Mediaboss Marketing

Five Democrats, an independent and a Libertarian have thrown their hats into the ring to fill the unexpired term of the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis in the 5th Congressional District, which includes southern sections of Brookhaven and Buckhead.

July 31 was the deadline to qualify for the Sept. 29 special election, which will select one of the seven to take the seat until the end of the year.

The seven contenders include Robert Franklin, a Democrat and former president of Morehouse College; Kwanza Hall, a Democrat and former Atlanta City Council member; Barrington Martin II, an educator and former unsuccessful challenger to Lewis in the June primary; Steven Muhammad, an independent and minister from East Point; Chase Oliver, a Libertarian and customer service specialist; state Rep. Able Mable Thomas, a Democrat who has served nearly 22 years in office; and Keisha Waites, a Democrat and former state legislator.

If none of the candidates get a majority, a runoff will be held Dec. 1.

The election to succeed Lewis, who died July 17, for a full two-year term will appear on the Nov. 3 ballot. State Sen. Nikema Williams is the Democratic appoint to replace Lewis on that ballot. The other candidate on the ballot is Republican Angela Stanton-King.

Continued here:
Seven qualify to fill U.S. Rep. Lewis's unexpired term in 5th Congressional District - Reporter Newspapers

On Wednesday, U.S. Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., and chairman of the House Judiciary Committees antitrust subcommittee, opened a half-virtual hearing on Online Platforms and Market Power with a combative opening statement: Our founders would not bow before a king. Nor should we bow before the emperors of the online economy.

That set the tone for the hours of sharp questioning of four of the wealthiest people on the planet: Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Tim Cook of Apple, Sundar Pichai of Google and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, whose companies have a combined market value roughly equivalent to the GDP of Japan.

Given the history of Silicon Valleys relationship with Washington, the intensity and precision of some subcommittee members questions were remarkable. It is a sign that significant tech regulation may be closer than we think.

Despite its techno-libertarian image, the tech industry has had close political ties for decades and remarkable success in getting what it wants.

In the late 1970s, venture capitalists and semiconductor chief executives got Capitol Hill and the Carter White House to agree to tax cuts and looser financial regulations. In the 1980s, a group of young legislators became such boosters of the industry that they were known as Atari Democrats. Ronald Reagan extolled Silicon Valley entrepreneurship and helped tech companies fend off Japanese competition.

The bipartisan love affair intensified in the 1990s as Bill Clinton and Al Gore invited tech executives to shape early internet-era policymaking. Newt Gingrich, then the Republican speaker of the House, talked up cyberspace and formed close alliances with libertarian-minded tech thinkers. His partys leaders convened high-tech summits on Capitol Hill.

The lightly regulated online economy we have today is a product of that decade, when Silicon Valley leaders persuaded starry-eyed lawmakers that young, scrappy internet companies could regulate themselves.

Washingtons embrace of tech continued even as questions emerged about the industrys wealth and power. A 2013 Senate hearing to interrogate Cook about Apples tax avoidance quickly was sidetracked by lawmakers gushing to the chief executive about his companys innovative products. Pichai faced tough questions at a 2018 House Judiciary hearing, but also was showered with praise.

Google is still the story of the American dream, declared Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte of Virginia, the committees chairman at the time.

Those days seemed a dim memory Wednesday. Instead, the mood recalled the traffic safety debates of the mid-1960s that helped catalyze significantly more regulation for the auto industry. After a steady drumbeat of studies and some short-lived congressional inquiries, traffic safety exploded into the public consciousness starting with Senate hearings in the summer of 1965, where top auto executives faced sharp questions about their lax approach to safety.

The evening network news programs showed Robert F. Kennedy, a newly elected senator from New York, grilling the leaders of General Motors about the tiny amount the company spent on safety research. Later that year a young lawyer advising the Senate committee, Ralph Nader, published a blockbuster expos of the industry, Unsafe at Any Speed.

This combination of political and media scrutiny led to passage of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966, which mandated seatbelts and additional car safety features, as well as road improvements like guardrails and traffic barriers.

Wednesday felt like Big Techs Ralph Nader moment: the pointed questioning by committee members, notably its Democratic women like Reps. Val Demings of Florida, Pramila Jayapal of Washington, Lucy McBath of Georgia and Mary Gay Scanlon of Pennsylvania; the crescendo of investigative journalism that, in part, led to this weeks hearing by shining a critical light on Big Techs practices. And now, this House subcommittee is merely one of several legislative or regulatory bodies considering limits on Big Techs power.

There are of course many reasons tech regulation may not come to pass. The issues at stake are wickedly complex, and quite different for each of these companies, something chief executives sought to underscore in the hearing.

It appears to me, Bezos observed, that social media is a nuance-destruction machine, and I dont think thats helpful for a democracy. (Zuckerbergs reaction to that statement sadly was not visible to the audience.)

Large tech companies also have prepared for the regulatory onslaught by starting some of the most well-funded lobbying operations in Washington. They learned a lesson from Microsoft, whose presence in the capital before its antitrust case in 1998 consisted of one employee who worked out of the back of his car because he lacked proper office space.

Although the trial didnt end with Microsoft being ordered to break itself apart, it taught the company that government regulators needed to be taken seriously. And as a result Microsoft tamped down its most aggressive market practices, and escaped much of the yearslong policy scrutiny now facing its peers.

Then there is the sticky problem of public opinion. During other seminal moments carmakers in the 1960s, tobacco in the 1990s the problems posed by unregulated bigness were clear-cut. Cigarettes killed people. Cars were unsafe.

Techs consumer dangers are harder to see and acutely feel on an average day: misinformation, an incomplete search result, a unfairly promoted link, privacy erosion, a skewed algorithm. We may wish we used our smartphones less, or worry about what overuse of social media is doing to our communities and brains.

But we still routinely check our Facebook pages, buy apps via Apple, and click buy on Amazon Prime. Even if, as some representatives noted, we do so because we have little alternative.

What happens next will depend on many things, including the November election. But this week marks the end of Washingtons great love affair with tech, one that helped make these companies bigness possible in the first place.

Margaret OMara is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times and a history professor at the University of Washington in Seattle. She is the author of three books, most recently The Code: Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America, and has published widely on the history of the high-tech economy.

Read the rest here:
OPINION EXCHANGE | The last days of the tech emperors? - Minneapolis Star Tribune

The economist James Buchanan, who along with Gordon Tullock founded the public choice school of economics, shares with Murray Rothbard a trait rare among his fellow economists. Like Rothbard, he is interested in political philosophy. He doesnt agree with Rothbards anarchism, and Id like to discuss one of his arguments on this issue. Buchanan rests his case on an odd view of ethics, and this leads him astray.

According to Rothbard, each person is a self-owner and can acquire unowned property through Lockean appropriation. Persons, if they wish, can hire agencies to protect themselves, but a monopoly state cannot justly seize control of defense and protective services and tax people to pay for these services.

Why does Buchanan reject this? The basic problem he finds with this view is that people wouldnt agree on the boundaries of rights. A Rothbardian world, he thinks, would be chaotic. In A Contractarian Perspective on Anarchy (Nomos, vol. 19, Anarchism, (1978)), he says:

I stated earlier that the primary value premise of individualism is the moral equality of men as men, that no man counts as more than another.The libertarian anarchist accepts this framework, but in a much more restricted application than others who also fall within the individualistic set. The libertarian anarchist applies the moral equality norm in holding that each and every man is equally entitled to have the natural boundaries of his rights respected, regardless of the fact that, among persons, these boundaries may vary widely. If such natural boundaries exist, the contractarian may also use the individual units defined by such limits as the starting point for the complex contractual arrangements that emerge finally in observed, or conceptually observed, political structures.

Buchanan doesnt write in an easy-to-understand style, so Id like to pause and explain his comment. (You might object that I dont write in an easy-to-understand style either.) Buchanan is saying that libertarians believe that everybody has the same rights but are willing to accept large inequalities in property and income. Contractarians like Buchanan could agree with this libertarian starting point, so long as there are objective ways of figuring out the boundaries of rights.

And this is exactly what he denies. In his opinion, objective boundaries of rights dont exist. He says,

What is the ultimate test for the existence of natural boundaries? This must lie in the observed attitudes of individuals themselves.In rejecting the extreme claims of the individualist anarchists, we should not overlook the important fact that a great deal of social interaction does proceed without formalized rules. For large areas of human intercourse, anarchy prevails and it works.In the larger context, however, the evidence seems to indicate that persons do not mutually and simultaneously agree on dividing lines among separate rights.

Buchanan thinks that people wouldnt agree about rights boundaries. For this reason, we need to have a state to settle these boundaries. He relies in this argument on a questionable conception of moral theory. Rothbard thinks that there is an objectively correct libertarian legal code that specifies the rights people have. Whether this code is correct does not depend on peoples agreeing to it. If they dont acknowlege it, they should. The code doesnt settle all disputed questions, but if you accept what Rothbard says, Buchanans argument for a state fails. Buchanans argument for a state depends on substantial disagreements about rights that people couldnt settle under anarchism, and he hasnt shown that there would be this level of disagreement if Rothbards system were in place.

Now we come to the heart of the dispute between Buchanan and Rothbard, and this is where I think that Buchanan has a mistaken notion of moral theory. In what is for him an expression of passion, he says of people who claim to judge on behalf or others what is in their interest, If God, in fact, did exist as a superhuman entity, an alternative source of authority might be acknowledged. But, failing this, the only conceivable authority must be some selected individual or group of individuals, some man who presumes to be God, or some group that claims godlike qualities.) Those who act in such capacities and make such claims behave immorally in a fundamental sense; they deny the moral autonomy of other members of the species and relegate them to a moral status little different from that of animals. Its clear that he would extend this condemnation to cover claims to know the moral truth about what people should do apart from their consent.

In other words, if you say that there is an objective law code that should prevail, regardless of whether people agree to it, you are immorally claiming to be better than other people. But in what way are you claiming to be better than other people any more than, say, an economist who advances a theory of how to analyze government is claiming to be objectively better than other economists who disagree with his theory? Buchanan would answer that this response misses the fundamental point. There are objective standards in science, but morality isnt a science. There is nothing beyond peoples value judgments.

But that is a view of morality that needs to be defended by argument. It cannot simply be taken as given. That doesnt show Rothbard is correct, but to refute him you would need to look at his reasons in defense of his view of libertarian rights and their proper boundaries. Its isnt enough to aver that if you claim to know moral truth you are claiming godlike powers.

There is a further problem with Buchanans view. From the vehemence with which he asserts the value of individual autonomy, it would seem that he takes this to be more than a personal preference. Is he claiming godlike powers or claiming to be morally better than others who interpret autonomy differently from him, or deny its value altogether? (Rothbard would be in the first group.) Buchanan would appear to grant himself immunity for behavior like that for which he indicts others.

You can learn a lot from reading Buchanan, but you wont find in his work a good reason to reject libertarian anarchism.

See the original post:
Buchanan and Anarchism | Mises Wire - The Shepherd of the Hills Gazette

"Exciting" and "exhilarating" were the words going through my head when I attended this past Libertarian National Convention.

The convention, in a normal setting, is worth looking forward to, but the recent events in the world made this one for the history books. The Libertarian Party was the very first party in history to nominate the presidential and vice presidential candidates via an online convention, using Zoom video conferencing.

I had the honor of presiding as the chair of the Oregon delegation, which consists of 14 other Oregon Libertarians. We connected in real time with over 1,000 other Libertarian delegates to the convention from across the country, and with the Oregon delegation by Slack, an online messaging tool. The convention is continuing in person next week in Orlando when we meet to ratify the nominations, elect party officers and edit and adopt our platform and bylaws.

While the mechanics of the convention were interesting enough, it was the result that was so exciting. The Libertarian Party is the third-largest party in the country and expects to be on the ballot in all 50 states again, as it has for the last three presidential elections. Our slogan is that we are the "Party of Principle" because we stand strongly on our principles, the primary one of which has been described as "Dont hurt people and dont take their stuff."

Libertarians strongly oppose any government interference into personal, family and business decisions. Essentially, we believe all Americans should be free to live their lives and pursue their interests as they see fit if they do no harm to another.

This year, we nominated Jo Jorgensen as the partys presidential candidate. She is a senior lecturer in psychology at Clemson University and was the Libertarian Party vice presidential nominee with Harry Browne in 1996. She wants to bring home our military and stop military aid to foreign governments, eliminate trade wars and tariffs, repeal arbitrary quotas on the number of people who can legally enter the U.S. to work, visit or reside, and slash federal spending, making government much smaller, and let you keep what you earn.

Her vice presidential running mate is Jeremy "Spike" Cohen. Cohen started a web design company in 1999 and retired from that three years ago to promote libertarian ideas full time. His aim is to make people more familiar with voluntary solutions and property rights.

Libertarians select their slate differently than the two major parties, in that the presidential nominee does not select her running mate: delegates do. We selected Cohen because he was the most articulate and had brought more new members to the party than the other candidates. He had been running with a satirical candidate so you may have seen him touting those goals online: a Waffle House on every corner and free cheesy bread. His candidacy is serious, though, and his positions include ending qualified immunity, demilitarizing the police, making officers pay for their own abuse settlements, reducing and eliminating sentencing for victimless crimes and ending the failed war on drugs.

If these ideas interest you, consider coming to the next meeting of the Lane County Libertarians. We meet on the first Tuesday of every month at 6:30 p.m. at the Oregon Electric Station.

Carolyn Wade is the chair of the Lane County Libertarians and secretary of the Oregon Libertarian Party.

See the rest here:
Guest View: Tired of the other two parties? - The Register-Guard

Libertarian party presidential candidate, Jo Jorgensen, has appeared on a podcast associated with the anti-government boogaloo movement just days after an adherent of the movement was arrested for allegedly murdering two law enforcement officers.

One of the other people on the podcast also runs a Facebook page which is strewn with memes that reference insurrectionary violence, and appear to invoke white nationalist and neo-Nazi imagery and subject matter.

The Libertarian party is one of the largest political parties in the US, outside the dominant pairing of the Democrats and Republicans. Although the partys vote is still comparatively small, it has finished third in the last two presidential elections, and has increased its share of the vote in four successive elections, going from 0.4% of the vote in 2004 to 3.3% in 2016, when it fetched almost 4.5 million votes

On the Roads to Liberty podcast, Jorgensen was quizzed on her policy proposals by a group of men who were introduced as some of the head admins for some of the most influential pages in the so-called boogaloo movement.

The word boogaloo refers to the prospect of a second civil war in the US by playing off a reference to a movie sequel, Breakin 2: Electric boogaloo. For some in the anti-government boogaloo movement, any such civil conflict carries the possibility of an insurrection against an overbearing state and the law enforcement officers who serve it, particularly agencies tasked with enforcing restrictions on gun rights. But others who use the term conceive of the boogaloo as a race war.

Apart from the podcast host, who broadcasts under the name Hobbs, and the producer, Ben Backus, the questioners included a man identifying himself as Rick, an administrator of the North /K/arolina Facebook page; a man identifying himself as Justin, an administrator of the now-absent Thick Boog Line Facebook page; and Cameron Purser, a North Carolina man who runs Flytrap Firearms Consulting, a firearms training business.

Also questioning Jorgensen was a man identifying himself as Squid, an administrator of the Patriot Wave: V 2.0 (PW2) page, which currently has 10,000 followers. A group associated with a previous, since-banned incarnation of that page were responsible for the first high-profile public appearance of the boogaloo movement, when they paraded masked and armed at a large pro-gun rally in Richmond, Virginia, in January.

While some boogaloo adherents articulate a racially inclusive, universalist form of anti-government ultra-libertarianism, the PW2 page features dozens of memes which reference fascist, white nationalist, and accelerationist neo-Nazi imagery.

Several memes featured on the page venerate white soldiers of the Rhodesian army who fought to maintain white supremacist minority rule in that country before it became Zimbabwe.Several other PW2 memes positively couch images of Nazi Germany and second world war German soldiers.

Other memes feature a reference to Marvin Heemeyer, aka Killdozer, a Colorado businessman who demolished several buildings with a modified bulldozer in 2004 before taking his own life. The Heemeyer incident was referred to by Steven Carillo, the accused double killer and apparent boogaloo sympathizer who allegedly scrawled a Heemeyer quote in blood on the hood of a police cruiser before his arrest on 6 June.

Alex Newhouse is the Digital Research Lead at the Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism at the Middlebury Institute, and has recently published two research papers on the boogaloo movement.

Upon viewing a selection of PW2s memes, Newhouse wrote in an email: While Patriot Waves memes do not explicitly promote Nazi ideologies, they are clearly evocative of more fringe and extreme Nazi accelerationist communities, and the allusions to Rhodesia and South Africa are clearly racist dog whistles which attempt to stoke fears of white displacement and genocide.

Cassie Miller, a senior researcher at the Southern Poverty Law Center who has written on the boogaloo movement, said: Patriot Wave reflects the overlap between the so-called boogaloo movement and the racist far-right.

The questioners ask Jorgensen about a range of policy areas, including taxes, veterans affairs, and second amendment issues.

Squid, however, asks about Jorgensens views on the boogaloo movement as a whole.

Jorgensen replies, Oh, can you please explain that to me again?, and appears not to know about the movement, despite recent arrests of alleged violent extremists who identified with the movement.

Squid explains the purpose of the movement as basically liberty and justice for all.

Well, I am definitely for liberty and justice for all, Jorgensen replies.

On Jorgensens appearance on a boogaloo related podcast, Newhouse, the extremism researcher, says: When politicians make outreach to boogaloo communities, they are mainstreaming this explicitly revolutionary, anti-government movement that has already been linked several instances of real-world violence.

He adds: Boogalooers routinely celebrate and call for deadly violence against journalists and government officials, which means that politicians who ally with them may tacitly legitimize anti-democratic actions, such as armed intimidation and confrontation of political opponents.

In an email, after being given examples of troubling images on the PW2 page, Jorgensen declined to specifically repudiate the support of the boogaloo movement, writing: I welcome the support of anyone who will reject violence and bigotry in favor of non-aggression, peaceful persuasion, and voluntary cooperation.

Asked if the boogaloo movement were anti-government extremists, Jorgensen wrote: The media tend to lump together peaceful protesters and those who advocate violence, and paint the entire group as being violent.

She added: The boogaloo movement is highly decentralized and comprises both those who are aligned with the principle of nonaggression, and some who run counter to it.

Squid, the PW2 administrator, denied that the group were racist in an email, writing that they were constitutionalists.

Dozens of boogaloo groups, including many of the largest ones, have been promoting Jorgensens candidacy in recent days, and a dedicated Jorgensen meme group involves many self-identified boogaloo adherents.

Facebook, meanwhile, banned hundreds of boogaloo-related accounts, pages, and groups on Instagram and Facebook on 30 June, explaining the move as designating a violent US-based anti-government network as a dangerous organization.

The Libertarian party formally condemns racism in its platform. However in 2017, after the Unite the Right rally, the partys leadership had to issue a public denunciation of white nationalism.

This was necessary because lawyer and recently accused domestic abuser, Augustus Sol Invictus, was a featured participant, having previously run in a primary to be the partys Florida senate candidate.

Asked about how the Libertarian party will keep extremists at a distance in future, Jorgensen wrote: The Libertarian Party is the only political party that favors non-aggression as a fundamental principle. Every Libertarian Party member has signed a pledge that they oppose the initiation of force for the purpose of achieving social or political goals.

Read more:
Libertarian 2020 candidate appears on podcast tied to boogaloo movement - The Guardian