Porc Fest 2022
My welcome home party to the Free State
It’s been almost a month since I said goodbye to the Beehive State. It was a moment of deep reflection and consideration for what was to come. I learned a lot about myself and a lot about the world while living in Utah.
For the drive home, I decided not to brave the typical 11 hour driving day that I had become accustomed to in the Kenworth, but to take it easy on my 1991 4Runner and took five stops along the way. First in Cheyenne, Wyoming with family, then Des Moines, Iowa, with podcasting friends from Overwritten.org, then Cincinnati Ohio with my buddy Big J, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania with liberty’s resident weight champion Kyle Matcovick, and finishing the last night before touchdown with a childhood friend in Bennington, Vermont.
It was not my first time returning to New Hampshire, as I had done so in 2016 after a couple years on the road. But in 2016 it had been a rather aimless move back. I was out of money, I had just finished a four month long road trip to Alaska, and I was simply returning to the same old job I had before I had left.
Things were different this time. I had left a secure, well paying job that I truly enjoyed out in Utah, and was making a proactive move based on what I had witnessed across the country for the past couple years.
The biggest conclusion I had reached was the sentiment that “everyone is a libertarian, they just don’t know it yet” was absolute horseshit. People LOVE bossing others around, and the ones who don’t feel competent enough to boss others around LOVE being told what to do themselves. The sad reality was that no matter how well-presented or eloquently explained libertarian philosophy was, it would never take root for the vast majority of people.
So I was returning to my homeland, the shire in the northeast. And to kick off my return was the annual celebration held in the north country, Porc Fest.
Porc Fest, short for Porcupine Fest, is a gathering of social conservatives, libertines, nudists, satanists, Christians, atheists, craftsmen, artists, thought leaders and interested passers-by who all put one philosophical pillar ahead of everything else: liberty.
Starting off my first day, Wednesday, June 22nd, I witnessed a talk on ESG scores by my friend Clint Russell of Liberty Lockdown, followed by an impassioned speech on ending our involvement in Yemen from Scott Horton, then my friend Eric Jackman doing an opening comedy bit for my talk on how the government has destroyed the working man. The speech went well, I received a few rounds of applause and hearty laughs, mostly winging it off the cuff looking to my notes as to not forget to tell stories of empirical influence from OSHA and other areas of the regulatory state.
My mom and Dad drove up to the north country to witness my speech, along with my friend Tony from Vermont. The newly elected Vice Chair of the Libertarian Party, Josh Smith, also showed up along with my cohost from Tower Gang, Toad and it was a crazy moment to witness so many of my friends and family mingling in the same location.
The following day, Scott Horton verbally drone striked Cathy Young in a debate over whether or not we should give military aid to Ukraine, I did a live podcast with Jeremy Kauffman on repatriating to the Free State, and questioning him on various campaign strategies in his run for US Senate. The day was finished off by me giving a talk to a tent full of inquisitive libertarians as to why they should move to the Granite State, followed by a long night of drinking and partying in the Mises Caucus tent.
Friday was especially unseasonably cold, which I like. The precipitation kept everyone inside their tents or under the roof of the pavilion. But there was still plenty of hustle and bustle throughout the campground as people continued to trade in silver, bitcoin, goldbacks and other currencies for goods they desired as they huddled in their multiple layers of clothing.
That night Clint Toad and I did a live podcast with Richard Grove for Tower Gang. We only had him for half an hour so I asked him about his thoughts on Ziad Al Jarrah’s Mossad connections and his seemingly unlikely presence on Flight 93. We then had Josh Smith on to discuss his recent conquest of the Libertarian Party and finished the pod off with a sitdown from Robbie the Fire.
I went to bed by midnight because the following morning we had planned to climb Mount Washington with roughly ten other interested people. However, when I woke up at 6 in the morning and drove myself and Toad to the rendezvous point, only one other hiker had actually shown up.
So off to the Jewel Trail it was! We started ascending the tallest mountain in the northeast at roughly 8:00 AM. Toad had a rough start as he fell into the river 100 feet from the trailhead and soaked both of his feet.
Unfortunately it was a cloudy day, and though this was my 18th ascent up Mount Washington, I want every first time hiker to see the spectacular views from the top. Luckily as we neared the ridge by Mount Clay, the clouds slowly began to lift, giving us incredible views of the Great Gulf and even showing Mount Washington’s summit a couple times.
Toad was not cut out for hiking, and his condition worsened as we neared the top, so I had to reassess. Mount Washington has a rare feature in that it is fully equipped with a road to the summit, a restaurant, and a railroad, not exactly a commodity found on every alpine mountaintop. We were now closer to the summit than we were to the trailhead, so I made an executive decision that it would be easier to get him to the top and organize transportation to the bottom than to turn around.
He ultimately made it to the top, and after a short celebratory bowl of clam chowder, we got tickets down the Cog Railway, a feature I had never before experienced. I will admit the ride down was nice, and instead of stumbling back to the truck at midnight carrying Toad on my back, we finished the expedition off at about 5 PM.
The last day of Porc Fest was pretty chill, starting with a speech from Josh Smith about the vision of the new Libertarian Party, and finishing with a soapbox rant competition in which I made the case that conservative white men are the most tolerant people on the planet, and that they need to put their foot down and put a stop to the insanity of what their wives and the media drag them through.
All I can say is, what a welcome home party! Nothing could concrete my decision more than a week long festival with my best friends, an ascent up Mount Washington, and the week was capped off with Sununu signing a bill that effectively nullified all gun laws in the State of New Hampshire.
It feels good to be home, and I look forward to the adventures coming down the pipe.
Great article Reed, keep up the good work!
Glad to find you here.