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L. Neil Smith's THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE Number 181, July 8, 2002 WHAT FREEDOMS ARE LEFT?
Neil, You Were Right
Exclusive to TLE TO: L. Neil Smith FROM: Angel Shamaya
RE: Neil, You Were Right July 3, 2002 Neil, Back during the 2000 presidential selections, I explained to you and several other libertarian friends my reasons for supporting Texas Governor Bush for the presidency. I explained that while I'd only ever voted libertarian all of my adult life, I'd be holding my nose and punching ballot in his name -- because I knew he'd blow it, and I believed that his failure to enforce our rights as a Republicrat would best assure a third party success in 2004 or 2008. Somehow, I convinced myself that only a Republican victory and the sure-to-follow failure as a Constitutional leader would produce significant Third Party Momentum. I was wrong. Way wrong to the point of "what the hell was I thinking" wrong. And not only did I settle my vote for the allegedly lesser evil, I involved our organization in the post-election fury over lost military votes and other Bush-getters, as well. So I thought I'd tell you what I learned and vow that I will never -- ever, in my entire life -- vote for a Republican presidential candidate again. If a governor who signed a concealed carry bill in his state can avoid true defense of our rights and scat all over our Founders' graves while swaying hordes of people with mere lipservice to Liberty and redoubled efforts to kill her, the national party and its governing "philosophies" are so utterly subverted they're beyond salvage. And a sad minority even notices, when it comes right down to it -- happy idiots believe what the talking head tells them, as long as the beer's not too warm. One need only look at W's record -- and the record of his administration -- to see what these police statists are made of:
There's more, a whole lot more, and more is on the way. You said in late October 2000 that our rights would probably fare better under Gore than Bush -- that it might just be a good thing for all of us if Gore were to win. You may have been right about that, too -- probably so. Under a Gore presidency, I can't help but wonder if the misnamed "USA PATRIOT" Act would've been squashed -- or at least read, and some of its worst tenets pared down. Instead, people who challenged that Dark Horse as it neared signing were labeled as unpatriotic -- as if questioning the dissolution of centuries of rights protection can be anything but good -- and Republicans toed the line in lockstep with their leadership like good little spineless ass kissers. The few that disagreed gave a valiant effort -- right up until the next paycheck rolled in, in most cases -- and it's back to business as usual with only small attempts to address the issues that would've been center stage, from "our" camp, had a Democrat tried to pull that sh*t. Under a Gore presidency, we'd have had a Reno-type Attorney General -- probably not someone who'd pass out on stage while muttering about how sad it was that she "had to" torch little children -- but it certainly wouldn't have been John Ashban. (The AG's new nickname comes from his commitment during congressional hearings to enforce the "assault weapons" ban King George III doesn't have the intestinal fortitude to let sunset.) While a Gore-appointed Attorney General would probably have, like Ashban, insisted that the "Supreme Court" ignore its duty recently to hear the valid Second Amendment cases in both Emerson and Haney, he or she would've taken very hot heat from at least some of the Republicans, and certainly the NRA, for so doing. Instead, we've got NRA telling us SCOTUS' refusal to hear either of these worthy cases is "a victory" -- overt Bravo Sierra to anyone with half a thinking cap, but eaten up like cotton candy from the masses of wishful-thinking dolts who seemingly cannot bear to face the results of this "win" -- and establishment Republicans pretending the truck didn't run over grandma's gun collection, or banking on the fact that it did, knowing their future advisor-choreographed wailing about it will help win re-elections. If Gore had become America's 2000 Dictator, "Homeland Security" wouldn't have the nazilike momentum for liberty's destruction that it has today -- if for no other reason than he'd be spending so much time inventing teleportation routers to interface with his internet. Gore's attempt to create some of Bush's most infringing, privacy-invasive, liberty-sapping "security measures" would've rallied the troops. Instead, the "Right" is mostly obediently going along to get along while "our side" pays W homage and pretends his nakedness is how it's supposed to be. What little anger we hear from the "radical" Republicans is tame compared to the bald, galling truth -- and many on the Left are making lots of sense these days when it comes to the things the Bush administration has done to walk all over their favored rights, assuring that their socialistic strength will grow as a result. And that doesn't even address the things that are being handed to the Left as consolation prizes for Bush having won an election with a margin smaller than the number of people you'll find in the bathrooms during the 7th inning stretch of a Major League baseball game -- the Bush Democrat-Socialist Entitlement Highway opened for business even before he was declared the victor in the election Liberty lost. Then there's the coming vote on whether or not to let the illegal, unConstitutional so-called "Assault Weapons" ban sunset. Gore wouldn't have let it sunset, but his failure to do so would've brought gunowners out in numbers, to many worthy ends. Instead, we've got president Push -- EPC, for Evilly Politically Correct -- to not let it sunset, and a mostly quiet hayride while and after he renews it. The NRA intends to urge "The Administration" and their sometimes-rented congressmen to let the AW ban sunset because "it hasn't been effective in fighting crime" -- as if crime has any damned thing at all to do with the Second Amendment -- and when their president Boy shuts them down hard on the issue, they'll still spend millions of dollars in his failed re-election bid and guilt their gullible flock to fork over more squandered federal reserve notes "for freedom". W's re-election will fail in 2004 -- but he won't lose to a Libertarian, and that's why I have to say I was wrong and you were right. Where I once thought Bush's destined insolence toward the liberties to which he translucently espoused loyalty would have gun owners and liberty advocates rush to go Third Party, I now understand that most people who believed W was the Second Coming are perfectly willing to dimple a chad on his behalf again even while admitting, with substantial and incriminating evidence, that he's got horns and a tail. Any president of the united States of America who'd rather blow a hijacked plane out of the sky than let pilots shoot hijackers is downright EVIL -- dark, sadistic, malicious, power-crazed to the point of maniacal, and malignant -- and anyone who can't stare that fact squarely in the eye needs to imagine both scenarios, imagine the 3,000-ish lives lost on 9/11 due to pilot vulnerability, and deal with the reality of who benefited most from the WTC and Pentagon attacks. If Gore had been selected in 2000, we probably wouldn't have had to see him with a beard, either -- I like beards on Real Americans, but seeing one on him was like seeing one on the school nurse while she tells you to swallow castor oil because it's good for you. Only a balaclava will cover what needs covering there. Good things will definitely happen as a result of W's presidency: libertarians and other third parties will see greater numbers in the 2004 presidential elections than they've previously recorded -- as will many lesser elections along the way and thereafter -- and the advancement of Establishment Republican Disillusion will be more apparent than ever before in our lifetimes. But it wasn't worth throwing my vote away on the guy whose cronies told the Supreme Court not to do their jobs on behalf of the Second Amendment. Neil... you were right. This Independence Day, one more thing I'm celebrating is my Independence from the George W. Bush administration -- it's full of, run by, propped up and fed by rabid domestic enemies.
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