Freedom Fest 2009 in Las Vegas was a great outreach event for the Libertarian National Committee. The local Libertarian Party affiliate of Nevada is owed a special debt of gratitude, specifically Nathan Santucci, Debra Dedmon, and Kris McKinster. We received dozens of inquiries and passed out tons of flyers, buttons, and LP bags to attendees who wore our logo proudly during the event. 
The speakers that attended were excellent, I especially enjoyed Michael Shermer the editor of Skeptic magazine and Peter Schiff, Ron Paul’s former economic advisor and market guru. Speaking of Schiff, he and his brother Andrew were kind enough to attend a social engagement I arranged at my suite at Bally’s. We got to chat a bit about his potential Senate run against Chris Dodd in Connecticut and what he thought his chances were. I was glad to hear he would be funding his own campaign as long as there was enough support up front from his followers. I hope people step up and give him a hand to take on Dodd, and if for some reason he doesn’t win the Republican primary, that he run as a Libertarian.
Pictured: Kris McKinster -Vice Chair LP Nevada, Nathan Santucci – Chair Clark County LP
Nathan Santucci, the technical director for Penn and Tellers show in Vegas and Chair of the Clark County LP managed to get Bill Redpath and I in to see their show. We were lucky and got seating in the VIP section that evening because of our friend. Chairman Redpath got to shake hands with the liberty minded comedy duo after the performance. Penn Jillette was very excited to meet Bill and gave him a warm handshake after he was introduced as the Chair of the Party.
Pictured: Penn Jillette and Bill Redpath
Pictured: LP Intern, Raymond Teller
Freedom Fest is a great place for the Libertarian Party to be doing outreach because there were lots of like-minded people who share our viewpoints, but haven’t joined the party yet. If we have the chance next year to get a booth and do more outreach it would definitely be beneficial. I’ve already been getting lots of responses to my follow up email I sent out to all of our new inquiries. Here’s to hoping that they will join the party, and also hoping they can keep secrets. After all, you know what they say about Vegas…
For Liberty,
Austin Petersen
Director of Outreach
