With some precincts still not reported from Alabama, Alaska, Georgia, Illinois, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Virginia, and Washington, and write-in votes and provisional ballots yet to be tallied, the Libertarian Bob Barr-Wayne Allyn Root ticket has 499,912 votes across the U.S., and will almost certainly become just the second Libertarian ticket to receive more than 500,000 votes. However, in terms of percentage of total votes cast, the 2008 LP ticket seems to have fallen short of the 1988 and 1996 tickets, in addition to the 1980 ticket that received 921,128 votes.
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I believe if Ron had run himself, he could have pulled more than 1%,
I think he may have pulled more than 10% as an independent, at least 2-3% as CP or LP or both.
Of course, one can slice and dice up the numbers the way one wants too. But I think overall these are encouraging numbers for 3rd parties.
Ron Pauls republican movement fluttered into nothingness by the time the general election came about. I believe if Ron had run himself, he could have pulled more than 1%, although, he too would have suffered the same fate as most 3rd party candidates.
The argument of ‘vote wasting’ has become very effective, for the time being. But I think the war of ideas can be waged on that front as well…it doesn’t have to always be that way, and it won’t.
We’ve seen over the years, any time you run a weak candidate, your numbers can tumble. Badnarik, Bergland….or infighting causes disgust and donations and support to drop off, as for example in Browne’s 2nd run.
My take on it…the fact that Barr got this far, with infighting raging full force…Ron Pauls attempt to harm the LP, along with the internal holy war…it impresses me, he did well for a newcomer.
I will certainly not support anyone who refused to come together as a unified party, for 2012.
But if we get someone that does unify the party…i.e. someone new who did not behave badly in 2008…could be looking at some real growth!
Nowhere near the celebrity that Nader is. I’ll guarantee her name recognition is not even close.
Raw total benchmarks I am also looking at:
Nader 700,000
Baldwin 200,000
McKinney 150,000
All still doable with write-ins etc.
“McKinney did the best for a Green who has not been a celebrity for decades, but Cobb was the only other one, so it’s not newsworthy.”
As a former member of Congress, McKinney is somewhat of a celebrity.
Nader ’96 vs. ’08 is another benchmark we’re watching.
McKinney did the best for a Green who has not been a celebrity for decades, but Cobb was the only other one, so it’s not newsworthy.
Now it’s time to start paying attention to Chuck Baldwin’s totals: The previous high for a CP ticket being 184,820.
Oooh. You mean the 500,000. My mistake.
Not OFFICIAL official, as there are at least a few hundred thousand votes to be counted in my home state and rumored at least a million in CA…
Those totals will likewise crawl upwards.
It’s official:
Nader
679,465
Barr
500,045
Baldwin
180,864
McKinney
146,559
This is good news, but still kinda sucks that we didn’t get 1 percent nationwide. I liked the Indiana results, but perhaps if we were on 50 states and not 45, it would be different.