"Thomas Massie is an M.I.T.-trained engineer, inventor, cattle farmer, libertarian, deficit hawk and skeptic of foreign aid and foreign wars. He is also, in the view of President Trump, a complete and total disaster who should be removed from office as soon as possible. Their falling-out wasn't a foregone conclusion. Mr. Massie votes with his party 91 percent of the time. He shares MAGA's distrust of the administrative state and MAHA's suspicion that federal health and agriculture bureaucracies are too cozy with the industries they regulate."
"And above all, Mr. Massie is against being told what to do and refuses to submit to the final test: unquestioning loyalty to the president. Mr. Trump recently called him disloyal to the United States of America, but what the president really meant was that he wasn't sufficiently loyal to Mr. Trump. His independent streak is what makes him so irritating to his party, and so useful to it."
"A movement that cannot tolerate a Thomas Massie has become exactly what its critics say it is a personality cult with principles grafted on after the fact. On Tax Day, I spent a couple of hours on Capitol Hill with Mr. Massie, and walked away convinced that America needs more Massies in Congress. He is the kind of libertarian-conservative that used to be, if not standard, at least not so unusual in the G.O.P."
"Congressional libertarians have traditionally tried to act as brakes on the machinery of the federal government, slowing its expansion in size and spending, regardless of who is in the Oval Office. Libertarians have correctly identified many of the dangers posed to Americans by the decisions of our government since Sept. 11, 2001 the growth of the surveillance state, endless wars, catastrophic debt and deficits, overreach by the executi"
Thomas Massie is a Kentucky Republican congressman and MIT-trained engineer who combines libertarian skepticism with conservative politics. He votes with his party most of the time and shares MAGA distrust of the administrative state and MAHA suspicion of federal health and agriculture bureaucracies. He opposes foreign aid and foreign wars, is a deficit hawk, and has an independent streak that leads him to resist being told what to do. His conflict with President Trump centers on loyalty to the president rather than loyalty to the country. He is portrayed as a useful irritant because libertarians traditionally act as brakes on federal expansion, spending, surveillance, and executive overreach.
#thomas-massie #libertarian-conservatism #trump-loyalty #federal-government-skepticism #deficit-and-foreign-policy
Read at www.nytimes.com
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