Libertarians Tried To Warn You About Executive Power

Plus: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson embraces warrantless ICE searches, the Super Bowl halftime culture war, and Trump continues funding the Department of Education

1x 1.1x 1.25x 1.5x 2x 3x

:15 :15

Download

Libertarians Tried To Warn You About Executive Power

HD Video Download

This week, editors Peter Suderman, Katherine Mangu-Ward, Nick Gillespie, and Matt Welch discuss Katherine's New York Times op-ed, "Libertarians Tried to Warn You About Trump," which lays out how Trump-era governance has repeatedly vindicated libertarian warnings about executive power, civil liberties, and the risks of trading principle for partisan advantage. The group then turns to Speaker of the House Mike Johnson's defense of warrantless Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) searches as a concrete example of how quickly Republican commitments to constitutional limits can erode once a party is in power, and why libertarian ideas so often get embraced only in opposition.

The conversation then shifts to Bad Bunny's Super Bowl halftime show and the now-permanent state of the American culture war, as political figures and influencers on the right, including President Donald Trump himself, weighed in to bash the performance. They discuss whether this cycle of outrage is simply what audiences and politicians now want, and how it crowds out serious debate about governance and the economy. A listener asks when each panelist had their own "aha" moment about the failures of the two-party system, before the editors turn to Trump's decision to continue funding the Department of Education, despite his promises to dismantle it.

 

0:00—Libertarians warned about Trump

13:56—Johnson complains about the Fourth Amendment

20:30—Bad Bunny and the culture wars

28:35—Trump's racist "Lion King" Obama meme

34:44—Listener question on libertarian lightbulb moments

44:34—Trump continues funding the Department of Education

52:14—Weekly cultural recommendations

 

Mentioned in This Podcast

"Libertarians Tried to Warn You," by Katherine Mangu-Ward

"Trump 2.0, Year 1: A Libertarian Nightmare," by Brian Doherty

"Claiming Bad Bunny Isn't Successful Is as Foolish As Claiming He Isn't American," by Eric Boehm

"Half-Hearted Halftime Outrage," by Christian Britschgi

"Mike Johnson Wants To Spare ICE the Hassle of Getting the Right Warrant Before Forcibly Entering a Home," by Damon Root

"So Much for Abolishing the Department of Education," by Eric Boehm

• Producer: Paul Alexander
• Video Editor: Ian Keyser

What are we consuming this week?

Peter Suderman

• Send Help

Katherine Mangu-Ward

• Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold, by C.S. Lewis

Nick Gillespie

• Mel Brooks: The 99 Year-Old Man, directed by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio

Matt Welch

• Miracle: The Boys of '80

---

Comments

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

Yet you celebrated judicial supremacy, or legislative supremacy, or deep state supremacy, or NGO sipremacy, or whatever organization that is controlled by democrats.

What you've never done is agree with normal execution of law as passed by congress and upheld by courts.

You didn't warn about shit. You even demanded we listen to experts and railed against audits.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

KMW is a despicable excuse for a human being, and should be fired.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

Fire KMW and MW.
Get out of DC and NYC.
Post some libertarian content.

It will never happen.

[mad.casual]

Libertarians Tried To Warn You About Executive Power

No you didn't. You reluctantly and strategically warned us in favor of a moderate, unifying executive and made the libertarian case for a socialist candidate that Trump has put to shame on the one point you raised in the socialist's defense.

We told you it was an LP fail if we wound up without an LP President and Massie and Paul as the only two congressmen willing to give you the time of day. You chose to campaign to put "What is a leppo?", "We must be actively anti-racist.", and "Just a little bit of trans-ing children is libertarian way." in the big chair.

Reason has been a day late and a dollar and at least one swinging dick short in everything it has "prognosticated" for almost a decade now.

Libertarians tried to warn us!

[Spiritus Mundi]

Warned us the executive branch cutting the size of the executive branch without congress was tyranny.

[Spiritus Mundi]

Hey Katherine Mangu-Ward, is this you warning us not to worry about Mamdani's executive power?

https://reason.com/2026/01/01/mamdani-cant-ruin-new-york/

[Spiritus Mundi]

Hey Katherine Mangu-Ward, is this you warning us not to worry about Google's executive power?

https://reason.com/2006/08/16/more-upsides-to-zero-privacy/

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

KMW is a totally despicable excuse for a human being.

[Spiritus Mundi]

Jesus, what the fuck is this nonsnse?

If the divine command for every Muslim to take a pilgrimage to Mecca isn't enough to get you moving, now there's another reason to go on the hajj: The shopping is fabulous!

For more on the intersection of Islam and the free market, go here.

Islam is famously free market when it comes to selling people.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

KMW is a despicable excuse for a human being.

[Rick James]

Before he was a prophet, Muhammad was a businessman. And it is perfectly in keeping with honoring him that a market is set up next to the Great Mosque.

You know who else was a businessman before he went into politics?

[Vernon Depner]

Almost no one. Politics is the refuge for avaricious people who lack the talent to make it in business.

[mad.casual]

For more on the intersection of Islam and the free market, go here.

Non-Muslims go here.

Again, they aren't no borders. They are "Just the borders *I* want (when *I* want them)."

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

Who are these libertarians you speak of?

[MWAocdoc]

"Are these libertarians here in the room with us now?"

[DesigNate]

I’m convinced they do this to drive hate clicks.

[Rev Arthur L kuckland (5-30-24 banana republic day)]

I'm starting to agree with you

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

You may very well be right.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

KMW should be fired, and John Stossel brought in as interim Editor in Chief. As a REAL libertarian he can right the ship. But this won’t happen since Kochbucks and virtue signaling are all that matter at Reason.

[Rick James]

0:00—Libertarians warned about Trump

There Reason was, standing alone, warning about Trump.

[mad.casual]

And by "warning" about Trump, they mean they impugned Ted Cruz for opposing *l*iberal *d*emocratic values when he clearly opposed the values of *L*iberal *D*emocrats of New York, like Anthony Weiner, Andrew Cuomo, and Chuck Rangel, all of whom he specifically named in the same breath.

I mean, if you were EIC and you had some sort of existential dread of Trump, you'd think you could muster up the ethics to say, "Sorry Jacob, that's a flatly and obviously dishonest presentation that devalues our opinion as much or more than it produces any desired outcome. Try again and do better."

[Public Entelectual]

KMW should pay a little attention to Mexico:

" a recent, Morena-led legislative package to implement a biometric system…stoked fears about global surveillance and tech hegemony.“Their objective is that they want to enslave us with biometric data,” he assured me.

Minerva Guzmán.., shared Juan Marcos’s concerns. “With the biometric CURP they’re going to know even when you go to the bathroom. They’re going to see how much money you have, how much money you spend each week,” she warned... : PAN and PRI administrations had unsuccessfully proposed versions of the program in the past, and the proposal was financed by the World Bank.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

Public Entelectual should fuck off and die, and take his lying web site with him.

[minus the clever name]

Should have had warrantless ICE searches LONG AGO

[minus the clever name]

So you say but you trashed Victoria Villareuel and disguised it as a warning about executive power. IT was really a pro-gay , anti-Catholic move.
Whom you don't like you call 'authoritarian'

[Mickey Rat]

No, you loved executive power when it gave you something you wanted, like when Obama did DACA by executive order, when Congress would not rubber stamp it for him. Trump ran on pushing back against one of your main pet issues, unrestricted immigration, which is why you think his executive power is dangerous.

[Mickey Rat]

"Claiming Bad Bunny Isn't Successful Is as Foolish As Claiming He Isn't American"

Ah, the strawman headline, to argue against a less nuanced version of what people you do not like are saying.

[MasterThief]

"It's amazing how much leftist discourse is just them pretending not to understand things, thus making discourse impossible."

Reason has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is how they engage in political discourse.

[mad.casual]

You know who would've been better/awesome for the Superbowl Halftime show?

Carlos Santana
Linda Ronstadt
The Refugee All-Stars (sans John Forte, PBUH)
Mark Anthony
Pitbull
Enrique Iglesias (or, FFS, Julio)
Los Lobos

They could even all get together do a tribute or tributes to Tito Fuentes, Ritchie Valens, and/or Harry Belafonte (in addition to more modern/popular hits).

[Set Us Up The Chipper]

To be fair, Ronstadt has lost her voice.

[Wizzle Bizzle]

But not our hearts.

[EISTAU Gree-Vance]

Yes, but When Will she Be Loved?

[mad.casual]

To be fair, is what Bad Bunny does considered singing?

To be fair, Linda Ronstadt hasn't produced a song in almost 20 yrs. and people *still* recognize her by name and understand *exactly* what I'm saying.

[damikesc]

Is there any chance, at all, Jay-Z would sign off on that?

We all know the answer.

[mtrueman]

Trump:
"It makes no sense, is an affront to the Greatness of America, and doesn't represent our standards of Success, Creativity, or Excellence."

That's not Strawman. It's a real person (Trump) tweeting about Mr. Bunny's failure to meet our lofty standards of success.

[Mickey Rat]

That is not Trump saying he is not American, or even financially unsuccessful as an entertainment act. It is Trump saying that he athink Bad Bunny's music sucks aesthetically and has little morally edifying value.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

True is stupid and democrat to understand that.

[mtrueman]

I defer to your superior mind reading skills. I have to rely on what Trump (or his proxy) writes.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

As a brain-dead POS, you should defer to a house-fly.

[DesigNate]

Except you’re not, as Mickey pointed out.

You’re the one doing the mind reading.

[mtrueman]

Trump (or proxies) posted a comment belittling Mr. Bunny's success:
"It makes no sense, is an affront to the Greatness of America, and doesn't represent our standards of Success, Creativity, or Excellence."

Reason posted the following headline:
"Claiming Bad Bunny Isn't Successful Is as Foolish As Claiming He Isn't American"

Mickey Rat claimed Reason's headline was strawmanning the issue:
"Ah, the strawman headline, "

I point out that it isn't a straw man if an actual man of flesh and bone spurs (Trump or proxy) actually did denigrate Mr. Bunny's attainment of success. Which he did:
"It makes no sense, is an affront to the Greatness of America, and doesn't represent our standards of Success, Creativity, or Excellence."

Mickey Rat follows up with a fanciful interpretation of Trump's tweet in which he claims Trump didn't denigrate Mr. Bunny's success, despite the obvious meaning of the posted words, something that didn't fail to escape me or Reason's editors.

I charitably credit Mickey Rat's superior mind reading skills for his ability to discern Trump's real meaning and intent over and above the misleadingly clear message which Reason's editors and I took to be disparaging Mr. Bunny's success.

My explanation? I've been diagnosed here many times as suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS). Mickey Rat as a true lover of Trump has an impeccable bill of health in this regard. The TDS sufferer is condemned to listen or read Trump's words and take them at face value. Only Mickey Rat and his ilk with clear minds and pure hearts are able to plumb the depths of Trump's true meaning.

[SRG2]

Waiting for one actual libertarian to post on this.

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

Poor shrike. Thinks he is the gatekeeper of libertarianism.

[GOD OF PENGUIN ISLAND]

While being too stupid to realize he just admitted he's not a libertarian.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

Yeah, here's the asswipe on government murder of an unarmed woman:

SRG2 12/23/23
“Then strode in St Ashli, clad in a gown of white samite and basking in celestial radiance, walking calmly and quietly through the halls of Congress as police ushered her through doors they held open for her, before being cruelly martyred for her beliefs by a Soros-backed special forces officer with a Barrett 0.50 rifle equipped with dum-dum bullets.”

[5Arete22]

I am reminded that I need to give my annual donation to the Reason Foundation.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"Libertarians warned about Trump"

Fuck the lot of you with a barb-wire-wrapped baseball bat!
Where were you when that pathological liar Obo was handing out his (misnamed) EOs? Where were you when droolin' Joe was letting the janitor walk by and have Otto sign something?
Fuck all of you slimy piles of TDS-addled lying shit!

[Wizzle Bizzle]

FWIW, I've stopped reading Reason due to its obvious lack of libertarian content. My first time back this month, and....yup. Still in denial.

Is Reason more libertarian than NPR and the NYT? Sure. They're stout on gun rights and they have all those pro-drug articles that were so edgy 60 years ago. But rarely (not never) do the few decent authors provide insights or facts better than what you get in the comments.

[SRG2]

what you get in the comments.

I'm curious - which posters here do you regard as representing any libertarian position?

[mad.casual]

Is Reason more libertarian than NPR and the NYT? Sure. They're stout on gun rights and they have all those pro-drug articles that were so edgy 60 years ago.

[Tilts hand]

They're pro-gun inasmuch as it's edgy in their social circles and gets votes. If you actually fire your gun in prima facie self-defense, they suddenly turn all "You shouldn't have been there!" and "OK, the first shot of three you fired in rapid succession was justified, but the second and third were not."

[Use the Schwartz]

Meanwhile I'm over here Mozambique-ing every session.

[Neutral not Neutered]

No. Libertarians never tried to warn anyone. You are not Libertarians.

More like staunch haters with TDS tried to fear monger people into believing that when Trump uses the exact same executive powers that all other Presidents had at their disposal that he would cause WW3, destroy the economy, be a dictator on day one, lock up journalists or anyone who spoke out against him, lock up political enemies without actual evidence as they tied to do to him. Because as you said he is a racist, misogynist, White Nationalist Nazi whom is only supported by uneducated rednecks.

Instead of writing the truth that Trump would shut down the democrats abhorrent and destructive actions trying to force the fundamental transform America and you don't want that.

You don't want common sense policies. You do not want America strong, to be leader of the free world and liberty.

reason writers appear to want the fundamental transformation of America into some subservient global state controlled by China.

You warned that Trump will end what you want to happen and return America closer to what it is supposed to be. A constitutional republic with a President.

[MWAocdoc]

I take exception to the title of the NYT article, although I am not crossing the NYT wall to try to read it. Libertarians warned about building up the power of the Executive branch for the advantage of one party because either party can abuse that power. It might be fair to say that libertarians warned the democratic socialists not to trash the Constitutional limits on the scope and power of the government to make it easier to advance their own agenda because someone like Trump could then abuse the power they created against them. But that is a very weak position! We object to anyone using concentrated power for ANY purpose, for the very reason that I happen to approve of a strong President downsizing government after the Constitution has been trashed in the absence of any other method of downsizing the government. The problem with that is that we cannot rely on Trump to actually downsize government while abusing his power in other ways. And so it goes ...

[mtrueman]

"we cannot rely on Trump to actually downsize government while abusing his power in other ways. "

Just last month Trump called for a 50% increase in military spending. He also invoked the 'donroe' doctrine, and told us that he wants to annex Greenland, Canada, et al, and would from here on be running Venezuela. I don't think you can rely on him to downsize the government under any circumstances. He seems bent on massively upsizing it.

[Use the Schwartz]

What do you call people who don't have their noses in the trough, they don't even get the bits that fall out of the trough, but are allowed to be in the same room as the people that get the bits that fall out of the trough?

OH SHIT, THAT ACTUALLY IS LIBERTARIAN!

[5Arete22]

For some reason, the sputterings of the many non-libertarian commenters in reaction to this article remind me of this 1907 poem by W.B. Yeats:

"On Those That Hated the 'Playboy of the Western World'"

Once, when midnight smote the air,
Eunuchs ran through Hell and met
On every crowded street to stare
Upon great Juan riding by:
Even like these to rail and sweat
Staring upon his sinewy thigh.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

No, it didn’t. You probably had an AI suggest that. I highly doubt you’ve ever read Yeats in your life.

[5Arete22]

SgSJabs, again you seem sure of something of which you are ignorant, in this case, the feeling of likeness that caused me to think that the Yeats poem somehow fit. Perhaps you could try to understand why I felt the connection.

I've read a fair amount of Yeats and even essayed reading his _A_Vision_ in hopes of better appreciating his works. Unusually for me, I did not finish the book after starting and do not recommend it for the non-specialist, such as myself.

George Orwell "turned me on" to Yeats many years ago when I read the former's essay on Yeats, which I recommend:
https://www.orwell.ru/library/reviews/yeats/english/e_yeats

Like Orwell, I admire Yeats's writing but not his politics. I have the same opinion about Orwell.

[mad.casual]

Like Orwell, I admire Yeats's writing but not his politics.

So you don't like his politics until it you think it makes you look intelligent and impugns the people you don't like and, maybe even deliberately, don't understand? And you think this distinguishes you from any other culturally-unmoored, post-modern, globalist, pseudo-intellectuals?

[Use the Schwartz]

It's all just undifferentiated Content unburdened by what once was.

[5Arete22]

m.c, my comment about Orwell's politics refers to his commitment to democratic socialism in his later adulthood. See the link at the bottom.
Being an American-style libertarian, I disagree.

Your hostile comments do not relate to what I wrote about Orwell.

https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/why-i-write/

[5Arete22]

m.c, now I think that you were commenting about my quoting Yeats. I did so to use Yeats's scorn toward lesser lights who emotively and uselessly attack their betters who make the lessers uncomfortable.

Assuming that art has only a meaning derived from the life and opinions of the artist is a mistake. It is like claiming that Shakespeare has nothing to say to us because he lived so long ago in a world where political, economic, and social relations were different from today's.

[mtrueman]

Orwell called himself a Tory Anarchist, seemingly a contradiction in terms, but also appropriate. J.R.R. Tolkien, another British writer of the same period has been called a Tory Anarchist. (Tories are the conservative land owning class in the UK. The Anarchist half of the label comes from Orwell's Socialism or Tolkien's Environmentalism.)

I ask you, have any Americans been given the same name for their beliefs or is it a British phenomenon? George Grant, author of 1965's Lament for a Nation, might be considered a Canadian version.

[5Arete22]

"have any Americans been given the same name for their beliefs ?" -- mtrueman

I don't know of any who used the term for themselves, but I think that Murray Rothbard called Albert Jay Nock a Tory anarchist.

Both Tolkien and Orwell used the phrase for themselves, though I doubt that they meant exactly the same thing by it. I think that their common elements were love of English traditions combined with suspicion of centralized governmental authority.

I believe that Orwell called himself a Tory anarchist early in adulthood but later was a committed democratic socialist. See his long essay "The Lion and the Unicorn" for his combination of the two feelings.

https://archive.org/details/lionunicornsocia00orwe

[mtrueman]

"suspicion of centralized governmental authority"

Sure, but if Nock wasn't also critical of capital, which I'm sure he wasn't, that would have put him at odds with Orwell, Tolkien and Grant, who definitely were suspicious of centralized authority in government or business.

Instead of Nock, how about Lewis Mumford? His views on communal life and technology put him much closer to Orwell and the others.

[5Arete22]

mtrueman,

Nock, of course, was one of the first self-identified, American-style libertarians, and his emphasis on free markets does not match Tolkien, Orwell, or Grant.

I have only read about George Grant and Lewis Mumford and have little familiarity with their works, so my reply is not well-founded.

My impression is that the "red Tory" Grant would fit pretty well with Tolkien, but that Orwell's desire to merge social classes does not fit Grant.

I associate Mumford with opposition to replacing what he considered human-centered values with values aimed at further development of technology, with which both Tolkien and Orwell would be in accord. However, I think that Orwell believed that further technological progress was too ingrained in current civilization and too necessary for military competition to be stopped and that Orwell hoped to make it more humane through keeping people grounded in nature and governing through democratic socialism.

[5Arete22]

[Flaco]

KMW: "Last head, best head"

[TJJ2000]

Again with Congress pushes MORE education funding than Trumps proposal but it's all Trumps fault! /s

Reason is becoming the platform of "Repeat a LIE enough times and it become the truth."