United Liberty
Gary Johnson is not a…wait, what?
Wed, 04/18/2012 - 2:20pm | posted by Jeremy Kolassa
Last week, I read a very interesting op-ed by Thomas Mullen that went by the title of “Gary Johnson is not a libertarian”:
Throughout this election cycle, Gary Johnson’s name has been omnipresent as a libertarian alternative. There’s only one problem. Gary Johnson is not a libertarian.
This just seems to be occurring to some of the faithful after his disastrous interview with the Daily Caller. In it, Johnson proposes to cut the military budget by 43 percent. However, when pressed on one hypothetical military intervention after another, Johnson refuses to rule any out. He’d consider military intervention for humanitarian reasons. He believes that the United States should maintain a military presence in the Middle East. He would continue drone attacks in Pakistan. By the end of the interview, libertarians were likely waiting for Johnson to rip off a mask Scooby Doo villain-style, revealing he was really Dick Cheney in disguise.
This gets back to the point I made in my last blog post about problems with the libertarian movement, specifically foreign policy. We, as a movement, have gotten way too puritanical about what makes libertarians libertarians. Many insist on an absolutionist view of the non-aggression principle, when really, the entire goal of libertarianism is simply maximizing individual liberty.
I don’t know about you, but legalizing marijuana, cutting the military budget by 43%, possibly eliminating the drinking age, and repeal the PATRIOT Act is pretty damn libertarian in my book. Saying that he isn’t libertarian because he doesn’t hew to an absolutionist line on the non-aggression principle is not just silly, it’s dangerous. As I said previously, it hamstrings us to a completely unreasonable policy line we can’t hold, as well as open us up to attacks both rhetorical and actual.
Mullen continues:
From the moment that he announced his run for president as a Republican, Gary Johnson has stated that he believes that all government policies should be formulated using a “cost-benefit analysis” (about the 2:20 mark). What are we spending our money on and what are we getting in return? (Libertarians would likely question him on just who “we” is and how it became “our money,” but I digress.) While that might be a lot better than what Washington is doing now – all cost and no discernible benefit – it’s not how libertarians make policy decisions.
Definitely not in Libertopia, but then again, we don’t live in Libertopia. And it would be a vast improvement over what’s going on inside the Beltway. If that’s the case, why don’t we embrace it?
And finally:
There is no evidence that Gary Johnson is even aware of the philosophical basis of libertarianism. If he is aware of it, he’s obviously decided to reject it. That’s certainly his prerogative, but he shouldn’t be seeking the Libertarian Party’s nomination.
The Libertarian Party has never garnered more than about 1% of the vote in a presidential election. Its chief benefit has always been that it nominated candidates that libertarians could actually believe in, even if they weren’t going to win. This was true as late as 2004, when the party nominated Michael Badnarik. However, it badly damaged itself by nominating Bob Barr in 2008. If it nominates Gary Johnson for president in 2012, it will completely lose all relevance, even among libertarians.
Ron Paul is not a perfect libertarian, but he does understand libertarian philosophy and he does form his positions based upon the non-aggression principle, as he confirmed in my own interviewwith him last year (about the 7:30 mark). That’s why he told Matt Lauer (about the 5:00 mark) that economic liberty, personal liberty and his non-interventionist foreign policy are all one package. Libertarians believe that initiating force is wrong, whether it is military force against another nation or a government bureau forcibly transferring money from one person or group to another.
[…]
If the Libertarian Party wants to be practical in spreading the libertarian message, it should endorse Ron Paul as its candidate in 2012. He is more libertarian than any politician in U.S. history and he has more visibility than any candidate the party could field. If it wishes to put forth its own candidate, then it should nominate a true libertarian. It has several choices.
This has got to be the most idiotic statement of the year, and it’s only April.
Bob Barr was a conservative Republican who switched to the Libertarian Party in order to run for president. Gary Johnson is definitely a libertarian (small-l) Republican who found that his beliefs were more welcome in the Libertarian Party. Furthermore, saying that the Libertarian Party would “lose all relevance” if it nominated Gary Johnson is just the height of idiocy. All you need to do is look at Johnson’s record: two-term governor of a state that had more Democrats than Republicans. Vetoed hundreds of bills. Sharply cut the budget. Balanced it within four years (if I’m not mistaken.) Get the picture? If anything, nominating Johnson would improve the Party’s standing and get it more publicity. Not enough to take the presidency, mind you, but enough to make a dent. (Particularly in New Mexico.)
As for Ron Paul, he would be a bad choice for the Libertarian Party. If he were nominated, it would destroy the libertarian wing within the GOP as the bigger party would force them out (which might be a good thing, but let’s not test that just yet.) Furthermore, it would utterly ruin Senator Rand Paul’s career, and right now, he’s practically the lone voice in the Senate wilderness protecting our freedoms and standing up to BS like PIPA. Losing Rand would be a huge blow to American libertarianism.
Now, I disagree with Johnson about some of his foreign policy: I would rule out military interventions for humanitarian operations, and I don’t want to send any more doughboys to the Middle East. But we need to stop this feldercarb where people aren’t libertarian because they’re not pure. That will surely be the end to our movement, and with it, any hopes for liberty in our lifetimes.
Mullen is just bitter Ron Paul has been running second and third place in the primaries, or discounted all together like the North Dakota where the committee ignored Santorum and Ron Paul and decided to send a lot of pro-Romney delegates and only one Ron Paul delegate instead.
I like Johnson, he’s the first politician I’ve ever seen where listening/seeing him talk doesn’t make my skin crawl. He’s honest to a fault, look the the New Hampshire registration incident whete he fessed up it was ultimately his screw up. He’s not a pure bred Libertarian, but Obama hasn’t been acting like a true bred Democrat and Romney is no true bred Republican either. I don’t agree with everything Johnson says, but where it matters a lot, I agree whole heartedly: spending, budgets, personal freedoms.
Ron Paul has many admirable qualities, but his isolationist views are unrealistic. Mullen is just feeling the bitterness of a lot of Ron Pail fans who have seen Ron Paul marginalized, made fun of or plain old ignored this election cycle. Look at what happened to Judge Napolitano after all his vocal support of Ron Paul on his show, Freedom Watch. They axed the show. Fourth most popular show on FBN and they ax it.
^^^^ I think you need to look up the meaning of isolatinist.
Gary Johnson is the most “libertarian” candidate that the LP has had in a long time. And the most qualified. Gary Johnson has the most potential for success of any LP presidential candidate.
Beware of those who are trying to drive a wedge between the Ron Paul supporters and Gary Johnson. They *are* out there, in force, and they’re the enemies of the Liberty message. We have a country to save and individual liberty to restore - don’t take the bait. The fact that they’re expending so much effort to dissuade you tells you how much potential Gary Johnson holds.
Great post, and good job calling this fuckwit out. Who gets to pass his ideological purity test? There is a candidate out there who meets every theoretical criteria? If not who do we support (draft Pat Buchanan, he needs a job, and someone once upon a time was able to make that asinine ideological justification)? WHEN Ron Paul endorses Mitt Romney (or keeps his mouth shut one way or the other) who do we support then? We all sit back, safe in our ideological cocoon for not having strayed, on this one principle that is supposedly THE most important thing ever to anyone who thinks about using the term libertarian, and hope Rand makes a run in 2016?
Johnson is more of a libertarian than anyone who is going to be running come November, and if he isn’t allowed to hold the title of “libertarian” because he can’t get a super-duper LRC special decoder ring, then the term doesn’t mean a fucking thing. What about the whole making the perfect the enemy of the good thing we keep hearing? I met Johnson on Sunday, spoke to him for a few minutes (read about it below if you care) and what I took away from it is the man is genuine, and cares about doing something over here in reality land. That is where we acknowledge that this country spent 60 Cold War years making enemies that are not going away over night no matter who is in the office, and also that one of the reasons libertarians don’t gain traction with people in general is the straw men that have been constructed to deflate the movement, the worst being how we would have let the Huns/Nazis/Commies/Moonies take over the planet had we been in charge. I would like to see a movement that actually tries to include people and accepts diversity of thought, something that can come together to create policies that will improve our countries lot. I don’t know who gave this asshat control of the velvet rope to decide who is/isn’t a libertarian, but I am unimpressed with his logic on this one, and you did a good job refuting it.
http://www.libertariansjustlikeyou.com/2012/04/gary-johnson-short-review…
I like Gary Johnson but the author of the other piece simply did what Kolassa has done on 3 or 4 different blog posts now: calling out a libertarian because he disagrees with some of their views. I actually find this post funny but quite hypocritical.
You know, that’s fair. That’s not the message I wanted to send across, but it might have happened, so that’s a fair cop.
There’s a difference between disagreeing with something, and saying “you’re not a libertarian.” What Jeremy is saying here is that libertarianism encompasses a wider philosophy than some might think, particularly on foreign policy, and to claim that Johnson is not libertarian is to believe that libertarianism dictates one single view of every issue. This is something that Randy Barnett and Ilya Somin, two top minds in libertarian circles, have noted before.
I was once the chair of the Multnomah County LP. We had a meeting, and one woman decided to take it upon herself to sit by the door and be the credentialing committee. I walked right past her, refusing to “check in”. As soon as I called the meeting to order, she stood up & screamed that I was “NOT a Libertarian”. For not checking in at the door? I’ve reached the age where I ignore idjits who think their delusions are objective truth. They’re not libertarians… ;)
So, you would “ignore” using the United States Military for humanitarian purposes? Wow. Just Wow!
So, in another words you would have been just fine with Hitler’s Holocaust against the Jews? 6 million dead and you would have just stood by and said, “hey dude, none of our business.”
Cambodia? Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. Worst genocidal atrocity in human history. 2 million killed by the Communists out of a population of 6 million. But hey, “none of our business, dude… pass the bong.”
You Sir, are a human piece of shit. You don’t deserve to call yourself a “libertarian.” Get the fuck out of our libertarian movement. And go join the Nazis and Communists that you’re so fond of.
Way to stay classy Eric.
Is this guy serious?
A person who has in the past endorsed non-libertarians like Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin, who holds out a bigot like Pamela Geller as someone to be admired, and who now seems in the tank for Mitt Romney has no business kicking anyone out of a “liberty movement” that you clearly don’t even represent very well.
Hey, Eric, I find nothing libertarian about your neo-con foreign policy.
Eric,
Please explain to me how you’re a libertarian. Please. I will sit here and wait.
Jeremy,
Just don’t hold your breath waiting for a good explanation.
Just for clarity, the US did not get involved in WWII because of Hitler’s war on Jews. You could use a few history lessons. (Also some well needed psychiatric evaluation based on your last comment.)
Mullen has already made his agenda known. He is a Romney supporter who is looking to undermine Gary Johnson because he fears Johnson will siphon votes from Romney in the general election. Do not fall for his tricks.
I think that to pass judgment on the Libertarian status of another, one must BE a Libertarian. Tom Mullen is not a Libertarian. He also completely misunderstands the Non-Initiation Principle that is the basic premise of Libertarian thought. Self-defense and preparation for self-defense is NOT initiation of force. There are arguments in Libertarian circles about how the NIP is to be applied, but every Libertarian understands the right to self-defense.
Ron Paul—and even more so his followers—hew to a nearly pacifist ideology in which the there is no right to self-defense. Rather, self-defense is a moral privilege that accrues only to those who are morally perfect and who have predecessors that have morally pure actions. In their view, the United States has no right to self defense because of actions in the past. This is not an individualist view, but rather collectivist in that it predicates an individual’s rights on the group to which he or she belongs.
Gary Johnson is a Libertarian, and his Libertarian creds are far more solid than those of Bob Barr or his VP-candidate side-kick, Wayne Allen Root (who also dissed the LP recently. See http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/04/wayne-allyn-root-tells… ).
Ron Paul represents the ideological side of libertarianism, Gary Johnson represents the pragmatic side. Gary seems to have almost exclusively arrived at libertarian solutions to problems on the basis of “they work”. Ron Paul seems to have been committed to liberty for liberty’s sake from the get-go, and embraces libertarian solutions whether or not they work (they do). RP says “it’s none of the government’s business what you smoke”; GJ says “drug prohibition is a disastrous policy that exacerbates the problems caused by drug abuse.” The same prescription — legalize drugs — arrived at from different logical starting points.
Gary Johnson is what this country needs right now The two main parties are like Coke and Pepsi, I’ll take the spring water and vote for Gary Johnson.
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