Mr. Bell goes to Washington..

For the most part, I don't get to town much. Hagerstown has a nice hardware store, and if it still had a lumberyard, I wouldn't have to venture out even as often as I do. Still, on occasion, a worthwhile adventure presents itself, and I wander out of my comfort zone.

I had the pleasure of visiting Washington D.C. for the first time in my life for a couple of days last week. Mark Rutherford, past chair of the Libertarian Party of Indiana, and John Vaught LaBeaume, editor of ElectionDissection.com , set up a chance for a few Libertarian candidates from Indiana to meet and conference with a few of the libertarian minded heavyweights in the nations capitol.

Mark accompanied Eric Schansberg, candidate for U.S. Representative, Steve Keltner, candidate for Indiana Senate,
and myself on a whirlwind one day tour.

We started out with the honor of meeting Dick Heller.
Dick Heller and me at the University Club

You may have heard of him. He's the Heller in the recent Washington D.C. vs. Heller decision that overturned the D.C. ban on the peoples ability to lawfully own a handgun. He's been in this fight for 5 years.

Apparently the powers to be in D.C. are unwilling to give up their control over their citizens so easily, though, and have instituted a different set of of overly restrictive laws in an effort to neuter the courts decision. Mr. Heller assured us that D.C. vs. Heller II is already in the works.

Thomas Jefferson said that "The cost of freedom is eternal vigilance". It's good to know Dick Heller is still on watch.

We took a tour of the National Libertarian Party Headquarters, and taped some interviews with Volunteer Coordinator Austin Petersen. I'm happy to say we found a lot of young people involved with the LP in D.C. I'm happy because some of us old guys could sure use the help.

Then we had lunch with David Weigel. He's one of the editors at Reason and Reason.com. It was quite a treat for me, as I have long been a fan of Mr. Weigel's writing style and analysis. Enough so that I linked Reason to my campaign website, and use it as one of the news and opinion feeds. If I wasn't a Libertarian, I'd say it should be required reading.

We found that Fred Smith of the Competitive Enterprise Institute is passionate about his desire for Libertarians and Libertarian candidates to communicate libertarian ideas better to the voters.
Fred Smith and me at the CEI offices

It's something we all agreed needs to be done.It's certainly something I'm going to work on.You can find a lot of solid support for the benefits of competitive free enterprise at www.cei.org .

We also took the opportunity to tour the headquarters of one of the premiere think tanks of the world, the Cato Institute. We had a round table discussion (minus the table) with Tim Lynch, the Director of Cato's Project on Criminal Justice.
John and Eric at Cato Headquarters

If you are familiar with the works of Cato, you would have to agree that there are a lot of intelligent people in Washington. Unfortunately, they're not always in the right places or positions.

As I said earlier, it was a whirlwind day. It ended with an informal (and noisy) meet and greet with a group of DC area Libertarians. Again, most of them were younger than me, and a lot of them were younger than my children, so they probably didn't think it was as noisy as I did, but all in all, a nice evening.

From the tidbit section:

There were 5 of us traveling from the University Club to the Darlington House. Three of the group climbed into the first cab, while Eric and I grabbed the second. I've waited 56 years to shout "Follow that cab!!!!". I don't think Eric or the driver enjoyed it as much as I did, though.

Apparently drivers in D.C. believe that honking your horn can displace matter.

I had the chance to do a little touring before my flight home the next day was delayed. I went to see the reflecting pond where Forrest Gump's speech wasn't heard. I don't know why they can't find someone to pick up trash and pull weeds in the area. Hopefully some of those TSA agents from the airport can help if we go off of the Orange Level Alert. That's all I have to say about that.

There are a lot of memorials in Washington, for a lot of patriots, both soldiers and statesmen, that have given their lives and fortunes in an effort to protect our freedom. I hope we decide that we are not going to give that freedom up to easily.

To anybody.

Not me....

It wasn't always easy to get one of kids to fess up when Mom asked who tracked mud across the living room floor, or when Dad asked who left the milkhouse door open. It really wasn't something you wanted to admit to.

We see the same thing a lot of times when it gets towards the end of an elected official's term of office. For the number of people who will admit voting for them, you have to wonder how Mitch or George ever won their elections.

I've had a lot of discussions with people explaining why I think they should vote for me this fall, and asking for their support in my race even if they cast their vote for another party in another race.

Most voters tell me they never vote a straight ticket, anyway, because they prefer to vote for the person instead of a party. I think that is a good thing. At least it shows they're thinking.

But in 2006, 43% of the voters in Wayne County cast straight ticket ballots, which tells me that people who cast straight ticket ballots don't talk to Libertarians.

I guess.

And then there were two...

I'm running for the Indiana House of Representatives District 54 seat this year. It's the same seat I ran for in 2006. I learned earlier this week that the only candidates in the race are myself and Republican incumbent Tom Saunders.

In 2006, it was a three-way race, with Democrat David Sadler joining in. In that three-way race, I was able to win 6 precincts, and finish second in three others. I recieved 22% of the vote in Wayne County, and 14 1/2 % of the vote district wide.

Tom won with 46%.

Now, I'm not pretending that the 54% that didn't push the Republican button last time will vote for me this time. But hopefully, some of them will. And also, hopefully some of that 46% that did push the Republican button last time will decide that their property taxes didn't go down while their sales taxes went up, and maybe some of them will be ready for a change.

Tom's campaign out spent my campaign by $190,000.00 the last time out. I have no doubt he will outspend me by a lot this time, too.

While I don't have as much money, I do have some better ideas at www.electRexBell.com .

And this year, it's just the two of us.

What and how....

I think most presidential candidates, like most people, want the same things. Generally speaking, we all want the United States to be free, safe and prosperous, although the definition of "free" varies from candidate to candidate and person to person. The main difference between the candidates is how the things we want should be accomplished. Since the poor will always be among us, certainly helping them out will always be necessary.

One of the core principles of Libertarian thought is that we should begin moving welfare from the tax burden and return it to private charity where it began and belongs. Traditionally, that was closer to the Republican way of thinking, while Democrats generally favored a little more involvement by the government.

While being an overtaxed family of modest means, we do support charities both inside and outside of our church as best we can, maintaining that we should keep the right to decide where our charitable dollars are spent.

A while back, George Bush decided to implement his faith
based initiative, where tax dollars were used even more to fund charities. Many Democrats were opposed to this plan, not for the right reasons in my opinion, but never the less, they were opposed to it.

As the line between Republicans and Democrats continues to blur, we find Barak Obama endorsing giving tax dollars to faith based charities. I'm anxious to hear the Democrats' response to the plan now.

I already know the Libertarian response.

What a waste....

I just finished spending a week of evenings at our county fair. I’m not sure how long a person can survive on Lemon Shake-Ups and Elephant Ears, but know from experience you can make it at least 7 days. I’m sure there are people who believe that spending three dollars for some lemon seeds and sugar in a glass of water, or four dollars for an ounce of fried dough dragged through a bowl of cinnamon and sugar might be wasteful, but it sounded like a good idea at the time, and it did sustain me for a week. And if I was wasting money, at least it was my own.

While I have a lot of family and friends that are active in 4-H, my main reason for attending the fair every night was to work the booth that was promoting our local, state and national Libertarian candidates. (I just happen to be one myself.) Whenever we set up a booth, we always manage to attract a diverse crowd with diverse opinions. Some friendly, some not so friendly, but usually interesting and always welcome.

This year we found a lot more interest in the national ticket than usual, Libertarian Presidential Bob Barr in particular.
Apparently a lot of voters are dissatisfied with the choices the other two parties are offering. But we also heard a lot of the same concerns voters have expressed before. Inevitably, at every event, at least one person tells us that they like a lot of our ideas, but they feel that voting Libertarian would be wasting their vote.

Now admittedly, Libertarians are seldom favored to win, but voting shouldn’t be like betting on a horse race, and if choosing the winning candidate was the only criteria for deciding whether or not your vote was wasted, then about half of the votes are wasted in every election.

I became convinced several years ago that the only way to waste a vote is to use it voting for something that you don’t want. Say, for instance, that you want lower taxes, but you vote for a person or party that continues to raise and create new taxes. That is a wasted vote. Or say, for instance, that you want government that isn’t quite so intrusive in your private life, but you vote for a person or party that continues to expand government. That is a wasted vote.

If you waste three or four dollars on some less than healthy fair food, you can probably recover by purchasing one less gallon of gas and walking 15 or 20 miles. Wasted votes have a longer lasting effect, and they’re a little harder to get over.

But we can get over it. We just need to stop wasting our votes voting for something we don’t want. And this November would be a good time to start.

Fair enough?...

Stop by the Libertarian Party of Wayne County booth at the Wayne County Fair in Richmond this week. Meet the candidates, ask questions, take the Worlds Smallest Political Quiz, sign up for a door prize, or just sit and rest a spell. Or all of the above.

The booth will be open each evening from 6:00 until 9:00.

We promise to be on our best behavior, because we're right across the street from the Sheriff's Mobile Command Unit and Tactical Response Vehicle.

Death by a thousand cuts...

Well, they're at it again. Or still. The president and the congress are again thumbing their collective noses at the 4th amendment guarantees of protection against unreasonable searches. If that disgusts you like it does Libertarians, you might want to consider voting against it this fall.



Here's the press release from the Barr for President campaign:

"June 19, 2008 6:33 pm EST

Atlanta, GA -- “In asserting his power to conduct warrantless searches of Americans, President George W. Bush has expressed his clear contempt for the Fourth Amendment. So has Sen. John McCain, despite his reputation as a supposed maverick,” says Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party candidate for president. Now the Democratic-led Congress is preparing to approve a so-called compromise that gives the Bush administration almost everything it wants in order to expand dramatically the power of the federal government to surveil American citizens without court orders. “America desperately needs leaders who will stand up for the Bill of Rights,” observes Barr, “not those who flaunt its vital and time-honored protections.”

The president already has the power to conduct surveillance of foreign terrorists. The 30-year old Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act provides for court oversight, along with the requirement that the government get a warrant. “The court has virtually never rejected a request,” notes Barr. “Changes in technology require updating the law, not gutting it.”

However, the bill being advanced by the Democratic leadership “would allow the government to listen to millions of phone calls by Americans with neither an individualized warrant nor an assessment of probable cause,” he adds. Although the law would offer some protection when a particular American was expressly targeted, even then “the proposed rules fall short of what the Fourth Amendment mandates.”

Moreover, the bill would immunize telephone companies from wrong-doing, protecting them against law suits even when the firms violated the law by helping the government conduct warrantless searches. Past cases would simply be dismissed. “Conservatives once said, ‘you do the crime, you do the time,’ but no longer,” observes Barr. Now virtually the entire Republican Party is prepared to sacrifice the Fourth Amendment rights of Americans in favor of federal government power.

And the Democratic leadership is ready to do the same. Congressional Democrats privately say that they don’t want to take the political risk of opposing the president. “But the individual liberty of Americans is not a political football, something to be tossed about when an election looms,” insists Barr. “It is the constitutional duty of lawmakers of both parties to defend the Constitution, even when they believe doing so might be politically inconvenient.”

Advocates of abandoning the Constitution warn us that we live in dangerous times. But Americans have long lived in dangerous times. “That didn’t stop the nation’s founders from creating a Constitution that secured individual liberty and limited government,” notes Barr. “It shouldn’t stop us from following the Constitution today.”

Barr represented the 7th District of Georgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003, where he served as a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, as Vice-Chairman of the Government Reform Committee, and as a member of the Committee on Financial Services. Prior to his congressional career, Barr was appointed by President Reagan to serve as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, and also served as an official with the CIA.

Since leaving Congress, Barr has been practicing law and has teamed up with groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the American Conservative Union to actively advocate every American citizens’ right to privacy and other civil liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. Along with this, Bob is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom."

"Time, time, time, see whats become of me"...

A few weeks back we had some fun making fun of some proposed government spending concerning a plan to synchronize their watches. Although we haven't been able to pinpoint when or how all of the funding was approved, apparently workers are stringing cables through the county building to make the hookups.

Since every cloud is supposed to have a silver lining, I've been looking for something positive to come out of this fiasco. Maybe I've found it.

Hopefully, with the new system, we will be able to pinpoint the exact time the taxpayers lost control of their government.