There Angela Goes Again — On the Michael Malice Show

Jun 15, 2024

Alas, national Libertarian Party chairperson Angela McCardle has done it again. She has gone on the attack against me with more false and scurrilous allegations. This time, it was on the Michael Malice show (around the 30 minute mark), where she falsely stated: “Jacob Hornberger was our candidate in 2020 and subsequently decided that Covid lockdowns and masking weren’t a big deal.”

Upon hearing McCardle’s assertion, Malice, who appeared to be somewhat familiar with my work, and undoubtedly thinking that McCardle would not simply make something up, responded incredulously, “Are you serious?” McCardle doubled down by quickly responding “Yes.”

Let’s quickly put to rest McCardle’s false and scurrilous accusation. In the Positions section of my 2024 presidential campaign website, which has been posted since February 2023, I stated the following:

Separate Healthcare and the State
Government has no more business involving itself in healthcare than it does in religion and education. The imposition of mask requirements, vaccine mandates, and lockdowns by the federal government and the state governments is the hallmark of tyrannical regimes.

But it’s not enough to simply terminate those infringements on liberty. To achieve genuine liberty, it is necessary to abolish the Centers for Disease Control and all other federal and state agencies that involve themselves in healthcare.

Leave healthcare to the free market. The free market produces the best of everything. Leave businesses free to establish their own mask and vaccine requirements. Leave consumers free to make their own healthcare decisions.

The ideal is a constitutional amendment patterned after the First and Fourteenth Amendments: ‘No law shall be enacted by ether the federal or state governments respecting the establishment or support of healthcare or abridging the free exercise thereof.

My FFF articles

Also, as McCardle knows, I have been the president of The Future of Freedom Foundation since its founding in 1989. Our mission at FFF is to present the principled, uncompromising case for the libertarian philosophy.

Here is a sampling of articles and presentations I have written for FFF since the Covid outbreak:

FFF Daily articles

For the past 20 years or so, FFF has published FFF Daily, a daily newsletter that links to libertarian articles in the mainstream press, websites, and libertarian think tanks and educational foundations. Here is just a small sampling of articles to which we have linked since the Covid outbreak:

Sickness Is the Health of the State by David Stockman
Looters, Lockdowns and the Law by Jeffrey A. Tucker
Freedom Requires Resisting Coronavirus Pessimism by Richard Ebeling
Listen to the Doctors, End the Lockdowns by Ron Paul
Pandemic Policy in One Page by David Hart
Coronavirus Shows Why We Need Separation of Medicine and State! by Ron Paul
Tragedies of Our Time: Pandemic, Planning, and Racial Politics by Richard M. Ebeling
The 1918 Pandemic and Economic Freedom by Pierre Lemieux
Was America’s COVID-19 Lockdown the Worst Policy Decision in Recent History? by Taleed Brown
Don’t Reform the CDC. Shut It Down by Anders Ingemarson
The Covid Cover-Up by National Review
Covid Lockdowns Were a Costly and Deadly Mistake by Richard W. Rahn

Other false accusations

Unfortunately, this is not the first time that McCardle has made a false statement about me. In an interview with a person named Tara Reade in April 2024, she accused me of being an “anarchist,” stating that I favor the complete dismantling of government. As I explained in a video about the matter, that was a false statement. In fact, ever since I discovered libertarianism, I have been an advocate of limited government. In 2016 I even authored a 6-part series entitled “Why I Favor Limited Government." Moreover, during the course of the 2024 presidential race, the Mises Caucus-endorsed candidate Michael Rectenwald, who labeled himself an anarchist, oftentimes took me to task for favoring limited government.

I wanted to give McCardle the benefit of the doubt by assuming that she had just made an honest mistake about me being an “anarchist.” But it was telling that she never publicly corrected, retracted, regretted, or apologized for her false statement. And now that she has simply made up the accusation regarding my position about mask mandates and lockdowns relating to Covid-19, I have to wonder whether her false assertions cross the line into intentional misconduct rather than simply innocent error.

This is especially true because that’s not the only false assertion about me that she made to Malice. He asked her: “On a personal level he’s gone after you publicly?” McCardle responded, “Many, many times.”

That is simply untrue. I have never leveled any personal attacks against McCardle or anyone else. I don’t engage at that level. Maybe she is referring to her post on X in the summer of 2023 in which she suggested that the party’s internal problems were due to the lackluster slate of L.P. presidential candidates. I took umbrage over that and responded that the party’s internal problems had nothing to do with the candidates for the L.P presidential nomination and that she and the LNC needed to take responsibility for the party’s woes. At the risk of belaboring the obvious, that is a far cry from a personal attack against her and the LNC.

In her interview with Malice, McCardle continued, “Every time he would go to a state convention and campaign and talk about his campaign for president, he would also talk about how corrupt the LNC was….”

Once again, that is an untrue statement. Not once did I ever have talk about how corrupt the LNC is. McCardle knows that ever since the 2022 Reno Reset convention, where she and the Mises Caucus took control over the LNC, I have taken the LNC to task for continuing the right-wing direction that the Libertarian Party has taken over the past 20 years. Again, that’s a far cry from personal attacks against her, the LNC, or anyone else.

A consistent adherence to principle

As I repeatedly stated over the past four years, it was my impression that the Mises Caucus was intending to restore the original brand of principled libertarianism on which the Libertarian Party was founded. Moreover, I had every reason to believe that that is what they intended to do, not only because that’s what they said they were going to do but also: Don’t forget — the Mises Caucus endorsed me when I sought the 2020 presidential nomination!

In fact, one of the most amusing parts of McCardle’s interview with Malice is when she informed him that she nominated me to be the party’s presidential candidate in 2020. I was cracking up when she said that because during the course of the interview she was saying that I was a “psycho” and that I suffered from “autism” because of the libertarian principles to which I adhere.

But the fact is that my principles have never changed over the the past four years or, for that matter, the past 30 years. In other words, I stand for the same libertarian principles today as I did when she nominated me and endorsed me four years ago! Unfortunately, Malice didn’t pick up on that because he missed the perfect opportunity to ask, “If you believe that Jacob is crazy for opposing things like school vouchers, public schooling, Social Security, Medicare, immigration controls, and the national-security state, why did you nominate him and endorse his candidacy in 2020?”

A right-wing direction

Sometimes what a person omits from a narrative can be as misleading as what she states. What McCardle failed to inform Malice was that the new Reno Reset LNC not only did not strive to restore the L.P. founding brand of principled libertarianism after it took control over the party, it became clear from the beginning that it was bound and determined to continue moving the L.P. in a right-wing direction.

That’s where the concept of school vouchers comes into play, which was the center issue that Malice and McCardle discussed in their interview. McCardle implied that I had attacked Corey deAngelis, the premier supporter of school vouches in the country, in a personal way, which caused Malice to exclaim, “That is so unfortunate that he goes after Corey because Corey does such good work.”

Once again, however, McCardle is being disingenuous. I have never gone after Corey deAngelis in a personal way. I would never do that. What happened was that immediately after the Reno Reset convention, the LNC had a fundraising event in which they invited de Angelis to be the featured speaker — to promote school vouchers! Soon after that, the Libertarian Party hierarchy sent out a fundraising letter seeking donations to promote their advocacy of school vouchers.

That was the first indication that I got that things were askew with the Reno Reset regime. After all, school vouchers are nothing more than a socialist reform measure that are designed to improve the socialist public (ie, government) school system through “choice” and “competition.” It was then that I took the new LNC to task in an article for supporting school vouchers, as reflected by their choice of deAngelis as a speaker at a LNC fundraising event, rather than a speaker advocating the libertarian position of the separation of school and state. At the risk of again belaboring the obvious, that is a far cry from going after deAngelis with a personal attack.

At about the same time — and what McCardle failed to tell Malice — the Libertarian Party hierarchy recruited two Republican candidates for state house to come over to the Libertarian Party and run instead as Libertarian candidates and decided to fund their campaigns to the tune of several thousands of dollars in L.P. money. At least one of them was a super-Trumpster who wore a MAGA cap!

It was then I realized that the new Reno Reset regime had no intention whatsoever of restoring the founding brand of principled libertarianism. That realization was fortified by the party establishment’s fervent endorsement of the Donald Trump-Ron de Santis-Greg Abbott Republican Party statist system of immigration controls — and the immigration police state that comes with it. I realized that that this was not what I signed up for when I supported the Mises Caucus takeover of the Libertarian Party.

Of course, at the risk of once again belaboring the obvious, McCardle’s highly publicized controversial invitations to Republicans Donald Trump and Vivek Ramaswamy to address the 2024 L.P. national convention only reinforced the right-wing direction that the Reno Reset regime has taken the party for the past two years.

Public schooling and vouchers

One of the fascinating parts of the McCardle interview was when Malice came to my defense with a criticism of public (i.e., government) schooling, undoubtedly to McCardle’s utter shock and dismay. Malice stated:

I have consistently been one of the biggest opponents of government schooling and a lot of my stupid little catch phrases I quote them all the time. And he’s [referring to Jacob Hornberger] correct that it’s socialism and fascism and it’s based on the Prussian model and it’s unspeakable and I’m very interested in James Lindsay’s critique where he says if you have vouchers … If you have a voucher system then you’re just going to have these things creep in and ruin the private schools….

Interestingly, McCardle didn’t attempt to dispute Malice’s points about public schooling or even call him a “psycho.” She instead simply responded with another personal attack against me — saying that I suffered from “peak autism and hypocrisy.”

Not surprisingly, she also didn’t inform Malice that one of the principal aims of the Reno Reset regime is to run L.P. members for school boards with the aim of taking over what Malice called a socialist-fascist system and showing Americans that Libertarians can run them as well as Democrats and Republicans. She also didn’t inform him that the L.P. hierarchy sends out fundraising letters asking for people to donate to help L.P. members run for school boards.

While Malice clearly sees the nature of public schooling for what it is, unfortunately he ended up caving with respect to vouchers themselves. He said that since we can’t get rid of public schooling, we might as well settle for school vouchers as a way to save some kids rather than none.

Really? At what cost? By supporting the political stealing that forms the foundation of vouchers? What about the people whose money is stolen by the state through taxation to fund the vouchers? Don’t they count? What would they have done with their money had it not been stolen from them?

Moreover, the recipients of the vouchers end up with a mindset of gratitude to the state for having helped them get an education. Is that the type of dependency mindset that is conducive to achieving a free society?

And let’s not forget that private schools that get on the voucher dole are now subject to government control, which, as Malice pointed out, leads to the ruination of private schools. Is the destruction of educational independence something that libertarians should be endorsing? Don’t forget Hillsdale College, which takes no government funds and will not permit its students to take government assistance. It remains totally independent of governmental control.

Moreover, once a libertarian begins advocating vouchers, he inevitably ceases advocating for the separation of school and state. How are people supposed to learn about the concept of educational liberty if Libertarians are not causing them to think about educational liberty?

The non-aggression principle and the L.P Pledge

Most important is what both McCardle and Malice failed to confront. In fact, it’s what the LNC and many L.P. members are loathe to confront. That’s the libertarian nonaggression principle and, equally important, the Pledge to never support the initiation of force that every L.P. member takes on joining the Libertarian Party.

The non-aggression principle is the core principle of the libertarian philosophy. It holds that the initiation of force is illegitimate. Since vouchers depend on taxation, they necessarily depend on the initiation of force. How can a self-labeled “party of principle” advocate a position that violates its own core principle? Who is going to vote for a political party that does that? Wouldn’t every voucher proponent vote for a Republican candidate rather than Republican-lite Libertarian Party candidate?

I don’t know whether Malice is a member of the Libertarian Party, but I know that McCardle is. Like every other L.P members, she signed the Pledge in which she pledged not to support the initiation of force. Is that important? As far as I’m concerned, it should be. A pledge is a pledge. It’s a vow. Why have the Pledge if L.P. officials and L.P. members are going to ignore it and violate it?

Methodology in advancing liberty

One thing you will notice in this entire article: I have leveled no personal attacks on either McCardle or Malice. I disagree with them most fervently on their pro-voucher position but I limit my critique to their positions. That’s the way I have always operated.

One of the things that I have noticed about some libertarians over the years is their propensity to lash out against critics by making up false and scurrilous accusations and leveling nasty personal attacks. Among the favorite, especially on X, is the one employed by McCardle — that a critic is “crazy” or “a psycho.”

In my opinion, the reason that they do that is because they lack the competence to defend their positions. Some libertarians read a couple of 30-page books on libertarianism and listen to a few podcasts and immediately consider themselves to be experts in the libertarian philosophy. But as soon as they are challenged, they are unable to defend their positions because their understanding of libertarianism is superficial. But rather than going back to the drawing board and steeping themselves into a deeper study of libertarianism, they start flailing by coming up with false and scurrilous accusations about their critics and by labeling them as “crazies” or “psychos” or worse. The idea is that if they can make things sufficiently nasty for their critics, the critics will back off and leave them alone.

Throughout the 2024 presidential campaign, I made it clear that I agreed with the 99 percent of American voters who reject the Republican-lite, pro-Trump, reform-oriented, pro-socialist (e.g., continuing Social Security for 25 years) message that has come to define the Libertarian Party and our presidential campaigns. But my opponents, including the party’s new nominee Chase Oliver, will acknowledge that despite my fundamental disagreement with them with respect to their Republican-lite, reform-oriented message, I never once leveled any personal attacks against them. I certainly never accused any of them of being “crazy” or “psycho” for supporting such policies as immigration controls, school vouchers, trying to take over the public (i.e., government) school system, the national-security state, paper money, and other statist positions that have come to define the Libertarian Party and L.P. presidential campaigns. For that matter, none of them ever leveled personal attacks against me. By the same token, as I often pointed out in debates, they were all able to very competently defend their Republican-lite, reform-oriented positions.

As we see with her interview with Michael Malice, Angela McCardle is clearly unable to competently defend school vouchers and public schooling. I am confident that the same holds true for Social Security continuation, immigration controls, the national-security state, monetary reform, and other right-wing position that have come to define the Libertarian Party. This incompetence was clearly reflected in her interview with Malice when she conflated the libertarian concept of separating school and state with “anarchism.” In my opinion, it is this inability to competently defend either libertarianism or the right-wing positions that have come to be labeled as “libertarianism” that drives McCardle to resorting to making up false and scurrilous attacks about me and leveling nasty personal attacks on me.

Of course, she knows that she can get away with it because of her stature with the party. The chance that the truth will catch up with the lies with respect to her interview with Malice are slim to none because I don’t have the influence that she does as L.P. chairman. But I do intend to send a copy of this article to Malice, in which case it might cause him to view assertions made by her in the future with greater skepticism.

And that’s what McCardle obviously doesn’t see — that the short-term gain of making up false and scurrilous accusations about people might succeed in the short term but over the long term they could conceivably end up garnering her a reputation for being a “person of the lie,” to coin the title of the book by the late noted psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, People of the Lie.

Jacob for Liberty

There Angela Goes Again — On the Michael Malice Show