For those voters fatigued with Iowa and already bracing for New Hampshire, there’s always Gary Johnson to consider. Let us recall that the Libertarian presidential hopeful garnered 1.2 million votes when he ran in 2012 — about 1 percent of the total vote. This time around, Mr. Johnson is not jetting from one state to the next like his establishment rivals; his campaign budget is very slim. Nevertheless, the tenacious candidate is presenting his case with considerable verve — and he’s casting a wide net.

“I reach out to you, members of all political parties. I reach out to anyone with a vote and an ax to grind. From the tea party, the Constitution Party, the Green and Libertarian parties, I call out to all of you, including the disaffected and disillusioned among Republicans and Democrats,” Mr. Johnson says in an edgy new campaign video.

“Today there’s a handful of people in Washington, ruining America. This small group has presided over the elimination of the Bill of Rights and the systematic dismantling of our freedoms guaranteed to us under our Constitution. Our leaders have blown it. I ask you to join me in trying something that’s never been attempted before in America. Let’s put our political parties and our differences aside one time. Be Libertarian with me for one election. “

The former New Mexico governor has adopted “Be Libertarian with me” as a campaign slogan and advises that he vetoed 750 bills during his nine years in office, cut taxes 14 times, has scaled Mount Everest and built his own house in Taos. He bills himself as a game changer and says that campaign contributions “are like fuel for liberty.” The Utah-based Mr. Johnson stages a Google Hangout on Tuesday at 7 p.m. MT and notes he’ll talk over the issues with all-comers.

THE HAIR-RAISING TOTAL

$19,012,827,698,417 and 93 cents.

— The federal debt, as of Friday, Jan. 29. The source is the U.S. Treasury Department.

ADVERTISERS PRAY IT’S BUSH Vs CLINTON

The 2016 race is projected to generate $6 billion in political advertising, drawing keen interest from those who create and manage the campaign. And some candidates are more lucrative than others, apparently. “A Jeb Bush versus Hillary Clinton presidential race would be best for business for the nation’s leading political advertising firms,” notes a new survey of national political ad agencies.

When asked which candidate would generate the strongest ad spend, 44 percent of agencies say Mr. Bush would be the strongest Republican revenue generator. The respondents unanimously agreed that Mrs. Clinton was the moneymaker among the Democrats. Sen. Marco Rubio was the second choice, followed by Donald Trump.

“It’s not that surprising that, from a pure business perspective, political advertising agencies would like to see a Clinton-Bush matchup,” say Judd Rubin, vice president of STRATA, the Chicago-based marketing group and media software adviser that conducted the survey.

Mr. Trump — who generates almost endless free publicity and press coverage for his campaign — is a source of fascination, even though he actually lagged in the poll.

“The story is Trump and his command of the earned media game. We’ve never seen anything like it and we may never see it again. After this campaign, there will be college courses examining Trump’s uncanny ability to demand media attention and his use of Twitter,” predicts Mr. Rubin.

AND SPEAKING OF UNCANNY ABILITY

Indeed, there are numbers which reflect Donald Trump’s near psychic prowess at attracting the media.

“An examination of all campaign coverage on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts from January 1 through January 31 finds Trump received nearly 157 minutes of airtime, or almost 60 percent of the total coverage of GOP presidential candidates,” reports Rich Noyes, research director for the media Research Center, which tracked the coverage.

“Sen. Ted Cruz received half as much coverage (79 minutes, or 30 percent), while Sen. Marco Rubio received a grand total of 10 and a half minutes of coverage (4 percent). None of the other Republican candidates received even ten minutes of airtime during the entire month of January,” Mr. Noyes notes.

REASSURINGLY REAGAN

“I hear all these Republicans — and you know who they are; you’ve heard them yourself — run around talking about the era of Reagan is over. And we need to get past this Reagan fetish that we all have. You take a look at the Republican candidates here, and even some who haven’t made it this far. I could give you Ted Cruz. I could give you Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, and Scott Walker before they got out. Those are all people in their 40s to early 50s who are Reaganites,” talk radio host Rush Limbaugh told his vast audience on Monday.

“They all came of age and were influenced by Reagan. The future of the Republican Party is represented by candidates in the primary who are all Reaganites, to one degree or another. Meaning: There’s no way the era of Reagan is over. This election is an opportunity to continue it. It’s an opportunity to build on it. It’s an opportunity to actually elect a Republican president who is a Reaganite,” Mr. Limbaugh concluded.

According to historian and Reagan biographer Craig Shirley, “Ronald Reagan continues to hold a tight grip on the American imagination and he is steadily moving into a place in history occupied by FDR, Lincoln and a few select others.”

POLL DU JOUR

• 59 percent of federal employees would be embarrassed if Donald Trump was elected president; 22 percent would be proud, 16 percent ambivalent.

• 49 percent would be embarrassed if Hillary Clinton was elected president; 27 percent would be proud, 22 percent ambivalent.

• 45 percent would be embarrassed if Sen. Ted Cruz was elected; 21 percent would be proud, 24 percent ambivalent.

• 37 percent would be embarrassed if Sen. Bernard Sanders was elected; 27 percent would be proud, 28 percent elected.

• 35 percent of federal employees consider themselves an independent, 28 percent are Democrats, 26 percent Republicans and 4 percent are “other.”

Source: A Government Executive Media Group survey of 688 federal employees conducted Jan. 20-26.

• Churlish remarks, happy talk to [email protected]

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