by Michael C. Jones, At-large director of the Collin County Party and SLECT representative for Senate District 8

Sometimes, I think I must’ve been born a “little L” Libertarian. I grew up in far West Texas, where circumstances encourage, if not absolutely require, rugged individualism. In some ways, it was still the Frontier and we learned to rely on ourselves, our family and our neighbors. Pecos County, where we lived, is four times as large as Rhode Island (4765 sq miles vs 1212), but only has about 15,000 folks, mostly in one town. The ranches where my dad worked had 2-3 families for ~165 sq miles. Government seemed a distant curiosity, as far away as the space satellites we could see flying over on a clear summer night.

As a teenager, I read everything! What else was there to do when the sun went down? We only had 2 TV channels and our nearest neighbors were 3 miles away. Most importantly, I read LOTS of American history, growing to appreciate Liberty, our Constitution, and the struggles of our Founders. I also read vast quantities of science fiction, which taught me to look at problems from different perspectives. Like David Nolan, I absorbed the libertarian works of Robert Heinlein and especially Ayn Rand. I went back to re-read Atlas Shrugged recently. Wow! I can’t believe I was reading this stuff as a kid!

It was a time of Cold War, and socialism seemed to be winning everywhere: China, North Korea, Cuba, the Space Race, the Great Society, Southeast Asia. Liberty was in retreat across the globe. Politically, there were only two “real” parties. I came to feel the Republicans were pushing back more than the Democrats. But at that time in Texas, large parts of the state had no Republican Party: the Democrat primary was “the election”.

Even when we moved to Collin County, “all the Republicans could meet in a phone booth”. I spent the next 30+ years as an active Republican at all levels, working until we controlled the entire Courthouse.

But slowly I came to see the words (smaller, less intrusive government at home and abroad) did not match reality (more spending, bigger debt, more regulation).

As I researched Libertarians, I discovered “THESE are my people!”. As one of our members once said “Nobody recruited me to become a Libertarian. I became a Libertarian when I found out there were other people like me!” Who could say it better?

Some of you may have already know this, but we were saddened to learn this weekend of the passing of a long-time Texas Libertarian activist and member of SLECT (State Libertarian Executive Committee of Texas, Ed Mishou.

At our meeting, the SLECT took time out of a crowed agenda to commemorate Ed and all his service to our Party and to our county.  It was said “Ed loved Liberty, he loved his country and he loved its Constitution.”  For any Libertarian there aren’t many praises that could be better.

Retired USAF Colonel Edward Clark Mishou departed on his final flight on June 22, 2014. While serving our country, he earned many medals and honors including the highly esteemed Distinguished Flying Cross.

After his dedicated service in the Air Force, Colonel Mishou moved to Brownsville where he loved the sub tropic climate of the valley. He also loved and was actively involved in several local organizations, including The Commemorative Air Force, Air Force Association, Quiet Birdmen, and had been a candidate for U.S. Congress for District 27 in 2010.”

For those interested the family has requested donations:

Wounded Warriors Project
P.O. Box 758517
www.woundedwariorproject.org/Donate
Topeka, KS 66675

by Albert Meyer, member CCLP

I frequently talk to young people about the Libertarian Party, with mixed success, except in recent times when I began focusing on Social Security. They don’t always understand what libertarianism entails, but they understand what it means to have 15% of their monthly wages confiscated and dumped into the Social Security System. Needless to say the whole idea generates a lot of anger, frustration and discontentment.

This got me thinking that the Libertarian Party should concentrate on this one issue for the time being. In the UK, a once unknown splinter party, UKIP (UK Independent Party), has gained a lot of traction by focusing on one issue: Get Britain out of the European Union. As soon as issues like abortion, gay marriage, guns, etc., become a major concern among voters, Washington starts taking note and politicians begin aligning themselves accordingly. Focusing and spending a lot of time to promote one single issue can be very productive.

I think it would greatly benefit the Libertarian Party, and the cause of liberty, if the party makes a promise to “young people,” everyone under the age of 40, a choice to opt out of Social Security, which could even include some kind of a refund of contributions made to date. (How do we pay for this? Cut the defense budget to 1.5% of GDP, which is more than adequate, seeing no country in the world would ever dream of invading us. There would be plenty of money available to fund current obligations, without having to run a quasi-Ponzi scheme.)

Here is the kind of argument that I use with young people: Most probably the government has already invested heavily in their education, whether they are graduates or not, but especially if they hold degrees, or even post-graduate degrees. What the government is effectively telling these highly educated young people is that despite their hard-earned and stellar educational credentials, they cannot be trusted to take care of their own retirement. This is ironic in the light of the fact that the tax code provides many incentives for people to start saving for their retirement. In addition, there are a multitude of fairly safe investments offered by the mutual fund industry that have proven track records that outperform the Social Security system by more than fifty fold.

There is no earthly reason why they should entrust 15% of their wages to a bankrupt system, a system that if operated by the private sector would be called a Ponzi scheme. It is even more galling when one considers that, by government-mandated standards, the least sophisticated and educated sector of our society, the Amish community, is exempt from participating in Social Security. They can be trusted to take care of themselves, but not us and especially those with some form of training, education or trade?

One way in which to launch this initiative would be to establish a website (Facebook perhaps) whereby individuals who want to opt out of Social Security can register their intention: “Get us out now!”

Once, say, a half a million registrants sign on, the media will take note. Pretty soon, the numbers will snowball to 5 million, even 10 million. At that stage, we declare victory. Every politician running for office would promise some sort of way in which to opt out of Social Security, but only the Libertarian candidates would have the true opt-out solution and, more importantly, the credibility.

I think this is an idea worth pursuing, because nothing grabs a young person’s attention more that his or her wallet/paycheck. Once they are shown that they will earn a meager return, if any, on the 15% (many don’t even know about the employer contribution, and if they do, they have never thought about it as something they might have a claim on) being contributed to the so called “trust” fund, they will be hooked.