The Big
Johnson Effect
Charlie Earl
Contrary to
your first impression, this is not a summary of my autobiography. This column
is totally based on my opinion and my perception. Whatever research or data I’ve
used to form my point of view comes from nothing more than anecdotal evidence
and my “gut.” Here is my premise: Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson
will “steal” as many votes from Barrack Obama in Ohio as he does from Mitt
Romney. For those of you whose partisanship outweighs your reason, what I’m
saying is that Gary Johnson is an equal-opportunity thief.
The weekend
poll results published by the Columbus Dispatch indicate that Obama has a 9-point
head-to-head lead in Ohio (51-42).
My sensitive
abdominal area informs me that the margin will be much closer in the Buckeye
state, and Gary Johnson’s ballot presence will be a significant contributor to
the narrower gap. Why? Because not all democrats are stupid. Not all democrats
are blood-sucking looters who expect the state (government) to provide their
needs and wants. Not all Democrats see that providing cell phones at taxpayer
expense for certain classes of voters is a sound fiscal idea. Not all
democrats, particularly union members, belong to public employee unions or the
UAW. Some traditional democrat voters belong to other unions that reaped no
benefits from the massive stimulus spending by the Obama administration. They
believe that they were used and abused. They recognize that the growing numbers
and power of public employee unions radically undermines our social and fiscal
fabric. They cannot vote for a republican without suffering from cognitive
dissonance and internal angst. They may choose to not vote at all…… or pull the
lever for a third-party candidate.
The
hand-wringing hyper-partisan element of the GOP loves to preach that a
libertarian candidate ALWAYS hurts the Republicans. Why would they assume that?
Is it because Libertarians promote small constitutional government and fiscal
sanity? Perhaps. The GOP leaders do so as well, but “everyone” knows they don’t
really mean it. It must, therefore, be the firm conviction and dedication to
the PRINCIPLES of smaller constitutional government exhibited by Libertarians
that gives GOP’ers the willies. Oh yes, there’s that “foreign policy” thing.
Why would some voters prefer a non-aggression policy over the macho interventionism
of the GOP (and the Democrats as well)? Perhaps because of the numbers of senseless
wars and costly interventions, people have surmised that a muscular
interventionism doesn’t work whereas a strong and determined defense makes
sense. So….do the hyper-partisan GOP apologists prefer constant warfare, or are
they fearful that their failing foreign policies will be exposed?
The
anecdotal evidence that supports my sense that third-party candidates will hurt
Obama as much, or nearly as much, as they do Romney springs from individual who
know the political system is broken. They also seem to suspect that both old
fossilized political parties (the oligarchy) share the fault. The Republicans
and Democrats have shared power for more than 150 years….a century and a half.
The burning question of this era is “are you better off than you were 150 years
ago?” Certainly we have progressed…technologically, industrially, medically
(though we do question some long-term negatives in the pharma front), but are
we better off socially? Are we freer or do we have more liberty? Has the
massive growth of government at all levels under both parties proven to be a
good thing? Or is it an obstacle, an impediment and a foe of our individual
sovereignty?
There are
life-long democrats who are asking themselves the questions listed above. Maybe
not in a literal sense, but they have some visceral unease about the state of
our nation, many of our states and most of our cities. They are unhappy with
the direction of their own party, and see no viable remedy from the other
political monolith. Chicken-Little Republicans should have enough vision to
recognize the phenomenon and encourage it instead of attempting to undermine
the liberty movement at every turn. Those who consistently fight against
liberty are condemned to failure. Either liberty shall prevail, or we shall all
become slaves.
Charlie Earl
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