWN PROCEDURES IN LITTLE ROCK, BU T IF YOURE RUNNING FOR A COUNTY OFFICE OR A SCHOOL BOARD OFFICE, YOU ACTUALLY WILL FILE IN YOUR LOC CALOUNTY CLERKS OFFICE DURING THAT SAME WEEK PERIOD AND IS TREHE A FEE FOR THE FILING PERDIO SO THERE ARE FEESOR F THE FILING PERIOD THOSE ARE SET BY THE POLITICAL PARTIES AND IT DEPDSEN ON THE OFFICE YOU RUN FOR AND SOMETIMES IT EVEN DEPENDS ON THE COUNTY THATOU Y RUN IN AND THE POLITICAL PARTY ATTH YOURE RUNNING FOR. SO EACH OF THOSE CANDIDATES HERE PLANNING ON FILING. IM SURE HAVE, YOU KNOW CONSULTED WITH THEIR POLITICAL PARTIES AND UNDERSTAND WHAT THOSE FILGIN FEES ARE NOWOR F NON-PERSON JUDICIAL OFFICES. THEY DO HEAV AN OPTION TO PAY A FILING FEE OR THEY HAVE AN OPTION TO ACTUALLY GATHER. TEACHERS AND TO FILE BY PETITION I HAD JENNIFER WHENRE A THE MIDTERMS AND HOW DOES THAT WKOR IN ARKANSAS? FOR EXAMPLE, CAN SOMEONE VOTE FOR BOTH THE DEMOCRATIC AND REBLPUICAN PRIMARIES AND PICK THEIR CANDIDATES FOR BOTH PARTIES? SO THE MIDTERM ELECTION IS MAY 24TH. WE ALSO HAVE TWO WEEKS OF ELYAR VOTING WHICH STARTS MAY 9TH WE DO HAVE WHAT IS CALLED AN OPEN PRIMARY SYSTEM, WHICH MEANS THAT YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE REGISTERED AS A DEMOCRAT OR PUBLICAN OR AN INDEPENDENT OR WHATEVER OTHER POLITICAL PARTY WILL HAVE A PRIMARY WHICH ALLSOW YOU TO SELECT WHICH BALLOT THAT YOU WANT ON ELECTION DAY, BUT YOU DONT HAVE THE OPTNIO OF VOTING FOR A CROSS BALLOT. SO FOR INSTANCE, YOU HAVEO T CHOOSE A DEMOCRATIC OR REPUBLICAN BALLOT, WHICH MEANS YOU CAN ONLY VEOT ON THOSE PRIMARY CANDIDATES AND TNHE OF COURSE IS THE NONPARTISAN AND THE SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATES ON THE BALLOT AS WELL. BUT THOSE ARE ON BOTH POLITALIC BALLOTS AS WELLS A THERES A NON-PERSON BALLOT WITH JUST THE NON-PERSON CANDIDATES AND THE SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATES. SO ITS IMPORTTAN TO REMEMBER YOU KNOW THAT YOU DONT HAVE TO BE REGISTERED WITH A POLITICAL PARTY THAT ON ELECTION DAY. WE ARE ASKING BALLOTOU Y WANT NOT HOW YOUR REGISTERED TO VOTE AND MOST VOTERS ARE ACTUALLY REGISTERED AS OPTIONAL WHICH MEANS THATHE TY HAVE NOT DECLARED A POLITICAL PARTY. OK,AY SO IM WHEN YOU ASK FOR A BALLOT YOU CAN DO IT EARLY VOTING ABSENTEE VOTING OR THEYRE ON ELECTION DAY, CORRECT? THAT IS CORRECT. SO WE HAVE ABSENTEE VOTING AND YOU KNOW, WE SAW A LARGER INCREASEF O ABSENTEE VOTING THAN 2020. WE DO EXCTPE TO SEE, YOU KNOW, A LARGE NUMBER OF ABSENTEE VOTING IN 2022 NOT QUITE THE SAME NUMBERS. WE SAW IN 2020 AND THEN OF COURSE WE HAVEHE T IN-PERSON VOTING FOR TWO WEEKS FOR EARLY VOTING AND THEN ON ELECTIO DNAY, BUT YES, YOU MUST DECRELA WHICH BALLOT YOU WANT. WE ARE NOT ASKING WHICH PARTY BENGLO TO AND IN FACT ONCE THIS ELECTION IS OVER WHEN YOUET G TO THE GENERAL ELECTION, THATS WHEER YOULL SEE THE CANDIDATES THAT WON THEIR PRIMARIES ON ONE SINGLE BALLOT. NOW YOU TALDKE ABOUT THE RISE IN ABSENTEE VOTING. IS IT BECAUSE OF COVID-19 OR MAEYB SOME CHANGES TO LAWS? WHY ARE WE SEEING THAT SURGEON ABSENTEE VOTING AND DO WE EXPECT IT TO CONTINUE ON? SO WE DEFINITELY SAW RISE IN ABSENTEE VOTING DURING 2020 BECAUSE OF COVID-19, YOU KNOW, WE HAD ABOUT A 12% OF NUMBER FOR ABSENTEE VOTING WHICH IS MUCH LARGER THAN THE TYPICAL ONE TO FIVE PERCENT THATE W HAVE FOR PRIMARY OR GENERALLE ECTION. WE DONT EXPECT TO SEE THAT 12% THIS YEAR, BUT WE DO EXPECT TO SEE A LARGERUMBER N OF PEOPLE TAKE ADVANTAGE OF ABSENTEE VOTING BECAUSE AS LONG AS UYO FOLLOW ALL OF THE PROCEDURES WHICH ANMES THAT YOU FILLUT O YOUR VOTER STATEMENT CORRECTLY YOU PROVIDE A PHOTOCOPYF O YOUR FOOD PHOTO ID AND YOU MEAK SURE THAT YOU SIGN AND RETNUR THE ABSENTEE BALLOT IN TIME. IT IS ACTUALLY VERY EASY WAY FOR VOTERS TO VOTE WHO ARE UNABLE TO BE AT THE POLLS DURING EARLY VOTING ON OUR ELECTION DAY, BUT WHAT WE DID SEE WAS AN INCREASE IN EARLY VOTING WE WENT FROM 50% EARLY VOTE BACK IN 2018 TO 65% EARLY VOTEN I 2020. WE DO EXPECTT THA TO TREND TO CONTINUE BECSEAU EARLY VOTING IS POPULAR. ITS CONVENIENT. ITS FOR AN EXTENDED AMOUNT OF METI AND WE HAVE SEVERAL LOCATIONS OPEN ACROSS WASHINGTON COUNTY. YEAH. I' AN EARLY VOTER. SO, ALL RIGHT JENNIFER PRICE. WERE GOINGO T BE BACK WITH MORE QU

What you need to know about Arkansas' 2022 Primary Elections

Updated: 2:28 PM CST Jan 28, 2022

In 2022, Arkansans will cast their ballots to choose new local officials and representatives to congress along with a new governor and lieutenant governor.Primary ElectionsArkansas' primaries will be held in May.The Democratic and Republican Parties of Arkansas will hold primaries to select their nominees on May 24, 2022. To vote in these primaries, you need to be registered before April 24, 2022. Early voting will begin on May 9, 2022.You can vote in either the Democratic or Republican primary, not both. You will be asked to select a party ballot when you arrive at the polling place.The Libertarian Party of Arkansas will hold a convention in early 2022 to select its nominee.Independent candidates are not running with a party and are not subject to primaries or conventions.Big RacesSeveral candidates are running to replace Asa Hutchinson as governor of Arkansas. Former White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is the only declared candidate on the Republican side, but several other candidates have announced. Follow this link to learn about the candidates for governor.The situation is reversed in the race for lieutenant governor. Six Republicans but only one Democrat, Kelly Krout, is running.General ElectionTo vote in the general election, you must be registered by Oct. 10, 2022.Voting begins Oct. 24, 2022, and lasts through Election Day on Nov. 8, 2022.If runoffs are needed, they will be held in December.

In 2022, Arkansans will cast their ballots to choose new local officials and representatives to congress along with a new governor and lieutenant governor.

Arkansas' primaries will be held in May.

The Democratic and Republican Parties of Arkansas will hold primaries to select their nominees on May 24, 2022. To vote in these primaries, you need to be registered before April 24, 2022. Early voting will begin on May 9, 2022.

You can vote in either the Democratic or Republican primary, not both. You will be asked to select a party ballot when you arrive at the polling place.

The Libertarian Party of Arkansas will hold a convention in early 2022 to select its nominee.

Independent candidates are not running with a party and are not subject to primaries or conventions.

Several candidates are running to replace Asa Hutchinson as governor of Arkansas. Former White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is the only declared candidate on the Republican side, but several other candidates have announced.

Follow this link to learn about the candidates for governor.

The situation is reversed in the race for lieutenant governor. Six Republicans but only one Democrat, Kelly Krout, is running.

To vote in the general election, you must be registered by Oct. 10, 2022.

Voting begins Oct. 24, 2022, and lasts through Election Day on Nov. 8, 2022.

If runoffs are needed, they will be held in December.

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What you need to know about Arkansas' 2022 Primary Elections - 4029tv

WashingtonNational Democrats added U.S.Rep. Dan Kildee's seat to their program that aims toprotect vulnerable incumbent Democrats in the Houseand said they aim to target the seat held by Republican U.S. Rep. Peter Meijer in the midterm elections.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee updated its Frontline Program this week as a result of redistricting. The DCCCaddedKildee and kept on the list U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Holly, who is running for reelection in a new Lansing-based district. Thirty-two Democratic incumbents are part of the program.

The DCCC removed from the Frontline Program U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens of Waterford Township, as she's now running for reelection in the 11th District that's considered a safe Democratic seat. Stevens is facing a primary against U.S. Rep. Andy Levin, D-Bloomfield Township.

"Frontline House Democrats head into November with a record of delivering for the American people by fighting to end this pandemic, rebooting our economy, and putting millions of Americans to work rebuilding America,DCCC Chairman Sean Patrick Maloney said in a statement.

Across the country, Republicans will have to defend their extremist agenda that just doesnt work for American families.

The National Republican Congressional Committee has not yet announced its Patriot Program for vulnerable Republican incumbents.

The DCCC on Thursday announced that the new 3rd District in west Michigan is among 38 GOP-held or open seats that it's targeting this fall. The groupsaid it views the new 3rd, which covers the Grand Rapids, Grand Haven and Muskegon areas, as trending toward Democrats and noted Meijer's challenge by John Gibbs, a Republican who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.

Democrat Hillary Scholten of Grand Rapids has spoken with the DCCC and is expected to be a contender. In 2020, she lost to Meijer in the old 3rd District 47% to 53% when the seat was open due to Libertarian Rep. Justin Amash's retirement.

Jeff Winston, Democratic chairman of the congressional district, said a Democrat will have a "fair shot" at the newly drawn seat.

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"After decades, upon decades of just horrible partisan gerrymandering, theCitizens Redistricting Commission did a really good job. In our particular case for the 3rd Congressional, it made it way more competitive," Winston said.

"On a level playing field, this is this is where the rubber hits the road. Our candidates are better, our message is better. Let the voters decide in a fair way, and Democrats will be victorious."

The DCCC is also targeting the open battleground seat in new 10th District, which includes parts of Macomb and Oakland counties and is rated "likely" Republican by Cook Political Report.National Republicans are hoping that former Senate nominee John James runs in this swing district, where the Democratic primary field is starting to grow.

Trump narrowly won the district in 2020, butDemocrats have also been successful there, including Sen. Gary Peters in 2020 andGov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2018.

Members of the Frontline Program would usually get extra fundraising and organizational help from the party organization, especially as Democratsseekto protect their majority in the House this fall.

The Lansing-based district where Slotkin plans to runis rated a tossup by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.

Slotkin flipped a GOP seat in 2018 andrepresents one of just seven Democratic-held districts won by former President Donald Trump in 2020.Shecould end up facing state Sen. Tom Barrett, a Republican from Charlotte, who launched his congressional campaign late last year.

Kildee of Flint Township chaired the Frontliner Program in a previous cycle. He is running in the new 8th District thatincludes Flint and the Tri-Cities and which President Joe Biden wonby about 2 percentage points. The district is also rated a tossup.

National Republicans are aiming to snag a top-tier candidate to run against Kildee after former state Attorney General Bill Schuette of Midland opted not to run this month.

"Dan Kildee is one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the country because of his lockstep support for Nancy Pelosis socialist agenda," National Republican Campaign Committee Mike Berg said. "The Pelosi-Kildee agenda has led to closed schools, rising pricesand skyrocketing crime.

At least one Republican has jumped into the race already Paul Junge of Brighton said this month said he intends to moveto Genesee County to run. Junge ran for Congress in the 11th District in 2020 and lost to Stevens.

Kildee was reelected in 2020 54%-42% over former state Rep. Tim Kelly, R-Saginaw Township.

mburke@detroitnews.com

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Democrats add Kildee to program that bolsters vulnerable incumbents - The Detroit News

Libertarian economic think tank

United States

The Ludwig von Mises Institute for Austrian Economics, or Mises Institute, is a libertarian nonprofit think tank located in Auburn, Alabama, United States.[2][3] It is named after Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises (18811973).

It was founded in 1982 by Lew Rockwell, Burton Blumert, and Murray Rothbard,[4] following a split between the Cato Institute and Rothbard, who had been one of the founders of the Cato Institute.[non-primary source needed][5] It was funded by Ron Paul.[3]

The Ludwig von Mises Institute was founded in 1982 by Lew Rockwell. Rockwell, who had previously served as editor for Arlington House Publishers, received the blessing of Margit von Mises during a meeting at the Russian Tea Room in New York City, and she was named the first chairman of the board.[6][7][self-published source?] Early supporters of the Institute included F.A. Hayek, Henry Hazlitt, Murray Rothbard, Ron Paul, and Burt Blumert.[4][non-primary source needed] According to Rockwell, the motivation of the institute was to promote the specific contributions of Ludwig von Mises, who he feared was being ignored by libertarian institutions financed by Charles Koch and David Koch. As recounted by Justin Raimondo, Rockwell said he received a phone call from George Pearson, of the Koch Foundation, who had said that Mises was too radical to name an organization after or promote.[8]

Rothbard served as the original academic vice president of the institute. Paul agreed to become distinguished counselor and assisted with early fundraising.[4][non-primary source needed]

Judge John V. Denson assisted in the Mises Institute becoming established at the campus of Auburn University.[9] Auburn was already home to some Austrian economists, including Roger Garrison. The Mises Institute was affiliated with the Auburn University Business School until 1998 when the institute established its own building across the street from campus.[10][non-primary source needed]

Kyle Wingfield wrote a 2006 commentary in The Wall Street Journal that the Southern United States was a "natural home" for the institute, as "Southerners have always been distrustful of government," with the institute making the "Heart of Dixie a wellspring of sensible economic thinking."[5]

Its academic programs include Mises University, Rothbard Graduate Seminar, the Austrian Economics Research Conference, and a summer research fellowship program. In 2020, the Mises Institute began offering a graduate program.[11] It has led to the creation of spin-off organizations around the world, including Brazil,[12][bettersourceneeded] Germany,[13] South Korea,[14][bettersourceneeded] and Turkey.[15][non-primary source needed]

A defining philosophy of the institute is Misesian praxeology ('the logic of human action'), which holds that economic science is deductive rather than empirical. Developed by Ludwig von Mises, following the Methodenstreit opined by Carl Menger, it opposes the mathematical modeling and hypothesis-testing used to justify knowledge in neoclassical economics. Misesian economics is a form of heterodox economics.[16] This emphasis on Misesian methodology is distinct from other scholars in the Austrian tradition, including Hayek and those associated with George Mason University.[17]

The Mises Institute has been criticized by some libertarians for the paleolibertarian and right-wing cultural views of some of its leading figures, on topics such as race, immigration, and the presidential campaigns of Donald Trump.[18][19][20][21]

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Rockwell and Rothbard embraced racial and class resentments to build a coalition with populist paleoconservatives.[18] This rhetoric appeared at the time in newsletters for Ron Paul that Rockwell was later identified as writing, including statements against black people and gay people that later became controversies in Paul's congressional and presidential campaigns.[18][3] Separately, Rothbard's writing opposed "multiculturalists" and "the entire panoply of feminism, egalitarianism".[3]

A 2000 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) categorized the Mises Institute as Neo-Confederate, "devoted to a radical libertarian view of government and economics."[22] In 2003, Chip Berlet of the SPLC described the institute as "a major center promoting libertarian political theory and the Austrian School of free market economics", noted Rothbard's disgust with child labor laws, and wrote that other institute scholars held anti-immigrant views.[23]

When a New York Times reporter requested a tour of the institute in 2014, Rockwell asked him to leave, saying he was "part of the regime."[3]

Candice Jackson, who served as acting head of the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights during the Trump Administration, was previously a summer fellow at the Mises Institute.[24]

The Mises Institute makes available a large number of books, journal articles, and other writings online, and archives various writings on its website. Its Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics discusses Austrian economics. It published the Journal of Libertarian Studies from 1977 to 2008.[citation needed]

Notable figures affiliated with the Mises Institute include:[25][non-primary source needed]

Coordinates: 323624N 852929W / 32.60664N 85.49128W / 32.60664; -85.49128

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Mises Institute - Wikipedia

Fred Fiske| Guest columnist

Watch Sen. Paul and Dr. Fauci's COVID-19 clashes

A mashup of the verbal showdowns between Dr. Anthony Fauci and Senator Rand Paul.

USA TODAY

A COVID-related bulletin: Dont trust the know-it-alls; the way forward is not always clear; no one has all the answers not Democrats, Republicans, independents or Libertarians.

President Joe Biden is as stumped now as former President Donald Trump was then. As Dr. Anthony Fauci explains, its a wily virus.

Heres a deal: Ill stop beating up on Trump over COVID-19, if youll take a break from bashing Biden over Omicron.

Its tough to be a leader during a pandemic whether a president, senator, governor, mayor, health administrator or school superintendent. People can get edgy.

Fauci and Sen. Rand Paul seem ready for a duel. There was a hubbub about education officials calling parents domestic terrorists. Hey, some parents railing about school closings have gone overboard; not good. I also sympathize with the frustrated moms and dads (and teachers).

Every day, in homes across the country, decisions have to be made: measuring risks and benefits. Its enough to drive anyone to distraction. Or into denial.

Mardie is one of my most COVID-conscious friends fully vaccinated, uses high-grade masks, limits exposure to strangers. Yet she makes an exception for an unvaccinated grandchild. And why not?

My palJoeyhas planned a two-family trip to Orlando for months, and now faces unwelcome factors a surging virus, an unvaccinated toddler, the depressing prospect of canceling and losing thousands in airfare and Disney tickets.

My buddy Michael, among the brainiest fellows I know, wont get vaccinated. Hes considered all the angles, believe me.

Michael stays cheerful; others, not so much. The vaccinated resent the unvaccinated. The unvaccinated face added risks, and feel besieged (that Green Bay quarterback seems to be OK, but the tennis star took a hit when Australia kicked him out).

In supermarket checkout lines, masked shoppers look daggers at the unmasked, who pretend not to notice. Parents worry about their children, and little ones in theirlittle masks are growing up worried.Worst of all, people keep getting sick, really sick, and dying.

Daughters Molly and Kate both had COVID scares, but theyre OK. Brother Jonathan got pretty sick, and is better. Kates family of four are on a dizzying test-go-round due to exposures and precautions in the normal course of their busy lives. Positive test results mean lonely, unsettled days of quarantine.

Will we get through this? I hope so. It would help if there was less passion, more compassion; more faith that democratically elected leaders even the ones you disagree with are not out to get you and wreck the country.

Most of them have done the best they can. That includes Biden, Trump, Fauci, Rand Paul, even (gulp) Mitch McConnell. (I never thought Id write that.)

There is plenty of room in this messy democracy to engage on any number of issues immigration, climate change, abortion, guns, race and more. Thats what elections are for.The COVID epidemic is different.Epidemiology is messy, too, but its science, not politics.

Trust the scientists to get us through this, and the politicians will continue to be well, politicians. Meanwhile, try not to take it so personally. Stop blaming the other guy. Lets declare a truce in politicizing COVID, which so far seems to be outsmarting us all.

Fred Fiske is the retired editorial page editor and senior writer of The Post-Standard in Syracuse, New York. He winters in North Hutchinson Island.

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Given that no one's perfect or always right, let's declare truce in COVID wars | Opinion - TCPalm