If the most libertarian Member of the House of Representatives, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), has lost his reelection primary by the time you read this, it will be thanks to Trump relentlessly attacking him while touting another bland candidate for no better reason than that Massie’s rival Ed Gallrein vaguely believes whatever contradictory things Trump currently tells him to.
Regardless, if the Trumpers who were recently in power in (or in the orbit of) the Libertarian Party keep touting Trump victories as if they are quasi-libertarian victories after this contentious primary, they plainly lack not only principles but even a modicum of strategic know-how. Even by their own grotesque, sold-out, low, ostensibly “pragmatic” standards, if their psychotic, stupid, tacky, corrupt pal in the Oval Office willfully takes the number of libertarians in the House from roughly one to roughly zero, that’s a pretty damn solid refutation of their approach.
In the marketplace, their customers would ask for their money back. I hope they still believe in markets, not just in Trump.
That the broader Trump movement lacks principles is underscored by the ease with which its members rewrite history the moment someone such as Massie is designated the enemy of the moment. Trump’s irrational whims relabel hardcore conservatives “RINOs,” even “Democrats,” overnight, with no regard to facts or philosophy. Massie may well disagree with you on some pet issue, but you can’t deny his ideological consistency, and despite what some bot-like cretin such as CatTurd2 says on X, the consistent Massie pattern is not traitorous-Democrat.
Some conservatives, despite claiming to want a budget-cutter, gun-protector, and deregulator like Massie in the House, might be pleased if he were gone and there were thus one less critic of Israel in that chamber, but there are so many of those lately that there’s very little to be gained by making that your litmus test in this case. By contrast, if you want less spending, more fidelity to the Constitution, and less war, Massie’s virtually all you’ve got. You might be trading him in for nothing at all.
Trump wouldn’t stop with crushing Massie, either. Any Member of Congress with a firm enough philosophy to get in the way of Trump’s ever-changing moods will be declared an obstacle (and then lied about). Trump has already denounced onetime loyalists such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Rep. Lauren Boebert, the former having recently quit Congress but the latter now in his sights. When does the imagined payoff arrive for loyalty to this idiotic, liberty-crushing demagogue?
The price for disloyalty, more obviously, is high: Former Trump evangelists Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes nowadays aren’t just insulted by Trump on Truth Social, they’re denounced as terrorists by Trump administration senior director for counter-terrorism Sebastian Gorka. That seems like reason enough to question Gorka’s fitness for his position, maybe even a new reason to impeach the person who put him there. (And Gorka’s denunciation of Carlson, coincidentally or not, happened right after Carlson interviewed a Ukrainian familiar with corruption in the Zelensky government, so liberals can’t even use their old favorite rule of thumb, namely that the Trump administration echoes whatever pleases Russia, to render it all predictable.)
What about you, do you have a personal plan for staying on chaotic Trump’s good side at all times—besides abject, self-abasing obedience?
I have one bit of advice. Trump’s favorite allies, it should long ago have been noticed, come from an array of ideologies and backgrounds but tend to have mercilessness as their most obvious shared characteristic. Trump’s approximately the sort of person who might sincerely favor fewer parking rules and regulations—swell!—but will grin with delight if he finds a parking official willing to have those who do violate the rules drawn and quartered (unless the rule-violators are themselves vocal Trump supporters, of course). Be ruthless and he may remain impressed with you.
Not coincidentally, Trump’s ruthlessness is very similar to the pigheaded attitude of all too many enthusiasts of the police and military, not to mention many members of the police and military themselves. Libertarians have long warned that a government powerful enough to give you everything you want is powerful enough to take away everything you have. Right-wingers these days might want to mull the similar axiom that a police state willing and eager to bust heads is probably also a police state willing to, say, partner with the Southern Poverty Law Center to fund white supremacist organizations (or even nudge the Oklahoma City bombers into action) in order to justify future crackdowns.
And the crackdowns will be more methodical than ever before, if Trump’s fondness for Palantir stock and Kash Patel’s stated fondness for using A.I. “everywhere” are any indication of how much they want this country to become the tech oligarchy’s heavily surveilled fiefdom. By the time Trump leaves office, he’ll be denouncing anyone who doesn’t want to be facial-scanned and tracked by government databases all day long as limp-wristed socialists. Never mind the President’s reasoning! He’s got a shit-eating grin on his face, so he must be winning!
You may have thought Trump was at heart an ornery militia man who’d take down the government for you, but it turns out he was just a fed all along.
—Todd Seavey is the author of Libertarianism for Beginners and is on X at @ToddSeavey.