Last updated on September 24, 2026
The LNC had eight employees, one of whom left for other employment and another was on reduced time because she recently gave birth to a child. We are advised by LNC Chair McMahon that “She moved from full time ED to part time Operations with Dasbach becoming the ED as a full time volunteer.” The total net pay of all employees was $22,164.
There there were the other expenses associated with paying people:
$3444 for Social Security
$2571 for health insurance.
$2047 for Federal Withholding and unemployment
$1092 was the Employee 401K contribution.
$805 was Medicare.
$574 was Pennsylvania withholding
$107 was Arizona withholding
The LNC has consultants. Their pay includes
$28,545 to Fresh IP PLC for legal-general
$6300 to Mountaintop Creative
$4500 to Oliver Hall as his retainer.
$2000 to Paula Edwards for FEC consulting.
$500 to Kelsey Lyon Design for Contractor Admin and Internships.
$3160 to All-in-On accounting
$493 for Payroll Service fees went to Paychex
$192 to PNC for bank fees.
$140 to Quickbooks for Accounting Services.
Expenses plausibly related to fund raising include
$7460 to The Miles Press for Ballot Access Fundraising.
$953 Postage and shipping
$689 to Printful for merchandise for resale
Advancing the party includes
$4000 to Iron Light
$3444 for software and hardware, of which @2445 to Zoho was the larget part.
$414 for historical preservation committee storage.
$220 to Etsy as an outreach and activism expense.
A credit card debt of $2053 was paid to PNC.
$39 for other costs.
Opportunity costs for $2 million over 40 years is about $13 million if invested in S&P 500. I can think of just one couple who were active, well off, and dedicated enough over those 40 years to have made such an outstanding contribution to the LP. When folks like them throw in the towel, the bout is over.
Do(ug)h isn’t the only one questioning the efficacy of the LP. David Nolan’s original call to “get the word out” through the political process has fallen on hard times. Maybe there are better ways these days?
Perhaps the thousands of hours of time and effort spent on endless litigation, squabbling, signature gathering, token candidates, and ego building, could be spent instead on “getting the word out” through social media? Imagine 9,000 Libertarians using their social platforms – even once a week – to post libertarian messages (instead of crafting multi-page arguments, say, for why the Judicial Committee should rule one way or the other). Imagine local Libertarians showing up at one of the major candidate’s talks and asking some pertinent questions, instead of spending the same time begging passersby at the supermarket to sign a petition for a candidate who will never get one interview or 1% of the vote. Libertarians do need a nationwide advocacy/activist organization with local chapters to “get the word out.” It just isn’t clear that third party politics is now the best way to do so.
And yet, no book, no think tank, no supper club, no magazine, no individual, no website, no podcast, NOTHING has brought the Libertarian philosophy to more people than the Libertarian Party has through it’s campaigns at every level. The Presidential Campaign alone reaches millions every four years!
That maybe used to be true 20 years ago, but no longer is. As for the organization ATBAFT described it’s called Advocates for Self Government, among many others that exist or can be created.
Thankfully, not a penny of my money went to any of that, since I no longer support the LNC, its state or local affiliates, any splinter parties or any other major or minor parties or alleged parties, or their actual or alleged candidates, financially, electorally, or as a volunteer. I don’t even do business with them as a contractor. Good riddance.
The libertarians have theoretical goals which broadly coincide with mine, but in practice are useless to counterproductive towards achieving those goals, and over 40 years of personal observation and experience have erased any hope that any faction, candidates or groups for internal or external office, strategies, plans, employees, etc will change that fact, particularly in a sustainable fashion. They are just spinning wheels and getting ever more stuck in mud, getting it all over themselves and anyone in their proximity, whether by accident or design, in the process.
Fortunately, as things have evolved over those 40 plus years of involvement and study, many alternatives have become more successful at advocating for, spreading the ideas of, and in various ways helping implement minimizing territorial monopoly political government and maximizing all other forms of governance, within, adjacent to, and outside of the electoral political process. This has occurred due to evolving communication technologies and legal changes that make it more advantageous to seek political goals through numerous forms of political organizations besides formal political parties ad such, in comparison thereto.
Other such legal changes have simultaneously made it harder to qualify and remain qualified for ballots, to gather valid signatures toward that end, to support parties and especially minor parties financially, to be publicly associated with them in a context of ever increasing bipolarization hostility between major parties and of a 24/7 delocalised news cycle, omnipresent social media maximizing conflict and viewpoint silo reinforcement , loss of privacy, etc.
And to politically and otherwise organize , fund, advocate, and popularize all manner of viewpoints and efforts of all sorts, including those aimed in various towards broadly libertarian goals.
Thank God.
“Thankfully, not a penny of my money went to any of that, since I no longer support the LNC, its state or local affiliates…” So, in other words, you’ve done nothing. Well, thanks for NOTHING.
As I revealed in a comment that was not approved, in reply to others which were approved and then deleted, I contributed thousands of hours and million$ over four devades. You’re welcome. Telling friends to stop spinning their wheels in the mud after finally having learned the hard way myself isn’t doing nothing, particularly when it’s on an unstable cliff which is prone to landslides.
Millons of dollars? Really? Wow!
That includes personal spending for party related events and travel, national, state, and local patties including many places I didn’t live, many candidates at all levels, over 40 years. It does not include opportunity cost. So yeah, all told, millions. Still technically true when not adjusting for inflation.