Welcome to New Things in 2023

On conventioning and being unconventional

Hello, liberty lovers of Riverside County!

You’re receiving this on the Riverside County Libertarian Party’s brand-new substack! We had been using Mailchimp for our Liberty Letters, but over the course of the past year they started making disturbingly censorious noises (via an oh-so-ominous-but-sadly-common “terms of service update”), so we went looking for an alternative dedicated to free speech. Substack is a newsletter engine that bakes the freedom right in, and is the new home of voices like Bari Weiss, Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, Glenn Greenwald, and many more who have abandoned platforms that knuckle under to authoritarians (including, as it happens, Edward Snowden). It’s a great place to plant our own liberty flag, so this and future communications from the LPRC will be coming to you via Substack. 

A few housekeeping notes regarding substack functionality:

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• Substack also has a reader app, if you’re into that sort of thing. 

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In County Party news, the annual convention of the LPRC was held on 14 January. At convention a new Executive Committee was elected. Meet the officers for 2023, in their own words: 

Chair: Loren Dean

I grew up in Riverside (Graduated from North High class of ‘89), and have always called it my hometown. Nevertheless, I spent 15 years working out of state, mostly in Oklahoma, where I discovered the Libertarian party around 2013 and realized it fit my own general contrariness quite nicely. I returned to the land of my people, my beloved Inland Empire, in late 2019 to remarry and start a new chapter of my life, only to watch in astonished disappointment as California crashed into lockdown hysteria. I was ready to get active for freedom, so I have done so, and plan to keep going until they throw me in a camp. 

Vice-Chair: Matt Gunnell

I’ve been a homeowner in Riverside County since 2012 and a small-L libertarian since at least 2008. I’ve had a wide variety of identifiers in my life including husband, father, grandfather, artist, musician, cop, soldier, non-profit organization builder, mountain biker, motorcyclist, and scout. A few I’ve moved past. I consider myself a constitutionalish liberty maximalist finally convinced that the Libertarian Party is a valid vehicle for both spreading the IDEAS of liberty as well as working at the local level to bring Libertarians more fully into the conversation.

Vice-Chair: Tara Young

I have been an active member of the Libertarian Party for the last 4 years, and spent the last 2 as the Southern Area Coordinator for the LPCA. The next season for me will be giving more time focusing locally within the City of Norco, where I was recently appointed to the Planning Commission. In my free time, I love to travel and enjoy making memories with my homeschooled daughter. I also have a small farm,Taveli Ranch, where I raise poultry for eggs, grow produce, and roast coffee for sale at the local farmers market. 

Treasurer: Joshua Clark

I grew up in Riverside and graduated from Jurupa Valley High School. I’ve been philosophically Libertarian since around 2005 when a friend gave me a copy of “The Uncle Eric Series” by Richard Maybury. I started reading a lot more libertarian oriented literature, and was a big supporter of Ron Paul in 2008, and 2012, moved back to the Riverside area in 2019, and decided to get involved with the local party in 2021. I have been RCLP Treasurer since 2022. 

Secretary: Wendy Hewitt

I have been very active with the Libertarian Party for the past 6+ years. I have been on the State Executive committee and also have been on the Riverside County Libertarian Party Executive Committee a few years ago. I am currently the Mayor Pro Tem for the City of Calimesa.

Calendar Notes

(events can always be found at the county party website: rclp.us) 

February 17-19: LPCA state convention. This is where the state officers get elected and statewide business gets conducted (and everybody has a libertarian good time, with guest speakers and a party and the whole shebang). This year it will be held in Sacramento. Check out ca.lp.org/convention for details. 

Closing Thoughts from The Chair

"Men hate each other because they fear each other. They fear each other because they don't know each other, and they don't know each other because they don't communicate with each other, and they don't communicate with each other because they are separated from each other." -MLK

This year, stop being separated from your community. Find something going on with a mission you can support, and join it. If that's a city government committee, great! If that's a local homeschool advocacy crew, great! If it’s your local Friends of the Library, great! Just join it and help it, and help the other members of that group understand where you stand on the importance of freedom. The principles of individual liberty are, frankly, hated by many, and they are hated because they are feared, and they are feared because nobody is communicating them in the places where they need to be heard and learned and understood. 

This year, get in there.

-Loren Dean