Difference Between Ron Paul and Gary Johnson
uncoveredpolitics.com/2012/06/08/family-ties-...
uncoveredpolitics.comPosted Jun 8, 2012, 1:57 PM UTC
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uncoveredpolitics.comThe liberty movement is a big tent. Not sure why there is so much hate between super RP and GJ fanatics. Maybe when libertarians get more than a handful of politicians representing us and have a viable presence, then maybe at that time we can start slinging mud at each other. But lets not shoot ourselves in the foot during the first leg of the race.
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It seems that a lot of libertarians are looking for the perfect candidate (many people see that to be Paul) and for some reason refuse to believe that Johnson is actually very similar to Paul on main liberty issues
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Liberty is both their goal. They just have different means to the same ends.
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I agree. I think we're in a bot of a catch 22: libertarians are reluctant to budge on core political views because unlike most other political parties, our views are based on principles. Compromising our ideals is akin to compromising on our principles and I think most of us find that morally intolerable. That's why its so hard for us to agree on a candidate, since there is such a diversity of views within the libertarian tent.
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I'd like to refer you to my comment
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Upvote for consensus building comment.
Busy with work at the moment, but I'll look into and post the differences in issues in policies.
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The main difference is Gary Johnson will be on the ballot in November.
Ron Paul's followers have assured us all along that Ron Paul's strategy was a sound one, that it somehow made sense to eschew a third party run and instead compete for votes with the likes of Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich. They assured us that Ron had sound reasons for refusing to run attack ads against Romney. They told us that "Ron Paul's strength is in the caucus states," and that he had a secret ground game that would rustle up big wins in those states.
At one point they were proclaiming breathlessly that Ron Paul could win California. This would be Ron's game changer. His Varian Disaster.
Later, many of these same people would assure us that it made perfect sense for Ron Paul to quit the campaign trail because he needed to focus on his opaque "delegate strategy." We have never really been told what this "delegate strategy" involves, but the most common refrain is that it's something to do with "making a splash" at the convention.
Nowadays we are often told that this was "the real purpose" of the Ron Paul campaign all along: to get a few minutes of camera time at an event that will be forgotten approximately 72 hours after it occurs. Do you remember lots of buzz about all the delegates Huckabee won in 2008? No, you do not. Yet this was apparently the primary reason why hundreds of thousands of Ron's poor, obsequious supporters shelled out their hard earned cash for Ron's numerous "moneybombs": so that Ron Paul could maybe get 30 seconds of air time to stand in front of Romney supporters one last time and repeat the same one-liners he already let off 18 times at the debates.
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Ignoring all the hyperbolic generalizations of "Ron Paul supporters" in there ...
His money bombs got a lot more than just 30 seconds of face time at the GOP convention. Getting Ron Paul on the stage for all those GOP primary debates was kind of a big deal.
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Getting Ron Paul on the stage for all those GOP primary debates was kind of a big deal.
Reasons why this is blatant backcasting include (but are not limited to):
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the fact that Ron Paul was in the debates in 2008, before his campaign was so loaded;
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the fact the Gary Johnson got into several debates, despite being poorly funded
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the fact that Ron Paul failed to win a single state despite being in every debate
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the fact the Gary Johnson will be on the ballot in November despite his minimal debate presence.
In retrospect, maybe the takehome point here should be that "getting on the debate stage" isn't worth all that much when the audience is full of republicans.
One could also make the argument that it was the debates that doomed Ron Paul's campaign, since he was forced to give so many embarassing answers and generally sounded crotchety and weak. For example, I personally knew Ron Paul's campaign was finished when he refused to release his taxes. No serious presidential candidate does that. If he hadn't attended that debate, maybe he could have avoided giving such a hamfisted response to that question.
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You are backcasting every bit as much as I am. You needn't use such inflammatory language regarding every single little thing.
In retrospect, maybe the takehome point here should be that "getting on the debate stage" isn't worth all that much when the audience is full of republicans.
What are you basing this premise on? You do realize that a lot of Dems and independents watched those primary debates too right?
One could also make the argument that it was the debates that doomed Ron Paul's campaign,
And realists understand that RP's chance at the presidency were doomed from the beginning for a variety of reasons. He's not a good candidate. About the only thing that set him apart (edit: in a positive way) was the ideas he was promoting. Americans don't vote for ideas for the most part.
If he hadn't attended that debate, maybe he could have avoided giving such a hamfisted response to that question.
You think he wouldn't have been asked the same question during the presidental debates?
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You do realize that a lot of Dems and independents watched those primary debates too right?
Fat load of good that did him when he was competing for the REPUBLICAN nomination. If his real target audience was independents and liberals he should have campaigned directly to them instead of getting into catfights over abortion. Having to out-Jesus Rick Santorum on the debate stage is a poor way to campaign for swing votes.
And realists understand that RP's chance at the presidency were doomed from the beginning for a variety of reasons.
Funny, I didn't see too many of these "realists" around these parts back in February. In fact every time I expressed skepticism about Ron Paul's chances I heard endless braying about the polls were rigged, how Ron Paul had a grand strategy to overtake the republican party and cruise to victory.
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A third party candidate can win if they get on the ballot and win the most votes. And unless Ron Paul was in a coma in 1992 he should have known that third parties are perfectly capable of getting on the ballot.
In fact time after time I saw polls touted here where Ron Paul was competitive against Obama. Problem is, he'll never get to run against Obama because he foolishly blew his campaign resources trying to win over the GOP instead.
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Bill moose party, Whig party, and George Washington. 3rd parties ( except Washington, he was a NO PARTYER!
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Show me in history when that's happened,
In every recent election except 2000 the candidate who got on the ballot and won the most votes won the election. Saying "a third party candidate hasn't done it, therefore it can't be done" is like saying "a black man named Hussein hasn't done it, therefore it can't be done," or "a Mormon hasn't done it, therefore it can't be done." It makes it sound like you're more interested in justifying failure than achieving victory.
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Read history books. 3rd parties do gain power, and I'd bet money that SOME PARTY will rise up to get over 15%.
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We have never really been told what this "delegate strategy" involves
The strategy has very clearly and explicitly been explained...
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What's the strategy?
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Step 1.) Win delegates Step 2.) ??? Step 3.) President!
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Having failed at step 1, what's his next move?
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I stopped reading this article when it compared Ron Paul to Scientology. That's asinine.
I'm going to support Paul through the convention where he will have a stage to bring a lot of important issues into the political discussion.
When he doesn't get the nomination (he almost certainly won't) I'll support Johnson.
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The issue I have with this is that the primary process is over. The only primary that hasn't taken place is in Utah, so unless you're a delegate (which some people here are), there's not much you can do to help Ron Paul's campaign. It's not like we can't support both guys at the same time, but I think Johnson needs more grassroots support than Ron Paul does, since the Presidential Debate Commission makes their decision only a few weeks after the Republican Convention.
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Well Ron Paul has built a Cult.
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I don't think he's consciously built one. But he's ended up with one, that's for sure.
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go back and read the rest of the article. While the comparison of Paul to Hubbard was clearly hyperbole, there are some disturbing factoids about the Pauls that people ought know (such as the allegations of nepotism).
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I'm not at all a fan of Rand Paul. Just about every time I hear something about him it makes me like him less.
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I kinda like Rand, myself. He seems like an OK guy. Not as good as Ron, and definitely not as good a presidential candidate as Gary (in my opinion), but he seems to be doing what he believes is right for the cause of liberty.
I disagree with his endorsement of Mittens, but I'm willing to believe he did it in a (misguided) attempt to advance the cause of liberty.
Just as Gary wants to legalize, tax, and regulate marijuana as a more palatable stepping stone to fully ending the drug war, I think Rand sees this (and the delegate strategy, state convention takeover) as a chance to reshape the GOP in the Paul image.
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“biggest purveyors of nepotism in U.S. history,”
An uncited quote that returns 1 hit on google, this page. Looks like pretty shitty reporting to me.
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How could the differences NOT be ideological? Johnson has never even read any of the works of libertarians (other than some Reason and CATO articles). He and Paul just happen to share some political positions. Challenge him on WHY he holds those views, or present some new issue, and he's likely to fold, because he has little or no clue about the reasoning behind the ideas.
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You really think Johnson has a weakness in ideology?
I disagree wholeheartedly. You don't need a philosophy major to understand the basic reasons behind liberty. It doesn't take a saint to conceive of the moral reasons behind supporting self-determination.
Johnson may not have the righteous rhetoric we've come to expect from Paul, but his intentions and values (it seems to me) are genuine. That's what I require in a candidate. If he has to use an extensive vocabulary and weasel words to get across these ideas (that at their core, are pretty basic) that's a problem
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Johnson may not have the righteous rhetoric we've come to expect from Paul, but his intentions and values (it seems to me) are genuine.
It may sound like I am taking a dump on your hopes and dreams, but you need balls to follow libertarianism. If you don't understand why you believe what you believe then, you won't be able to follow it in face of adversity.
Case in point, this is July 2008, You are the president of US, and Lehman Brothers need a bailout, you refuse them the bailout, they go bankrupt.
All your Economists and Economic advisor come to you, and tell you that you need to pass this giant bailout, or else there will be a calamity on the economy.
Lets assume that you don't actually budge(Bush claimed, this is what happened). Banks start to fail, there is a 10,000 company pile up out there, unemployment rate shoots to 25%, wage rates fall massively.
IF you chicken out at that moment and start passing bailout then you end up creating this massive problem of a slow and poisonous recovery, but if you understand your economics then you'd know that you just need to ride this out for few more months.
In over a year you can expect unemployment rate fall down to 3-4% and thousands and thousands of new startups, taking over old firms and people would consider to to be a miraculous recovery. Real wages have gone up significantly.
But the point is, if you don't understand economics, do you really think you will stand there with your balls hanging staring at a 25% unemployment rate and a 10,000 company pileup? I don't think Gary Johnson would do it, since he doesn't know economics.
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It may sound like I am taking a dump on your hopes and dreams, but you need balls to follow libertarianism.
I think it takes balls for more than just economic questions. The social ones, especially considering how left leaning the MSM is, are just as difficult. Those questions are constantly piled on, harped by mouths on a screen day after day after day. To have these "balls" you speak of, you need conviction. Johnson may not have had captured my attention this cycle like Paul did, but do you really think a mountain-climbing, bike-riding, conservative governor in a Dem leaning state lacks balls? Come on.
I don't think Gary Johnson would do it, since he doesn't know economics.
Do I wish Johnson had more of an austrian background? Yeah. I wish he was a super being who'd done all the things he has while quadruple majoring at MIT. You seem to forget that not only does Johnson have a clear, well thought out case for social issues - he also has practical real world evidence that a veto-heavy, libertarian governor can reap massive rewards for a state. New Mexico thrived under his governorship. It's not like he spent the whole time tossing fucking softballs to Keynesian doctrine.
You posit a doomsday scenario that will break Johnson because he can't engage in the whining, bleeding heart emotional appeals that we hear bleating from the left when the road gets a little bumpy. He's already done that in spades.
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Johnson may not have had captured my attention this cycle like Paul did, but do you really think a mountain-climbing, bike-riding, conservative governor in a Dem leaning state lacks balls? Come on.
I donno what bike riding and mountain climbing has to do with anything?
Your argument about his 'balls' is nothing but rhetoric. If Mitt Romney's pics come out where he is riding a bike and climbing a mountain(and he had been a Governer of a heavily Dem leaning state), then does that mean Romney has balls to stand for his values?
The problem is, this is not just a matter of whether you can be just a stuck up ass about your values. I apologize if that's the impression I gave you when I said 'you need balls'.
Assuming all Gary Johnson does is stands on his values in the face of adversity, he refuses to pass the Bailout and everybody tells him to do so. What is he going to do to convince anyone about it, if he cannot use economic logic? Sure he can make the appeal to liberty and freedom, but what then? Some people sure will get the appeal of this, but what after that?
You posit a doomsday scenario that will break Johnson because he can't engage in the whining, bleeding heart emotional appeals that we hear bleating from the left when the road gets a little bumpy.
Maybe you have bigger hopes for the future of our current situation, but what you call as 'doomsday' is hardly a doomsday scenario. If Austrian Business Cycle is correct by even a margin, we kept near 1% interest rate from Jul 03 to Jul 04 and that caused the havoc called real estate boom. Just imagine what this coming boom and bust is going to look like because we have kept Interest rates near 0% from 2008 Dec onwards(3.5 years and counting) esp when Fed plans to keep it until 2014. There is so much malinvestment in the market right now despite of the fact everyone considers the world to be in a recession. Can you believe what things are going to look like when we 'recover'.
So no, sorry, as much as I don't want to go through the painful disastrous scenario economics tells me about, it is going to happen, and there is nothing you can do about it. If a libertarian president has to face this, I wouldn't have a half-assed libertarian president for this, I would rather have 4 more years of Obama and see things go much worse before they become better.
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That Johnson supports liberty and self-determination (to at least some degree) does not mean that he understands or can elucidate the reasons behind those ideas. I don't expect the average person to do so, nor to have thought-out libertarian positions on every social or political issue, but I do expect it of the LP candidate!
Without a solid philosophical base and values that are rationally determined, all one really has is a collection of slogans that can be substituted for convenience of the moment.
I'm no philosopher or economist, but I've read plenty of Mises, Rothbard, Hazlitt, etc., and it saddens me that one who's putting himself in front of the party that claims to revere these giants has done so little to educate himself on its foundational works.
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Why don't you look at his record as governor and decide for yourself? He may not be a philsopher per-se, but he has managerial experience in both the public and private sectors and he had a credible track record of vetoing bills and reducing spending.
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Yes, he has a good a record. It sounds like he was a good governor, but he didn't have to face issues like fiscal and monetary policy, foreign relations, international trade, and huge bureaucratic departments, military interests, etc. Where will he stand on such issues? Will he A) just adopt the common libertarian position? B) be able to defend his position based on principle and using reason? C) go with what his advisers tell him? D) go with his gut feelings? I don't have any confidence that he'll do the right thing.
That said, I'll admit that he's still a far better candidate than Barry or Willard. But since I don't expect him to get any more media attention than he got as a Republican candidate or than past LP candidates have been given, I think the best role of LP candidates is (still) that of educators rather than sound-bite emitters.
And how can he educate if he doesn't really know the material?
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I suppose we might disagree on the complexity of the libertarian message. I don't think it requires a Ph.d or that the ethics of our political stance are beyond the grasp of the average American. The case for liberty itself is easy to make. I've done it hundreds of times, and I'm no intellectual giant. When you confront people with beautiful, simplistic, consistent ideology that conflicts with their own, they respond with something other than rationality. I don't think Johnson needs to memorize this foundational literature to prove his opponents are hypocritical fools.
That said, its still desirable to have that knowledge. So I agree with you in a way.
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You exaggerate my position when you say that I'd expect anyone (presidential candidates included) to be a Ph.d or to memorize anything in order to be a good libertarian. The first step is just getting people to accept the ideas of liberty; the reasons can come later. But if the reasons never come, then the ideas are liable to float out just like they floated in.
And it may be one thing to agree on the fundamentals of liberty (e.g. property rights, self-ownership, non-coercion, etc.) but it's the grey areas that require sometimes profound analysis and a thorough examination of the topic. These are things a president is likely to encounter.
My guess is that the average libertarian is OK with some level of taxation, regulation of certain drugs, immigration rules, product safety laws, air travel regulations, etc. But at what levels? Can they justify those levels based on philosophical principles, or just on utilitarian grounds? Just saying, "it will be better this way," is no different from the arguments that the collectivists use.
We all need to work harder at fully grasping why we believe the things we do, and being able to defend and communicate them better.
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IMO Ron Paul is a libertarian by principle (his political views are based on morality and philosophy) while Gary Johnson is a pragmatic libertarian (he believes small government and liberty are efficient and get things done).
They are both correct. However I am a libertarian by principle and so prefer candidates who are also this.
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In terms of the appeal needed to win over the American public, I'd argue that pragmatism is of far greater value than zealotry. Ideally, a candidate would have those principles but be able to justify them using reasons that don't require people to have sound ethical reasoning. It's unfortunate that it has to be that way.
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I agree that pragmatic libertarians are probably more palatable to the average voter.
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The last line attacks "the Paul clan" based on Rand's endorsement of Romney.
Rand Paul is no Ron Paul (and neither is Gary Johnson).
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There are a lot of people who donated to Ron Paul campaign purely to have more converts to Libertarianism and had no intention of a Ron Paul presidency, for them Ron Paul campaign gave a major bang for their buck.
Gary Johnson on the other hand might even have a better chance at becoming President(who knows), but its clearly not what a lot of RP followers want from him.
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Wow, this kind of article is the last thing we need right now.
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I'm not following this guy's train of thought. What is the specific criticism of Jesse Benton's campaign management? Campaigns cost money, yeah. We also amassed several hundred delegates, enough to force the Romney camp to negotiate with the Paulites, and all that without winning a single state. Imagine what the same amount of money can do for a liberty candidate for years from now. I don't think you can reasonably say it hasn't been a successful campaign.
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I really like Ron Paul, and look up to the man.
But he's a human being. Every human being has his faults. Ron Paul's is a bit of naivety and a bit of nepotism. In a sense, he is too trusting of others. Maybe that's why he believes that charity and libertarianism goes perfectly hand in hand.
But he's done what he set out to do, which is help repopularize the message of liberty during a dark era in American politics.
It's up for future politicians to carry on his message to greater and greater successes.
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It is so funny how you are all jumping off the sinking ship and trying to find refuge anywhere you can.
R/libertarian is fucken hilarious today.
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Hoping for a good article about differences in issues and policies. Instead I read an article mainly attacking Ron Paul's Campaign.
Right? I donated to the Paul campaign because getting another opinion on politics in the media is crucially important. But since RP is not gonna be on the ballot, my vote will be going to Gary Johnson. I will try to get many others on board as well
No, you donated because you are a "true believer" who was fleeced of your last dime. /s I've been a Gary Johnson supporter from the start, but I don't like seeing Ron Paul supporters dismissed as cult members.
It's just divide and conquer tactics. It's trying to fragment a population that is coming together under one banner of real liberty. I think if everyone figures out they have a viable third party option, and that the two running parties are indeed one in the same, it then becomes only a two option choice. I think if they realize that Obama and Romney have no discernible differences (Same lobbyists pushing the same agendas on both sides) then people will realize that things are stacked against them. When anyone realizes they have been painted into a corner they want other options. If Gary gets enough coverage and is actually on the ballot he will do very well I believe.
The premise that Paul's campaign has been some elaborate moneymaking ruse is fucking insane. Johnson's campaign has been frugal because it had to be, not because of a conspiracy to fund the Paul family.
That being said, I'm excited to donate a ton of money to Johnson next election cycle. I'll be in a more secure financial situation, and Johnson (truthfully) lines up more with my views than even Paul. Between that and his track record I think he'll be a great choice after Paul's retirement.
It is most definitely a mischaracterization of the majority of Paul supporters, but not wholly unfounded. Just as there are quite a number of racists and misogynists in the GOP who give the rest of them a bad name, there are a number of people who seem to believe in a cult of personality more than the message the man is trying to spread.
Yep, just as there are for any candidate
Also that Ron Paul is a false libertarian, he doesn't believe in liberty, he doesn't care about privacy. What's important to him is states rights. He says that texas has the right to regulate social practices such as sex, fuck him. Gary Johnson, even though I'm a libertarian Keynesian. Source for bashing ron paul: http://imgur.com/Xzfse
If you're hoping to run the government, isn't how your run your campaign fair criticism?