Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr appeared on Fox News’s “Your World With Neil Cavuto†Tuesday afternoon. Cavuto opened by noting that the “Libertarian candidate just picked by his party would command six percent of the vote in a general election matchup, and he hasn’t really even gotten campaigning yet. He says he’s in it to win it, that he’s not interested in being a spoiler.†Barr said he is “interested in being more than a Ross Perot phenomenon. I have great respect for him. And, as a matter of fact, his campaign manager is now our campaign manager. We’re putting together a team that will deliver a positive message to an awful lot of new and disenfranchised older voters.†Barr said his campaign hopes to be the ballot in at least 48 states and D.C., “if not 49 or 50 states.â€
On the notion of being a spoiler for John McCain, Barr said, “I cannot think of any reason why somebody who is predisposed to vote for John McCain, a big-government Republican, would choose instead to switch from John McCain to Bob Barr, a small-government Libertarian. It would make no sense. There are a number, a large number of disenfranchised, disenchanted Republican voters that we hope to pick up and appeal to. But those are voters that would not vote for McCain in the first place.â€
On whether he can qualify for the major-party debates, Barr said, “It’s very, very difficult. But we certainly anticipate more than meeting the threshold that is set down for the debates in the fall.â€
In other Barr media news, on his MSNBC “Verdict†show Tuesday evening, Dan Abrams called Barr “our big winner of the day,†saying he “could be the Ralph Nader in the general election but first he will have to overcome the ‘Borat effect.’†And on MSNBC’s “Hardball,†Chris Matthews said Barr’s nomination led to Mike Gravel’s announcement that his “political career is over.†Matthews said, “Gravel told me a while back he’s been hiding under a rock, all those years since he was a U.S. Senator in Alaska. I wonder if that rock is still available.â€
I wonder how much of his tracker that will emcompass. 150,000 seems paltry when reflecting on other campaigns where funds of up to a million were all spent on ballot access.
We may have to wait ’til September after the Convention to see a spike.
I notice that on Barr’s website, his donation tracker now shows “ballot access” as their next goal.
Getting to the debates also weighs greatly on who the candidates are; they’re the ones who sign a memorandum of understanding.
He does have a good chance to get the ballot access he describes but it is wasted on him.
Barr/libertarians have no access to those sorts of numbers. See The Libertarian Vote/Cato Institute. Perot was a populist. Most of his votes must have come from the middle of the bell curve i.e. centrist. The Libertarian Vote does not intersect the populist/centrist vote by far. Barr can get some of the libertarian, disaffected McWar & leftist crossover vote. Almost certainly much less than 10%. Only the inclusive libertarian 13% + inclusive leftist 27% vote i.e. the total progressive vote, has any chance of getting into the debates15%/winning34%, except another exceptional(billionaire) populist/centrist. IMHO.
Here’s the video online BTW:
http://www.foxnews.com/video2/video08.html?maven_referralObject=851631&maven_referralPlaylistId=&sRevUrl=http://www.foxnews.com/yourworld/index.html
I like how he’s been handling the spoiler issue, and I especially like how he basically said “if you really like John McCain, you won’t be wanting to vote for me.”
Barr won’t get in the debates. There’s a major liberal independent (Nader) and a major right wing “independent” (Barr), just like in 2000. So the two major campaigns have nothing to gain from including both in the debates. Unless one pulls way ahead in the polls (that is, above 15% consistently), don’t think they have a chance in hell of getting into the debates.