Ballot Access News reports

Because most states purge their voter registration rolls between elections, the United States has fewer registered voters now than in October 2010. There are fewer Democrats now, fewer Republicans now, fewer independent voters now, and fewer voters in each nationally-organized minor party now. The nationally-organized parties that existed in 2010 and that have as many as 500 registrants in the nation are the Libertarian, Green, Constitution, Working Families, Reform, Socialist, and Socialist Workers Parties, in that order.

Americans Elect did not exist in 2010, and now has 3,285 registrants, so it is the only nationally-organized party that now has more registrants than in 2010.

However, there would be more registered Libertarians in the nation now than there were in October 2010, except that sometime during late 2010 or early 2011, Massachusetts converted all registered Libertarians to independents without telling them or without telling the party officers. Massachusetts had 15,857 registered Libertarians in October 2010, and did not do a new registration tally until last month, when the state said there are only 15 registered Libertarians. If the Libertarian Party still had the registrants it had had in October 2010, it would be the only nationally-organized party that had existed in 2010, and which gained nationally between 2010 and now.

Massachusetts keeps track of how many registrants there are in each group that tells the state that it wants that service. The Massachusetts term for such groups is “political designation.” Such groups never need to reapply for status as a “political designation”; Massachusetts continues keeping a tally for them, even if they have utterly ceased to exist as organizations (for example, the Natural Law Party).

But there is an exception in the case of political designations that become qualified parties, and then later lose their status as a qualified political party. The Libertarian Party had 12,534 registrants in Massachusetts when it was just a political designation, in October 2008. It became a qualified party in November 2008, by polling over 3% for U.S. Senate. In November 2010 the party lost that status when it didn’t run any nominees for statewide office. It didn’t realize it was supposed to immediately reapply for status as a “political designation.” If the Secretary of State’s office were courteous, it would have asked the Libertarian Party if it wanted to now be a “political designation”, since it was longer a qualified party, but instead the state said nothing to the party, and eliminated all its registrants, and now the party has to start accumulating registrants from scratch.

Arizona, California, Florida and, Pennsylvania are the only states that have more registered Libertarians than, Massachusetts, did before they got wiped out. Oregon, North Carolina and Kansas (just barely) have over 10,000 each. 25 states have known numbers of registered Libertarians; four of these have less than a thousand each.

UPDATES:

1) George Phillies, from comments:

Assuredly, the change from Political Party to Political Designation status has happened several times: 1996, 2006, and 2010, and in the first two cases voter registrations were maintained, and the state Libertarian Association did absolutely nothing to cause registrations to be maintained.

2) Richard Winger, from comments:

If anybody in Massachusetts wants to be 100% sure that my report is true, send me an e-mail to richardwinger@yahoo.com and I will forward you the electronic Massachusetts registration report that the Secretary of State’s office e-mailed to me less than a week ago.

That report has been forwarded to me and I am attaching it here:. MA.enrollment_count_31DEC2011 (2)

I am presuming that since this is information from the state government that there is no problem with posting it here. If there is a problem that I am unaware of, please let me know and I will take it down.

It appears that it shows 10,839 registered Libertarians, not 15. I’m awaiting explanation from Mr. Winger and will update the post again or put up a new one.

UPDATE

Richard Winger from comments:

I’m very happy to say I was wrong. I am also extremely puzzled as to how this happened. The state sent me an Excel file showing how many registered voters there are in every precinct in eveery party and every political designation. It was so huge, I didn’t print it. I just took notes. Maybe something was wrong with my Excel program. Column J is for the Libertarian Party. When I opened it up the day I got it, it plainly showed 15 voters in column J. I so wish I had printed it out on paper. Now, when I open, it has 10,839. None of the other column totals have changed (in other words, none of the other parties now show anything different from my notes). So, please alter IPR’s title. And if anyone who is experienced with Excel can tell me how a program can do what this one seems to have done, let me know. richardwinger@yahoo.com.

In retrospect, I should have phoned the Mass. Sec. of State’s office when I first got, or perceived, the 15 voter figure, but I just assumed they would give me a hard time. The state did take away all the Working Families registrants when it lost its status as a political body. The Working Families Party tried to persuade Massachusetts to put them back, but the state wouldn’t do it. So I assumed the office was giving the Libertarians the same treatment it had given to the Working Families Party.

I meant to say, above, when Working Families lost its status as a party. That happened in 2008. Working Families had 5,534 registrants in Massachusetts in October 2008, but it lost its party status a month later and even though it re-applied as a political designation, it didn’t do that for several months after it had gone off the ballot, and the state wouldn’t restore its registrants. That is why it only has 26 registrants in Massachusetts now.

And in the corrected version of the story at Ballot Access News:

UPDATE: an earlier version of this post said that Massachusetts had converted the state’s registered Libertarians to independents. The earlier version was mistaken about that. Massachusetts had 10,839 Libertarians registrants as of December 31, 2011. When that figure is added into the national Libertarian total, the Libertarians don’t have as many registrants nationally as they had had in October 2010, but they only declined by 390 nationwide.

1,792 votes cast, Jill Stein received 1,223 of them, or 68%. Roseanne Barr, who had just entered the race in the last week, picked up 526 votes, or 29%. There were 35 votes for Kent Mesplay, and 8 votes for Harley Mikkelson

GPW reports that Roseanne Barr is very active on Twitter, and had tweeted a challenge to Bill Maher, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert to have both herself and Jill Stein on their programs.

They also report that Jill Stein is actively fundraising, has hired at least 3 staff onto the campaign, and has campaigned so far in California, Colorado, Delaware, DC, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Virginia, Wisconsin, and other additional states as well.

Jill Stein issued a short statement saying “It is great to have Roseanne Barr on the Green Party team. Let’s bring down the house!” Barr has similarly already made positive statements regarding Stein’s candidacy.

An email from the Stein campaign says that

Dr. Jill Stein, Green Party presidential candidate, begins a three day tour of Indiana and Ohio today with a visit to the Evergreen Cooperatives in Cleveland, accompanied by Cleveland City Councilman and Green Party elected official Brian Cummins and County Executive candidate David Ellison.

Saturday at 11:30am, Dr. Stein addresses the Green Party of Ohio Presidential Nominating Convention in Columbus.

This Sunday, as part of Indianapolis’ Occupy the Super Bowl protests, she rallies with supporters at the state capitol against anti-labor legislation such as “Right to Work for Less.”

The full itinerary of public events is viewable here: http://www.jillstein.org/events

Dr. Stein is especially interested in the Evergreen Cooperatives for providing one successful model, among many, for how economic democracy can provide employment and prosperity for stressed communities. In her recent People’s State of the Union address, Dr. Stein called for a Green New Deal providing for full employment and an immediate transition to a sustainable, more democratic economy. The Evergreen Cooperatives “are pioneering innovative models of job creation, wealth building, and sustainability,” and are, “employee-owned, for-profit companies are based locally and hire locally.”

On Occupy Super Bowl Sunday, at noon, Dr. Stein will rally with supporters and other labor movement advocates at the Indiana statehouse in Indianapolis. Dr. Stein is not only strongly opposed to so-called Right-to-Work legislation (RTW), her Green New Deal includes a “program of immediate creation of 25 million, publicly useful, sustainable, well-paying jobs,” according to a prepared statement. Stein will be joined at the rally by lifelong labor organizer Anthony Prince, and student activist Erika Wolf, both newly hired members of the Jill Stein for President campaign staff.

The Green Party has put out a press release welcoming Stein and Barr to the presidential race:

The Green Party of the United States welcomes two candidates into the race for the 2012 Green presidential nomination, Jill Stein and Roseanne Barr. Ms. Barr and Dr. Stein submitted paperwork to meet the Green Party’s requirements as of the evening of the Feb. 1 deadline.

“We are thrilled to have two strong women running for President as Greens,” said Darryl Moch, national co-chair of the Green Party. “We look forward to a race based on Green ideas and values, and to showing the Democrats and Republicans how to run without the corrupting influence of fat corporate campaign checks and corporate-funded attack ads.”

“Anyone hopeful about the Occupy Wall Street’s challenge to the status quo or disappointed by the Obama Administration’s broken promises of change now has a pair of candidates to watch. Anyone bored or irritated with the Mitt Versus Newt Show by now will be relieved by the breath of fresh air — maybe a Green gale force of righteousness — that’s about to come,” said Tamar Yager, also a national co-chair of the Green Party.

For more information about the candidates, visit the following sites:

Jill Stein: http://www.jillstein.org

Roseanne Barr: http://www.roseanneforpresident.com

2012 Press Information for Green Candidates http://www.gp.org/candidates/index.php

The nominee will be chosen at the Green Party’s national convention, July 12-15, in Baltimore, Maryland (http://www.gpconvention2012.com)

State Green Parties in California, Arizona, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, and possibly Ohio are participating in primary elections. Other state Green Parties will choose the nominee they support and apportion delegates during statewide Green conventions. The Green Party currently has ballot access in 17 states. Greens expect to have the presidential nominee and other candidates on the ballot in at least 46 states and the District of Columbia on Election Day 2012.

Past Green Party convention sites and nominees:

2000: Denver, Colorado; Ralph Nader

2004: Milwaukee, Wisconsin; David Cobb

2008: Chicago, Illinois; Cynthia McKinney

“We consider it important to have strong women candidates at a time when women’s reproductive rights are under assult, from the Obama Administration’s decision on the morning-after pill to the Komen Foundation’s withdrawal of funding for breast cancer screening from Planned Parenthood. We’re proud that our presidential nominee in 2008 was a woman,” said Carl Romanelli, Pennsylvania Green and member of the Green Party’s International Committee.

132 Greens hold public office in the United States, including five mayors. The largest city with a Green mayor is Richmond, California, with Mayor Gayle McLaughlin. The Green Party and its candidates accept no money from corporate PACs.

Many Green candidates are promoting the “Green New Deal” in their campaigns (http://www.greenpartywatch.org/2010/08/11/62-green-candidates-endorse-green-new-deal). Greens have been active participants in the Occupy Movement; both Ms. Barr and Dr. Stein have appeared and spoken publicly at Occupy rallies.

Ballot Access News reports that the Associated Press has this story about Roseanne Barr’s announcement that she is seeking the Green Party presidential nomination; here is a Los Angeles Times story about Barr’s candidacy.

Kent Mesplay was featured in the Bloomington Alternative (H/T Green Party Watch).

This article at Green Party Watch has biographical information about four candidates (Stein, Barr, Mesplay and Mikkelson).

Green Party Watch also reports that Cindy Sheehan wrote

In the last election, I supported the Green Party candidate, Cynthia McKinney and her running mate, Rosa Clemente. Unfortunately, the Party is not entirely functional (which party is?), even if many of us do support its 10 Key Principles.
I have also been impressed by the other woman seeking the nomination, Jill Stein–she is bright, articulate, well-informed, truly progressive and dedicated to public service–but if push came to shove, I would support Roseanne.

Barr was a supporter of Sheehan in her race for Congress.

On October 18, Massachusetts and Minnesota both held special legislative elections. In the Massachusetts State House race (Berkshire Third District), Green Party nominee Mark C. Miller came close to winning. The Massachusetts Secretary of State’s office does not supply semi-official returns on election night. Unofficial returns reported in the press differ with each other. Some sources say Miller lost by only 92 votes, and some say he lost by 192 votes. He placed second, with either 30% or 32% of the total. The winning Democrat, Tricia Farley-Bouvier, polled 33%. The independent in the race, Pam Malumphy, received 22%, and the Republican nominee, Mark Jester, received 15%.

In Minnesota, in a Minneapolis State House district, the Green Party nominee also placed second. Farheen Hakeem received 22%; Democratic-Farmer-Labor nominee Jeff Hayden won with 68%; Republican nominee Bruce Lundeen received 8%; and Independence Party nominee Matt Brillhart received 2%. Thanks to Uncovered Politics for this news.

In Holyoke, Massachusetts, United Auto Workers has endorsed Green-Rainbow Party candidate Rick Purcell in his campaign for Holyoke City Council Ward 3. This is the UAW’s second recent endorsement of a Green in MA, after their recent endorsement of Mark Miller for MA State Representative. From Purcell’s website:

I’m pleased to announce that I have gained the endorsement of the United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2322 and the Massachusetts State UAW for my campaign for Holyoke City Council. The UAW Local 2322 is based right here in Holyoke, MA. It represents more than 3,000 workers in Western Massachusetts at 15 workplaces, including higher education, early childhood development, and health & human services. UAW members come from a wide range of cultural, economic, educational, and national backgrounds, including many proud residents of Holyoke Ward 3.

I’m thrilled to have the UAW’s endorsement of my candidacy. Union workers fought for and won improvements that we all now take for granted, like the minimum wage, the 40 hour week, social security and the end of child labor. When unions lose ground in this country, the results are clear: the rich become richer, the poor become poorer and the middle class all but disappears.

October 9, 2011 10:00 AM
Tweed’s Restaurant
229 Grove Street, Worcester

[...]

Carl Person (confirmed attending)
Brian Irving (surrogate for R. Lee Wrights, confirmed attending)
R. J. Harris (may attend)
Roger V. Gary (may attend).

The Moderator
George D. J. Phillies
Former Candidate, President of the United States

Mark Miller’s campaign for Massachusetts State Representative in the 3rd Berkshire District has been busy in the final weeks leading up to the October 18th special election. This is Miller’s second run for the office, after earning 45% of the vote in 2010. In a recent email to supporters, the Miller campaign announced its latest endorsement:

The Planned Parenthood Advocacy Fund (the political arm of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts) has announced that it is supporting Mark Miller in his bid to become the next State Representative for the Third Berkshire District. The announcement comes on the heels of the endorsement by Mass Alliance, the statewide coalition that includes Planned Parenthood.

George Hollister Isman of Mass Alliance cited Mark’s pro-choice stance in her statement announcing the coalition’s endorsement of the GRP candidate: “Mark Miller is the clear progressive choice for State Representative. His commitment to excellent public schools, good local jobs, a woman’s right to choose, and a heath care system that is truly universal and affordable will make him a strong progressive voice in the State House.”

Together with the support of the UAW, Mass Nurses, and Mass Alliance, this latest endorsement shows that the GRP’s Mark Miller is staking out political ground usually occupied by Democrats.

Soon afterward, another email reported back from a debate sponsored by Pittsfield media:

Yesterday evening (Monday, October 3) Mark joined the three other candidates for a sometimes lively debate at Berkshire Community College. The debate sponsors were the Pittsfield Gazette and Pittsfield Community TV.

Mark drove home the point that politics-as-usual isn’t working for Pittsfield, which has lower wages, lower per-pupil spending, and higher unemployment than the state average. In the audience were Mark’s wife, Osneyda, and their two children, both of whom are students in the Pittsfield public schools.

To read the Berkshire Eagles’s account of the event just click here.

To learn more about Mark Miller’s campaign, check out his website.

The Massachusetts Green-Rainbow Party has announced another endorsement for Mark Miller, the Green candidate for MA State Representative in the 3rd Berkshire District:

Breaking News! Mark just today received the endorsement of the Mass Alliance, the foremost coalition of progressive organizations in Massachusetts, including economic and social justice, labor, immigrant, environmental, womens, gblt and progressive Democratic organizations.

This is their first ever endorsement for a Green-Rainbow candidate. If ever there was a sign that the political landscape is changing, this is it. With endorsements from the UAW, Mass Nurses Association, and the Mass Alliances, it’s clear that Mark Miller is breaking through the Beacon Hill sound barrier, and his message – our message – is getting heard.

Now each one of us can make the difference in this game-changing race on Oct. 18 by electing Mark as State Representative.

To help push Mark over the top, please join me in volunteering to spend at least one full day door knocking for Mark in Pittsfield.

It’s easy and fun, and involves simply asking “Are you planning to vote for Mark Miller in the special election?”

Peter Vickery, Mark’s campaign manager extraordinaire, will give you a 15 minute training, partners to canvass with, and a route to cover.

At this time of extraordinary converging crises – threatening our jobs, homes, schools, state and national budgets, environment and democracy – there is an equally extraordinary potential for real change – to start taking our future back, and making it healthy, just, peaceful and green.

Mark Miller represents the leading edge of that change.

Do you feel as strongly as I do about the unjust, unsustainable, unconscionable course that we’re on?

Then please join me in committing one day each week till the Oct. 18th election to bring Mark Miller to the Massachusetts State House.

Let’s get back on track for people, peace and the planet.

I’ll be starting this Saturday, Sept. 24th. I hope you can join me in supporting Mark as soon as you can.

Whether you can commit one day or 10, please contact campaign manager Peter Vickery asap to sign up and get started: click to send an email to Peter, 413-549-9933 or 413-222-8760.

I hope to see you soon on the Pittsfield streets!

Upward,

Jill Stein

PS. If you haven’t contributed to Mark’s campaign yet, you can make a big difference by throwing whatever you can into the hat right here right now: Donate to Mark Miller’s campaign . Thank you!!

On October 18, Massachusetts holds a special election to fill the empty State House seat, in the Berkshire 3rd district. So far, Green Party nominee Mark Miller has more funds in his campaign bank account than any of his three opponents. He is opposed by a Democrat, a Republican, and an independent. See this story. Miller ran for this seat as a Green last year, and polled 45% of the vote in a two-person race against a Democrat.

Independent 9th District Congressional candidate Bruce Burleson’s campaign is officially underway. Flyers are going up, Burleson is meeting and greeting voters at local shopping centers, yard signs are on their way, and he has also just launched a campaign website. The site details much of Burleson’s views on a variety of issues, including Social Security reform and management of America’s foreign policy in the Middle East.

The site also features a chatroom where Burleson holds weekly chats with anyone who wishes to pop in and discuss issues important to them.

In addition, the site will soon feature a weekly video “fireside chat” which Burleson says is inspired by the radio addresses of FDR during the Great Depression.

Burleson says the main strategy of his campaign is not to spend too much time comparing his ideas with those of incumbent Congressman Stephen Lynch, but to present his own ideas and to spend time listening to what people want. He says his main campaign slogan is “putting the ‘represent’ back in Representative.”

His campaign can be reached at (339) 502-2621 or online at www.burlesonforcongress.org.

By Wayne Allyn Root, Former Libertarian Vice Presidential Nominee and creator of ROOTforAmerica.com

The U.S. economy is crumbling. Businesses are collapsing in record numbers. Jobs have disappeared. Tax revenues are down dramatically. Coincidence?

Everything happening today under Obama resembles the storyline of Ayn Rand’s famous book, Atlas Shrugged, one of the most popular books of all time, selling over 7 million copies. Now, under President Obama, Atlas Shrugged has come to life. Rand prophesized a country dominated by socialists, Marxists and statists, where looters, free loaders and poverty promoters live off the productive class. To rationalize the fleecing of innovative business owners and job creators, the looter class demonized the wealthy, just as Obama and his socialist cabal are doing in real life today.

The central plot of Atlas Shrugged is that in response to being demonized, over-taxed, over-regulated, and punished for success, America’s business owners were disappearing — dropping off the grid, and refusing to work 16-hour days to support those unwilling to put in the same blood, sweat and tears. They were going on strike. Because of that the original proposed title of “Atlas Shrugged” was “The Strike.”

They were going on strike to teach that civilization cannot survive when people are slaves to government. That without a productive class of innovative business owners willing to risk their own money and work 16-hour days, weekends and holidays, there are no jobs and no taxes to pay for government. If you punish the wealthy, the risk-takers, the innovators, you kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. In Obama’s America, fiction is becoming fact.

The lesson of Atlas Shrugged is that without the $100,000+ earners paying into Social Security, there are no pensions for the poor and lower middle class. Without the wealthy owners of million-dollar mansions paying $25,000 and $50,000 annual property tax bills, there is no funding for public schools. Without the wealthy paying into Medicare, there is no “free” healthcare for the elderly. Without capitalists motivated by profit, there are no discoveries to eradicate polio or create miraculous cancer and AIDS drugs. Without capitalists motivated by profit, there are no jobs, period! That is what happens when the producers of society go on strike to protect themselves from the looters.

Ayn Rand was warning the looters that there are consequences to their overzealous actions. She was warning that if the productive classes felt used, demonized, ripped off, and taken for granted, they would go on strike — stop working, retire early, go underground, or move to places where achievement is celebrated and they feel appreciated.

The latest U.S. Census proves Ayn Rand right. Under Obama the wealthy are striking, voting with their feet. They are moving to low-tax red states in droves, escaping from high-tax blue states where they are being demonized and punished by the millions.

The Census proves that Obama’s tax and spend philosophy is a dismal failure, an economic disaster killing jobs. It is no coincidence that 1.9 million FEWER Americans are working than before Obama’s stimulus. It is no coincidence that jobs are not returning to the private sector. It is no coincidence that tax revenues have dropped dramatically and cannot support Obama’s bloated Big Brother government. The innovators, risk-takers, and wealthy he demonized and punished are on strike.

The high tech revolution has killed the progressive-liberal tax-and-spend dream. Because of the Internet, email, Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Satellite TV, I-phones, I-pads, and cell phones, business owners are no longer prisoners of Big Brother. Take a look at states where the latest Census shows Americans moved during the past decade: Nevada, Texas, Arizona, Florida, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alaska, Virginia — all low- or no-tax red states, states that lead the USA in economic freedom.

Now look at states they escaped from: New York, New Jersey, California, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan. Taxpayers, business owners, jobs creators, retirees with assets are fleeing the high tax, big spending, Big Brother states — the states being run like Obama is running the nation.

Progressives be afraid, be very afraid. If Obama is re-elected, these valuable producers will pick up and leave America altogether. There is a big world out there begging them to come. Places like Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Monte Carlo, Belize, Costa Rica, Panama, Bahamas, and Cayman Islands are low-tax havens that appreciate business owners and their sacrifices. They welcome wealthy ex-patriates. They celebrate individual achievement. They reward instead of punish business owners and financial risk-takers. They are wonderful places to live and are aggressively pursuing Americans.

I am just one small businessman, a third-party Libertarian political leader. Yet I personally have heard from thousands of fans, friends and supporters who have left America, are thinking of leaving America, are visiting other countries right now to decide where to go, or making preparations to leave in case Obama is re-elected. Just as Ayn Rand predicted, business owners are going on strike. Permanently.

The high tech revolution has freed them to run their businesses from anywhere in the world. The same high tech tools and toys that toppled a powerful and invincible 30-year dictator in Egypt and now threaten to topple powerful leaders throughout the Arab world, also offer mobility and freedom to U.S. taxpayers. Obama better learn the lesson of Mubarek before millions more business people decide they do not need to put up with looters, free loaders, and politicians who despise them.

Atlas is shrugging. Ayn Rand is saying “I told you so.”

And The Strike has begun.

Wayne Allyn Root is a former Libertarian vice presidential nominee. He now serves as Chairman of the Libertarian National Congressional Committee. He is the best-selling author of “The Conscience of a Libertarian: Empowering the Citizen Revolution with God, Guns, Gold & Tax Cuts.” His web site: www.ROOTforAmerica.com

The Libertarian Future is Here
and Republicans have only bad news incoming.

Exciting news from the Pew Trust. They just completed their latest study of American political opinions. They do these every few years, with careful statistical analysis. You can read the whole study at people-press.org/2011/05/04/beyond-red-vs-blue-the-political-typology/
The implications of the latest study are totally spectacular for the libertarian political movement. In particular:
*There are many more left libertarians than there are right libertarians.
*Libertarians are at least as large as Republicans. All liber-tarians need to do is to bring our supporters together.
*Are you wondering why you suddenly see “Libertarians should run no Presidential candidate and vote Republican”? Without libertarians, Republicans are completely dead in the water.

What did Pew do?

If you do not care how Pew came to its conclusions, skip to ―What did Pew Learn?
They asked a very large number of Americans a long list of questions. Then they used computers to do “cluster analysis”, meaning they looked for groups of people who agree with each other on lots of their questions. Of course, very few people agree with anyone else on everything. However, it turns out
experimentally that you can break voters into groups of people who agree with each other on most issues, and you can show that the space between groups has relatively few people in it, and everyone is in some group.
That outcome, well-defined tribes of people with similar sets of views, and few people with views midway in between, does not have to be the case. You could find, having asked your ques-tions, that people giving each combination of answers are ex-actly as common as people giving any other combination. You could, but you don’t. For example, you don’t find a lot of people who support gay marriage, believe that the social safety net is important, support government intervention to protect cli-mate, and … think that abortion should be totally illegal. You don’t find zero people like that, but they are rare, while people who support gay marriage, the safety net, and carbon emission control, and who are pro-choice, are common. That’s clustering.
The reason you do computer analysis is that computers are
relatively unbiased politically. They will find clusters that exist in your data, will not find clusters that are not there, and will tell you the odds that a cluster is real rather than random chance. If you are worried whether this approach makes sense, it is the same as the classical approach that decides whether two groups of not-entirely-similar birds are the same species or two different species.

What Did Pew Learn?

Pew found that you can divide Americans into nine political
clusters. That‘s way more clusters than a liberal-conservative line shows, and it is considerably more clusters than fit on the Nolan chart. What are these clusters?
“Bystanders” are young, politically disengaged, and amount to 10% of the population, but approximately zero percent of the registered voters. For political purposes, they don’t matter because they don’t vote. They could matter, if they became voters.

So what are the groups that matter politically?

Three groups of people that are mostly Democratic. There are ‘Solid Liberals’, amounting to 16% of registered voters, who take liberal stands most of the time. There are ‘hard-pressed Democrats’ who are religious and financially challenged, amounting to 15% of the electorate. Finally, the ‘New Coalition Democrats’ at 9% of the electorate take a positive view of our institutions, including business, and tend to be Latino and other minority groups. These groups differ on some questions; the liberals are much more socially liberal.

Count them up; the Democratic base is 40% of the voters.

Then there are the two groups that are mostly Republican, the
‘staunch conservatives’ at 11% of voters and the ‘Main Street
Republicans’ at 14% of the voters. The ‘staunch conservatives’ are very conservative on almost everything, and include the people favorable to the conservative tea party types. However, the Tea Party is much more complicated than the Staunch Con-servatives, and is not a unified movement. The Main Street Conservatives are also conservative, but less so. Observe that the conservative tea party types, who are not all the tea parttypes, the staunch conservatives, are a minority in their own party.
How do the Republican groups differ? Staunch conservatives think environmental laws hurt the economy and businesses do not make too much profit; Main Street Republicans are just the opposite. Counting them up, the Republican base is 25% of the voters, way less than the Democratic base.
Pew identified three totally different groups in the middle, which the Pew writers described as ‘Disaffected’, ‘Libertarian’, and ‘post-modern’. The three groups are very different. Post-Moderns might reasonably be described as Left Libertarians, while Pew Libertarians are actually ‘Right Libertarians’. Non-libertarians may be unaware of that there are right and left libertarians, let alone that they disagree. The Left and Right Libertarians are substantially split, even as the two groups of Republicans and the three groups of Democrats are badly split. The Disaffected may be described as very upset, but not in the same ways as some other people; they think that government is almost always ineffective and wasteful, and also government should do more to help the needy.
Left and Right Libertarians are both fiscally conservative and
socially liberal, left libertarians being younger and more diverse, while right libertarians are 2/3 white males. Oh, yes, left libertarians are young people, largely under 30. The Right Libertarians are 10% of the population, the Left Libertarians are 14% of the population and the Disaffecteds are 11% of they
population. Left and right libertarians differ on such issues as global warming.

My conclusions

There are many more left libertarians than there are right
libertarians. The ratio is almost 3:2. Counting even a few of the disaffected ‘government does not work’ people as libertarians, 25%+ of the electorate is libertarian, and that’s as many libertar-ians as there are Republicans. Now we see why Republican empty heads have been calling for Libertarians — mostly right libertarians — not to run a Presidential candidate next year, namely without the right libertarian vote the Republicans are in an impossible position. They have the same fine electoral chances as Massachusetts Republicans.
The Democratic block will not vote Republican. The Disaffect-eds see that Republicans will tamper with the social safety net to the profit of the Republicans’ plutocrat bosses. The Left Libertarians are overwhelmingly supportive of gay marriage and environmental protections, and will not go near Republican religious-anti-environmental types. Without Right Libertarians, the Republicans are stuck at a quarter of the vote, which is not even minority status in most places.

What Should Libertarians Do?

The Libertarian objective is to become the #2 and then then #1 party in the country. To become #2, one of the other parties must be sent to the grave. There are far fewer Republicans than Democrats, and their positions on issues dear to the younger generation are far less acceptable to that generation, so clearly the Republicans should be the first to go, the Democrats coming later.
Thanks to first-past-the-post elections, a 30% Libertarian bloc confines the Republicans to third-party status.
How do we unify left and right libertarian voters and others? We need to pound hard on the wedge issues that divide right libertarians from Republicans, and we need to remove some wedges that make it harder for left libertarians to support us.
The core wedge issues for pulling Right Libertarians away from
Republicans are the social issues, notably abortion and gay rights. An effective libertarian campaign will take hard core libertarian positions on abortion, gay marriage, gay adoption, and other GLBTQPL issues, forcing right libertarians to consid-er the ways in which right libertarians are least like Republi-cans. Opposition to the Asian land wars and to the national security military welfare state likely also help.
Libertarian Party supporters will correctly recognize that Liber-tarian Parties in the deep south and parts of the Mississippi river basic may not like a pro-abortion stance. Supporting abortion access is like supporting the right to vote for African-Americans. Both are the right thing to do, racist reactionary manques notwithstanding, even if supporting voting rights did cost the forces of virtue the votes of white racist bigots. All the
Southern white racists shifted from the Democratic Party to the Republican. In the modern era, the libertarian position that immigrants strengthen American society not only drives away Republicans but links right and left libertarians.
Core issues for uniting right and left libertarians are again the social issues, the belief that we are a secular rather than a reli-gious society, that we welcome immigration, that capitalism works, that we oppose the warfare national security state, and that America has substantially made the changes needed to give equal rights for all.
And now we come to a few wedges that need to be removed.
Right libertarians are somewhat to prone to fall for conserva-tive anti-intellectualism, expressed as global warming denial, evolution denial, and a completely unworkable environmental defense scheme based on litigation on an unprecedented scale. Anti-intellectualism may have a long American tradition be-hind it. However, we are the wealthiest and most productive country in the world because of our engineers, our skilled workers, and our learned professions, not because the ignorant assert their right to believe their wrong opinions.
For a somewhat different progressive democratic take on the same data, see dailykos.com/story/2011/05/08/973770/-Pew-typologies: Beyond-mere-left-and-right.

PITTSFIELD — Mark C. Miller, the Green-Rainbow party candidate who challenged state Rep. Christopher N. Speranzo last November, formally announced he’s a contender for the seat Speranzo has to give up if he’s confirmed for the Central Berkshire District Court clerk-magistrate job.

In an announcement to supporters Thursday, Miller said he plans to run for the 3rd Berkshire District seat, which covers most of Pittsfield.

Miller told The Eagle that he expects a tough race, but he also expects to win — in part because this campaign will be better organized and have more volunteer help than his previous one.

The fact that he commanded 45 percent of last November’s vote, for a campaign he essentially ran alone, tells him that he has a real chance this year, he said.

On March 17, the Massachusetts Libertarian Party asked the U.S. Supreme Court for an extension of time in which to file a cert petition in Barr v Galvin. Such extensions of time are fairly easy to obtain. Barr v Galvin is the Massachusetts case over whether unqualified parties have a right to use stand-in presidential candidates on their ballot access petitions, given that qualified parties have the right to change their presidential and vice-presidential nominees. For example, in July 1972, the Democratic Party certified Thomas Eagleton as its vice-presidential nominee to election officials in all states, but the following month, the party substituted R. Sargent Shriver.

Also on March 17, The Massachusetts Libertarian Party asked the U.S. District Court who had originally handled the case to certify the question (to a state court) of whether Massachusetts election law already permits presidential stand-ins. Originally, the U.S. District Court had ruled in favor of the party, and had ruled that the apparent ban on presidential stand-ins for unqualified parties violates the Constitution. Later, the First Circuit had reversed the U.S. District Court on the constitutional issue, but had suggested that perhaps the state courts should interpret whether the law really bans stand-ins or not. The law is not clear.

ong-term, the percent of the state’s 4 million voters not affiliated with a political party leapt from 40.6 percent of the total in 1982 to 51.9 percent in 2010. Over the same 28-year period, the percent of registered Democrats in the state fell from 45.3 percent to 36.5 percent. Republican totals also dropped from 14 percent in 1982 to 11.3 percent in 2010. . . .

Voters in Massachusetts are notorious ticket-splitters and fiercely independent, Cignoli said. Last year, independents were key in re-electing the Democratic governor but they also pulled the lever in the voting booth for enough Republicans to more than double the party’s numbers in the state House of Representatives from 15 to 31 including the win of Nicholas A. Boldyga in a three-way contest for the Agawam-based seat in the House.

Independents elected one of their own to a major office in Hampden County. Mark G. Mastroianni, a Westfield lawyer and independent, won by a decisive victory for Hampden district attorney after running on a platform of keeping the office above the politics of both parties.. . . .

Massachusetts Libertarians have organized a national political event ‘The Future of the Libertarian Political Movement’. The event will be held Sunday, June 19 at the Highlander Inn in Manchester, New Hampshire.

Keynote speaker Judge John Buttrick of Arizona will speak at lunch. Libertarian Presidential candidates will debate. For morning, afternoon, and early evening, there will be a main session, a parallel breakout session, and a large dealer/exhibitor room. Further speakers will be announced soon.

Libertarian politics has made serious inroads into New Hampshire. A panel including libertarian members of the state legislature is anticipated.

Light breakfast, lunch, and dinner will be served. Registration including all meals is $100. Send your checks to Massachusetts Libertarians, POB 1154, Worcester MA 01613. You can join on the web at LPMass.org. Click on “donate”, go down the page to “To donate to our Federal PAC, click here”, and advance to DonorTown Square. Please mention in the ‘notes’ section of the donor form that you are coming to the conference.

The Highlander Inn is right at the entrance to the Manchester Airport. If’ you’re flying to PorcFest, come a day early for an extra serving of libertarian political discussion.

Asked about location and timing, LPMass officers said ‘We have PorcFest, right there starting the next day, June 20. It’s a great way to put attendees on our doorstep. And we just had two events similar to ours tragically cancelled. We’re offering a replacement.”

Somerville, MA, February 26th, 2011 – With the WikiLeaks controversy,
net neutrality concerns, and a need for a voice in the protection of
the internet, one group of people have decided to stand up and answer
the call for these issues. The Massachusetts Pirate Party, MAPP for
short.

The Massachusetts Elections Division has approved the MAPP’s political
designation petition. Voters will now be able to register as Pirates
in addition to other political parties.

We live in a country founded on the ideals of life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness. For many people, those ideals are not real. The
Supreme Court and Congress have expanded the power of corporations and
made them more powerful than people. Increasingly government
officials ignore open meeting laws, make deals favorable to
corporations behind closed doors and sell off our public information
to private interests. Congress has allowed corporations to lock down
our culture through copyrights that last four times longer than they
did at the founding of our nation.

Ever since the 9/11 attack on the United States by Al Qaeda, the
United States government has increasingly sacrificed our liberties and
privacy while increasing the number of secrets the government keeps
from its citizens. Must we give our government the right to listen to
everyone’s phone conversations or have surveillance cameras in our
houses before we feel secure? Should we allow our government to hide
documents on international affairs, especially concerning
international war, and even go as far as wanting those who release
these documents “assassinated”? What kind of country do we live in
where we can openly call for someone to be assassinated for releasing
truthful information?

The MAPP will advocate for putting people before corporations, opening
up government, maintaining personal privacy, promoting culture and
knowledge through copyright reform, and fostering innovation by
abolishing patents. We call for people to join together and stand
for the rights of the common citizen and expect basic honesty from our
government.

The MAPP is currently focusing on defeating the Combating Online
Infringements and Counterfeits Act (COICA) and other bills that would
allow our government to censor the internet. We are looking for
people who wish to show and present the truth. We believe that
standing up for rights long guaranteed to regular citizens of America
is something on which all Americans can agree.

The Massachusetts Pirate Party can be contacted at:

Phone: (617) 863-6277 (MAPP)
Email: info@masspirates.org

WASHINGTON – At their booth at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the Libertarian Party is displaying a "Republican Wall of Shame." (View low-res JPG or high-res PDF.)

These are the prominent Republicans featured on the Wall of Shame:

• Mitt Romney, supporter of the RomneyCare socialized medicine program in Massachusetts.
• Mike Huckabee, who as a governor supported so many tax increases that the Club for Growth labeled him a "liberal."
• George W. Bush, who had a long track record of supporting big-government programs and regulations, and who once said, "I’ve abandoned free market principles to save the free market system."
• Newt Gingrich, who often supports big-government intrusion and who said about global warming, "The evidence is sufficient that we should move towards the most effective possible steps to reduce carbon loading in the atmososphere."
• John McCain, who while running for president famously suspended his campaign to rush back to Washington to vote for bailouts.
• Paul Ryan, the House Budget Commmittee chairman who voted for the Medicare expansion in 2003, the No Child Left Behind Act, the TARP, GM and Chrysler bailouts, and even ethanol subsidies.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger, former California governor. The caption reads "No comment necessary."
• The "mystery Republican president." He signed many massive spending bills, and during his administration, federal spending was the largest percentage of GDP in post-WWII history. (His shameful record might be broken by the Obama administration.)

Libertarian Party Executive Director Wes Benedict commented, "Our goal at CPAC is to reach out to libertarians who have been misled into thinking of conservatism as a small-government ideology. In fact, conservatives just want their own version of big government, as we pointed out last year."

Benedict continued, "We’ve already heard some talk about the Republican ‘three-legged stool.’ My view is, Republicans are wrong on foreign policy, they’re wrong on social policy, and they’re lying hypocrites on economic policy. Their stool has no legs."

Wes Benedict is attending CPAC and can be reached on his cell phone at 512-659-8896.

The LP is America’s third-largest political party, founded in 1971. The Libertarian Party stands for free markets, civil liberties, and peace. You can find more information on the Libertarian Party at our website.

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A federal judge today sentenced Chuck Turner to three years behind bars for accepting a $1,000 bribe, a stinging rebuke to the former Boston city councilor.

US District Judge Douglas P. Woodlock rejected an appeal for leniency by defense attorneys, who had asked that the 70-year-old civil rights crusader receive probation and be spared prison because of his more than four decades of service as a community activist and elected official.

Woodlock’s stiff sentence came at the urging of prosecutors, who accused Turner of lying on the witness stand and making a mockery of public office and the criminal justice system. They had sought a prison term of 33 to 41 months.

After a jury convicted him in October of attempted extortion and three counts of providing false statements to FBI agents, Turner maintained his innocence and blamed his conviction on a government conspiracy to discredit elected officials of African-American descent.

The Libertarian Party of Massachusetts has restored ballot access for Massachusetts Libertarians. Ballot access was lost in 2008 when LP U.S. Senate candidate Bob Underwood outdid himself and received 3.1% of the vote, making “Libertarian” a political (major) party, and under Massachusetts’ arcane ballot access laws making it nearly impossible for Libertarian Party candidates to get on the ballot. To avoid a repeat of the 2008 event, in 2012 statewide Federal Libertarian candidates will run on the “Liberty” line.

Getting into a routine is exactly what Mark Miller, former Green-Rainbow party candidate for the county’s 3rd District, hopes to achieve with monthly meetings and greater exposure within the community. He cited many venues through which the party could spread its message of the 10 Key Values as well as show a strong presence within the community as a whole.

“We want to carry our values forward, and volunteering is an effective way of getting the message out,” he said. “We need to be collaborating with other community organizations like Habitat for Humanity, the Western Mass. Labor Action, the Salvation Army. They would all be receptive to having anybody there to help. Plus it’s a great cross section of the community.”

Laugenour is hoping that as the party grows, more members will be inspired to run for local government, including in the upcoming elections for town offices held in the spring. Gaining candidacy and recognition within their own communities, the very same ground-up approach, he said, launched the Green Party into legitimacy in the Berkshires.