Off The Grid: John McAfee Wants Your Vote in 2016 (Maybe)

So what's John McAfee running on…and why is he running?

• Wired  reports: “Like Lawrence Lessig, the Harvard professor who is running for president to push an agenda for campaign finance reform, McAfee seems far more concerned with having his voice heard on one particular issue than with taking a seat in the Oval Office.”
• In his interview with Wired Magazine this morning, McAfee cited government's technological illiteracy as a primary motivation in announcing his run for president
• He sees the recent hacks of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and Homeland Security as his reasons to run.
• “Things like this cannot happen or should not happen,” he says. “It’s clear that the leadership of our country is illiterate on the fundamental technology that supports everything in life for us now, that is cyber science, our smartphones, our military hardware, our communications.”
• However, he’s also hoping his one-issue-platform will persuade someone else who is “smarter and more charismatic” than he is to run with his backing (he did not mention whom he had in mind).

Since this morning, McAfee has started his own political party called the “Cyber Party,” as reported by ArsTechnica. Here is his campaign website.

McAfee has led a rather colorful life since selling the last of his shares in McAfee Associates almost 20 years ago. 

Here’s Fifteen Things You Might Not Know About John McAfee, as reported by NBC News:

1. Just last month, he was arrested in Tennessee on charges of driving under the influence and possession of a handgun under the influence.

2. He was detained in Guatemala in 2012 on suspicion of entering the country illegally.

3. McAfee crossed into Guatemala to evade investigators in Belize who wanted to question him in connection to the death of his neighbor, a fellow U.S. citizen.

4. He was deported to the U.S. a few weeks later. He claimed he faked two heart attacks to buy time so his lawyer could get him extradited back to the US, rather than to Belize, where he feared authorities would kill him.

5. Belize never declared McAfee a suspect, and McAfee denied any involvement in the murder.

6. Belize authorities did sell off the assets they seized.

7. McAfee's blog became a must-read as he posted frequently about his escapades as a fugitive, detailing the many disguises he adopted, as he was “on the run” from Belize authorities.

8. Dean Barrow, Belize's prime minister then and now, described McAfee at the time as "extremely paranoid, even bonkers."

9. McAfee describes himself as an "eccentric millionaire."

10. According to Men’s Journal, “what isn't up for debate is that McAfee had a posse of teenage girls living with him [while he was in Belize­.] They were misfits, runaways, and troublemakers; one pulled a gun on him.”

11. McAfee is now 69 years old. He lives in Tennessee with his wife Janice, a black call girl he met in Miami after he got out of Guatemala.

12. He told Gizmodo that the Ashley Madison hack was an inside job due to the way the technology was released.

13. NY Daily News reports McAfee’s presidential announcement "coincides with the filming of a six-part Spike series about his life, "The McAfee Project," which is set to debut in April 2016."

14. He's also "filming a documentary series about himself with Billy Corben, who directed the 2006 film Cocaine Cowboys," according to a recent interview.

15. McAfee now joins the growing list of unlikely presidential candidates including a cat, 15-year-old Deez Nuts and possibly "Rent is Too Damn High" leader Jimmy McMillan, who announced a bid to the New York Daily News, but has yet to put in the paperwork. 

So what do you think? Is this a publicity stunt? Would you vote for the "eccentric millionaire"? Sound off below!