Today, we have one of the best opportunities in our lifetime to advance liberty. It might not seem like that, especially given the massive assaults on our liberty and well-being brought on by COVID-19 regulations, but the fact is that we are living in a time in which many people are thinking, pondering, and reflecting on the situation in America. That’s because there are currently no major crises that are producing the deep fear that interferes with rational thinking.
We need to take advantage of this opportunity. More than ever, we need to keep pushing for a free society — a genuinely free society, not some sort of warmed-over, reformed serfdom.
Since its beginning 32 years ago, The Future of Freedom Foundation has been advancing the principled, uncompromising case for the free society. We have been able to do this thanks to the generous financial support from people who share our vision for achieving freedom. I am writing to ask you to help us out in the coming year with a generous donation to FFF.
I am not being pollyannaish about the situation we are in. The feds are hurtling America toward national bankruptcy with their out-of-control spending and debt. They are using the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse for tightening their control over the American people. They continue to assassinate people in the Middle East, thereby increasing the chances of another major terrorist attack on American soil. They continue their efforts to take our guns away. They are also looking for every excuse to destroy our rights of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.
But while it’s easy to look at a glass as half-empty, it’s important that we also recognize it as half-full.
At its founding, FFF called for the legalization of all drugs, not just marijuana, at the time a lonely position for which we were severely criticized. But we stood our ground and continued, year after year, making the principled case for liberty when it comes to drugs. Today, the climate of public opinion on that issue has radically changed. Just recently, for example, the New York Times had a forum to discuss the legalization of all drugs, not just some drugs.
That is what the power of ideas on liberty is all about. Things can change. Circumstances can turn on a dime. You just never know when that will happen, but one thing is for sure: If we give up and settle for reform, our chances of achieving a genuinely free society dissipate.
Consider foreign policy. From the beginning, we have been making the principled case for the restoration of our nation’s traditional foreign policy of non-interventionism. Twenty years ago, we stood firmly against the invasions and occupations of both Afghanistan and Iraq. We were holding lonely ground and were inundated with nasty, vituperative correspondence and cancellations of support. Today, with the acknowledged debacle in Afghanistan, along with all the lies that came with it, more people than ever are questioning and challenging the concept of foreign interventionism. We need to keep pushing on this issue, before the Pentagon and the CIA can incite a new foreign-policy crisis that will encourage people to trade liberty for the pretense of security.
The conversion of the federal government into a national-security state after World War II, along with its omnipotent powers of assassination, torture, indefinite detention, and secret mass surveillance, was the biggest mistake our nation has ever made.
The second-biggest mistake was the conversion of our free-market system to a welfare state in the 1930s. That conversion caused people to look to government to keep them secure, much like chickens look to a fox to keep them safe. It also severely damaged people’s sense of self-reliance, independence, and private charity.
The third-biggest mistake was the adoption of the federal income tax and the Federal Reserve in 1913. They opened the floodgates to massive confiscation of wealth, both directly through the IRS and through decades of monetary debasement.
We need to continue raising people’s vision to a higher level — toward restoring our nation’s founding governmental system of a limited-government republic — including principles such as the separation of healthcare and the state, money and the state, charity and the state, and the economy and the state.
How do we achieve a genuinely free society? Through the continued dissemination of sound ideas on liberty! For some 20 years, we have published FFF Daily, which includes original articles and my daily blog that address the burning issues facing our nation. We strive to make it the best daily libertarian commentary page on the Internet. For 32 years, we have also published our monthly journal, Future of Freedom, which features longer, more timeless articles that explore the principles of liberty at a deeper level. Our weekly Internet show, “The Libertarian Angle,” brings you perspectives on freedom and free-market economics within the context of the burning issues of the day.
This year, we brought you two of the best conferences we have ever held, both online through Zoom — one on the Kennedy assassination last spring and one this fall on restoring civil liberties to our land. The videos of those conferences are posted on FFF’s website.
This is where your financial support to The Future of Freedom Foundation goes — toward the achievement of liberty — genuine liberty, not some watered-down version of it.
We must continue opposing the statists who are destroying our liberty and our well-being. We must never surrender to them. We must continue placing our faith in the power of ideas on liberty to influence a critical mass of people who support moving America in the direction of freedom, peace, prosperity, and harmony. We must continue making the principled, uncompromising case for liberty.
Will you help us do so in the coming year?
Yours for liberty,
Jacob Hornberger
P.S. Please don’t forget our FFF Freedom Club for people who donate $250 or more. You’ll receive a monthly video message from me!