LP.org has a table showing how well the Barr ticket did in each of the 45 states where he was on the ballot.
They break down as follows:
Indiana 1.1%
Texas, Utah, Georgia 0.7%
(Of the top four states, Utah was the only one to have an alternative candidate besides Barr on the ballot for president; of the remaining states, North Carolina, in the next group of four at 0.6%, was the only one that didn’t).
Arizona, North Carolina, Wyoming, Idaho 0.6%
California, Montana, Kansas, Colorado, Michigan, Alaska, South Dakota 0.5%
Nevada, Ohio, Massachusetts, Maryland, Illinois, Arkansas, South Carolina, Missouri, Washington, Oregon 0.4%
Kentucky, Iowa, Hawai’i, Vermont, Virginia, Delaware, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, North Dakota, New York, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Nebraska, Minnesota 0.3%
New Jersey, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi 0.2%
The highest raw vote total was in Texas, followed by California; each had over 50,000 votes for Barr.
The next two states were Georgia and North Carolina, in the 25,000-30,000 range.
The lowest total, and the only state where he was listed on the ballot where he failed to get over a thousand votes, was Vermont, with 832 total votes for Barr (listed as 100% reporting).
32 responses so far ↓
1 paulie cannoli // Nov 7, 2008 at 1:40 pm
I forgot to wish Barr a happy birthday. He turned 60 on Wednesday.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/129921.html
2 George Phillies // Nov 7, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Remember, that’s ‘100% of precincts’ in many places nothing like 100% of votes, because absentee ballots are still being counted. Vote totals are going to be changing for a while.
3 George Phillies // Nov 7, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Vote totals, comparing Barr with Browne 1996:
Read http://www.thedailyliberty.com/story/2008/11/7/13516/5371
4 richardwinger // Nov 7, 2008 at 4:00 pm
I expect the final vote totals to be about 10% higher than they are so far. California alone has over 1,000,000 provisionals and absentees to count. We won’t have the final totals until mid-January 2009. Of course that won’t change the percentages much, but it will increase the raw vote totals.
5 songster7 // Nov 7, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I find it especially rewarding that here in Tennessee, Daniel Lewis’s total for Senate was about 1000 votes higher than Barr’s for Prez … just about the number showing for Charles & Tom, so we even know where the principled votes came from! (Daniel was also endorsed by the BTP …)
6 Galileo Galilei // Nov 7, 2008 at 4:13 pm
In Wisconsin, there were 9 people on the ballot:
Obama
McCain
Nader
Barr
Baldwin
McKinney
the socialist party
the socialist & Liberation party
the We, the People candidate
7 brainbuz // Nov 7, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Here in Pennsylvania our Row Office Candidates (of the three only one did any campaigning, and her budget was trivial) set new records with the least important (Auditor General) pulling 174,000* votes to 20,000 for Barr. Our best prior showing for a row office in the last decade was 61,238. Our Attorney General Candidate who ran under a different party four years ago (and was the only one with any campaign activity this year) polled 105,000* votes compared to 70,624 votes last time.
The only plausible reason that Row office candidates who did little or no campaigning set new party records (almost tripling the old one) was that the Barr campaign reached and impressed a lot of voters, but that the voters for whatever reasons (see Barry Goldwater Jr’s endorsement of McCain for insight) chose not to “throw away” their vote for President, but in the irrelevant race chose to show support.
* I rounded vote counts which are not final.
8 johncjackson // Nov 7, 2008 at 5:35 pm
Senate, House, and other candidates ALWAYS get more votes than the POTUS candidates.
It means absolutely nothing. It means nothing about the LP candidate, the BTP, or anyone else.
Look back at 2000 and 1996 and probably all of history. You will find 3rd party candidates for Senate that got 2-3% where the POTUS candidate for the same party had <1%. You always see “spoilers” in the Senate and House races and very few cases in the POTUS races.
9 paulie cannoli // Nov 7, 2008 at 5:47 pm
True.
10 Jerry S. // Nov 7, 2008 at 7:46 pm
I disagree I think it absolutely means something. I got about 25,000 more votes than our LP POTUS candidate as the US Senate candidate here in ‘92. Our POTUS cand. have never got more than 10,000 votes (Clark included) here in this deep south state. But we have received tens of thousands for state auditor, etc. Of course when that happened they put one of the worse BA laws in the nation on us. But my point is the citizens are more agreeable to giving us a shot at the lower levels, but not willing to give us the nuclear button yet! I understand the argument (Harry Browne made a good one) to run for POTUS, but we would be better off donating to local candidates!
Afterall when all the smoke clears only the paid staffers of Barr come out ahead on this deal. And let’s face it Barr’s campaign was a failure compared to bloated expectations. I mean CP candidate Baldwin (a Baptist preacher no less) defeated Barr and his paid staff in several states. I don’t think a CP POTUS cand. has ever defeated a LP POTUS candidate in any state before…
11 WinstonSmith // Nov 7, 2008 at 9:01 pm
I’m still trying to figure out why people are so obsessed with vote totals. Who cares if we got .7, .9, .4, or 2%? Either way we lose. Our presidential elections should be judged by vote totals.
They should be judged by media time and new membership. A small indicator on why I feel this campaign was a success is the LP facebook group. 2 months before the election is had 2,500 members. It is currently about to hit 10,000. Thats quite a jump in only 3 or 4 months. Something good happened. I don’t know about dues paying members, but there are clearly far more people interested in the LP.
Now can we please quit wasting time and resources on failed Presidential bids and start focusing on local elections. That is the only way this party will ever grow.
12 WinstonSmith // Nov 7, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Meant to say,
“Our Presidential elections should *not* be judged by vote totals.
13 Fred Church Ortiz // Nov 7, 2008 at 9:06 pm
Now can we please quit wasting time and resources on failed Presidential bids and start focusing on local elections. That is the only way this party will ever grow.
It’s odd that you preface that statement by arguing that the campaign helped the party generate interest.
14 G.E. // Nov 7, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Not true at all of Nader in 2000. One would have expected Barr to have been a similar case in ‘08.
15 WinstonSmith // Nov 7, 2008 at 11:10 pm
“It’s odd that you preface that statement by arguing that the campaign helped the party generate interest.”
You are correct. I should have clarified my statements. The LP should spend money on media, but not really waste money on ballot access drives.
Spreading the message is incredibly important. Vote totals are not.
My main point was we need to focus on local politics. Libertarians around the country need to volunteer for every local city and state position possible. Otherwise we will continue to be doomed to failure.
16 qh4dotcom // Nov 7, 2008 at 11:14 pm
In Miami-Dade county, Barr got a lousy 500+ votes and 0.06% of the vote. Chuck Baldwin got even less. Needless to say I was disappointed.
Funny how Zogby said Barr was polling double digits in NH and he actually got 0.3%…same with other states where they were reporting 5-9%.
17 G.E. // Nov 7, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Stupid. What, you think libertarians are going to get elected to dogcatcher and work their way up through the system and turn America into a libertarian utopia via electoral politics? That’s ridiculous.
There will never be any libertarianism on any real scale until this evil government is dissolved, and it won’t be through the actions of a benevolent president or Congress.
18 Jerry S. // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:07 am
Some bedtime reading about the REAL american history…
http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NWO/Council_Foreign_Relations.htm
http://lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm
I have seen the enemy, I hope you have TOO…
19 paulie cannoli // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:07 am
You are correct. I should have clarified my statements. The LP should spend money on media, but not really waste money on ballot access drives.
LOL. Why would the media give half a shit about the LP if it is not on the ballot?
If that’s what you want to do, give your time/money to the Campaign for Liberty, Mises Institute, the Advocates, ISIL, Cato, or whatever non-party organizations you think are worthwhile. Start a new one if need be. Ballot access is a key part of why the LP exists as a party.
20 G.E. // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:12 am
All of those organizations, save for Cato, are too libertarian for the slave Winston Smith.
21 Spence // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:18 am
LP.org has a table showing how miserablethe Barr ticket did in each of the 45 states where he was on the ballot.
There, fixed that for you.
As to the whole question of whether we should focus on base-building or the absurd “p00f” theory advocated by the radicals, I think it’s quite obvious now the correct approach to that. As this race has shown, there are a few candidates out there capable of pulling in more votes. They just need to escape the failed brand of the LP.
Nothing but inbreds, infighting, and instability.
22 José C // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:40 am
I am glad Bob Barr received more votes than the other “liberty” candidates, Ron Paul, George Phillies, and Charles Jay. I am also glad he received more votes than Chuck Baldwin who in my opinion ran a very strong and classy campaign. Other candidates can learn alot from Chuck Baldwin’s performance.
23 JimDavidson // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:49 am
Paulie is correct. If your candidates are on the ballot, the media pay some attention. Charles Jay was on Fox News and has had considerable other coverage because he’s on the ballot, and only in three states.
If the objective is education, then you need to get people’s attention. During an election year one of the things that gets people’s attention is politics. And the way to maximize that attention is to have candidates on the ballot. Which requires ballot access work.
24 Spence // Nov 8, 2008 at 12:52 am
Which requires education on the off-season. Any coach will tell you that his players don’t pick up offensive pointers on the road, during the regular season. But the LP stupidly insists that’s the only time it can make a splash. This idea damns every libertarian involved in this struggle, not just the fools that repeat the same mistake perennially.
25 Ross Levin // Nov 8, 2008 at 1:24 am
brainbuz - I convinced two people to vote Marakay Rogers for attorney general. There’s the real reason.
26 WinstonSmith // Nov 8, 2008 at 1:41 am
Stupid. What, you think libertarians are going to get elected to dogcatcher and work their way up through the system and turn America into a libertarian utopia via electoral politics? That’s ridiculous.
Bases are built from the bottom up. You cannot build from the top down.
I’m also directing my post towards rational people who want to be part of the political process. Which probably disqualifies you.
LOL. Why would the media give half a shit about the LP if it is not on the ballot?
I’m saying don’t spend so much money on it. Focus on the easy states. If we have the right candidate they will still get media time like Barr did before the ballot drive was even finished.
What I find incredibly stupid is spending more than a million dollars on a campaign to not even hit 1%. Which is normal for the LP.
That money could be used to support local candidates and give money to state chapters to help recruit.
27 Jerry S. // Nov 8, 2008 at 2:13 am
The MSMedia will never cover a third party unless they have $40 - 50 million for paid advertisement to reach the voters. Sure they do the regular short interview so if comforted they can say we interviewed them. They might get 15 minutes total on the NETWORK (where the viewers are) while the corporate candidates get 15 MONTHS of DAILY coverage.
Did anyone notice they cut Nader and Barr completely off even the cable stations (where not many viewers are) the closer the election got? Baldwin got to talk 40 seconds on Lou Dobbs one night, he did get some coverage on C-SPAN but not many “undecided” voters watch C-SPAN. And McKinney didn’t get much coverage anywhere either. And we are all dejected at such low totals. The messages were NOT rejected, the vast majority of the people didn’t hear the messages.
The corporate media has always and will always cover the corporate controlled candidates with MONTHS of free media and basicly blackout (and/or ridicule) the non-controlled candidates (except for one or two short interviews). I truly hope you who disagree will see the truth before you die. Barak Obama was handpicked. Watch who he places on his staff and cabinet. There will be no major CHANGE in the organizations to which these people belong from the Bush people. Same bunch behind the curtain…
The media is controlled http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPlvdSQ6cAM
The Illuminati and the New World Order http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKI6vrJG8yM&feature=channel
XXX-Mind Control - TV Education - Mass Media http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfdmpv48Rwo&feature=related
BARACK OBAMA: THE WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9P15YZrnv0&feature=related
28 Catholic Trotskyist // Nov 8, 2008 at 4:38 am
You are correct that Obama will bring about a Socialist Illuminati New World Order, but what this means is far different than what you think it means. It will have aspects of Christianity and Libertarianism in it also, and will be much better than what America and the world is now.
29 George Phillies // Nov 8, 2008 at 10:39 am
Let me note that there is some opportunity to use the Presidential campaign to improve mailing lists, raise money for state parties, and get people involved in local and state groups. Very very late in the election cycle, National Party membership actually did climb appreciably. Unfortunately, the last data dump of names from the LNC to state parties seems to have gone out in August, so use of this opportunity appears not to have been practical for this election cycle.
30 Thomas M. Sipos // Nov 8, 2008 at 11:59 am
G.E.: “There will never be any libertarianism on any real scale until this evil government is dissolved, and it won’t be through the actions of a benevolent president or Congress.”
Which will never happen because the American people overwhelmingly do not want a libertarian govt.
This is what many libertarians refuse to face. The American people like words like “liberty” and “freedom” etc., but they don’t really want it. What they really want is to be taken care of.
It takes years of education to edge liberty forward by a slim margin. Then a single single crisis (9/11, the mortgage crisis, etc.) can set back libertarianism by decades, as the people demand financial handouts or “protection.”
All the LP can do is maintain the torch of liberty, educating and speaking truth to power, hoping that someday in the far future things will change.
I realize that many libertarians gripe that “Hey, I want to see some liberty in my own lifetime,” but that’s not gonna happen, no matter who the LP runs for president.
When will things change so that the country is “ripe for liberty”? It will take a massive crisis that the govt proves unable to fix. Sort of like the collapse of the entire economy in some East European communist countries some 18 years ago. Some of them (Poland, Czech Republic) adapted mostly free economies, because the economic crisis was so severe, they had no choice.
The LP can’t change anything by running candidates. It can only keep the torch of truth alive for that far future day when the nation becomes “ripe for liberty.”
31 Michael Gilson-De Lemos // Nov 8, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Someone reminded me that with absentee and other ballots, news groups are reporting 133MM-140 MM votes, which would make Barr about where Badnarik was, possibly less.
Nonetheless I congratulate those who made an effort.
32 Catholic Trotskyist // Nov 8, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Thomas Sipos gets it, he is absolutely right. And of course, the same thing could be said about socialists, which is why libertarians and socialists can actually be good friends in this current political climate. Good job.
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