What was your line in the sand?

[bigmike]

Bigmike, I didn't know you were from my hood...

Sorry.

"I'm in the Clem, yo!"

I ran with the Macomb County LP party for a minute. We may know people in common that have positions in metro-Detroit area government.

I live with Marvin Marvin, if that name rings a bell. Perhaps we've crossed paths?

[KBCraig]

No particular issue, no specific line in the sand. We just want greater personal liberty and far less government.

I had heard of the FSP before the vote, and had a vague recollection that the vote had selected NH. One evening I mentioned to my wife the possibility of a job transfer to NH, and her immediate response was, "OMG, are you serious? How soon can we move?"

That was around August/September of 2005, and I told her about the FSP. We spent a few weeks making comparisons and reading the original "101 Reasons" list, and we knew the move was inevitable. We bought a travel trailer and attended PF'06, and pretty much decided that Lancaster was already our home, just waiting for us to move.

We haven't been back to NH since '06, but we read the local news online, check the real estate pages compulsively, and scheme about how best to get the hell out of Texas and move to NH.

And yes, I do currently work for the feral gummint, but I'm not proud of it. The surest way to create disbelief in and mistrust of the government, is to work for It. Working in the belly of the beast doesn't make you feel all warm and cozy, it makes you keenly aware of just how much the beast has already consumed, and how voracious its appetite really is.

[Russell Kanning]

a bunch of  stuff pushed me in this direction

[Kat Kanning]

Thanks for the replies!    (except for yours, Russell  )

[Lloyd Danforth]

 

[Bill St. Clair]

This:

[Russell Kanning]

a prophet is never respected in his hometown ... and neither are schmoes like me

ok ok .... i did it for the children

[MTPorcupine3]

The question might be 'What was your red pill?'

I was a mainstream Republican type until 1990. That's when I fully woke up to the circumcision issue. I wondered what else was going on that isn't covered by the media, what else were my parents wrong about, what else are the medicos doing that is harmful, what else do we Americans do that we take for granted that others see as barbaric, what kind of country was I defending when I joined the Marines, where was God when this happened to me, is there a God?, why didn't my religion (Christian Science) take a stand against it... And so my paradigm began to unravel, ultimately leading me to libertarianism and the FSP.

How I discovered the FSP is another story which I've covered on other posts.

[Kat Kanning]

No really, thanks everyone for the replies   Russell's going to feel funny when I quote him saying, "I did it for the children." 

[djbridgeland]

Read a Reason article, I believe just after NH was picked and some had started moving in.  Was sold a little later on after listening to Free Talk Live for a couple of month and signed the pledge.
Moved after getting laid off from my job last year, and seeing my former state of residence (Illinois) going down the tubes fast.

[DigitalWarrior]

I don't know that I would call it a line in the sand, but...

"L"ibertarians have pissed me off with countless coffee house arguments about who is more ideologically pure.  I saw a practical movement with people who were committed to taking the concrete action of moving to a real place (in America) to work for more, not perfect, freedom.  I saw the ability to take an incremental approach to taking back our freedom.  I saw the ability for people to influence politicians and get elected.

Here I am, still missing my friends after three years, spending two hours a day in the car, slapping mosquitoes or shoveling snow, and having coffee house arguments about freedom.  But I can also make more decisions about my own life than I can anywhere else, to the best of my knowledge.  It has been worth it.

[FreelanceFreedomFighter]

This:

Ditto... That was basically the last straw... I had gone from objectivist to libertarian to minarchist before
then... that was when I ran out of excuses...

[geoff]

I was in the military, got out and let my wife move us to NJ.  Then I wanted an air rifle, and found out that for any gun, air rifle, or even slingshot, or to buy ammo for any of those you have to go through a 3 month waiting period/backround check to get licensed.  And it just so happens that guns are my "pet" issue.  That was my reason for joining.

[violence]

[Kat Kanning]

Did you see Waco, Rules of Engagement?  I watched it in the theater in Berkeley and people were booing and screaming at Janet Reno by the end of the movie.