By objective standards (actual popular performance), Hospers. Then again, he was best by electoral vote total.

See, I can be unfair too!

All I knew about him, was that he was from Alaska, had a rather odd video on YouTube a few months ago, and made a terrific statement in a debate back last summer about lowering the drinking age to 18.

During all last year, you may recall, I was totally wrapped up with the GOP primaries to pay much attention to the Dems. If I had any time leftover at all, I spent that watching the LP.

Not the majors, but on the cusp of the majors.

Ruwart, Kubby, et.al. keep the LP at Single ‘A’.

Not too mention the very first elected Libertarians ever won office that year.

And MacBride got a feature story about him in People Magazine.

Wow, the thought of that will just keep me up at night.

I lost all respect for Bush with that idiotic Port Dubai deal two years ago. I still like him personally, but seriously question his judgement on the War on Terror.

Do you know the guy has used the term “Islamo-Fascist” a grand total of one single time in his entire Presidency.

He’s a Moderate Squish in fighting Islamo-Fascism. He’s offered no help to the Euros who are under daily assault from these Fascists.

And he covered up for Clinton and Janet Reno for their complicity in blaming McVeigh and Nichols as the sole purportrators for OKC bombing, instead of the real culprits Saddam Hussein and Iraqi Intelligence.

Bush? Middle-of-the-Roader, right half the time, terribly wrong the other half.

Yes, MacBride was only the LP’s second presidential candidate. Remember who the Republican Party’s second presidential candidate was? His name was Abraham Lincoln.

When MacBride ran in 1976, the GOP had just suffered several major black eyes. Vice-President Spiro Agnew had resigned over a bribery scandal. The Nixon administration had pissed off all sides of the Vietnam issue, implemented wage and price controls and proposed national health care, and the country was in the doldrums of double-digit inflation …

... the 1976 election was so wide-open that the peanut-farming governor of Georgia was able to secure the Democratic nomination and win the election. And MacBride, a former Republican state legislator and presidential elector, was only able to pull down 173,000 votes? Pathetic.

In 1984, there was no doubt whatsoever that Ronald Reagan was going to win in a landslide. Everyone loved the guy, he’d stolen the LP’s rhetoric and even an eensy, teensy tiny bit of its actual economic and foreign policy, and according to Dondero the LP is just the GOP’s beard anyway. Who would expect an unknown like Bergland to do well in an environment like that? But he outpolled Roger MacBride by 50,000 votes even without Crane/Koch support.

Is any of the above “fair?” Absolutely not. We can pick “best” and “worst” candidates by any number of criteria, and trying to explain why who performed how is incredibly complex and frustrating (hint: Michael Badnarik 2004 polled more than 3/4 as well as Ron Paul 1988 on 1/3 the money and with 1/3 the post-nomination campaign time). So when Dondero goes on for a week about “Bergland. Worst. Campaign. Ever,” I figure it’s worth actually discussing whether that’s a hard truth or not.

Roger MacBride was only the LP’s second presidential race—dont know if that’s fair.

What, you didn’t know Gravel was antiwar? What planet do you live on?

It really doesn’t matter who the LP nominee is going to be because you and all your cosmo libertarian buddies will be in John McCain’s dog kennel by the summer, singing the praises of campaign finance reform and the Patriot Act while McCain gives you your 100-years war you can watch from a distance, safely I might add.

Getting back to your point, the War in Iraq is already won.

Obviously, George Bush disagrees with you because we still have 144,000 troops there and the death rate of Americans has increased over the last two months. In any case, let’s assume you’re right. Does this mean that you can link arms with antiwar libertarians, declare victory, and then bring the troops home by 09? If so, I’m willing to call it a victory too! Deal?

Just to be clear here, I’m not arguing that Marrou was worse than Bergland. I was just explaining why Nolan might regard Marrou as worse than Bergland.

If I had to pick a “worst ever” candidate, it would probably be neither Bergland nor Marrou. I recall we had a presidential candidate who polled very poorly—only 173,000 votes—only four years after the LP actually got an electoral vote, cast by that candidate himself, who was a former elected state legislator. It was a pathetic performance, almost 60,000 votes fewer than Bergland (who happened to be the VP candidate on that candidate’s ticket), from a candidate with real name recognition and credentials.

I just read Mike’s issues – http://www.gravel2008.us/issues – looks like he’ll probably get my vote.

I’d prefer Barr do most of the talking.

Also, the Ballott Access drives that year were Keystone Cops. At one point, they missed 4 or 5 states in a row, spending all sorts of money on each one, only to miss them by a few thousand sigs each time. Alan Turin is an expert on this. He was one of those petitioners. He tells the story of the Bergland people first sending him to RI. Missed it. Then to NH. Missed it. Then to another State. Missed it. Then to another. Missed it. Each time paying for room and board, and top dollar for signatures.

Worst run LP Presidential campaign in Party history.