Gary Johnson: Doing

“I may have vetoed more legislation than the other forty-nine governors in the country combined. And it wasn't just saying, "no," it was really looking at what we were spending our money on and what we were getting for the money we were spending. And I really do believe in smaller government, I really believe that there are consequences of legislation that gets passed and maybe it isn't in our best interest to pass all the legislation that we pass, that it layers bureaucracy on transactions that aren't made any safer by you and I, but that just end up making it so much more cumbersome, so much more burdensome, and ends up adding a lot of money as opposed to the notion of liberty and freedom and the personal responsibility that goes along with that… My entire life I watched government spend more money than what it takes in and I just always thought that there would be a day of reckoning with regard to that spending, and I think that day of reckoning is here, that it's right now, and it needs to be fixed… But what I said then and I'll say now, I think that Republicans would gain a lot of credibility in this argument if Republicans would offer up a repeal of the Prescription Health Care Benefit that they passed when they had control of both houses of Congress and ran up record deficits.”

Gary Johnson

Announcement of Intention to Run for the Republican Nomination for President of the United States
YouTube
2011-04-21
http://youtu.be/lBlA7yEiiZs
2012-02-24
Sound Government

Life , Money , Health , Thinking

“I think that repealing or doing away with the corporate income tax is simply getting us back to where we were. We need to understand that the corporate income tax is a double tax, that we all own the corporations and that when income gets distributed to us we pay the tax on that. So we have the highest corporate income tax in the world right now, let's abolish it, let's make it the way that it was to begin with, and that will literally create tens of millions of jobs overnight because this country will be the only place to establish, grow, nurture business. Why won't that happen?”

Gary Johnson

Statement at FOX News Debate
YouTube
2011-05-05
http://youtu.be/QRPrZxHUqsA
2012-02-24
Economic Policy

World , Way , Understanding , Business

“The argument to raise taxes to pay back the debt, that's one thing, but my experience tells me that it's not possible. Government raises taxes, they're gonna spend that money in other places. I'm gonna do a better job at balancing revenues and expenditures… That was a responsibility that we had, but we prioritized what government should or shouldn't be doing and as a result of that, again showed a fiscal discipline that I don't think anyone else can demonstrate.”

Gary Johnson

Statement on Taxes
YouTube
2011-08-23
http://youtu.be/227YyBf7-KQ
2012-02-24
Sound Government

Money , Thinking

“I was opposed to us going to Iraq from the very beginning. I really thought that there was no threat to our national security, I really thought that if we went into Iraq we would find ourselves in a civil war to which there would be no end, and I thought we had the military surveillance capability to see Iraq roll out any weapons of mass destruction and if they had done that we could have gone in and dealt with that. Afghanistan, originally, I was completely supportive of that. We were attacked, we attacked back. That's what our military is for and after about six months I think we had pretty effectively taken care of al Qaeda. But that was ten years ago! We're building roads, schools, bridges, and highways in Iraq and Afghanistan and we're borrowing forty-three cents out of every dollar to do that. In my opinion, this is crazy. And in looking at Libya right now… my opinion is I'm opposed to it A through Z.”

Gary Johnson

Statement at FOX News Debate
YouTube
2011-05-05
http://youtu.be/QRPrZxHUqsA
2012-02-24
Foreign Policy

War , School , Support , Thinking

“I think the best thing the Federal Gov. can do when it comes to education K-12 is to abolish the Federal Department of Education. The Federal Department of Education gives each state about 11 cents out of every school dollar that every state spends but it comes with about 16 cents worth of strings attached. So what I think the country … people do not understand is it’s a negative to take federal money… So just get the fed. govt. out of education completely. Leave education to the states. Fifty laboratories of innovation and best practice and in my opinion we would have some fabulous innovation that would get emulated because we are all so competitive.”

Gary Johnson

Statement made to representatives of the Pagan Newswire Collective (PNC)
2011-10-16
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paganswithdisabilities/2011/10/full-transcript-of-qa-with-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson/
2012-02-24
Sound Government

Money , People , Education , School

“I am in the camp that believes that we are on the verge of a monetary collapse given the fact that during the last year up to 70% of the money used to pay our ongoing expenditures were moneys printed up by the Federal Reserve I mean literally out of thin air. Monetary Collapse occurs when we are printing 100% of that money going forward and all of the roll over of treasury is that 15 trillion dollars is out there in existing notes when all of those notes also get rolled over with 100% of that money being printed … that's the monetary collapse. And that’s not something that their going to announce is going to happen two weeks from Thursday that’s just gonna happen literally overnight when we have a complete melt down in the bond market. Which I’m predicting is gonna happen unless we actually balance the federal budget so this is what we are entering into is a real mutual sacrifice on the part of all of us. I would argue let’s have that mutual sacrifice as opposed to all of us having nothing which is what happens during a monetary collapse that our money ends up being worth nothing. That happened in Russia part of that was Afghanistan. We’re not immune to this. We can fix it but we need to do it now and that’s the position that I hold.”

Gary Johnson

Statement made to representatives of the Pagan Newswire Collective (PNC)
2011-10-16
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paganswithdisabilities/2011/10/full-transcript-of-qa-with-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson/
2012-02-24
Economic Policy

Money , Parting

“I do think that climate change is occurring, that it is man-caused. One of the proposals that I think is a very libertarian proposal, and I'm just open to this, is taxing carbon emission that may have the result of being self-regulating. … The market will take care of it. I mean, when you look at it from the standpoint of better results, and actually less money to achieve those results, that's what is being professed by a carbon tax. … Coal is a great free market example right now. You and I do not want carbon emission. We don't want it. right now. Natural gas costs less than coal. So there are no new coal plants that are going to be built, given the price of natural gas. And that's something that you and I desire. So it's happening. I'm afraid that coal, from a free market standpoint, has been done in.”

Gary Johnson

2016, Interview with CNBC's John Harwood (August 22, 2016)

Money , Nature , Thinking , Change

“I really do think that the two-party system is broken. I don’t think Democrats are able to balance a checkbook these days. That’s it’s all about bigger government and higher taxes. And then Republicans with, I think, the social agenda. Look, whatever your social inclinations are just don’t force it on me. And I think the Republican Party has gotten really extreme in that category.”

Gary Johnson

2016

Thinking

“Yeah just so back to being Governor of New Mexico. I vetoed a bill that I think the label of the bill was Bringing Competition to the Telecommunications Industry of New Mexico… I vetoed it because the reality was that was the title but the reality was just the opposite. It was gonna actually make the environment less competitive. It was going to empower Quest communications to have more of a monopoly they it all ready had. That wasn’t the label of the bill. So net neutrality the notion is that it’s going to create a freer environment when the reality is.. is there really an issue now? And if you get government involved in getting its nose in the tent isn’t this ultimately gonna make things a lot worse and cost us a lot more than just doing nothing? So all of my free market friends, all of my computer savvy people that are advising me, say that net neutrality is anything but. All of what’s it supposed to accomplish that actually by supporting it you’re creating the opposite.”

Gary Johnson

Statement made to representatives of the Pagan Newswire Collective (PNC)
2011-10-16
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paganswithdisabilities/2011/10/full-transcript-of-qa-with-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson/
2012-02-24
2011

People , Communication , Support , Thinking