05/26/09 – Jeff Frazee – The Scott Horton Show

For Antiwar.com, I'm Scott Horton.
This is Antiwar Radio.
And our next guest on the show today is Jeff Brazy, who I first met back in, oh, I guess 2004 at some sort of libertarian party function way the hell out somewhere.
How are you doing, Jeff?
Welcome to the show.
Good, Scott.
Good to be with you.
Yeah, it's been quite a while that we've been friends.
I guess it was back in the day, 2004.
Yeah, you were a young kid then.
I guess not so much anymore.
Although, I guess, I'm not saying you're old.
You're still young enough to be the, what exactly is your title?
President or leader somehow of the Young Americans for Liberty.
Yeah, that's right.
Executive Director of Young Americans for Liberty.
Ah, Executive Director.
That's a good one.
Tell us about this.
Yeah.
What is the Young Americans for Liberty?
Well, we were born out of the Ron Paul campaign.
I was Congressman Paul's national youth coordinator for the presidential campaign.
And we started over 500 students for Ron Paul chapters on high school and college campuses in all 50 states and recruited over 26,000 students to the campaign.
And there's just a large youth following for the constitution and Dr.
Paul's message.
And so when the campaign wound down, you know, we wanted to make sure that these ideas carried on amongst young people.
And so I helped start Young Americans for Liberty to continue the students for Ron Paul effort.
And that's where we are.
We're on our feet now.
We've been raising some money and starting college groups.
And right now we're just trying to build our base.
And when it comes campaign cycle, we're going to get as many students involved either as a candidate or in campaigns as possible for candidates that hold our ideas.
Right on.
Now tell me this.
How different is the Young Americans for Liberty from Young Americans for Freedom?
I don't know if that's still around, but that was kind of the movement that birthed a lot of the neocon influence inside the American right.
Well, yeah, we're kind of built in the same mold in the sense that it's born out of an anti-establishment presidential candidate that really inspired the youth movement.
You know, the Young Americans for Freedom really got its start on the Goldwater campaign.
And then here we are getting our start around the Ron Paul campaign.
So they're similar births.
But I think what sets themselves apart is the principles and the message that we stand upon.
I think if you read the Sharon Statement, which was the founding document of Young Americans for Freedom, there's a lot of good qualities to it.
And it's actually pretty good.
But in terms of the activism and what they did and what they're known for, you're right.
It kind of had a more hawkish stance to it in terms of foreign policy.
And they didn't go fighting for freedom as much as they proclaimed they were supposed to do.
So we're trying to correct some of those wrongs and be a new youth movement that can revive and rally around the Constitution and the principles that the country was founded upon.
And that's what we're trying to do.
Well, you see where the skepticism kicks in.
Because when you put it like that, it's a bit vague.
And it's like you said, the conservatives can sound just like Ron Paul.
But there's a certain large distinction, I think, between somebody like Ron Paul and the typical Republican platform in this country that claims to believe in these principles.
How do you, as executive director and as you run your organization, how do you make sure that the people here are not just a bunch of, you know, they discovered that the government isn't, you know, the be all and end all of everything, say, around last January 21st or 22nd, but really they're just a bunch of warmonger and Republican types?
Right.
Well, there's two things I think kind of set us apart.
And they're in our founding documents, our mission statements, which can be summarized.
And winning on principle is really what we're about.
That's what we want to do.
We want to win in the political process, on the principles we stand for.
And then the question you may ask is, well, what are the principles you stand for?
And they can be found on our website, YALiberty.org.
We have a statement of standing principles that we are founded upon.
Read that document.
It's published in every issue of a Young American Revolution, which is our magazine.
But they're very libertarian, I guess you could say.
They're very, of course, based on the U.S. Constitution and individual liberty and personal responsibility.
And we take pride in that.
We're not going to back down on our issues.
We're going to make sure that we stand firm in these principles.
So I don't think that's going to be an issue down the road where we're going to see ourselves compromised.
Now, that said, our membership is made up of all sorts of different people.
We don't, discriminatory in who we allow to join an organization.
But we do say these are the standing principles that we represent.
And if you want to be associated with these principles, then you know it.
Welcome to the organization.
Right.
And now, you mentioned foreign policy before, and this really is the kicker.
I've got to tell you, I saw a Judge Napolitano show, the Freedom Watch internet show there.
He interviewed a libertarian candidate who was running against a Republican in some special election in 2010 or something, I don't know.
And he says, so what's the difference between you and a conservative that says that he's for limited government and small deficits and all this stuff?
And the guy had no idea.
And the point to me, which was the most glaring omission of all, is the simple, immediate answer.
Peace.
This is not, the libertarian movement is not the Glenn Beck 9-12 movement where we all want to remember what it was like to love the government so much and believe whatever it said and endorse its killing of whoever it wanted.
You know, Ron Paul and the people at LewRockwell.com and AntiWar.com, our reaction to September 11th was, that's horrible, and oh no, what's our government going to do now?
That's what 9-12 means to me, and that's what 9-12 means to libertarians was, oh no, the power of the state unleashed.
And now that the Democrats are in power, right wingers want to pretend that they agree with you.
They want to say, oh yeah, I'm all about limited government like Jeff Frazee.
But if they don't believe in peace, if they don't even comprehend that there's an American empire that needs to be dismantled here in order that they may have limited government here, then they're not libertarian at all.
They're not Paulians at all, are they?
No, you're right.
And that's why we have to do our best to make sure we're reaching out to these people and educating them on what you're saying, and that shows like yours are getting on the air and being heard, because there's an enormous opportunity right now within the right to have a strong revival for peace and a strong revival for limited government in a very principled way, but that's also not just lip service.
It is a carried out, and when we restore power with the Republicans, or whoever it may be, or people who at least preach limited government, that they're held accountable to those principles.
And I'm thinking a lot of what this 9-12 movement is, you're right, it's made up of a whole bunch of different people, but there is a large contingency of libertarians, and there's a large opportunity right now to influence their ideas, particularly in the foreign policy where these people are starting to come around to Dr. Paul's position.
So I think it's important that we don't isolate ourselves and say, look, we're libertarians, we're too good for everybody else, and therefore we can't associate or work with anyone else.
It is important that we are getting involved, and although we may not agree on 100% of the issues, we can still have the debate with them and try our best to recruit them to our side.
Yeah.
Well, and that's important, and you've got to run your organization however you want, but I like that emphasis on internal education and making sure that, you know, if the whole you know, never mind the real Tea Party that we had in December of 07 for the Ron Paul candidacy and all that, but all this AstroTurf, Dick Army, and Newt Gingrich type tea bag movement, if these are the people who end up becoming the Ron Paul Army, then it's going to, or whatever it is, the freedom movement out there or whatever, then, you know, we're in trouble, because it's going to be dragged down by hypocrisy.
I mean, that's the thing.
We have to, you know, it's not a matter of purity.
You can't belong because you're not good enough.
It's a matter of, listen, no warmongers allowed, because this is a peacemongering organization, damn it.
That's a line that we don't compromise on.
We don't debate whether we really believe there's an Islamo-fascist caliphate taking over the world or not in here.
We've already decided here that that's a bunch of crap.
Right, right.
Well, it's important, too, that with this whole Tea Party movement is we make sure that who our leaders are and who's representing us, because you mentioned the names Newt Gingrich, Dick Army, Fox News, again, is a large one as well, are coming in and seeing this opportunity and trying to score on this opportunity.
So we need to make sure that we do separate ourselves from these types, particularly the Newt Gingrich and the Fox News types, and make sure that this movement stays as a grassroots versus the establishment type movement rather than a left versus right type movement is what they're trying to push it toward.
So it's important that we keep our voice involved in this growing movement.
Well, and you know, one of the cool things, too, is it's so easy to just say, hey, read Ron Paul, man, he's great.
If you go back and read, you know, especially his longer speeches, articles, and little sort of mini-books he's written and what have you over the years, this guy will teach you about the principles of liberty just right, man.
Oh, yeah.
What amazes me, you know, he'll go down one day in history, we'll look back and see him as the greatest statesman that ever elected to Congress, because someone who has been very unique for 30 years and so principled in the voting record, I don't know if we've ever had someone like that to represent the Constitution as straightforward as he has for so many years, especially the competing forces that he deals with every day in the Congress.
So I mean, I cannot thank the man enough for the opportunities he's given me personally, but even more importantly, the ability to keep representing the Constitution and being a voice for the American people in the way it should be.
Well, you know, speaking of going down in history and all this and that, I'm not so certain where the libertarian movement in the dawn of the 21st century really fits and how important it is and exactly where this thing is going and its effect on the empire or vice versa and both and those kinds of things.
But certainly whatever history is written about this time, we'll have the Ron Paul's term in Congress and his writings and his presidential run and all the people that were brought into the peace and free markets go together kind of movement that came from that candidacy.
I'm not sure exactly how important it'll be, but certainly that'll be a central part of the story, will be Ron Paul and the people around him's contribution.
Of course, that includes you.
You worked in his office for how many years before you left to do this?
Well, I worked, I guess I interned for his office in the summer of 2005 and then I worked for his presidential campaign.
But you're right, and I hope that history will show that this is a catalyst and not just a spark in history or a flame in history that just disappears.
So it's important that your listeners join organizations like Young Americans for Liberty and Campaign for Liberty, groups that are principled and followed Dr. Paul's message and they do bring together the idea of free markets and peace and it's a no compromise type approach to it.
And I think now is the opportunity to grow with this campaign that showed that not only are there a lot of people out there, but something that's really overlooked quite a bit is Dr. Paul raised $36 million in the course of about 10 months.
And if you learn anything in politics, it's money talks.
And when you can raise $36 million, you have a strong force.
And so there's no need to water down this message.
We need to keep it principled.
We need to keep educating more and more people and outreaching to as many people, especially young people when they're receptive to this new idea.
But get them involved and then once they're educated and understand the issues of Young Americans for Liberty, our goal is to get them involved in the political process.
Because, you know, Congressman Paul is 73 years old and when he decides to eventually retire, you know, who's going to fill his shoes?
And we need people that are well trained and educated and understand how to win in politics and that's what we're all about is training the next generation to follow in Ron Paul's footsteps.
All right.
Well, it's a hell of a tall order and I wish you the very best of luck.
Everybody, Jeff Frazee is the executive director of the Young Americans for Liberty.
They've got 134 chapters at universities all across this country now.
What's the website where they can go and join up, Jeff?
It's YALiberty.org.
YALiberty.org.
Thanks very much for your time on the show, young man, today.
All right.
Thanks a lot, Scott.
I'll talk with you soon.