Investment Themes: The speakers repeatedly highlight Bitcoin and Precious Metals as attractive alternatives to political donations, noting better outcomes since 2014.
Policy Angle: There is sustained discussion of eliminating capital gains taxes on gold, silver, and Bitcoin, with references to state-level tax reforms for metals.
Macro Outlook: Concerns about economy-wide malinvestment from the financial crisis and COVID suggest tougher conditions ahead.
Market Risks: The influence of powerful interest groups like AIPAC and centralized congressional leadership is seen as constraining anti-war and monetary reform agendas, shaping policy risk.
Strategy: Preference is expressed for building interest-group power and communication platforms over chasing federal legislative wins.
Assets over Activism: One speaker explicitly owns Bitcoin and contrasts allocating funds to assets (Bitcoin, gold, silver) versus political campaigns.
Companies/Tickers: No specific public companies or tickers were pitched; the focus remained on broad assets and policy-driven opportunities.
Transcript
Welcome back to the Power Market podcast. I'm Ryan McMaken, editor-inchief at the Mises Institute. And joining me today for this episode are two of our contributing editors. We've got Tho Bishop and we have Connor O'Keefe. And before we get rolling, we got a couple of well, we got a new book and we got some upcoming events, right though, that we should mention. >> Absolutely. Well, we've got got a few new books in the bookstore. uh one of which is not yet available but will be very soon. We do have though on the table already um a book celebrating the 75th anniversary, the influence and significance of human action after 75 years um which is a collection of scholarly articles from an event that we had celebrating that great equation or that great occasion. Not a lot of equations um but that is in the Mises bookstore right now as well as free online through mises.org and all the usual channels. Uh, we also have if you want a free book, if you haven't read Anatomy of the State, if you got people that haven't read Anatomy the State, if you want to be celebrating this year of Rothbard, you can get your free copy of Anatomy the State at mises mises.org/state. Register there. We've gotten a lot of great feedback from people explaining how they attend to use these copies, which is really great to see. A lot of excitement around that. And of course, we've got the Rothbart intellectual biography, Murray Rothbard, the making of an Austrian Economist that will soon be launched to the public. We had a preview uh debut during Rothbard University last weekend, a great great event. So, that's very exciting. Speaking of great events, we are coming to the wonderful state of New Hampshire uh for an event dedicated to why is the healthcare system broken on June 27th. Um would love to see our free sters up there. Uh we have Mises University coming in July. Again, as I said last week, if you are a student and you're listening to this podcast, stop what you're doing. Apply right now. Uh those seats will be going fast. Um and u a new one, a a revamped event on the website. If you're in South Carolina, we're coming to Greenville, South Carolina to talk about why government schools don't want you to understand economics in September, September 12th. Um so we just relocated that event origally. It was in Raleigh. Now we're in Greenville. So, if you are in that area, uh, come say hi to, uh, staff we have, including Dr. Tim Terrell. I know he's bringing some some F folks there. So, yeah, it' be great to be in the great state of South Carolina. Hopefully Lindsey Graham doesn't know about it. >> Well, the subject today, we're going to talk a little bit about uh this the other day's primary uh Republican primary. There was more than one. The one we mostly watched was the one in Kentucky. Uh, and maybe there's something we can learn about how the democratic system works in the United States. Uh, and spoiler, I don't think it works as advertised. Uh, I I shocked >> I don't think it's the the means to change and and goodness in America, but we'll look at that in some more detail here. But though, first of all, why don't you just kind of bring us up to speed on just the basic facts uh of what's going on there uh with with the primaries. >> Yeah, so la last uh last Tuesday was very interesting. a lot of lot of Alabama primaries as well, which uh I think most of the people in our office were more paying attention to Kentucky than Alabama, but neither here nor there. I know there was a very entertaining sheriff's race in Lee County that uh I think had some people happy. Um I'll let Connor comment on that one. Um but uh uh obviously, you know, really the eyes of the nation were on Kentucky 4, which probably for the first time ever, um the most expensive primary in the grand history of American democracy took place there. Um the result being Ed Gallerin, the the Trump endorsed candidate who ran ran very much a Biden style basement campaign, right? No debates, not a lot of public appearances. Even canceled some ones that he was having late in the race because of people coming up and asking questions he didn't want to answer. Uh but he did get through with 10% about roughly a 10% margin over Thomas Massie. Obviously though the relevance of this race is multiffold, right? Massie as sort of a national figure for libertarians out there. Definitely the biggest face in a competitive primary um connected to the Epistonian file release. most of the, you know, a good amount of Ed's money came from people aligned with Apac and the the Israel question being, I think, a a large funer of the kind of the weaponry within that race on the outside and obviously Trump I think particularly after the the big beautiful bill um last year which Massie did not support that I think was was one of the original catalysts from the Trump team's focus on this particular race which we can talk a little bit more in the future cuz I've maybe some controversial views on that one. Um but but again, it's very interesting seeing one of these few congressional races that really have genuine national importance. Um we could talk about some of the genu uh uh geograph uh uh what am I trying to say? The demographical issues to it. There's some interesting things about media consumption and the way that likely shaped your views there. So, I think it's a it's an interesting race, not only from those who are, you know, of our intellectual uh movement, if you will. Um, you know, we we and all all of that, but also just some interesting details about how, you know, politics really works. Um, some of the interesting generational divides that are baked into the system that are not quite at the top yet. Um, and so all of these are very interesting topics to all come from the fourth district of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Connor, did you watch this race at all? Like what's what are your feelings about it? What's your reaction? >> I uh I followed it um not super super closely, but I was aware it was one of the big stories. And then yeah, that night I was tuning in for the results. Um and you know, I was I wasn't happy to see Massie lose. I guess um the we talk a lot about how you know democracy is a sham and um you know the how irrelevant Congress is and I I I believe all that but at the same time elections are helpful signals to send to the ruling class. And I was hoping that despite all the money that was being, you know, poured into this race to take out Massie, that it would have been pleasant to watch him win it despite all of that. And so, yeah, that that was a a nice moment that um was taken from us. I that said, the fact that that much money was poured in to remove him and it was still a pretty close race is um still notable and hopefully that gets noticed. Um, it was also helpful to see the age breakdown. It's kind of interesting data. Basically, the younger you were, the more likely you were to go for Bassie. The older, um, the more likely, what was his name? Gellerin. He was like, >> it doesn't matter. >> Like an empty body there. >> You'll never hear from him again. Like he'll be totally irrelevant in the house. He will he will do nothing. >> He's he accomplished the goal, which is to get mad. It doesn't even matter. Yeah. >> There. But yeah. and they they got basically enough of the the boomer Fox News watchers to come out and I guess at the end of the day it was probably just a turnout race between them and trying to get the the young people out and yeah the the boomers won this round but you know I guess that that does make me kind of um hopeful for the future. It's it was so absurd. I don't know if you guys saw the Ben Shapiro clip where he was talking about how this this shows that the future of the right, the future of the Republican party is like his version of MAGA, basically Israel first uh MAGA and that Massiey's irrelevant. It's the end of the story and it's like look at the ages. Do you know how time works? Like it's in his favor right there. So I I was disappointed to see him lose. Um but then at the same time as I imagine uh I imagine your takes are kind of similar to mine in that there there are also some benefits to him being out of there. I I think that I my broader sort of macro view of the political situation right now is things are not good and there's a lot of potential for things to get worse especially if you look at all the malinvestment in the economy um really from the financial crisis but also especially from COVID. And so I think that being out of power is actually a big political advantage and will be a big political political advantage in the future. It kind of already has been. I think that was one of the reasons Trump was so successful is because he had no real claim to the situation in 2015. And so I do think like looking at some figures like Massie is now one of them, MTG and other even like Tucker getting forced out at Fox. I think they're positioned well to benefit as things get messier in the future. So, even, you know, we could talk about like Massiey's non-political career, but I I do think that um there there's potential for this to actually age quite well for him. >> Yeah. I mean, I don't know what he's going to do next. Um I mean, Ron Paul had two different stints in the House and I I suppose the criticism of him was he didn't pass enough legislation or whatever. Every criticism I saw of Massie was just so dumb that like I just felt my IQ going down anytime I saw comments from the anti- Massie people in social media. And you know what it reminded me a lot of? You guys probably don't remember this, but when um Ron Paul was running for president, uh they his opponents decided to try and slander him by pointing out that when Ron Paul was president, he voted or when he was a congressman, he voted for Congress stipulating how federal monies were to be spent. um also called earmarking and there are other names for it. So what Ron Paul wanted in Congress was not the president and not the executive agencies to determine how federal money's once spent once authorized. How would they be spent? Congress Ron Paul thought constitutionally Congress should determine how federal monies are spent which is the correct answer. Uh, but I remember people saying, "Well, I can't I can't support Ron Paul anymore because he's for ear marking." Like, what what are you talking about? And they're like, "Well, he supported XYZ dollars going to, you know, ABC causes." And I'm like, that money was already spent. It was already authorized by Congress. And he had no ability to stop it. And all he was saying is that I don't want executive agencies. that is the deep state to determine where that money is spent. I think Congress should determine where that money is spent. And you would say that and they're like, "No, it just means he's he's not a real uh fiscal conservative or libertarian or whatever. He's betrayed the cause because he supported earmarks, which is just the stupidest argument." And I mean, you just have to be a special kind of either ignorant or really dumb to be persuaded by that by that argument. And I think they peeled off a lot of people from Ron Paul with that claim. Now Ron obviously wasn't going to win anyway that they were never going to let someone like that win the presidency. If it looked like he might win, they just would have killed him. I mean this is obviously how the system works. Uh so that I mean it's not like that made the difference. But it was interesting to see how the dumbest arguments will work against like consistent pro-f freedom candidates. And so I was just reminded of that Ron Paul bit with a lot of what people were saying about Massie that they were saying, "Oh, he voted uh against um Trump on some bill or even worse, it was some procedural thing where he like voted so that he could vote no later and they're like, "No, that proves he's a liberal." Of course, this you know right away you're dealing with an ignorant person when they just kind of use liberal just generally to mean progressive, right? He voted with the Democrats and and I mean my eyes just glaze over when they talk about this. Um so this guy, right, who is in every way like a proun, proonstitution, anti-federal government thing. He voted the wrong way on some procedural amendment. So now Trump is the keeper of freedom and Massie is an enemy. It's it's just amazing to me the lack of brain power that has to go into coming to that conclusion. And that just seemed to be the the the overall claim that I saw in social media when it came to Massie. So it was a real black pill just seeing uh how many people fell for it for that. Although I guess the upside is Trump has like 20% approval rating among independents or whatever. So, I mean, there's that, but there's the significant MAGA crowd out there. They support Trump no matter what, who will basically just repeat anything you tell them to repeat. And that just seems to be the reality right now. >> Well, I think one of the byproducts, one of the one of the the indicators of this election is that the the trust Trump no matter what is is the Republican party. It's the Republican party voter base, the traditional voters Republican party. and you know not good or you know not good bad whatever but but like this is very clear that um you know I think it is interesting that despite the very pain on the streets um you I've talked to a lot of of normal Republicans they will complain about gas prices they will they will complain about various economic hardships but when it comes to Trump they still you know still good to go and this is clearly been demonstrated with a number of these primaries to date including uh uh Bill Cassidy who was a a sitting member of the Senate losing a primary which is a very very rare event. Um looks like Cornin's going to be on his way out in Texas which a very very rare event. Well I mean saying it's a rare event now it's twice now in the same calendar year. So do with that what you will. Um you know the Indiana State Senate races that we talked about a couple weeks ago yada yada yada. Um so it's very very clear that despite everything else Trump's control of the Republican party is perhaps stronger now than ever before. And it's unfortunate that Thomas Massie definitely got caught in that that ride. Um I I do think though there is some you know you know it is it is easy correct fair whatever right to talk about man these boomers watching Fox News you know if only they were listening to these sources they'd have more respect for Massie um you know the boomers ruining politics yada yada yada all you know you know I think all of that the generational divide topics that we talk about a lot all you know valid understandable right you know we we lost a good man um you know really a good And um and I I want to emphasize that I got great respect for Thomas Massie, his voting record, him as a person, um his his new wife I I knew in Ran's office. I mean, all wonderful people and the treatment they had this campaign was was very unfortunate. But um and I'm not trying to use but as in the traditional way of everything before that should be discarded. I do think however though there are some broader interesting questions that that a movement if you will needs to consider on national politics in the age of 2026. like what does it mean to be a libertarian congressman in 2026? Um you because like when Ron Paul was was Dr. Paul actually kind of an interesting similarity and in '96 I believe Nuke Gingrich actually like put did a similar sort of pressure campaign financed and promised out the wizoo a Democrat to change over to run against Ron. Ron was successful in 96 but that's a little bit different than than the Trumping in 2026. Um but but there was sort of the similar sort of establishment massive massive focus on that race um for for Dr. Paul. Uh but but Dr. Paul, as much as anything else, was able to really elevate the monetary policy issue both through his unique position on the Financial Services Committee, which allowed him to frequently grill Federal Reserve chairman, right? Have have control over a committee that allowed to bring, you know, rebellious and subversive speakers such as many Mason Institute faculty on the issue. Um, was was able to elevate a topic that was broadly out of the conversation being monetary policy at all. right? And elevating that. Um, and and I I think when when you look at Massie, right, if you think about like one of the greatest hits of Thomas Massie, it is a lot of no votes, right? Which is f, you know, a lot of it's bad. I'm not sure, you know, a lot of no votes and it was co, right? The the the co stop stuff very very important. Uh, Rand Paul deserves some credit in terms of kind of being this sort of examined you this this examiner of data and and medical bias and and all that sort of stuff with with co very very important. Um, but I you I don't think there's been a similar sort of broader attention to a niche issue as a byproduct of of Massiey's career in part because the environment has changed. You have so many new different news sources. Obviously, Massie is an outlier when it comes to foreign policy within DC, calling out Apac within DC, right? You know, that perhaps is the closest to kind of really planting a flag on a particular issue. Um but the question is is that particularly with this ex uh uh increasingly tribalized element of politics like what is the practical value to a libertarian movement or to yeah to the libertarian movement of having a member of Congress at all and that does not mean that Washington's better off with Thomas Massie not in it but I but like what what what is to be done like what what what would you want a congressman to do if it's not just simply being a constant no vote on issues that kind of lean into the oh well you know he doesn't get anything done. Grandstanding sort of accus acquisitions there, accusations there. And I I think there is some meaningful conversation. And I I think one of the things that has hurt um this this broader movement since 2016 is that, you know, there's a division of labor, right? Like I I can't name to you what is like the ideal, you know, what is a meaningful libertarian policy aim that you could kind of build a coalition to get behind in 2026, right? the KO. I'm not trying to take the traditional, you know, bash of the KO and the Koch brothers and I mean, anyone interested in the Coctopus and the Rothbart background, very very fun stuff. I'm not trying to like, you know, it's like, oh, well, you know, they they they did Murray wrong back in the day, but, you know, for a long period of time, Kato at least was a had had practical pragmatic policy suggestions for that, you know, typically directed to Republicans and, you know, maybe some some some potentials for reforms in the margins. KO doesn't pretty much exist as a viable political entity since 2016 because like they went left while Trump was going populist. I think that further erodess like the market brand value of libertarian free markets and etc is just like how uh uh deliberately and explicitly offensive a lot of the leading scholars at KO are to maga sensitive Republicans. And so like, you know, it's it's very I think it's more more difficult now to even make marginal differences from a legislative position without any sort of of meaningful Washington apparatus um than ever as before. So So what is the what is the payback for libertarians on investing in federal campaigns given that this is what currently exists in Washington? And we can complain about it and we can moralize about it. All of which the analysis will be just and righteous. But when it comes to like if libertarians are investing their money in libertarian candidates since 2014 or investing in, you know, gold, silver, Bitcoin, one side of that libertarian political activism, I think you can argue, has had a far better payout than the other. And so I think these are some of the conversations that should be had amongst people that are interested in libertarian activism, libertarian politics, in part as a lesson from this from Massiey's race. Well, uh, I have nothing against investing in Bitcoin. I own Bitcoin. Uh, I would not consider it among my libertarian activities. >> Starting a business, starting a business, entrepreneurship, broad broad gambit of >> I don't think that counts as activism versus this is not investment advice. Not a financial notism. >> Well, I'm just saying if you're going to choose between giving money, put investing in Bitcoin or giving money to some candidate you like, the two aren't the same thing. They're not going toward the same goal. Uh but I mean even when Paul Ron was in Congress, his ability to do anything legislatively was always very very small. It was always I mean and this was what Lou Rogwell always said was primarily a he his advantage was as a spokesperson >> uh for right because he think about how often he was on TV back in 2008 2012 and that generated huge amounts of interest in Austrian economics in our site we got huge waves of visitors to the site uh people were buying books uh and I I would credit Ron with a lot of back then back in 2012 people you would just like meet people at like a national association of realtors meeting and stuff and they would ask you like what kind of economics would you like because I would give presentations as a state economist and they're like well what school of economics I'm like well that's a weird question first of all almost nobody used to ask that and then if you said Austrian they would like start nodding which was a totally new uh experience in 2012 12 and it happened a little bit in 20 in 2008. Uh I I think for decades that's been the primary advantage. Now if you go way back in time where you go back in time where a single member of Congress could actually make a difference in terms of debating things on the floor of Congress. We're me we're members of the Senate. We're actually engaging in in real discussions of topics and facts and things like that. And I don't want to be too utopian about it like senators of the 19th century where you know intellectual giants or anything like that but that's that stuff mattered to some extent and a single vote in the Senate mattered. >> Uh those days are gone right so it's certainly more it's certainly less now that any single member can do. Well, I I I I my push back to that is for one, I do think Ron is is a different thing entirely in part because like Ron explicitly used his platform in Congress to push an explicitly ideological intellectual agenda. I I I again this is not a criticism of Massie, but like you don't you didn't have Massie out there saying, "Oh, everyone should read Rothbart, right?" And so like so so connecting political service to like a deeper like you know Massie would attend libertarian functions, but I I don't I didn't see him as like a libertarian activist congressman. He was a libertarian constitutionalist guy, but he was like an activist like you know Ron was like an institution builder within the movement, right? Um but but I I do think though and this this is my biggest criticism of Massie on the one big this is my controversial opinion that I I alluded to earlier is is that like the one big beautiful bill was an opportunity to get a gimme, right? And and like there there are specific opportunities where you can get something done easier because margins are so so small, right? like it's much difficult when you're when you're Ron Paul and you've got, you know, a 20 seat advantage because of the Tea Party revolution, right? Um, one of the things Ron Paul actually did get done is he worked with like Alan Grayson who was like a populist interesting Democrat Floridaian on getting like a um a short-term a limited but still an audit of the Fed during the DoddFrank and and all sort of interesting stuff there. But there are there are individual moments where you can leverage your vote because it must pass on this very thin margin. And and Ran's also really bad at this is that like either the reflexive thing is it has more spending and therefore it's bad rather than trying to attach your own sort of gimme your own cookie to the thing, right? Uh the big beautiful bill was additionally kind of problematic because like there's automatic tax increases if it didn't pass. So it's not like an omnibus bill where like oh well you know government shutdown is going to happen if we don't pass this and therefore that might be preferable to uh you know a six million a billion dollar I'm using very simplified math but you know a $6 trillion budget versus a $7 trillion budget right um you know but like there's actually a tax amplifier with within that particular bill but you could leverage that for some sort of policy gimmick rand Rand Paul's had this multiple times in the Senate with their very thin margins and I think that's one of the problems is that since you've lacked the monetary focus from Rand and Massie Right? They know the Fed is bad. They know spending's a problem, right? But without thinking radically on the monetary issue, something like eliminating the capital gains tax on gold, silver, and Bitcoin, right? Or gold and silver, right? If you, you know, want to go narrow with it, um or you know, if taking Bitcoin money in that, but like you know, whatever. But like eliminating the capital gains tax on a competing currency, like that was one of Ron's like leading policy. And yet that particular aspect of it is something that no one like you the people that have picked up that bill for the most part have been like interesting uh uh fellow travelers like Paul Brown was like an interesting tea party congressman from Georgia. He ran with it for a little little bit of time. But like those sort of things were like you could actually have like a radical impact on the American monetary policy polit monetary system by increasing a very kind of you know meaningful but you know radical kind of wonkish narrow elimination of capital gains tax is something that could be leveraged in these sort of situations but but they have it right. And so so when it comes to translating the the leverage that comes with being the the the lone voice of reason and and trying to identify opportunities where you can make differences in the margin. If you're not interested in doing that, if you're interested in being a a a constant vote against no and those those no votes are are ideologically and morally sound, but you know, they just replace you like, okay, well, we can't bribe Massie, so therefore we're going to bribe, you know, some worst guy, right? Because they're all worse guys. And so therefore, you know, we're going to increase spending to take care of this little guy's uh you know, some some some boondoggle project in northern New York, right? Instead of instead of this, instead of getting a tax tax cut on gold, silver, and Bitcoin, right? Like that's the that's the transactional nature of all this, right? There is very little legislating. It is you come to the trough, you ask for your thing, you know, if they need you, they give you your thing, right? And so there's a transactional politics that is the reality of modern legislating. This is not lofty people debating merits and first principles and all this. This is will you vote with me? What what what do I need to trade with you to get that? And so if we do not have people willing to do that and again there's good good reasons not to want to be into this. Like again I I do not encourage anyone going to DC. It's bad for your soul. It's bad for everything, right? But like to me like if if that function is not taking place then you're kind of you're you're you're you're you're a podcaster with an office in terms of just simply having occasional media appearances to say why X Y and Z is bad and there's a value to that but you can have that same value particularly now by going on you know Joe Rogan or going by on Dave Smith's podcast or going on Piers Morgan or whatever is that the difference of that messaging device I think has fundamentally changed in this age of decentralized media and the interesting thing is that the age of central ized media is changing the way younger generations are consuming news and so that has the potential to be something fun down the road but currently we're still in a boomer control political system and so what does the real you know what is the proper way of navigating the system with all of its warts and flaws and stupidity and absurdities and and fallacies and whatever like what what what if we're going to be realistic what is the value of this clown show to make marginal meaningful differences on on the sides >> I don't and I don't I don't claim to have all the answers but I think these are conversations that are worth having when it comes to political engagement really >> 100%. You want to avoid the libertarian version of what I think especially progressives do but everybody all sides of the tribe are kind of guilty of where they imagine themselves as this you know morally pure creature going into DC and then purely working you know for progressives it'd be like for the little guy um for conservatives it'd be whatever their version is and not having any understanding that the way that states actually work is they're essentially these ongoing wars between interest groups essentially. >> Yeah. And that like if you get in there somehow, it's immediately going to be a struggle with all these other groups that have their agendas and it's this whole like scrap that's happening below the surface and it's invisible enough in the public that people aren't thinking about it. But no, like if you actually get into that, that's why I and a lot of my bias I focus so much on the communication side of things that that's where I'm really focusing and that's why I really uh put a lot of emphasis on the election. The election itself is valuable and like winning an election is wonderful. Getting into office after that's something that like I I mean I would hate that. I'd hate to actually have a position like that and that's that's no fun. Like I don't like any of that stuff. I I think a lot of people are similar. say like they love the idea of Massie running and being out there and if he was able to do those debates doing those debates and they want him to win kind of like 2024 like the the Trump campaign in 2024 the all the people that are the independents that are turning against him now like they were totally on board and there was all this energy so like it shifts dramatically once you actually get in there because of the actual nature of politics and even though a lot of libertarians are pretty good realists when it comes to how it actually works there's still some trap in terms of thinking that if we just that a pure one of our guys that's pure enough in there he can start unraveling with the whole system is designed to not be unraveled by one or two people coming in and to your point and once again getting back to the communication I do think there's a lot of value communication wise with having Congress members I think one episode that comes to mind is Massie going on Tucker I think and talking about how Apac had uh I think he said a babysitter for every single member of Congress and there's like there's ways that he can give an inside account that other people can't I I think also when you're a politician, people listen to you a lot more and so it's this it's a way to get on national TV that you wouldn't have if you were just a communicator and but to your point that's valuable but the question is is it worth the cost? Like Rothbart wrote about political strategy as a form of entrepreneurship in a way you're you're devoting scarce time and resources to different things and is this the best use of time like to your point that's an important thing to talk about. Well, and and it's definitely true that being a congressman is a nice credential for different media hits. And again, like you know, I'm you know, if if if you want to run for Congress and more and and you have a path of viability, more power to you. Um but but I think you hit the nail on the head where like, you know, it's I think it's more useful to think about special interest groups for liberty over, you know, libertarian freedom fighters in Congress, right? And and I I think you have seen nationally um you know often more perhaps more often the state level than the national level because the national level you know it's just there to feed the machine and and keep the cartels going. But like uh I mean if you think like what have been the biggest advancements for liberty you know whatever you how you define it. Um chances are you're going to be interested in some of these categories that have had meaningful legislative change. Gun rights right massive massive improvements in gun rights nationwide on the last several decades. Um, again, we complain about the NRA and whatever, all all valid, but like you know, there's a variety of different organizations there, but like the gun rights have have clearly improve improved significantly in the last several decades. Um, school choice and again, we have a broader conversation about vouchers and whatever, but but educational freedom has certainly expanded. Um, that has been kind of do tove uh a little bit in the the kind of hybrid realm of parental rights, which would also include different aspects of like postcoid maha stuff, right? like getting rid of the fluoride and Florida and and some alternative medicine sort of stuff and and interesting credentialism sort of stuff when it comes to the medical treatments and things like that, right? Um but outside of that, like I mean I'm there might be a handful I'm thinking I know there's been some good state level stuff when it comes to elimination of state taxes on gold silver, but if you don't have the federal thing done then done well, you know, there that the big big player there is going to continue to play a role. Um but but like yeah thinking of it more in special interest groups for liberty I think is something that that is is you know it's less attractive. You don't have like oh well you know my entire personality is about how great Ron and Rand and and Thomas Massie are. And again don't me wrong I've been one of those people. I am one of those people. Love them all right? You know all the all the all the trappings of of fandom and all that sort of stuff. But but in terms of like actual political movements, a special interest group that can persuade 30 members who might not be ideologically pure but or can be convinced on doing one big thing can be more valuable in ter in terms of making any slight marginal improvement than having one great champion given the crude purely transactional way that American politics certainly uh operates now and has operated in some form quite. Yeah, I think I agree with Connor though that the communication role is fine. I mean, I don't see any problem with diverse investments, right? You can invest in a group like the Mises Institute. Obviously, that's very important. Some people don't want to do that. So, they want to give money to a candidate. Be good if you had one candidate that someone could put their money toward. I mean, one out of 435 or whatever who can then right just be a gadf fly uh in the Congress. I don't see a big downside to that. >> No, >> it's it's not downside if you win. not down a few which is the which but and that's that is one of the the unfortunate aspects of like the political system right now is that like >> you know I I think for for a while there there was very positive trends being made on the margin within Congress because of some of the the MAGA America first congressman like like Matt Gates Marjgerie Taylor Green and Thomas Massie as a trio they're all friends and there's a few people on the sidelines that again you can nitpick at the time you know Tim Burchchett's kind of an interesting guy in Glen Glenn Jacobs district. You know, there's a few others that are you Victoria Sparks is is has usually been a Massie ally, but but it's but it's now like it's kind of wild that you know 2026 like those three people used to kind of point to and doing some really kind of interesting things or or saying interesting things and now completely gone which I think is probably does not project particularly well for American politics in the next in the short term. Um but but you know again and and none of this is universal, right? like you you shake you shake the dice up and you you have a demographics change and and you have fewer boomer boomer participation in federal elections and you have someone who is Thomas Massie like but doesn't have like the entire like Trump armada against them, right? Like again I'm not I'm not trying to black pill anyone in terms of of meaningful gains in the margin here. Um but I I do think though like you know when you get to Congress like what does it mean to be an effective you know liberty legislator in Congress I I think needs to be more than simply voting no on things. It's like it's like so so should you get there if if I'm gonna invest money there if the movement is going to invest money in there and again I don't want to speak collectively for particularly for libertarians but like what does it look to be effective in that position? How do you maximize that position to make meaningful changes back home? Um and I think that's kind of that's that's something that I I think should be should be part of the conversation alongside this is bad. Having foreign interest groups spend this amount of money in election is bad. Very obviously true. Right. the fact that a non- entity can beat a someone of Thomas Massiey's individual character. Not ideal, right? Like there's a lot of valid critiques and a lot of hand ringing and a lot of like, you know, of of really bad things that that per primary illustrates that are external, but I think that there are some internal things that should be considered in terms of like, you know, how can Rand Paul, you know, maximize like his his time in office? Um, assuming he doesn't end up on the chopping block in four years. Luckily, he's got four years, so like that buys him some time. But everything you just said though, I mean that applies to any member of Congress regardless of their ideology, right? So the question is >> any member of Congress who comes in and doesn't largely agree with what the ruling elites want from you, >> you're going to have a hard time and you're basically you're not going to be an important member. You're just you're not. And first of all, you come in and you're expected to fund raise most of the time, >> right? That's a big part of what you do. They don't really care about what your opinions are. And all that matters is how much can you deliver a vote for what the foreign policy blob wants, what the people at the very top wants. And all legislation is crafted in these big omnibus bills. It's all there is no vote, right? The whole committee process which still works in state legislatures from the ground up. None of that applies in Congress. And so it's all decided by the leadership 90% of the time. And so you'll be successful as a member of Congress if you agree with the ruling class. If you don't, you're meaningless. You don't have to be a libertarian for that to be true. >> But I I I think this is where I disagree. And and for one, most members of Congress worthless, right? But but but there but there but they they get certain things done. The thing is is that what they're what they're there to get done is not ideological. They're there to secure federal grants for building a marina in downtown of their city, right? They're there to secure funding and like that is that that is their number one priority is to bring home bacon back to their district. There is a smaller subset that are ideological in nature, right? And if you're on the left, you can get a lot done because like you know there's there's no even like hesitation there. like you know if if if your if your ideological preference is to expand the scope of the state then it's very easy to bribe you right I think it's a unique issue that libertarians have because for one again like Massiey's national importance is not his relationship with with Kentucky now he took good care of Kentucky right like I'm not you know I'm not trying to say that he was he was not connected to the Kentucky soil like I mean he built his own house out of you lumber in his yard and two hands right like you know but he so so you know Kentucky was important but him nobody would caring like you know libertarians nationwide wouldn't be caring about Kentucky if his top thing was bringing home bacon back to Kentucky for right it's precisely that he is an ideological figure and of an ideology that opposes the state that makes it difficult to get these small little gimmies on the margins whereas anyone else like like it's a unique libertarian problem I think more than anyone else because even though like an an AOC or an Elon Omar right or um you know any of like the let's say the the left-wing equivalents of mass They might be out there and be ripro and mad and and and condemn, you know, this legislation as racist and and and oppressively patriotic and they might pretend to be against the regime. And when it comes to certain foreign policy issues, they might even really really mean it. But when it comes to their domestic desires, it is easier to attach something, particularly when you have Democrats running the process, it's easy to attach the most insane thing possible. Right? if you want to, you know, Somali Marxist studies department and with a federal grant, like it's pretty easy for Elon Omar to attach that to some sort of writer and anomous bill, right? And so therefore, he t she takes care of her little ideological niche and can keep on going. But if you're a libertarian and you have to ask and and then it's then you're kind of like your hands off if you're not interested in attaching something to a bill when the whole bill is bad, right? So like I think it's a unique consideration that libertarians are forced into because we know the entire system is bad. we we you know we want to cut the entire you darn sucker down to the bone that's not going to happen. So how do you leverage that? It's like I think it's a unique libertarian problem even if there's you know in theory anybody who doesn't play along is going to get the backbench of treatment but like they might play along just a little bit to get something and still be in the backbench. >> I think the deal breaker though is going to be on the Israel issue or on war in general though it's very hard to find. I mean you do have some left-wingers who are consistently anti-war. They don't last very long. They tend to become unimportant real quick. And that's just not allowed. You're not allowed to take a pro peace position in Congress and still be given any sort of real leadership position or anything like that. So, I think members learn real quick like what you know what's his face? Bernie cosplayed as a peace candidate for a long time, but in reality, he never was one. And so he learned how to like play the part without actually upsetting the foreign policy blob on that. And so I mean you're right to a certain extent of that if if you can fool the voters into thinking you have some sort of ideological principles but everyone in Washington knows how you really function then I think you can have a long productive career in Congress. the the problem Massie gets to is he he he he was what he was telling the voters was actually true uh in terms of his opposition to the >> he's usually not popular in politics, >> right? So that was a problem. >> No. And and and it's interesting like the the next two most expensive congressional races were both primaries that Apac uh played into. Cory Bush was one of them in Missouri, which I mean like she's also like I don't I don't want to equate her on next Thomas Massie on any other issue. like she had some other other issues that might have hurt her besides simply Apac spending, but like that was a major player there. I think it was like by the maybe one of the New York congressman, but you know that it is funny that that you the Apac targeted congressional races are the ones that just have completely outlandish amounts of of primary spend. But but it is worth noting that like Massiey's had Apac money against them for for years now. It's not like it's not like just you know in the last two years Thomas Massie started to being vocal about the Apac problem and therefore they got engaged. I think the reason why it was a particular issue here is that Trump is that Massie voted against the big beautiful bill which like a most must pass bill that had all of Trump world against them that uh uh Apac saw the opportunity to to quadruple down on this and just massively filed you know put put resources in there. they were able to find someone. And so it was it was it was the combination of just Trump's wrath supported by Apac funding that made this situation different than 2020, right, when Trump was also against them, but like a lot a lot of things going on. You'd have the same level of of a Apac spending um or some of these other races where Apac was spending against Massie, but it wasn't like a full, you know, was it $20 million or whatever from from those sort of folks. So, so there there's there's multiple different factors I think that play into this particular race, but it's definitely true at large is that, you know, if if if Apex smells blood in the water on a on a member that is not playing ball with them, they have shown the ability to m organize incredible amounts of money and they they have definitely been taken a lot more scalps within these primaries and both left and right, >> which is why I'm >> Go ahead, Conor. Going back to what we were saying earlier, that's why I'm pro-in interest group as a a strategy there because I I think it's I mean it's the age-old dilemma for libertarians like we're against the system. So do we not play in the system at all or do we play a little bit? Do we dip our toe in? What do we do once we're in um like our basically whole identity is that we don't want any of this stuff. We don't want Washington um at all there. So the way that it works right now um we have a problem with but yeah you have to be realistic and I think it's that the system exists to serve different interest groups and I mean you just look back at uh well you don't even have to go far like the uh defend the guard I think is a movement that's doing a good job on the state level right now where it's just this ideological group that is going for one specific >> uh legislative victory and are putting all their energy into that. I think like um going back in history, something Rothbart's written a lot about that David Brady really woke me up to was what is it the National Association of Manufacturing um was like a big ideological movement there and yeah they were an interest group and so like back to your point and to stress something that you've kind of said over and over again we're not because I think I'm in agreement with you. We're not against Massie being in there and voting no on all this stuff. was some real real utility to I think especially I I had a tweet that kind of took off um the other day just the contrast of that that the fact that all of these Republicans are going in and saying we're going to cut spending, we're against spending in their campaigns and even in all the media hits and then he's the only one consistently voting against it. That's valuable and it's valuable to to is like a foil character to really show the nature of all the the rest of the politicians. So we are in no way against that at all. It's just it's purely a question of is this the best like from like a strategy entrepreneur perspective would it be better if all the money that went into Massiey's campaign and I donated to the campaign I definitely like I gave him some money so I'm I'm part of that but the question is would that like if there was an interest group that could have gotten all that money and tried to you maybe it was on the state level maybe it's federally it's just a question of uh of strategy and investment really at the end of the day because these are all I mean most of the strategy uh you know ideas or possible paths put forward are good. It's just a question of what's the best investment for you know the the political return. >> Yeah. Yeah. Again make it clear like I mean it's a tragedy that messes the last race it makes Congress a worse body etc etc. I think it was dumb and the thing is I think it was dumb from all sides. I think I think it was I think it was a self-sabotaging move by Trump to alienate someone who has who's got you know there's probably a thousand plus massie fans of every single congressional district. That ups the margins again. I I think it was I think it was bad for both sides. I think it was dumb for you know I think both sides made mistakes in this and I think both sides you know are I think both all three sides Massie the congressional body and and the Trump political wing are all worse off based off of of what happened um um on Tuesday. But I'm I'm also may this is kind of this byprod I some of the stuff I love reading from Rothbart is you know when when you when you're when the movement is in a certain stage and you're kind of like you know 15 I mean again I'm maybe just being nostalgic now as a Ron Paul era guy and you see like the last figure of the Ron Paul movement you know fall and it's like okay well how should we think about the last you know 15 years and again I I definitely think there's something lost after Ron Paul that even that that Amos and Massie couldn't fill um in part because committee seats and things like that, right? Like I mean, you know, it's been been diminished since Dr. Paul left Congress as a whole, but it's like you what what what else could have been done in those years to have made things, you know, that that could have resulted in something qualifying as a win. And I I think there's there's again unfortunately we once upon a time there was a broader division of labor of relevant libertarian organizations thinking those sort of things. And now I think particularly post Trumpening, you know, I think the Institute is probably one of the few libertarian organizations out there that is in a better better position in 2026 than it was in 2015. And I think that there's some I think that is worth bearing when we think about the liberty movement is again there's not a DC organization in uh and and again not that you know NES had the the the greatest things to think about 20 2012 KO um back when they you know when they were sucking up to a political class that are now completely powerless you the Chris Christies of the world. Um, you know, things were not great then, but I think they're even worse now. And I think that's true with Freedom Works, which no longer exists, right? The the entire network, the entire Koch network basically of Ron Paul era organizations that were either strengthened or built as a result of the of 2012 are completely defunct. And I think that that makes a political movement weaker is not having a division of labor of institutions thinking about these things practically. And again, the institute's position is like we're not part of that. like it's like, "Oh, why don't why don't you guys go up there and lobby and have like, you know, our our focus is research. We there's a structure of production. We're kind of this part of the structure of production pyramid, right?" Like, I mean, that's that's what we do. This is not this is not the Mises Institute's purpose in the libertarian movement is going after lobbying members of Congress, right? Like we we we made scholars and scholarship on this sort of stuff. But once upon a time, there were other other entities out there that could do these sort of questions. And I think that is a void that needs to be talked about as much as what's the next podcast or what's the next figure we can get to run for Congress or you know is Thomas Massie you know runs for 2028. You know think about all the young people that be brought in the movement. All fine and dandy and and again I'd be very interested to see a Massie 2028 race. Um kind of figuring following that sort of national figure role that Ron Paul had in in uh 2012. I think that's a lot more interesting than a Rand Paul version of that. Um but but there are broader aspects of the movement in this division of labor that I think are rooted in now and again a lot of them are the the former coke wings. >> All right. Well, we'll go ahead and wrap up with that for this episode of >> power and market. >> The opportunities are there though. Uplifts uplift. >> No black pillar. >> You got a you got a lot of work to do out there. Other people who want more direct political activism. You know that's a comment Lou made to me once is it's amazing how we've got our hands full at the Mises Institute right uh creating the next generation of researchers scholars people who are teaching your kids in college people who are carrying forward these ideas which we cannot take for granted it's amazing the number of people I hear from say we don't need to teach these people ideas these these ideas everyone I know already agrees with me everyone I know means like 80-year-old guys at their gun club and they think that those ideas will magic ally be transferred to the next generation or something. I'm like, who do you think's going to pass on these ideas who actually value freedom? This is not something that automatically happens. Just look at 90% of the human race and how they view uh natural law and freedom and that sort of thing. These ideas have to be passed on and we're doing that all the time. But people would always ask Lou, why aren't you guys running candidates? Why aren't you guys like lobbying in Congress? He says, we're not against those things, but you get to it. go for it, right? You're you're free to do so. You have our blessing. But they don't want that. They want somebody else to do those things. So, uh they complain that the Mises Institute doesn't do everything they want to do because they're too busy to do it or to fund it or to devote their time and treasure to it. >> Well, and and I mean not the first time I've said this, but thank God for Lee Rockwell because I I think like imagine libertarian movement like that that did not have the Mises Institute in our particular brand of these ideas within the ecosystem. I mean, the libertarian movement would be effectively done because I think again, I'm not trying I'm not trying to take pot shots. I'm not trying to be like overly dismissive and whatever, but but I I think, you know, the the Rothbartian dynamic of of radical free market populism that that hits upon the the class conflict that again, anyone hasn't seen Ryan's LSC lecture, highly highly recommended. But like those are, I think, found necessary components of engaging with politics at large. And I think particularly in this era and we're kind of the only ones doing it that we get barbs and arrows from very serious scholars out there that you're like oh well you know you know whatever right like you know people hate us because of it but that's the only brand of libertarianism that has any chance of function like Massie Massie was a torchbearer for that um and and Ron Paul was it was baked in his DNA and without that particular brand of radical free market economics focused on the Fed and this this broader appreciation for the class dynamics of of you know the class conflict involved with liberalism. This entire everything else, you know, tax policies and whatever would be completely sterile and lifeless without the particular brand of these ideas that Blue Rock will embody the institute with. But again, but we can't do there's a division of labor. So So we we need we need more mises institute, astrobianspired organizations out there. >> All right. Well, this time we're really going to wrap up the episode for real. >> All right. Thanks guys for joining me. Thank you though. Thank you Connor. Thank you everyone out there for listening. We'll be back next time with more. So, we'll see you then.
Post-Massie America
Summary
Transcript
Welcome back to the Power Market podcast. I'm Ryan McMaken, editor-inchief at the Mises Institute. And joining me today for this episode are two of our contributing editors. We've got Tho Bishop and we have Connor O'Keefe. And before we get rolling, we got a couple of well, we got a new book and we got some upcoming events, right though, that we should mention. >> Absolutely. Well, we've got got a few new books in the bookstore. uh one of which is not yet available but will be very soon. We do have though on the table already um a book celebrating the 75th anniversary, the influence and significance of human action after 75 years um which is a collection of scholarly articles from an event that we had celebrating that great equation or that great occasion. Not a lot of equations um but that is in the Mises bookstore right now as well as free online through mises.org and all the usual channels. Uh, we also have if you want a free book, if you haven't read Anatomy of the State, if you got people that haven't read Anatomy the State, if you want to be celebrating this year of Rothbard, you can get your free copy of Anatomy the State at mises mises.org/state. Register there. We've gotten a lot of great feedback from people explaining how they attend to use these copies, which is really great to see. A lot of excitement around that. And of course, we've got the Rothbart intellectual biography, Murray Rothbard, the making of an Austrian Economist that will soon be launched to the public. We had a preview uh debut during Rothbard University last weekend, a great great event. So, that's very exciting. Speaking of great events, we are coming to the wonderful state of New Hampshire uh for an event dedicated to why is the healthcare system broken on June 27th. Um would love to see our free sters up there. Uh we have Mises University coming in July. Again, as I said last week, if you are a student and you're listening to this podcast, stop what you're doing. Apply right now. Uh those seats will be going fast. Um and u a new one, a a revamped event on the website. If you're in South Carolina, we're coming to Greenville, South Carolina to talk about why government schools don't want you to understand economics in September, September 12th. Um so we just relocated that event origally. It was in Raleigh. Now we're in Greenville. So, if you are in that area, uh, come say hi to, uh, staff we have, including Dr. Tim Terrell. I know he's bringing some some F folks there. So, yeah, it' be great to be in the great state of South Carolina. Hopefully Lindsey Graham doesn't know about it. >> Well, the subject today, we're going to talk a little bit about uh this the other day's primary uh Republican primary. There was more than one. The one we mostly watched was the one in Kentucky. Uh, and maybe there's something we can learn about how the democratic system works in the United States. Uh, and spoiler, I don't think it works as advertised. Uh, I I shocked >> I don't think it's the the means to change and and goodness in America, but we'll look at that in some more detail here. But though, first of all, why don't you just kind of bring us up to speed on just the basic facts uh of what's going on there uh with with the primaries. >> Yeah, so la last uh last Tuesday was very interesting. a lot of lot of Alabama primaries as well, which uh I think most of the people in our office were more paying attention to Kentucky than Alabama, but neither here nor there. I know there was a very entertaining sheriff's race in Lee County that uh I think had some people happy. Um I'll let Connor comment on that one. Um but uh uh obviously, you know, really the eyes of the nation were on Kentucky 4, which probably for the first time ever, um the most expensive primary in the grand history of American democracy took place there. Um the result being Ed Gallerin, the the Trump endorsed candidate who ran ran very much a Biden style basement campaign, right? No debates, not a lot of public appearances. Even canceled some ones that he was having late in the race because of people coming up and asking questions he didn't want to answer. Uh but he did get through with 10% about roughly a 10% margin over Thomas Massie. Obviously though the relevance of this race is multiffold, right? Massie as sort of a national figure for libertarians out there. Definitely the biggest face in a competitive primary um connected to the Epistonian file release. most of the, you know, a good amount of Ed's money came from people aligned with Apac and the the Israel question being, I think, a a large funer of the kind of the weaponry within that race on the outside and obviously Trump I think particularly after the the big beautiful bill um last year which Massie did not support that I think was was one of the original catalysts from the Trump team's focus on this particular race which we can talk a little bit more in the future cuz I've maybe some controversial views on that one. Um but but again, it's very interesting seeing one of these few congressional races that really have genuine national importance. Um we could talk about some of the genu uh uh geograph uh uh what am I trying to say? The demographical issues to it. There's some interesting things about media consumption and the way that likely shaped your views there. So, I think it's a it's an interesting race, not only from those who are, you know, of our intellectual uh movement, if you will. Um, you know, we we and all all of that, but also just some interesting details about how, you know, politics really works. Um, some of the interesting generational divides that are baked into the system that are not quite at the top yet. Um, and so all of these are very interesting topics to all come from the fourth district of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Connor, did you watch this race at all? Like what's what are your feelings about it? What's your reaction? >> I uh I followed it um not super super closely, but I was aware it was one of the big stories. And then yeah, that night I was tuning in for the results. Um and you know, I was I wasn't happy to see Massie lose. I guess um the we talk a lot about how you know democracy is a sham and um you know the how irrelevant Congress is and I I I believe all that but at the same time elections are helpful signals to send to the ruling class. And I was hoping that despite all the money that was being, you know, poured into this race to take out Massie, that it would have been pleasant to watch him win it despite all of that. And so, yeah, that that was a a nice moment that um was taken from us. I that said, the fact that that much money was poured in to remove him and it was still a pretty close race is um still notable and hopefully that gets noticed. Um, it was also helpful to see the age breakdown. It's kind of interesting data. Basically, the younger you were, the more likely you were to go for Bassie. The older, um, the more likely, what was his name? Gellerin. He was like, >> it doesn't matter. >> Like an empty body there. >> You'll never hear from him again. Like he'll be totally irrelevant in the house. He will he will do nothing. >> He's he accomplished the goal, which is to get mad. It doesn't even matter. Yeah. >> There. But yeah. and they they got basically enough of the the boomer Fox News watchers to come out and I guess at the end of the day it was probably just a turnout race between them and trying to get the the young people out and yeah the the boomers won this round but you know I guess that that does make me kind of um hopeful for the future. It's it was so absurd. I don't know if you guys saw the Ben Shapiro clip where he was talking about how this this shows that the future of the right, the future of the Republican party is like his version of MAGA, basically Israel first uh MAGA and that Massiey's irrelevant. It's the end of the story and it's like look at the ages. Do you know how time works? Like it's in his favor right there. So I I was disappointed to see him lose. Um but then at the same time as I imagine uh I imagine your takes are kind of similar to mine in that there there are also some benefits to him being out of there. I I think that I my broader sort of macro view of the political situation right now is things are not good and there's a lot of potential for things to get worse especially if you look at all the malinvestment in the economy um really from the financial crisis but also especially from COVID. And so I think that being out of power is actually a big political advantage and will be a big political political advantage in the future. It kind of already has been. I think that was one of the reasons Trump was so successful is because he had no real claim to the situation in 2015. And so I do think like looking at some figures like Massie is now one of them, MTG and other even like Tucker getting forced out at Fox. I think they're positioned well to benefit as things get messier in the future. So, even, you know, we could talk about like Massiey's non-political career, but I I do think that um there there's potential for this to actually age quite well for him. >> Yeah. I mean, I don't know what he's going to do next. Um I mean, Ron Paul had two different stints in the House and I I suppose the criticism of him was he didn't pass enough legislation or whatever. Every criticism I saw of Massie was just so dumb that like I just felt my IQ going down anytime I saw comments from the anti- Massie people in social media. And you know what it reminded me a lot of? You guys probably don't remember this, but when um Ron Paul was running for president, uh they his opponents decided to try and slander him by pointing out that when Ron Paul was president, he voted or when he was a congressman, he voted for Congress stipulating how federal monies were to be spent. um also called earmarking and there are other names for it. So what Ron Paul wanted in Congress was not the president and not the executive agencies to determine how federal money's once spent once authorized. How would they be spent? Congress Ron Paul thought constitutionally Congress should determine how federal monies are spent which is the correct answer. Uh, but I remember people saying, "Well, I can't I can't support Ron Paul anymore because he's for ear marking." Like, what what are you talking about? And they're like, "Well, he supported XYZ dollars going to, you know, ABC causes." And I'm like, that money was already spent. It was already authorized by Congress. And he had no ability to stop it. And all he was saying is that I don't want executive agencies. that is the deep state to determine where that money is spent. I think Congress should determine where that money is spent. And you would say that and they're like, "No, it just means he's he's not a real uh fiscal conservative or libertarian or whatever. He's betrayed the cause because he supported earmarks, which is just the stupidest argument." And I mean, you just have to be a special kind of either ignorant or really dumb to be persuaded by that by that argument. And I think they peeled off a lot of people from Ron Paul with that claim. Now Ron obviously wasn't going to win anyway that they were never going to let someone like that win the presidency. If it looked like he might win, they just would have killed him. I mean this is obviously how the system works. Uh so that I mean it's not like that made the difference. But it was interesting to see how the dumbest arguments will work against like consistent pro-f freedom candidates. And so I was just reminded of that Ron Paul bit with a lot of what people were saying about Massie that they were saying, "Oh, he voted uh against um Trump on some bill or even worse, it was some procedural thing where he like voted so that he could vote no later and they're like, "No, that proves he's a liberal." Of course, this you know right away you're dealing with an ignorant person when they just kind of use liberal just generally to mean progressive, right? He voted with the Democrats and and I mean my eyes just glaze over when they talk about this. Um so this guy, right, who is in every way like a proun, proonstitution, anti-federal government thing. He voted the wrong way on some procedural amendment. So now Trump is the keeper of freedom and Massie is an enemy. It's it's just amazing to me the lack of brain power that has to go into coming to that conclusion. And that just seemed to be the the the overall claim that I saw in social media when it came to Massie. So it was a real black pill just seeing uh how many people fell for it for that. Although I guess the upside is Trump has like 20% approval rating among independents or whatever. So, I mean, there's that, but there's the significant MAGA crowd out there. They support Trump no matter what, who will basically just repeat anything you tell them to repeat. And that just seems to be the reality right now. >> Well, I think one of the byproducts, one of the one of the the indicators of this election is that the the trust Trump no matter what is is the Republican party. It's the Republican party voter base, the traditional voters Republican party. and you know not good or you know not good bad whatever but but like this is very clear that um you know I think it is interesting that despite the very pain on the streets um you I've talked to a lot of of normal Republicans they will complain about gas prices they will they will complain about various economic hardships but when it comes to Trump they still you know still good to go and this is clearly been demonstrated with a number of these primaries to date including uh uh Bill Cassidy who was a a sitting member of the Senate losing a primary which is a very very rare event. Um looks like Cornin's going to be on his way out in Texas which a very very rare event. Well I mean saying it's a rare event now it's twice now in the same calendar year. So do with that what you will. Um you know the Indiana State Senate races that we talked about a couple weeks ago yada yada yada. Um so it's very very clear that despite everything else Trump's control of the Republican party is perhaps stronger now than ever before. And it's unfortunate that Thomas Massie definitely got caught in that that ride. Um I I do think though there is some you know you know it is it is easy correct fair whatever right to talk about man these boomers watching Fox News you know if only they were listening to these sources they'd have more respect for Massie um you know the boomers ruining politics yada yada yada all you know you know I think all of that the generational divide topics that we talk about a lot all you know valid understandable right you know we we lost a good man um you know really a good And um and I I want to emphasize that I got great respect for Thomas Massie, his voting record, him as a person, um his his new wife I I knew in Ran's office. I mean, all wonderful people and the treatment they had this campaign was was very unfortunate. But um and I'm not trying to use but as in the traditional way of everything before that should be discarded. I do think however though there are some broader interesting questions that that a movement if you will needs to consider on national politics in the age of 2026. like what does it mean to be a libertarian congressman in 2026? Um you because like when Ron Paul was was Dr. Paul actually kind of an interesting similarity and in '96 I believe Nuke Gingrich actually like put did a similar sort of pressure campaign financed and promised out the wizoo a Democrat to change over to run against Ron. Ron was successful in 96 but that's a little bit different than than the Trumping in 2026. Um but but there was sort of the similar sort of establishment massive massive focus on that race um for for Dr. Paul. Uh but but Dr. Paul, as much as anything else, was able to really elevate the monetary policy issue both through his unique position on the Financial Services Committee, which allowed him to frequently grill Federal Reserve chairman, right? Have have control over a committee that allowed to bring, you know, rebellious and subversive speakers such as many Mason Institute faculty on the issue. Um, was was able to elevate a topic that was broadly out of the conversation being monetary policy at all. right? And elevating that. Um, and and I I think when when you look at Massie, right, if you think about like one of the greatest hits of Thomas Massie, it is a lot of no votes, right? Which is f, you know, a lot of it's bad. I'm not sure, you know, a lot of no votes and it was co, right? The the the co stop stuff very very important. Uh, Rand Paul deserves some credit in terms of kind of being this sort of examined you this this examiner of data and and medical bias and and all that sort of stuff with with co very very important. Um, but I you I don't think there's been a similar sort of broader attention to a niche issue as a byproduct of of Massiey's career in part because the environment has changed. You have so many new different news sources. Obviously, Massie is an outlier when it comes to foreign policy within DC, calling out Apac within DC, right? You know, that perhaps is the closest to kind of really planting a flag on a particular issue. Um but the question is is that particularly with this ex uh uh increasingly tribalized element of politics like what is the practical value to a libertarian movement or to yeah to the libertarian movement of having a member of Congress at all and that does not mean that Washington's better off with Thomas Massie not in it but I but like what what what is to be done like what what what would you want a congressman to do if it's not just simply being a constant no vote on issues that kind of lean into the oh well you know he doesn't get anything done. Grandstanding sort of accus acquisitions there, accusations there. And I I think there is some meaningful conversation. And I I think one of the things that has hurt um this this broader movement since 2016 is that, you know, there's a division of labor, right? Like I I can't name to you what is like the ideal, you know, what is a meaningful libertarian policy aim that you could kind of build a coalition to get behind in 2026, right? the KO. I'm not trying to take the traditional, you know, bash of the KO and the Koch brothers and I mean, anyone interested in the Coctopus and the Rothbart background, very very fun stuff. I'm not trying to like, you know, it's like, oh, well, you know, they they they did Murray wrong back in the day, but, you know, for a long period of time, Kato at least was a had had practical pragmatic policy suggestions for that, you know, typically directed to Republicans and, you know, maybe some some some potentials for reforms in the margins. KO doesn't pretty much exist as a viable political entity since 2016 because like they went left while Trump was going populist. I think that further erodess like the market brand value of libertarian free markets and etc is just like how uh uh deliberately and explicitly offensive a lot of the leading scholars at KO are to maga sensitive Republicans. And so like, you know, it's it's very I think it's more more difficult now to even make marginal differences from a legislative position without any sort of of meaningful Washington apparatus um than ever as before. So So what is the what is the payback for libertarians on investing in federal campaigns given that this is what currently exists in Washington? And we can complain about it and we can moralize about it. All of which the analysis will be just and righteous. But when it comes to like if libertarians are investing their money in libertarian candidates since 2014 or investing in, you know, gold, silver, Bitcoin, one side of that libertarian political activism, I think you can argue, has had a far better payout than the other. And so I think these are some of the conversations that should be had amongst people that are interested in libertarian activism, libertarian politics, in part as a lesson from this from Massiey's race. Well, uh, I have nothing against investing in Bitcoin. I own Bitcoin. Uh, I would not consider it among my libertarian activities. >> Starting a business, starting a business, entrepreneurship, broad broad gambit of >> I don't think that counts as activism versus this is not investment advice. Not a financial notism. >> Well, I'm just saying if you're going to choose between giving money, put investing in Bitcoin or giving money to some candidate you like, the two aren't the same thing. They're not going toward the same goal. Uh but I mean even when Paul Ron was in Congress, his ability to do anything legislatively was always very very small. It was always I mean and this was what Lou Rogwell always said was primarily a he his advantage was as a spokesperson >> uh for right because he think about how often he was on TV back in 2008 2012 and that generated huge amounts of interest in Austrian economics in our site we got huge waves of visitors to the site uh people were buying books uh and I I would credit Ron with a lot of back then back in 2012 people you would just like meet people at like a national association of realtors meeting and stuff and they would ask you like what kind of economics would you like because I would give presentations as a state economist and they're like well what school of economics I'm like well that's a weird question first of all almost nobody used to ask that and then if you said Austrian they would like start nodding which was a totally new uh experience in 2012 12 and it happened a little bit in 20 in 2008. Uh I I think for decades that's been the primary advantage. Now if you go way back in time where you go back in time where a single member of Congress could actually make a difference in terms of debating things on the floor of Congress. We're me we're members of the Senate. We're actually engaging in in real discussions of topics and facts and things like that. And I don't want to be too utopian about it like senators of the 19th century where you know intellectual giants or anything like that but that's that stuff mattered to some extent and a single vote in the Senate mattered. >> Uh those days are gone right so it's certainly more it's certainly less now that any single member can do. Well, I I I I my push back to that is for one, I do think Ron is is a different thing entirely in part because like Ron explicitly used his platform in Congress to push an explicitly ideological intellectual agenda. I I I again this is not a criticism of Massie, but like you don't you didn't have Massie out there saying, "Oh, everyone should read Rothbart, right?" And so like so so connecting political service to like a deeper like you know Massie would attend libertarian functions, but I I don't I didn't see him as like a libertarian activist congressman. He was a libertarian constitutionalist guy, but he was like an activist like you know Ron was like an institution builder within the movement, right? Um but but I I do think though and this this is my biggest criticism of Massie on the one big this is my controversial opinion that I I alluded to earlier is is that like the one big beautiful bill was an opportunity to get a gimme, right? And and like there there are specific opportunities where you can get something done easier because margins are so so small, right? like it's much difficult when you're when you're Ron Paul and you've got, you know, a 20 seat advantage because of the Tea Party revolution, right? Um, one of the things Ron Paul actually did get done is he worked with like Alan Grayson who was like a populist interesting Democrat Floridaian on getting like a um a short-term a limited but still an audit of the Fed during the DoddFrank and and all sort of interesting stuff there. But there are there are individual moments where you can leverage your vote because it must pass on this very thin margin. And and Ran's also really bad at this is that like either the reflexive thing is it has more spending and therefore it's bad rather than trying to attach your own sort of gimme your own cookie to the thing, right? Uh the big beautiful bill was additionally kind of problematic because like there's automatic tax increases if it didn't pass. So it's not like an omnibus bill where like oh well you know government shutdown is going to happen if we don't pass this and therefore that might be preferable to uh you know a six million a billion dollar I'm using very simplified math but you know a $6 trillion budget versus a $7 trillion budget right um you know but like there's actually a tax amplifier with within that particular bill but you could leverage that for some sort of policy gimmick rand Rand Paul's had this multiple times in the Senate with their very thin margins and I think that's one of the problems is that since you've lacked the monetary focus from Rand and Massie Right? They know the Fed is bad. They know spending's a problem, right? But without thinking radically on the monetary issue, something like eliminating the capital gains tax on gold, silver, and Bitcoin, right? Or gold and silver, right? If you, you know, want to go narrow with it, um or you know, if taking Bitcoin money in that, but like you know, whatever. But like eliminating the capital gains tax on a competing currency, like that was one of Ron's like leading policy. And yet that particular aspect of it is something that no one like you the people that have picked up that bill for the most part have been like interesting uh uh fellow travelers like Paul Brown was like an interesting tea party congressman from Georgia. He ran with it for a little little bit of time. But like those sort of things were like you could actually have like a radical impact on the American monetary policy polit monetary system by increasing a very kind of you know meaningful but you know radical kind of wonkish narrow elimination of capital gains tax is something that could be leveraged in these sort of situations but but they have it right. And so so when it comes to translating the the leverage that comes with being the the the lone voice of reason and and trying to identify opportunities where you can make differences in the margin. If you're not interested in doing that, if you're interested in being a a a constant vote against no and those those no votes are are ideologically and morally sound, but you know, they just replace you like, okay, well, we can't bribe Massie, so therefore we're going to bribe, you know, some worst guy, right? Because they're all worse guys. And so therefore, you know, we're going to increase spending to take care of this little guy's uh you know, some some some boondoggle project in northern New York, right? Instead of instead of this, instead of getting a tax tax cut on gold, silver, and Bitcoin, right? Like that's the that's the transactional nature of all this, right? There is very little legislating. It is you come to the trough, you ask for your thing, you know, if they need you, they give you your thing, right? And so there's a transactional politics that is the reality of modern legislating. This is not lofty people debating merits and first principles and all this. This is will you vote with me? What what what do I need to trade with you to get that? And so if we do not have people willing to do that and again there's good good reasons not to want to be into this. Like again I I do not encourage anyone going to DC. It's bad for your soul. It's bad for everything, right? But like to me like if if that function is not taking place then you're kind of you're you're you're you're you're a podcaster with an office in terms of just simply having occasional media appearances to say why X Y and Z is bad and there's a value to that but you can have that same value particularly now by going on you know Joe Rogan or going by on Dave Smith's podcast or going on Piers Morgan or whatever is that the difference of that messaging device I think has fundamentally changed in this age of decentralized media and the interesting thing is that the age of central ized media is changing the way younger generations are consuming news and so that has the potential to be something fun down the road but currently we're still in a boomer control political system and so what does the real you know what is the proper way of navigating the system with all of its warts and flaws and stupidity and absurdities and and fallacies and whatever like what what what if we're going to be realistic what is the value of this clown show to make marginal meaningful differences on on the sides >> I don't and I don't I don't claim to have all the answers but I think these are conversations that are worth having when it comes to political engagement really >> 100%. You want to avoid the libertarian version of what I think especially progressives do but everybody all sides of the tribe are kind of guilty of where they imagine themselves as this you know morally pure creature going into DC and then purely working you know for progressives it'd be like for the little guy um for conservatives it'd be whatever their version is and not having any understanding that the way that states actually work is they're essentially these ongoing wars between interest groups essentially. >> Yeah. And that like if you get in there somehow, it's immediately going to be a struggle with all these other groups that have their agendas and it's this whole like scrap that's happening below the surface and it's invisible enough in the public that people aren't thinking about it. But no, like if you actually get into that, that's why I and a lot of my bias I focus so much on the communication side of things that that's where I'm really focusing and that's why I really uh put a lot of emphasis on the election. The election itself is valuable and like winning an election is wonderful. Getting into office after that's something that like I I mean I would hate that. I'd hate to actually have a position like that and that's that's no fun. Like I don't like any of that stuff. I I think a lot of people are similar. say like they love the idea of Massie running and being out there and if he was able to do those debates doing those debates and they want him to win kind of like 2024 like the the Trump campaign in 2024 the all the people that are the independents that are turning against him now like they were totally on board and there was all this energy so like it shifts dramatically once you actually get in there because of the actual nature of politics and even though a lot of libertarians are pretty good realists when it comes to how it actually works there's still some trap in terms of thinking that if we just that a pure one of our guys that's pure enough in there he can start unraveling with the whole system is designed to not be unraveled by one or two people coming in and to your point and once again getting back to the communication I do think there's a lot of value communication wise with having Congress members I think one episode that comes to mind is Massie going on Tucker I think and talking about how Apac had uh I think he said a babysitter for every single member of Congress and there's like there's ways that he can give an inside account that other people can't I I think also when you're a politician, people listen to you a lot more and so it's this it's a way to get on national TV that you wouldn't have if you were just a communicator and but to your point that's valuable but the question is is it worth the cost? Like Rothbart wrote about political strategy as a form of entrepreneurship in a way you're you're devoting scarce time and resources to different things and is this the best use of time like to your point that's an important thing to talk about. Well, and and it's definitely true that being a congressman is a nice credential for different media hits. And again, like you know, I'm you know, if if if you want to run for Congress and more and and you have a path of viability, more power to you. Um but but I think you hit the nail on the head where like, you know, it's I think it's more useful to think about special interest groups for liberty over, you know, libertarian freedom fighters in Congress, right? And and I I think you have seen nationally um you know often more perhaps more often the state level than the national level because the national level you know it's just there to feed the machine and and keep the cartels going. But like uh I mean if you think like what have been the biggest advancements for liberty you know whatever you how you define it. Um chances are you're going to be interested in some of these categories that have had meaningful legislative change. Gun rights right massive massive improvements in gun rights nationwide on the last several decades. Um, again, we complain about the NRA and whatever, all all valid, but like you know, there's a variety of different organizations there, but like the gun rights have have clearly improve improved significantly in the last several decades. Um, school choice and again, we have a broader conversation about vouchers and whatever, but but educational freedom has certainly expanded. Um, that has been kind of do tove uh a little bit in the the kind of hybrid realm of parental rights, which would also include different aspects of like postcoid maha stuff, right? like getting rid of the fluoride and Florida and and some alternative medicine sort of stuff and and interesting credentialism sort of stuff when it comes to the medical treatments and things like that, right? Um but outside of that, like I mean I'm there might be a handful I'm thinking I know there's been some good state level stuff when it comes to elimination of state taxes on gold silver, but if you don't have the federal thing done then done well, you know, there that the big big player there is going to continue to play a role. Um but but like yeah thinking of it more in special interest groups for liberty I think is something that that is is you know it's less attractive. You don't have like oh well you know my entire personality is about how great Ron and Rand and and Thomas Massie are. And again don't me wrong I've been one of those people. I am one of those people. Love them all right? You know all the all the all the trappings of of fandom and all that sort of stuff. But but in terms of like actual political movements, a special interest group that can persuade 30 members who might not be ideologically pure but or can be convinced on doing one big thing can be more valuable in ter in terms of making any slight marginal improvement than having one great champion given the crude purely transactional way that American politics certainly uh operates now and has operated in some form quite. Yeah, I think I agree with Connor though that the communication role is fine. I mean, I don't see any problem with diverse investments, right? You can invest in a group like the Mises Institute. Obviously, that's very important. Some people don't want to do that. So, they want to give money to a candidate. Be good if you had one candidate that someone could put their money toward. I mean, one out of 435 or whatever who can then right just be a gadf fly uh in the Congress. I don't see a big downside to that. >> No, >> it's it's not downside if you win. not down a few which is the which but and that's that is one of the the unfortunate aspects of like the political system right now is that like >> you know I I think for for a while there there was very positive trends being made on the margin within Congress because of some of the the MAGA America first congressman like like Matt Gates Marjgerie Taylor Green and Thomas Massie as a trio they're all friends and there's a few people on the sidelines that again you can nitpick at the time you know Tim Burchchett's kind of an interesting guy in Glen Glenn Jacobs district. You know, there's a few others that are you Victoria Sparks is is has usually been a Massie ally, but but it's but it's now like it's kind of wild that you know 2026 like those three people used to kind of point to and doing some really kind of interesting things or or saying interesting things and now completely gone which I think is probably does not project particularly well for American politics in the next in the short term. Um but but you know again and and none of this is universal, right? like you you shake you shake the dice up and you you have a demographics change and and you have fewer boomer boomer participation in federal elections and you have someone who is Thomas Massie like but doesn't have like the entire like Trump armada against them, right? Like again I'm not I'm not trying to black pill anyone in terms of of meaningful gains in the margin here. Um but I I do think though like you know when you get to Congress like what does it mean to be an effective you know liberty legislator in Congress I I think needs to be more than simply voting no on things. It's like it's like so so should you get there if if I'm gonna invest money there if the movement is going to invest money in there and again I don't want to speak collectively for particularly for libertarians but like what does it look to be effective in that position? How do you maximize that position to make meaningful changes back home? Um and I think that's kind of that's that's something that I I think should be should be part of the conversation alongside this is bad. Having foreign interest groups spend this amount of money in election is bad. Very obviously true. Right. the fact that a non- entity can beat a someone of Thomas Massiey's individual character. Not ideal, right? Like there's a lot of valid critiques and a lot of hand ringing and a lot of like, you know, of of really bad things that that per primary illustrates that are external, but I think that there are some internal things that should be considered in terms of like, you know, how can Rand Paul, you know, maximize like his his time in office? Um, assuming he doesn't end up on the chopping block in four years. Luckily, he's got four years, so like that buys him some time. But everything you just said though, I mean that applies to any member of Congress regardless of their ideology, right? So the question is >> any member of Congress who comes in and doesn't largely agree with what the ruling elites want from you, >> you're going to have a hard time and you're basically you're not going to be an important member. You're just you're not. And first of all, you come in and you're expected to fund raise most of the time, >> right? That's a big part of what you do. They don't really care about what your opinions are. And all that matters is how much can you deliver a vote for what the foreign policy blob wants, what the people at the very top wants. And all legislation is crafted in these big omnibus bills. It's all there is no vote, right? The whole committee process which still works in state legislatures from the ground up. None of that applies in Congress. And so it's all decided by the leadership 90% of the time. And so you'll be successful as a member of Congress if you agree with the ruling class. If you don't, you're meaningless. You don't have to be a libertarian for that to be true. >> But I I I think this is where I disagree. And and for one, most members of Congress worthless, right? But but but there but there but they they get certain things done. The thing is is that what they're what they're there to get done is not ideological. They're there to secure federal grants for building a marina in downtown of their city, right? They're there to secure funding and like that is that that is their number one priority is to bring home bacon back to their district. There is a smaller subset that are ideological in nature, right? And if you're on the left, you can get a lot done because like you know there's there's no even like hesitation there. like you know if if if your if your ideological preference is to expand the scope of the state then it's very easy to bribe you right I think it's a unique issue that libertarians have because for one again like Massiey's national importance is not his relationship with with Kentucky now he took good care of Kentucky right like I'm not you know I'm not trying to say that he was he was not connected to the Kentucky soil like I mean he built his own house out of you lumber in his yard and two hands right like you know but he so so you know Kentucky was important but him nobody would caring like you know libertarians nationwide wouldn't be caring about Kentucky if his top thing was bringing home bacon back to Kentucky for right it's precisely that he is an ideological figure and of an ideology that opposes the state that makes it difficult to get these small little gimmies on the margins whereas anyone else like like it's a unique libertarian problem I think more than anyone else because even though like an an AOC or an Elon Omar right or um you know any of like the let's say the the left-wing equivalents of mass They might be out there and be ripro and mad and and and condemn, you know, this legislation as racist and and and oppressively patriotic and they might pretend to be against the regime. And when it comes to certain foreign policy issues, they might even really really mean it. But when it comes to their domestic desires, it is easier to attach something, particularly when you have Democrats running the process, it's easy to attach the most insane thing possible. Right? if you want to, you know, Somali Marxist studies department and with a federal grant, like it's pretty easy for Elon Omar to attach that to some sort of writer and anomous bill, right? And so therefore, he t she takes care of her little ideological niche and can keep on going. But if you're a libertarian and you have to ask and and then it's then you're kind of like your hands off if you're not interested in attaching something to a bill when the whole bill is bad, right? So like I think it's a unique consideration that libertarians are forced into because we know the entire system is bad. we we you know we want to cut the entire you darn sucker down to the bone that's not going to happen. So how do you leverage that? It's like I think it's a unique libertarian problem even if there's you know in theory anybody who doesn't play along is going to get the backbench of treatment but like they might play along just a little bit to get something and still be in the backbench. >> I think the deal breaker though is going to be on the Israel issue or on war in general though it's very hard to find. I mean you do have some left-wingers who are consistently anti-war. They don't last very long. They tend to become unimportant real quick. And that's just not allowed. You're not allowed to take a pro peace position in Congress and still be given any sort of real leadership position or anything like that. So, I think members learn real quick like what you know what's his face? Bernie cosplayed as a peace candidate for a long time, but in reality, he never was one. And so he learned how to like play the part without actually upsetting the foreign policy blob on that. And so I mean you're right to a certain extent of that if if you can fool the voters into thinking you have some sort of ideological principles but everyone in Washington knows how you really function then I think you can have a long productive career in Congress. the the problem Massie gets to is he he he he was what he was telling the voters was actually true uh in terms of his opposition to the >> he's usually not popular in politics, >> right? So that was a problem. >> No. And and and it's interesting like the the next two most expensive congressional races were both primaries that Apac uh played into. Cory Bush was one of them in Missouri, which I mean like she's also like I don't I don't want to equate her on next Thomas Massie on any other issue. like she had some other other issues that might have hurt her besides simply Apac spending, but like that was a major player there. I think it was like by the maybe one of the New York congressman, but you know that it is funny that that you the Apac targeted congressional races are the ones that just have completely outlandish amounts of of primary spend. But but it is worth noting that like Massiey's had Apac money against them for for years now. It's not like it's not like just you know in the last two years Thomas Massie started to being vocal about the Apac problem and therefore they got engaged. I think the reason why it was a particular issue here is that Trump is that Massie voted against the big beautiful bill which like a most must pass bill that had all of Trump world against them that uh uh Apac saw the opportunity to to quadruple down on this and just massively filed you know put put resources in there. they were able to find someone. And so it was it was it was the combination of just Trump's wrath supported by Apac funding that made this situation different than 2020, right, when Trump was also against them, but like a lot a lot of things going on. You'd have the same level of of a Apac spending um or some of these other races where Apac was spending against Massie, but it wasn't like a full, you know, was it $20 million or whatever from from those sort of folks. So, so there there's there's multiple different factors I think that play into this particular race, but it's definitely true at large is that, you know, if if if Apex smells blood in the water on a on a member that is not playing ball with them, they have shown the ability to m organize incredible amounts of money and they they have definitely been taken a lot more scalps within these primaries and both left and right, >> which is why I'm >> Go ahead, Conor. Going back to what we were saying earlier, that's why I'm pro-in interest group as a a strategy there because I I think it's I mean it's the age-old dilemma for libertarians like we're against the system. So do we not play in the system at all or do we play a little bit? Do we dip our toe in? What do we do once we're in um like our basically whole identity is that we don't want any of this stuff. We don't want Washington um at all there. So the way that it works right now um we have a problem with but yeah you have to be realistic and I think it's that the system exists to serve different interest groups and I mean you just look back at uh well you don't even have to go far like the uh defend the guard I think is a movement that's doing a good job on the state level right now where it's just this ideological group that is going for one specific >> uh legislative victory and are putting all their energy into that. I think like um going back in history, something Rothbart's written a lot about that David Brady really woke me up to was what is it the National Association of Manufacturing um was like a big ideological movement there and yeah they were an interest group and so like back to your point and to stress something that you've kind of said over and over again we're not because I think I'm in agreement with you. We're not against Massie being in there and voting no on all this stuff. was some real real utility to I think especially I I had a tweet that kind of took off um the other day just the contrast of that that the fact that all of these Republicans are going in and saying we're going to cut spending, we're against spending in their campaigns and even in all the media hits and then he's the only one consistently voting against it. That's valuable and it's valuable to to is like a foil character to really show the nature of all the the rest of the politicians. So we are in no way against that at all. It's just it's purely a question of is this the best like from like a strategy entrepreneur perspective would it be better if all the money that went into Massiey's campaign and I donated to the campaign I definitely like I gave him some money so I'm I'm part of that but the question is would that like if there was an interest group that could have gotten all that money and tried to you maybe it was on the state level maybe it's federally it's just a question of uh of strategy and investment really at the end of the day because these are all I mean most of the strategy uh you know ideas or possible paths put forward are good. It's just a question of what's the best investment for you know the the political return. >> Yeah. Yeah. Again make it clear like I mean it's a tragedy that messes the last race it makes Congress a worse body etc etc. I think it was dumb and the thing is I think it was dumb from all sides. I think I think it was I think it was a self-sabotaging move by Trump to alienate someone who has who's got you know there's probably a thousand plus massie fans of every single congressional district. That ups the margins again. I I think it was I think it was bad for both sides. I think it was dumb for you know I think both sides made mistakes in this and I think both sides you know are I think both all three sides Massie the congressional body and and the Trump political wing are all worse off based off of of what happened um um on Tuesday. But I'm I'm also may this is kind of this byprod I some of the stuff I love reading from Rothbart is you know when when you when you're when the movement is in a certain stage and you're kind of like you know 15 I mean again I'm maybe just being nostalgic now as a Ron Paul era guy and you see like the last figure of the Ron Paul movement you know fall and it's like okay well how should we think about the last you know 15 years and again I I definitely think there's something lost after Ron Paul that even that that Amos and Massie couldn't fill um in part because committee seats and things like that, right? Like I mean, you know, it's been been diminished since Dr. Paul left Congress as a whole, but it's like you what what what else could have been done in those years to have made things, you know, that that could have resulted in something qualifying as a win. And I I think there's there's again unfortunately we once upon a time there was a broader division of labor of relevant libertarian organizations thinking those sort of things. And now I think particularly post Trumpening, you know, I think the Institute is probably one of the few libertarian organizations out there that is in a better better position in 2026 than it was in 2015. And I think that there's some I think that is worth bearing when we think about the liberty movement is again there's not a DC organization in uh and and again not that you know NES had the the the greatest things to think about 20 2012 KO um back when they you know when they were sucking up to a political class that are now completely powerless you the Chris Christies of the world. Um, you know, things were not great then, but I think they're even worse now. And I think that's true with Freedom Works, which no longer exists, right? The the entire network, the entire Koch network basically of Ron Paul era organizations that were either strengthened or built as a result of the of 2012 are completely defunct. And I think that that makes a political movement weaker is not having a division of labor of institutions thinking about these things practically. And again, the institute's position is like we're not part of that. like it's like, "Oh, why don't why don't you guys go up there and lobby and have like, you know, our our focus is research. We there's a structure of production. We're kind of this part of the structure of production pyramid, right?" Like, I mean, that's that's what we do. This is not this is not the Mises Institute's purpose in the libertarian movement is going after lobbying members of Congress, right? Like we we we made scholars and scholarship on this sort of stuff. But once upon a time, there were other other entities out there that could do these sort of questions. And I think that is a void that needs to be talked about as much as what's the next podcast or what's the next figure we can get to run for Congress or you know is Thomas Massie you know runs for 2028. You know think about all the young people that be brought in the movement. All fine and dandy and and again I'd be very interested to see a Massie 2028 race. Um kind of figuring following that sort of national figure role that Ron Paul had in in uh 2012. I think that's a lot more interesting than a Rand Paul version of that. Um but but there are broader aspects of the movement in this division of labor that I think are rooted in now and again a lot of them are the the former coke wings. >> All right. Well, we'll go ahead and wrap up with that for this episode of >> power and market. >> The opportunities are there though. Uplifts uplift. >> No black pillar. >> You got a you got a lot of work to do out there. Other people who want more direct political activism. You know that's a comment Lou made to me once is it's amazing how we've got our hands full at the Mises Institute right uh creating the next generation of researchers scholars people who are teaching your kids in college people who are carrying forward these ideas which we cannot take for granted it's amazing the number of people I hear from say we don't need to teach these people ideas these these ideas everyone I know already agrees with me everyone I know means like 80-year-old guys at their gun club and they think that those ideas will magic ally be transferred to the next generation or something. I'm like, who do you think's going to pass on these ideas who actually value freedom? This is not something that automatically happens. Just look at 90% of the human race and how they view uh natural law and freedom and that sort of thing. These ideas have to be passed on and we're doing that all the time. But people would always ask Lou, why aren't you guys running candidates? Why aren't you guys like lobbying in Congress? He says, we're not against those things, but you get to it. go for it, right? You're you're free to do so. You have our blessing. But they don't want that. They want somebody else to do those things. So, uh they complain that the Mises Institute doesn't do everything they want to do because they're too busy to do it or to fund it or to devote their time and treasure to it. >> Well, and and I mean not the first time I've said this, but thank God for Lee Rockwell because I I think like imagine libertarian movement like that that did not have the Mises Institute in our particular brand of these ideas within the ecosystem. I mean, the libertarian movement would be effectively done because I think again, I'm not trying I'm not trying to take pot shots. I'm not trying to be like overly dismissive and whatever, but but I I think, you know, the the Rothbartian dynamic of of radical free market populism that that hits upon the the class conflict that again, anyone hasn't seen Ryan's LSC lecture, highly highly recommended. But like those are, I think, found necessary components of engaging with politics at large. And I think particularly in this era and we're kind of the only ones doing it that we get barbs and arrows from very serious scholars out there that you're like oh well you know you know whatever right like you know people hate us because of it but that's the only brand of libertarianism that has any chance of function like Massie Massie was a torchbearer for that um and and Ron Paul was it was baked in his DNA and without that particular brand of radical free market economics focused on the Fed and this this broader appreciation for the class dynamics of of you know the class conflict involved with liberalism. This entire everything else, you know, tax policies and whatever would be completely sterile and lifeless without the particular brand of these ideas that Blue Rock will embody the institute with. But again, but we can't do there's a division of labor. So So we we need we need more mises institute, astrobianspired organizations out there. >> All right. Well, this time we're really going to wrap up the episode for real. >> All right. Thanks guys for joining me. Thank you though. Thank you Connor. Thank you everyone out there for listening. We'll be back next time with more. So, we'll see you then.