" Reagan, Reagan, Bush, Bush, Dole, Bush, Bush, McCain, Romney ..." If you think you know where this is going, think again, said the Richmond Times-Dispatch's editorial page this weekend.

Though the second largest Virginia newspaper has endorsed Republicans for president for the last 36 years, the editorial board found that they just couldn't this time for Donald Trump. Nor could they endorse Hillary Clinton.

They started to reach that conclusion "several weeks ago, as scandal continued to engulf the Democratic nominee while the Republican candidate's statements and behavior daily piled distress upon puzzlement."

At the same time, they started seriously looking at the Libertarian Party ticket with its one-two punch of former GOP governors, former two-term New Mexico executive Gary Johnson and former Massachusetts governor William Weld.

Several on the board were positively disposed toward Johnson but their "final decision to endorse the Johnson/Weld ticket, and to do so with great confidence and enthusiasm, came only after Johnson met with the editorial board last Monday morning."

That meeting went well for Johnson. The editors "found him to be knowledgeable but unscripted, reasonable and good-humored, self-assured but free from arrogance, willing and able to address every question, consistent in his beliefs without being dogmatic, even tempered, curious — and in all respects, optimistically, realistically presidential."

Part of Johnson's realism is his acknowledgement that if he doesn't get into the presidential debates, he doesn't stand a reasonable chance of breaking through America's two-party duopoly. To that end, the Richmond Times-Dispatch had a request for the Commission on Presidential Debates, which decides such things.

"[Johnson] is, in every respect, a legitimate and reasonable contender for the presidency — but only if the voters give him a fair hearing. And that can happen only if he is allowed to participate in the presidential debates that begin on Sept. 26 at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.

"If the Commission on Presidential Debates wants to perform a real service to its country, it will invite Gary Johnson onto the big stage," the paper wrote.