The trouble there stems from the fact, as I’ve argued at length in my column at Rare, that Johnson’s libertarianism is based more in instinct than principle. His policy impulses are, from a libertarian view, generally good, but they are not grounded in anything resembling a developed governing philosophy. As a result, when two of his impulses conflict, he goes to pieces.

Here Johnson found himself possessed of instincts that free expression of religion is a right; that discrimination based on sexual orientation is bad; and that attempts to legislate matters of conscience typically turn out poorly. But he was entirely unable to coherently adjudicate between these competing (though not necessarily conflicting) proposals. This led to Johnson remarking in an interview with a conservative publication that he sees “religious freedom, as a category, as just being a black hole.”

With comments like that, is it any surprise polling has shown Clinton snagging almost triple Johnson’s support among social conservatives? No wonder he couldn’t top the 15 percent national backing he needed to get into the debates.

That libertarianism of instinct rather than informed philosophical grounding is also why Johnson-Weld has been a better representative of bland centrism than libertarianism proper.