The Burlington Free Press (Vermont) reports that Senator Bernies Sanders has begun to consider a run for President in 2016. On October 17, he began a tour of four southern states with a talk at a high school in Philadelphia, Mississippi.
The town made headlines in 1964 when members of the Ku Klux Klan killed three civil rights workers. In 1980, Ronald Reagan chose to make the town the site of his first campaign appearance after winning the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.
“That’s the reason why I wanted to go there,” Sanders said Friday, referring to Reagan’s visit.
Reagan went on to win Mississippi by 1 percent and capture the White House, defeating President Jimmy Carter.
Senator Sanders, Independent of Vermont, wants to make sure a progressive voice is heard in the 2016 race for President, and he might be willing to do it if nobody else steps forward.
Sen. Sanders is not anxious to run, he says:
“Anyone who really, really wants to be president is slightly crazy because this is an unbelievably difficult job given the crises that this country faces today.”
However, he thinks it will be important to have a candidate “who is willing to take on Wall Street, address the “collapse” of the middle class, tackle the spread of poverty and fiercely oppose cuts to Social Security and Medicare.”
Sanders said if he does run, he would “probably” do so as an independent. It’s a label that has been of value to him in his statewide races but could become a complication as a presidential hopeful.
“The disadvantages of being an independent are you not going to get in these big debates that you have on television,” he said. “But I’m very proud to be an independent.”
Full article based on an interview with Senator Bernies Sanders @ Burlington Free Press
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20131115/NEWS03/311150043/Sanders-wants-progressive-presence-2016-president-race
I forgot the smiley.
Could be a political reference. The Decatur Commies were a little more open about their affiliations.
Clearly a reference to Seconal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secobarbital
Some background that may be useful.
Bernie Sanders first ran for office as a candidate of The Liberty Union Party, a socialist group headed since 1970 by Peter Diamondstone. Being unsuccessful, Sanders formed The Progressive Coalition in Burlington and was elected Mayor.
As Mayor, he brought Burlington its first baseball team – The Vermont Reds.
The Progressive Coalition elected some legislators, and backed Bernie Sanders when he ran for Congress as an Independent. The Progressive Coalition became The Progressive Party sometime in the 1990s I think.
In 2000, The Progressive Party provided the ballot line for Ralph Nader in Vermont.
In his book “Crashing the Party” Nader mentions Congressman Bernie Sanders introducing Nader at a campaign rally in Vermont. Other sources indicate Congressman Sanders endorsed Al Gore for President in 2000, and I don’t know how to confirm the truth.
In 2004 Congressman Sanders endorsed John Kerry for President in a front page editorial in The Nation Magazine. He supported Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012.
When he ran for the Senate in 2006 as an Independent, he endorsed Peter Welch, Democrat for the seat in Congress he was vacating. He has in local races endorsed some Democrats and some Progressives.
The greens actually have a pretty good plan to keep the electoral college. They would make it entirely proportional. In 2000 Bush would have gotten 49% of the electors, Gore 49% of electors, with Nader having the deciding 2%. If you look up the recent green pages issue it explains the validity of it all.
When it comes to chicken I am all about the Popeye’s. It would be kinda funny though if they started calling Bernie the Colonel.
Maybe a slogan like “Taste the Sanders difference!”
The biggest problem I have with the NPV is scale. I’m not a big fan of centralizing decisionmaking at such a large scale. I’d like to see initiative and referendum in as many places as possible – as imperfect as they are, they are better than the legislative/lobbying process – but I’d prefer to keep them at the state/local level rather than one giant NPV.
I was a Gravel man myself. He actually said the other Dems scared him. I liked his direct approach. He is wrong about the national popular vote though.
http://www.kfc.com/food/chicken/ky-grilled.asp
Kind of like the grilled chicken on the KFC menu.
Yeah, I guess Kucinich and Gravel are good, recent examples. So, basically, the Dems will tolerate a small amount.
In this day we may want to avoid anything having to do with fried chicken. I think it was the mayor of Bakersfield that did that once.
There is already a Green Party petition on the internet to encourage Bernie to run as Green Party candidate. Bernie’s brother is (or was – his term may have ended this fall) an elected Green Party city councilor in the UK. The Green Party and Bernie have worked together for years and on many issues. As everyone here knows the petitioning and ballot access will be brutal. The smart way to go for Bernie and the Green Party is for Bernie to run as a Green Party candidate. With Bernie as the candidate the Green Party provides the ballot access, Bernie as a sitting U.S. Senator provides mainstream media access. That’s the theory. It will be an excellent process to watch. It certainly gives some Green Party juice.
That said — Doctor Jill Stein was a superb, intelligent, collaborative, intelligent, positive candidate for the Green Party in 2012. A Sanders/Stein alliance would be a very positive step for the Green Party. More important that Green Party strength might push the debate forward to stop wasting American lives, and American tax dollars in Afghanistan.
Go Green Party Bernie.
https://www.change.org/petitions/senator-bernie-sanders-run-for-president-in-2016-as-a-green-party-candidate
Maybe if Sanders runs, someone can make a KFC themed button for him.
Probably, that would be my guess.
The most plausible explanation I can think of is that someone else incorrectly combined information from the two different Andersons to create the button years later.
Not the one I saw. It was a red button with Anderson and Lucey’s pictures. It had American at the top and Party at the bottom. It was probably just home made. I would, if I were John Anderson, see to it that they at least had my data correct when my stuff was sold. He is still a man of some importance so labels can affect that.
I think most of TJ Anderson’s stuff was white with just text. BTW Darcy Richardson has some neat info on him over at uncovered politics.
That squares with what Richard said. I suppose Utah allowed him to remove himelf from the ballot when he decided not to run.
Maybe they somehow mixed it up with TJ Anderson in ’76.
The only reason they might be, for a short while, is to head off an independent run. Otherwise they could not care less.
See: Kucinich, Gravel.
The book about the Anderson campaign states Utah and Kentucky were qualified for the ballot. It is possible he was removed after dropping out. It is called No holding back and the info appears on page 451. He did not actually appear on the Utah ballot but the book says he qualified. Any dispute with that info should be taken up with the author Jim Mason.
I never said he actually used it on a ballot. If he never actually referred to his group as the American Party, never once, then why doesn’t he contact the memorabilia brokers that list him as such and distance himself from what could be considered a racist designation? In fact he should definitely contact one that has his designation very confused and listed as American Independent Party, which of course he was not. I would at least send an email as Anderson is still involved in politics.
I will concede that the button I saw could have been a brokers or a fans fanciful creation.
I see no reason to think that the Dems would be nice to Sanders. They may allow him in the debates, if it seems like it would be helpful to the success of the eventual nominee. They certainly don’t give a damn about poll numbers, and, even if they did, what’s to say he would poll very high at all. Some people who care about politics know who he is. Those of us who care about non-major party politics probably know him better than even the average political junkie. So, just because his article gets 27 comments on IPR does not mean that he’ll go anywhere in the Democratic party.
With that said, it would be interesting to watch him try. I’d like to see just how welcoming the Ds are to alternative viewpoints.
Thanks for the correction.
For one thing because he would never make it past the primary thus foregoing the opportunity to engage all the people that don’t pay attention until the primary is over. For another because they may require him to pledge loyalty to the eventual nominee and/or the party, which may be a deal breaker for him.
True, but I think that they would do it rather than have him run as an independent if they are given a choice. He’d probably get 89 seconds out of an hour or two like the Republicans did Ron Paul when he started out.
I wouldn’t bet on that. Relatively few people know who he is and he does not have the money to compete effectively with the likes of the Clintons.
It’s their primary; they can do whatever they want.
John Anderson in 1980 did not have “American” as a ballot label in any state. He had “independent”, “by petition” “unaffiliated”, “Liberal”, “Anderson Coalition”, “Independents for Anderson”, “National Unity Coalition”, “Anderson Party”, “The Anderson Alternative”, “Independent Party”, “Anderson for President”, and in Maine no label at all, as his ballot labels.
He was on automatically in Kentucky in 1984 because he had polled over 2% in 1980 under the label “Anderson Coalition”, and Kentucky considered that a ballot-qualified party. Kentucky lets ballot-qualified parties change their names, so it let that party change its name to “National Unity” for the 1984 election. Kentucky was the only state in which Anderson was on the ballot in 1984. He spent a lot of money in 1983 trying to qualify his “National Unity Party” in California and Ohio, but both drives failed, so then he gave up for 1984.
Gene, if he switches affiliation to Democrat, which the Democrats would allow if he wanted, he is most certainly popular enough to get poll numbers necessary to permit his participation in the debates. Are they allowed to block him even if he way above polling thresholds?
Brian – there is no guarantee that the Democrats would allow him into the debates, since he has always been elected as an Independent.
As an independent, Sanders admits he will not get into the televised debates in the campaign for the general election, so why would he not join the Democratic Party and compete in the Democratic Primary? He would be permitted to take part in televised debates during the primary, and thus would get his message to many more people and substantially improve his name recognition.
Another odd factoid I don’t recall hearing before. Thanks!
It’s kinda strange the Anderson of 1976 was a southerner and had been John Smitz running mate in 1972. Anderson ’76 ran on the small American Party ticket. John Anderson along with Patrick Lucey were technically independents but had to put down party names on some of the registrations. Where that was required they usually put National Unity but for some reason they put American Party in some states. There were actually a few campaign buttons produced that show J.B. Anderson with the title American Party. The ultra conservative American Party was still active at that time and ran a candidate in 1980 as well.
Thanks…I either did not know that, or forgot it.
There was a TJ Anderson who ran in 1976, but that was a different person altogether.
John Anderson actually attempted a 1984 campaign. His National Union Party was eligible for a huge chunk of public financing so he decided to make a go for it. He became disheartened when he only wound up with about half the volunteers from the 1980 campaign and his wife expressed displeasure. There were also problems with getting the NUP on the ballot because it is often easier to get on ballots as an independent than as a third partier. When he quit campaigning the NUP was on the ballot in Utah and Kentucky. In 1984 a little more than 1,100 Kentuckians actually voted for Anderson even though he had dropped out.
Probably, but he would be smart to take whatever nominations he can get that would help him get ballot access in a bunch of states without having to pay for it, including the Greens if they are willing to nominate him.
David Cobb is, as far as I know, a man and at least appears to be white. If he is Native, I have no knowledge of it. Nader is Arab-American, which can be considered a minority, but many people who know who he is are not even aware of his Arab heritage. So, I see no reason on those grounds that Sanders couldn’t run with them, although there could be other reasons.
I don’t know if this is still the case, but in 2006, Forbes reported:
“Rep. Bernie Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist who trounced millionaire Rich Tarrant in Vermont’s Senate race, seems to live a spartan life, in accordance with his political beliefs. Aside from a Burlington condominium valued at $100,000 to $250,000, he had just $31,000 to $115,000 stashed in a credit union and a retirement account.”
As far as I know Anderson only ran once, in 1980.
For clarification, Sanders not not wealthy in terms of funding an entire campaign as Ross Perot and Michael Bloomberg can. But he is wealthy in a general sense as he steals $174k per year like every other senator. He has become a millionaire from “public service”.
While he has never said he wants to be a Green Party candidate he does have many beliefs that would be compatible. Either way you and I both know a straight independent campaign is a bad idea. If he runs Independent he will have to run twice to get any serious public financing. If he forms a party or runs with an existing party he can get 5% and then the party can build off that.
John Anderson and Ross Perot both found out how hard it is to run two consecutive third party campaigns. I really dont know how Nader survived four straight.
From what little I have found form the last few weeks, Sanders was clear that he was thinking of an independent campaign and to run to win because the opportunity is there like never before. Whereas if the Democrats were to nominate someone like Warren that would draw off enough potential Left voters that Sanders could not win.
He is not wealthy, but he has developed a serious fundraising capabilities. And I think he could use some of that were he to run for President. I have never heard of Sanders having having any sympathies with the Green Party. Perhaps he would use his campaign to build a national Progressive Party, or at least start one. I think, unfortunately, he may well run as an independent.
My guess is that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic estabilishment is getting to set to make aure she has the nomination wrapped up in January or february. I think Sanders could get on the ballot as an independent and whatever label he needs in most/all states?
I kinda like the coalition philosophy. Of course you would have to see if the FEC would allow the coalition to keep the public financing that was earned. If you got the greens on board they would get you 35+ spots. The PFP has California and Florida which the greens already have. The PVP will put him on in Vermont. I don’t really know which is the correct strategy. The GP might select him if he chose a female running mate.
For what its worth PSL might jump on board if he chose an under age running mate.
Independent run will be very difficult. Sanders is not wealthy. Though Sanders is Jewish, I cannot see the Green Party nominating someone who is not female or at least a member of a racial minority. Perhaps he is someone Rocky Anderson and the Justice Party can get behind. Last December Rocky told me he had no interest in running for president in 2016. Sources close to Rocky told Ron Gunzburger otherwise. A Sanders-Anderson Justice Party ticket would help the party grow into a major third party force. Of course, Sanders could also help grow the Peace and Freedom Party or get the Socialist Party back on track.
I was thinking about that as well. He might not wait for the official word. I don’t really see too much difference in Clinton, O’Malley, and Biden. So he may actually want to see if Warren or De’ Blasio mount a realistic challenge. If no one does then I guess he is in.
I was playing with an electoral college calculator and I just don’t see him influencing the election much. It is possible that he could win Vermont and get 5% nationally and the Dems still win. Even if the Republicans get Ohio, Virginia, and Florida the worst case for Dems is that Sanders delegates would choose them.
Realistically, by the time the Democrats have a nominee or even a presumptive nominee, his ballot access efforts would need to already be well underway if he wants to run as an independent in all or almost all states.
My understanding from reading a few articles about Bernie Sanders is that he is saying he does not want to run and that he expects he wont have to but if the Dems run Hillary he will. In that sense his decision to run is being made by others but he isn’t asking people to go out and put him on the ballot.
I missed that part.
Some folks think Jesse Ventura sounds like a socialist. At the very least Bernie Sanders appears to be anti-corporate money.
Eh, he sounds like a socialist Jesse Ventura to me. I think he wants to see if he can get by without doing any work himself.
If I understand the FEC regualtions correctly Senator Sanders may be able to game the rules a bit. He has been involved with the Progressive Party of Vermont in the past. Let’s say he is on the ballot there under that label. He could use whatever label he wants and create a party coalition. The Greens, VPP, United Citizen’s and whoever else could all be involved. He could even get on the ballot as an independent in some places. If he get’s 5% the matching funds could then be allocated to the various groups for work in 2020. But he would have to create an FEC recognized group and register the sub-parties as part of the group.
I’m thinking this is what Ben Spock was trying to do with the People’s Party in the 1970’s.