A Zogby poll of 1,008 likely voters across the U.S., conducted September 11-13 (+/- 3.1%) offered respondents a choice between Libertarian Bob Barr, Republican John McCain, independent Ralph Nader, and Democrat Barack Obama in the presidential race. Nader was the choice of 1.6%, Barr 1.3%, and 0.8% volunteered that they would vote for someone else; 6.5% were undecided. Obama led McCain 45.1% to 44.6%.
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I predict that when the election results are in, Nader tops 1 million votes, and the gap between Barr and Baldwin is <150,000 votes. I also say there’s a 9-1 chance that Baldwin actually gets more votes than Barr.
Steve,
The purist mantra that it is possible for the LP to stand on principle has always been a farcical idea, kept alive mostly the fact that, no matter what they say in telephone polls answered from the comfort of their living rooms, most voters are just not angry enough at the current two-party duopoly to vote 3rd party. Because of this, our party has remained small, and thus the idea of “standing on principle” has seemed viable to some.
The reality of the matter is, if the American public truly got angry enough at the Demopublicans to the point where they would seriously consider voting third party, the likely scenario is that a current politican from one of the two major parties would sense this mood and switch to the LP to run for president. Consider Gravel, Paul, and Barr canaries in the coal mine, so to speak.
To think that this person would be a purist is ludicrous. They would simply move far enough over to a Libertarian position to maximize their vote total. Under no conceivable scenario would this position be anywhere close to “purism.”
More importantly, as a purist you would have no way to stop it, because almost by definition you are and will be a minority in the party. Barr’s victory in Denver proves this. Imagine if the electorate was truly angry with the Demopublicans. The reality in the case is something you as a purist will have to deal with now, or in the event the scenario I describe happens: the party will be overrun almost immediately with “moderates.” There would be no way for you to stop it.
I also wonder abt Nader really pulling 1.6 million votes. Especially if the vote is close, I think there are a lot of would be Nader voters that are seriously worried abt Palin/McCain. Like me. I’m not saying I will vote for Obama. I’m not sure I could mentally/psychically survive voting for a major party presidential candidate.
p.s. most of us were democrats or republicans before we became libertarian. We all have records of non-libertarian thought, for the most part, in our histories.
Certainly, if we want the electorate to move to the Libertarian position, they will only do so by abandoning their current positions.
It cannot be a criticism that you were not libertarian sometime in the past. We have to judge people based on their current positions.
Bob Barr has been an eloquent, and consistent speaker on behalf of Libertarian ideas, for several years before he even was convinced by Ron Paul and others, to join the presidential race, which he did so, only reluctantly at the behest of other Libertarians who recruited him.
No, you will only be recruiting new infants at the maternity ward, if you need all Libertarians to be pure with no histories.
The LP certainly has not thrown principled libertarianism out the window. To say such a thing, is an unwarranted, undeserved, and unsupported slap in the face to the highly principled, dedicated membership of the LP.
The fact that Bob Barr was a republican, before joining the Libertarian movement several years before he was nominated to this post, is not a violation of any type of Libertarianism.
The fact is, he is a libertarian, a hard working, highly intelligent and professional libertarian, and one of the best out there.
Now I do agree about one thing, even if over inflating numbers is one way of attracting interest, I think its a mistake.
And this Bob Barr supporter never predicted he would get over 1%, I’ve consistently stated we should educate all that we meet, that we aren’t going to win. We want to retain membership for the long hall. We will win – someday, but it will be after the base membership is at least 10 times in size. For now, we are in a membership building phase.
I don’t think Nader and Bob Barr will maintain their current numbers. History shows that people launch protest support until about election day, and then they go ahead and vote for the major parties candidates, that they truly believe to do anything else is throwing their vote away.
Let’s see now . . . all the Barr supporters were saying 5%, 7%, raising 10 to 20 million.
As predicted, the “polls” for Barr are getting in the 1% range, and we still have 1 1/2 months until election day. Look for Barr to get in the 0.4 to 0.8% range as the election draws near.
Barr will probably not get more than 600,000 votes. Certainly, that’s more than every other LP campaign for president except Clark in 1980, but not by much.
Will it have been worth it to throw principled libertarianism out the window (by nominating Barr/W.A.R.) for a measly 200,000 additional votes?
Not in my book it isn’t.