Depends on how he does in the debates. If he does really well, things can take off and he might end up doing better than what he could have done on name confusion.

If he bombs or is ho-hum, he may not get as many votes as he might have if people didn’t know that he’s not Joe For Oil. But then it gets into what you hope to accomplish by running.

In my way of thinking, the whole point is to popularize his views as much as possible. Thus, avoiding debates – even if it were to lead to a higher vote total, which is far from certain – would not be “doing better” in terms of achieving the campaign’s goals. The only exception to that might be if he were to actually win based on name confusion alone, but I don’t think that’s plausible.

The Democrat is probably demanding that he be there to a.) lessen the impact of the Republican and b.) make it clear to voters that Joe Kennedy is not a Kennedy-Kennedy.

Wes, if you’re reading, please blast those out through the email list too.

I imagine the weather in mid-January New England will keep all but the most committed voters away

I think this would be a great opportunity for the LP National to try to moneybomb this fellow if they could. Special election means lower turnout, which is good news for third parties in general. Kennedy has a name that gives him a good amount of press. He has gotten into the debates. And most importantly, Massachusetts is so lopsidedly Democratic the Libertarians can be seen as a far less “quixotic” venture to pursue when Republicans won’t win anyway.

If the LP wants to pump up its electability and image, I can see no better race in the 2010 elections to pursue than this one, which comes before those even start. Which is another great opportunity: get the pundits talkin about an insurgent Libertarian (BIG L) movement in the runup to 2010!