Jimmy McMillan, who came to light last fall during the New York gubernatorial campaign saying “the rent is too damn high,” is taking his message national as a candidate for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination — this time adding that “the gas is too damn high”.
McMillan has run for public office eight times in New York since 1993, including his last gubernatorial run as the candidate, for The Rent Is 2 Damn High Party.
His belief that the necessities of life have become too expensive prompted McMillan recently to collaborate with the activist group Let Freedom Ring to shoot a video for GasolineIsTooDamnHigh.com. McMillan stands outside the White House in the video with his trademark white hair, goatee, suit, gloves and golden earrings asking people if “The gasoline is too damn high.”
Let Freedom Ring President Colin Hanna told The Daily Caller McMillan used humor in the web video to remind Americans that the administration’s refusal to expand domestic oil drilling is a significant part of the problem of high oil prices.
The easiest way to reduce the price of gasoline is to increase the supply and reassure futures speculators that more oil and gasoline will be available in the long run, Hanna said.
McMillan told TheDC that the Obama administration is out of touch with the hardship high gas prices have imposed on families across the country where mothers and fathers have to choose between paying for gas and paying for rent. He warned that gas prices were affecting other industries such as food production and transportation, fueling inflation in the process.
“We need the necessities of living, not the accessories of life,” McMillan said. “You don’t run a country and the White House the way you are doing right now.
McMillan continued: “People should be ashamed of themselves for the way they are voting because they have put their children in a hell of a position. They’ve been voting like they’re on crack.
“You put this country into this mess because you keep voting for the same people over and over again.”
President Obama and the other declared or potential GOP candidates such as Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and Ron Paul are out of touch with the way average Americans live, McMillan said.
“These Republican candidates need to stop playing these fool games, and start focusing on those things that matter,” McMillan told The Daily Caller. “Gas is too damn high, rent is too damn high and everything is too damn high.
“We ought to be ashamed of ourselves because they government is taking other people’s money, and then the government goes and bails out corporations.”
But he promises to be a different kind of a candidate and a president — one who knows what it is like to be an ordinary American.
McMillan believes having been a Vietnam veteran and postal worker means he is more in touch than more establishment candidates in the Republican pack.
“If you think I stole the debate, you’ll see I’ll steal the presidency and bring gas down, tuition down and rent down, and get people back into their homes who have lost their homes to foreclosure,” McMillan said. “I can’t wait to debate all of [the other presidential candidates].”
He contends real Americans cannot afford basic necessities such as food, and the price at the pump is forcing people to decide between gas and rent.
“People can’t afford to put a roof over their heads and put money in their pockets,” McMillan said.
And he vows to change that.