Category Archives: Gary Johnson

What Gary Johnson Should Have Said About Legalizing Heroin

In one of the more predictable moments from last night’s CNN Libertarian Town Hall, Gary Johnson was confronted by the mother of a young man who ingested a single line of heroin and was disabled for life. Jacob Sullum has already weighed in on what Johnson should have said from a libertarian perspective, but his thoughtful and informed piece is still too verbose for a political campaign.

Libertarians like to make fun of “sound bites” and slogans, but if they ever want to win an election for dog catcher, much less President of the United States, they need to face the reality that people stop listening and stop reading when the answer is long and developed. Here is how Gary Johnson should have answered:

“Ms. Morella, I am very sorry to hear about what happened to your son. It’s a tragedy. But I have to tell you the truth, even though it’s not what you came here to hear. What happened to your son may not have happened if heroin were legal. Here’s why:

When drugs are illegal, they’re sold by criminals who have no business address. You can’t sue them if they’re negligent or prosecute them when they willfully defraud you.

Reactions like your son’s usually occur with what’s called a “hot load,” meaning there was another substance mixed with the heroin. If the heroin he ingested were sold by a legitimate business in the light of day, there would be an immediate investigation. If the product had dangerous ingredients in it or otherwise wasn’t what the package said it was, the owner would be sued. If it were discovered he did it intentionally, he’d be prosecuted.

Ms. Morella, no one in America is concerned that when they buy a bottle of gin, there is going to be foreign substances in it that are going to kill them. But they used to be. Know when that was? When alcohol was prohibited. They called it “bath tub gin” and tragedies like your son’s occurred all the time when only criminals could sell alcohol.

There is absolutely no difference between alcohol prohibition then and drug prohibition today. Your son’s tragedy is the 2016 equivalent of what happened to people drinking bath tub gin.

Prohibiting alcohol also led to the rise of heavily armed, violent gangs like Al Capone’s. You don’t see sellers of alcohol today behaving like Capone. Do you know why? Because that’s not how business is conducted in the absence of prohibition.

You said, “Can you people in positions of power please get rid of the drugs?” I’m the only politician who is going to tell you the truth. No. We’ve had a war on drugs for decades and there are more drugs now than ever. It’s a little like the government war on terrorism. Is there less terrorism today than fifteen years ago or more?

What we can do is stop subsidizing criminal drug dealers by taking away their legitimate competition. If you want someone to tell you what you want to hear about drugs, I’m sure Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton will be happy to do so. Their parties have told you they’ll get rid of drugs for fifty years. If you want the truth, the only way to make America safer is to end prohibition and allow all drugs to be sold like alcohol.”

The answer above is chock full of sound bites. Sound bites become headlines. That’s how you get your message out to 315 million people.

It also answers the woman’s question, something Johnson’s rambling answer failed to do.

This is the way Gary Johnson has to start answering questions if he’s going to take any advantage of the opportunity the Libertarian Party is being presented with during this election. Hopefully, his debate coach is listening.

Tom Mullen is the author of Where Do Conservatives and Liberals Come From? And What Ever Happened to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? Part One and A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America.

Interview (Video): Christina Tobin of Free and Equal Elections Foundation

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TAMPA, November 4, 2012 – “Remember, remember the 5^th of November.”

So says Christina Tobin, found and chair of the Free and Equal Elections Foundation, a 501 (c)3 non-profit formed to ensure a fair an open electoral process for all. The organization is sponsoring its second presidential debate this election season on November 5^th at 9 PM EST. Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson will square off against Green Party nominee Jill Stein.

Johnson and Stein won the right to participate by finishing first and second, respectively, in an online vote conducted after the first Free and Equal debate on October 23^rd. In addition to Johnson and Stein, Constitution Party nominee Virgil Goode and Justice Party nominee Rocky Anderson also participated in the first debate.

While united in their opposition to the two-party system, Johnson and Stein have very different ideas about the role of government and the solutions to America’s problems.

“They do have a different take on things such as healthcare and so on, but my feeling is that the two-party system has been playing us for over a century now and they’ve made us quite divisive. I do foresee, after this election, a huge movement of independents running for office and finding, well, we do have a lot in common across the spectrum,” said Tobin.

Watch the video interview at Communities@ Washington Times…

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Support for Kill List and NDAA make Obama and Romney unfit for office

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TAMPA, November 2, 2012 – It wasn’t so long ago that the following statement could only appear in a dystopian novel or movie script:

The U.S. President has killed an American citizen without due process, without even charging him with a crime. His decision to do this has been challenged by members of neither party.

While the media-fueled frenzy goes on about how supposedly different Romney and the conservatives are from Obama and the liberals, no one even raises an eyebrow about this terrifying political development.

Not even the left, which quite correctly howled at passage of the Patriot Act and the Bush administrations’ other assaults on freedom.

Bush and the Republicans committed egregious crimes against liberty, but did not go near this far in violating the even more important right to life.

The president makes a mockery of the term “due process” by claiming the requirement is fulfilled by a panel of his own self-appointed czars and cronies reviewing the case. This doesn’t even pass the constitutional test. The panel is exclusively comprised of members of the executive branch of government. Judicial power is explicitly denied to the executive by the plain words of the constitution.

At any previous time in American history, a summary execution by the executive without due process would have been considered cold blooded murder and an act of tyranny. Yet, it has happened in the light of day and neither the political class nor the citizenry has batted an eye.

If even this does not rouse American citizens to stand up to their government, to what would they conceivably say “no?”

Given Romney’s endorsement of the president’s action, there is a well-worn term that applies to both candidates for president. “Unfit for office” has been wasted in the past on extramarital affairs or scandals involving some misappropriation of funds in private business. Like the cry of “wolf!” its impact has been eroded by overuse.

However, it is a gravely serious charge. It denotes a fundamental moral failing that puts a candidate completely beyond consideration.

Both President Obama and Mitt Romney are unfit for office due to their support for the presidential kill list. Regardless of where they stand on economic policy, foreign policy or social issues, this position alone should disqualify them in any civilized society.

So why hasn’t it?

The only possible answer is the American public has become so numb to the exercise of arbitrary power that they are unable to even raise a bleat while being led to the slaughter.

It is almost anti-climactic to point out that if you are not summarily executed by either a Romney or Obama administration, you may be arrested by the military without a warrant and held indefinitely without charges, recourse to a writ of habeas corpus or any appeal to an impartial judge. This provision is part of the last NDAA bill which the president signed and which Romney stated he would have signed as well. It is the law of the land.

So was the Reichstag Fire Act in 1930’s Germany. That did not make it right. Without exaggerating, that is where we are right now.

Anyone who watched the first Third Party Debate could not have helped but notice that the various candidates were as different from each other individually as they were collectively from Romney or Obama. Green Party candidate Jill Stein is so far left on economic policy that she makes Obama look like Warren G. Harding. Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson is so laissez faire that he makes Romney look like Woodrow Wilson.

However, all of them agreed on one thing. The basic protections of personal freedom and security guaranteed in the Bill of Rights are not open to negotiation. That is the “red line” over which the government may not tread. That line is the one tangible thing that has made America different from the worst tyrannies of history.

A vote for Obama or Romney on November 6^th is worse than wasting your vote. It is surrendering not only your liberty but your very life to the discretion of the all-powerful state. It is accepting a station even lower than a slave’s.

Fortunately, you do have other choices. Gary Johnson will be on the ballot in at least 47 states. Many of the other candidates may be on your ballot as well. Florida’s ballot will provide twelve choices for president. Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein will debate again on November 5^th, one day before the election.

Regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum, you will find among these choices a candidate you agree with at least as much as you agree with Romney or Obama. What you will not find is a candidate who claims arbitrary power over your life.

Do not give your consent to a candidate who does.

2nd Third Party Debate: Will Americans Remember the 5th of November?

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TAMPA, October 31, 2012 – “We’ll have to agree to disagree.” When uttered in a political context, there is no passive-aggressive cliché that I detest more than this one,

Invariably, this is the rejoinder offered by the statist who has painted himself into a corner while trying to justify his invasion of the life and property of others. Unable to honestly answer the question, “Aren’t you advocating the initiation of force against your fellow man?” the statist will end the conversation with this insipid bit of anti-reason, usually with condescending sanctimoniousness.

The problem is that one side of the argument is agreeing to refrain from invading the property of anyone else, while the other side claims doing so is his right. There is nothing either fair or civilized by “agreeing to disagree” under these circumstances.

Of course, the problem isn’t that the statist holds this opinion.

It is his right to hold any opinion he wishes and to express that opinion freely. The problem is what happens next. Informed by his opinion, the statist then goes into the voting booth and votes himself the life and property of other people.

Worse yet, according to the bizarre principles presently governing American society, he is then provided with the ill-gotten gains by the politician.

Continue at Communities@ Washington Times…

Read Free Chapters of A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America here!

Do Americans still believe that government is evil?

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TAMPA, October 28, 2012 – Nine days before Election Day, Americans are hunkering down into their traditional Republican/Democratic camps. Supposedly, the future of American society rests upon which corporate-backed candidate wins the presidency. Americans of the past would have regarded this as complete nonsense.

In late 1775, the shot heard ‘round the world had been fired and the American colonists had Boston under siege. Still, most Americans either favored reconciliation with Great Britain or were undecided.

Then, in January 1776, Thomas Paine released his instant bestseller, Common Sense. It is this pamphlet that is credited with persuading a critical mass of American colonists to support American independence from Great Britain. In it, Paine laid out his arguments about the role of government and why the British constitution failed in fulfilling this role for American colonists.

The very first plank he laid down in his argument was that government was evil.

“Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil;”

Paine, Jefferson and other founding fathers recognized government for what it is: the pooled and organized capacity for violence of the whole society. This idea comes straight out of John Locke’s Second Treatise on Civil Government. There is no law, no matter how minor, that is not ultimately backed up by the threat of violence.

This is no less true today than it was in 1776. Despite “social contract” theories and other linguistic gymnastics that attempt to euphemize the nature of government, it remains merely organized violence. This is apparent to most people when the government wages war, but somehow it escapes them otherwise.

Yet, even when the government runs a healthcare program, you pay for it or they will come to physically force you to pay. If you resist, you will be killed. It is no different for education, housing, or the ultimate canard, “job creation.” Even a parking ticket is backed by the threat of violence. Yes, you will get many “reminders” if don’t pay before any real action is taken, but eventually the government will come and physically force you to obey.

That is the inescapable nature of government. That’s why Paine and the founding fathers believed it was evil.

Then why constitute a government at all? The founders believed that although government was evil, it was also necessary. Although society, meaning people voluntarily associating and trading their various products with one another, is always a blessing; some of the people will commit violence against the life or property of others, at least some of the time.

So, as Paine wrote, man “finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest.” The government’s job is to defend peaceful citizens against violence committed by others. It is society’s bouncer.

While the term hadn’t been coined yet, the founding fathers were libertarians.

The bouncers aren’t the source of fun in a nightclub any more than government is the source of general happiness in a society. Neither do the bouncer’s run the nightclub. They are employed by the owners, and not for their creativity, ingenuity or compassion. They are employed for their ability to use brute force and are told to stay out of the way unless they are needed. Bouncers are a necessary evil in a nightclub for the same reason that government is a necessary evil in society, if necessary at all.

Yet, judging from the rhetoric of both parties’ politicians and the poll results, social media posts and other expressions of opinion by most of their supporters, most Americans don’t seem to see government this way anymore. One can only conclude that most Americans believe that government is good in and of itself, and that it just happens to be populated with corrupt or incompetent people at the moment.

Not only do most Americans seem to view government as a good, but they seem to want government to solve just about every societal problem, all of which were caused by government in the first place. The bouncers have been running the nightclub for a long time and Americans don’t seem to be able to figure out why it isn’t any fun anymore.

The most disturbing aspect of this belief in the goodness of government is the conversation surrounding the presidential election. Most Americans not only believe that the government can solve problems, rather than just employ force, but that the election ofone man can actually save or destroy the republic. If that’s true, then any difference between America and the most barbarous empires in history is gone.

It is generally believed that the United States transformed itself from a relatively poor, agrarian society to the wealthiest nation in history because of the individual freedom available to its citizens. That freedom resulted from Americans recognizing that government is evil. It resulted from a libertarian theory of government.

America is at a crossroads, but Mitt Romney and Barack Obama don’t represent the fork in the road. They are both the same road. Whether you are looking for “Hope and Change” or “Smaller, Simpler and Smarter Government,” neither Romney nor Obama will provide it.

The first step in changing course is to rediscover America’s founding, libertarian idea that government is evil. If you think the presidential election can make a difference, why not take Gary Johnson up on his proposition? Be libertarian with him for one election. What do you have to lose?

Tom Mullen is the author of A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America.

Libertarians vs. Conservatives on the welfare state

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TAMPA, October 26, 2012 – Many people think of libertarianism as a subset of conservatism, but that’s not true. Libertarianism and conservatism are completely separate philosophies with distinct and separate philosophical traditions. The philosophical differences result in very different positions on issues, from domestic to foreign policy. Their differences on the welfare state provide a perfect example.

Most Americans believe that President Obama and the liberals believe in wealth redistribution and that Republicans/conservatives are against it. That just doesn’t line up with the facts.

While Republicans make general statements against the welfare state, they actually support 95% of the actual spending. A key plank of the Romney/Ryan campaign is “preserving and protecting Social Security and Medicare.” That’s more than half of welfare spending alone. They also support government subsidization of housing, agriculture, energy and other “job-creating” programs. They are willing to support corporate welfare if they believe it will be good for the overall economy.

The only criticisms Republicans generally make are for social safety nets like TANF. This illustrates a key difference between conservatives and libertarians on welfare.

Libertarians object to the welfare state on this basis: Any taxes collected from citizens are collected under a threat of violence. You pay or you get kidnapped at best, killed resisting at worst. Therefore, libertarians object to using the taxing power to take money from one person or group and give it to another. When individuals do this, it is called “armed robbery.” For libertarians, it is no different when the government does it. It is the crime itself that libertarians object to.

Conservatives see it differently. They don’t object to the crime itself. Rather, they formulate their positions based upon who will receive the benefits. Redistribution to certain types of people is acceptable, to others it is not. That is why they will excoriate the “welfare queen,” whose impact upon the budget is minimal, while fully supporting Social Security and Medicare, which will eventually bankrupt the entire government.

Continue at Communities@ Washington Times…

Gary Johnson and the empty chair at the first presidential debate

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TAMPA, October 5, 2012 – The first presidential debate between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama was staged by professional television producers. The podiums were positioned such that they were turned three quarters toward each other but still facing the cameras and just the right distance apart to make for a good wide shot of the two candidates.

In addition to an informative debate, the producers also wanted to deliver a first-rate television production.

The results were up to the standard one would expect on such an occasion, but if the producers really wanted to make the most effective use of their medium, they should have taken a page from Clint Eastwood’s playbook. There should have been an empty chair right in the middle of the stage, between the two podiums.

Philosophically speaking, it might have represented the entire range of opinions and ideas that fall outside of what best-selling author Tom Woods calls “the Mitt Romney-Hillary Clinton Continuum.” They are all of the ideas that we little people are apparently not allowed to even hear.

More specifically, the chair would have represented Gary Johnson, a former two-term Governor of New Mexico and Libertarian Party nominee for President.

Continue at Communities@ Washington Times…

A skeptic’s case for Gary Johnson

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TAMPA, September 26, 2012 – You may be an independent that finds the major party candidates for president particularly weak this year. You may be an “Old Right” conservative that can’t bring yourself to vote for Mitt Romney. You may be a died-in-the-wool liberal who thinks Barack Obama’s presidency has been just a little too similar to Dubya’s.

Or, you may be a libertarian.

If you belong to any of those groups, you might be considering voting for Gary Johnson. Ironically, if you are a libertarian, you may need the most convincing.

Gary Johnson isn’t well-grounded in libertarian theory and it results in him taking some positions that libertarians don’t like. I made the argument myself that Johnson is not really a libertarian at all. In two subsequent interviews (here and here), Johnson didn’t allay those concerns.

Regardless, Gary Johnson is the best choice for president this year for voters from all over the political spectrum.

Continue at Communities@ Washington Times…

Can a libertarian be pro life?

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TAMPA, May 20, 2012 – Thanks to Ron Paul’s extraordinary presidential campaign, libertarianism is arguably getting its best hearing in decades. It’s catching on, especially with young people. While baby boomers prepare to retire and devour Social Security and Medicare to the bone, the generations succeeding them realize that they will be stuck with the bill for these financially insolvent social programs, along with an unsustainable foreign policy.

Proceeding from its central tenet of non-aggression, libertarianism sees government the way Thomas Paine did. “Even in its best state, [it] is but a necessary evil.” Some libertarians think Paine was only half right. Either way, a libertarian government would do far less and cost far less than the one we have now.

Ron Paul has presented one of the purest libertarian platforms of any presidential candidate in U.S. history. Paul absolutely refuses to consider preemptive war and wants to “march right out” of the Middle East, Germany, Japan and Korea. He doesn’t just want to reform Social Security and Medicare; he wants to let younger workers opt completely out.

He wants to end the drug war and pardon all non-violent drug offenders. He wants to repeal the Patriot Act and subsequent “war on terror” legislation.

Paul doesn’t pitch a watered down version of libertarianism to avoid ruffling feathers within his party. When asked about a federal prohibition on gay marriage, Paul responds that the government should get out of the marriage business altogether, even at the state level, except for enforcing marriage agreements like any other contract.

However, there are a few issues where Paul’s libertarianism has been questioned. The most consequential in terms of political impact is his stance on abortion. Paul is staunchly pro-life.

Some have said this violates the basic tenets of libertarianism. The government cannot be allowed to dictate what an individual does regarding her own body. All libertarian theory is rooted in property rights and the most basic, fundamental property right is self-ownership. This precedes modern libertarianism. John Locke, the philosopher that inspired Thomas Jefferson, established this principle before the right to any other kind of property.

“Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his.”

The progressive pro-choice argument rests firmly upon this foundation. A woman owns her body and has sole dominion over what occurs within it. While progressives generally go on to violate this principle with their support for government regulation of virtually every other decision one makes with one’s body, they are very libertarian on this issue.

Or are they?

While libertarian theory is built upon property rights, it also recognizes a natural limit to the exercise thereof. That limit is what Locke called, “the law of nature,” which is that “no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.”

Based upon this limit, the woman’s rights would seem to end before she can bring harm to the fetus. Yet, libertarians recognize that everyone has a right to forcibly remove an unwanted person from his or her property. What is the libertarian answer?

Continue at Washington Times Communities…

Can Ron Paul supporters accept Gary Johnson?

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TAMPA, May 15, 2012 — Ron Paul’s announcement today that he will “no longer spend resources campaigning in primaries in states that have not yet voted” may finally have some of his supporters considering the possibility that he will not be the Republican Party’s nominee. That may be overly pessimistic considering that Paul also stated that he will continue to pursue his delegate strategy, which has been far more successful than his quest for a primary win.

However, even the most ardent supporter may find it prudent to have a “Plan B,” especially in states where the rules on write-in candidates are onerous. There is one man who believes he’s wide open in the Plan B end zone. He’s former Governor of New Mexico Gary Johnson.

Johnson secured the Libertarian Party’s nomination for president at its national convention last Saturday in Las Vegas, winning over 70% of the delegate votes.

Johnson supports Ron Paul, but doesn’t think Paul will win the Republican nomination. He wants Ron Paul supporters to know that he represents an opportunity to vote for a lot of the things they believe in.

“Ron Paul has always been about a message and so have I and it’s the same message. It’s about liberty and it’s about freedom, first and foremost, and when Dr. Paul’s candidacy comes to an end, there’s a viable alternative and I don’t think it’s a handicapped choice. I think it’s reloading. There’s no concession.”

So, do Paul supporters have to compromise to vote for Johnson?

Continue at Communities @Washington Times.com…