Longshot Republican candidate mulls third-party run [Gary Johnson]

Yahoo ^ | 11/26/11

[freespirited]

Disgruntled former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson says he is considering leaving the Republican slate and running as a third-party candidate in the 2012 presidential election.

"I feel abandoned by the Republican Party," Johnson, who has been left out of most of the Republican debates, told the Sante Fe New Mexican newspaper this week, saying he might seek the Libertarian Party's support.

"The Republican Party has left me by the wayside," said Johnson, whose polling numbers have recently been so low that they are often not even being picked up by pollsters.

"If I'd have been included in 16 of the last debates we wouldn't even be having this conversation," he said.

While the Libertarians are on the ballot in every state, Johnson acknowledged that the party, which espouse freedom of expression and action, had never received more than one percent of the nationwide vote.

Johnson, 58, holds dear libertarian values such as low taxes and limited government and wants to legalize marijuana.

[logician2u]

Republican wins 48%. Libertarian wins 3%. Who is the Libertarian helping ? This is the point I’m making.

I get your point.

Votes aren't owned; they are cast. Some may be cast willy-nilly, others with great deliberation, but unless you're in Chicago they are entirely the result of individual actions, not some external force.

We differ on the significance of the margin of defeat being attributed to "siphoned votes" that went to a Libertarian candidate (or a Green or Peace and Justice for that matter). With secret ballots, we cannot know but what a voter might have just left it blank if his or her preferred candidate was not listed. Or not even voted in that election.

Election outcomes would be a whole lot more predictable with just two candidates for any office, wouldn't they? Or maybe one?

To overcome the "spoiler" problem--which is nothing new, if you recall the election of 1912--a different way of counting votes has been proposed and studied called approval voting.

While each method has its flaws, none of them are as severe as restrictions some states place on minor parties attempting to gain ballot access. By the time they've gathered sufficient signatures to qualify a candidate for the ballot, they're about out of money that could have been spent on running ads.

FReepers seem a bit misinformed about libertarians, I've noticed. I agree they're not the traditional conservatives we usually find at Chamber of Commerce luncheons. But they are not by any means "big government" types like you also find at C of C affairs. Calling them "liberals" would be appropriate only if you make it plain you mean "19th Century liberals" like Locke, Jefferson and Tom Paine who valued human rights (except for slaves) more than any presumed divine right of kings and other government functionaries.

To them, and to me, the same rights are bestowed upon us all, no greater or lesser among the governing class. The government therefore has no rights simply by its existing that are not inherent in each of us as individuals.

[pallis]

He has nothing better to do than waste his time.