Bob Johnson for Congress - Let's Try FREEDOM!
Relevant Biography of Robert Edward Johnson
I am Robert Edward Johnson, or Bob Johnson as I'll be listed on the ballot. You can call me Bob if you ever talk to me. I was born in Washington, D.C. and raised with my younger brother Frank in Arlington, VA. My father worked for the National Archives, and the Warren Commission and all of its relevant artifacts (the gun, Oswald's socks) fell under his care. If you ever see any documentaries on the assassination of JFK, you'll recognize him as the man who carries out the rifle allegedly used to kill JFK.
I went to Washington-Lee High School, attended also by Shirley MacLaine, Warren Beatty and Sandra Bullock. During my stay there, despite being reared by moderate Democrats (or perhaps because of it, since my parents had a portrait of Jefferson on our wall) I became more and more interested in the concept of limited government. After hiding Conscience of a Conservative by Barry Goldwater under my pillow the way some teenaged boys hid Playboy under theirs, I realized that perhaps an even more consistent philosophy than Conservatism was desirable. During the 1973 Young Americans for Freedom Convention, I discovered what that philosophy was. It was called Libertarianism. I knew that for the rest of my life, I wanted people to learn about these ideas, and I knew that I wanted a planet where those ideas would be put into practice, not only here, but all over the planet. After graduating, I went to Princeton and got a BA in economics cum laude. I then attended The University of Chicago and received an MA in economics. I worked briefly doing economic research at the U.S. Commission of Civil Rights. I also taught microeconomics and macroeconomics courses at Roosevelt, DePaul, and The University of Chicago itself before pursuing a career as a computer consultant, which I've been doing since 1987.
During my first year in Chicago I met my wife. We stayed there about 10 years, lived in Philadelphia about 4 years, and eventually moved here gradually. I had a computer contract in Dallas and have lived in what is now the 3rd Congressional District since about September of 1993, first in apartments as I finished my first contract after about a year, then in a house as of about December 1994 as I moved my family here. Although my wife divorced me later after 18 years of marriage, I later obtained custody of my daughter Rachel Diana Johnson (now 21) and my son Stuart Mill Johnson (now 18). They are both in college now in Texas. I have only lived outside the district since then on two occasions: during 1996 when my mother had a stroke towards the end of 1995 and I needed to help take care of her for about a year, and during 2004 when the disastrous economy during 2003 required that I temporarily do contract work in Tampa, Florida during the end of 2003 and all of 2004. As I gradually began to realize that most of the economy's dive during the end of 2002 and 2003 had been due to a poor handling of the corporate corruption scandals by the Bush Administration and the subsequent invasion of Iraq, I decided to get political and decided to run for Congress in Florida in the 11th Congressional District as a Libertarian against the pro-war, pro-so-called "PATRIOT" Act Democratic Congressman Jim Davis, hoping to redirect our nation in the direction of the freedom philosophy which the Republican Party had once represented before the Bush Administration took matters in incorrect directions.
Jim Davis seemed to have very little in common with Libertarianism. On the usual economic issues he adopted the usual Democrat Big Government line, but on issues where the Democrats (more than Republicans) would normally appeal to Libertarians (staying out of fights with other countries unless we're attacked first and staying out of people's medicine cabinets and beds), my opponent was more like a staunch moralistic Republican. He voted to get into Iraq, voted for the so-called PATRIOT Act, and voted against medical marijuana use. Was there ANY position where he AGREED with Libertarians? Well, I eventually found that he seemed to be for Free Trade, or more accurately anything that had the phrase 'Free Trade' in it, like Free Trade Area of the Americas. However, as one could imagine, FTAA actually erects supra-national structures that would literally bring World Government closer (e.g., the UN would run FTAA). He also seemed to go a lot quicker on giving nations like Red China a permanent version of Most Favored Nation status. Since this could lead to the US being an accomplice in fencing stolen goods (e.g., ripped-off intellectual property rights, the slave labor of those in Chinese prisons), even this seemed fraught with error. The last straw was when I discovered that Davis had not even been opposed in 2002, but had indeed been opposed by a Libertarian in 2000 who had managed to get about 15% (lousy for a Republican, quite good for a Libertarian). Given the importance of the war and the so-called PATRIOT Act, and given that if I didn't oppose him, no one would (the Republicans' last candidate was in 1998), I decided that perhaps I should take a stand against Big Government. I decided to put myself on the ballot. What I discovered is that people vote party label, and that money only matters a lot in close races.
When the economy improved somewhat in Texas after the re-election of George Bush, I returned and quickly found a new job in January of 2005. In fact, I first heard about the job on the day of the election! Almost immediately after returning, I discovered that my Congressman, Sam Johnson, on February 19th, 2005 had claimed he thought that the Weapons of Mass Destruction still existed, were in Syria, and then offered to take an F15 with a couple of A-bombs to nuke Syria. Eleven days later he had said it was 'sort of a joke' when Roll Call magazine (a magazine concerning US Congress) informed him of a tape proving he'd made the statement. At this point I discovered that while my Republican Congressman was a vast improvement over Jim Davis of Florida, Sam Johnson's formerly excellent reputation as an opponent of intervention in other nation's affairs and an opponent of big spending by the Federal government had started to show cracks starting in about 1999 and accelerating as Bush took office, a trait sadly shared by most Republican Congressmen. Like Jim Davis, Sam Johnson had voted for Most Favored Nation status for Red China, and things continued to slide from there, until the most recent nutty statements about nuking Syria, urging us to stay in Iraq with no deadlines (a bit ironic since it was Nixon's deadlines on getting our troops out of Vietnam that got Sam Johnson out of the Hanoi Hilton via the Paris Peace Accords), opposing McCain's anti-torture bill, and finally, Sam's involvement in the growing DeLay/Abramoff scandal. I am running to try to set things right within the Republican Party - to return us to our traditional sanity on foreign policy (namely, a modest, non-interventionist policy) and fiscal responsibility which was our hallmark until Bush took office. I urge alienated voters to return to the Republican Party, or perhaps to turn to it for the first time, to oust a once-fine Congressman from office who has evidently become corrupt, out of touch with an increasingly diverse district, and out of touch even with his Republican base and the Texas Republican Platform on such matters as MFN status for Red China.
Don't get me wrong - I empathize with my opponent's sufferings during his military career. I just don't want him in Congress anymore.