So it has come to this: The distaste for Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton has driven some voters to latch onto the Libertarian Party.
Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson registered 10 percent in a recent Fox News survey, putting him near the 15 percent mark that would qualify him for a spot on the national debate stage with Trump and Clinton.
That’s quite a jump for a rather peculiar party that’s always come across as a not-ready-for-primetime organization. After all, the Libertarian presidential candidate captured 0.99 percent of the vote in 2012, 0.4 percent in 2008, 0.32 percent in 2004, and 0.36 percent in 2000.
At the Libertarian National Convention last weekend, a Saturday presidential debate broadcast on C-SPAN featured candidates that, in comparison, made Trump look absolutely presidential.
Brian Doherty of Reason Magazine, a pro-Libertarian publication, cringed. He wrote that some of the questions (for example, “should it be a crime to sell heroin to 5-year-olds?”) and answers made the five candidates seem like “eccentric loons.”
One of the top contenders, Austin Peteresen, offered his standard mantra: “I believe in a world where gay married couples can defend their marijuana fields with fully automatic machine guns.”
I’m convinced that once the public gets a closer look at Libertarianism, they will discard it without a second thought. This is a party with longtime doctrinaire positions such as eliminating Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid; dissolving the Environmental Protection Agency; making massive cuts to the defense budget; allowing a free flow of immigration across U.S. borders; wiping gun control laws off the books; and legalizing most drugs.
At the same time, Johnson, who won the nomination on Sunday, as he did in 2012, is now considered suspect. He was booed several times at the debate. As Doherty put it, the question has become whether the former New Mexico governor is “libertarian enough for the Libertarians.”
Another problem for Johnson this time around is that his running mate is former Massachusetts governor William Weld, which was certainly an odd choice. Weld’s legacy may be that he represents the last big-government liberal Northeastern Republican who had a place on the national political stage.
In this bizarre election season of “NeverTrump and #NeverHillary factions, it would surprise no one if internal bickering among the Libertarians spawns a #NeverJohnson movement.
To sort all this out, columnist Susan Demas steps forward with a new piece today for Dome Magazine that dissects whether the Libertarian Party is “ready for its closeup.” Demas, editor and publisher of Inside Michigan Politics, sees two emerging stories following the convention that will determine Libertarian success:
So far, Libertarians aren’t having much luck with prominent Democrats, who are alienated by their isolationist, anti-tax and anti-social safety net platform, despite their liberalness on social issues and immigration. But rank-and-file Sanders supporters –– some of whom don’t have ties to the Democratic Party and believe (despite all evidence to the contrary) that the election is being stolen from him –– may be better targets.
There have already been a few Republican defections of note. Longtime GOP strategist Mary Matalin, a key adviser to former President George H.W. Bush, registered as a Libertarian this year, arguing the two-party system is failing. (She’s a charter member of the “Never Hillary” contingent, even as her husband, Democratic strategist James Carville, is a long-time Clinton loyalist).
… But the second big story was Libertarian Party chair candidate James Weeks doing a striptease (yes, set to music), which, naturally, went viral. That’s the wacky Libertarian Party most of us know and love. One of the biggest running media jokes was that there were more people in Chewbacca costumes at the (Orlando) convention than at the new “Star Wars” attractions at Disney (for the record, that wasn’t true).
Regardless, it’s not clear that the Libertarian Party is ready for its closeup yet. At (the) debate, Johnson was booed for supporting driver licenses and the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Those are eminently mainstream positions –– but they are in conflict with doctrinaire libertarianism.
Photos: CNN, C-SPAN
