Joel Kurtinitis is a columnist for the Des Moines Register, contributing editor for The Liberty Conservative, and operations director for the US Federalist Party.
Joel was a Regional Director for Ron Paul 2012 and served on the State Central Committee of the Republican Party of Iowa. He co-founded Liberty Iowa in the wake of the Paul campaign, and organized the Free DC Project during the government shutdown of 2013.
When not busy setting the virtual world aflame with controversy, Joel is actually an okay guy who enjoys reading, cooking, chess, bluegrass music, and an occasional foray into fiction writing. Joel and his family live in Des Moines, IA.
Watching the mainstream press try to interview University of Toronto Professor Jordan Peterson, one thing becomes exceedingly clear: they literally can’t even. While the above expression makes my inner grammar Nazi cry, it is possibly the best description of the predictable sequence of befuddled expressions, desperate strawmen, and whiffed shots fired at Peterson from a growing list of
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In the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election, much was made of the threat of ISIS. Wild threats abounded as candidates fought each other over who would come down harder on the then-thriving Islamic State. Sen. Ted Cruz threatened to “carpet bomb (ISIS) into oblivion.” Now-President Donald Trump promised to “bomb the (expletive) out of
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West Lafayette, IN – It’s not often that a topic as well-worn as abortion finds a new angle, but last week saw one Purdue professor take the pro-abortion argument in a strange new direction. During a public debate at Purdue University, Dr. David Sanders, associate professor of biology at Purdue, was in the middle of
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CLICK HERE to watch the debate starting at 7 pm Eastern. West Lafayette, IN – Today, as Israel marks another Holocaust Remembrance Day, Purdue University’s Forney Hall will host a debate on what many consider to be a modern holocaust – abortion. Seth Drayer, Director of Training for the pro-life group Created Equal, will
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Political ideologies are like gas prices – everybody has an idea of what they should be, but in reality they are constantly moving to reflect the priorities of the surrounding marketplace. In today’s hyperpartisan culture, trying to pinpoint someone’s ideological niche seems of utmost importance. Most folks act like their property value depends on whether
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Pro-lifers are perhaps more accustomed to disappointment than any other reliably Republican constituency. For years, the needle has stayed static on abortion regardless of which side holds power – the Bush administration managed no more significant limitations on abortion than did Obama. Given the inability of federal legislators to move the ball on abortion, many
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I made it through the entire 2016 electoral cycle without writing a single article on race. I wrote nothing on Trayvon and Zimmerman, Ferguson, Baltimore, Black Lives Matter, or the KKK celebrating Trump’s election. I managed to avoid being targeted online by either BLM racists or alt-right “race realists” as I tried to navigate the
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Nick Somberg, representing attorney for Taylor Trupiano – the Michigan man recently ticketed for warming up his car in his own driveway – isn’t mincing words when it comes to his feelings about the case. In a statement to The Liberty Conservative, Somberg said he feels it is his duty to take the case –
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Among the many time-honored structures left in ruins by the 2016 presidential process, perhaps nothing has suffered more than our comfortable set of political labels. Terms like “conservative”, “progressive”, “liberal”, “libertarian”, and even “classic liberal” (courtesy, Speaker Paul Ryan) have been growing dull for years, but this year seems to have become so useless that
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I am privileged. Despite growing up in a poor family in one of the most impoverished counties in rural North Florida, in a century-old farmhouse with no air conditioning and a woodburning stove that we all had to huddle around in the winter. Despite the fact that after high school I worked construction for $11 an hour
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When NPR hit me up earlier today asking about Cruz’s endorsement of Trump, I was asked to give an opinion before I even knew for certain it was happening. I was hoping that Ted would hold out, and give #NeverTrump the public face it needed to continue to effectively project between now and November. Needless
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Something sorely lacking in the Trump/#NeverTrump debate is, well, debate. Most people only sally out briefly on social media to make their case, before quickly retreating back to their support group – and that doesn’t help anyone sort out the truth of the matter. But as the specter of Hillary rises over the nearing November
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“We don’t win anymore.” If there’s one overwhelmingly applicable truth that conservatarians can glean from the deranged ramblings of Herr Trump, it’s the one his campaign has helped reinforce this cycle at the expense of the constitutional right: we don’t win anymore. Conservatives have become the Cleveland Browns of American politics. Sure, on a good year we
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One of the most impeachable derelictions of the modern libertarian movement is its blatant disregard of – or support for – government attacks on religious liberty. The Gary Johnson complex, as I’ve come to call it, is not grounded in any libertarian ideology – a fact that fellow candidate Austin Petersen ripped the proverbial fig
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By now Brexit has been analyzed from approximately every point of view, by everyone who wants to make a point with it; but amid the fear and festivity, one of the simplest points seems to have been overlooked. At its core, the choice of the British people was between union and autonomy, with experience informing both
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Anyone who has argued with a teenager knows that facts can evaporate and definitions can become fluid with enough motivation. Such immaturity and posturing is to be expected from a child. We don’t expect the same sort of reasoning from adults, let alone federal judges. Maybe it’s time we start. In a 7-4 vote, the
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On June 6th, 1944, thousands of Allied soldiers stormed the beaches of Normandy and began what we know as the liberation of Nazi-occupied Europe. One the eve of D-Day, as those soldiers, sailors, and airmen prepared to take part in the largest amphibious invasion in military history – an operation that would see thousands of
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Late in the autumn of 1943, German fighter general Adolf Galland headed to the opulent estate of Luftwaffe Reichsmarschall and Hitler’s second-in-command, Hermann Göring. Galland, a decorated combat ace, had seen extensive action on the western front, and by this point in the war, he could see that the odds were turning against the Third
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Dear Austin, As a Libertarian Presidential Candidate, I know you’re busy with a lot of interviews and meetings with conservative media and voters looking for a way out of the coming Trump/Hillary nightmare, but I wanted to take the opportunity to reach out to you and try to iron out some of the wrinkles in
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This article is the first in a three-part series titled “Conservatives Under Siege”. Subscribe to Liberty Conservatives Magazine or follow Joel on Facebook or Twitter to be notified of subsequent articles. From the explosion of outrage and hyperbole that violated my social media newsfeeds in the last two days, I gather that gender-confused individuals are now
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Idaho Representative and Freedom Caucus leader Raul Labrador has endorsed Senator Ted Cruz for President, National Review reported yesterday. Labrador joins fellow Freedom Caucus members Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS) and Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC), who previously indicated support for the Senator from Texas. Labrador, long viewed as an ally of the Liberty Movement, earned support from
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Iowa was the final act for a number of presidential candidates, including liberty candidate Sen. Rand Paul – but the reason Paul dropped might come as a shock to many. Though the Rand campaign made many overtures to his father’s base in the final months, Rand Paul did not carry the Iowa libertarian vote. Among
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Much of the libertarian interest in next week’s Iowa Caucuses is focused on Rand Paul – and rightfully so. Since his apparent decision to drop the middle-of-the-road rhetoric and go full libertarian early this year in the face of declining money and support, many of his father’s sidelined activists have taken renewed interest in his
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As we approach tonight’s Republican debate, sure to be a spectacle similar to the last three awkward attempts to manage the political equivalent of a starting football lineup, it’s worth mentioning that debates don’t have to be this way. Late last week Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal challenged Senator Ted Cruz to debate Obamacare mano y
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It turns out the death of the Liberty Movement has been greatly exaggerated. At the first sign of some sputtering from the presidential campaign of “libertarian-ish” Sen. Rand Paul, critics and pundits gleefully took to the web to declare the so-called “libertarian moment” over. But those seeking evidence of the continued relevance of America’s youngest
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As the series of shocking videos released by the Center for Medical Progress continues to land body blows on Planned Parenthood, fewer and fewer abortion advocates can be found to defend them. They are even slowly disappearing from the typically safe comments sections of traditionally left-leaning sources like Slate and my state’s resident MSM outlet,
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Last week I had the chance to interview Senator Ted Cruz backstage after his “Believe Again” event at Drake University in Des Moines. Considering Cruz’s reputation as an avid gamer, I decided to spice things up by challenging him to a chess match during the interview – doing my best to keep the former Princeton debate
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Most of the recent discussion surrounding Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) has focused on the overwhelming distrust of the President from, well, pretty much everyone. Many fear that the President plans to use trade agreement back-doors to compromise US sovereignty and ram through environmental and immigration policies that would not have a chance of making it
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The Far Left and the Far Right finally have something to agree on: opposition to the package of legislative endeavors leading up to what has been dubbed “Obamatrade”. The issue has given rise to the most bizarre coalitions, with Senators Rand Paul and Mike Lee joining Harry Reid and Elizabeth Warren in opposing the deal,
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The other night as my wife Kelsey and I were getting ready for bed, we were talking about the 2016 presidential race and discussing how things would shape up for the first-in-the-nation caucus state – our home state – of Iowa. We had both heard that Ted Cruz was set to announce his candidacy at
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Nobody thought that former US Representative Ron Paul would show up in Iowa this week to stump with his son, Kentucky Senator and likely 2016 presidential candidate Rand Paul; but when Rand took the stage to deliver the keynote at an “Audit the Fed” rally hosted by Liberty Iowa, there was a whole lot of
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Nearly two weeks ago, just prior to his appearance at Steve King’s Iowa Freedom Summit, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz carved out some time to meet with leading liberty activists from around Iowa. The low-key meeting, held in Des Moines, was many activists’ first time to meet the libertarian-leaning Tea Party firebrand. It was also Cruz’s
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Tea Party champion and conservative firebrand Ted Cruz may be ready to embrace his libertarian side – and he may need to, if he hopes to find a path from Iowa to the White House. As it turns out, the death of the Liberty Movement in Iowa may have been greatly exaggerated. While an establishment
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Torture. Just hearing that word is enough to give one pause. It’s a bit of a superlative for pain – a word reserved for those times when “hurt”, “suffering,” and “agony” just don’t cover it. The word carries with it images of gory slasher films and whispered stories from Soviet gulags. It’s a vestige of
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A couple weeks ago, President Obama announced that he would disregard the Constitutional process and grant executive amnesty to over five million illegal immigrants living in the states, surprising exactly no one. Equally predictable was the conservative uproar, and the ensuing accusations of racism from the Left. Much of the conservative reaction rightly centered on
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Dear Oatmeal, As I was scrolling through my social media news feed yesterday, I couldn’t help but notice a letter you wrote to Texas Senator Ted Cruz. Your letter, in response to Mr. Cruz referring to Net Neutrality as “Obamacare for the Internet”, portended to explain to the Senator just how Net Neutrality works. I am not Ted Cruz, but
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Invincibility lies in the defense; the possibility of victory in the attack. – Sun Tzu Last week, Kentucky Senator and likely presidential candidate Rand Paul got in a highly-publicized spat with Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council over the Senator’s answer to a question on abortion and contraceptives. Paul – a medical
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The Middle East is in flames again, and for once, Liberty people seem unsure what to think about it. For years our only rallying cry was “no more nation-building – bring the troops home!” And for a while, that was enough. Our foreign policy ideals were so diametrically opposed to those in play for the
More“The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer.” As a young man growing up in a conservative home in the ‘90s, I must have heard this cliché thrown around by liberals a thousand times. I really never gave it much thought. Even though my family often toed the poverty line, we worked hard to
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Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions; but those who kindly reprove thy faults. – Socrates Last week I wrote an open letter to social conservatives, in the interest of broadening communication between two groups that both have a vital interest in stopping the socialist slide engineered by people who benefit
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“In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.” – St. Augustine Dear Social Conservatives, I hesitate to address you by that name in a political sense, because being socially conservative isn’t really a theory of government, it’s a theory of culture. One could be socially conservative in a totally stateless environment. That’s why
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Independence Day has always been one of my favorite holidays. In fact, if Thanksgiving didn’t land squarely on the intersection of food, football, hunting, colorful leaves, hoodies, and cool weather, the 4th of July would be the undisputed champion of my holiday list. Independence Day is one of only a couple holidays that hasn’t yet
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Since the Branstad-led moderate takeover of the Iowa GOP in April of this year, social conservatives have found themselves pushed into the same corner of the room as the Liberty Movement – unwanted by the very party whose base they form. Several social conservative and tea party groups worked together with my organization, Liberty Iowa,
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