Courting the Ron Paul Vote: Libertarian Gary Johnson and Constitution Party Nominee Virgil Goode Make Their Case
CHICAGO—Libertarian Party presidential nominee Gary Johnson of New Mexico and Constitution Party nominee Virgil Goode of Virginia are both looking to scoop up as many disaffected Ron Paul voters as they possibly can on Election Day. During the third party debate here they both made their own unique pitches that would appeal to Paul backers. Goode emphasized his paleoconservative positions on things like trade and immigration while Johnson pushed his libertarian credentials on things like ending the war on drugs and a non-interventionist foreign policy.
Both, though, were reluctant to tell Paul voters in detail why they should for them. Goode declared that Paul voters should look at all the candidates but not vote for Mitt Romney or President Obama. Johnson said he thinks Paul voters should favor him because he doesn't really want to tell them what do, but, he adds, his positions are the same as Ron Paul on nearly everything. Here in their own words are Goode and Johnson after the jump.
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Virgil Goode:
And other such insanity about the NAU and the IMF.
Pass, thanks. Although if it came down to him, Romney or Obama, that would be a tough call.
He would totally get my vote for all that great stuff, except that I want the official language to be Lemerig, so Johnson it has to be.
I was pulling for Flemish myself.
Vanuatu over Belgium any day.
AlJ had a solid 30 minute special on the 3rd party debate this morning.
At least Virgil Goode is sort of honest (other than running under something called the Constitution Party) about being a run of the mill neocon. He seems to be less of a whiny dick about it than John.
I thought neocons were militaristic and not too enthusiastic about respecting Congressional prerogatives to declare war.
Not too enthusiastic about reducing military spending, either.
Goode would reduce military spending and limit himself to fighting wars declared by Congress. No respectable neocon would let him in their club.
Neither of them actually pitched for the Paul voters - were they afraid of a backlash if they seemed to come on too strong?
They were afraid they would limit their appeal to voters who didn't agree with Ron Paul on everything.
This Ron Paul supporter will be voting for Gary Johnson, despite his absurd Fair Tax ideas and the fact that he's not pro-life. As for Goode, he over-emphasizes the only major issue I disagreed with Ron Paul on, cracking down on "illegal" immigration.
I don't think Paul's backers (or Ron Paul himself) are against free trade for the most part, but it seems that Goode definitely is.
Paul is definitely not against free trade. Sometimes he is mistakenly seen as such because he opposes "free trade" agreements, but he opposes them because he thinks they don't go far enough, and basically thinks they are too complicated and more along the lines of "managed trade" agreements with too much micromanagement by the government.
Seems like neither of them are serious about the election. Even that Democrat lady running for US senator from Mass. is saying why libertarians should vote for her!
No, what they're saying to Ron Paul supporters is, you'll do the right thing regardless of whether you vote for me. We don't really want votes, we just want to persuade people of ideas, and those people don't need persuading, we count them as ours anyway.
"Seems like neither of them are serious about the election."
Despite all evidence to the contrary...