Posted at LP.org staff blog:
Dear Libertarian candidates and supporters,
Thank you for all you did in 2013.
Candidates, thank you for running for office and for taking time away from your family, your work, and the rest of your life. We are grateful for your dedication.
Thank you to key campaign team members. Some of you put in as much time as your candidates did, and made many sacrifices. You were indispensable.
Thank you, volunteers and donors of our Libertarian campaigns. Without your help, without your donations, our campaigns would have been stalled, stuck, and stopped in their tracks.
Thank you for gathering signatures, overcoming obstacles, and turning petitions in on time to make the ballot.
Thank you for writing, creating, and printing brochures, bumper stickers, yard signs, hand cards, emails, Facebook posts, and more.
Thank you for talking about your campaigns to your friends and family.
Thank you for canvassing neighborhoods and talking to voters one on one.
Thank you for leafleting, mounting yard signs, and holding up signs — sometimes in lousy weather.
Thank you for organizing and working at campaign events.
Thank you for doing government research, formulating Libertarian solutions, and filling out surveys.
Thank you for getting mailings out and for submitting campaign finance reports.
Candidates, thank you for challenging the Big Government status quo. Your campaign changed the debate by injecting the idea that we can actually shrink government.
Thank you for showing voters how their lives and those of their loved ones will be better with much less government and more freedom.
Candidates and supporters all: Thank you for everything you did.
Your efforts made a difference. More voters are open to libertarian ideas because of you. More will vote Libertarian in the future because of you.
You are true patriots.
With utmost respect and appreciation,
Carla Howell
Political Director
National Libertarian Party
I see Spence has abandoned this thread but left some substance-free comments on other threads. Spence is clearly a troll, regardless of whether he is the troll or not…and he probably is.
“Antirevolutionary January 5, 2014 at 2:22 am
I’m pretty sure there was a commenter named Spence on IPR around 2008 or 2009. I’ll investigate tomorrow if no one else has done it by then.”
The IPR Troll has posted under a bunch of fake names, sometimes even going so far as to using names of regular IPR posters, including myself.
Here is an exert from the Harry Browne article which Paul posted a link to from which Gary Johnson could learn something:
“If, for example, our candidates promote a simpler, fairer, more efficient tax system, how does that spread the libertarian idea that you should be able to keep everything you earn?”
I’m pretty sure there was a commenter named Spence on IPR around 2008 or 2009. I’ll investigate tomorrow if no one else has done it by then.
I answered your arguments with a link to Harry Browne’s essay which directly addressed them. And your reply to that was essentially that Harry Browne did not really believe what he wrote, which is an ad hominem argument. Applying your own proposed standard consistently, can you reply to the arguments made at http://harrybrowne.org/2000/media.htm regardless of the author or whether you believe his motives were sincere?
“Spence” said: “Can you answer my arguments or not?”
I’ve already answered your stupid comments. This is a site for news about minor party and independent candidates. If you don’t think that minor parties are the way to go, then fuck off and die. Nobody gives a rats ass about you and your fake name.
You are likely the same person as “Randy,” and you are also likely the IPR troll. I would not be surprised if the IPR troll is also signed up as an IPR writer.
Remember some poster who used the name “Randy” posted the same kind of crap that “Spence” is posting, and I called “Randy” out as a fake and then “Randy” disappeared. It looks like “Randy” is back now posting under the name “Spence.”
Spence said: “Andy,
My last name is none of your business and completely irrelevant to the validity of my opinions. You only want to know it so you can try to make ad hominem arguments”
Translation-I, “Spence,” am a cowardly chickenshit weasel who posts online and hides behind a fake name.
Tell us which state LP you were a member of and also your last name. If you do not do this then we will all know that you a liar and a coward.
Michael,
Yes, there are lots of great people IN the LP. If there were not I would not even bother talking to you all. My point is that they (you) are wasting time ON the LP. Time that can be better put to other, more productive uses. Fortunately, many LP members have some time left over for some of those, but they would have even more if they did not waste their time on the used up tissue that is the LP.
Andy,
My last name is none of your business and completely irrelevant to the validity of my opinions. You only want to know it so you can try to make ad hominem arguments, which must be because you have no other reply to what I say. If you did, you would have made it by now. Therefore, you must be sensing that I am correct. I find it hard to believe that you have donor lists with thousands of names on them and not a single person named Spence or Spencer, but even if you do, why would you presume I would be on your list? I never said whether I have ever been an LP member or not, or if I have been, in what decade. Nor do I see any reason to tell you now.
None of what I have said requires any special knowledge that someone would have had to have been a party member to acquire, so I don’t know why you persist on making an ass of yourself by making unwarranted assumptions. However, I strongly suspect it is because you know I’m right and don’t want to face the truth. At least that suspicion is based on logic, unlike your “hunches” and “feelings.” As for me being a “fake” I’m not sure what you mean: that my first name isn’t Spence, that I don’t believe what I’m telling you, or both? It is and I do, but even if it wasn’t or I didn’t, what difference would it make? Can you answer my arguments or not? If you can, go ahead and answer. If you can’t, keep proving your inability to do so.
Jill,
Sorry I missed your inside humor. I couldn’t be a Democrat or Republican either. I agree the movement is finally getting attention, but the party is only a drag on the movement. You should consider practicing voting abstinence or at least being an independent.
Spence says: “Jill’s apparent inability to comprehend how anonymouse works”.
Of course I know how it works, although I’m more familiar with TOR (The Onion Router). I was being sarcastic, although I know it’s hard to detect that online. Emily was quite entertainling on New Year’s day and the day after. actually, so it was kind of an inside joke.
I’m also concerned that the Libertarian Party in general sometimes seems like it’s spinning its wheels. The problem is that I could never be a Democrat or a Republican because their stink would never go away for me. I’m active in the overal liberty movement, and the LP is only one area that I’m involved.in. I actually think the libertarian movement is finally getting attention and the interest of many disillusioned Americans.
Spence said: “Your feeling is wrong, but if it was a fake name, what difference would it make? Would my views be any more or less valid then? I know you don’t want to consider the truth of what I am telling you so you are throwing up these distractions to avoid dealing with it.”
Well then by all means, tell us a little more about yourself. What is your last name? Which state LP affiliate was it where you were a member?
I have been in the LP since 1996, and I know, or know of, lots of Libertarians around the country. I have LP donor lists with several thousand names on them. Now it is true that I don’t know or know of every Libertarian in the country, particularly if they were members a long time ago and dropped out of the party, but still, I’ve never heard of you.
My hunch is that you are a fake and that you are probably the IPR troll.
Spence writes; “It ended? Wonderful news! I totally missed that. Perhaps you mean a couple of states legalized possession of small amounts of marijuana? That’s a long ways from ending the drug war, and the LP played almost no role in it. In fact whatever time LP members spent on the LP would have been better used on that or any number of other causes or pursuits.”
I figured you pick up on that. Of course my comment can be read a couple of ways. No the drug war isn’t over but we are winding it down given where society was three decades ago. Yes, we still have a long ways to go. You may wish to re-consider your comments or maybe you have little or no knowledge of the people who have worked this issue for years such as Steve Kubby, Judge Gray at Seattle’s Hempfest and the many other Libertarians who have done everything from collecting signatures to giving speeches about this public policy.
Jill
“Emily on the Royal thread pointed out that IPR has a problem identiying IPs”
I don’t know who that is or where that was but before you embarrass yourself any further try it for yourself. Go to anonymouse (link above), go to this website from the URL box inside theirs and leave a comment. Then look up the IP address and come back and tell me what you discovered.
“Where did Stewart do that?”
Do what? Show an excess of concern with who I am rather than with what I said? In his original comment that I was answering.
Michael,
“Maybe Spence isn’t aware that the LP and its members have played a significant role in ending the drug war.”
It ended? Wonderful news! I totally missed that. Perhaps you mean a couple of states legalized possession of small amounts of marijuana? That’s a long ways from ending the drug war, and the LP played almost no role in it. In fact whatever time LP members spent on the LP would have been better used on that or any number of other causes or pursuits.
Andy,
“Who in the hell is this Spence character?”
Just a person with a computer and an opinion or several. What’s the matter, can’t respond to my arguments so you have to deflect attention to who I am? What does it matter who I am?
“He sure seems to take an interest in what is going on in the LP,”
Not especially. I just notice a lot of good pro-liberty people I know waste a lot of time and money on this totally worthless organization.
“yet I’ve never heard of him. I know, or know of, a lot of Libertarians around the country, but I don’t know of one named Spence.”
I hope you are not really serious. Spence is a fairly common name, and hundreds of thousands of people have been in and out of the LP over the course of forty plus years. I hope you are not suggesting you know all of them? That would be even more laughable than Jill’s apparent inability to comprehend how anonymouse works. By the way, I’m not a Libertarian (as in party member or supporter) nor did I say whether I have ever been one in the past.
“I get the feeling that “Spence” is a fake name.”
Well it’s a good thing you have “feelings” since logic appears to not be your strong point. Your feeling is wrong, but if it was a fake name, what difference would it make? Would my views be any more or less valid then? I know you don’t want to consider the truth of what I am telling you so you are throwing up these distractions to avoid dealing with it.
Michael,
“Spence you may also wish to read this Reason piece about the LP and gay rights”
Gay rights? That’s just collectivist groupthink. How about individual rights?
Jill,
“There was someone named Randy a month or two ago that also knew a lot about the LP and IPR, who said pretty much the same things. He was also very negative about the Libertarian Party.”
I don’t know who that was and I did not see those comments.
Stewart,
“No, your writing style matches someone that I know who called me yesterday, saying he’d just been in IPR after a long absence and making arguments about the party being dead. It may simply be coincidental.”
It’s a coincidence. I don’t know you and haven’t called you and I have never used any other name to leave comments here.
Steven
“Our national party is worthless, but the people on the ground are not.”
Correct on both counts. But the party at all levels is worthless and its “victories” are just self-deluding spin.
“Hard work makes a difference.”
Not when you are just spinning your wheels in mud, which is all the LP ever does.
Libertarian or third party campaigns can “win” in two easily accessible ways.
1. Force voters to see the first past the post system as well as ballot access (Ballot duopoly).
2. Force issues that might have been ignored by Dem and Rep candidates.
Sarvis may not have served every libertarians format or wishes, but his campaign did “win” in secondary ways. Anyone who runs outside of the Dem or Rep can “win” if their message is marketed properly. Our national party is worthless, but the people on the ground are not.
Candidates
Petitioners
Campaign staff and volunteers
Hard work makes a difference.
No, your writing style matches someone that I know who called me yesterday, saying he’d just been in IPR after a long absence and making arguments about the party being dead. It may simply be coincidental.
There was someone named Randy a month or two ago that also knew a lot about the LP and IPR, who said pretty much the same things. He was also very negative about the Libertarian Party.
Spence you may also wish to read this Reason piece about the LP and gay rights. http://reason.com/blog/2013/12/30/slate-wonders-why-libertarian-party-insi
I used to be from Cincinnati … but I still had the good sense to not be a Bengals fan … 😉
Andy stick the letters su in front of spence.
Spence said: “Andy and Jill,
You have me mixed up with someone else. See http://anonymouse.org/ … It anonymizes the IP address. Check it out.
”
Who in the hell is this Spence character? He sure seems to take an interest in what is going on in the LP, yet I’ve never heard of him. I know, or know of, a lot of Libertarians around the country, but I don’t know of one named Spence. I get the feeling that “Spence” is a fake name.
Maybe Spence isn’t aware that the LP and its members have played a significant role in ending the drug war.
Spence said: ” Is an ad hominem argument the only one you can make against what I have said?”
Where did Stewart do that?
Emily on the Royal thread pointed out that IPR has a problem identiying IPs. Clearly, it’s our problem. 😉
George,
Thanks for the good wishes. Hopefully you will realize that I am correct about the LP and put your time, money and energy towards something more useful, sooner rather than later.
Pauleieio,
Harry Browne knew full well that the LP and voting were a dead end and avoided them for most of his life. He used them as a gimmick to sell books and speaking engagements/fees for a few years at the end of his years but I don’t think he fooled himself; he knew better.
Stewart,
I haven’t lied about who I am but I don’t see any reason I have to give you a last name or non-anonymized IP, either. Why does it matter to you? Is an ad hominem argument the only one you can make against what I have said?
I think I know who “Spence” is. I will do further investigation.
Paul, or paulie. The i and the e are a package deal.
I’m for a multi-faceted approach to advancing liberty which includes the LP. This addresses your point directly:
http://harrybrowne.org/2000/media.htm
Much more you and everyone should read at
http://harrybrowne.org/2000/ …
Spence, best wishes on your pursuits to advance liberty. I will continue to build the Libertarian Party and support its candidates.
Steve,
It’s more like you’ll never be a brain surgeon…so put down the scalpel and back away from the patient. And you won’t see me at the polls – voting only legitimizes an illegitimate system and encourages the bastards.
Pauli,
Yes, there is a reason why the LP can’t be one of those. Namely that it is a counterproductive waste of time and money that people who believe in liberty can put to many better uses.
Andy and Jill,
You have me mixed up with someone else. See http://anonymouse.org/ … It anonymizes the IP address. Check it out.
Dave,
What’s my point? The people here are, I hope, sincerely interested in advancing liberty. My point is that they should use that time and energy on things that make a difference, of which there are many, and the Libertarian Party is not one of those. The sooner you realize that, as most people who have been involved with the LP at one time or another already have, the better. The LP is a dead end.
Bengals. My wife is from Cincinnati. So I have to mind what I say in the house.
Spence has the same IP as our troll. I believe it’s the same person. Notice that he didn’t really contribute, but just said negative things? I don’t delete his comments unless they’re racist or obsene, but we know he’s not here for helpful purposes.
Spence wrote:
“So much action, so little accomplished. What’s the point?”
The Point is: “Defeat is temporary, Surrender is forever”
So, what’s the point of your negativity? What do you hope to
accomplish? Why are you ‘wasting your time’ writing this crap?
“Rome wasn’t build in a day”. Estimates suggest that it took
between 20,000 and 30,000 laborers, over 20 years to build
the Great Pyramid at Giza. By comparison, Notre Dame
Cathedral took almost 200 years to complete.
In both cases, the culture they represented, no longer exists,
but we all know that they were here and what they stood for.
I truly believe that “freedom” is in our future and that it will
be delivered by libertarians and libertarianism. But if we fail,
and freedom is lost, at least future generations will know that
we were here and we gave our all to this cause. Can YOU say
the same?
PLEASE, crawl back into the cave from whence you came.
Maybe some future archeologist will dig up your bones and
wonder whether you were one of the victors or one of the victims.
At least Knedler has the good sense to not be a Bengals fan 🙂
“Jill Pyeatt January 3, 2014 at 11:02 pm
Spence, someone at your same IP address is posting trash that I have to delete. Please stop..”
“Spence” is probably the IPR troll posting under yet another fake name.
No reason the LP can’t be one of them.
Spence, hey I will never be a rock star so I should give up playing my guitar too? I am one of those people who like the journey and don’t worry to much about reaching the end.
Happy New Election Year…. See you at the polls Spence.
Mark: There are thousands of things to do …here are a few, and there are more:
http://billstclair.com/lodge/Books101.shtml
Jill: I am using anonymouse as are many other people. Millions of people, possibly. So whoever is posting comments that you had to erase wasn’t me.
Spence, someone at your same IP address is posting trash that I have to delete. Please stop..
Oh, Knedler, just in case you don’t know it: the Browns suck.
(This from a life-long Jets fan, so I should know.)
And do what instead?
The Browns lose a lot, but they win way more than the LP does. And if their average loss margin was 100-1 would they even be allowed to remain in the NFL? Face it, the LP is not ready for the big leagues, never was and never will be. Time to close up shop.
Guess I am delusional. I am a Cleveland Browns fan. Nothing since December 27, 1964. Yet I still follow them.
“Spence January 3, 2014 at 10:03 pm
Don’t be delusional. That’s what the libertarian *movement* does. The Libertarian *Party* does a lot but doesn’t accomplish jack shit.”
The Libertarian Party is a part of that movement, and the party does get the message out to a lot of people who would not hear it otherwise. A lot of the public is accepting libertarian views on a lot of issues as compared to years past.
“And Sarvis? Yeah, he got single digits and lost. So what was the point?”
The Sarvis campaign got the Libertarian message out to a lot of people who would not have heard it otherwise. This was a good thing.
Stewart Flood said: “Yes, growth is slow — some would say too slow — but the movement is growing and the public is becoming more aware and more supportive of our issues.”
Yes, this is true. I encounter way more people now than I did say 13 years ago who know what the word Libertarian means and who have a positive view of it. This is a good sign.
Don’t be delusional. That’s what the libertarian *movement* does. The Libertarian *Party* does a lot but doesn’t accomplish jack shit. And Sarvis? Yeah, he got single digits and lost. So what was the point?
There are lots of ways people win victories.
Very occasionally, we beat the statists at the ballot box. Sometimes we beat them in the courtroom.
And then there’s the battle for hearts and minds. We are fighting against 100 years of the progressive movement, where we are winning battles every day.
Stewart is correct.
The point? Anyone who reads IPR or similar sites and has to ask “What’s the point?” May not understand politics and how our political system forces us to act. The point is to get out the message and work to enlighten people who do not understand what the problems with our government are and what needs to be changed.
Yes, growth is slow — some would say too slow — but the movement is growing and the public is becoming more aware and more supportive of our issues.
Sarvis campaign was awesome and the next one will be even better!
I for one am very happy made in the Sarvis campaign in Virginia for Governor.
So much action, so little accomplished. What’s the point?
You are welcome, Carla. And thank you for your work for the Libertarian Party, too.
Yes it is. Thank you Carla!
Very nice to see something like this.