In an article published by the Santa Monica Observer, headlined “Romney, McCain, Bush, other major Republicans Set to Endorse Libertarian Gary Johnson for President: Rebel Republicans Will Hold an Event in late August to Endorse Johnson & Weld over Clinton & Trump,” staff writer Stan Greene reports:
“Mitt Romney, George Bush 41 and George Bush 43, as well as other mainstream Republican party figures, are set to endorse Libertarian Presidential Candidate Gary Johnson next week, say sources within the “Never Trump” movement and other disaffected Republicans.”
The entire article can be read HERE.
The most efficient advertising for a POTUS race of this type is Targeted Major Network Broadcast TV in key states. It can be targeted much better than YouTube and is far more effective than Internet advertising. Internet ads are very cheap for a reason – they don’t work very well.
And, from various reports, the Johnson campaign appears to have raised enough to spend $2 to $3 million dollars on late August and early September ads in key states. Of course, as usual, they will probabaly use the money to pay themselves and piss away a bit on radio and cable – not enough to be effective in any market – pretending to advertise, but just enough so they aren’t lying to the donors to whom they promise advertising and outreach.
This is the last window: We must run Major Network Broadcast TV advertising in the targeted states from the last week of August through the second week of September: $2,000,000 to $3,000,000 minimum on these 12 states:
You seem to be making the rather bold assumption that he has $2-3 million to throw onto TV advertising to begin with.
That said, advertising in some kind of video form would certainly help. It seems people thought the “greatest lie” ad was pretty good, but you need people to actually see the ad who haven’t been told about it. I do wonder if YouTube is the better option, though, as I believe it’s less expensive than television ads (in terms of how much you pay per thousand) and you can be more sure people actually watch the thing (YouTube only charges you for when people actually watch enough of your ad, and unlike television people are less likely to leave the ad playing as they leave the room, because there’s only one commercial to sit through). And it can be set up to only play for people in the US so you don’t spend money on someone in Romania.
fox news talked about gary Johnson a lot today and that one guy endorsed him hardcore…hes polling 12 percent when just the 3 of them are polled…..also debate commission says to everyone be prepared for a 3rd podium…..wow…..u never know this is the year. I still believe trumps right on the wall though….weve pissed off enough muslims over the years by envading there countries for no reason at all that we need a wall
This is the last window: We must run Major Network Broadcast TV advertising in the targeted states from the last week of August through the second week of September: $2,000,000 to $3,000,000 minimum on these 12 states:
What makes you so convinced they even have that kind of money to drop on TV ads?
What surprises me is lack of Internet ads. I’ve yet to see any ads for Gary Johnson at the start of a YouTube or Hulu video, and those ads are much cheaper; some quick research indicates the cost per viewer to advertise is something like 1/10th what it is on television. Then again, maybe I’m just not in the demographics being targeted?
Amount of TV advertising to date:
http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/team-clinton-now-outspending-trump-ads-52-million-0-n626236
The above reports:
In total, that’s $91 million for Team Clinton, versus $8 million for Team Trump.
What’s more, the Trump campaign ($0) is also being outspent on ads by Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson ($15,000) and the Green Party’s Jill Stein ($189,000).
SOURCE: Advertising Analytics
If what the Santa Monica Observer is right, this is exciting. But, this get’s filed under “I’ll believe it when I see it”.
I suspect a lot of never-Trump/never-Clinton politicians are holding their breaths on endorsing anyone yet. Few want to stick their necks out against their party too far. That so many are stepping out to say they are voting for neither is quite a thing in itself.
I’m guessing they’re waiting to see if the RNC can or would do anything to improve the ticket (I doubt they can or will barring something dramatic happening like Trump quitting or imploding beyond the low standards he’s set for himself).
Or maybe they’re holding out for some other republican to run independently and make a splash. Apparently the just announced, “Egg McMuffin”, is the defacto contender for that. But I don’t think this has a chance of getting much traction.
But if Gary Johnson’s polls continue to move up, and the media attention holds up, I think there will be endorsements, but they’ll come slowly at first. Once fantasies of the great GOP hope fade away, maybe they’ll pick up.
I am not sure Be Rational’s idea is good, but it is surely better than nothing. Readers may compare this proposal with Johnson campaign ad buy announcements.
However, we will know in a few weeks if they have the money Be Rational says is necessary.
There is only one major barrier to GJ and WW being elected P and VP in November, and that is a campaign management team that is clueless about snowballing the campaign by advertising, earning free media and generating growing interest in the ticket which will bring in donations in growing increments to allow the cycle to build, grow and repeat.
This is the last window: We must run Major Network Broadcast TV advertising in the targeted states from the last week of August through the second week of September: $2,000,000 to $3,000,000 minimum on these 12 states:
ME, NH, VT
MA, RI, CT (excluding expensive NY market)
NM, CO, UT
WA, OR, CA (excluding expensive LA market)
This is to generate the free media needed to get to the 15% plus needed for the debates. It will also generate a massive surge in funding for the fall advertising blitz through November that will target states to win for 270 EV.
The initial plan is to go after the regions where Gary and Bill are better known, naturally more popular and stronger plus three West coast states. Most of the 12 states are blue states that are safe for Clinton, so dissatisfied Ds can safely shift to GJ since the state is safe for Hillary, and dissatisfied Rs know there is no chance of any R, let alone Trump, carrying the state so they can dump the hated Trump safely.
After the debates, there will be the chance for a slight shift in some of the targeting to the most winnable states.
Should Johnson make the debates and deliver a rational, sane, positive alternative to C and T, increasing poll numbers will eliminate the “wasted vote” problem and the “lesser of two evils” problem.
At that point we add a much larger group in the West and North to the target and (depending on funding)temporarily drop CA.
Adding through the end of September:
MT, ID, WY
NV, AZ
ND, SD, NE
IA, MN, WI
While continuing in:
ME, NH, VT
MA, RI, CT (excluding expensive NY market)
NM, CO, UT
WA, OR
This is still not 270, but funding and polls at that point will drive the choices of battleground states from that point onward toward the 270 and beyond. Being D vs L, the battlegounds will be new and different. The campaign will change from Clinton vs Trump with Johnson a distant third to Clinton vs Johnson with Trump as a Perot type potential spoiler at 18% or so.
But, the GJ/WW team has to spend the money they’ve raised NOW on major network broadcast TV ads in the first round of target states.
… and any Super PACs sitting on a million or more out there – Get busy and run ads FOR GJ/WW in the targeted states.
Don’t wait. Start NOW and more funds will come.
This is our last window before the debates. Wait any longer and all chances will be gone.
We’ve already waited far too long and it’s already much more expensive to generate the interest we need. Soon it will no longer be possible to make the debates.
“Rep. Scott Rigell, R-Va., joins Morning Joe to discuss why he is backing Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson for president, why the Republican Party made a mistake in nominating Donald Trump and why many in Congress are uneasy about Trump as the nominee.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPVtW67Jh2w
********
This is a solid, serious endorsement of Gary Johnson. More of these – if his campaign actually learns how to run a POTUS campaign – and GJ can not only make the 15% for debate inclusion, but he can be elected POTUS outright.
********
… and more …
“This Latino Republican will support Libertarian Gary Johnson:
Johnson is not only an option “C,” he is our only option.
Juan Hernandez was the Hispanic outreach director for the 2008 John McCain presidential campaign. He is a contributor to CNN Espanol.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/08/09/this-latino-republican-will-support-libertarian-gary-johnson/
The Edsels and Ford Pintos with the chicken part of the “Chicken on a Stick” stuck on top of the radio antenna didn’t give that away?
Their actual media strategy, nonetheless, is even worse. (Although the content of the GREATEST LIE EVER TOLD IN AMERICA video was excellent.)
My apologies, I had thought you were being humorous in return . . . That child’s needless death on that misdesigned waterslide is tragic.
Joe
JB, I hope your post is intended to be humorous.
It would be very bad earned media indeed to be associated with a young boy killed in a tragic accident.
They’re too smart for that!
“Don’t Water Down Your Vote, Use Your Head – Vote for Johnson!”
Should generate a lot of earned media for them.
(Reuters) – A 10-year-old boy, the son of a state lawmaker, died of a neck injury while riding the world’s tallest water slide in Kansas City, Kansas, police said on Monday.
Caleb Thomas Schwab died on Sunday at the Schlitterbahn waterpark on the Verrückt water slide, which sends riders plunging down 17 stories at up to 50 miles an hour (80 kph).
*******
It would be a HUGE mistake to put a billboard on this ride in this election cycle.
Whatever plans the campaign may have made for this should be immediately cancelled.
Ad wrappers on cars and billboards …
This is how you run a low budget campaign for statewide office in a low population state …
… and you still need TV advertising to win, in most cases.
The GJ/WW campaign management team is completely clueless about a nationwide POTUS campaign – 3rd pary or major party, they have no clue.
“Logic fail. The Libertarian Party could not possibly be responsible for who endorses its candidates. A number of Libertarians endorsed Ron Paul in 2008 and 2012. Did that mean that the GOP had “sold out its principles” and turned into a libertarian party?”
In this case, TeamGov is actively pursuing these endorsements. I don’t know the extent the LP is actively involved in such pursuits but they will be trumpeting them. As well as TeamGov’s media arm, including Reason and Cato.
Over a year ago. I wrote/tweeted that we would end up w/ Clinton v Bush and though at the time that choice would seem like the epitome of plutocratic establishment rot, by the time the election rolled around that choice would be trumpeted as a liberation. Well, we didn’t get Bush, but we sure as hell got Clinton. And I’ve got people telling me that it is a crime against humanity not to vote Clinton in order to thwart the forces of evil. On the libertarian side, an endorsement by the crusty establishment rot that is the Bush dynasty is now a great victory.
The sh*t is so transparent and predictable…
And here are some other quotes from Tucker, in his younger days. About half of them sound like they might have been written by Hans Hoppe, or even Gary North.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Tucker
Here’s a link to that Tucker rant about “Eleanor Rigby”: https://web.archive.org/web/20070406074759/http://blog.lewrockwell.com/lewrw/archives/010177.html#more
(Strangely, the original seems to have disappeared from LRC. Maybe it was “too libertarian” for Lew?
As an example of how far to the right Tucker used to be on cultural issues, I recall him once going off a truly bizarre tangent about how the song “Eleanor Rigby” was a classic example of anti-Christian propaganda, and was basically evidence that rock music was “the devil’s music” (I don’t think he used that exact term, but that was clearly the gist of his argument). No joke.
As for Tucker, his own views seem to have changed a lot more over the years than have those of Rockwell, and if he felt uncomfortable with the Mises crowd, I think it had more to do with his own evolution than anything else.
Were these changes motivated by the prospect of monetary gain? Possibly. But I’m more inclined to believe that Rockwell was simply imitating his idol Rothbard, who also had a tendency to keep the same basic positions, but greatly alter the “spin” he put on them, based on how he perceived the political winds of the time to be blowing.
Midway through Obama’s first term (somewhere around the time Obamacare was passed), the site seemed to start slowly moving back toward the right, with more focus on cultural issues (especially opposition to immigration/globalism).
If you go back and look at the early days of LRC, during the end of Clinton’s second term and the beginning of Bush’s first term, the site was pretty far to the right. Then, after 9/11, it took a pretty dramatic turn to the left, as cultural issues largely took a backseat to furious neocon-bashing.
Well, LRC has always been an amalgamation of political libertarianism and cultural conservatism. How much emphasis is placed on each of those things has varied greatly over the years.
langa,
If you think I implied that he doesn’t want to be associated with libertarian ideas, that thing you’re doing that you think is thinking, isn’t.
He’s fine with being associated with any ideas, as long as being associated with those ideas brings in the bucks.
He’s not fine with being associated with people who expect him to put any litmus test on what ideas he associates with above and beyond the test “does this idea bring in the bucks?”
That doesn’t make sense. If he didn’t want to be associated with libertarian ideas (as you imply), why would he continue to host articles promoting those ideas? Unless you think he “purged” Tucker over a personal issue, or something like that. But of course, that would have nothing to do with “purging the libertarians.”
langa,
Just because he didn’t want the PEOPLE around doesn’t mean he didn’t want the traffic — and therefore the revenue — generated by their articles.
If Rockwell wanted to “purge” Tucker, you would think he would have deleted his LRC article archive, no?
“Why is that surprising? Tucker used to be a major player at Mises.”
I think Krzysztof is pretty young. He may not be old enough to remember what LvMI/LRC looked like back before Lew purged the libertarians.
But anyway, when I first opened the book, I flipped to the editorial introduction, and lo and behold, it was written by none other than….Jeffrey Tucker himself! I nearly had a convulsion. Turns out Tucker’s Laisse Faire Books published the title.
Why is that surprising? Tucker used to be a major player at Mises. For example, LRC published over 200 of his articles: https://www.lewrockwell.com/author/jeffrey-tucker/
Why, at http://www.edselworld.com, of course.
Edsels? Those are real antiques. Where did the campaign find them?
So Johnson/Wells is hiring more non-libertarian mercenaries. Great, just what they need (sarcasm).
George Phillies @ August 8, 2016 at 20:11
“lead people from the McCain/Palin campaign team”
I can confirm this as I also heard they are giving them cars to use – Edsels and Ford Pintos to be wrapped with the Johnson/Weld logo, no mention of “Libertarian” but they will have the chicken part of the chicken on a stick atop the radio antenna. They are also apparently in negotiations to put a billboard up on that world’s largest water slide in Kansas.
Be Rational writes: “You just can’t get there without advertising. Internet and radio only work to supplement and fill in tiny nitches. There is no substitute for a very substantial, Targeted, Major Network, Broadcast TV advertising plan in key states.”
Well, the first sentence is certainly correct. We also understand where Be Rational works or used to work.
However, Johnson/Weld does not appear to be advertising very much, and is getting the consequences. In fact, for June, they socked away a lot of cash. This was the time to put out ads, before those other parties start doing so. However, good news, we seem to have from the last LNC meeting that Johnson/Weld hired another 35 staffers. From multiple reports, they are going to be bringing on some other big-time campaign people, namely lead people from the McCain/Palin campaign team that did so well in 2008.
“It’s failure to do real political advertising and real political party buliding and outreach – the hard work, over the long years needed to win.”
Yep, keep telling yourself that.
This is good. Better than the louse Ron Paul who won’t endorse anyone.
“… instead of doing the hard work of building a strong national party with strong state parties and strong county parties; running a real – yes, expensive – ad campaign; and doing the difficult but real political work – outreach at every public event and door-to-door – required to win elections.” – BR
“Uh, they’re already doing that, plus the star power of the Johnson/Weld ticket is going to make the above a lot easier to do in the long run.” – CQ
*****
Nope. That kind of work, outreach and organization has only been done by two or three state LPs, and only for a few years, out of the entire history of the Party.
… and that’s why the LP hasn’t grown to major party status:
It’s not the SoP, NAP, difficult ballot access laws, single member voting districts or plurality elections…
It’s failure to do real political advertising and real political party buliding and outreach – the hard work, over the long years needed to win.
I’m very concerned that the propagators of the neo-con foreign policies and crony capitalist economic policies, that has harmed America, are going to endorse Gary Johnson. – Joe Wendt
******
You should be more concerned if they don’t.
There are not enough Ls to win an election.
This year, America needs to elect someone other than the D & R nominees.
Both are dangerous for America and the World.
Trump is psychologically and emotionally unfit to be POTUS.
Clinton is a corrupt, opportunistic, power-driven, military interventionist, fascist-socialist.
You should expect that many sane, thoughful individuals will be looking for alternatives to prevent one or both of these dangerous major party candidates from sitting in the Oval Office – even former Presidents, presidential candidates, Senators and House members.
Hopefully they WILL endorse Johnson/Weld as the only sane, balanced, experienced, trustworthy choice.
There is more than ideology at stake in this election.
“… instead of doing the hard work of building a strong national party with strong state parties and strong county parties; running a real – yes, expensive – ad campaign; and doing the difficult but real political work – outreach at every public event and door-to-door – required to win elections.”
Uh, they’re already doing that, plus the star power of the Johnson/Weld ticket is going to make the above a lot easier to do in the long run.
Btw, the L.P. just got on the ballot in Massachusetts today.
Latest Monmoth Poll: nationwide:
Support among likely voters stands at 50% Clinton, 37% Trump, 7% Johnson, and 2% Stein
As the Washington Post has pointed out, media interest is declining.
As the polls show, voter interest is declining.
You just can’t get there without advertising. Internet and radio only work to supplement and fill in tiny nitches. There is no substitute for a very substantial, Targeted, Major Network, Broadcast TV advertising plan in key states.
But, the best advertising windows have all closed for effective pre-debate polling advertising.
Late August and early September TV ads will require $2 to $3 million dollars now in a pool of target states. There is no reason to change the pool previously presented at this time – if you’re still going for the 15%.
But, we can all cross our fingers, hope and pray that someone else will save the day.
Why is it that even Libertarians have adopted the welfare state mentality in relying on fantasy, magic or superheros to save them?
… instead of doing the hard work of building a strong national party with strong state parties and strong county parties; running a real – yes, expensive – ad campaign; and doing the difficult but real political work – outreach at every public event and door-to-door – required to win elections.
I’m very concerned that the propagators of the neo-con foreign policies and crony capitalist economic policies, that has harmed America, are going to endorse Gary Johnson.
To everyone,
First of all, I was too harsh with my first comment….I should not paint the entire LP with a broad brushstroke just because Weld is on the ticket. I know that there’s plenty of activists and candidates for down ballot races that are genuinely anti-war. My word choice was poor in this regard, as I was just reacting impulsively to the information that we now know is, thankfully, not correct. I apologize for labeling the entire Libertarian Party as a group that is becoming apologetic towards mass murder. This was an extreme, off the cuff statement, and I’m sorry, once again, to the longtime LP members, activists, readers and everyone for using that type of insulting language.
Here’s a brief, true story: in 2012, Johnson received 4 votes in my precinct (I was 16 years old at the time) and Stein received 3. One of those Johnson votes came from my mom, who I dragged to the polls at the last minute. I was actually going through my first major truancy period from school at the time, but I got my mom to vote for Johnson/ Gray, thereby ensuring he beat Stein by one vote and bringing his percentage in the district up to 0.69%. This is just to show that I genuinely liked Johnson back in 2012, when I was continuing the Ron Paul Revolution to the ballot box, albeit it being technically continued by my mom’s act of civic participation.
Thomas:
As for your question about Assad and his party, and providing any reasons why he shouldn’t be condemned: I honestly cannot give a substantive, well-reasoned response – due to my overall ignorance on the subject. One of the noble qualities I find in Gary Johnson, as a person, not as a political candidate, is his humility and willingness to admit when he is wrong or when he does not know the answer to a question. The latest CNN town hall was an illustration of this. Of course, I will not vote for him under any circumstance largely in part due to Weld (but also Johnson himself), but I think that Never Trumpers, Sandernistas and first time voting youth will be drawn to Johnson’s candid demeanor. Johnson’s line “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to memorize anything,” was a home run. I admit this as an avowed opponent of his campaign.
So (sort of, kinda) following in his footsteps, I just genuinely don’t have the information at this point in time to articulately answer your question. I do know there’s a Polish nationalist organization, which runs the website xportal.pl, called Falanga, and it members have visted with Assad, supported the Syrian government staunchly….Falanga is also a Russophile group (I’m pro-Russian myself), they are pro Lukashenko, anti Ukrainian nationalism (Stepan Bandera, OUN UPA committed mass genocide against Poles in 1943 on the terrain now belonging to Ukraine that was historically Polish) anti NATO/US/Israel, socially conservative and economically they are pretty much communists. I do not know how many similarities there are between this group and Syrian Falangists (I believe Falangism was also a player in Spain at one point), but I believe there may be some.
Back to the point though, I will learn more about Assad and his ideology and history to provide an actual answer to the question.
Finally, this one is just for fun: I went to the library today and picked up the one book by Hans Herman Hoppe that was currently available: The Great Fiction: Property, Economy, Society, and the Politics of Decline (2012). I’m on page 27 of the book, and it’s absolutely enthralling and fascinating, Hoppe has such prose, but it’s on such a high level that it’s not easy for me to follow at times. But anyway, when I first opened the book, I flipped to the editorial introduction, and lo and behold, it was written by none other than….Jeffrey Tucker himself! I nearly had a convulsion. Turns out Tucker’s Laisse Faire Books published the title.
I’m going to at least TRY to not be as combative until I have a firm grasp of what libertarianism actually is. After Hoppe, I’ll turn to the few books my library has by Mises, Rothbard and Hayek.
Be Rational @ August 8, 2016 at 13:02
“My pre-nomination requirement for supporting Johnson and Weld was that they replace their campaign manager with someone who understands 3rd party campaigns – especially using targeted advertising for free media leverage – and run their campaign with a very open accounting of fundraising and expenditures in real time.”
Ditto. I told Governor Johnson, who graciously hosted me in his home in New Mexico a year and a month or so ago, very much the same. He was under the passionate impression at that time, apparently, that there were “no debts from 2012” (meanwhile the FEC reports at that time showed $1.5 million, if memory serves). Best I could manage was a heartfelt request that he “double check what Ron is doing.”
One of the Governor’s core qualities is loyalty to those closest to him. But from that moment, I walked away. Makes me sad. He is truly a very likable, guile-free, honest nice guy.
This whole article is speculative, yet their endorsements certainly wouldn’t stop me from voting Johnson/Weld because for a minor-party ticket to attract establishment endorsement like these figures would only show how fragile and divided our country’s establishment has become.
Sorry, but if we are to defeat the establishment, it must be done when either the establishment is internally divided against itself, or if a sizable portion of it defects to an anti-establishment cause and aids/funds them. To defeat our country’s establishment completely from the outside is a laughable, unrealistic pipe dream.
In the meantime, this McMullin candidate entered too late to make a difference, and while he will attract some establishment support, it will not be enough and I do believe that some of these political figures are going to go with Johnson anyways, since he is the more realistically feasible candidate when it comes to ballot access and polling strength. And when it comes to the general public, I can see McMullin drawing as many votes as Tom Hoefling on election day.
But, when this race ends, the LP should have better name recognition and better ballot status in place than ever before:
If we begin immediately to organize county LP groups – with a goal of organizing an independent, separate LP group in every county in every state (excepting those small counties under 1,000 or so population), and doing outreach at every state fair, county fair, gun show and other open, public events. If we set up speaking events for LP luminaries to reach out to the public. If we do serious internal education to make good Libertarians out of the tens of thousands of prospects we can generate through this campaign and our couty groups. And if the LP finally learns how to advertise using leverage to garner free earned media, we can nominate our own elected officials in the “20 and ’24 POTUS races and make the debates.
Actually, I’ve always assumed, even before the convention, that their first goal was to pay themselves.
My pre-nomination requirement for supporting Johnson and Weld was that they replace their campaign manager with someone who understands 3rd party campaigns – especially using targeted advertising for free media leverage – and run their campaign with a very open accounting of fundraising and expenditures in real time.
Be Rational @ August 8, 2016 at 12:43
You remind me of how long it took Hank and Dagny to reevaluate their assumptions about the looters in Atlas Shrugged.
You assume their goal is to “win.”
It seems there may be another thesis that would more closely match the data from both 2012 and today.
And one in which they are, indeed, accomplishing everything they set out to do (while pulling along a lot of good, dedicated, but ultimately misled, liberty fighters in their wake.)
Or so it seems to me.
Did Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson miss his moment?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/08/07/did-libertarian-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson-miss-his-moment/
*******
Johnson’s only hope now is to get these hinted endorsements.
However, with the never-Trump candidate, Evan McMullin, emerging – that seems less likely.
And Richard Winger’s comment on the McMullin thread indicates that he believes the opportunity for the Romney / Bushes / McCain endorsements has already passed.
*******
*So, the GJ/WW campaign continues to flop around, vacuuming up money and paying their “political consultants” and waiting for a miraculous turn of events to propel them to 15% in the polls and a ticket to the debates.
They have had plenty of funds and several windows of opportunity to take control of events, to earn the free media they needed to win the 15% or even 20% in the polls and earn a place on the debate stage …
This would have headed off the foolish never-Trump gambit by taking control of the 3rd ring first.
And, this would have locked in the much needed Romney, Bush, Bush, McCain endorsements …
But that would have required
a serious, experienced, 3rd party political strategy
running a real campaign with …
wait for it …
YES, that’s right …
Targeted Major Network Broadcast TV advertising in key states.
… but now we’re down to waiting for a miracle, the magic endorsements, or a media love fest …
It’s like a man who wants to be rich, but he won’t save, invest, work, or even look for a job … he’s waiting to win the lottery, but he won’t even buy a ticket … people give him money to eat and to invest, but he gives it all away and waits, and waits and waits for good luck to call …
Anyone who wants to know the petition deadlines for president is free to look at the petitioning chart in the July 1, 2016 Ballot Access News. The print edition is up at http://www.ballot-access.org. Utah deadline is August 15. I saw a news story that says Better for America expects to get its Utah petition done today and tomorrow. The requirement is 1,000 signatures.
I wasn’t referring to the book of Mormon. I guess I was referring to the Constitution party itself rather than Mr. Castle personally.
“the book of Mormon is not ancient. it is more recent than the Constitution, at least in its English form.”
Is a modern translation of an ancient book a new book?
Mormons don’t take their instructions only from the Book of Mormon. They also take their instructions from the Bible, and from another allegedly ancient book, The Book of Abraham, translated by Joseph Smith from papyrii found with an ancient Egyptian mummy (included in Mormon Canon as part of The Pearl of Great Price). The papyrii, unlike the golden plates the Book of Mormon was translated from, were actually available for translation by real Egyptologists. Shockingly, their translation differs from Smith’s.
Ummh, much of the above analysis assumes that what Romney, etc do is expected to make sense in English. Try again.
Ummh, the book of Mormon is not ancient. it is more recent than the Constitution, at least in its English form.
Umm, I believe his name is “Weld” Who is the “CFR?” 🙂
And if you want to go ahead and vote for someone who takes his guidance from an ancient book of fables rather than the Constitution, be my guest.
Yeah this would only further fuel me to vote for Castle and not Johnson/CFR.
Richard, how many ballot deadlines have already passed? – Particularly, has Utah?
These neocons potentially endorsing the LP ticket has everything to do with their hate of Trump, and doesn’t appear to me to have anything to do with the LP from what I can see. If “Better for America” or whatever, had been able to get it’s act together months ago these neocons would endorse B4A. imo.
So run with it get 5% nationally. I’ll probably vote Johnson/Weld to help break the Duopoly.
George Phillies is right to bring the August 8 candidacy of Evan McMullin into the discussion. McMullin was born in Utah, is LDS, and is chief policy director of the House Republican Conference. It is McMullin who will be getting the endorsement of former Presidents Bush and Mitt Romney. Not Gary Johnson. This whole post, which was always speculative, is now obsolete.
Andy,
Your claim vis a vis these endorsements was not that they were evidence that the LP’s candidates have abandoned Libertarian principles, it was that the LP itself has. But the prospective endorsements seem to be for the candidates rather than for the party, for the candidates’ positions rather than for the party’s positions, and in response to approaches from the candidates rather than from the party.
Person X endorsing Candidate Y is not proof of anything regarding Organization Z.
George, it is past the deadline to get on the ballot in most states.
In other news of the weird
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/trackers/2016-08-08/independent-conservative-may-announce-u-s-candidacy-today-nbc
Presumably the plan is to get on the ballot the American Way by bombing the problem with money.
Logic fail from Tom. You are going with the false assumption that we have a libertarian Libertarian ticket this year. We do not. These people are endorsing the ticket because the ticket has been co-opted by the establishment.
Also, Ron Paul was NOT the Republican candidate for President, he was a candidate for the nomination, a nomination he never won.
If Ron Paul had won the Republican nomination, Republicans could have viewed it as the Republican Party having betrayed its big government New World Order principles.
Johnson/Weld are the LP ticket, and yes, a little over half of the delegates in Orlando sold out the party’s principles by nominating them.
Krzysztof,
All of that is interesting, but on two read-throughs I don’t find any answer to the question I actually asked. So I’ll try again:
Is there some particular reason not to condemn Assad?
To my mind, it is entirely possible to:
1) Oppose US intervention in Syria; and
2) Not support the Sunni/Salafist Islamist forces in their attempts to take over the country; while
3) Still condemning Assad and refraining from believing that he is “Syria” — or at least not supporting him or pretending that he is.
I’m against Trump, but that doesn’t mean I can’t condemn Clinton. I’m against communism but that doesn’t mean I can’t condemn falangism.
“Getting support from ANTI-libertarian establishment hacks like Bush, Romney, and McCain is NOT a good thing. It is a sign that the Libertarian Party ticket is not really libertarian. It means that the party has sold out its principles.”
Logic fail. The Libertarian Party could not possibly be responsible for who endorses its candidates. A number of Libertarians endorsed Ron Paul in 2008 and 2012. Did that mean that the GOP had “sold out its principles” and turned into a libertarian party?
How the LP responds to such an endorsement will tell us what the party’s status is. If I was doing communications for the party or the campaign, the response would look something like this:
“We welcome the endorsements of so many politicians who have so completely screwed up everything they’ve touched. We assume that they’ve realized and are admitting the error of their way and asking us to fix the problems they have caused. We’ll try.”
Thomas,
Assad is certainly an authoritarian leader, and his father, Hafez al Assad, was responsible for the 1982 Hama massacre, which I originally thought had maybe killed around 300 people, but as it turns out after a quick search, between 10,000 and 20,000, or even 40,000 people were killed by the Syrian army, according to Wikipedia – and this was in a three week period. Apparently this was in response to an uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood, and they also had their forces, but the article says a vast majority of the causalities were civilians. I quickly tried to see if I could locate any so-called “revisionist history” on this event, and basically found none.
Mass murder of innocent people by government is pure evil, and by all means Hafez al Assad bears responsibility for what happened. Only tyrants indiscriminately slaughter civilians.
With that said, Bashar al Assad was obviously not in power during his father’s reign. More importantly, Assad was never supported, to my knowledge, by the U.S. /Israel axis which works, with shocking efficiency, to destabilize nations that resist its hegemony. Qaddafi and Saddam certainly were propped up by America/Israel to an extent until the resisted the hegemony of the international bankster gangsters by freeing their countries from dependency upon fiat Federal Reserve Notes. If a nation resists U.S. central planning and meddling in its affairs, we better believe that “democracy bombs” are only a question of when, not if. Assad has maintained independence from the red, white and blue superpower, and like Russia and Iran, is one of the very, very few countries to do so.
I followed the Syria crisis a little bit when it started in 2011. I mainly read alternative Polish media on the subject. From what I understand, just like Putin in Russia, Assad enjoys overwhelming popular support in Syria – as I recall 80-90%, though I can’t give a year on that. Unlike the Clinton/Bush backed Saudi Arabia, Syria has been protecting its Christian and other non Muslim populations. They are at war with barbarians funded by, surprise, the US…barbarians who are destroying the country, killing indiscriminately, and also posing for photo ops with JOHN MCCAIN, the latest neocon to jump aboard the #ImwithWeldJohnson bandwagon. This is not to say that Assad has not aggressor against civilians at all…it’s a war, surely he has…but, the alternative is so much worse. This is a pretty terrible analogy, but I’m going to equate it to like choosing between Trump and Clinton….Trump may ignore some aspects of the Constitution like EVERY single one of his predecessors, but he’s not going to push for WW3 with Russia…and Clinton, she’ll do both, and much, much worse.
Here is a globalresearch.ca article by a professor at the University of Sydney: “Why Syrians Support Bashar al Assad”:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/why-syrians-support-bashar-al-assad/5405208
And now, here’s Ajamu Baraka, the new Green VP:
“JUNE 4, 2014
The Syrian Elections”
“Defying threats of violence, tens of thousands of ordinary Syrians went to the polls to cast a vote that was more about Syrian dignity and self-determination than any of the candidates on the ballot. After three years of unimaginable atrocities fomented by a demented and dying U.S. empire, with the assistance of the royalist monarchies of the Middle East and the gangster states of NATO, the Syrian people demonstrated, by their participation, that they had not surrendered their national sovereignty to the geo-strategic interests of the U.S. and its colonial allies in Europe and Israel.”
More:
“Western corporate news outlets, especially in the U.S., were unable to explain the huge turnout of Syrian refugees voting in Lebanon preceding the election on Tuesday, so they just decided not to cover it. Images of Syrians displaced by war yet backing al Assad for president did not support the carefully crafted story that the only people fleeting war were those who had been terrorized to do so by the government.”
More Baraka:
“Policymakers in Washington and London have already made the shift to supporting what are being called “moderate” Islamists forces grouped around the Islamic Front (IF) with al Nusrah, al Qaeda’s official Syrian affiliate, operating in the background. The problem for the Syrian people is that these moderates the west is supporting are Salafi-Wahhabi fundamentalists who reject representative democracy and support the imposition of sharia law in Syria. ”
And one more from Baraka:
“It is not about al Assad, it is about the people of Syria and imperialism: …”
And he comments on
“consistent alignment of the left with the imperial project of the U.S. – from the attacks on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia through to attacks on nationalist projects throughout the global South, from Libya to Syria. ”
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/04/the-syrian-elections/
I encourage reading the full article; I quoted gratuitously, but full credit was given, and given he’s a national political candidate, I would think this would constitute the Fair Use doctrine.
CONCLUSION: There is no question that nationalist movement in Africa, the Middle East, and even Europe (with several notable exceptions, such as the FPO in Austria and large factions of the nationalist movements, that cooperate with paleolibertarians under Janusz Korwin Mikke, the Polish version of Rothbard, in my native Poland) are socialist in nature. However, I believe that nations have the right to protect their industry and capital from foreign intervention and meddling and destabilization. The have the right not to become colonized by the US/Israel (I use this interchangeably because no one even bothers anymore to deny the power the Israeli lobby exerts over the U.S.; at least those who are honest or not brainwashed by the mass media will not deny it). When you have Jewish Ivy League professors (Mersheimer and Walt – Israel Lobby) writing about it ( in 2006 no less) the cat is out of the bag. But, to finally conclude, Syria has the same right as other nations to resit the American empire and the global banking cartel. I could quote Meyer Amschel R*******d’s attitude towards controlling the money s supply here, but I feel that would be too conspiratorial, even for IPR’s most hardcore conspiracy theorists (news flash for the uninitiated: Bill Cooper exposed Alex Jones as complete fraud and was murdered for it back in 2001).
FINAL conclusion: I never trust the mainstream, corporate media, ever. While I did not answer your question about the Baath Party due to my ignorance on the subject, I think I’ve shown that I’m not spouting some fringe views on Syria and Assad from some internet neckbeard chatroom – I quoted heavily the 2014 article by the 2016 VP candidate for the Green Party, Ajamu Baraka. Cynthia McKinney, 2008 GP candidate, has said very similar things. There is only one objective Truth, and CNN, Fox, MSNBC, T(r)eason Magazine, Infowars etc etc will not deliver it. Long live Syria, may the defeat the CIA sponsored coup.
Looks like he beat me to it!
Where’s Andy next post correcting his grammar / typing mistake? He must be apoplectic from the good news. 🙂
David Nolan is likely very happy now knowing that more people are willing to listen and that leads to brand recognition and, therefore, more people learning about the LP
Should read, “Johnson and his CFR buddy…”
What a bunch of horseshit! These neo-cons are not talking about endorsing the Libertarian Party ticket because they are adopting any of our principles, or because they give a rat’s ass about us. They are doing this because they have hijacked our ticket with phonies Johnson is CFR buddy Bill Weld. This is establishment co-opting the Libertarian Party, thus making it controlled opposition. They want to swing the election to Hillary Clinton. These people are enemies of liberty. David Nolan must be spinning in his grave.
Based on personal discussions with David Nolan, I believe Tony’s views are precisely what Nolan and many of the other party founders hoped would eventually happen. It will be up to the more purist Libertarians to convince they less purist to stand firm on libertarian principles. And if they can’t convince people who are one-third or half-way there to accepting “pure” libertarianism, then how do they ever expect to convince all those people who are currently opposed to libertarian principles? Sure, an influx of LINOS will be a challenge, but it is a challenge the founders expected and welcomed in order for eventual success.
Getting support from ANTI-libertarian establishment hacks like Bush, Romney, and McCain is NOT a good thing. It is a sign that the Libertarian Party ticket is not really libertarian. It means that the party has sold out its principles.
This would be GREAT publicity!
This would be terrible publicity.
YEAH!! That’s right Andy! We want the LP to only get .5% of the vote for the rest of time!
So who exactly is SUPPOSED to vote or support the LP candidate? Only the .5% who have consistently voted LP?
Disgusting. This shows just how low the LP has sunk that it is attracting this kind of scum. A picture of a dead Libertarian Party should be added to the article.
Great publicity if it happens.
This source seems a bit fringy. Love Santa Monica, but one wonders whether this is a well-sourced story.
Krzysztof,
Is there some particular reason not to condemn Assad?
One need not support the Ba’athist regime in order to oppose US meddling in Syrian affairs.
Any endorsement by these diehard Republican warmongers and crony-capitalists like Romney, McCain, and Bush will show the extent to which the LP has been captured and ethically bankrupted. If these officials support Johnson/Weld, that’s not good. But if the National LP leadership sends out an email bragging how they’re getting support from these crony, corrupt hacks, you can stick a fork in the LP right then and there. It’ll be time for real libertarians to split from the fake LP and re-establish a genuine libertarian party.
Hi Krzystof – I understand your concerns, but these endorsements wouldn’t keep me from voting for Johnson. In order for any candidate to even have a chance of winning, let alone actually win, they are going to have to attract support from people of whom I strongly disapprove. Castle has support among white supremacists, and Stein among leftist anti-semites. Their supporters are no more pure than anyone elses.
Well, here’s even more reasons to vote for either Castle or Trump. Castle is not exactly on the radar when it comes to making an impact, but Trump is hated by the neocon madmen pushing humanity to the brink of WW3. At least that’s what it seems like.
Seriously, when did the Libertarian Party start attracting war criminals? I guess Weld was an appointee of the Clinton administration, and Clinton did bomb a hospital a hospital in Africa and waged a campaign of terror against the Serbs in conjunction with NATO…the CFR membership makes sense, after all.
I would sooner vote for Jill Stein at this point than this Neo-Libertarian Party ticket. Stein at least calls out Israeli war crimes against Palestine, and her VP choice wrote for CounterPunch, which is actually legitimately anti-war -and he, Baraka, did not condemn Assad they way the neocons have. And forget the so-called “scandals” within the Constitution Party, the real atrocity is what the Libertarian Party is being turned into: a party for mass murder apologists.