The Declaration of Independence was an 18th Century libertarian manifesto if there ever was one. Its author was Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson owned slaves. He made the Louisiana Purchase. Effectively stealing land from Native Americans who had owned and occupied it for centuries by giving a small payment to France. He was a man with flaws.
Ron Paul was probably the most libertarian Congressman ever. He is also an advocate of restrictions on immigration even more draconian than the ones we have now. He has flaws.
And Elon Musk is a free-speech "absolutist". Except when it comes to tweeting the location of his personal jet or giving publicity to his erstwhile competitor, Substack. And a big reason he's the wealthiest man in the world is that he is not averse to SpaceX making sweetheart deals with NASA. Nor is he unwilling to accept government subsidies for Tesla and his solar energy companies. Musk is a flawed human being.
We all are.
And we, as libertarians, are not in power in government. So we should be measured in our criticism of those who do wield power and influence when we have substantial areas of agreement.
When Musk bought Twitter he brought in bona fide ACLU thumping, Goldman Sachs is a vampire squid phrase coining, Matt Taibi to write the story of how Twitter had been colluding with the administrative state to outright censor any news (think Hunter laptop) which could lead to Biden losing his bid for the Presidency. Not to mention outright censorship and suppression of any information, true or not, that contradicted the official administration story, under both Trump and Biden, on anything to do with COVID. Censorship at Twitter under Musk is much reduced to the horror of the censors in the White House and their sycophants in traditional media.
It continues in all the rest of the corporate controlled media; Facebook, Google-owned YouTube, Microsoft-owned LinkedIn, the Bezos-owned Washington Post, the New York Times and many more.It's possible that some of these media companies are honestly in favor of limiting their own free speech. But doubtful. It's an absolute certainty that they are all abjectly terrified at the not so subtle threat that if they do not cooperate with government censorship, they will face new regulations that dramatically reduce their profitability.
They fear the fist in the velvet glove.
Elon Musk does not. For that we must give him credit. He's got a lot to lose. Government contracts for SpaceX and the Boring Company. Loss of subsidies for Tesla. The adulation of the chattering class.
For the sake of the Republic, let's hope he retains that fearlessness.