Elections Gary Johnson at 12% (3% away from debates), potential game changer

Libertarian Gary Johnson Is Nearing a Prime-Time Slot

Newsweek
Matthew Cooper 6 hrs ago

With Donald Trump plummeting in the polls and Hillary Clinton registering high negatives, the Libertarian Party ticket has a rare opportunity: to be represented in the presidential debates for the first time since 1992.

That opportunity has been underscored by a new Fox News poll that shows the Libertarian Party’s presidential nominee, Gary Johnson, the former New Mexico governor, getting 12 percent support. A party qualifies to join a presidential debate if it scores 15 percent in a series of polls leading up to the fall forums.

In addition to the attraction of being someone other than Clinton or Trump, Johnson is helped by his running mate, William Weld of Massachusetts, who like himself is a former Republican two-term governor of a Democratic state. Both men have a certain charm: Johnson is a triathlete who has climbed the highest peaks on all continents and Weld is an old-line Boston Brahmin who once dove fully clothed into the city’s Charles River to show its cleanliness. Pro-abortion and anti-Common Core, they’re libertarian without heeding some of the party’s more extreme freedom-loving, anarchistic elements. (At the party’s convention this spring, Johnson had to defend his belief in driver’s licenses and anti-discrimination laws.)

During their second CNN town hall this summer on Wednesday night, both men were in full form, eschewing ideological straightjackets and offering some humor along the way. Weld, wearing the kind of thick pinstripe suit eschewed by modern pols, said Trump had a “screw loose” and cited two Franklin Roosevelt appointees to the Supreme Court, William O. Douglas and Hugo Black, as the kind of justices he’d look for.


Both men used the town hall to take their best shots at luring Bernie Sanders supporters. “Well, I think Bernie and I are similar on about 75 percent of what's out there,” Johnson said. “And, of course, that would be marriage equality, a woman's right to choose, legalizing marijuana, let's stop with the military interventions.”

Weld appealed to traditional Republicans, citing his experience in the Reagan Justice Department as well as his appearance at previous GOP conventions which could occasionally be a mixed bad. The 71-year-old has a tendency to walk down memory lane in a way that may seem like a distant soujourn to younger voters, such as when Weld cited Reagan’s first CIA director, William Casey, and his preference for “humint” (human intelligence sources), or offered recollections of the 1996 Republican Convention as if it took place yesterday instead of 20 years ago.

Both men know that their presence in the debates is essential for having a shot in the presidential race or even doing better than the mere 1 percent Johnson scored as the party’s nominee in 2012. The 63-year-old is blunt: “There's no chance of winning without being in the presidential debates…the first presidential debate is going to garner more audience than the Super Bowl,” he said during the town hall. “Well you can't win the presidency if you're not in that game.”

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...hnson-is-nearing-a-prime-time-slot/ar-BBvgspd


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So I am hoping beyond hope, that Johnson gets on that stage for the debates. Trump and Clinton are the 2 most unpopular nominees in the history of polling. Our presidential campaign has become a running joke for the world.

I believe if people are introduced to a viable 3rd option, we could see a meteoric rise of a candidate. Below is the scenario I envision and hope for.

Trump and Clinton enter into a feces throwing competition in the debate, and walk out covered in shit. Gary Johnson tries to present himself as the only adult in the room, and has a good debate performance. GJ goes from 15% to 30% after one debate, when the whole country realizes that they don't have to pick from the clown show that is Trump and Clinton.

We now have a 3rd party candidate in a 3 way race for president, and all conventional assumptions are thrown out the window, as has been the case throughout this whole election.

Discuss..............

 

This is why I love the WR as my news feed.

 

I voted johnson in 2012, i was hoping he made the debates this time around... until he picks a vp that wants "non hunting" guns banned and calls himself the original libertarian.

Darrell Castle became my backup vote from that.

 

This country needs a third party option badly.

 

War Gary Johnson. Can't imagine how much better the debates will be if he's invited.

 

I'd love to see a genuine person like GJ enter the debates just to offset some of the insanity.

 

I'd like to see a H2H barn burner with Shillary and Drumpf before we get down to business though.

 

Would be interesting to see the debates. Hillary and Trump will be getting 90% of the speaking time anyway probably.

 

Why have the left Nut or the Right Nut when you can have the Johnson.

 

I'd welcome it. In a perfect world, there would be even more.

 

Democrats worst nightmare.

If Johnson got in the debates id bet on a Trump Presidency.

 

I don't think he's that interesting. Economic laissez-faire benefits the rich and corporations. Yet he loves BLM and illegal immigrants. It's like you're getting the worse of both worlds.

 

Another lefty leaning BLM and illegal immigrant apologist being passed off as an "outsider". Eat a dick Gary Johnson, even this clown thinks Trump is RACIST waaaah waaah.

 

Except that when he says laissez-faire, he actually means a level playing field, and not crony corporatism. Kind of a big difference between GJ's free market ideas, and the RNC's.

GJ wants to cut big oil's subsidies, and tax breaks.

I swear to anyone reading this, that the problem we face today isn't that ideas from the left or right have been tried and failed, it is that ideas from the left and right have been bastardized, and packaged as an idea like the free market, or more regulation, but in reality they were just corporatism in both forms.

More regulation = reign in Wall Street as an idea, in practice it is used to limit competition

free market = a level playing field as an idea, in practice it is corporate protectionism at the cost of everyone else

 

??? Do you know who Gary Johnson is?

 

actually it benefits all of us, big businesses needs workers. who the fuck do you think works for corporations???
but i understand you really don't know shit about how the economy works.

 

The LIbs just had a town hall meeting yesterday on CNN. Will MSM allow the Libs to be in debates with Trump and Hillary? They have said some intredasted things yesterday. I wonder why Rand does not just go join them. Well, Rand is young, I bet he going to be in it again in fo yees.

 

Johnson is a BLMer? Oh, no. That won't do.

I'm assuming he's an open border guy, too? I know that's a libertarian tenet, but it won't work so well if you're the only country in the world with an open border. Oh, and if you still have pretty generous welfare programs in place, yeah...

 

He's not a very good debator tbh. Hopefully his integrity would shine through

 

Just what America needs a libertarian.