Wil Nadar cost Kerry the Presidency?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4701027/

the above link contains the latest AP poll showing Bush and Kerry at a near deadlock, at 45% and 44% of the vote respectively. it also shows Nadar getting 6% of the vote.

Nadar has been blamed for costing Al Gore the election last year (even though Gore won the Popular vote..insert your AP/BCS reference here if you like). most experts think Nadar votes would go to Kerry if Nadar was not in the election.

This poll shows me GWB is not a lock for re-election by no means, and I am sure the new problems in Iraq and the recent 9/11 hearings are not going to help his cause in the future.

 

I think almost 75% of Nader votes are people who would never vote for the two main candidates. The remaining 25% would mostly go to Democrats, but not completely.

I don't think Nader cost Gore the presidency. Most of Nader's votes came from states Gore carried.

 

Al Gore lost Florida by 573. Nader had 97,488 votes in florida. so less than 1% of the nader voters in florida could have swung the entire country to gore.

 

I don't understand the thinking process involved with someone voting for a third party to make a statement.

In my view its a wasted vote and it doesn't effect the election because
a Democrat or Republican will always be elected under the current system.
I would rather say that you would only be hurting yourself because you didn't vote for your party or your candidate if they lose.

Sometimes I have thought that a 3rd party might be good for this country
but thier just isn't the support for it yet.

 

Saying that florida is the reason Bush won is like saying the last shot in a basketball game is the reason a team won. Yes, it was important( especially in 2000), but all states are added up and while some count more than others, they are all part of the electoral game....

 

It's really an interesting debate. Would the 3rd party be fiscally conservative and morally liberal or vice versa. Or would it be a which way is the wind blowing party. The support in the Senate and Congress would be a whole different creature. So in my opinion a 3rd party would have to start at the local level and have a platform that stood the test of time or you would have people on board for one year and not the next or one starte and not the next but nothing solid without a party line to tow.

I just hope and also believe that Kerry and his cronnies will cost him the election and we don't take a step backwards. President Bush may not be the best in history but considering the circumstances of his Presidency; continue on old boy.

 

i was using florida as an example of how the election was so close that nader voters cost gore the election. had nader not run, i think we can safely assume bush would have lost florida, and the consequently, the whole country.

 

Things like this don't help:

http://www.indcjournal.com/archives/000248.html




I'll tell you what my dream is, and I think, if the Democrats keep imploding every other November and keep going further and further left, it could really happen.

I would like to see the total disintegration and destruction of the Democratic Party and have the Libertarian Party replace it as the second strong party.

Why? Well, the Republican Party is not as "conservative" as it used to be regarding fiscal affairs and, while I tend to agree with most of their rigid social conservatism, sometimes they push it too far. In an effort to win votes and become popular, the GOP has compromised on a number of core issues that were once paramount in importance to it (such as, the promises to promote federalism by slashing the federal budget and devolving more power to the states) that, for Libertarians, are non-negotiable. Also, the Libertarians have little taste for legislating morality, even the most basic standards of civil decency, but they also have no desire to let federal courts run amok and overturn local and state laws on these matters.

In short, I believe a Libertarian Party that believes in a hugely scaled down federal govt., devolved federalism, "law-of-the-jungle" capitalism, an open-ended interpretation of the Bill of Rights, and hands-off federal courts would be the perfect balance to a GOP that either can't or won't go the distance on these issues. We could have a party system where it's the wacky Libertarians who want to cut everything and make Washington irrelevant and the Republicans would be seen as the party of "restraint" by those who like them and as "The Establishment" by those who dislike them. That was the way it was prior to the 1980s, when Democrats were the powerful party which was expanding the role and size of the federal govt. daily and the GOP, the minority party, was the voice of "restraint." On fiscal affairs, the GOP would now be the "big spenders" and the Libertarians would be the "budget-cutters." On social issues, the reverse; the Libertarians would be the voice of unrestrained political, moral, and sexual freedom, while the GOP would be the party for "moderation" and "basic civil decency and order."

But that's how it is now, right? Well, a few things would change. First of all, "big spending" is a relative term. Even in their worst gluts, the GOP of tomorrow still would not spend as much as the Democrats of today would like, and both parties would favor not just tax cuts, but serious fundamental changes in the tax code as we know it. Either way, govt. is going to be reduced in size, not increased. Instead of the Democrats growing Big Govt. by leaps and bounds, with the GOP desperately trying to hold them back, you will have the Libertarians taking a chainsaw to the federal budget with the GOP desperately trying to protect the parts of govt. it sees as vital.

Also, national security issues would change. The Libertarians would be more traditional on foreign policy, favoring not isolationism, but certainly a more limited role for the United States on the world stage. They would meet with like-minded Republicans to form a huge middle bloc in Congress to entrench this view, against the neo-conservative Republicans, who favor a more aggressive, interventionist, prevention-geared foreign policy, and the radical Libertarians, who would want total isolationism, U.S. out of the U.N., a national missile defense shield only for America, a withdrawal of all U.S. troops from all foreign stations, and a " let the rest of the world kill each other off but nuke anyone who comes near us" foreign policy. The key differences between Libertarians and Democrats would be patriotism level and the willingness to use force level. The Democrats nowadays have become beholden to the extreme radical left flank of their party, a group of folks that, frankly, don't like the U.S. much, aren't proud or happy to be Americans, and tend to give America's enemies the benefit of the doubt. The smart ones (not the idiots from International ANSWER and Democratic Underground) don't show it that much, but I think a tell-tale indicator is when they seek to put more faith and responsibility for America's best interests in the United Nations than our own government and military. And as a result, they will be a lot less willing to use military force to deal with ANY threat to America. Not so with the Libertarians. Most Libs I know, even the isolationists, are fiercely patriotic, are convinced of America and the American system's supremacy over all other forms of government, and are completely in favor of using overwhelming force to crush any threat to America or American interests immediately. Their response to September 11th probably would have been far more lethal and overwhelming than Bush's. Again, the moderate GOP can team up with more level-headed Libertarians to provide restraint and wisdom in this area and prevent us from becoming too interventionist or too isolationist, and present a united front against subjugating the U.S. to the UN, NATO, "world opinion," or any other similar attempt by the Lilliputians to tie down Gulliver (which the Democrats seem all too willing to do at times).

But under this system, what happens to the "fringe Left" and the "fringe Right?" Well, the "fringe Left" will be the Third Rail of the American Electorate for quite a while; no one will want to associate with them for fear of being labeled as sympathetic to their beliefs. They will be known as the people who killed the Democratic Party. And as the old leftist vanguard of Vietnam-era hippy-protestors who went on to become college professors and media/political pundits dies off and/or fades from public life, replaced by more conservative-minded folk from a more conservative country, the fringe Left will become more and more marginalized and more and more alienated from mainstream politics. They won't even be able to unite to continue representation in the Congress; those whose pet cause is the environment will join the Green Party; those who put economic conformity and "social justice" first will become Communists, Socialists, or join race-centered minority parties; those who hate America and her "evil foreign policy" will join one-world govt. advocacy orgs, anti-Zionist parties, totally drop out of the political process, and maybe even leave the country (Good riddance, I say). As for the Democrats, all that will be left for them is the pro-abortion lobby and the labor unions. The labor unions will quickly realize they have backed a losing horse and will make the best deal they can with either of the dominant parties, and as the country becomes more and more in favor of restricting abortion and the federal courts find themselves more restrained and more conservative (as liberal judges retire/die and are replaced by Libertarians and Conservatives) the abortion lobby will fade in power and influence. The Democrats will either die off completely or become a small, irrelevant 3rd Party of "vanilla" leftists and Old Guard populists.

As for the Fringe Right, they were never too fond of the GOP anyway, and they too will break up and align with whoever represents their most important interests. Free-traders will make up the majority in both parties, and you might see the radical protectionists go back to the GOP, although there won't be enough of them to completely stop free trade, only limit it or slow it down. Some protectionists might get fed up and leave for a third party. The white supremacists were never big in either party, they will remain alienated, especially since the GOP of tomorrow will be aggressively courting black and Hispanic voters and the Libertarians have little tolerance for racial politics of any kind. Racial politics will become a thing of the past after the Democratic Party collapses, affirmative action is repealed, and the black and Hispanic middle class explodes. If foreign policy is your main voting point, you'll go GOP if you are a neo-con, Libertarian if your a paleo-con or isolationist, and either party's middle bloc is good if you fall somewhere in the middle. If taxes are your big deal, both parties are cutters, how big a cut you would like will determine where you fall.

The wild card are conservatives with a Christian worldview, the much-despised (among leftists) "Religious Right." They like the Libertarian viewpoint on economics and govt., but don't care much for their "anything goes" attitude on social issues. However, the Libertarians are all about total non-interference in state and local govt. by the federal govt. and the federal courts, as long as nobody's being denied their constitutional rights. And the Libertarians view of the 1st Amendment differs quite a bit from the ACLU's viewpoint. For them, so long as nobody's being forced to convert to Christianity at gunpoint or having their homes searched without a warrant, everything's cool. And while a lot of Libertarians are for legalized abortion, a lot are pro-life. If the Libertarian/Republican America is a pro-life America, the Religious Right would pretty much cease to exist as a voting bloc. For most of these voters, as long as taxes are very low, abortion is illegal, and there is prayer before kickoff at the high school football game, everything is wonderful and there is nothing to get riled up over. And most Libertarians would have no problem with either of those three conditions, as long as they were arrived at through the democratic/legislative process. The Libertarians view on such matters is much more attuned to be favorable to traditional religious viewpoints than unfavorable.

Could this happen? You bet it could. If the Democrats don't get their crap together, ditch the nutjob Left, and start winning some elections on the national level, they will go the way of the Federalists, the Whigs, and the Progressives. It's been Democrat and Republican for a long time. But that doesn't mean it has to be that way forever. Complacency and hostility to change, even in the face of a change in the American Electorate, could be fatal for the Democrats.