On May 26, and into the early hours of May 27, in a foreshadowing of things to come, Libertarian National Convention delegates took seven rounds of voting to nominate Chase Oliver (who beat “None of the Above” after eliminating all other opponents) for president and two ballots to nominate Mike ter Maat for vice-president.

Three days later, Libertarian National Committee secretary Caryn Ann Harlos informed the committee of “a policy issue that is causing great upset.”

That issue: “Oliver has said he believes that giving puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to … minors is healthcare and simply up to parents and doctors. Others argue, and I agree, that it is child abuse …”

To her credit, Ms. Harlos makes clear that she doesn’t favor rescinding Mr. Chase’s nomination (which the committee can do with a 3/4 vote) over the matter.

That “policy issue” has, however, become a talking point for the Libertarian Party’s sore losers. At least one state party — Montana —  has already announced that it doesn’t intend to fulfill its obligation to place Mr. Oliver and Mr. ter Maat on its state ballot line.

I apologize for re-hashing inside third party baseball, and perhaps burying the lede. The matter is bigger than the Libertarian Party, but it’s just too good an example of the phenomenon I want to explore to pass up.

That phenomenon is not “puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to minors,” but rather the use of moral panic to move opinion.

You might be surprised to learn that of the 70 million minors living in the US, fewer than 20,000 received prescriptions for puberty blockers or hormone therapy in the five-year period covering 2017-2021.

That’s about three one-hundredths of one percent.

It’s not quite as rare as getting struck by lightning or death by drowning, but it’s in the same ballpark.

Absent demagoguery for the express purpose of creating moral panic, that’s not much of a “policy issue.”

But look where demagoguery for the express purpose of creating moral panic has brought us:

Even among self-described libertarians, Libertarian Party members, and LP officials, we find factions up in arms over the “issue” of parents/guardians (with the assistance of doctors), rather than politicians, making healthcare decisions for minor children.

It’s not just L/libertarians, of course. The entire modern political discourse seems pretty much driven by moral panic.

Drugs. Guns. Immigration. Gambling. Sex work.  Heck, even a non-existent “war on Christmas.” The list of handles politicians use to grab Americans and pull them from the common sense column to the  “SOMEONE might be doing SOMETHING I don’t LIKE — there should be a law!” column never ends.

When you’re handed a moral panic disguised as a “policy issue,” try thinking it through instead of hiding under your bed.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

As you’ve no doubt heard, a New York jury closed out the merry month of May by convicting former US president Donald Trump on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Media — mainstream, alternative, and social — are awash with analyses of how Trump’s criminal conviction will affect votes this November.

Hunter Biden, son of US incumbent president Joe Biden, went to trial on completely unconstitutional gun charges (there is no exception to the Second Amendment that allows the government to deprive drug users of their gun rights) at the beginning of June, so we’ll soon see a similar flood of “how does this affect the election?” punditry.

My prediction in both cases: Not noticeably.

Donald Trump and Hunter Biden are quite a bit alike in two ways.

Firstly, they’re crooked as San Francisco’s Lombard Street. They’re so crooked, they have to screw their pants on in the morning. They’re bent as pretzels.

Secondly, everyone — everyone who cares, anyway — has known that fact about both of them for a long, long time. No one with an IQ over 40 would leave a wallet, or a daughter, alone in a room with either of them (or with Hunter’s dad).

Both similarities bring me back to the well I always drink from: William James’s dictum that “a difference which makes no difference is not difference at all.”

Voters who’ve supported Donald Trump for president twice are almost certain to support him a third time. They knew he was a snake when they picked him up. One more bit of snakiness — especially one that’s old news, was really just a misdemeanor the statute of limitations had expired on, and  was tortured back into existence and into felony status by trying to tie it to unspecified “underlying crimes” — won’t change their minds.

Voters who’ve supported Joe Biden for president once are almost certain to support him again. They knew he was a snake when they picked him up. One more bit of snakiness — especially one that’s patently unconstitutional, indirect, and unrelated to corruption involving the father/son relationship — won’t change their minds.

Even those who MIGHT change their minds aren’t likely to switch “major party” sides. Former Biden voters won’t pick Trump. Former Trump voters won’t pick Biden. If they can’t bring themselves to support their previous pick, They’ll cast their votes for independent or third party candidates.

We can all predict with 99.9% certainty that, no matter how — or even if — we vote in November, either Joe Biden or Donald Trump will get (re-)inaugurated next January.

That’s a fine reason to not even bother voting.

It’s also a fine reason to make use of your vote to “send a message” that you’re unhappy with the “major party” choices.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

While panhandling for votes at the Libertarian National Convention over Memorial Day weekend, two non-Libertarian presidential candidates — Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. — promised to free political prisoner Ross Ulbricht if elected.

That promise is a big deal to Libertarians. Ulbricht, 40, is about a decade into his two life sentences, without the possibility of parole, for the “crime” of operating a web site.

Yes, you read that correctly.

You may hear other, darker allegations concerning what Ulbricht did, but those allegations were so weakly supported by evidence that even grandstanding, corrupt US Attorney Preet Bharara was afraid to charge Ulbricht over them.

Unfortunately, corrupt US District Judge Katherine B. Forrest, after openly rigging the trial to ensure a jury conviction, used those unproven allegations to justify the draconian sentence.

When it’s all said and done, the excuse for Ulbricht’s imprisonment comes down to this: He ran an e-commerce web site (Silk Road), and some people sold things on that site … things which the government disapproves of, like certain drugs.

That’s it. That’s all. There’s nothing else. He ran a web site, and now he’s sentenced to die behind bars for running that web site.

While I won’t be voting for Trump or RFK Jr. (I support another candidate who promises to “Free Ross,” Libertarian presidential nominee Chase Oliver), I do thank them for their offers.

But really, why should we — or, more importantly, Ross — have to wait until next January to get this matter taken care of?

Yes, Trump or RFK Jr., if elected, might keep the promise and do the right thing.

But President Joe Biden could do the right thing TODAY. Biden could commute Ross’s sentence or pardon him and put the  matter to rest.

That would be the right thing to do … and good politics as well.

Two of Biden’s leading opponents have pledged to get the job done.

With a stroke of his pardon/commutation pen, Biden could take the issue away from those opponents.

Politically, it would be an easy, all-benefit, no-cost proposition.

The constituency for freeing Ross may not be huge, but neither are the likely margins of victory this November.  Fewer than 50,000 votes in key states separated victory from defeat for Biden in 2020. He needs every vote he can get. SOME grateful Americans would reward a pardon or commutation at the polls.

The constituency for keeping Ross in prison is, for all practical purposes, non-existent. The tiny group supporting his continued incarceration wouldn’t change their votes over it.

What’s better than doing the right thing? Doing the right thing, rubbing your opponents’ noses in it, and adding votes to your column at their expense.

Mr. Biden, tear down this (prison) wall. Free Ross!

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY