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NEWS RELEASE
Thursday, November 16, 2006
For Immediate Release

GOP Caucus Supports New Congressional Leadership Calls for Renewed GOP Commitment to Liberty

Thousand Oaks, CA — The Republican Liberty Caucus has urged Congress to elect new party leaders who
are committed to a “Liberty Agenda” of individual rights, limited government, and private
enterprise. “This election was a repudiation of those Republican legislators who abandoned principle
in the pursuit of bigger and more intrusive government,” said Republican Liberty Caucus Chairman
William Westmiller.

The organization of libertarian activists within the GOP urged House members to elect RLC Advisor
Rep. John Shadegg (R-Arizona) as Minority Whip and consider Rep. Mike Pence for Minority Leader. The
Caucus applauds the election of Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Arizona) as the new leader of the Republican
Conference and Sen. John Ensign (R-Nevada) as Chair of the Senatorial Campaign Committee. The
Senators were endorsed for re-election by the RLC and Kyl serves on its Advisory Board.

“It’s unfortunate that it took a defeat like this for the us to realize that we badly needed a
course correction, but that’s where we find ourselves,” said RLC Advisor Rep. Jeff Flake (R-
Arizona). Senator Tom Coburn (R-Oklahoma) agreed, saying, “This election does not show that voters
have abandoned their belief in limited government; it shows that the Republican Party has abandoned
them. In fact, these results represent the total failure of big government Republicanism.”

The Republican Liberty Caucus candidates enjoyed broad success, in spite of widespread party losses.
Over 70% of RLC candidates won election or re-election in federal, state, and local contests. “The
defeated GOP candidates were simply not committed to the principles of limited government,” says RLC
Chairman Westmiller, “and were properly repudiated by voters. The average Republican is sick of
porkbarrel legislation, new interventions on their liberty, and expanded government entitlements.
It’s time to abolish earmarks, cut spending, and reform the perverse Social Security and Medicare
programs.”

The RLC Liberty Index has provided ratings on every member of Congress for over 15 years and
supports its favored candidates through member activism and RLCUSA-PAC donations. “We’re growing
because the universal demand for individual liberty is growing,” said Westmiller, “The GOP has to
abandon corporate favors, hollow rhetoric, and hypocritical moralizing if it wants to win the
affection of libertarian and conservative voters across the country.”

The Republican Liberty Caucus has members in all 50 states and 14 Chartered state organizations
dedicated to promoting the ideals of individual rights, limited government and free enterprise
within the Republican Party.

Republican Liberty Caucus
44 Summerfield Street
Thousand Oaks, CA 91350
(866) RLC-Liberty [752-5423]
(http://www.RLC.org)

Contacts:
William Westmiller, RLC Chairman (805) 493-4332 — Chairman@RLC.org
Thomas Sewell, Communications Chair (435) 531-6964 — Secretary@RLC.org

The Cato Institute has just published a new study on the importance of the libertarian (small “l”) vote in the American electorate.

The main theme of political commentary in this decade is polarization. Since the battles over the impeachment of President Clinton and the Florida vote in 2000, pundits have been telling us that we’re a country split down the middle, red vs. blue, liberal vs. conservative. Political analysts talk about base motivation and the shrinking of the swing vote. But the evidence says they are wrong.

Not all Americans can be classified as liberal or conservative. In particular, polls find that some 10 to 20 percent of voting-age Americans are libertarian, tending to agree with conservatives on economic issues and with liberals on personal freedom. The Gallup Governance Survey consistently finds about 20 percent of respondents giving libertarian answers to a two-question screen.

Our own data analysis is stricter. We find 9 to 13 percent libertarians in the Gallup surveys, 14 percent in the Pew Research Center Typology Survey, and 13 percent in the American National Election Studies, generally regarded as the best source of public opinion data.

For those on the trail of the elusive swing voter, it may be most notable that the libertarian vote shifted sharply in 2004. Libertarians preferred George W. Bush over Al Gore by 72 to 20 percent, but Bush’s margin dropped in 2004 to 59-38 over John Kerry. Congressional voting showed a similar swing from 2002 to 2004. Libertarians apparently became disillusioned with Republican overspending, social intolerance, civil liberties infringements, and the floundering war in Iraq. If that trend continues into 2006 and 2008, Republicans will lose elections they would otherwise win.

The libertarian vote is in play. At some 13 percent of the electorate, it is sizable enough to swing elections. Pollsters, political strategists, candidates, and the media should take note of it.

For more details:

• Article at Cato website
• Link to full study in PDF format.

The New York Times recently posted a list of questions for candidates for State Assembly to answer, and our man Stu Mirsky, Candidate for the Assembly in the 23rd AD, responded.

Recently the New York Times posed a series of questions for voters to ask their candidates for the State legislature this year before choosing whom to support on Election Day. I’ve taken the liberty of providing my answers to the Times’ questions here (since the Times showed no interest in them when I actually sent them to them directly):

[…]

The Times: Does the candidate support property tax relief?

Stu Mirsky: Actually, I want all kinds of tax relief. I want to cut all taxes wherever and whenever this can be done because taxes are a burden on the citizenry and the economy. Of course this means we have to cut spending as well. To do the latter, I would seek to introduce zero based budgeting for state agencies, establish sunset provisions for all discretionary state programs, rein in and reform the “public authority” system, introduce transparent budgeting rules (so the public can see how we’re spending their money and where), restrict usage by the state of surpluses collected in any tax year by directing that they either be returned to taxpayers or placed in a rainy day fund against future fiscal difficulties, and seek to ensure that borrowed funds could not be routinely used to cover operating expenses (though this could be waived in emergencies). Finally, I’d look for cost reduction opportunities in areas currently identified with major fraud and abuse such as the state Medicaid program.

If you want to read all the questions (and Stu’s answers), visit Stu’s blog, here: Stu’s Blog: Responding to the NY Times.
Related:

• Stuart Mirsky for Assembly (official site)
• Stu’s Blog: Responding to the NY Times 

Death and Taxes: A Visual Guide to Where Your Federal Tax Dollars Go.

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The Declaration of Independence

Liberty: Winning The Battle for Freedom
(a talk by Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, from the June 2006 issue of “Liberty”)

Excerpt:

How many people in the audience believe drugs should be legalized? What about pornography? How many of you believe that prostitution should be legal? I believe all three should be legalized — within certain parameters which protect children. Who among you believes that private ownership of guns should be made illegal? I certainly don’t. Gun ownership is protected by the 2nd Amendment of the Constitution. It is an important right.

I believe, however, that all four of these issues are far less critical for improving our society than creating educational choice, privatizing Social Security, deregulating health care, and enacting meaningful tort reform. The legalization of drugs, pornography, prostitution, and guns, as issues, are all too closely associated with the freedom movement. Aligning ourselves with these issues has hurt our brand tremendously, by associating the freedom movement with cultural decadence. Parents don’t want their children’s lives ruined by drug experimentation, or their innocence prematurely lost to pornography and prostitution, or their lives ended with a bullet.

These four freedom issues need to be de-emphasized by the freedom movement if we hope to create a mass movement and continue to evolve our society in positive directions. How many of you believe that lessening the power of government over our lives is the most important goal of the freedom movement? I believe that the freedom movement’s biggest mistake today is focusing primarily on freedom “from” government coercion as its primary goal. Obviously this is a very important goal, but I strongly believe it must be accompanied by an equally important goal: the freedom “to” take responsibility for our own lives; the freedom “to” take responsibility for our own communities and our planet.

Freedom from government coercion is clearly a very, very important goal. But unless you live in a country like China, North Korea, Cuba, or Iran that lacks many personal liberties that we Westerners take largely for granted, freedom is not usually an important goal. American citizens mostly take their liberties for granted. Unlike the people in this audience, most Americans forget that vigilance is the eternal price we have to pay for protecting liberties.

Once we are free, or relatively free, to live our lives in the manner we choose, we must answer the question, “How then shall we actually live our lives?” Will we live our lives as hedonists, indulging ourselves with various amusements, diversions, and pleasures? Or will we choose the more difficult path of personal development and acceptance of social responsibility?

The freedom movement needs to reposition itself and re-brand itself. Personal freedom may be the first goal we work towards — but we can’t stop there; it isn’t enough. There is so much more to life. Using our freedom to take on greater social responsibility, as well as striving to reach our fullest potential as humans, needs to be a goal we support just as much as freedom from government coercion.

Has there ever been a more destructive legislative session than the one just ended in Albany?We’ll leave that matter for the historians. Suffice it to say that the lawmakers last week passed a raft of bills that will leave New York saddled with monster taxes and at the mercy of greedy union bosses long into the future.

On the other hand, it will leave the members of the state Assembly and Senate safe and cozy in their protected legislative cocoons.

That’s all that matters to them.

Robbing New York Blind (New York Post, June 27, 2006)