"The Future of Our America" 
Gary Johnson, Governor New Mexico, 1995 to 2003,
possible Presidential candidate 2012

Thursday, March 3
Admission Free        No reservation necessary

* We'll socialize from 7:00pm.
* The meeting begins at ABOUT 7:30pm with 
    a discussion of current issues and events.
* The featured speaker is introduced at ABOUT 8:00pm.
* The meeting will continue to ABOUT 10:00pm.

General Society Library, 
20 West 44th Street, bet. 5th & 6th Aves., NYC
near the Grand Central Terminal

Subway: 
4, 5, 6, 7, S to Grand Central -- 42nd St.  
or
B, D, F, 7 to 42nd Street -- Sixth Ave. at Bryant Park   
or
A, C, E, N, Q, R, S, 1, 2, 3, 7 to Times Square -- 42nd St.
or
Bus: M5, M6, M7, M10, M27, M42, M104

Please note: 
    Junto is not the usual sort of meeting with a long speech 
followed by Q & A. Junto's invited speakers give a short 
presentation and are challenged to defend their assertions. 
    Discussions are intense, but polite. Participation by all 
attendees is highly encouraged.
    Junto meets on the first Thursday of every month, at the 
General Society Library, 20 West 44th Street, NYC, 
between 5th & 6th Aves., near Grand Central Terminal
**************************************************
Gary Johnson, Governor New Mexico, 1995 to 2003. 
    "The Future of Our America" on the important topics of our 
time, discussion items and potential solutions including our 
economy, government spending, immigration, civil liberties
and the failed war on drugs.
    He's a low-tax, privatization Republican and a possible
Presidential candidate 2012.
    He was a two-term liberty minded Republican Governor 
of NM, best known for having vetoed over 750 bills -- more 
than all the other 49 governors combined. 
    His line-item vetoes, numbering in the thousands, stripped 
wasteful spending from many pieces of legislation, with the 
majority during his first term. 
    He outright vetoed nearly half of all bills sent to his desk 
during that first term, and he often jokes that he "took the 
process to a new art form." Unsurprisingly, his use of the veto 
pen earned him the nickname "Governor Veto."
    He cut the rate of NM's government growth in half and 
oversaw the elimination of the state's budget deficit without 
once raising taxes. 
    He cut taxes 14 times while Governor, and when he left 
office, NM was one of only four states with a balanced budget. 
In his eight years real NM GDP increased by almost 30%. 
    In 1995, he was one of 21 Republican Governors who asked 
then-Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader 
Bob Dole to prioritize balancing the federal budget within 
seven years. 
    He went further than the others, however, by calling for 
the "exciting prospect" of proportional cuts in a wide range of 
programs in order to put hundreds of billions of dollars in the 
hands of entrepreneurs.
    Despite his strict record of fiscal conservatism in a state 
where registration is 2-1 Democrat, he won re-election to 
his second term by a wider margin than in his initial run. 
    He debated his Democratic opponent 28 times, and counts 
as one of his proudest achievements that he never ran a 
negative ad nor spoke ill about any of his opponents. 
    By talking only about matters of importance, he focused 
public debate on those issues alone. He also succeeded in 
privatizing half of NM's state prisons. 
    He was the country's most outspoken advocate of school 
choice and other market-based education reforms, proposing 
what the NY Times called "the most ambitious voucher 
program in the country." 
    Charter schools hadn't been on the table before in NM. His 
efforts resulted in the passing of legislation for it. 
    In 1999, he became the highest-ranking public official to 
speak out against the Drug War, arguing that prohibition of 
marijuana in particular is the chief cause of violence along 
the U.S.'s southern border. 
    He advocates for a reassessment of the nation's drug laws, 
and more recently endorsed Proposition 19, California's 
campaign to legalize marijuana in the state.
    A successful businessman before running for office in 1994, 
he started a door-to-door handyman business to help pay his 
way through college. 
    Twenty years later, he'd grown his firm into one of 
the largest construction companies in NM, with over 
1,000 employees. 
    He brings a distinctly business-like mentality to governing, 
believing that decisions should be made based on cost-benefit 
analysis rather than strict ideology.
    He retired from public office when he was term-limited in 
2003, and remains a strong proponent of citizen- rather than 
career politicians. 
    He stayed out of public life for the next few years, instead 
choosing to work toward his personal goal of climbing the 
highest peaks on all seven continents. 
    An avid skier, adventurer and bicyclist, he has currently 
reached four of those summits, including Mt. Everest, which 
he climbed with a partially broken leg. 
    In addition to these pursuits, Johnson served as an investor 
in a number of private enterprises.
    In 2009, after becoming increasingly concerned with the 
country's out-of-control national debt and precarious financial 
situation, the Governor formed the OUR America Initiative, a 
501(c)(4) non-profit that promotes fiscal responsibility, civil 
liberties and rational public policy. 
    As the group's Honorary Chairman, he's traveled to more 
than 30 states and spoken to over 120 conservative and liberty 
type groups since January 2010. 
    Ranging from tea parties to Campaign for Liberty events, 
some of the his more noteworthy appearances have been his 
keynote addresses at the West Virginia and Maryland state 
Republican Party Conventions, his speech at the Freedom
Works-sponsored 9-12 Tea Party Rally on the National Mall, 
and his recent appearance at the 10th Amendment Center's 
Nullify Now Conference.
    Billed the "most interesting Republican you've never heard 
of," he's received a significant amount of press recently.
    The conservative southern California OC Register ran an
editorial and an AP profile ran in newspapers across the 
country recently. 
    His recent appearance on John Stossel's TV show "Battle 
for the Future" has re-aired on Fox News many times. 
    See it here: bit.ly/JohnsonStossel  
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