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Maxime Bernier, QuebecMP and former ForeignMinister, narrowly lost his bid for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada on Saturday to Saskatchewan MP and former House of Commons Speaker Andrew Scheer by just 49% to Scheers 51%.

Scheer is a closeally of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who was criticized by libertarians during his tenure for his support for Keynesian-style stimulus spending. The relatively bland and generic Scheer is generallyassociated with the party establishment, while Bernier was seen as an outsider candidate.

Bernier was believed to be the frontrunner in this race after the impromptu withdrawal of fellow outsider and Shark Tank star Kevin OLeary, who went on to endorse Bernier.

However, the ranked ballot system usedin the leadership election, which involves eliminating lower polling candidates and transferring their votes to the voters subsequent preferences, made the ultimate result difficultto predict. This system appears to have benefited Scheer, who had less personal support, but had the benefit of being less polarizing than other candidates.

Bernier performed unusually poorly in his home province of Quebec, even losing the area he represents in Canadas Parliament, Beauce, to Scheer. Many in Quebec benefit from Canadas statist agricultural policy of supply management, which Bernier seeks to abolish. Supply management has been a major flashpointin Canada-U.S. trade relations, with President Trump lambasting the policy for its unfairness towards American dairy farmers.

Berniersomewhat made up for his lack of support in Canadas eastwith strong support in provinces in Canadas Mountain West, such as Alberta, where his limited government ideologyresonated with Conservative voters. Unfortunately, it appears this was not enough to prevail over Scheer.

Bernier, a self-described Ron Paul fan and an adherent to Austrian economics, previously didan interviewwith The Liberty Conservativelate last year. Much like Trump, Bernier embraced the use of memes during his the campaign, and garnered the support of prominent Canadian libertarian commentatorssuch as Lauren Southern. He also pitched himself as strong on immigration, calling for Canadian troops to be deployed to the border with the United States to prevent migrants denied refugee status there from illegally crossing the border to apply for refugee status in Canada. Berniers strong support fromCanadas young, libertarian-leaning, Trump-inspired new right managedto push Scheer in a positive direction on several important issues, with Scheer pledging last month to defund colleges that do not protect the free speech of students.

Although this result may dismay libertarians in Canada and beyond, Berniers close second place finish demonstratesthat libertarian ideas dohave electoral potential witha right-of-center electorate when combined with a healthy dose of anti-establishment populism. Should Scheer fail to beat Prime Minister Justin Trudeauat the 2019 Canadian general election, Bernier will be well-positioned to succeed him as Conservative leader and take on Trudeau in the 2023 general election.

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Libertarian Maxime Bernier Narrowly Loses Canadian Conservative Party Leadership Election - The Liberty Conservative

Welcome to another edition of The Lowdown on Liberty, where each week we take questions submitted from our readers as we attempt to clarify the inner-workings of libertarian principles. This week, we cover a universal basic income, the non-aggression principle, non-interventionism, and the infamous Antifa!

To answer the first part of your question Lucas, while people have always had a fear of automation rendering human labor obsolete, that type of scenario has yet to happen, and most likely never will. Automation doesnt actually destroy jobs, it displaces them usually the lowest skilled jobs. A popular example is: If we imagine the job market as a ladder with jobs being the rungs, and the lowest skilled being at the bottom, moving up in skill as we climb, then automation simply kicks out the bottom rung of the ladder and places a new, higher-skilled rung near the top.

As technology advances, the least skilled jobs, often repetitive, menial tasks are automated first. Causing the immediate job loss for a person in that position, but creating a more skilled position somewhere else. Whether its building the robot that does their previous job, installing it, maintaining it, programming it, or improving its design, these are all new, more skilled jobs that are added to the market in exchange for the less skilled job being automated. Weve seen this over time as first-world nations either automate or outsource low-skilled jobs and acquire more high-skilled, technical ones. People have always speculated that jobs would run out once automation began, but population has only grown and even though automation has become more prevalent, there are more jobs today than ever. We may theorize that automation will eventually get to a point where human labor is no longer useful, but its much more likely that higher-skilled labor that doesnt yet exist will continue to enter the market, as people continue improving and inventing. Half the skilled jobs being done today didnt exist 100 years ago, and there is no reason to think the next 100 will be any different.

Now, the second part of your question is a bit easier to predict. Universal basic income has been a hot topic lately, with people such as Mark Zuckerberg coming out clearly in support of it. However, libertarianisms core value of non-aggression is incompatible with the idea. A program that implicitly states that each person should receive according to their need, while others pay into it according to their ability (which is what it boils down to), sounds like the antithesis of libertarianism, and more in line with what a communist would endorse. Seeing as automation is unlikely to render us all suddenly unemployed, we should stick to fighting the welfare state, not endorsing it.

Great question, Scott. This example points out the obvious need for pre-determined rules in these situations. In current cases regarding these matters, most cities have laws telling citizens when excessive noise can be punishable as a citable offense. As Murray Rothbard noted, we should have clearly defined and enforceable property rights because we all partake in activities with unavoidable consequences that affect more than just our own property (smells, light and sound pollution, etc.). In a privatized society, we may resolve these with contracts voluntarily signed between neighbors, by-laws within a homeowners association, or a myriad of other ways to ensure that rules are agreed upon beforehand to ensure peaceful resolutions.

The ideas of non-intervention and keeping terror out go hand-in-hand. Our recent history in the Middle East has shown quite convincingly that there is no resolution to be had from nation-building and constant foreign occupation. While you could make the argument that simply pulling out of there would not solve all our current issues with terrorism, its important to point out the Dave Smith argument, which is: when you murder peoples children, they tend to fucking hate you. Our current strategy, Operation Enduring Freedom, is now the longest conflict in US history, outlasting the Civil War, WWI, and WWII combined. And its clearly failing, so there is no harm in trying non-intervention, because at least it would be a change, and the worst-case scenario would only be a return to the status quo. Although, there is quite a case to be made that it is our decades-long intervention and attempts at regime change that have resulted in our current predicament more than anything else. Why is it that we see swarms of terrorist groups in countries around Africa, yet the US and Europe experience almost no problems from them compared to the attacks coming from the Middle East? Non-intervention may not guarantee the total end of terrorism, but ongoing foreign intervention and attempts at nation building will certainly guarantee its persistence.

The Antifa movement seems to be bad joke that simply wont go away. The idea that you could fight fascism by forcibly shutting down the free speech of those you disagree with is so repugnant that its hard to take them seriously. Yet, we see from their actions that they are quite serious in their approach.

This is troublesome for libertarians for two reasons.

First, the ideas they represent fly directly in the face of libertarian ideals. Our strict adherence to property rights and non-aggression are the two foundations Antifa fights most adamantly against.

Second, they are providing the media with the opportunity to damage our image. For those who may not know, true anarchists, those who identify as anarcho-capitalist, fall under the larger umbrella of libertarianism. However, the media, as well as Antifa themselves, call themselves anarchists too. Now, we in the liberty movement can distinguish their anarcho-communism from what actual anarchy is, but most average Americans cannot. To the uninformed, these people fall into the category relating to anyone who is anti-government; thats us. With that in mind, we must fight the ideas of Antifa at every point possible if we hope to distinguish ourselves from them. They are truly a hypocritical scourge in our society, but if we arent careful, they may cause serious damage to our image and our credibility.

Alright, thats it for this week. Thank you to everyone who wrote in, and make sure you submit your questions each week on our The Lowdown on Liberty post, and the top questions will be answered the following week!

Featured image: BasicIncome.org

This post was written by Thomas J. Eckert.

The views expressed here belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect our views and opinions.

Thomas J. Eckert is college grad with an interest in politics. He studies economics and history and writes in his spare time on political and economic current events.

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Can Libertarians Advocate for Universal Basic Income? The Lowdown On Liberty - Being Libertarian

With the recent release of BackWordz debut album and its success, it dawned on me that a part of libertarianism that was missing is just now beginning to bud into something. That something is taking our ideas and putting them into pop culture.

The ideals of libertarians have been stuck for decades in the academic realm because of the influences of economists, philosophers and historians. While this is great for defending those ideas with other intellectuals, it makes the literature and discourse explaining them and very dry and less accessible.

Frankly, its hard work to learn about free markets, non-aggression, and individualism because these are not widely expressed in popular media. This doesnt mean principle must be sacrificed to spread the ideology, but it might be time for libertarians to leave the lecture hall in favor of the concert venue or movie theater.

What makes the ideologies of the major parties (and even the more left leaning third parties) so rampant, is that their views have had their own music, movies and other pop culture influences for even longer. The 1960s saw the rise of music protesting the government and preaching the need for Civil Rights.

Country Joe Mcdonald wrote I-Feel-Like-Im-Fixin-To-Die-Rag and Creedence Clearwater Revival released Fortunate Son in 1969, both in protest of the Vietnam War.

Art was more geared towards drug use and sexual experimentation. An article from History Now describes the culture as youth counterculture, it carved out new spaces for experimentation and alternative views about what constituted a good society. While a new left, made up of civil rights and anti-war activists, developed as the war in Vietnam dragged out and became increasingly bloody, confounding, and ultimately unpopular.

Patriotic songs like Ballad of the Green Berets by Staff Sergeant Barry Sadler and Merle Haggards Okie from Muskogee also did well as songs supporting the war. Vietnam was the first time that the nations music clearly reflected a division of political views in the country. The tradition of political music has expanded and continued since this era.

The lovers of liberty who would eventually become the Libertarian Party were just beginning to form in response to the war and the Nixon administrations lifting of the gold standard, so supporters of the major parties had way more time than the would-be libertarians to focus on music and art to express their views.

Today, the major parties also have more high profile celebrities, from Leonardo DiCaprio giving a speech on the environment while accepting his Oscar, to Arnold Schwarzenegger becoming Governor of California. Thebiggest libertarian celebrities, outside of economists and philosophers, include Drew Carey, Vince Vaughn and Clint Eastwood, who are not necessarily current A-listers.

Conservatives and liberals also have popular TV shows that support their narratives. Duck Dynasty, and 19 Kids and Counting come to mind when one thinks of conservative shows, while the left has shows like Dear White People, and Modern Family. The closest thing to a libertarian TV show is the greatness (personal opinion) of Ron Swanson in Parks & Recreation.

Libertarianism is just beginning to make its own pop culture and its spearheaded by music groups like BackWordz, and Freenauts, as well as websites like Anarchyball.

Clothing that contains messages of individual and economic freedom are becoming easier to acquire thanks to sites like Libertarian Country, and Threads of Liberty, and sites like Etsy and Zazzle that allow independent producers to sell their products.

This is just the beginning.

In the future, there could be libertarian music festivals, film festivals, art galleries and clothing outlets. What I hope to see is libertarian ideas to begin seeping into more and more pop culture until the values of individualism and non-aggression have become mainstream and more easily able to be adopted.

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Pop Culture is the Next Step for Libertarians - Being Libertarian

A 'popular libertarian' might ... feel all that needs to be done to bring the world to justice is to institute the minimal state now, starting as it were from present holdings. On this view, then, libertarianism starts tomorrow, and we take the present possession of property for granted. There is, of course, something very problematic about this attitude. Part of the libertarian position involves treating property rights as natural rights, as so as being as important as anything can be. On the libertarian view, the fact that an injustice is old, and, perhaps, difficult to prove, does not make it any less of an injustice. ... We should try to work out what would have happened had the injustice not taken place. If the present state of affairs does not correspond to this hypothetical description, then it should be made to correspond. ~ Jonathan Wolff

Libertarianism is a political philosophy which advocates the maximization of individual liberty in thought and action and the minimization or even elimination of the powers of the state. Though libertarians embrace or dispute many viewpoints upon a broad range of economic strategies, ranging from laissez-faire capitalists such as those who dominate in the US Libertarian Party to libertarian socialists, the political policies they advocate tend toward those of a minimal state (minarchism), or forms of anarchism, and an insistence on the need to maintain the integrity of individual rights and responsibilities.

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Libertarianism - Wikiquote

Zoo owner Joe Exotic is one of the Libertarian Party candidates for governor in 2018. He spoke Thursday at the Oklahoma Capitol.[Photo by Dale Denwalt, The Oklahoman]

Joe Exotic, the animal handler who owns a zoo and dipped his toe briefly into politics to run for president last year, is one of two announced Libertarian candidates for Oklahoma governor.

Exotic, whose name is Joseph Maldonado, joined other Libertarian Party candidates at the Oklahoma Capitol on Thursday.

Also running for governor is Rex Lawhorn, a small business management consultant from Tulsa. If they both file for office, they'll face each other in the 2018 primary election.

Maldonado, who owns Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park, said he went on food stamps before running for governor to show how broken the system is. At one point, he held up the card.

To show you how desperately it needs overhauled, I ride around in a limousine and I choose not to get paid, while the state of Oklahoma gives me a SNAP card, he said, referencing the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

The program is funded by the federal government but administered by the states.

He criticized other state politicians, saying that lawmakers at the state Capitol don't have a clue.

I have some of the most amazing plans to overhaul some of these programs, he said. If we're going to keep up with the rest of America, we have to legalize marijuana. Even though I don't smoke it.

Maldonado also referenced the Oklahoma Highway Patrol's practice of parking in construction zones to slow traffic, saying he could save the state millions by, among other things, hiring a private security firm to sit in their cars with emergency lights on.

Lawhorn said the state's budget situation should have been fixed two years ago.

The example is in this building right now of why you need us, he said of the Libertarian Party.

He said when he walked into the Capitol, he looked up. On the inner ring of the Capitol dome are names of individuals, families and companies that helped pay for the dome's construction.

That disgusts me. That horrifies me that our government has corporate sponsorship, he said. That is the exact reason you cannot vote for a Republican. You cannot support the Democratic Party. They're the reason we got into this situation.

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Libertarian candidates visit Oklahoma Capitol | News OK - NewsOK.com