Gary Johnson: Right

“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

“Ultimately, taxes are being paid for by your and my freedom because we have to spend more time to make the money to pay for those taxes. The current reality is that with a deficit that is going to double in the next eight years is that taxes, currently, as it stands right now, taxes are going up, unless there becomes a real movement to understand that we should be reducing taxes and not allowing taxes to increase.”

Gary Johnson

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

Money , Understanding , Reality , Freedom

“Everything that I did as Governor, and everything that I think needs to occur right now in the Federal Government, needs to be a cost-benefit analysis. What are we spending our money on, and what are we getting for what we're spending? I am of the belief that we are on the verge of a financial collapse. We can not repay fourteen trillion dollars in debt if we're spending one point six trillion dollars more than we're taking in this year and years to come. That is not sustainable… We landed on the moon, we can balance the federal budget. And that means cutting forty-three cents out of every federal dollar that we're currently spending.”

Gary Johnson

Statement from CNN Interview
YouTube
2011-04-21
http://youtu.be/VFf4P20cWmU
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 support a woman's right to choose up until viability of the fetus. As Governor of New Mexico, I would have signed a bill banning late-term abortion. I've always favored parental notification, I've always favored counseling, and I've always favored the notion that public funds should not be used for abortion.”

Gary Johnson

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

Support , Parent

“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 think the main ingredient that’s needed when it comes to campaign finance reform is simply transparency more than anything. Right now it’s not transparent. You can be Coca Cola. You can donate a million dollars to a … you can donate a million dollars to me via the republican national committee and it will not be reported as coming from Coca Cola. So when it comes to campaign finance reform in my opinion what’s needed very simply is just one hundred percent transparency.”

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
Miscellaneous

Thinking

“Politics is momentum. And we have right now straight line momentum.”

Gary Johnson

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