Third Party Watch

Here are a couple of articles from the Constitution Party’s presidential candidate, Chuck Baldwin.

“Remembering D-Day” is an edited copy of a speech he gave back on June 6, 1994, when he was invited to address the 50th anniversary of D-Day celebration at the National Cemetery, Naval Air Station, Pensacola, Florida.

“In Praise of Marriage and Parenting” [...]

As a Republican-oriented conservative magazine, the American Spectator is having a little bit of difficultry trying to figure out how to handle Bob Barr. On the one hand, he was their hero back in the ‘90s, when he headed the Bill Clinton impeachment team. On the other hand, these days he’s talking as [...]

Michael Freeman at TheLedger.com thinks Bob Barr and the Libertarian Party can expect more attacks along the lines of Mike Huckabee’s comments that libertarians are selfish, with their platform constituting a “soulless type of economic conservatism.”

Freeman notes that Huckabee is indeed the polar opposite of a libertarian:

Huckabee is a strong believer in the power of [...]

We have received unconfirmed word of an upheaval of some kind in the Chuck Baldwin (Constitution Party) campaign.

An unhappy campaign volunteer (code name “scandinavian”) says: “People who signed up to volunteer were sent messages to a conference call last night where the new campaign manager Anita Andrews spoke. Chuck came on board and [...]

Dr. Steve Parent writes that he will be interviewing Chuck Baldwin, presidential candidate of the Constitution Party, tonight at 7:30 pm Eastern Time on www.revolutionbroadcasting.com.

McCusker, on NolanChart.com, is not a happy warrier for Bob Barr:

From what I can tell from recent media, his own press releases, his official campaign website, and various Libertarian Party websites, this campaign is DOA.

Give McCusker credit, though. He doesn’t just gripe about this, he offers “an overall win strategy.” Also needed is [...]

John Lofton is a recovering Republican, editor of TheAmericanView.com, and co-host of “The American View” radio show.

On that radio show he has interviewed Bob Barr on topics such as God, government, Barr’s atheist hero Ayn Rand, abortion, homosexuality, and Terri Schiavo—”not his favorite subjects,” Lofton surmises.

Lofton’s conclusion after the interview:

Bob Barr’s answers during my interview [...]

Recent polls have shown Barr’s support at 8% in Georgia and 6% in North Carolina. Taken together, those two states have more electoral votes than Florida, or Ohio, or Pennsylvania.

AllahPundit on hotair.com thinks a third party or independent candidacy has to get support in the range of 20% to 25% in order for one [...]

The dust hasn’t even settled from Obama’s apparent nomination win and the first commentary I’m seeing has a very interesting message: Bob Barr Democrats!

Eric Blankenburg writes:

My guess is that [Obama] is going to be the next President. Not because he’s so great. Rather because George Bush has ruined the party that Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, [...]

Libertarians who, for whatever reason, want to check if they’re still alive should hook themselves up to one of those blood pressure measuring devices and read Stu Rothenberg’s nasty, nasty attack on the Libertarian Party. About the nicest thing he has to say is his concluding paragraph:

Some voters have always thrown away their votes, [...]

The Constitution Party’s presidential candidate says:

Nowhere is McCain’s chicanery and duplicity more jeopardous than in the area of the right to keep and bear arms. On issues relating to the Second Amendment, John McCain is a disaster! For example, the highly respected Gun Owners of America (GOA) rates McCain with a grade of F-. McCain’s [...]

David Boaz (Cato Institute) and David Kirby (America’s Future Foundation) have published a new study, The Libertarian Vote. Some of their conclusions:

Gallup consistently finds about 20 percent of respondents to be libertarian. We used a narrower definition, and we found that in 2004 libertarians accounted for 13 percent of the voting-age population and 15 [...]

This blog in the New York Times said this about Rep. Bob Barr’s victory speech at the Libertarian Party convention:

Mr. Barr combines the politician’s practiced caginess with his baritone fervor as a former federal prosecutor. In victory, he disclaimed the possibility that he will be a third-party spoiler this fall — a Ralph Nader of [...]

Libertarian Marc Guttman makes a compelling argument:

The Democrats and Republicans are the spoilers in the most important way. We have let them spoil the principles and benefits of self-government that had allowed us to create the most free, prosperous and peaceful society on earth.

Year after year these two parties bring us further down the road [...]

...from crispin sartwell

...about anarchism.

Tom Knapp declares that the Barr/Root victory in Denver “was as accurate a reflection of the desires of the party’s membership as our processes were able to produce”, and says the ticket deserves a clean slate and to be supported until and unless it gives reason not to be. Steve Kubby is making [...]

Steve Shives, in American Chronicle, includes in his wish-list two reforms related to third parties. One of them is:

Give minor party candidates access to federal election campaign funds equal to those received by Republican and Democratic candidates

With term limits, the problem of federal elected officials spending more time running for re-election rather than doing [...]

It’s time for a Denver Accord that restores the symmetry of the Dallas Accord adopted when the Platform was short and sweet.

About the Platform Committee’s proposal to “help re-awaken America’s faith in freedom”.

CNN’s financial wing, CNN Money, takes a look at some of the Libertarian Party’s presidential nomination candidates in “Entrepreneurs eye the White House.”

The feature includes articles on Wayne Allyn Root, Alden Link, Michael Jingozian, Steve Kubby and Bob Barr.

In fairness, I’m not sure why Kubby and Barr are included in this type of profile when [...]

by David F. Nolan

While most of the postings here in the last couple of weeks have centered on various candidates’ prospects for the Libertarian Party nomination, very little has been written about how things are likely to shape up in the general election. And since a lot of the discussion here has revolved around how [...]

by Gene Trosper

I have been a self-identified Libertarian since 1988 when I cast my vote for Ron Paul. When I officially joined the LP in 1990, it was a learning experience, to say the least. Because I was moderately libertarian by Nolan Chart standards, there was sufficient room to grow and become educated on the [...]

Chuck Baldwin’s campaign is, more and more, resembling Ron Paul’s. With the obvious change in rhetoric, the emphasis of non-social issues, and the championing of the non-interventionist foreign policy, Baldwin is quickly becoming a known name amongst Ron Paul supporters. Here in Louisiana, I’m getting calls daily—mostly from my fellow Ron Paul activists—wanting to know [...]

I’ll be traveling for the next few days and won’t be able to write much here, so I thought I’d provide a quick parting thought. The current version of the Alabama Constitution still contains these words: “That the sole object and only legitimate end of government is to protect the citizen in the enjoyment [...]