5 Ways That Liberty Won in 2018

By my own self admission I am incredibly optimistic, but my fellow writer at TLR Gary Doan is way too much of a Debbie Downer.

I will say, originally I wanted to do the negatives and positives of 2018, but I am just too positive of a person. So, if you want the full effect of this article, I highly suggest going to read his article “5 Ways Liberty Lost in 2018”

However, if you don’t like the doom and gloom of Liberty politics, you should totally read mine first.

So here it is. The 5 Ways Liberty Won in 2018 from least best to the best best.

5. Trump has had executive power limited

This is something that Trump supporters and non-supporters should both support. Throughout the year, Trump has been defied by both his administration, the Senate, and even his own Supreme Court nominee.

When Trump announced he was remaining a “steadfast partner” of Saudi Arabia after the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, Republican and Democrat officials alike criticized him.

In December, Trump, an adamantly pro-life President,  had his Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh side with the abortion industry, by declining to hear a Planned Parenthood defunding case.

Even something libertarians can’t stand is good in terms of restricting executive power. The Feds continually  rising interest rates despite Trump’s calls to bring them down.

While all of these actions are clearly not wins for liberty, which is why it’s number 5, restrictions and checks on executive power most definitely are. For it was John Adam’s in a letter to Thomas Jefferson that said “Power must never be trusted without a check”

4. Firing of Jeff Sessions

In early November most libertarians got an early Christmas present when Jeff Sessions was fired. Sessions was very well-known for being a staunch supporter of the War on Drugs, civil asset forfeiture, supporting the death penalty, being HORRENDOUS on criminal justice reform, and many more big government regulations we don’t need.

In January of 2018 Sessions repealed Obama era rules and started telling Federal prosecutors to “aggressively enforce federal laws against marijuana.” In 2017 he started the route to bring back civil asset forfeiture, a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment. In 2018 he also sought to start bringing back penalty, and to “OK more death penalty cases” at the federal level. This is not only a violation of the Right to Life, but also not an enumerated power given to the federal government, making it a violation of the Tenth Amendment as well.

Sessions replacement Matthew Whitaker isn’t expected to do much to build or bring down big government, but with Sessions out we can out least count on no more “reefer madness” policies being put into place.

3. The First Step Act

Lots of gifts didn’t come for liberty lovers until the end of 2018, but when they came, they came fast. The FIRST STEP Act is just another example of this. This will reform the criminal justice system to allow ex convicts not only leave prison earlier, but also give them skills to enter the work force after leaving, steering them from committing crimes again.

Signed by Trump just a few days before Christmas, this bipartisan legislation could have  “53,000 prisoners be released over the next 10 years.” It will also input more rehabilitative measure, so when prisoners are released from prison they are less likely to commit more crimes.

While the FIRST STEP Act is not perfect, it is certainly a step in the right direction, and it is definitely a great first step. (Pun intended)

2. Elections 

Election season is where my optimism often gets me in trouble. When working on the Austin Petersen campaign, I thought we would beat Hawley by 8%… instead we only got 8% of the vote. I didn’t let that get me down though, as I went on to make sure we had some solid victories in November.

As Gary pointed out, Young Americans for Liberty (YAL) has a new Win at the Door program. What he failed to point out is that the program did amazing. In the end we knocked 1 million doors and won 37 campaigns, of which two of those I had the privilege of working on.

In a press release the President of YAL Cliff Maloney Jr. had this to say, “1 million doors knocked and 35 victories for YAL endorsed candidates shows that our new tactic of deploying students for state legislative races is working. Mark my words: YAL will elect 250 state house members by the end of 2022. This is how we mobilize YAL’s national college campus network to build the next generation of leaders and advance the libertarian philosophy.”

That makes 11 states that now have at least one Liberty legislature, including Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, a staggering 22 in New Hampshire, Kentucky, Georgia, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, and Wisconsin.

All of these now state legislatures, will one day go on to be the Thomas Massies, Justin Amashs, and Rand Pauls. These positions give them the name ID, for when they run for federal office one day, the newspaper headline won’t say “Local Schmuck Decides to Run for Congress.” Instead it will say, “State Representative Tony Lovasco Looking at a Bid for Congress.” This is what we need to start getting the principles of Liberty in DC, and to start getting those dirty swamp creatures out of there.

This is also an opportunity for young people looking to advance the ideas of liberty, to gain experience in politics and get paid doing it. YAL is already hiring for 2019, and as someone who worked for two of their campaigns, I highly suggest applying! If you want to help out any other way to Make Liberty Win you can also donate or run yourself and get endorsed!

Win at the Door isn’t the only election win for liberty though. Former Governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson, and his bid for Senate was most certainly not an electoral win, but it was definitely a win to get us headed in the right direction. Rand Paul’s endorsement of Gary was definitely a sign that we are on our way to see a split in this Republican Democrat paradigm.

One way to put this is, The Battle of Bunker Hill was a lost battle for the Patriots, but if you ask me I consider it a win. While sure we may have lost the battle, the amount of resources that the enemy had to put in to it to make sure we lost makes things easier for us in the long run. And sadly as libertarians and Liberty minded individuals, we cannot win every battle, but you can be sure as hell we will win the war.

Honorable Mention   

If you look over seas right now you may have seen there is a bit of a revolution going on in France. For those that don’t know, for the past few months French citizens have been rioting over high gas taxes. The reason this only receives an honorable mention though is because what most of the rioters want in replacement isn’t much better, but as a freedom lovin’ son of a gun, I love a good ol’ revolution against big government statists.

1. Bringing them Home

President Trump pulled a lot of surprises out for us in late 2018. Firing Sessions, making a supporter of Rand Paul’s his Chief of Staff, supporting the FIRST STEP Act, but by far the best of them was announcing he is planning on pulling the troops out of Syria.

The news broke the day after Trump banned bump stocks, costing him some of my support, but the announcement to bring the troops home gained all of my support back and then some. If that wasn’t enough, less than 24 hours later, he said he is also bringing half of our troops home from Afghanistan.

This led to the resigning of  James “Mad Dog” Mattis, sadly not John Bolton, and members of both parties attacking him. Even his old opponent Hillary Clinton criticized his decision. Doesn’t bother me much as Ron Paul complimented him on the decision, just three days before Christmas.

This is just a start to pulling out of our endless wars, and I really hope Trump continues on this path of foreign policy.

If you’d like to look more into why pulling out is a good idea, I highly suggest reading my good friend Squiggly Line Guy’s article.

In conclusion, was 2018 a perfect year for Liberty? Absolutely not. However, we should be optimistic going into 2019 about the things we as liberty loving individuals can do to affect change.