So is McCain rediscovering his centrist roots after he ran to the right to secure the GOP’s nomination? Maybe he has regrets about unleashing the embarrassment that is Sarah Palin on to the world?

Whatever the reason…glad to see him come back towards the middle.

From Reuters:

The Republican Party’s presidential nominee in 2008 raised the possibility of a third party about a year ago, but his comments on Tuesday suggest he has hardened his views as polls show Americans increasingly disillusioned with Washington politics.

The 75-year-old McCain may now be the most prominent politician forecasting Americans will look to another party to compete with Democrats and Republicans.

“Unless both parties change, then I think that it’s an inevitability. We aren’t doing anything for the people,” McCain said in blunt remarks at the Reuters Washington Summit.

Americans, he said, are frustrated by sluggish economic growth that has depleted their incomes while corporate executives take in massive salary bonuses.

Asked if the new option would be a centrist party, or a wing of the left or right, McCain quipped; “I think a Fed-Up Party.”

We also get to hear McCain’s opinion of the Tea Party…

“The Tea Party was a movement, not an organization, as we know. And so they’ve kind of receded. There was never any permanency to them,” he said.

Yeah, because the Koch brothers don’t have unlimited funds and can’t hide who’s actually funding this “movement” indefinitely. Otherwise they would have some permanence.

More as it develops…

Americans Elect (AE) is an organization that intends to qualify for the 2012 presidential ballot in all 50 states, then field a presidential slate through an open nomination process on the internet.

I took note of the organization when they received favorable coverage after “de-cloaking” a few weeks ago. Realistically, we can expect “Americans Elect” to have as much impact on the 2012 election as their predecessor organization “Unity08″ had on the 2008 election. Which is to say – none. They can probably be safely ignored until such time as they show some real traction.

Still, this is an organization that proposes to dramatically change the way we select our President and they appear to have the financial support and the legal wherewithal to succeed with their ballot initiative. As such, it is prudent to take a deep dive into Americans Elect representations and bylaws, ask questions, and look for unintended consequences. Some bloggers are already working this beat.

Jim Cook of Irregular Times is skeptical and has been frustrated in his attempts to get his questions answered. Sol Kleinsmith of Rise of The Center (and occasional contributor here) is more favorably inclined, has been promised an interview, and is soliciting his readers for questions to ask the organization. It should be an interesting interview.

An interesting artifact of the Americans Elect proposed process for nominating and electing our president surfaced in one of the RoTC threads. Here is the scenario – Let’s say American’s Elect has successfully obtained ballot status and fielded a credible presidential candidate in 2012. They lose the election but win a plurality in one or more states and consequently neither the Republican or Democratic candidate have a majority of electoral votes. This is a plausible scenario (unlike actually winning the presidency for an AE candidate – which has a zero probability). While there is no history of a third party candidate winning the presidency, they have on occasion won the electoral votes for one or more states. One could easily envision an AE candidate with a strong geographic appeal winning a plurality in a state and securing their electoral votes as a favorite son. In that circumstance AE would make the decision between the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates for the entire country.

Americans Elect anticipated this scenario in their bylaws:

9.4.2. Coalition Agreement. The Americans Elect ticket receives fewer popular votes nationally than the ticket of at least one of the major political parties and the Americans Elect Delegates have convened in convention after the popular vote but before the Electoral College vote and endorsed a candidate of either major political party on such terms and conditions as may be reflected in the vote of endorsement, in which case the person serving as Elector shall vote solely in the affirmative for the endorsed candidate and for no other candidate.

This says Americans Elect intends to reconvene an on-line convention and through a vote of their delegates (theoretically any registered voter who opts-in – including me) decide whether the Republican or Democratic candidate will be our president. Specific details of how this AE re-convention would take place are sparse, but lets just take AE’s representations at face value and look at this through the prism of a hypothetical scenario:

It is November 7, 2012. A plurality of the people of New York state have voted to put their confidence in AE candidate Michael Bloomberg. In a close election, neither Democratic candidate Barack Obama or Republican candidate Mitt Romney have secured a majority of electoral votes. New York’s 31 electoral votes will now determine who will be president.

Not all of the registered voters of New York are AE delegates. They voted in a general election for a candidate – Michael Bloomberg. Yet by AE bylaws, Michael Bloomberg is now sidelined and will not decide how to cast the New York electoral votes on behalf of the people of New York. Instead, it is the Americans Elect delegates who will decide whether Obama or Romney receive New York’s 31 electoral votes and the presidency. As a practical matter, the people of the state of New York will be completely disenfranchised in the 2012 electoral college vote. How do you think they will feel about Texans, Floridians and Californians deciding whether their 31 electoral votes will be cast to make either Obama or Romney president? If clearly understood, would any New York voter to take that risk?

These are rhetorical questions. The answer is obvious.

In their haste to put together bylaws for their ballot initiative, AE may not have thought through the political ramifications of this provision. Assuming they get on all 50 state ballots and come up with a credible candidate, they can easily be undone by this provision alone. It is just too easy to run against. If an AE candidate shows any strength in any state, the consequences of an AE win in that state will be shouted from the rooftops by competing campaigns, bloggers, pundits, partisan of both parties, and the mainstream media. The message is simple and easy to communicate: The state will be disenfranchised in the Electoral College if the AE candidate wins that state.

From a tactical political campaign perspective, this is the equivalent of leading with your chin in a boxing match. I suspect that AE has a glass jaw and it would not take much of an uppercut to put them on the canvas. I have to believe that once Americans Elect realizes this problem, they will change these bylaws if they can.

If nothing else, this is a cautionary tale on the importance of transparency and the need for a deep dive when vetting those advocating new ways to elect our president. If the top gun political public relations professionals that run AE missed something like this, you’ve got to wonder what else they missed.

The Devil is in details and the details need to be out in the open where we can look for the bugger.

^{X-posted from “Divided We Stand United We Fall.”}

^{You just can’t keep a good 501(c)4 corporation down.}

A “new” national organization focused on the 2012 presidential election uncloaked their semi-stealth operation over the weekend. After receiving special access to the organization, columnists Tom Friedman and John Avlon were released from their press embargo and obligingly wrote fawning reviews. Others were a bit more circumspect.

Americans Elect is a 501(c)4 corporation. This means they are not required to disclose donors. The reader may be more familiar with this particular corporate classification within the context of the Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court decision. Citizens United was a 501(c)4 corporation.

Taken at face value, the objectives of the organization are novel, ambitious and exciting. They intend to qualify for the 2012 Presidential Ballot in all 50 states, then field a presidential slate that is nominated through an open process on the internet by means of a virtual on-line convention.

Getting on the ballot in fifty states for any third party is a Herculean task. Kudos to Americans Elect for taking the challenge on. Given the legislative roadblocks and partisan landmines used by the the two party duopoly to ambush third party electoral efforts, it is easy to rationalize the need for well-heeled donors to kick start the effort. As it turns out, Americans Elect secured some well heeled New York donors to kick start the effort. We don’t know who they all are because, you know, Americans Elect is a 501(c)4 corporation and they are not telling us.

Taken at face value and considered in a vacuum while looking at them sideways and squinting slightly, one could get excited about this new high-concept high-tech initiative to reinvent our political process. Problem being, this is really not a new organization, and we have some recent history to consider, and considering that recent history, we learn we cannot take what they say at face value.

Americans Elect is Unity08, or more precisely – they would have been Unity12 until they got the shiny new name. Unity08 started at about the same time as I started my blog. I subsequently burned a few posts chronicling the Unity08 journey through the ’06 midterms and the run up to the 2008 presidential election.

In early 2008, well before a promised internet convention to nominate a “unity ticket” for the presidential election, Unity08 suddenly went up in flames and shuttered their site. Miraculously, only days later, the DraftBloomberg.com site emerged phoenix-like from the ashes, using the same address, infrastructure, a domain purchased a year earlier by Unity08, and staffed by many of the same people. This led some to speculate that the entire enterprise was nothing more than a Bloomberg stalking horse from the beginning. Cynics. Anyway, after Unityo8′s rather unseemly demise (chronicled at the Donk here and here – be sure to check the particularly entertaining comments), I considered them dead and buried. Certainly I did not expect to see or hear from them again.

Surprise.

Jim Cook of the Irregular Times has been obsessively stalking this particular white whale since it’s inception, and brings us up to date:

• The corporate address reported by Unity08 in the first half of 2009: 1775 Pennsylvania Avenue Suite 1212, Washington DC 20006
• The corporate address reported by the Unity12 Task Force in the second quarter of 2010: 1775 Pennsylvania Avenue Suite 1212, Washington DC 20006
• The corporate address reported by the renamed Americans Elect in the third quarter of 2010: 1775 Pennsylvania Avenue Suite 1212, Washington DC 20006
• Americans Elect is the intentional extension of Unity08, as Americans Elect Chair and Unity08 Director Peter Ackerman made clear when sitting for a deposition in a lawsuit filed by Unity08: “If Unity08 is successful in this litigation, Unity08 has a clear and definite intent to resume its activities — renamed ‘Unity12′ — for the 2012 presidential election. The ‘Unity’ mission remains as critical today for the 2012 presidential election as it was in 2006 for the 2008 presidential election.” The only matter Ackerman didn’t anticipate was the name change from ‘Unity12′ to ‘Americans Elect.’

So here we are. Americans Elect, backed by a bucket load of New York mystery money, is hiring petition gatherers, fighting expensive legal battles, and doing the hard grunt work necessary to get on the ballot in all fifty states. All in order to field a presidential candidate – To Be Named Later. So – if you are considering putting your idealistic heart and soul into this brave new political operation, make sure you understand exactly what you are getting into.

Americans Elect is almost certainly the Mike Bloomberg for President campaign. They probably need to maintain the Americans Elect facade to keep their 501(c)4 status. But if Mike Bloomberg is not heading their ticket in 2012, I expect Americans Elect will go the way of Unity08. Now, if you want to see Bloomberg run as a spoiler in 2012, by all means – sign up. As for me, my views about this organization has not changed since January, 2008:

“Unity08 had over 120,000 members and raised about a million dollars. Not much by presidential campaign standards, not as much as they wanted, but nothing to scoff at. Actually, I liked the idea of a Hagel/Bloomberg Unity08 candidacy, which is why, although dubious, I signed up as a “delegate”. I feel bad for those who put their heart and soul into the effort, as they have been treated rather shabbily by the organization. The whole thing smells so manipulative, so contrived and betrays such cynical contempt for the Unity08 supporters that I would find it difficult to support Bloomberg now.”

Look – I like Mike Bloomberg. Under the right circumstances, I might even be tempted to vote for him for President. But not as a 3rd Party candidate in 2012. He could not win but he could garner significant support and, like all “successful” 3rd party presidential candidates, function as a spoiler.

My guess is that in 2012 he would be more likely to pull votes from Obama than the Republican candidate. I’d have preferred that scenario in 2008, as we might have avoided the subsequent disastrous two years of Democratic One Party Rule. However, I am also not interested in seeing a return to equally disastrous One Party Republican Rule in 2013. The GOP will probably take control of the Senate in the 2012 election. Reelecting Obama is the only sure way to retain our happily divided government.

Sorry Mike. Let me know when you start hanging around with a better class of 501(c)4 corporations.

^{X-posted from “Divided We Stand United We Fall”}

It’s jumped considerably since the 2008 election.

But do people really want the Tea Party to be the third way?

Gallup with more…

My gut tells me that most folks understand that the Tea Partiers are just really angry conservatives who are lashing out at their own for supporting fiscally irresponsible behavior. And yes, there are some independents who identify with that too, but once those folks scratch the surface of the Tea Party, I guarantee 90% of them will not like what they find. And the other 10% were conservatives who just liked to call themselves independents.

And to that point, note how the number of conservatives wanting a third party has shot up more than any other group. Coincidence?

Still, liberals and independents want a third way more and I think there’s appetite for a moderate left/middle progressive-lite alternative to the Tea Party message. One that stresses fiscal responsibility, social justice and basic fairness…all wrapped up in a populist “let’s get back to work” message. It won’t happen in the next election cycle, but don’t be surprised if it pops up in 2016 if Obama wins or Obama loses in 2012.

Either way, it’s on the horizon.

What say you?

I wont be nearly the first person to be writing about California’s Proposition 14. I’m coming late into the game, having only listened to the vague positive talking points of the California Independent Voter Network (CAIVN), and their allies, who have talked this proposition up. But I began to see some dissent, and took at a look at it myself. To be blunt, if this passes, partly because of support from CAIVN and their allies, I will genuinely be embarrassed to affiliate myself with these organizations that I hold in very high regard for their work fighting for the rights of independents.

Like so many other laws that make it through corrupt, and usually quite partisan, legislatures or ballot initiatives, this law violates the first rule that an ethical lawmaker or political organization ought to look at when drafting a bill or proposition; ‘first do no harm’.

Independents are doing two things that are inexcusable by supporting this proposition. They are supporting a change in the electoral system, only allowing the top two vote getters to make it through to the general election, that has flatly been shown to not accomplish the stated goals of lessening partisanship in the other states and areas that have, or have had, such rules in place.

I am personally quite familiar with these kinds of rules. In my home state of Nebraska, I considered running for state senate, as an independent, myself. This rule was not the only reason I decided not to do so, but looking at a short primary season where I would have had to overcome a huge money, organizational and manpower deficit… it certainly was one of the straws that broke the camel’s back. Had I had the entire campaign season to catch up, my decision could have been different.

In other words… we’re hurting our own chances, in trade for a rule that has no history of lowering partisanship, and actually has a track record of lowering the rate of incumbent turnover.

The second mistake is even more insidious, and the reason why I dub this bill the ‘First DO Harm’ Act. The first could be explained away as being duped, misinformed or (at best) perhaps blindly grasping for straws on a gamble. No… this is wholly deliberate. This is taking a page from the two party duopoly playbook. Its inexcusable and so hypocritical I cringe to think about how it might effect the future of independent movement types should this pass in California.

Independents have been the whipping boy of the political process for the dozen or so years that I’ve been really paying attention to politics. Its terribly hard to have an effect on primary elections, the hurdles to running for office as an independent are disturbingly high in most places and candidates from the two major parties pay attention to us only when races get close.

If there is any group of people that we have some common cause with on electoral reform, its third party organizations. Now, I think that both major parties are far too partisan, and I recognize that organizations like the Green Party and Libertarian Party are even more ideologically extreme in most cases. But my ideological differences with them don’t go so far as to impinge upon my higher conscientious support for basic democratic ideals, and fundamental fairness.

Richard Winger, over at Ballot Access News, hits the nail on the head in his op-ed in the San Francisco Bay Guardian:

“…since minor party candidates almost never place first or second in the June primary, minor party members would never be able to run for statewide office in November. And, the catch is that only the November vote counts for meeting the 2 percent vote test.

and…

“The real irony is that the big newspapers of California know about this problem with Prop. 14 but refuse to mention it. That’s ironic because back in 1981, when Democrats in the Legislature wanted to toughen the ballot-access requirements, the big newspapers of California denounced that bill with full fury. Forty of California’s biggest newspapers, TV stations, and radio stations editorialized against that measure.

lastly…

“Prop. 14 is supported by the Chamber of Commerce, the for-profit health insurance companies, the for-profit hospitals, and various multimillionaires, and the Yes on 14 campaign has a huge war chest. Why won’t the L.A. Times even mention this flaw in the measure? Who are the big dailies afraid of offending?”

And who are these independent organizations afraid of offending… or perhaps who are they pandering to?

This proposition flat out screws the minor parties. This glaring selfishness is made embarrassingly worse by the fact that several independent supporters I have communicated with, or read explanations of their reasoning for support, of the proposition have actually touted this as a way of further marginalizing these minor parties. This rings of a bully at school taking his anger out on even smaller kids because his bigger brothers have been beating on him for years. In fact, this is precisely what this is.

I’m not going to split hairs on this issue. Independents that support this bill should be ashamed of themselves.

I’m not kidding. It’s the perfect combination. A slew of ill informed protesters who heart Glenn Beck, think they know “true” conservative values and are convinced our country is turning into a dictatorship and Sarah Palin…an ill informed politician who hearts Glenn Beck, claims she knows “true” conservative values and loves to convince folks our country is turning into a dictatorship…and that Obama wants to kill your grandparents.

What’s not to love?

So yes, I’m bringing this up because she’s headlining their first convention, and that’s where it gets very interesting. Because while the Republicans have a big opportunity to pick up steam going in 2012, the Tea Party movement could completely undermine it…in much the same way the Deaniacs did in 2004.

A political scientist explains…

But courting what many call a fringe and inchoate movement carries huge risks, argues Alan Abramowitz, a political scientist at Emory University, in Atlanta.

He says a Republican shift toward the Reaganesque Tea Party ideal could lead to a sort of pogrom for moderate Republicans, forcing out those (think Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe) who don’t hew precisely to rock-hard conservative principles around economic freedom and limited government interference.

“The Republican Party is trapped by their base, which is going increasingly conservative,” says Mr. Abramowitz. “Yes, Republicans can do fairly well in the 2010 elections – it’s entirely possible that they could pick up 20 to 30 seats in the House – but they could read the wrong message from that. In 2012, if the economy is doing reasonably well again and Obama’s popularity has stabilized, that strategy is going to be very risky and this could all come back to haunt them.”

Oh, and Palin is getting paid anywhere from $75K to $100K to speak at the event. Looks like freedom pays handsomely!

My question: Does this hint at a third party run in 2012?

Must read on Redding News Review — Lenora Fulani explains why she did not support Bill Thompson in November’s mayoral race in NYC…. *******   With more than 40% of the country being independent, opening up the primaries is an important democratic (small “d”) electoral reform that would promote non-partisanship and allow independent voters access to the first round of voting. Californians will vote in June 2010 on a “Top Two” version of open primaries, and while this concept is very popular at the grassroots, the loudest opposition is coming from minor party spokespeople like Rich Winger of Ballot Access News. However, Jon Fleichman at Fox & Hounds Daily (a news site dedicated to the principle that “an economically healthy California is a boon for all citizens”) unintentionally makes the best argument in support of  open primaries.   *****   And speaking of third party voices, I was glad to see that the Independent Political Report picked up The Hankster’s coverage of the attacks on the Working Families Party–maybe one day IPR will recognize the NYC IP as well….   ******* Mike Bloomberg apparently has something else in common with Fred Newman (in addition to their both being independents): neither of them gives grades!  *******  NY Post’s Frederic U. Dicker has really lost it — he seems to be living in a place where up is down….  *******   And finally, lots of interesting analysis of health care, Obama, independents, and the current nature of our political culture.  ******  Oh, and one more thing! Technorati‘s got itself a brand new bag. See why I care here at The End.

MUST READ

• The Independence Party and the Black community: A power partnership (By Lenora Fulani, Redding News Review)

INDEPENDENT VOTERS

• Voter angst: Nation might see third party rising (Chris Austin, Knoxville News Sentinel)

OPEN PRIMARIES/ POLITICAL REFORM

• Effort launched to end marginalization of independent voters (By MARTIN WISCKOL, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER)
• The Dark Side of the California Open Primary Proposal (By Richard Winger, California Progress Report)
• Maybe it’s time to drop political labels (By Mizell Stewart III, Evansville Courier Press – IL)
• Random Thoughts on the Political Scene (By Jon Fleischman, Fox & Hounds) The so-called “open primary” is supposed to reduce the role of special interests in the legislature, right? Yet the measure, if passed, would make it vastly more expensive for anyone to get elected to the legislature (successful candidates will have had to campaign to every voter in their district, twice). Hmmm.

GOV RACES

• Independent candidate to join Senate debates (By DAN RING, Mass Live/The Republican) Brown, Coakley and Kennedy will face off in the first televised debate on Tuesday. The debate will be taped, and it is scheduled to be aired on WBZ-TV Channel 4 in Boston from 8 to 9 a.m. on Dec. 27 and on WSBK-TV Channel 38 in Boston from 7 to 8 p.m. on Dec. 28.
• Decision-making publicity suits Goodman just fine (By Michael Mishak, Las Vegas Sun) Goodman was changing his party affiliation from Democrat to nonpartisan, a necessary step if he decides to run as an independent candidate for governor next year — something he’s been hinting at for months.

NEW YORK POLITICS

• Working Familes Party “Taking Heat” (Independent Political Report)
• Target Practice (BY ELIZABETH BENJAMIN, Daily News/Daily Politics)
• Obama gets an ‘A’ for effort from Schwarzenegger (From CNN Associate Producer Martina Stewart, Political Ticker)
• Losers abound in NY politics this year (Fredric U. Dicker, NY Post) Among the losers: * Bloomberg, whose surprisingly narrow election victory weakened him even further, and “the leftist Working Families Party”* HUH???  Did Mr. Dicker overturn the election???

BLOGS: RECOMMENDED READING

• Dean’s Blind Spot (Ronald Brownstein, the Alantic)
• GROWING CLOUT OF INDEPENDENTS IS A GOP NIGHTMARE (American Opinion, by Jackie Salit)
• The Flawed Logic of William Kristol (By: SJGulitti, FireDogLake/The Seminal) To date, had independents firmly embraced the principles of the conservative movement generally or the G.O.P. in particular, the percentage of voters identifying as Republicans would show a marked increase and so far that is not the case. I would argue that the shift to the right among independent voters is far from solid and is conditional, being subject to a set of factors that will likely change by the time of the 2012 election.
• Why Obama Is Failing (By Robert Parry, Consortium News) By failing to do the hard work of building institutions, the progressive community has largely sidelined itself, sitting in the stands and booing the players on the field.

THE END

For more news for independents, see The Hankster

Poli-Tea author Damon Eris, independent political blogger, talks with The Hankster about independent and third party politics, the rise of independent voters in the face of an entrenched political duopoly, and what it all means to American politics circa 2009 and beyond.

Click here to sign in to the show.

You’ll be able to access the call online and make comments, ask questions and give your opinion!

And you can also call in by phone between 8:30 and 9:00pm Eastern Time at (347) 884-8634!

Please join us!

Nancy

I won’t say that this represents all of these parties, but some delicious crazy starts at 2 minutes in. Basically, the argument can be summed up as Obama wanted to wait until June to put in the digital TV converters in so he could brainwash people.

I’m not kidding…

A big thank you to Glenn Beck and Fox News for helping create this. Very entertaining.

By the way, Libertarians need to run FAR away from these folks if they ever want to build a viable third party.

(h/t: BTB)

Just found a comment left by the Transportation Security Administration in the post I wrote yesterday about that situation in St. Louis where a Ron Paul supporter was held and questioned because he had $4,700 in cash on him (which is roughly represented in the picture above).

From Evolution of Security:

At approximately 6:50 p.m. on March 29, 2009, a metal box alarmed the X-ray machine at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, triggering the need for additional screening. Because the box contained a number of items including a large amount of cash, all of which needed to be removed to be properly screened, it was deemed more appropriate to continue the screening process in a private area. A Transportation Security Administration (TSA) employee and members of the St. Louis Airport Police Department can be heard on the audio recording. The tone and language used by the TSA employee was inappropriate. TSA holds its employees to the highest professional standards. TSA will continue to investigate this matter and take appropriate action.

Movements of large amounts of cash through the checkpoint may be investigated by law enforcement authorities if criminal activity is suspected. As a general rule, passengers are required to cooperate with the screening process. Cooperation may involve answering questions about their property, including why they are carrying a large sum of cash. A passenger who refuses to answer questions may be referred to appropriate authorities for further inquiry.

A few things…

1. I applaud the TSA for reaching out like this and responding so quickly. And the fact that they said some of the employees were acting inappropriately is a MASSIVE shift from what we’ve seen the past several years.
2. I still would like to see what law requires passengers to answer questions about why they have cash on them. Because the officers on the tape never answered the question and this blog post doesn’t either.
3. Why would $4,700 in a metal box constitute criminal activity? I can understand if this guy was hiding it the lining of a suitcase or in his underwear, but from I’ve heard of the story, it was your basic lockbox.

So yes, there are still some questions to be answered and I still think the TSA needs to think about revising some of their policies, lest they receive an inordinate amount of backlash for incidents that never needed to happen in the first place.

I think I’ve said this before, but the Republicans definitely run the risk of being fractured between the social and the fiscal conservatives. Because call him whatever you like, but Bush was not a fiscal conservative. And there are A LOT of fiscally conservative folks who really despise the less tolerant aspects of social conservatism.

Now Newt is weighing in on the obvious split and since I’m moderately cynical…I think he’s starting to lay the groundwork for a 3rd party run.

From CNN:

“If the Republicans can’t break out of being the right wing party of big government, then I think you would see a third party movement in 2012,” Gingrich said Tuesday. The speech, to a group of students at the College of the Ozarks in Missouri, was recorded by Springfield TV station KY3.

But Gingrich, bemoaning President Barack Obama’s “monstrosity of a budget,” acknowledged that Republicans are partially to blame for the escalation in federal spending.

“Remember, everything Obama’s doing, Bush started last year,” he said. “If you’re going to talk about big spending, the mistakes of the Bush administration last year are fully as bad as the mistakes of Obama’s first two, three months.”

Want more proof that Gingrich is thinking 3rd party? His American Solutions group is starting to get its hooks into the “Tea Party” movement.

Long story short, Newt knows a movement when he sees it and if there’s a chance he could use it to raise his profile, well, all the better.

More as it develops…

A truly dumb move by St. Louis airport employees is recorded and shared here by Fox News…

Is Missouri’s militia/Ron Paul tie still in full effect?

One note, the commentator in the middle who tries to tie this to Obama’s economic policies at the very end was a truly hacky move. He didn’t need to go there, but there it is nonetheless.

Otherwise, a very good clip.

(h/t: Below The Beltway)

This was definitely troubling, so it’s good to see that some real action was taken after the report was revealed.

From McClatchy:

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — The Missouri Highway Patrol this week retracted a controversial report on militia activity and will change how such reports are reviewed before being distributed to law enforcement agencies.

The Highway Patrol also will open an investigation into the origin of the report, which linked conservative groups with domestic terrorism and named former presidential candidates Ron Paul, Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin.

The Lt. Gov has also suggested that the Director of Public Safety be put on leave pending an investigation into how the report came about. I think that’s harsh, because there probably are some ties between 3rd party supporters and militia members, but the big thing here was the profiling based on bumper stickers. That was just a lazy move and the DoPS should have known better.

However, 3rd party supporters should take note at how quickly this was reversed once it was discovered. In other words, try not to fall into the trap of thinking this is part of a conspiracy. We’re still a nation of checks and balances, and this situation demonstrates that.

Still, I think somebody should keep an eye on the guy who put all those stickers on his car in the picture above. :-)

I’m just saying…

(A series on little-known candidates for President)

Alan Keyes is not a little-known candidate, but many people may be surprised to know he is on the ballot in three states this general election - California, Colorado and Florida. The real news is not that, but how many times Keyes has run for President this year.

Keyes ran in the Republican primaries, eventually putting together his best showing in North Carolina when he gathered 2.7% of the vote and two delegates. Prior to that, Keyes complained that the media ignored him and excluded him from the Presidential debates. In the debates he did appear, Keyes complained that the moderators did not ask him questions.

In April, Keyes announced his departure from the Republican Party. He sought to get the Constitution Party’s nomination, but was defeated by Chuck Baldwin. Party leaders criticized Keyes for being out of sync with Constitution Party issues and lingering in the Republican Party until a week before the Constitution Party’s convention.

After that defeat, Keyes announced, “I kind of represent, in political terms, the abortion.”

After two failed tries for President in one year, most people would move onto another cause. That is not Alan Keyes. After his Constitution Party defeat, Keyes immediately announced his intention to run as an independent candidate and notified the FEC he was doing so.

In the process, he started America’s Independent Party. You have to give Keyes credit there. If he cannot win a party’s nomination, he may as well start his own. At least that way the nomination cannot be denied to him.

Yet Keyes was not through with his nomination pursuit in 2008. One of the state delegations at the Constitution Party’s convention was California’s American Independent Party. Since 1988, it has aligned itself nationally with the Constitution Party or its predecessor the U.S. Taxpayers Party. The AIP delegation backed Keyes at the convention.

Keyes had the backing of the chair and 14 of the 23 members of the AIP executive committee. Back in California, they hastily convened a meeting breaking their longtime affiliation with the Constitution Party and nominated Keyes. The remaining nine committee members met at a separate convention, two to three times larger than the pro-Keyes convention, and reaffirmed their support to the Constitution Party.

In the end, a ruling by California’s Secretary of State and a judge gave the coveted ballot spot to the Keyes’ faction. It is a good bet that the AIP’s legal woes are just beginning as its two factions fight it out.

In this busy political year for Alan Keyes, he has run for three party nominations and won one. He has announced an independent candidacy. In addition, he has started his own political party.

Yet this story still has a couple of twists. The AIP is segregationist George Wallace’s 1968 party. It is a little ironic that in 2008 the last remnant of that movement nominates a black man. Perhaps that is an indication just how far this country has come.

That brings up the last twist to the bizarre case of Alan Keyes –  Barack Obama. In 2002, the Illinois Republican Party carpetbagged Alan Keyes from Maryland to run for a Senate seat no other Republican wanted to waste the effort on. Yes, Barack Obama defeated Alan Keyes in his election to the U.S. Senate. It is a appropriate that in the same election where one man stands at the edge of achieving the highest political office in the land, the other is the political equivalent of an abortion.

(from Foolocracy.com)

(A series on little-known Presidential candidates)

In 2006, The Boston Tea Party broke from the Libertarian Party and adopted the most concise platform of any organized party in the country.

“The Boston Tea Party supports reducing the size, scope and power of government at all levels and on all issues, and opposes increasing the size, scope and power of government at any level, for any purpose.”

Their candidate for President is Charles Jay, a former boxing manager, and for Vice President Tom Knapp. They are on the ballot in Colorado, Florida and Tennessee.

The Boston Tea Party is openly soliciting the support of Ron Paul supporters on their websites.

Jay is best known for his 2004 Presidential run as a member of the Personal Choice Party. Jay’s running mate in 2004 was 1970’s porn star Marilyn Chambers. The duo was on the ballot in, of all places, Utah. They received 946 votes in that election. The Personal Choice Party is backing Jay again this year too.

According to BTP’s website, a Jay-Chambers ticket is being pushed as a protest write-in option in states that forbid write-in voting for President.

In the last few weeks, it seems that all is not well for the fledgling party. BTP claims a membership of 582 on their website, but that seems too many for the party to operate smoothly.  The Presidential candidate, John Jay, and the Florida branch have split from the national party. Apparently, the national committee wants to rescind an endorsement for a North Carolina candidate. The Florida state party does not agree and by a 4-0 vote of its state committee is unaffiliating itself from the national party.

 ”I didn’t involve myself in all of this to play in a sandbox with children,” said Jay on his website.

(from Foolocracy.com)

Is Barr this year’s Nader? Probably not because this doesn’t appear to be a close call.

However, he could definitely siphon off crucial votes in New Hampshire and Georgia.



So, will Barr help bring about an Obama landslide?

(A series on little-known Presidential candidates)

The small United States Pacifist Party has run a Presidential candidate as a write-in candidate in previous elections, but this is the first time they are on the ballot in a state. That state is Colorado, which has 16 candidates for President — the most crowded Presidential general election ballot in history.

Why is the ballot so crowded? That is because Colorado, like Louisiana, requires only a $500 fee to get on the ballot. Apparently, no signatures or other symbol of support is needed. So if you have an extra $500 in 2012 and want a footnote in political history or just want to embarrass your family…

The Pacifist Party seems to take some pride in running a Senate candidate in Colorado in 1998 who came in last with 1,900 votes. Somehow they have extrapolated this out to mean that there “are at least 100,000 in the U.S.” who would support their party. That would equal about 1 out of every 3000 Americans; that will not win very many elections.

The party’s founder and Presidential candidate Bradford Lyttle has also written a paper called “The Apocalypse Equation.” It is explained here, but basically spells out the risk of a nuclear disaster in a mathematical equation. It is supposed to mathematically prove that unless nuclear weapons are eliminated civilization is doomed. The only hard fact to come out of it is “that in 50 years the probability of the launch of at least one missile is about 52%.” Since that only suggests a nuclear disaster is about as likely to happen as not to happen, it is rather meaningless.

Lyttle received notoriety after 9/11 when he was interviewed by CNN and Bill O’Reilly. He proposed the pacifist response to the 9/11 attacks. Knowing the tone of the country at the time, Lyttle must have made for an interesting interviewee.

The Pacifist Party platform is what one would expect, such as “Preparation for nonviolent resistance against possible invasion and occupation attempts.” They also support a crash program to create a global solar power program, Canadian-style healthcare, unrestricted immigration, full employment and a guaranteed minimum income. Of course, all this is going to be paid for by eliminating the defense budget.

Interestingly enough, while they support banning handguns and assault weapons, it appears they will leave rifles alone.

(from Foolocracy.com)

(A series on little-known Presidential candidates)

What is America’s third oldest political party?

The Prohibition Party.

One would think that with the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1933, the Prohibition Party would have died long ago. Not quite. It is still twitching.

The Prohibition Party has run candidates in every Presidential election since 1872. Its best showing was 1892 when John Bidwell pulled 271,058 votes or 2.3%.

In 2003, five time Presidential nominee Earl Dodge split from the Prohibition Party to form the National Prohibition Party. At that time, some members accused Dodge of financial irregularities and refusing to accept new members because they would vote against him.  The split was precipitated when Dodge held the 2003 nominating convention at his home by invitation only. Dodge was nominated for a sixth time by eight people, including himself and his two daughters.

Word leaked out of Dodge’s actions, and a new national convention formed that selected Gene Amondson as its candidate.

The two competing factions continued to squabble with both parties separately nominating Dodge and Amondson for 2008. Dodge was nominated in a secret convention rumored to number about three attendees. Amondson was nominated by about two or three dozen. The death of Dodge last year has apparently ended the secession. Dodge’s faction then nominated Amondson for President as well.

The Prohibition Party is on the ballot in Colorado, Florida, and Louisiana. Leroy Pletten is the Vice-Presidential candidate.

The Prohibition Party’s platform is against foreign involvement by the United States in the affairs of other nations and supports the withdrawal of the United States from the World Bank. It has a “We pray for peace” plank in its platform.

The Prohibition Party seeks to abolish the Federal Reserve System. The party is against death taxes. It is against funding to the National Endowment for the Arts. It is against illegal immigration. It appears to oppose agricultural subsidies. The party opposes the sale, advertising and use of alcoholic beverages, tobacco products and illegal drugs. It opposes gambling, state lotteries, pornography and commercialized vice. The Prohibition Party also opposes the promotion of unnatural lifestyles.

In the 2004 Presidential election, Amondson received 1,944 votes while Dodge gathered 140.

(from Foolocracy.com)

(Note from Glenn Church: Within two hours of posting this article, Calvin Dodge, Earl Dodge’s son, commented that I had only given one side of the Prohibiition Party split. As an ardent anti-prohibitionist myself, I do not want to be perceived as biased towards one prohibiitionist faction over the other. Here are Calvin Dodge’s comments.)

You have only one part of the “split” story there. One other reason for the split was Leroy Pletten (this year’s VP candidate). He engineered a takeover of the party, resorting to such tactics as threatening board members with lawsuits, then getting his own people those positions after the existing members resigned to avoid those lawsuit threats.

Since Dad’s (Earl Dodge) death, Mr. Pletten has dedicated at least part of his time to posting his slanders on Dad’s Wikipedia page, using “sock puppet” identities

(A series on little-known Presidential candidates)

The McCain campaign has made socialism a buzzword in the last week. However, if they want to find a real socialist, they need to look no further than the Socialist Workers Party.

The SWP is on the ballot in Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Iowa, Louisiana, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, and Washington. Their candidate is 39-year-old Roger Calero. Calero was also the 2004 nominee. He collected 10,791 votes in 14 states.

In several states, Calero had to have James Harris fill in as a surrogate nominee because Calero is constitutionally ineligible to be President. Calero is not an American citizen. He was born in Nicaragua, although he does have permanent resident status. Harris is once again the surrogate nominee for Calero in 2008. If the SWP won, that could make for an interesting constitutional crisis. However, that is one scenario no one needs to worry about for this election.

The SWP was formed in 1938 as a pro-Trotsky faction after its members were kicked out of the Communist Party on the orders of Stalin. Since the 1980’s, the SWP has drifted toward Fidel Castro style Marxism. The SWP has called Castro’s Cuba “a shining example for all workers.”

Calero and his running mate, Alyson Kennedy, want to shorten the work week with no cut in take-home pay. They also want an emergency halt to farm and home foreclosures, a massive infrastructure rebuilding program with union-scale wages, withdrawal of all U.S. troops in foreign countries and, of course, normalization of relations with Cuba.

Calero was convicted of a felony for the sale of marijuana in 1988. In 2001, he was arrested after reentering the United States and threatened with deportation because of the conviction.

(from Foolocracy.com)

(A series on little-known Presidential candidates) 

Richard Duncan is an independent candidate on the ballot in a single state – Ohio. In 2004, he ran as a  write-in candidate for President and received 17 votes. Duncan expects to do considerably better this year.

The most notable thing about Duncan’s campaign is how he picked his Vice-Presidential running mate. The Constitution states that a Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidate must be from different states otherwise their joint home state can only cast its electoral votes for one of the candidates.

With that in mind, Duncan picked up a list of independent voters from next-door Pennsylvania. He proceeded to call voters asking if they wanted to be his Vice-Presidential running mate.

Not surprisingly, most people did not take Duncan seriously. After about 500 calls, Duncan had his man. Ricky Johnson lent his name to the campaign. And to think some people thought John McCain did not properly vet Sarah Palin.

Duncan is not a one-issue candidate. He places homeland security and jobs as his main issues. Duncan favors committing U.S. troops to U.N. peacekeeping missions but does not favor increasing our military presence in Afghanistan. On trade issues, he supports NAFTA and CAFTA but is undecided on GATT. He favors establishing English as the national language. Duncan favors maximizing alternative and traditional energy sources as well as opening ANWR to drilling. He backs medical marijuana and mandatory drug sentences for selling illegal drugs.

In 2006, Duncan ran for the U.S. Senate in Ohio against Sherrod Brown and Mike DeWine. Duncan polled 830 votes out of 3.8 million cast.

(from Foolocracy.com)