Free State Wyoming vs. Free State Project (New Hampshire)

[John F Kennedy III]

Is there a site that breaks down states based on political affiliation/leanings? Like libertarian/conservative/socialist/etc?

 

[John F Kennedy III]

That is an interesting theory you have but as far as I can tell, history and all of the facts don't show what you say to be true.

History isn't always current reality and I don't know what facts you are referencing.

Honestly, my guess is that you are new to serious effective activism. How many Leadership Institute training events have you been to? How many candidates have you campaigned for that got elected? How many bills have you helped pass? Being relatively new to effective political activism doesn't make you a bad person, but if does mean you don't know what you are talking about. Seriously, if you didn't already know that NH was the freest state, there is likely a lot of information you don't know about. Please stick with politics. You can likely be an excellent activist if you keep it up

1. Yes I'm new to serious political activism.
2. Never been to any LT events
3. One.
4. Zero bills.

There is alot I don't know and I am always open to learning more and I am always open to being wrong. Feel free to educate me Also I would love to be an activist, I know I can be excellent at it. However I don't do groupthink, I will only be an activist for what I believe in.

I completely agree and I've never met a single political activist in NH than does anything like that. Of course, NH is the most effective place for a national political activist to be outside of the DC area. If someone is really interested in national politics, I recommend they live in one of those (NH or DC / VA suburbs) areas.

NH is sounding really good. The whole Ron Paul thing really disturbs me though. And I'm hearing there are a ton socialists there. Both of these things seem to be counter productive to the liberty movement and the things that make NH rank #1 in freedom. I have alot to weigh before I decide where I can go that will give me the chance to make a real difference.

Absolutely agree. That's why people need to work hard to counteract the statist on a national level and within states by influencing state government.

Agreed 100%

Oh for sure. The idea of the free state isn't that liberty activists moving to NH will instantly save the world.

I do not intend to come off as saying NH is expected to instantly save the world. I do however feel that our country is on the brink of either saving itself or falling off the cliff into something that will make 1984 (or even Nazi Germany) seem tame.

We need lots and lots of well training, experienced liberty activists to gather in one state, and this is only happening in NH. It is going to take 100,000s of hours of hard work to bring about any type of serious protection from the national government IMO. I'll already working hard on this by recruiting other liberty activists to move to NH and helping training liberty activists in NH in connection with the top liberty activist training organizations in the world.

I agree it will take ALOT of work. I think that a FSP needs alot more than 20,000 people for it to work. We can only take over a state if we have the numbers. Is there anything to show that FSP has been recruiting NH into the liberty movement?

 

[Keith and stuff]

NH is overrated and was a bad state to pick. RP did poorly there in 2007 while he finished 2nd in Montana (or Wyoming I forgot) in 2007 and they did not even have FSP help. SD, ND, Montana, NM, Wyoming all would have been much better picks.

What Ron Paul did in WY or MT cannot be compared apples to apples with what Ron Paul did in NH. However, if you want to look at an honest comparison, check out this one. In the opinion of this author, NH did better than almost every state for Ron Paul in 2007,
Which is the Most Pro-Ron Paul State? Assessing the Determinants of Paul’s Primary and Caucus Support
http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~jsorens/rpvotes.pdf

"So we can now answer the question: In which state did Ron Paul’s organization do best? The answer is New Hampshire. New Hampshire was the most pro-Ron Paul state, although Idaho ran a close second. The other states are well behind. At the other end of the spectrum, Paul did really badly in Mississippi. We can only deduce that voters and activists in Mississippi strongly disliked or ignored Dr. Paul’s antiwar, libertarian message. Colorado, Massachusetts, Alabama, Kentucky, Utah, and North Carolina were also pretty poor states for him."

Perhaps you disagree with that. That report was an opinion based off numbers and not above disagreement.

However, I have some numbers for you that you cannot disagree with because they are fact and not opinion.

"On November 5th [2007], the record-setting day when Ron Paul supporters donated $4.3 Million, Ron Paul raised more money per capita in New Hampshire than in any other state"
http://freestateproject.org/intro/ron_paul

It's true. I remember giving in that money bomb and looking at the results.

Had the 1000 people moved to Wyoming, Montana or a state like that it would have been so much better.

Interesting point. I was actually one of the lead people researching and pushing for WY in 2002. However, WY lost because the top liberty activists in the country (or at least those folks that votes in FSP state vote) decided that overall, NH would make a better choice. I moved to NH anyway because it was more free than where I used to live, had better weather (IMO) than where I used to live and had many other people moving there with measurable results (unlike all of the other 49 states.)

Now I understand you all wanted NH because it is more fun to live there than a empty state like ND, which is fine I can't fault you......but don't act like NH was the best state to pick. It was and is nowhere as good of a state to pick for liberty as many other states, many of which are in the Mountain West region.

The voters selected NH for many good reasons. All of the reasons for all of the states is archived on the FSP website. NH won not only because it is more fun to live in, has access to many more jobs and has a larger variety of rural and urban living environments, but also because it has the most accessible government in the US and is the easiest to change.

The goal is to take over ANY state- so it should have been the smallest state.

I can assure you, take over a state and the FSP are not related in anyway. The goal isn't to take over a state. Well, at least that isn't the goal of the FSP or those involved with it.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

I am a part of the Free State Wyoming. I was one of the first movers. I must agree it has not been a success. It is much, much smaller than the FSP in New Hampshire, and has had few if any political results or successes.

New Hampshire, on the other hand, has elected a whole bunch of libertarians to the state house and appears to be on a good trajectory. I still think Wyoming would have been the better choice, because of lower population and more counties, but what's done is done and I have to think that at this point moving to New Hampshire and joining the liberty activists there would be a better choice for you and anyone sharing your goals.

 

[BuddyRey]

I'm still waiting for the Republic of Lakotah to take off. Anyone know what the current status of that might be?

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Being either in or very close to the proposed borders of the Lakota Nation, I can say: not much. But at least they've got a better web site, more frequently updated, than the FSW.

http://www.lakotafreedom.com/

 

[Eric21ND]

21.37% (3rd place) and 5 delegates

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Dakota_Republican_caucuses,_2008

There you go, thank you.

 

[Eric21ND]

ND only has 600k people so a hardcore group of 1000+ activists could make a big impact.

 

[BuddyRey]

^ Good point. I think Boston T. Party had a good point when he said that the FSP made a mistake by choosing a highly populated state with pre-existing liberty potential instead of a sparsely-populated state that could be "flipped" far more quickly and drastically.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

^ Good point. I think Boston T. Party had a good point when he said that the FSP made a mistake by choosing a highly populated state with pre-existing liberty potential instead of a sparsely-populated state that could be "flipped" far more quickly and drastically.

NH won the FSP vote because of the large state assembly and that it was a state that can be traveled rather easily for activism reasons. WY was my 2nd (and very close) choice because I'd had been there before and loved the landscape, while was unsure about New England. From I've seen about WY, not only is the activism minimum but the drive time from one place to another is too much and they also have very deep snow fall in the winter. Also, most of the cities/towns are quite small while surrounded by vast lands/mtns that are owned by Chicago bankers. I envisioned the great land of WY and thought at some point I could get a nice plot of land but I've heard that most of it has been bought up. I've only lived in NH so I'm partial but there are so many liberty activists, both FSP and natives, and that alone drowns out whatever WY has left to offer + many tangible successes. The WY movement has no ad plan nor much else, so that will likely be the end of it. The FSP is alive and well in NH, and two of our very own from here (RPF - invisible and wife) just moved to NH today, just got off the phone with them a couple hours ago.

 

[John F Kennedy III]

What do ya'll think about Oregon?

It does rank #1 in personal freedom...

 

[Keith and stuff]

^ Good point. I think Boston T. Party had a good point when he said that the FSP made a mistake by choosing a highly populated state with pre-existing liberty potential instead of a sparsely-populated state that could be "flipped" far more quickly and drastically.

Boston T. Party had a lot of good ideas (and still does.) I'm glad he worked with Joe, Robert, Paul and myself to promote WY before the FSP vote. I'm glad he writes liberty books even if I'm not a big gun person. Let's look at things now though. Boston cannot even recruit someone to update his website. That would just take a couple hours per week and he cannot even find someone to do that much activism.

Even though I supported WY, clearly the majority of liberty activists and almost all of the earlier moves disagreed with me. I've heard of liberty activists moving to AK, WY, MT, ID, NV, SC, TN and NH for more liberty. But when I hear about a move, 9 times out of 10 it is a move to NH.

Also, NH isn't highly populated, not at all.

In WY state reps and state senators are professional legislators. In NH they are citizen legislators. In WY state senators work for 4 year terms. There isn't even an executive council that shares power with the governor in WY. In WY, people don't vote on town budgets line by line like they do in NH.

I get that WY has a lower population than NH but with only 50-100 movers in my estimation it doesn't matter. And when you consider that some of those movers aren't political activists and that some of them aren't even activists at all, what do you have? Maybe 10-30 current political activists that are movers. And with so few movers spread out so far, national political liberty training organizations are going to go to WY to train the activists. In NH we had 3 Leadership Institute trainings this year alone. Two were free 1/2 day events and the Campaign Bootcamp that Young Americans for Liberty helped with in October was a full day training with 2 meals plus snacks for only $20. So the activists likely aren't trained well. 1 well trained political activist is worth several poorly trained political activists when it comes to making positive changes.

Do Leadership Institute, American Majority, Campaign for Liberty or Young Americans for Liberty do training in WY, ND or MT? Most likely either no or only once every few years. Young Americans for Liberty is thinking about doing a training event in NH next year (for the 3rd year in a row) and I'm already planing 2 training events that I want to put on in NH next summer.

 

[libertybrewcity]

I don't know what any of you do for a living or what your situation is, but I can't see myself moving the middle of nowhere in ND, WY, or MT in the first half of my life. I'd love to buy a piece of land there in the future, but how are you suppose to convince a gf or wife to live on a chunk of land in the boonies?

Unless you decide to farm or ranch or something, how do you even work or live if there is nothing around? Idk. I've been a city kid my whole life so I haven't experienced much else. I'll move up to NH once I get my life in order.

 

[Nathan Hale]

The FSP had this very debate a looooong time ago back in 2002 and 2003. The NH group is the only serious statewide libertarian movement in this country. They have numerous members in the state house (and one in the state senate), they pack state house testimony sessions. They demonstrate and organization across the state. If you want to be a part of an effective liberty movement, the FSP is it.

 

[Keith and stuff]

I don't know what any of you do for a living or what your situation is, but I can't see myself moving the middle of nowhere in ND, WY, or MT in the first half of my life. I'd love to buy a piece of land there in the future, but how are you suppose to convince a gf or wife to live on a chunk of land in the boonies?

Unless you decide to farm or ranch or something, how do you even work or live if there is nothing around? Idk. I've been a city kid my whole life so I haven't experienced much else. I'll move up to NH once I get my life in order.

Most people in WY and MT live in urban clusters. There is a lot of empty space in WY but it might be a 1,000 acre ranch (the land tends to be unproductive so the ranches need to be large) with 5 people living on it and then down by the highway there is a town with 2,000 people clusters together. That's a good explanation of how people live in WY. As for convincing spouses to move there, I guess you have to hope they love mountains and horses, otherwise...

As for jobs, there are jobs but they tend to be of the less high tech type and outside of the mining / oil /government jobs, the pay usually isn't very good. In the small towns, which is most of WY other than Casper, Cheyenne, Gillette and Laramie, you may have to take what you can find. Whatever you do in WY or a similar state, be a hard worker because if you get fired a couple of times in a small town you may need to move 50 miles down the road before you find someone that will offer you another job.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

Most people in WY and MT live in urban clusters. There is a lot of empty space in WY but it might be a 1,000 acre ranch (the land tends to be unproductive so the ranches need to be large) with 5 people living on it and then down by the highway there is a town with 2,000 people clusters together. That's a good explanation of how people live in WY. As for convincing spouses to move there, I guess you have to hope they love mountains and horses, otherwise...

As for jobs, there are jobs but they tend to be of the less high tech type and outside of the mining / oil /government jobs, the pay usually isn't very good. In the small towns, which is most of WY other than Casper, Cheyenne, Gillette and Laramie, you may have to take what you can find. Whatever you do in WY or a similar state, be a hard worker because if you get fired a couple of times in a small town you may need to move 50 miles down the road before you find someone that will offer you another job.

^Got it

 

[TexMac]

Another really hard-to-live with thing in Wyoming is that you have to go to Denver, CO or Rapid City, SD or Billings MT to fly anywhere. There is not one big airport in the whole state.

There is really excellent trout fishing there, though.

 

[John F Kennedy III]

Oregon?

 

[muzzled dogg]

The FSP is alive and well in NH, and two of our very own from here (RPF - invisible and wife) just moved to NH today, just got off the phone with them a couple hours ago.

I forget man, have we met? I just moved up but had been coming up from mass all calendar yr

 

[John F Kennedy III]

Maybe ill just start a new thread tomorrow. Lol.