A lot of folks are disappointed by the showings of various alternative candidates for the presidency in 2008. I, on the other hand, am quite impressed. It is quite an achievement to attract 100,000 or 200,000 or 500,000 votes while being almost completely ignored by the media and remaining unknown to most voters. I think perhaps the most impressive performance came from the Constitution Party. While Libertarian Bob Barr, Green Cynthia McKinney, and independent Ralph Nader all had some national stature and recognition, the CP ran Chuck Baldwin, a virtual unknown, who still received more than 180,000 votes.
While the numbers are small compared to those won by the major parties, here’s a comparison to show just how many individuals did opt for an alternative candidate:
True meaning of liberty = protectionist tariffs, immigrant- and gay-bashing, and lying about (or idiotically not understanding) Ron Paul’s positions? If so, then Chuck Baldwin is the real deal, for sure.
HA!
Baldwin’s speeches fired up conservatives around the country and delivered a strong message about the true meaning of liberty. This is worth much more than voter turnout. That is why I donated to his campaign. When I met him, I urged him to continue spreading this message around the country after the election. I am sure I am not the only one who would continue to support such a campaign.
I think that we will only see improvement in the strength of the third party, libertarian, and progressive movements if these candidates continue to aggressively get their messages out beyond the election seasons.
Although, there were only about 96 million votes in 1996, and something like 130 million this year.
The fact that Baldwin is probably going to break the CP record despite not being on in California and Pennsylvania, states that likely would have awarded him a minimum of 35,000 combined votes, is impressive.
Here is an AP article about Mr. Farthing and the MO CP.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gjUre9uC0FfXJ5qUPBuuj8X4wjuAD94CM2980
All these candidates did good considering what they were up against and that they had very little money to spend.
One state race that has recieved little to no coverage is Rod Farthing’s campaign for Missouri State Treasurer. He spent very little money, raised no money and he recieved 65,911 votes.
For a state-wide race that had no advertising, no signs or literature and only his personal word of mouth, I’d say he was victorious.
The public will chance on something new, whether its John Anderson in 1980 running as an ‘Independent’, or Ross Perot ‘reformist’, or even Ralph Nader.
We absolutely would have had the same phenomena this year, if Bloomberg had run. But as the pundits say, these independent runs are like bees, they only sting once.
What we see among 3rd parties, and even recent Nader runs…are groups that are not getting the benefit of much in the way of ‘protest’ votes (we need to recognize this fiction about protest votes for what it is)…
What we are seeing is the actual, core support for these groups, and their relative sizes.
I agree, 3rd parties did well. Not as some kind of all 3rd parties are rising as one…I still believe that is more coincidence. Nader, Baldwin, Barr, McKinney, all did better, because they all really did better, i.e. the run was more organized than in 2004.
True Baldwin and Barr had countervailing pressures, like Baldwin completely losing California to the split with AIP, Barr getting attacked from within by so-called ‘purists’.
But, nevertheless…all of these 4 people really did a better job than their counterparts in 2004, and should be proud.
This regionalization of the results makes the case for secession.
Why do the wealth-producing (and yet socialism-loving) blue states continue to subsidize the welfare-sucking leech red states that hate them? Let the red states go in peace. And then let all freedom-loving people carve out their own city-non-state, too.
This is my favorite way to analyze the numbers, thanks!