Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr was on CNN Monday morning discussing his presidential campaign. Independent Ralph Nader was on this morning; I will try to post a transcript when it becomes available.

HEIDI COLLINS: Well, much of the election talk has been centered on the Republican and Democratic candidates, but you should know and remember there are, of course, other parties on the ballot. Bob Barr is running for president on the libertarian ticket. He’s joining me now here on the set to talk a little bit more about this. Good morning to you. Thanks for being with us.

BOB BARR, LIBERTARIAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Always a pleasure, Heidi.

COLLINS: Thank you. First thing I want to do is look at one of our latest poll. This, of course, is a CNN Opinion Research Corporation Poll. Let’s go ahead and put that on the screen for everybody so they can see it at home here. You see the numbers. This is likely voters’ choice for president. Barack Obama, 51 percent, John McCain 43 percent, Ralph Nader, 3 percent, and you are there at 1 percent. Tell me about what you’re hoping to have happen tomorrow. What’s the goal here?

BARR: Well, what we’re hoping for and what we expect to happen is that that 1 percent will increase significantly, you know, certainly not enough to vault me into a runoff for the presidency, but to make sure that the American people look at the results on November 5th, the day after the election and say, by, golly, yes, there is a real choice. And it — you know, the sky did not fall because we voted for the libertarian candidate. To make people understand and realize that the libertarian platform, a much smaller federal government and more individual liberty, really is a mainstream, relevant political philosophy.

COLLINS: Because there certainly has been an awful lot of talk during this election cycle about how big the federal government could potentially grow. How do you explain that to people? How do you explain that this is not something that your party believes is going to be effective or beneficial to the people?

BARR: Both the Democrats and the Republicans have handed us the perfect illustration of why the current system that results in ever- bigger government isn’t working, and it’s these bailouts. We just read in the paper today that the AIG bailout, which — for which they’ve already gotten over $100 billion, actually isn’t working, isn’t doing anything. When the federal government steps in and takes taxpayers’ money, takes money out of our pocket, and tries to manipulate the market instead of leaving it to the free market forces, things don’t work properly. This is the best example, this $1 trillion bailout or series of bailouts that we could hope for.

COLLINS: But to be fair, this came up after — long after you decided to run for president. What is it that made you want to run for the highest office in this country?

BARR: What made me run — want to run for president is the fact that both the Republican and the Democratic parties are not responding to the basic needs of our history and the people of this country to empower people as opposed to empowering government.

COLLINS: In fact, you say that they don’t understand the constitution.

BARR: They really don’t. For example, these bailouts, there’s no constitutional authority at all for the federal government to be doing what it’s doing, but very few people outside of the Libertarian Party and a few constitutional scholars are raising that as a legitimate issue, which it is.

COLLINS: So you feel like the American people should be really upset about this?

BARR: They ought to be tremendously upset, particularly young people, because it’s the young people that are going to be paying years into the future for this massive spending, and the inflation that’s inevitably going to come from it.

COLLINS: I know you’ve been doing an awful lot of traveling, just like the other candidates have been doing. We discussed the battlegrounds are the same battlegrounds for you, of course. When this is over tomorrow, possibly into Wednesday, God forbid, what do you hope to take away from this and what will you do next?

BARR: Well, of course, I’m a working stiff, like you are, and so many millions of Americans, after, I’m going to get back to work, practice law, do consulting work and writing as I have for many years. But I’m also going to remain very active politically. And what we hope will happen on Election Day is that the Libertarian Party will obtain a sufficient percentage of the popular vote in order to influence public policy in much the same way that Ross Perot’s ideas took hold after the ‘92 election, even though he didn’t win, because he got sufficient votes so that the other two parties could no longer ignore him.

COLLINS: We call it a spoiler.

BARR: No, we call it a public policy advocate. And that’s the way, by getting a sufficient percentage of the vote so the other two parties can’t ignore you, that way you can make sure that those issues that are important to your party and to the American people are actually heard.

COLLINS: All right. Well, we will be watching. We sure do appreciate your time here.

BARR: Thank you.

COLLINS: I know it’s been a long, long run for everybody. We appreciate it. Presidential candidate and former congressman, Bob Barr.