[qrendel]

Green Party is also an option if you want to protest vote. A problem, for some, with supporting libertarian candidates is that they (voters) may not be as fond of the low-hanging fruit policies most likely to get implemented (e.g. defunding many agencies, removing environmental protections) as the moonshot policies they also promote (e.g. ending the war on drugs and reducing the military-industrial-natsec complex). Even though neither 3rd party will ever win, the votes do send a message about which way policy adjustments should be made, so it's still worth some thought about what message you really want to send.

[jeffdavis]

Most people live in uncontested states (for the presidential election). Voting for a major party only makes sense if you actually like the candidate, or you live in a swing state.

The Libertarian party is much bigger than the Green party, and there are many people who sympathize with libertarians on a lot of issues even if they don't call themselves libertarian.

Johnson/Weld are real candidates -- both two-term governors from moderate states! I'm surprised they don't have more support considering how bad the major candidates are.

[qrendel]

Regarding size, the official memberships from 2014 were ~411,000 (Libs) vs ~248,000 (Greens). You could look at that as either the Libertarians being 66% larger, or them being practically the same as far as order of magnitude and portion of the total electorate. Johnson/Weld are more experienced candidates than Stein, but on the other hand, Ron and Rand Paul never came as close to winning a nomination as Sanders did, either (him being about 98% in line with Stein's positions - I remember his local campaign staff even defecting to her around the time of the DNC endorsement).

Regarding policies, Greens and Libertarians are also 99% in alignment on this particular issue (war on drugs), as well as some others. I know people have their preferences, just pointing out that there are multiple similarly-sized third parties of yet complete opposite ideological natures that would still be optionable for those wanting to vote on this kind of thing. It's even easier to not support this kind of behavior by the DEA.

[jlj]

On this issue, he is the best person for the job. Voting for the best person for the job is never a protest vote.

[elktea]

You guys really need preferential voting