By Vikki Hutton
The Libertarian Vice Presidential candidate believes his party will win the presidential election in 2016.
Judge Jim Gray said he felt equally “sorrowful” about the prospect of Romney or Obama winning the race for the White House on November 6th, adding “our country will be in a worse state in four years than it is today.”
“I hope I’m wrong but I don’t think so, it might help our campaign but not our country” he added.
The party missed out on the primaries for this year’s election, with Gray admitting that a win for the party “will not happen” on November 6th.
“Governor Gary Johnson and I will not win this election in a couple of days” he said.
“We should have been in the primaries. Had we been, I believe we may very well have won or been highly competitive.”
But, Gray was bullish about their chances for the next election in four years time.
The judge said: “We are going to win the presidency in 2016, I believe.”
The Libertarians’ priority for the 2012 election is now to secure 5% of the overall vote.
“If we just get 5% of the vote nationwide or more, that means that we as Libertarians will be qualified for Federal Matching Funds for future elections,” Judge Jim said.
“That will give us a sense of viability, people will see us as being competitive and it will be the beginning of the end of the two party system.”
The American political stage is overshadowed by Democrats and Republicans, with very little funding or coverage available for other parties.
Judge Jim explains that this makes gaining 5% of the vote and the subsequent funding all the more important.
“We do have a couple of PACs as well, but we just don’t have those tens and hundreds of millions of dollars that the Republicans & Democrats have. And by the way, they’re not using it on ads that talk about their record because neither one of them has one. They’re not talking about their ideas because they really don’t have any. What they are spending this money on is showing how inept the other one is and, honestly, we agree both of them!” he said.
The party suggest that a coalition government could be the way forward, holding up Britain’s current political team as an example of its benefits.
“We’d have a coalition made up of high ranking Libertarians and Independents in our administration, but with Republicans and Democrats” Judge Jim said.
“We’ll give credit to anybody that embraces a good idea, that has a good idea, to start working for our country, instead of for this selfish politics. You folks kind of see that in Britain, where you actually have a coalition government where it really is noteworthy and helpful.”
The Libertarian viewpoint is that both Republicans and Democrats have somewhat sold out.
“We believe that the Republican party has deserted its principals,” Judge Jim said.
“They used to talk about smaller government, less intrusive and less expensive government and keeping us safe, but they’ve retreated from that. The democrats have also retreated from their position.”
One of the most contentious issues for the Libertarians concerning Obama’s administration is the subject of American military.
“The Democrats have our military fighting in conflicts all around the world. They now have a programme where we now have drones – unmanned airplanes flying over our states, over our cities, surveilling us [sic]. That is not a liberal position.”
“We believe that we are classic liberals and classic conservatives and we actually uphold those where the Democrats and Republicans do not,” Judge Jim said.
Should they be successful in 2016, the Libertarians’ top priority will be the economy.
“We will submit the balanced budget to congress immediately,” said Judge Jim, “because the biggest security threat to USA is to have a failing economy. If we continue going like we have been, where we are borrowing 43 cents for every dollar we’re spending in the fed government today, we simply could collapse.”
“Paul Ryan’s radical budget, if you pencil it out, we will not balance our budget for 28 years,” he added.
Judge Jim holds up the Libertarian Party as “both financially responsible and socially tolerant.”
“We are where most of the voters are,” he said. “No-one is going to accuse Mr Obama of being financially responsible, and nobody is going to accuse Mr Romney of being socially tolerant.”
Neither one of the current presidential candidates looks promising to the Libertarians.
“It really doesn’t make much difference between Romney and Obama, they’re pretty much the same,” Judge Jim said.
The only reassurance is that Judge Jim expects either result to increase support for more Libertarian attitudes.
“I’m sorrowful about either candidate winning this election, but optimistic that people will start understanding what Libertarians would do and start ordering the political parties – whichever ones they are – to actually adopt Libertarian principals.”
This, and successfully obtaining 5% of the vote on November 6th, would stand the Libertarian Party in the best stead to run in 2016.