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Libertarian Thread (Was: Gary Johnson Thread) (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Maurile Tremblay
- Start date
Dinsy Ejotuz
Footballguy
Tom Servo
Nittany Beavers
Politico: Johnson and Stein fail to make threshold. As expected, I might add. It's amazing what happens when a commission of Ds and Rs decides who gets to participate in debates. 
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Gawain
Footballguy
I thought that GJ and the Libs would tear down the Repubs this election, but I was wrong. A lot of his support is coming from Dems and left leaning independents. Meanwhile, Hillary can't put Trump away to the point where Repub voters don't see a chance for him to win and are willing to cross party lines.
joffer
Footballguy
Gawain
Footballguy
I thought that Gary Johnson could hit 17% of the vote. I was wrong according to current polling (8% or so)
I thought the vast majority of that support would come from Republicans disgusted by Trump and/or small government conservatives. I was wrong. On September 4th, the NY Times stated that Johnson pulled evenly from the left and the right.
I thought that Gary Johnson would garner even more Republican support once party-line voters realized that Trump had no shot at the Presidency and that voters could vote their conscience free of the fear that their vote would cost the Republicans the election. Donald Trump still has a legitimate shot at the Presidency and any dyed in the wool Republican has a major reason to vote the party line. Their vote may matter.
Had my thoughts been accurate, Gary Johnson could have signaled the end of the Republican Party as we know it. Had the election finished Clinton-49%, Trump-30%, Johnson-20%, Stein-1%, I think the Republicans as a National Party could have been done. Or, there would have been a major shift in the Party's fundamentals where a sea change had to occur to bring the 40% of the defecting voters back to the fold.
Now, we could see an election that goes Clinton-45%, Trump-43% (or vice versa as impossible that may seem) Johnson-10%, Stein-2%, no one learns anything, there are no changes to the parties that I'd like to see and we get to go through the same manure parade in four more years.
cstu
Footballguy
skol asylum
Footballguy
cstu
Footballguy
He could have all the money in the world and would still have lousy economic ideas.
Nugget
Footballguy
Boo. You are now to be known as Negative Nancy going forward. You can either create an alias or I can try to get a mod to change your handle. Boo.
IvanKaramazov
Footballguy
He's a little flaky -- third party candidates almost always are. But he's still the best candidate in the race.
SaintsInDome2006
Footballguy
I think unfortunately Gary is getting a lot of protest votes. In PA he is at 14%, that's one of his better states. Last time he got 1%. Is he really that much more popular? No, I doubt it. I think people have had their eyes and ears wide open though. If he was charismatic and carried a true ideological message that captured people's hearts and minds he could have won this thing, or if not him then someone with his opportunity. I do like the guy and many of his stances but he's obviously not a special candidate. Otoh the Libertarians had Austin Peterson and then McAfee behind him, they really did not step up their game for this chance, though I wonder what Peterson might have done given the opportunity.
One main advantage GJ has had throughout is that he was a former governor from a sunbelt state. I still think in general elections people love that.
Rove!
Footballguy
They need more balls
" yeah I flubbed Aleepo, but I understand email security classifications and the Geneva Convention...."
NutterButter
Footballguy
love the platform but a little underwhelming as a candidate. i thought weld came off as the more charismatic of the two.
Binky The Doormat
Footballguy
Would be nice to see this get him to 15% so he can hit the debates.
Mr.Pack
Footballguy
Dinsy Ejotuz
Footballguy
Take it up with the folks who spent 5 pages arguing that it didn't matter after a Presidential candidate flubbed a softball Q on it.
He's locked in right around 8% and has been for quite some time now. He's not going to double his support at this point.
TobiasFunke
Footballguy
Hey guys, caught your man on 60 Minutes last night. I was curious about his plan to get rid of some federal agencies. All of them do some important work, and of course I'm always a little wary of plans to put hundreds of thousands of people out of work.
But I'm specifically confused about what would happen if we got rid of the Department of Commerce, as he proposes.
Here are four of the agencies within the Department that seem like they do fairly important work:
International Trade Administration- regulates international trade, including (most importantly IMO) protecting US businesses from dumping
National Weather Service- obvious
National Marine Fisheries Service- guards against overfishing and resulting resource depletion
Patent and Trademark Office- obvious
I looked on his website and don't see anything about any of his plans to replace the work done by these agencies. Does Johnson want us to just stop regulating trade practices? Does he think the federal government should get out of the weather game? Are we just going to let fisherman deplete stocks until there's no fish left? Would we no longer protect intellectual property? How would all this work?
But I'm specifically confused about what would happen if we got rid of the Department of Commerce, as he proposes.
Here are four of the agencies within the Department that seem like they do fairly important work:
International Trade Administration- regulates international trade, including (most importantly IMO) protecting US businesses from dumping
National Weather Service- obvious
National Marine Fisheries Service- guards against overfishing and resulting resource depletion
Patent and Trademark Office- obvious
I looked on his website and don't see anything about any of his plans to replace the work done by these agencies. Does Johnson want us to just stop regulating trade practices? Does he think the federal government should get out of the weather game? Are we just going to let fisherman deplete stocks until there's no fish left? Would we no longer protect intellectual property? How would all this work?
I don't have a comment on the rest, but if that's the most important thing that the International Trade Administration does, it should almost certainly be gotten rid of. The sun dumps sunlight on us very cheaply -- who is to protect the U.S. candlestick-making business??? The answer, which should be self-evident, is that we don't need "protection" against being offered free or cheap goods. Dumping is awesome and should be encouraged.
TobiasFunke
Footballguy
It was the least important of the four, and also maybe the one I know the least about. But that seems like a pretty poor analogy, no? Dumping is more like if the sun decided to shine 24 hours a day just to run the candlestick-makers out of business and shut down all the candle factories, and then knowing it would take forever for us to start making candles again (and that it could just burn for 24 hours again even if we did) it plunged us into 24 hour darkness until we begged and pleaded and offered out virgin sacrifices for its return.
Or, you know, somewhere between those two analogies.
Leroy Hoard
Footballguy
Either way it would seem that Gary Johnson is no friend of the U.S. candlestick-making business.
I'm way behind in this thread, but I'm rather surprised to see anyone make a big deal out of the Aleppo thing -- going so far as to suggest that it shows that Gary Johnson isn't familiar with the situation in Syria. His substantive answer (after the "What is Aleppo?" gaffe) shows that he's at least somewhat familiar with the situation. It's just that, in that particular moment, the word "Aleppo" didn't ring a bell. It happens.
I can probably tell you more about Larry Fitzgerald than most people reading this thread can. (I've been doing the Cardinals' team and player profiles on this site for years.)
During my local draft this year, I was writing names on the big easel as people drafted. Somebody drafted "Fitz" sometime in the first few rounds. I needed to write down the full name. My thought process at the time went -- Fitz? Who's that? He probably doesn't want Ryan Fitzpatrick here, does he? What other Fitz is there? Let me think hard for a second. Um ... Fitzgerald Toussaint? That's all I got. "And who is Fitz?"
That doesn't mean I don't know who Larry Fitzgerald is.
I can probably tell you more about Larry Fitzgerald than most people reading this thread can. (I've been doing the Cardinals' team and player profiles on this site for years.)
During my local draft this year, I was writing names on the big easel as people drafted. Somebody drafted "Fitz" sometime in the first few rounds. I needed to write down the full name. My thought process at the time went -- Fitz? Who's that? He probably doesn't want Ryan Fitzpatrick here, does he? What other Fitz is there? Let me think hard for a second. Um ... Fitzgerald Toussaint? That's all I got. "And who is Fitz?"
That doesn't mean I don't know who Larry Fitzgerald is.
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Rich Conway
Footballguy
If it keeps those ####### vanilla/peach/babypowder scented Yankee Candles out of my house, then I'm definitely voting Gary Johnson.
This is the kind of "dumping" that's alleged in antitrust cases sometimes -- and I'm under the impression that it's pretty much an economic impossibility. When Company A sells something below cost in order to try to drive competing Company B out of business, it is Company A who ends up suffering more than Company B because of it. (It is selling at a loss, and it is selling faster -- and therefore losing faster -- than Company B.) I'm also under the impression that actual real-life examples (as opposed to false allegations) of this kind of "dumping" are absent from history.
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
He is a small government advocate.
If you believe that all federal bureaucracies do important work!!!!, then you aren't going to support his ideas, whether he provides a lot of detail on them or not.
SaintsInDome2006
Footballguy
The rarest of rarities in 2016, a policy debate.
I feel like I'm observing rare ocelots in the wild.
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
As my governor for 6 yrs, gaps do not surprise me where Johnson is concerned. A wonk on issues that concern him, in NM (where he would have been re-elected in a landslide w/o term limits) largely considered an insular, incurious man.
SaintsInDome2006
Footballguy
cstu
Footballguy
I expect better from you, MT. If this was a candidate you didn't like you would be wondering how it would be possible to make this guy President in 4 months. If Bernie or Hillary were so clueless about world affairs I would admit they are unfit for the office.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/09/us/politics/gary-johnson-aleppo.html
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
Having a brain fart isn't the same thing as being clueless.
And not that it excuses the gaffe, but Trump is several times more clueless about...everything.
cstu
Footballguy
Put it this way - I think Gary's fiscal ideas are terrible and he's not the most knowledgeable about foreign policy but I would vote for him a million times out of a million over Trump.
IvanKaramazov
Footballguy
This is a lot more like the "57 states" thing than anything serious. We all had a nice little chuckle about that and moved on.
What's your evidence that he's clueless about world affairs? The fact that "Aleppo" didn't immediately register for him any more than "Fitz" did for me? I don't think that's very good evidence.
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cstu
Footballguy
Once he was informed about Aleppo all he had to say was "With regard to Syria, I do think that it's a mess."
Does that sound well-informed about the subject to you?
NutterButter
Footballguy
Unless company A is state sponsored and can absorb those losses. Happens with china and steel.Maurile Tremblay said:
TobiasFunke
Footballguy
I understand that. My point is that, as with most issues, there is a lot of nuance and detail here. Saying "shrink government" without explaining how you're going to get that done- and more importantly how you're going to address the repercussions of doing it- is as stupid as saying "reduce the deficit" or "more American jobs" or "bring peace to the Middle East" and leaving it at that. It's just empty campaign rhetoric.RedmondLonghorn said:
Steve Tasker
Footballguy
Been keeping an eye out in the giant work parking lot for presidential bumper stickers. I still have yet to see any supporting Hillary or Trump, but there's still a bunch of Bernie stickers and one lone hero (not me) with a Johnson/Weld 2016 sticker. 
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
Is it as empty as suggesting that the government can provide "free" college for everybody without a viable plan to finance it? Or as empty as pretending the current structure of entitlements in the US is sustainable without massive increases in taxes or cuts to other programs?
I am all for holding candidates accountable for having feasible policy ideas, but I'd like to see that accountability applied fairly.
IvanKaramazov
Footballguy
If Chinese taxpayers want to sell us steel below cost, that's fine with me. How generous of them.
TobiasFunke
Footballguy
As to the first question, yes it's like that, except that "free college" is just one empty promise made by two candidates not the central theme of their campaigns. As to the second, no, I haven't seen anyone campaign on that, let alone make it the central theme of their campaign.
I'm with you- I would like to see this accountability applied fairly. That's kind of my point- I think third party candidates have not been subjected to the same scrutiny as the major party candidates, which is understandable given the limited time voters and the media have to spend on this stuff but is still noteworthy.
If you google "Clinton college plan" you get literally dozens of results criticizing the lack of specificity on costs. If you google "Gary Johnson eliminate federal agencies" you get a bunch of articles basically just saying he wants to do it. As far as I can tell not one of them asks, for example, what would happen to the patent and trademark system if we got rid of the PTO or what would happen to our marine resources if we got rid of NOAA (both agencies are under the Department of Commerce umbrella).
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
Fair enough.
The way I look at it, very few of a presidential candidate's policy proposals ever get implemented without some very significant study, debate and recalibration. And lots of them require modification to become feasible.
They are more directional indication of intent. And directionally, Johnson's stance is one I agree with.
I might have said something like, "When I am elected we are going to embark on a massive program of reductions to government bureaucracies and spending. This will entail large scale cuts and could conceivably even result in the effective elimination of entire Federal agencies. Obviously we will have to make sure that certain critical functions remain in place, but make no mistake, I plan to dramatically reduce the size and cost of government. And I think most Americans will be hard-pressed to notice the difference, except it will cost a lot less."
But it is certainly possible to nitpick that to death as well.
NutterButter
Footballguy
I'm pretty sure our steel manufacturers feel differently. Could be a little shortsighted in general as well. If there comes a point where the chinese are the only game left in town, those prices might not be so attractive. Not to mention the ~150k people out of work. Lost tax revenue.
Koya
Footballguy
That's all well and good without context.
What if, though, over say 10-20 years of subsidies all US Steel providers go out of business, the allowing China to control the market from both a pricing and supply perspective?
seems as short sited as to suggest, hey, is Walmart wants to undersell all the competition, good for me! Until there are no alternatives, Walmart jacks up the cost and there are no other options be it price or experience/quality driven.
while I appreciate the theory many here put forth, there seems to be a willingness to lack critical and extended thinking on many of these issues.
Im surprised even by MT for being an apologist over the now long past Aleppo remarks. As I recall, the concerns brought about by many, including myself, stem from a lack of building the proper team of advisors to make sure that GJ doesn't sound stupid on critical issues. And apologist or not, he sounded stupid and uninformed. Don't think the deep concern was because of his just drawing a blank on the issue. Building on his lack of gravitas to begin with, that issue reinforced - on a number of levels - that he may not be ready for the big time, and the presidency certainly qualifies as such.
Just because GJ provides a much needed third option does not mean we should no longer expect presidential qualities and performance from him. He does not just get a pass - nor does he really need one considering the two other candidates.
If anything Id hope those prone to vote Libertarian would not so easily fall into the apologist category we see so often from the two main parties' base of support.
IvanKaramazov
Footballguy
I'm sure they do feel differently, just like MT's candle-makers do.
Those 150K people find other jobs. They're not just sitting around. The example that I like to use is that if you compare our current labor force to that of 1900 or so, about 12 out of every 13 farmers is now employed in some other sector. That's not a bad thing -- it's an awesome thing. We still have more than enough food to eat, but now we get to produce a bunch of other stuff as well.
Steve Tasker
Footballguy
This is a legitimate concern, and I'd like to raise a couple of points - though not answers, I don't have those - in response:
Hillary's policy positions are picked apart because she is a legitimate candidate to become POTUS. Investigative agencies, news agencies, etc. take the time and the resources to analyze her positions in-depth because of this. As much as we all like the momentum in this thread, the Libertarian Party is not a challenger for the presidency this time around and won't make a major dent in our political system - there's not as much reason for the NY Times or whoever to grill Gary Johnson on his positions, because only a small percentage of people are going to vote for him anyway. Couple that with the fact that he has much less staff and a much smaller budget, and it's likely that his positions are not as sharply-formed as Hillary's are. Hillary has a giant political machine backing her, with staffers and money and a lot of resources that the Libertarian Party doesn't have. Hillary herself isn't coming up with all of these positions, her advisors are - well-compensated, highly-qualified advisors that Johnson doesn't have.
There is a certain measure of voting for a libertarian candidate that is a vote of philosophy. Yes, there will be plenty of Johnson voters in this election who are voting him as a protest vote, but of those of us who have been in this thread stretching back to the previous election, most of them would probably say that they loosely identify as libertarian / recognize their libertarian political leanings. I am fully aware that Johnson's policies may not be fully formed or set in stone and that frankly he may not be able to accomplish much in terms of cleaning up the bureaucratic red tape. But my vote for Johnson is roughly a vote for libertarian philosophy. I trust that he would attempt to govern in a manner that I would most like to see the country governed, even if he can't tell me the absolute specifics of how he would go about it. I am happy enough with his New Mexico track record and private business record that I trust him to run the country as best he can.
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
Many of those proposals are sharply defined because they were written by her lobbyists and political backers.
And I realize that isn't unique to Clinton. Though, in this POTUS election cycle, it really is.
TobiasFunke
Footballguy
Sure is, most prominently the fact that "it will cost a lot less" is a lie, at least relatively speaking. Even if he slashed the three agencies mentioned on 60 Minutes outright, didn't replace then with anything (leaving us, for example, without a system for registering and protecting patents, or for maintaining sustainable fisheries), the impact on the budget would be negligible, somewhere in the range of 1% of annual federal spending by my back of the envelope calculations. And that's before we account for unemployment, health care, etc. to the 60,000ish people suddenly without jobs and their families.
But I wasn't interested in discussing those details so much as highlighting the disparate levels of scrutiny applied to third party candidates. I'm curious about the possibility that many people have turned away from the major party candidates (and particularly the one who's not a crazy bigot) due to scrutiny of those candidates while not applying similar levels of scrutiny to the candidates they choose instead.
RedmondLonghorn
Footballguy
When your philosophy on foreign intervention is "not gonna do it", there is a lot more room to be a little loose with specifics about incredibly complex civil wars half a world away.
Personally, I prefer his mix of humility and perhaps lack of grounding in every detail, to somebody who knows all sorts of detail, but whose enthusiasm for interventionism borders on Paul Wolfowitz territory.
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