Articles Archives - Queens Libertarian Party

Neither Party Wants to Solve Immigration by Jay Sanchez

By QueensLP | September 3, 2020

originally published in http://www.leaderobserver.com/view/full_story/27772033/article-Neither-Party-Wants-to-Solve-Immigration

I come from a family of Latinos, Puerto Ricans who came to New York in the 1940’s. Thanks to the sacrifices of my grandparents and my parents, I was able to graduate [from] Harvard College and Harvard Law School and become part of the local legal community.

Although my family may not be considered under certain definitions to be an immigrant family, since Puerto Rico is part of the United States, their experience is similar to the experience of many immigrants in our country today.

Moreover, I can personally identify with the experience of immigrants, as I have lived as a foreigner in Japan for two years and Bolivia for seven years.

I find it disconcerting that after decades of transfer of power between the Democrats and Republicans, it has become apparent that neither side truly wishes to resolve the immigration issue. Immigration has become a useful political football to play to each party’s base.

The Republicans seek to placate their base by “building the wall” or limiting immigration from certain countries. That is how they get votes so that the people and companies who pay for those votes (the Republican Donor Class) can get a return on their investment at the expense of all of rest of us.

The Democrats, despite claims to be pro-immigration, have done nothing to change these laws despite 16 years in power under presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

The reason is that the Democrats would rather use immigrants as political pawns to electrify their base than resolve the issue and lose that leverage.

That is how they get votes so that the people and companies who pay for those votes (the Democrat Donor Class) can get a return on their investment at the expense of all of rest of us.

The parties want this system to continue because that is how they get these donations, which allow them to pay for the “good life” for them and their families and friends.

There is a political party that has always sought to remove the regulations and allow immigrants to enter the United States freely: the Libertarians.

One of my favorite shows is the “Walking Dead” and the charismatic character Negan. Although his character is generally a blood-thirsty and power-hungry leader, he [does] hesitate to kill even his enemies during the zombie apocalypse.

His famous quote is “people are a resource,” which sums up the policy of the Libertarians. All people have the right to work anywhere they choose as they are a necessary resource for a vital economy.

Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats are honest about the immigration issue, and the fact that it has to be separated from national security.

Security of our country’s borders is of course essential. Any person entering the country must identify themselves and their intentions. With modern technology, that is simple to implement, especially if people are welcome to come and go to work or travel.

Immigrants are more likely to come check in at the border if they know they will not be harassed or incarcerated just for being a foreigner.

Republicans especially seem to be hung up on the issue of foreigners inside the country that have entered illegally. They claim these “illegal aliens” are criminals for crossing an artificial line.

Every American citizen has broken the law during their lifetime, whether it be jay walking or drinking underage. Crossing the border without a visa is not a severe crime, and it should never have been a crime in the first place.

It is a violation; have the person pay their fine and move on. The cost of arresting, prosecuting, and incarcerating for such a violation far exceeds the actual harm of the crime.

The Democrats are no friends to the immigrants, as immigrants are natural entrepreneurs and small business owners. For anyone, including a first-generation immigrant who wishes to open a restaurant, hair salon, or other personal service, there are a multitude of unnecessary regulations.

Immigrants do not stop to think of what laws there are before opening a business, they just naturally get to work. But then are fined or arrested later for doing honest work.

Remember the immigrant lady who was arrested for selling churros on the subway? The Democratic City Council members howled foul for over-policing, but which party passed those laws in New York City?

And these laws don’t only hurt the immigrants, they hurt all of us.

If you are tired of the overreach by the Republicans and the false promises by the Democrats to modernize immigration laws, then now is the time to seek a party that has always been pro-immigrant and pro-entrepreneur.

Then real change will finally come.

Jay Sanchez is a practicing attorney and resident of Howard Beach, and running for Congress in the 5th District on the Libertarian Party Line.

15 Reasons to Vote Libertarian

By QueensLP | March 3, 2020

originally distributed by the Libertarian Party on 03/03/2020

SUPER TUESDAY 2020 HAS ARRIVED…

For 15 jurisdictions, today is your first chance to cast a vote in the 2020 presidential election. Of course, it’s not quite that easy if you are not supporting one of the two old parties. For Libertarians in these 14 states and American Samoa, the rules are not all the same. For some, participating in the primary will disqualify them from participating in their Libertarian convention process (heads up Texas, DO NOT VOTE IN THE PRIMARIES if you want to vote in your Libertarian convention). For other states, the convention process is done, and you can sit back today. (We’re talking about you Arkansas, Alabama, and Tennessee). Other states still have conventions coming up (so make sure you know the details, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, Utah, Vermont and Virginia). Finally, some states do include Libertarians in the primaries and you can get out and vote today (hopefully you already knew this, California, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Oklahoma).

Whether you are voting today, waiting for your state convention, or still trying to decide what to do, we’re here to help. In honor of the 15 different groups of voters trying to figure out what to do today, here are…

1. The Libertarian Party is the only anti-war party.

You cannot count on Democrats to end the wars — they have been every bit to blame as the Republicans. While in the midst of trying to impeach President Trump, a bi-partisan Congress approved a military budget of over $700 billion. Neither old party has any intention to ease up or end our military interactions. If you are ready for an America at Peace, it’s time to vote Libertarian.

2. The Libertarian Party is the only party committed to eliminating the national debt.

Republicans have long been considered the anti-debt party, but that can only be laughed at now. After eight years of calling out President Obama’s reckless spending and increased deficits, they have been silent and/or outright supportive of Trump’s explosive spending that has taken our national debt from $19 trillion to $23 trillion in three years. If an annual deficit of $1 trillion dollars is unacceptable to you, your best move is to vote Libertarian.

3. The only way to stop more government overreach is to vote for the Libertarian Party.

Increased taxation for “free” college is promised by the Democrats; tariffs (which are taxes) and bailouts are executed by Republicans. Both old parties are inching or running toward single-payer healthcare, more gun control and granting the executive branch more and more power. The only choice for those who care about personal and economic liberty, separate from the boot of big government, is the Libertarian party.

4. The only way to send a message to the ruling old parties is to vote for the Libertarian candidate.

Once again, the only alternative party that will be on every ballot in the 2020 general election is the Libertarian Party. A vote for Trump sends the message that nothing needs to change. A vote for any of the Democratic candidates likely to get the nomination is a message that nothing they do needs to change either. We currently have more people choosing not to vote for anyone than to pick one of the options the Rs or Ds serve up, and that does nothing to wake up these power-hungry politicians. If your hope is to see better candidates coming from any party, the only way to send that message is to scare those who rule over us by voting Libertarian.

5. Libertarian policies benefit everyone, and they get adopted the more voters show support for such things.

It seems hard to believe that the Democratic party was officially still against same-sex marriage less than a decade ago. The Libertarian Party has supported equal rights (and removing the government from marriage) since its founding in 1971. Both parties are still waffling on if people who chose to use cannabis for medical or recreational purposes should go to prison. Many states have changed their laws, while federally some lawmakers are looking to add vaping as a crime. The Libertarian party has supported individual liberty (and no victim, no crime) since its founding in 1971. The liberty movement does affect the public view of issues and eventually leads to better policies. If you want to see more Libertarian policies adopted by old party representatives, you show them that by voting Libertarian.

6. You don’t want to have to spend the next four years explaining why the dumpster fire you supported was not as bad as the dumpster fire someone else supported.

Voting for the lesser of two evils is still attaching your name to something evil. It sucks. Don’t do it. Vote Libertarian.

7. Because you “Support the Troops”.

Democrats and Republicans both like to act like they are moral patriots who value nothing more than the brave men and women who serve their county. Truth is, they are lying. If they really cared about the troops, they would never flippantly start a new war, they wouldn’t refuse to do their job to vote on military action, and they would certainly spend much more time talking about the 22 veterans a day who commit suicide. War is a failure on every level, and we fail our service men and women once they return home. Do you support the troops, really? So does the Libertarian Party.

8. Consistent Principles only exist in the Libertarian Party.

We already mentioned the Democrats’ evolution on rights for gay people only when it became politically beneficial to them. Republicans say they support your Second Amendment rights, until Trump says we need to limit that a bit. Both old parties jump around on which personal decisions they will allow and which they will criminalize. In their histories, the ruling parties have changed their principles drastically. The Libertarian Party platform has held consistent values of individual liberty since it was first written in 1971. Do you want to know that the party you support is going to hold to the values you supported them for? Your party is the Libertarian Party.

9. The Libertarian Party supports ending harmful election laws and opening up the ballot for other parties too.

Perhaps you feel that another party best represents your views, but they do not have ballot access. Republicans and Democrats write the very laws that keep alternative parties off the ballot or using all of their resources to get on the ballot. Libertarians believe the duopoly has to be defeated if we will ever see real and meaningful changes in this country. A vote for the Libertarian candidate is a vote for allowing more candidates and more parties of future ballots, and an end to the ruling parties ability to force you to choose between two terrible candidates.

10. The Libertarian Party is the most welcoming to immigrants and refugees.

If you believe children should never, ever be separated from their parents and held in government custody for crossing a political border, you can be sure that the Libertarian Party agrees with you. Democrats and Republicans will continue to argue over [minuscule] changes – the Libertarian Party will end this insane and dysfunction humanitarian crisis by legalizing the free movement of peaceful people.

11. Because you do not want to live in a {insert religion here} theocracy.

Libertarians believe that everyone should be able to hold faith and religion as important or irrelevant to their life as each chooses and that the government should never propose policies or laws based on the support or opposition of any religion.

12. To get money out of politics.

It’s funny how often you hear Democrats talk about getting money out of politics, while they promise to pay for college, healthcare, retirement, childcare, and on and on. That is every bit “money in politics” as corporations and lobbyists writing huge checks. Libertarians want to return the executive branch to the limits our Founders intended — that means removing the authority to make such false promises, either to special interest groups or the general public.

13. You support Free Speech — for everyone.

Both old parties will talk about their commitment to the First Amendment, but in practice, both have proven willingness to limit free speech that they do not appreciate or agree with. Libertarians believe that if you don’t support free speech for everyone then you don’t support free speech.

14. Reject Nationalism and Socialism with one vote.

There are two broken ideologies threatening liberty in our nation today, and they are coming from both major parties. Reject the inhumanities we know come from these authoritarian philosophies, and support liberty instead.

15. Libertarians do not seek power – they seek a world set free.

Republicans and Democrats continue to fight over which one best knows how you should live your life. Libertarians know that they best thing for individual humans is to be free to live their life without the approval of any political party.

Can you think of anymore? No matter which one of these reasons rings the truest for you, remember that when you go to vote. Even if you are not voting today, you can still cast a vote for liberty, fiscal responsibility, human rights, and integrity by supporting the party of principle. We are proud and honored to be the voice for freedom in America today.

Are you a Libertarian, or are you a Republican?

By QueensLP | February 29, 2020

originally printed in in the Volume 50, Issue 1 of LP News
reprinted by permission

by Bob Johnston
LNC Staffer & LPMD State Chair

A month ago, a former Maryland Libertarian Party candidate called to let me know that he is going to run for the same race in 2020 as a Republican.

I thanked him for having the courtesy to let me know and asked him why he was planning on running as a Republican. He replied that he wanted to win.

I asked him why not run as a Democrat for that seat.

He sputtered incredulously, “Why would I do that?”

I said, “Because a Democrat has won that seat the last three elections, the last two by double digits.”

After a pause, he replied, “Well, I have a better chance of getting elected to the seat as a Republican than as a Libertarian”.

“True, but you still have much better shot getting elected as a Democrat”. Nonetheless, he still couldn’t fathom running as a Democrat.

The supposed affinity with the Republican Party is a problem the Libertarian Party has had for most of its history.

Part of the fault is on the Libertarian Party. For decades, the party has reached out mostly to disaffected conservatives, particularly on the issues of spending and gun rights. There has been a theme going around for years that the LP is a bunch of conservatives who like to smoke pot. In 2016, many Libertarians tried to position the party as one for “Never Trumpers.” Well, the Republican Party has sucked for a long time prior to Donald Trump getting elected president. The LP has done a poor job of reaching out to those who are anti-war, for civil liberties, against corporate welfare and for immigration. Further, former Libertarians running as Republicans give the GOP libertarians credibility they don’t deserve.

The other part of the problem is that Republican candidates love using libertarian rhetoric when running for office. Never mind that they never deliver. In 2000, Bill Clinton’s last year as president, the budget was $2 trillion and the debt around $5.5 trillion. The budget is now $4.4 trillion and the debt reaching $23 trillion, with a majority of the spending since the Clinton Administration written and passed by Republican-controlled US House members. They have been fully behind our aggressive foreign policy, where we have been mired in the Middle East for 16 years with no end in sight — a war that has cost over a trillion dollars, thousands of deaths and massive environmental destruction. Going back to Nixon, they have enforced the War on Drugs which has locked up countless nonviolent people and ruined their lives.

Some libertarian-ish people have been elected to Congress as Republicans, such as Rand Paul, Thomas Massie and Justin Amash. Rand Paul has come out and said he isn’t a libertarian, rather a “constitutional conservative.” While he has tried to push the Republican Party to limit our presence in our foreign wars and pushed for some changes to civil liberties, he is a full supporter of Donald Trump and has backed some of Trump’s un-libertarian legislation and appointments, such as Mike Pompeo. He recently tried to get the Republicans in Congress to pass a budget that would cut a whopping two percent in spending. He got no takers. And Amash was run out of the Republican Party for speaking out about Trump. Paul, Massie and Amash have had to fight their own party as much as they have the Democrats, and they haven’t made the Republican Party any more libertarian than it was prior to their getting elected.

When Rand’s father, Ron Paul, decided to run for Congress again in 1996 after being away for eight years, the GOP did everything they could to prevent him from getting reelected. They backed former Democrat-turned-Republican Greg Laughlin against Dr. Paul since the district was strongly Republican and the winner of the Republican primary would most likely win the general election. Then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush, along with his father, former President George H. W. Bush, both campaigned against Dr. Paul, as did then-Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. Fortunately, Dr. Paul still won. In 2006, also in Texas, then-Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay resigned after winning the primary, due to ethics violations. It was too late for the Republicans to place another candidate on the ballot, thus there were only a Democrat and Bob Smither, a Libertarian appearing in the general election for that seat. Did the Republicans back the Libertarian? Of course not. They chose to get behind a write-in campaign for a Republican candidate. It didn’t work, and the Democrat won.

The Republican establishment would rather a Democrat win than a Libertarian.

The national GOP has made it extremely difficult for Libertarians to get on the ballot in partisan races in Arizona, has spent over a decade trying to keep us off of the ballot in Ohio, and recently the Republican-led Texas legislature passed a law requiring minor party candidates, such as ours, to pay expensive filing fees to get on the ballot — fees which will cost in the thousands to run for statewide office, and which few of our candidates can afford. Republicans (and Democrats) will do anything to prevent candidates who want to shrink government from winning elections.

Libertarianism isn’t conservative nor liberal, in the current sense of that term. To be a Libertarian means you are against the initiation of force or fraud to get what you want or feel needs to be done. Period.

Working for freedom can be a long, slow grind. It is quite possible that I won’t see a free society, or any significant shrinkage in government by the time I pass on. My time and efforts working for the cause through the Libertarian Party may not come to fruition. But I also know beyond the shadow of a doubt that I will never get a free society working through the Republican or Democrat parties.

Are you a Republican, or are you a Libertarian?

The Libertarian candidate for Public Advocate, Devin Balkind, supports policies that sound like ones a progressive Democrat supports. So what’s the difference?

By QueensLP | October 25, 2019

https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/inside-city-hall/2019/10/25/2019-nyc-elections-whos-running-public-advocate-libertarian-devin-balkind-candidate

5 Solutions the Public Advocate Should Deliver for New York City

By QueensLP | October 15, 2019

by Devin Balkind

This post and image originally appeared July 23rd on Gotham Gazette.

The New York City Public Advocate is a poorly defined position that, over its 30 years of existence, has often been used to advance the political interests and status of career politicians. I’m running for Public Advocate because I want to do something very different with the office: turn it into a “startup” working in the public interest to deliver real products and services that improve New Yorkers’ lives and helps under-resourced civil servants modernize our city’s government.

I’ll do this by delivering five noncontroversial “solutions” that I’ve outlined in Gotham Gazette columns over the last few years: 1) strengthening our social safety net; 2) kickstarting technology-enabled government reform; 3) improving civic engagement processes; 4) facilitating metro-regional coordination; and 5) producting websites that help New Yorkers see and understand their government.

1) A Searchable Safety Net
Politicians talk constantly about our city’s safety net, but where is it? New York City doesn’t have what almost every major city in the country does — a “211” system that organizes government and nonprofit health, human, and social service information and makes it available to the public through a website and 2-1-1 phone hotline.

Everyday thousands of city and nonprofit staff are duplicating work and struggling to keep their own resource directories up-to-date, recognizing that the availability of this information is the difference between a New Yorker accessing the critical health and social services they need or needlessly suffering without it.

No nonprofit or government agency has taken it upon themselves to solve this citywide problem — but the Public Advocate can and should.

As Public Advocate, I will create an open source directory of all available health, human, and social services available in New York City, and make that information accessible on the web, via an app, by phone, and via API to partner organizations all over the city.

2) Digital Transformation Team
New York City’s bureaucracies were designed in an era of telegrams, switchboards, and printed memos. It’s past time for an upgrade. And the best way to get one is by helping city agencies create their own Digital Service Organizations (DSOs). These groups use open source technology and agile production techniques to bring government services and the bureaucracies that provide them into the modern era.

The first DSO was the UK’s Government Digital Service. Founded in 2011, it has driven a digital transformation in the UK government — greatly improving services and reducing annual operations’ costs by over a billion pounds per year. We could get similar results in New York City, but someone needs to lead. That someone should be the Public Advocate.

As Public Advocate, I will work to ensure that New Yorkers get faster, better, and cheaper government services by working with civil servants and their agencies to train, support, and network them together as we create DSOs throughout our city’s various government agencies.

3) Civic Engagement Oversight
In November 2018 New Yorkers voted overwhelmingly to establish a “Civic Engagement Commission” (CEC) to “enhance civic participation.” We need to make sure that the CEC advances the interests of the public, rather than those of politicians.

As the voice of New Yorkers, the Public Advocate is in the perfect position to provide oversight and help improve New York City government’s civic participation programs. We can do this by providing New Yorkers with clear information about the city’s existing public participation processes, which agencies are doing them, who leads them, what metrics they use to determine success, and how those programs could be improved using best practices (which I’ve honed over the past decade from working around the world).

Then, we will establish an “Engagement Lab” that works with individual civil servants and government agencies to support them as they establish and improve public engagement processes.

4) A Regional Organizing Project
New York City is the largest city in the United States with more than 8.5 million residents, but we’re also the beating heart of the nation’s largest “metropolitan area,” with a population of over 23 million spanning four states and 30 counties.

Our city’s ability to tackle some of our most important challenges such as housing, transit, energy, pollution, climate resilience, and more all require regional solutions. But systemic coordination among the 30 counties and four states in the New York Metropolitan Area doesn’t happen efficiently. In fact, it’s hardly happening at all. Our current methods for regional coordination are woefully inadequate, relying on a hodgepodge of nonprofits, commissions, and multi-government “authorities” that each work on their own sliver of these massive and deeply interconnected challenges.

Sometimes these groups compete; sometimes massive areas of work go completely uncoordinated; and the public is hardly aware these groups exist or that they are charged with making such important decisions. Unfortunately, we experience this coordination failure everyday — crumbling subway systems; out-of-control infrastructure construction costs; our communities’ unmitigated vulnerability to extreme weather are all evidence of this massive problem.

That’s why, as Public Advocate, I’ll launch an online metro-regional coordination hub that aggregates and organizes information from the various coordination bodies, produces events that bring these bodies together, and develops a 10-year plan for improving metro-regional governance.

5) An Open Government Interface
Thanks to the city’s innovative open data law, city agencies are publishing a tremendous amount of information to the city’s open data portal, but finding the right information can get a little tricky. Professional researchers and large businesses have the resources needed to make sense of city data, but smaller businesses, journalists, and the vast majority of residents often do not.

Fortunately, the city created the Commission on Public Information and Communication (COPIC) with a charter mandate to “educate the public about the availability and potential usefulness of city produced or maintained information and assist the public in obtaining access to such information.” Unfortunately, information on COPIC is hard to find. It seems to lack an official website or an active Twitter. Go figure!

As Public Advocate, I will reconvene COPIC and work with that body to create a unified interface for information about city agencies, such as their budgets, expenses, capital projects, social services, performance indicators, and more. In the words of the original OpenCongress.org web project, we’ll build “the website [the city] should have made for itself.”

Successful implementation of the five solutions described above requires a focused vision, a motivated team with the right skills, and the resources — financial and political — that come with the Public Advocate’s office. As a technologist that helps nonprofits, governments, and startups build information systems to achieve specific goals, I know how to get this work done. As a concerned New Yorker dedicated to giving this city the government it deserves, I’m confident I will — whether I’m elected Public Advocate or not.

***
Devin Balkind is a nonprofit executive, civic technologist, and startup advisor running for Public Advocate as the Libertarian Party nominee. On Twitter @DevinBalkind.

(photo; Edwin J. Torres/Mayor’s Office)

reprinted from https://votedevin.com/2019/09/25/5-solutions-the-public-advocate-should-deliver-for-new-york-city/ by permission from author, September 25, 2019

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