Libertarians sense an opportunity.
Donald Trump’s campaign has alienated enough Republican voters that, for the first time in a long time, the Libertarian Party could get 5% of the popular vote. 5% is important because a Libertarian candidate in 2020 would get over $10 Million in federal subsidies. To date, Gary Johnson has raised $8 million dollars (opensecrets) and has been using this money to run numerous popular political ads. Imagine if he had started off with $10 million before he raised a dollar? The question is, however, if Libertarians recognized that 2016 was the year to make the all-important 5%, then why did they nominate Gary Johnson? In 2012, Gary Johnson got less than 1% of the popular vote.
In 2012, Governor Johnson raised $2.3 million and got .99% of the popular vote (opensecrets). An argument could be made that Trump and Clinton have dramatically increased the Governor’s chances of reaching 5%. If $2 million equals 1% of the vote, then $8 million could equal 4% of the vote. In 2012, there was some controversy over Governor Johnson’s claim to John Stewart that he was polling at 8% (politifact), but it turned out he was probably polling closer to 6%, with core support between 1 and 3%. So what happened?
When polls are conducted, people angry with the choice between Governor Romney and President Obama often told pollsters they were voting for Governor Johnson. However, while they did, in fact, refuse to vote for Romney or Obama, they also stayed home, not voting at all. I have every reason to suspect that we will see the same thing in 2016. The assumption that money buys votes has been proven utterly false (Thank you Jeb!). While I agree that Gary Johnson’s ability to raise money indicates that he will gain a greater share of the popular vote, I do not believe he will reach the 5% the Libertarian Party is hoping he’ll achieve.
Once again, Johnson is polling (in 2016) at about the same level he was polling in 2012. Johnson is currently polling at 7.2% (rcp). It is hard to believe that, this time, all these people saying they are going to vote for Johnson are actually going to show up at the polls. Truly, what’s their incentive to do so? While many Americans consider themselves to be “libertarian”, philosophically, very few are actually interested in voting for the Libertarian Party.
Why? The Libertarian Party is not active in American Culture, have not been relevant in American Media (minus Fox Business Channel) and have not contributed popular social, foreign or political policies (other than ending prohibition). Their position on open borders is extremely unpopular with both Republicans and Democrats. Their position on Prostitution is unpopular with Republicans (Moral Majority) and Democrats (Subjugation of Women). Their Conventions are usually focused on four priorities: nudity, open borders, prostitution and pot. This is not a winning formula capable of galvanizing the electorate.
The Libertarian Party is also overwhelmingly pro-abortion, which hardly fits with their supposed love of life and liberty.
While 538 predicts that Governor Johnson will receive 8% of the vote, they bizarrely give Johnson a .3% chance of winning the electoral college. Clearly something is wrong with their formula.
I understand why Libertarians are so passionate about getting Johnson over the 5% mark. If they do and if they can find an actual Libertarian to nominate in 2020, they could have a huge impact on the next Presidential Election. I also understand the Libertarian argument that voting for Trump or Hillary, regardless what party you belong to, is insane, considering that Democrats cannot stand Secretary Clinton and Republicans cannot stand Billionaire Donald Trump. However, while there is plenty of incentive to vote against candidates you hate, there is little incentive to vote for candidates that can’t win. Very few Americans are aware of, or even care about, the all important 5% mark. Many libertarian-leaning Republicans who believed Johnson in 2012 when Johnson promised that he’d reach 5%, will be less likely to consider it a possibility after Johnson failed so catastrophically in 2012.
Furthermore, Americans must question why the Libertarian Party has, for the last three election cycles, nominated Republicans for both the top and bottom of their tickets. Is the Libertarian Party libertarian? Or is it Republican? It’s confusing.
I predict that Gary Johnson will get 3.2% of the popular vote, zero electoral college votes and once against disappoint loyal Libertarian Party members. I also suggest that if the LP is serious about getting 5%, it would be better not to depend on terrible Republican and Democrat nominees to drive voters to the polls for your candidate. We’ve had terrible Republican and Democrat nominees for the last three electoral cycles and you haven’t ever gotten close to 5%. Instead, try nominating a libertarian to run as a libertarian and focus on the most important issues facing the American electorate, setting your more unpopular plank to the side for a while.
22 comments
Don’t forget that “burn it down” sentiment has been stoked among liberals and conservatives. Now that both Hillary and the Donald have demonstrated themselves to be two faces of the same elite machine, voters may realize that the one responsible manifestation of “burn it down” is to vote third party. It’s going to be an election to remember, that’s for sure.
Who knows and who cares? No one will remember his name in six months or care about his gross but amusing ineptitude’s. Why is TBE devoting all this content space to libertarian navel gazing just 40 days out from the most important national election in over a hundred and fifty years in effect since Republican Abraham Lincoln defeated Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge, Democrat Stephen A. Douglas, and Constitutional Union candidate John Bell? If you want to be up on the latest nonsense from the libertarians go read “Reason”. Right now the Republicans have an historic election to win. How is this endless libertarian introspection from a so called convert to Republicanism helping that critical event? Or is this a libertarian blog now?
You do realize the “Libertarian Party” is a scam founded and supported by corporate America.
http://www.alternet.org/visions/true-history-libertarianism-america-phony-ideology-promote-corporate-agenda
Lol
The guy is really out there. I like most of the Libertarians I know, some of their stuff I could go along with, but I doubt they will ever win POTUS. If we don’t get Trump in we won’t get the chance to know. My guess Soros put Johnson up to it and is paying to split the vote, except it isn’t working. Soros is in ALL things.
There is a very interesting article at the Treehouse explaining who the two that Bill Kristol wanted to run against Trump. The corruption is so deep I don’t know if we will ever recover.
He’s not even really a libertarian.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/gary-johnson-religious-freedom-as-a-category-is-a-black-hole/article/2598088
Interviewer: “You think it’s the federal government’s job to prevent—”
Johnson: “Discrimination. Yes.”
Shouldn’t allowing discrimination between private entities be a core belief of a libertarian? Sometimes I get the impression Libertarians (notice the capitalization) are only concerned about legalizing marijuana.
If libertarians modeled their party after classical liberalism they may pull enough votes from Ds and Rs to do real damage. And this was the election cycle for libertarians to make a statement (or any third party for that matter)
But, as it is, libertarians are actually me-atarians and are just plain self-interested and weird. Too fringy for just about everyone. They will have do do things like not show up naked to run their own convention in order to be taken seriously.
The libertarian problem isn’t Gary Johnson. He is way more normal than the average L. The libertarian problem is libertarians.
That’s fair, but I know a large number of libertarians that I greatly respect, who are intellectuals. This article was really for them. I’d like to know what they were thinking.
And what percentage of the L crowd would you consider intellectual? They are vastly outnumbered by the pot smoking contingent.
I just looked up the circulation number of Reason magazine: 50,000. That’s not enough move the L needle.
Percentage? I don’t know. In Virginia it seems higher than normal. Robert Sarvis and Bo Brown are smart guys. Bo is a little too liberal for me. I’m sure he’d say I’m too conservative for him.
I guess a better question is: who do you think would be better than Johnson as a presidential nominee? I actually think he is as good as the Ls could do this cycle. He had name recognition and is a former governor, which isn’t bad.
I thought of Austin Peterson as a libertarians libertarian.
So did I, but that’s about like expecting a limited government, socially and fiscally conservative Republican to win the GOP presidential nomination. Seem to recall that you yourself wrote a great article on why that doesn’t or won’t happen.
On specific policy issues, I believe Johnson gets painted into corners where he never went or stated he would go, but that’s a perception issue and it’s hard to change perception.
For Republicans, the two clinking issues are abortion and open borders. Johnson does not support federal funding of abortion, but supports the individual’s right to choose abortion.
From a pragmatic pov, abortion has been legal for most of voters’ entire adult lives. Putting that genie back in the bottle now, 43 years later, is a bit of a pie in the sky goal. Eliminating federal funding for abortion is entirely doable, if our more liberal Republican congressional members would stop voting with Dems to keep it! A president willing to use the veto pen on that nonsense is miles ahead of what either of the duopoply candidates have offered.
Open borders – maybe I’ve missed something, but everything I’ve seen from Johnson indicates he supports *legal* immigration and keeping the doors open for it. I don’t think that means he is willing to turn a blind eye to illegal immigration like Obama, interfere with or discourage immigration enforcement, or ignore existing immigration law. That would be a fair middle of the road resolution of the problem, imo.
All that being said, I’m not a capital “L” liberatarian. I’m a voter faced with two unacceptable choices from the duopoly. Despite a few gaffs, Johnson is the only one I see offering a platform that can possibly unify a very divided country and keep the widest spectrum of voters happy.
Outstanding reply. Thank you for making a ridiculous amount of sense. That’s rare these days.
His VP Weld would be better than Johnson.
Weld has said Hillary Clinton is best qualified to be President and he identified Justice Breyer as the type of jurist he’s looking at for the High Court.
Weld is a nut.
Robert Sarvis a “smart guy?”
On two occasions I heard Jarvis speak and answer questions. He’s dumb as a fence post.
If you think Sarvis is dumb, then you either don’t know him, or don’t know the difference.
Most Libertarians are Socialists. Libertarianism is not so much about Liberty as understood in the 18th and early 19th century. Libertarianism is more about self-indulgence tinged with a bent towards anarchy. In fact, many Libertarians openly promote the New Anarchism in which the state is either minimal, or not at all.
From your write-up: “Their Conventions are usually focused on four priorities: nudity, open borders, prostitution and pot.” This is not at all surprising, and as you say, not entirely a winning proposition with most Americans.
By such promotes as the above, Libertarians actively promote the Culture of Decay, which is an identity with a Culture of Self-Indulgence. By extension, if the one scratches the skin of the Libertarian Intellectual, one is more apt than not to find the word ‘infantile’ in their every truncated, twisted thought.
Many of the most respectable libertarians do not become Libertarians. Instead, they promote libertarian values and positions within the two-party system, where they have a much greater chance of achieving results. The problem is that Democrats and Republicans each have some sympathies with certain libertarian values, and opposition to other libertarian extremes. On top of that, the Libertarian agenda is truly devoid of any big ideas that would dominate an election to upset the current duopoly. Three of the four top issues mentioned (Prostitution, Nudity and Drugs) are simply trivial when compared to the issues that drive elections (e.g. economy and national security). Their fourth issue, Open Borders, is certainly a big idea, but as Donald Trump has shown, the exact opposite approach (tighter immigration control and nationalist trade policy) is threatening to upset both major parties and possibly will realign one or both parties in the future. The libertarian open borders position is a loser in the current environment.
So an earnest libertarian has to make a choice. He or she can align with a major party and get slow but steady progress on some libertarian issues, or they can compete head-to-head with the two major parties and get crushed into irrelevancy in every election.
That’s why I’m a Republican.