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Wednesday, April 03, 2024

My First (And Possibly Only) Public Endorsement for Libertarian National Committee ...

... is Shawn Levasseur for Secretary.

Why maybe my only public endorsement?

Because I'm well aware that my endorsement, to the extent it's noticed at all, could be a negative as well as a positive. I don't endorse without letting the endorsee know that first so that I can be asked not to endorse, if that seems like the better way to go. I asked Shawn, and he said to go for it, so here it is.

Why the endorsement?

  1. It is my opinion that the entire current LNC owns the consequences of its current term. They should all be strongly considered for replacement, because the current term has been a financial, membership level, and "messaging" disaster. If I'm a Coca-Cola stockholder and the company loses money, loses market share, and runs commercials saying "our beverages taste like ass," my default position will be against re-election of the board running the show. Which is not to say that I won't listen to arguments from incumbents as to why they should be re-elected ("I personally raised this much money, I personally recruited this many members, and I vehemently objected to and voted against the 'tastes like ass' commercials"), but that would be a request for an exception -- as a body this LNC has been a failure of epic proportions.
  2. While I supported the current secretary for election in 2018 and re-election in 2020, I believe that position in particular is up for a change after three terms, and would be even if the current secretary hadn't become a damaging chaos agent in her second and third terms. I'm just generally a "two terms at most, then out" type, although I've made exceptions.
  3. Shawn has the record (see the link above for his resume) and he's someone I trust to do the job because he says he's willing and able to do that job. I strongly prefer a long record of party work and demonstrated competence when looking at candidates. When it comes to LNC, I tend to emphasize those factors over ideological agreement.
  4. But, speaking of ideological agreement, Shawn's long-time support for this blog and other projects of mine indicates to me that while we may not agree on everything, we're at least somewhat on the same general page.
That's it for the endorsement, but let me add a note.

As you may have noticed, I am an "anti-Mises-Caucus" type by inclination and have belabored both that  orientation and my reasons for it. That does not mean I will never support a Mises-affiliated or Mises-endorsed candidate for LNC. In point of fact, I supported Joshua Smith for LNC in 2018, though in retrospect I think that was a bad call. I will listen to (and probably have questions for) any and every candidate I come across, regardless of affiliation.

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