Libertarian Diary

A BLEEDING-HEART LIBERTARIAN IN AMERICA'S DAIRYLAND

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Remembering Harris's 'We Choose Freedom' Ad

Remembering Harris's 'We Choose Freedom' Ad

Good morning. Well over a year ago, during the 2024 presidential race, the Harris campaign released a video entitled We Choose Freedom. It was Harris's first campaign ad. I've thought about that ad, now and again, in the year and a half since it was released. Harris was the better choice

Barron County’s “Trust ICE” Message Comes with a Threat

Barron County’s “Trust ICE” Message Comes with a Threat

On Sunday, I wrote that for Wisconsin county officials, cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement has more than one meaning (sometimes plain, sometimes concealed through ambiguity). If official cooperation is sometimes shielded from view, at other times an expectation of the public's cooperation is stated more as an implied threat. That's

Considering Possible Federal Election Interference in Wisconsin

Wisconsin elections

Considering Possible Federal Election Interference in Wisconsin

Even in his first presidential race in 2016, Trump falsely claimed irregularities in Wisconsin’s election results, although final results showed that he won the state. (The Green Party's own bogus post-election claims of lent Trump's baseless assertions a faint patina of credibility.) Then and ever afterward, Trump's accusations

Wisconsin’s Immigration Enforcement — 'Cooperation' Has More Than One Meaning

Immigration Law

Wisconsin’s Immigration Enforcement — 'Cooperation' Has More Than One Meaning

It's a quiet, gray morning here in southern Wisconsin. There's almost a foreboding to these gray skies: the far-yet-near conflict in Minneapolis demands that we consider what a de facto occupation by federal law enforcement means for our fellow Americans. More immediately, Minneapolis is a neighbor to Wisconsin, and Milwaukee is

'For My Friends, Everything; For the Federal Reserve, the Law'

'For My Friends, Everything; For the Federal Reserve, the Law'

There is an expression from the first half of the twentieth century of disputed attribution to either Peruvian Óscar R. Benavides or Brazilian Getúlio Vargas, in which an autocrat offers "for my friends everything, for my enemies the law." Donald J. Trump has neither Spanish nor Portuguese, but he's inclined by

The Inclination to Raw Force

The Inclination to Raw Force

At The Bulwark, Catherine Rampell lists four key reasons that Taking Venezuela’s Oil Isn’t the Win Trump Claims (sub. req'd). Her four well-supported contentions are that (1) it’s not clear the United States needs more oil, (2) even if we did want more oil, that doesn’t mean we’d

The World's Next Oil Magnate

The World's Next Oil Magnate

Last night, one read that while Donald J. Trump wanted to control Venezuela's oil industry, he hadn’t considered — of course he hadn’t — how the Venezuelan oil industry could operate profitably under his control: Despite Trump's optimism, oil companies have appeared skeptical of quickly entering, expanding or investing in Venezuela.

1.3.26: War at Home Becomes War Abroad

Embed from Getty Images The Midwest, and all America, awoke today to the news that Trump had ordered an attack on Venezuela and the abduction of its ruler.[1] No one should have been surprised. This attack and abduction in Venezuela did not stem from Trump's desire to halt the flow of drugs

1.1.26: The Ninth Year

1.1.26: The Ninth Year

It has been nine years, one month, and twenty-five days since Trump’s first election. Later this month, it will be the ninth year since he was first inaugurated. By any calculation, he has battered, besieged, and beleaguered this country; by any measure, he is the most contemptible man to hold federal executive office. Those

Tenets

Tenets

Individual rights, freedom from interference, free markets in labor and capital, limited government, property rights, a spontaneous and dynamic social order, and advancement of social justice. Each tenet is presumptively held and supported, within a liberal democratic society that recognizes all persons of equal moral worth.