GARY JOHNSON MAKES HIS CASE.

Johnson’s op-ed is mostly positive, focusing mainly on his policy ideas while taking just a couple specialized shots at his opponents Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Johnson, who didn’t poll high enough to make the debate stage Monday night, says that his Libertarian Party ticket is the only one that offers Americans “a chance to find common ground.”

Johnson and his running mate, Bill Weld, suggested they are fiscal conservatives but social liberals. Johnson vetoed more than 750 bills as governor of New Mexico, and said he believes “government does too much and costs too much.” He also scolded the treatment of black Americans by police officers and advocated for criminal justice reform.

“What would government be like in a Johnson administration?” he asked. “First, we would begin the conversation about the size of government by submitting a real balanced budget. Every government program would have to justify its expenditures, every year.”

He added: “Cuts of up to 20 percent or more would be on the table for all programs, including military spending. Changes to Social Security and Medicare must also be considered.”

Johnson called Trump’s immigration proposals “ludicrous,” and implied that a Libertarian president wouldn’t deport “noncriminal undocumented immigrants” or build a wall. He also knocked Clinton on foreign policy for her “muddled mix of intervention, regime change and bombing campaigns.” These, Johnson wrote, created the disasters in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria.

He makes some solid points.