508: Why Does This Libertarian Farmer Want To Be Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania? (w/ Tim McMaster)

Brian Nichols  0:06  
focusing on winning arguments. We're teaching the basic fundamentals of sales and marketing and how we can use them to win in the world of politics teaching you how to meet people where they're at on the issues they care about. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show. There, folks, Brian Nichols here on The Brian Nichols Show and thank you yes, for joining us on of course, another fun filled episode. I am as always, your humble host and today we have a returning guest he ran for PA State Senate back last election cycle this time he's running for lieutenant governor but before we get there want to give a shout out to today's sponsor. Yes, that is the expat money summit 2022 November 7 through November 11, five days and 30 expert speakers, McHale Thorpe from the expat money show he will be hosting that and I promise you if you join it will be a week worth of watching but you will reap the benefits for generations head over to the Brian Nichols show.com forward slash expat and grab your free tickets today. Yes, I mentioned our guests he did run for PA State Senate back last election cycle this election cycle he is running for lieutenant governor the one the only Tim McMaster Welcome back to The Brian Nichols Show.

Tim McMaster  1:22  
It's great to be here. I don't know if I can quite live up to all that hype. But thanks. Thanks very much. Tim,

Brian Nichols  1:27  
welcome back to the program, my friend. It's great to have you on the show. And uh, yeah, you're you're doing a lot of fun exciting things. You're in the world. Yeah, you ran for state senate here back last election. Now you're running for lieutenant governor in

Tim McMaster  1:40  
between, I ran for and won auditor for my local township here and was actually appointed the chair of the audit committee. So it seems like we never we just never stop.

Brian Nichols  1:51  
Now. Shame on me, Tim. Shame on me. I completely forgot that you ran for town. Otter, congratulations. Yes. And you get to be in elected office with the big ailments. Your

Tim McMaster  1:59  
name, right. Yeah, it's pretty phenomenal. And here in Pennsylvania, you know, we're, we're pretty blessed through a lot of hard work. And a lot of really smart people. A lot of hard working people. We have, you know, over 200 elected libertarians in office right now in Pennsylvania, which is more than the other 49 states combined.

Brian Nichols  2:17  
Wow, that's impressive. And now I will confess, I did just leave the the Keystone State I moved over to become a Hoosier. I'm now over in Indiana. So I let that slide. I think you I appreciate it. And you know, I think the Hoosiers here will let us lie to you. They've embraced me with open arms. But I've seen Yes, Pa has had the chance to really make a strong name for itself in the libertarian circles electorally especially you look at local politics. And let's talk about that, Tim, because when you were last in the show, we mentioned it here a couple of times at the beginning, you were running for State Senate. And we've seen there's been a resurgence, especially in the political discourse to get away from the national conversation. I mean, the national conversation seems to be dictated more towards cultural conversations more than anything, the real, the real, like meat and potatoes of how we have found the most success and bring our ideas to your average person. Beyond that cultural conversation has been through local and state politics. So let's talk about really quickly your attention in really what you've experienced and running for state and local politics, what's been the reception, what's been the feedback? And what have you found had been some of those top of mind issues that voters consistently bring up to you time and again,

Tim McMaster  3:30  
you know, it was great, I again, I don't know how I can follow all that. But it's been great, you know, especially having the local office, being elected to that. It's really good to be out front and center with the local people. And as they say, All politics is local. And I truly believe that because every issue that that we kind of face on the local issue, if you just expand that out, essentially, that's on the state level on the national level as well, with some exceptions, you know, but overall, I mean, people are concerned about the same things, how they're going to feed their kids, you know, are they going to raise their kids properly? How are they going to educate their kids? Are they going to have anything to leave their kids? Is it gonna be all taken from your property taxes or some other kind of government extortion program? Those are really the top of mind things that I've really been focusing on and I've really been talking to the people about is how is how as a libertarian, first a small l libertarian, I can or we can expand their freedom through I apologize, my dog is loose. He's part of the interview. It's no it's fine.

I know he's got me distracted. Hang on a second. Sorry, I had to let the boss know we had to go.

Through small libertarianism, we could really get people to focus on what matters to them, which is the things that they can control, you know, taking responsibility for their own, you know their own money for taking responsibility for how they educate their kids taking responsibility for how they are what they do on their own property. I think that's kind of the core tenants of small L. Libertarianism is that I'm going to do, I'm going to do what I'm going to do here, and it's not going to impact your rights you do what you're going to do over there, so long as it doesn't impact my rights.

Brian Nichols  5:13  
Yep. And let's really quick before we go more into your running for office, let's talk about really quick this this conversation about the reception of the small l, I appreciate you using the small l signification. There, because you do see, there has been a resurgence and an appreciation of this small L. Libertarian ism, that's really, it's been thrust almost into the national conversation by Elon Musk. And this is something I think we're gonna I don't know if we're gonna see the coattail effect immediately. But I would daresay we're gonna see some coattails sometime in the near future, be it people who are inspired now to stand up and speak their values. This is something I've been trying to really talk about when I'm speaking to business owners entrepreneurs is going out and being your authentic self not being afraid of speaking your values and knowing that there are people out there who will appreciate that because they've been afraid of speaking their values behind closed doors themselves. But then you go to the other side, you do see now there is there is not so much this, um, you know, this fear of retribution, and more so an acceptance of alternative ways of thinking. So do you see this going forward? Do you see this helping us in the big L. Libertarian camps? And we'll say, our pro Liberty friends both on the right and I will say sometimes in the Democratic Party, though, as I talked about, Kenny Cody, in the show, there are fewer and far between. But with that being said, Do you see this helping us when we are talking about that kind of that cultural conversation, moving the pendulum towards our way,

Tim McMaster  6:53  
you know, anytime that you can get the majority of people or what we like to call the old dying parties, if you can get members of the of those parties and members of the general public talking about and thinking about their own liberty, thinking about their their own rights, that's going to be a win, whether it's for small l libertarianism or capital L Libertarian Party, it's going to be a good thing. As long as it's shifting that pendulum more towards more freedom and more liberty. I think that's a good thing. I think, as far as coattails, I don't think we're going to see too much of it this year, depending on how it goes in the Twitterverse. And with Elon, I think, maybe 2024 could see some serious coetail action, I guess. But I don't see that necessarily on a national scale, I think that's going to be far more localized. You're going to have, you know, people like me, who just run for local office. And maybe we'll run for a bigger office. But failing that we'll run for another smaller office, or we'll run for reelection. Or we'll inspire somebody else who's you know, maybe Liberty minded like themselves to run for local office, maybe they run for constable or township supervisors, school board, something like that. That's going to, it's going to put capital L libertarians in front of people more and they're going to see that we're not crazy boots on our head. You know, kind of wackos, although there's a special place in the party, you know, for folks like that. But we're really we're just people that want our kids to be freer than we were. And I can't think of any any simpler way to say that.

Brian Nichols  8:24  
You made me laugh because I am going back to our Friday episode with our good buddy there. Chris Goyzueta. He's a marketing professor and he helps us talk about where we go wrong when we're trying to reach out to our target markets or when are we talking to our target markets? And we talked about the top three ways that libertarians scare away the normies or actually said the Liberty curious, but we see this and you referred to it is unfortunately, yes, the the Bhutan head blow horn in hand, us screaming on the corner type of person that has been too often the the libertarian character, and we have to get past that. And I think that's why I'm so excited. I'm sorry. Oh, no, go ahead. A lot. A lot

Tim McMaster  9:06  
of that is actually what the mainstream is kind of thrusting out there. Like, if you if you actually listen to what and the boots on the head, for those that don't know, is vermin supreme with vermin, actually says makes a lot of sense. You know, when he starts talking about, you know, economic policy and foreign policy of non interventionism, you know, these things make sense. And they are consistent with the small l libertarian and capital L Libertarian Party. The problem is he puts a boot on his head, and that's what the media focuses on.

Brian Nichols  9:36  
Well. Can you blame them? No, I think that's

Tim McMaster  9:40  
the point. I'm just saying like we're kind of, we're giving them the ammunition to bludgeon us with

Brian Nichols  9:46  
Yeah, yeah. And that's why that's why we've talked about sales and marketing here. Right. Like that's, that's where I think we've we've gotten wrong like yes, we there's two different rules there is there is the the court jester rule Right, the the poking fun and drawing light to the disaster that is our federal government and, and what it has done to people and vermin plays that role well, but when people are looking to cast their vote, they're not looking to vote the jester in command of the castle, right, they're looking to make sure that they can vote for somebody that they can trust actually presents solutions to the problems they see. And candidly, that's why I like having folks like you on the show, because you be you give us the chance to get away from the characterization that the media has presented instead of instead, it gives us a platform to present real libertarians who are running for real elected office and local positions, and then the real solutions that you're bringing to those individuals. And I mean, we've had you in the show, right? You talked about this from the state run back last time. Right now you're in the role of auditor, so I'd love to hear more about that. And then now you're running for lieutenant governor. So Tim, let's very quickly as the role of auditor what is the direct impact of having a big L libertarian in that seat on the voters? Number one? And then number two, what's been the feedback from those voters?

Tim McMaster  11:12  
So the biggest impact is that as the capital L libertarian on the audit committee is every time that my township wants to spend a dime, I'm the guy who's right there, you know, waving the budget say this has not necessarily been approved. This has not necessarily been debated. The voters haven't had a chance to you know, approve this and you guys need to justify that and I think my camera just died. Sorry. That's okay. Sorry about that. The audience got a nice view of me drinking from my, my Brian Nichols show thermos, which you can get your Brian Nichols show sticker over at Brian Nichols show.com,

Brian Nichols  11:48  
forward slash shop. Tim continuing.

Tim McMaster  11:51  
Okay, sorry about that. Technical difficulties over here. So yeah, so you know, having the capital well libertarian in the auditor position, that's, that's really exactly the position, you want a libertarian and because I'm, I'm enforcing the township supervisors to justify every single cent that they spend every single cent that they try to tax, every single cent that comes through on any budget, I'm the guy who says you need to justify this. So they don't really like me all that much in that role, which is good. I'm not there to make friends. You know, I'm there to try and do some good and kind of walga township here. And so far, the the reaction from the voters has been phenomenal. Like they, you know, they will stop me on this, but like, we were doing signature collections on primary day last week. And a lot of them recognize me from the township supervisor meetings. And, you know, they're, they want to shake my hand, they're like, thank you. Finally, somebody is saying, you know, to these people stop spending all of our damn money, you know, somebody is making them actually justify it, and whether or not they actually change their behavior. At this point, it's kind of irrelevant, because it's got the entirety of my locality, talking about how they're spending their money. They're thinking about how these three people on the board of supervisors are spending their tax money, how they're increasing their tax bill, and how they're not getting any services back for it. So it's definitely been an overall net positive. And we're not even, you know, six months into the position. So

Brian Nichols  13:17  
that's what you'd like to hear. And it means that materials are making a difference.

Tim McMaster  13:20  
Yeah. And you know, when they find out I'm a libertarian, they're like, huh, I Okay, I will look into that more do and there. Now we've got one more, you know, checking the Liberty curious box. And once we get them there, I mean, they start seeing what we're all about nine times out of 10. We've got a new libertarian,

Brian Nichols  13:37  
not see, folks, what Tim did there was he's utilizing some of the techniques that we talked about. Over at The Brian Nichols Show is Morning Sales huddle, which if you have not had the chance yet, by the way, head over to the Brian Nichols show.com forward slash, no, yeah, forward slash selling Liberty ebook. There we go. And you can sign up for our morning, our morning sales huddle, as well as get your free copy of four easy steps you can implement now to help sell liberty to friends and family, I will include that link in the show notes as well is in the description here on YouTube for our YouTube watcher. And by the way, if you folks who are listening, have had a chance to read four easy steps. Please do me a favor. Go ahead. And in the comments here on Youtube. Tell me what your takeaways have been? Or email me, Brian at Brian Nichols. show.com. I'd love to hear that as well. But no, Tim, let's let's talk about now taking these ideas away from the local perspective. And now let's bring them to the state perspective. Right now. We know the state is not necessarily the end all be all, we will always want to go back more towards the locality. But there is a role for us to play, you know, politics at the state level. What are you seeing as right now the libertarian role in state politics? What are some of those top of mind issues that you want to make sure you're addressing?

Tim McMaster  14:53  
So the biggest thing that we want to address is our the tax rate here in Pennsylvania, you know, our sales tax rate keeps going up. property tax rates keep going up, and we're not getting any more services for it. The only thing that's happening is the legislature in Harrisburg is voting themselves pay raises, you know, and that's, I can't think of another word for it. But that's just pure evil. You know, they keep taking money from what they consider the tax cattle, US citizens, the voters, and to vote themselves a raise, while the value of the dollar is in the toilet. There's food shortages or supply chain problems. But you know, these, call them what they are scumbags in Harrisburg and the General Assembly and the executive are voting themselves new, you know, brand new raises, you know, meanwhile, they're the fourth highest legislature, fourth highest paid legislature in the country. It's ridiculous. So one of the big things that Matt, Hackenberg who's the Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania is candidate for governor and myself. And one thing that we're really focusing on is we want to get the tax rate as low as we possibly can. And to do that we have to stop the spending in Harrisburg. And one of the first things that we're going to do is we're going to enact a policy that every legislator in Harrisburg takes an immediate 50% pay cut across the board period, they want 50% of your pay. Now, don't think a lot of friends, or well, good, I'm not there to make friends like it, or we go back to being a part time legislature. Because I mean, really, they're out of session now. And they will be back in session till after the fourth of July. But their paychecks are going to still keep coming. You know, and I believe that there is a place for the legislators to go back into their home districts and meet with the people and talk to the people. But there's no reason they should be getting paid constantly for that. You know, there's plenty of other states that enact Texas, Vermont, I believe, have part time legislatures, and they do just fine. Their legislators come in a couple of months, a couple of months a year, they get done all the everything that they need to get done. They think back to they live under the laws that they've just passed, so that they actually know what they're doing. They're actually still in their communities, meeting their people. And that doesn't happen in Pennsylvania, if you see a Pennsylvania state legislator, either from the general or either from the Senate or the House of Representatives, they're generally somewhere getting a photo op or getting a check. And that's that's just not something that I can imbibe. You know, and one of the cool things about lieutenant governor is one of their chief positions is to be the president of the State Senate, which means I could technically be the boss of the guy that beat me for the last job I ran for, which will be awesome. He doesn't like me too much either. largely the same reasons.

Brian Nichols  17:30  
Well, you know, I, I used to see a lot in Philadelphia, we'd see election season. And whenever you'd walk into the shop right over I when I lived in West Philadelphia, there, if it's election season, there was always a candidate of some sorts, standing outside with their, you know, the brochures and stuff, and you're just handing out stuff. And it struck me funny that they're always there. And election season, but they're never there afterwards saying how am I doing? If they're like, they're never there afterwards, saying, talk to me about your issues. Now they'll they'll be in DC or they'll be in Harrisburg, but they won't come back to this shop, right and stand in this parking lot. It's a parking lot. And see the mom who's pushing the card out with tears in her eyes, knowing that it's getting harder trying to make her paycheck, put the food in the cart to bring it home to her family. They don't get to see that they can read about it in on Facebook, and they can watch it in the YouTube channel. But they don't really see it up close and personal unless, of course, Tim, they're asking for your vote.

Tim McMaster  18:37  
Exactly. You know. And that's one thing that I've always said, as I said, like, don't, you know, if you want to vote for me, that's great. But here's, here's the things that I have done. Here's the things that I want to do. And for the love of God hold my feet to the fire on it. If I say I'm going to do something, and you see me not actively trying to get that done or not actually getting that done. Call me out on it. All right. I you know, I'm an IT guy in my day job. But I also want to go for him here. So the only way that I learn is if somebody tells me if I'm doing something wrong, you got to tell me, you know, and that's one thing that I'd never see what these politicians is they never come back and say, you know, Hey, how are we doing? Like you just said,

Brian Nichols  19:14  
Yep. All right, Tim, this is the probably the most important question I'm asked today. You're running for lieutenant governor. What the hell does Lieutenant Governor do?

Tim McMaster  19:24  
So the biggest thing is that the lieutenant governor does, as I said earlier, is now the president of the State Senate. So basically, they call they call the Senate the to order. They recognize the speakers, though, you call for the bills to be advanced or anything they don't really have any powers was largely like the chair of a party. They just kind of organize the meetings and stuff. But they do have a certain degree of, we'll say a bully pulpit in there, which is what I would use to tell them like, Hey, you're taking a pay cut. The other thing that the lieutenant governor does, they're the chair of the pardons board. And one of my one of my other passion projects is to see a full restoration Have riots and pardons for anyone who has been convicted of a nonfat non violent drug charge. Because there's so many drugs now that are, they're either illegal or they're available with a prescription or this, there's, there's no reason that these things should be illegal and ruining someone's Lives for, say, a plant. So I would really push to have like everybody's records expunged, you know, full pardons and full rights, restoration. And apart from those two things, the other real thing that the lieutenant governor is supposed to do is go out and make speeches. I think I'm okay with that. But it seems like a waste. So you know, what I'd like to do is I'd like to, you know, take that time where I'm supposed to be out, giving speeches and stuff, and I'd like to have town halls with people and let them talk to me, you know, not me talk to them, like a traditional speech, but do like what they used to call a listening tour, you know, where you go and say, Hey, how's everybody doing? You know, talk to me, what, what's on your mind? What's bothering you? What can we do better? What are we doing good? I mean, how it's possible, they could be doing something good. In a general assembly, unlikely, but it's possible. You know, they they say your chances of being eaten by a shark on a subway are never quite at zero. So there's always a possibility, you know, so there's always a possibility the General Assembly is actually doing something good. Yeah, so that's, that's really it. And, you know, and backing up the governor and what the governor would stand for and with Matt hat, Hackenberg, excuse me. You know, I really believe in Matt's message, which is largely similar to mine, Matt being a veteran is he's definitely in support of an organization called defender guard, Pennsylvania, which seeks to retract the deployment of the Pennsylvania National Guard short of a declaration of war. So that the National Guard the PA National Guard can actually stay in Pennsylvania, where they're supposed to be where they were originally designed to be, so that they can focus on if there's localized flooding or any kind of natural disasters or first any kind of emergency versus where where are they now? Tim? Pa National Guard now, I believe is mostly deployed at an undisclosed location, which I believe has a lot of sand.

Brian Nichols  22:06  
So not so not not too much, Pennsylvania. Okay. Not that not not not in the plateaus. Okay, guys, love the

Tim McMaster  22:13  
contiguous 48

Brian Nichols  22:14  
Well, I think we're seeing right now and we've had a couple of guests here talking about defending the garden so this this for past members of your the audience, they're familiar that conversation for old, or for rather new members of the audience, please go back and listen to those episodes. But no, this, this is definitely something I think we're gonna see right now moving forward, like you're, you're not gonna see a takeover of libertarian ideals immediately, right. And it never comes all at once. But it's gonna take a little bit of time, it's how to eat the elephant one bite at a time. And we're seeing the chink in the armor. And this has become apparent after COVID You can't it's just like in Star Wars where Princess Leia is talking to Tarkin and she says, the tighter you squeeze your your fists Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers that is by nature, the way that freedom works. And this go actually it quite literally freedom is science. That's where the freedom is science line comes from over The Brian Nichols Show shop over I'm proud libertarian, Dr. Adrienne bidjan talks about this with constructible law and that anything in life and anything in nature, it will do so in a way that will be the easiest way to get to whatever path is going towards. So freedom in its very essence is nature. It is science, it is the the basic operating procedure for every living nonliving just existing thing out there. And anything that we tried to do opposite to it, it will always find a way back. So we're seeing this right now a reversion almost to that freedom, liberty mean, and it's exciting because I think more people are starting to get into that conversation. They're starting to have the conversation who typically were maybe sitting on the sidelines or not even in tune with what was happening. They were just kind of, you know, they were out there with a little drones doing their own little thing. And then all sudden, one day they took off the hat and now all sudden they're open up to a brand new world. So Tim, if they are open to a brand new world, they just happen to live in the Keystone State. They're over in Pennsylvania on former states for just about seven years or so. And they want to go ahead and get involved and support your candidacy for lieutenant governor. What can they do to go ahead and support you? And is there any way they can go ahead and financially support you as well as you pursue your endeavor to be Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania?

Tim McMaster  24:30  
Thanks for that, Brian. So the easiest way is Tim the number for pa.com And that's the website that's where you can find all of our information contact information where we're going to be awesome media appearances like this. But you can also go to Tim for pa.com/donate If you'd like to throw a couple of bucks at us we're not funded by the mega corporations like the old dying parties are you know, they say what's what's the difference between donating to a Democratic Republican and donating to a libertarian If you donate to a Democratic Republican, you expect a favor. If you donate to a libertarian, you expect results. And that's what we're about results. So you know, $1 with us is equivalent to $1,000 with them, you know, we make every dollar count. So Tim for pa.com/donate You can also go if you'd like Liberty branded merch, Tim for pa.com/shop. We have t shirts, hats, we're getting some etched glass, bumper stickers, yard signs, all that stuff is going to be there. But the big takeaway is Tim for pa.com, or if you're on the Twitter, it's Tim for PA, I guess at Tim for PA and on the Facebook. It's McMaster Lt. Gov 2022.

Brian Nichols  25:43  
Perfect. And what we'll do, Tim will make it easier for everybody. We'll include all of this in the show notes, but we'll do folks click your podcast catcher. artwork there for The Brian Nichols Show, it will bring you the Brian Nichols show.com where today's episode can be found, along with all of the social media links all the bio and by the way, the entire transcript of today's episode. Oh, plus all 500 Plus episodes of The Brian Nichols Show available for your listening and viewing pleasure. But that being said, Folks, thank you for joining us on the episode Tim final thoughts or words of wisdom for the audience as

Tim McMaster  26:15  
we wrap things up today on Monday? The biggest thing we have now is it was eight words and they're all to two letter words that was given me if it is to be it is to be us. So we need to focus on us and hashtag make Pennsylvania free again.

Brian Nichols  26:28  
Please, yes, we don't need more folks like me leaving PA We need more folks making pa free so please do that. Indeed. Folks, if you enjoyed today's episode, please go ahead and give it a share. And when you do go ahead and give yours truly a shout at be Nichols liberty. And by the way, if you enjoy today's episode, well you're gonna love yesterday's episode. We're actually over here on YouTube aired today because I wasn't allowed to put my clip I had about the office. So that became they got copyright. Struck by by NBC. Can you believe that? Tim?

Tim McMaster  27:00  
I couldn't believe it. I didn't believe that. Actually, I wasn't even using it. Like in a bad way. I

Brian Nichols  27:05  
was using it for comedic purposes. So I guess that's a podcast exclusive. But if you if you want to go ahead and check out our awesome conversation with the professor Chris Goyzueta. About the top three things that libertarians do to scare away the Liberty curious. Well, it's gonna be right here. Hit my microphone right here. There we go below me in here on YouTube. But otherwise, folks, thank you for joining us on today's episode of The Brian Nichols Show. With that being said, it's Brian go signing off for Tim and McMaster. He's running for lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania. We'll see you tomorrow,

Unknown Speaker  27:35  
listening to The Brian Nichols Show. Find more episodes at the Brian Nichols show.com

Transcribed by https://otter.ai