More Reasons to Support Nebraska State Senator Laura Ebke!

Ebke told the Journal Star, “Senators may not be paying enough attention to how to forge consensus and work with people on legislation. Working a bill and trying to find compromise is so important. You can’t just bully your way through on things.”

Three of Ebke’s bills were passed this session, which is a more than respectable total. One, a bill to reform occupational licensing laws in Nebraska, was praised in an editorial in the Wall Street Journal,  which called it a “reform that could be a national model.”.

But the governor is sending mailers against the senator and they are nasty and misleading:

Ricketts is pulling out the stops. In the last few days (at great expense) two sets of highly negative mailers were sent out to residents of Legislative District 32, twisting Ebke’s legislative record to portray her as unprincipled and as a friend of criminals.

The first mailer is an attack on the senator “switching” her party affiliation to Libertarian.  Now a clarification:  The one chamber legislature in Nebraska (called the Unicameral) is nominally non-partisan with open primary for senate seats with the top two going to the November election.  There are three candidates in this district and two of them are registered GOP.

Speaking to News Growl, Ebke cited this event as the issue that riles Ricketts about her the most.

“I suspect that I embarrassed him when I left the GOP,” she said. “After he called us out at the GOP State convention, I left. I don’t think he thought anyone would actually call his bluff. He thought it would just scare us into submission.”

Defying Ricketts and resigning from the Republican Party was an act of enormous political courage for Ebke. With millions of dollars at his disposal, and the organization of an establishment party behind him, Ricketts can focus enormous resources on negative campaigning against Ebke.

And he has.

The second one deals with criminal justice reform:

One mailer shows a shot of a man in a black hoodie holding a picture of Ebke with the words, “Laura Ebke: Siding with Criminals.”

As evidence it cites Ebke’s vote against the death penalty (even though this was about application of the law, not the penalty itself), a criminal justice reform law that reduced the use of mandatory sentences (but did not reduce the possible sentences themselves), and a bill to abolish Nebraska’s ridiculous Marijuana Tax. As marijuana is not legal in Nebraska no one pays tax on it, and yet the state spends money paying for marijuana tax stamps to be produced. The stamps are highly prized by collectors, not by marijuana dealers.

Is Nebraska about to become the Liechtenstein of US states?  Not hardly, the stamps start at $100 but maybe there could be some variations and denominations in the future!

This is really an attack on an independent-minded legislator who would be one of the first legislators elected as a Libertarian (technically the first one with the title “state senator”) and a sign to those wanting to be more independent:  Don’t cross the governor!

So I again encourage my Libertarian friends (I am not a LP member but it is tempting sometimes when bills like the latest spending bill or our Virginia House’s budget are approved by our side) to give money or even go to Nebraska to help Senator Laura Ebke.  This small win could be a rock slide that leads to a tsunami in the fall of liberty-minded victories!

And if she loses, the cause of liberty gets a huge set back.  So give up a 12 pack or couple gallons of CFA’s finest sweet tea for the cause!