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Libertarian Mark Wicks is running against Democrat Rob Quist and Republican Greg Gianforte for Montanas lone U.S. House seat, but he says a lack of media coverage of his campaign is making for a tough political fight.

Well I think they have been doing a real poor job, said Wicks. I had a really good performance in the debates. People have been really excited about it, but Sunday morning you had to read to the very end of the newspaper article to even find out I was there. People didnt even know what happened. Three out of the four commentators at the end said I had the win for the debate.

Wicks believes that an entrenched bias is swaying media away from covering him properly.

I think it is the two party bias, Wicks said. They are protecting the parties. It is hard to get around and hard to get articles ran or even get asked my opinion on stuff. They ask the other two candidates and gloss over me.

Wicks isnt alone in his grievances with Montanas treatment of third party campaigns. Lawsuits have been filed on behalf of the green party bid to get on the ticket and, historically, no third party has had success in attaining a major office in Montana.

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Libertarian Candidate Accuses Montana Media Of 'Poor Coverage and Bias' - Newstalkkgvo

In February of this year, republican state representative from Pelham, Caleb Dyer became the only sitting state rep in the United States to join the Libertarian Party. Now, just three months later, New Hampshire is making libertarian political history again as Keene democrat representing Ward One, Joseph Stallcop, today announced at a press conference at Concords state house, that he is also flipping to Libertarian! Heres the full press conference video:

Not only does New Hampshire now have more sitting state reps than the other 49 states combined, but Dyer and Stallcop, both 21 years old, are forming what is likely the youngest political caucus in the history of the United States.

Now that state reps from both parties have openly defected to the libertarians, the big question is which state rep will be next? Will the courage of these two young men inspire the other libertarian reps who are still operating as republicans and democrats to come out? Former state reps Eric Eastman and Joe Lachance also recently revealed they have flipped from republican to join the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire.

State Representative Joseph Stallcop, of Keenes Ward One

Rep. Stallcop joining the Libertarian Party is also historic as he is the second sitting democrat state representative to have ever done so in the 45-year history of the national party.

New Hampshire, of course, also holds the distinction of having the first-ever democrat state rep to have flipped, when prior to the 2000 election, late state representative Steve Vaillancourt joined the party as a sitting democratic state rep and then ran for re-election in 2000 as a libertarian and won! This fact contradicts those naysayers in the liberty movement who have been claiming its impossible for libertarians who make the flip to actually win re-election. What they are saying is impossible has already been proven possible by New Hampshires own political history! In addition to Vaillancourt, in the nineties New Hampshire had multiple libertarian state reps who also won re-election.

At this mornings press conference, Stallcop gave an excellent speech that revealed the command-and-control structure in the NH democratic party, which echoed Dyers experience in the republican party. Thinking for ones self when in the major parties is apparently discouraged and voting his conscience resulted in his democratic colleagues lying to and looking down on him. One was overheard saying of him, Maybe we shouldnt have college students doing this job.

He called out the democrats hypocrisy, saying, they claim to be against casinos for fear of addiction, yet ignore the lotterys grasp on the poor. They claim to be for criminal justice, though many turned away from a bill that would close the asset forfeiture loophole. They claim to be for the protection of transgender rights, yet didnt even mark that bill as a caucus priority.

LPNH Now Holds Two Seats in State House!

Stallcop called his experience a Cinderella story in reverse and went on to excoriate the two-party system, saying hes, seen beyond the veil of politics and found that ignorance spreads best with mascots and teams. His speech made it clear that the governments social programs are built on a house of cards and he called for voluntary solutions that dont hinge on one political vote. Other speakers included LPNH chairman Darryl W Perry, national LP vice-chair Arvin Vohra, and state representative Caleb Dyer, who is now the floor leader of the new Libertarian house caucus. (Click their names to jump to the start of their speeches in the full video.)

Stallcop recently surprised many by attending the 420 rally at the state house, not only toking up with the crowd of civil disobedients, but also giving a great speech. Rumors began flying that he was considering joining the libertarians, a particularly exciting prospect as it flies in the face of the common misconception that libertarians come from the right, politically. Libertarians come from across the political spectrum, because the non-aggression principle, the guiding principle of libertarianism, is a universal principle and attracts anyone who can understand why its wrong to use aggressive force against peaceful people.

Libertarians and voluntarists around the world should take note of what is happening here. Once again, New Hampshire has proven how unique it is. There are 101 reasons why thousands liberty-loving activists have been moving here, and that list just keeps getting longer and more attractive as we continue to have success after success, as libertarians elsewhere continue to fail over and over again. If you really care about liberty, you really need to be planning your move to New Hampshire, ASAP. If youd like to connect with other libertarians already living here, please visit the Shire Forum.

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Keene Democrat State Rep. Joseph Stallcop Flips to Libertarian ... - Free Keene

@GhutfvbjfdrgvcWhat's worse, anti-anti-Trumpism, or Kmele Foster singing James Taylor? Or is that just an Obamaesque false choice? These are just some of the questions explored in this week's edition of The Fifth Column podcast, also featuring myself and Michael C. Moynihan. We of course dive into President Donald Trump's firing of FBI Director Jim Comey, and the media reaction thereof, as well as the likelihood of Congress exerting oversight.

Also receiving extended examination is top U.S. law enforcement assertion that Julian Assange is not a "journalist," and the fundamental boringness of libertarians vociferously agreeing with one another. Receiving additional mentions: Augustus Sol Invictus, Reason commenters, Jamie Kirchick, Milo Yiannopoulos, and this great Reason TV video. Listen up:

Reminder: Kmele Foster will be debating Lawrence Ross at the SoHo Forum May 16 on whether America's colleges have fostered a racist environment that makes them a hostile space for black students. And as mentioned on the podcat, I'll be on HBO's Real Time With Bill Maher tomorrow night.

Get more Fifth Column at iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, wethefifth.com, @wethefifth, and Facebook.

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Comey, Assange, and Libertarian Purity Tests: The New Fifth Column - Reason (blog)

This week President Donald Trump announced the names of 10 judicial nominees he is putting forward to fill vacancies on federal courts around the country. It is an impressive list, featuring both distinguished legal academics and respected state judges. What's more, Trump's picks have been widely cheered on the legal right, earning kudos from both conservatives and libertarians.

C-SPANWriting at the Library of Law & Liberty, John O. McGinnis also praises Trump's judicial picks and then goes on to speculate about why they have been so uniformly applauded by right-leaning legal thinkers. "Appointing judges whose ideal is to enforce the Constitution as written unites almost all strands of the political right," McGinnins notes. "For traditional conservatives, the Constitution represents an anchor against too rapid change. For libertarians, the Constitution contains valuable limitations on government power and protections of rights."

But don't conservatives and libertarians also have some pretty fundamental disagreements about the meaning of the Constitution? How long can the current harmony last on the legal right? McGinnis has some interesting thoughts:

[O]ne might wonder whether this union will survive the increasingly fierce debate between judicial engagement and judicial restraint among constitutional theorists on the right. Given the harshness of the words exchanged, it might seem surprising that Trump's judges receive praise from both quarters. These appointees, as fine as they are, cannot be simultaneously apostles of judicial engagement and judicial restraint.

In McGinnis's view, the union will hold for now because it makes sense as a temporary political alliance. But it will start to fray as the conservative legal movement enjoys greater and greater success:

Most libertarians and conservatives prefer the other's interpretive methodology as compared to the increasingly aggressive progressivism of left-liberal judicial review, because advocates of both engagement and restraint at least begin with the Constitution's original meaning. Political enemies often help bind coalition partners who are in less than full agreement. But if Trump were to replace Justices Kennedy, Breyer and Ginsburg, the theoretical debates would then gain political resonance. Political victories are never permanent in part because they make real divisions out of the theoretical fault lines that previously existed.

In other words, as more "conservative" judges are appointed to the federal bench, the various factions within the conservative legal movement will increasingly jockey for position and influence, and will increasingly clash with each other over their preferred candidates for judicial vacancies.

Here's an example of how the rift between conservative and libertarian legal thinking might play out on the national political stage. One of the names on Trump's famous list of 21 potential SCOTUS candidates was Judge William Pryor of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. Pryor is a strong advocate of judicial deference. In a 2007 article in the Virginia Law Review, for example, Pryor praised the Supreme Court for its landmark 1937 rulings in favor of New Deal regulations, such as National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., in which the Court adopted an expansive new interpretation of congressional power under the Commerce Clause, and West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, in which the Court overturned its previous line of cases protecting the fundamental right to liberty of contract. "Not every controversy requires a judicial resolution or trumping of the will of the majority," Pryor wrote. In those pro-New Deal rulings, he insisted, "the judiciary wisely has acted with restraint."

Now contrast Pryor's views with those of Texas Supreme Court Justice Don Willett, whose name also appeared on Trump's SCOTUS short-list. "When it comes to regulating the economy," Willett complained in his 2015 concurrence in Patel v. Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, "Holmesian deference still dominates" at the Supreme Court. The term Holmesian refers to Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., the patron saint of liberal and conservative devotees of judicial deference. Needless to say, Willett rejects the Holmesian approach. "The State would have us wield a rubber stamp rather than a gavel," he declared in Patel, "but a written constitution is mere meringue if courts rotely exalt majoritarianism over constitutionalism, and thus forsake what Chief Justice Marshall called their 'painful duty''to say, that such an act was not the law of the land.'"

Pryor and Willett are both "conservative" judges and they no doubt agree on many issues. But on this fundamental issuedo courts owe "Holmesian deference" to democratic majorities?they are in stark disagreement. So here's a thought experiment: Imagine that Justice Anthony Kennedy retires from SCOTUS and Trump lets it be known that he is choosing between Pryor and Willett to replace him. Will the conservative legal movement still maintain its current levels of harmony?

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As Trump Reshapes the Judiciary, Libertarian-Conservative Fault Lines Are Exposed - Reason (blog)

PAT BENIC/UPI/NewscomPresident Donald Trump's decision to fire James Comey as head of the FBI on Tuesday set off a fire storm of political commentary, and with good reason. It's only the second time in the 108-year history of the FBI that the director has been fired by the president (the other was in 1993 when William Sessions was canned by President Bill Clinton over ethical issues), and, more importantly, the firing seemed to coincide with an escalation in the FBI's investigation of ties between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.

Trump apparently wants the Russia story to go away, but he did himself no favors by firing Comey in a way that invites criticism.

Setting aside the politics and optics of Trump's decision to dispose of Comeyboth of which look awful for Trump and have ramifications for Republicans in Congressthere are important legal and constitutional questions about Tuesday's firing.

Did Trump have the authority to fire Comey out of the blue like that? What happens next? Is this a constitutional crisis? I asked some of the top libertarian legal scholars in the country to weigh-in on those questions and offer their assessment of this whole, wild situation.

Here's what they told Reason on Wednesday (responses have been edited for clarity and length):

Ilya Shapiro, senior fellow on constitutional studies at the Cato Institute; editor-in-chief of the Cato Supreme Court Review:

"The legal/constitutional issues here are really easy: there are none. The president has undisputed removal power over the FBI director and he can now appoint a successor. (Until that successor is confirmed by the Senate, deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe is the acting director.)

"In other words, nothing that President Trump has done or is contemplating here is beyond his powers and there is no constitutional crisis. Having said that, the political and policy issues at playnot to mention the opticsare extremely serious.

"Congress may now set up its own investigation, or Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein (at Trump's direction) could appoint an independent prosecutorbut one who by law would also be removable by the presidentor all of these actors could do nothing, leaving the ultimate verdict to the voters in next year's midterm election."

Ilya Somin, professor of law at George Mason University, with a specialty in constitutional law:

"The President has the legal authority to fire an FBI director for almost any reason he wants. I don't think any serious legal commentator doubts that.

"What happens now is that Trump will nominate a replacement for Comey and the Senate will have to decide whether to confirm that person. That may turn out to be an extremely consequential decision."

Somin added that he did not want the first part of his answer to cause libertariansor anyone elseto conclude there is no reason for concern:

"There is a danger that Trump will appoint someone who will look the other way on the Russia investigation (which is looking into allegations of possibly very serious lawbreaking by Trump and his associates), or someone who will condone abuses of civil liberties of the sort we saw in the earlier history of the FBI. Trump's disdain for freedom of speech and his threats to use the power of government to go after his critics are far from reassuring on that score."

Josh Blackman, associate professor of law at the South Texas College of Law in Houston, with a specialty in constitutional law and the U.S. Supreme Court:

"The actions are perfectly constitutional. What happens next is up to the political process. Congress can investigate as it sees fit, and use whatever remedies, up to impeachment, it deems necessary."

On his personal blog, Blackman detailed the crucial difference between Trump's firing of Comey and the so-called "Saturday Night Massacre" in 1973, when President Richard Nixon pushed for the firing of a special prosecutor investigating the Watergate break-in:

"Further, for those drawing analogies to the Saturday Evening Massacre, recall that Nixon never actually fired anyone himself. Instead, he had to ask a subordinate to fire the special prosecutor for cause. Comey was fired by the President, directly, at will (though plenty of causes were given)."

David Bernstein, professor of law at George Mason University:

"I don't think there's any doubt that Trump has the constitutional and legal authority to fire Comey. As for what comes next, Trump will have to appoint a new FBI Director, who will need to be confirmed by the Senate. If the Senate does its job, it will ensure that the new director is not a Trump crony, and indeed the hearings for that new nominee could shed light on the background to Comey's firing.

"There is definitely no constitutional crisis here. Indeed, by a proper understanding of how the executive branch is supposed to work, it would be absurd to think the president is obligated to keep an official he doesn't want, as they are all essentially his employees/agents.

"I can't really speak to how this will play out politically, but in Nixon's case you had a special prosecutor who was getting close to revealing Watergate related secrets, and Nixon was trying to interfere with the investigation. Here, I don't think it's at all clear that the FBI, and any new FBI director, will be any less aggressive than Comey in pursuing the Russia investigation.

"Moreover, because such an individual will have been confirmed by a GOP Senate and not have Comey's baggage from the campaign, the results of that investigation will have additional credibility."

Todd Gaziano, senior fellow in constitutional law, Pacific Legal Foundation:

"Whether you think Comey's dismissal was justified or not, it is not a 'constitutional crisis' for the head of the FBI to be fired. Our republic and the constitutional separation of powers do not require an FBI director at all. The primary checks on executive error or abuse that the Framers created were political, electoral, and judicial checks that do not require a 'special prosecutor' or other 'independent' figures in the executive branch."

Tim Lynch, the Cato Institute's director of criminal justice projects, highlights Comey's history of conducting "trial by news conference," a tactic that he used against Hillary Clinton last year. Though the removal was ham-fisted, Lynch says, it was probably the right thing to do.

"We can do much better than James Comey. If Trump can repeat the careful process by which he selected Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court and secure a fairly swift confirmation vote, this matter will soon be forgotten. If the selection process is mishandled, the political storm clouds will hang over the White House for quite some time."

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Here's What Libertarian Legal Scholars Think About Comey's Firing - Reason (blog)