More Libertarian than not: Credico's
platform includes "Promotion of jury
nullification" (screenshot from
YouTube video)
Even though progressive activist, comedian, and former cocaine addict Randy Credico announced his candidacy for Charles Schumer's US Senate seat three months ago to the YouTube world – "As of today, November 5th, I am a candidate" – local New York media was suddenly full of the story on Saturday.
Maybe it was just a slow news day in the Empire State.
The "activist" label is the first hint that Credico is more than just a funnyman.
Over the weekend the Parsippany Daily Record noted that "He's spoken out for years against New York state's drug laws and has helped push for clemency for men and women who have been harshly sentenced or falsely accused of crimes."
And the New York Daily News identified Credico as a "drug law reform advocate."
And the Long Island Press reported that while Credico hopes to take on Schumer in the Democratic primary, "he’s also talking to officials in the Libertarian Party."
At first blush the idea of Credico being palatable to the Libertarians sounds to be at odds with his November YouTube announcement explaining why he's running against the Democrat Schumer.
"Because Chuck Schumer has abandoned, if he was ever even there in the progressive agenda of the Democratic Party, he supported both wars, the Patriot Act, he has supported the death penalty."
But if Schumer isn't "progressive" enough for Credico, is Credico "Libertarian" enough for the LPNY?
According to the Long Island Press, "Credico has a platform – he supports decriminalizing drugs and ending the drug war, opposes gun control, supports an immediate military pullout from Afghanistan and Iraq and a ban on torture."
That's all good libertarian stuff, including his opposition to gun control, which is usually anathema to "progressives." But it proves what libertarians have been saying for years; that libertarianism is not just far right Republican politics.
Credico is a prime example of a "left libertarian" and that's why the LPNY is talking to him.
Hardcore libertarians won't like his inconsistencies, however. He calls Schumer "a prostitute for corporate America" (what libertarians vilify as "corporatism") and then accuses him of "gutting oversight and regulation of our financial sector" while libertarians want government oversight and regulation gutted in favor of free-market capitalism.
Meanwhile, he has a serious, professional website and several big-name backers.
As a Huffington Post headline put it, perhaps jokingly, perhaps not, "Senator Chuck Schumer Running Scared Says Candidate Randy Credico."
(Randy Credico Announces His Candidacy against Chuck Schumer - YouTube video)
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Comments
As long as someone is heading in my direction I "support" them until they head off the trail into "control-freak land". Then, as long as they don't try to drag me with them, it can be an amicable parting. Of course, if he really expects to get elected he's going about finding Liberty the wrong way since "the system" will never allow real, meaningful change.
As a New Yorker my biggest beef with him asking for the LP endorsement is that he favors amnesty for illegals.
What's an "illegal"? It can't be a person. People can not be "illegal".
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