A lot of voters seem not to know who Gary Johnson is or what his values are. All most people seem to care about is that he's not Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. Here's some background information about the Libertarian candidate for those of you who have never heard of him before. 
Gary Johnson is an author, businessman and politician. He also was the Libertarian Party candidate for 2012 as well. Johnson served as the Republican Governor of New Mexico from 1995 to 2003. Gary Johnson's platform while in office was the stereotypical Republican platform with a 10% decreased state budget, tax cuts for both businesses and citizens, and a focus on school vouchers. Johnson deviated from most of his fellow Governors at the time due to marijuana decriminalization plan. However, his lenient views weren't the only thing setting him apart from the pack. Gary Johnson used his veto power more than the other 49 Governors in office at the time put together. He vetoed 47% of bills in his first term and used line-item vetos on the rest.
From the outside, he seems like a somewhat successful Republican Governor. In reality, that is far from the truth. Education spending went up nearly 1/3 during his first term despite promises of budget cuts. Notwithstanding this budget increase, scores and attendance was sinking in New Mexico, so Johnson quickly turned to a standard Republican solution to education- school vouchers. However, the flaws with the voucher system are that it allows upper middle class and wealthy students to a higher quality education than most low-income families can afford. Most prominent private schools cost more than Johnson's proposed 3,500$ voucher, and often private schools may favor a religious curriculum that directly goes against the country's values of church separate from the state. Simply put, Johnson would not make a suitable president.
Johnson is not the candidate that most people think he is. Most people look at him as the more socially favorable version of Trump while not as corrupt as Clinton. This view of Johnson is far from the truth, though. Johnson supports private prisons when America is number one when it comes to incarceration rates. This statistic is easy to understand when you look at the amount that these 'super'prisons profit off of prisoners. He also supports the continued usage of fracking despite acknowledging that it is inefficient and extremely harmful to the environment. Johnson's argument is that fracking can't be improved on if its practices are discontinued. He also remains apathetic when it comes to fossil fuels and carbon emissions. The libertarian even goes so far as in 2012 supporting the Keystone Pipeline without quite knowing why the government should be interceding in it. While he admits that there is a problem with the energy system, he argues that it is not the government's job to intervene with private business to fix it. What private citizen can intervene where the government isn't supposed to, though?
Overall though, Johnson seems mostly unaware on issues that most presidential candidates should be aware of. He only seems to favor issues if it seems like libertarians would support it, and his views reflect that of a 'lesser of two evils' candidate. The libertarian candidate supports TPP or the Trans-Pacific-Partnership despite not completely understanding the plan itself.When asked he also couldn't recognize a famous site of the Syrian civil war- Aleppo.He's expected to be the commander-in-chief. Gary Johnson also recently had his second "Aleppo moment" when he was asked to name his favorite foreign leader. He was unable to name one and his running mate eventually had to answer the question so that they could eventually move on. However at the end of the day, several of Johnson's misconceptions can be construed as deadly. He previously was an opponent of mandatory vaccines until he was made informed of the effect that not vaccinating can have on local populations. He has made it abundantly clear that Jews should be forced to bake cakes for Nazi customers. Johnson's largest argument is that he will cut national spending and the deficit along with it. However, he doesn't mention the fact that he increased New Mexico's budget by three million and the debt by nearly four million. A rate unmatched by nearly 22 former governor presidential candidates from either party for the twenty years.
Overall, Gary Johnson is just another candidate running under whatever party's platform will land him an election. He promises budget cuts but overall hasn't provided very much information or initiative to go through it. His estimates of 43% budgetary cuts are ridiculous but are to be expected from a candidate who is simply coasting by on the electorate's dislike of the two major candidates. Gary Johnson ran initially as a Republican candidate in 2012 but only fielded 2% of the vote in the primaries. Therefore he quickly changed his party to Libertarian once it became apparent to Johnson that he would not make it far on the Republican ticket. He declared that he was going to win 5% of the vote which would mean equal ballot access and federal funding for the Libertarian party in the next election. Despite his goal, he ended up winning 1.3 million votes or .99% of the popular vote. He now has 12% of the popular vote as shown by polling. The Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson, has not changed much. His views nor his platform have not deviated much from what he ran with in 2012. The only things that have changed are the candidates, and he would not even be getting a fraction of the attention that he is getting if Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were not the candidates this presidential cycle.
October 11th is the last day that voters can register to vote in Georgia. Remember the open Supreme Court leaves this election very important, SO GO OUT AND VOTE!
