Polling shows room for Libertarian vote to grow in New Hampshire

I blogged yesterday about the 7% support that Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson enjoys in New Hampshire. It is important to note that 65% of the voters know nothing about him. The support he has comes primarily from moderates and those who list themselves as Very Conservative. His support among liberals is noticeably lower.

New Hampshire: One place where Gary
Johnson's "Live Free" slogan should
definitely resonate.

Today's Public Policy Polling follow-up in New Hampshire suggests that there is significant room for Johnson to grow that liberal support. PPP found that two of Johnson's signature issues are rapidly rising in popularity:

-Support for gay marriage in New Hampshire continues to be on the rise. 57% of voters think it should be legal to 35% who think it should be illegal. That represents a six point increase in support for gay marriage compared to last July when we found support at 51/38. Democrats (85% support) and Republicans (just 21% support) are pretty far apart on this issue but as we're finding more and more independents (61% support) are a lot closer to the Democrats than the Republicans on it. 85% of voters support some form of legal recognition for gay couples in the form of either marriage or civil unions, including 69% of Republicans.

-65% of voters support legalizing medical marijuana to 24% opposed. That includes more than 70% of Democrats and independents and even a plurality of GOP voters (46/43).

Given that most people now believe that President Obama's abrupt conversion on marriage equality was a cynical political maneuver (as compared to Governor Johnson's long-held position), and that neither Obama nor Romney has anything planned for marijuana except continuing prosecution and persecution, this would appear to be fertile ground for Libertarians.

If you're in New Hampshire and interested in helping out the Gary Johnson 2012 campaign, visit the New Hampshire for Gary Johnson 2012 Facebook page and get involved. You can also contact campaign officials direct via the Gary Johnson 2012 website.

Comments

A Libertarian Martin Luther King Jr. Day post

In which we travel into interesting waters . . . (for a fairly long trip, so be prepared) Dr. King's 1968 book, Where do we go from here: chaos or community? , is profound in that it criticizes anti-poverty programs for their piecemeal approach, as John Schlosberg of the Center for a Stateless Society [C4SS] observes: King noted that the antipoverty programs of the time “proceeded from a premise that poverty is a consequence of multiple evils,” with separate programs each dedicated to individual issues such as education and housing. Though in his view “none of these remedies in itself is unsound,” they “all have a fatal disadvantage” of being “piecemeal,” with their implementation having “fluctuated at the whims of legislative bodies” or been “entangled in bureaucratic stalling.” The result is that “fragmentary and spasmodic reforms have failed to reach down to the profoundest needs of the poor.” Such single-issue approaches also have “another common failing — ...

More of This, Please

Or perhaps I should say, "Less of this one, please." Or how about just, "None of them. Ever again. Please....For the Love of God." Sunshine State Poll: Grayson In Trouble The latest Sunshine State/VSS poll shows controversial Democratic incumbent Alan Grayson trailing former state Senator Dan Webster by seven points, 43 percent to 36 percent. A majority of respondents -- 51 percent -- disapprove of the job that Grayson is doing. Independents have an unfavorable view of him as well, by a 36/47 margin. Grayson has ignored the conventional wisdom that a freshman should be a quiet member who carefully tends to the home fires. The latest controversy involves his " Taliban Dan " advertisement, where he explicitly compares his opponent to the Taliban, and shows a clip of Webster paraphrasing Ephesians 5:22 -- "wives, submit to your husbands." An unedited version of the clip shows that Webster was actually suggesting that husba...

A reply to Salon's R. J. Eskrow, and his 11 stupid questions about Libertarians

Posts here have been in short supply as I have been living life and trying to get a campaign off the ground. But "11 questions to see if Libertarians are hypocrites" by R. J. Eskrow, picked up at Salon , was just so freaking lame that I spent half an hour answering them. In the end (but I'll leave it to your judgment), it is not that Libertarians or Libertarian theory looks hypocritical, but that the best that can be said for Mr. Eskrow is that he doesn't have the faintest clue what he's talking about. That's ok, because even ill-informed attacks by people like this make an important point: Libertarian ideas (as opposed to Conservative ideas, which are completely different) are making a comeback as the dynamic counterpoint to "politics as usual," and so every hack you can imagine must be dragged out to refute them. Ergo: Mr. Eskrow's 11 questions, with answers: 1. Are unions, political parties, elections, and ...

Search This Blog