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Jesse Ventura has endorsed Bernie Sanders for President. See this story. Thanks to Jack Ross for the link.
Ventura has been reportedly mulling an independent or Libertarian run for President of his own next year, and has left the door open:
And Jesse being Jesse, he hinted he’s willing if Sanders doesn’t win the nomination.
“And if Bernie fails, maybe next year Jesse Ventura will pick up the gauntlet.”
Ventura served as the Reform Party/Independence Party Governor of Minnesota, and at one time was rumored to be a likely candidate for the Reform Party Presidential nomination in the leadup to the 2000 election. He later backed a prospective run by Donald Trump for that same nomination, which did not end up happening either. Both Trump and Ventura have been rumored as possible independent or alt party Presidential candidates in 2004, 2008 and 2012 as well, though nothing came of it in any of those years. Trump also mulled a Republican run in 2012, and is now running as a Republican, but is also openly speculating about possibly running as an independent or alt party candidate if he does not seem to be on track to get the Republican nomination as the race shapes up. Similar rumors also swirl about Bernie Sanders and his current run for the Democratic Presidential nomination (althoug I am not aware of Sanders openly encouraging such rumors as Trump now has). Sanders has been elected as an independent and Liberty Union (socialist) candidate in the past.
Over the years Ventura has endorsed a wide variety of candidates from both establishment and non-establishment parties with a wide variety of viewpoints, including Gary Johnson, Ron Paul, Cynthia McKinney and John Kerry among others.
Whoever is erasing past comments here, please stop. If you want to remove your comment after the fact, especially if other people responded to it, please just erase the text portion and leave a note saying you edited it out. Makes the conversation seem disjointed otherwise.
Tangential:
http://www.oppositionnews.org/articles/2015/q3/independents-sanders-and-trump-rocking-establishment/
http://reason.com/blog/2015/07/20/are-donald-trump-and-bernie-sanders-tapp
Good read back to back IMO
The Washington Post blog has a post on Jesse Ventura voicing support for Bernie Sanders http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/07/19/bernie-sanders-newest-fan-jesse-ventura/
Same here.
Yeah you’ve got some point perhaps, but I would say they have not been that fluid for several years. He’s been saying the same things for years with no change. The only difference with Kerry is that he probably realized Kerry is not a lesser evil, but the same sort of evil. Off the Grid has been consistent since his start and he hasn’t contradicted himself since perhaps 2008 in any serious way. Certainly since 2013, heh.
2013 is not that long ago. I disagree with several things Rand Paul says and will continue to, but I don’t diminish the fact that he is trying to influence conservative politicans and a conservative electorate.
What’s the cut-off date on that? It was only a decade ago, after he had already been elected and completed a term as Governor of a state. After he had vocally supported Trump in 2000. If his views are that fluid (I think they’re just that poorly-defined), it doesn’t speak well of the possibility of putting him in the White House, potentially until 2025, based on what he’s saying today.
I’ve also seen Rand Paul supporters make a similar “hey that was so long ago!” argument about stuff he’s said as recently as 2013.
Presently. I think we had a similar conversation. Political views do change. I also supported Kerry at that time but would never now. Hardly surprising.
“Ventura would not endorse Kerry.”
Ventura did endorse Kerry.
http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2004/10/28_mccalluml_venturakerry/
Don’t quote me on him supporting breaking up financial institutions, actually. Ventura is always a little more careful when he deviates a little too much from libertarianism.
Sanders didn’t change any of Ventura’s positions. He already supported before regulation of the financial markets at least by breaking up large institutions, shifting spending from the military to social welfare and domestic infrastructure (roads and highways, as he says), enforcing taxes on the wealthy that they should already be paying.
Imagine a candidate who’s against all of the above. They are too far to the right, most people would say, and the media would be all over them for being a reactionary, that is if they get enough support to be a threat.
It is certain that Ventura also “endorses” or likes Rand Paul, by the way.
At least from this he’s got a good handle on who would work to benefit the people and who would work to benefit multinational corporations and banking conglomerates.
Ventura would not endorse Kerry, although probably he “likes” him as much as he says he “likes” Al Gore. “Liking” a person is just good etiquette. I think the answer is probably to ask Ventura himself if he considers this an endorsement
Kerry?
Ventura seems more of a populist than anything else. He likes outsiders who shake things up.
Some populists go from one indie/maverick/3rd party candidate to another, without regard for consistency in ideologies. The same populist can, at different times, support Ron Paul, Ralph Nader, Pat Buchanan, Jesse Ventura, Donald Trump, Ross Perot … even Barak Obama in 2008, when he appeared like an outsider to some.
Jesse Ventura has lost my vote- he’s gone too far to the Left now.
The LP would be very wise to reject Ventura should he suddenly flip flop and join the LP in order to run for president next year.
Don’t forget Gary Johnson also endorsed Rand Paul. He said Rand Paul is the best candidate seeking the Republican nomination and that he would definitely support Rand Paul over Hillary Clinton and over Jeb Bush. He does have five differences with Rand Paul, but Rand Paul is better on those anyway. So either get behind Rand Paul or get behind Donald Trump is the bottom line. If we want to preserve our country and have a future for our children it is a must.
Ventura should quit jerking off, forget about Sanders and the Losertarians, and either endorse Trump like he did in 2000 or endorse Rand Paul like he did with Rand’s father. Time to stop playing and be serious now. We must save our bloodline and our land from invading hordes. Our future children and their children’s children are counting on us to get this done now.
“No one said it was a bad thing.”
I’ll say it was a bad thing. 😉
I think paulie is right- this was quite clearly an endorsement in substance and impression, and it’s being reported as such elsewhere. The only qualification, is leaving open the possibility that he’ll run himself if/when Bernie loses to Hillary. But that doesn’t make it any less real than the several Libertarians who have endorsed Ron Paul for the GOP primary before or while running themselves for the Libertarian nomination (including both Barr and Johnson).
I also don’t think this will actually affect Jesse’s chances of being the Libertarian nominee, because you can’t reduce any further from the 0% chance he was already at. It’s honestly less crazy than saying Cynthia McKinney should be the Libertarian nominee for Vice President, anyway.
This post was the last thing mentioned in the LNC meeting before the sound cut out. So it helps to repost stuff on IPR even if it is already on BAN…
That is what I intended.
No one said it was a bad thing. Like this one, some people questioned whether it was truly an endorsement or not.
You can parse “endorsement” til the cows come home. If anyone has constructive criticism let me know.
“NewFederalist
July 19, 2015 at 8:04 am
It could be a bit more definitive but it ranks right up there with Ron Paul’s endorsement of Chuck Baldwin in 2008.”
Ron Paul’s endorsement of Chuck Baldwin was not a bad thing, especially given who the other candidates were.
It could be a bit more definitive but it ranks right up there with Ron Paul’s endorsement of Chuck Baldwin in 2008.
Sounds like an endorsement to me. And see prior comment.
Yeah, I’m not sure if this is so much of an endorsement of Bernie Sanders as it is an endorsement of Bernie Sanders being in the race to challenge Hillary Clinton.
http://blogs.mprnews.org/capitol-view/2015/07/ventura-ventura-backs-bernie-sanders-for-president/
“Former Gov. Jesse Ventura says he’s backing Sen. Bernie Sanders in his bid for president. In a blog post on his independent media site, Ventura praised Sanders for challenging Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Party nomination.
“’I think what Bernie Sanders is doing is extremely healthy,” Ventura wrote. “I love the idea of somebody throwing a fly in the ointment.’”
And…
“’Hats off to Bernie Sanders. I’ll help him anyway I can, although I’m not quite as socialistic,’ Ventura wrote. ‘Bernie believes in power to the people and the people controlling the government, and I believe in that also. So I hope Bernie’s successful, and I wish him well the whole way.’”
I’m staying with the headline at least for now – if it’s good enough for BAN it’s good enough for me – but I’ll entertain other suggestions. He did say “And if Bernie fails, maybe next year Jesse Ventura will pick up the gauntlet.” I take that to mean that if Sanders somehow does get the Democratic nomination Ventura would be ruling out a run. I guess a lawyer can object that he did not actually say that per se, but I see no other reason to include that clause. I would count that as at least a de facto endorsement at a minimum.
I noticed this earlier but I’m unsure whether this can be considered a formal endorsement.
Funny, I remember Ventura was a loudly in favor of Ron Paul in 2012. But to be fair, he’s not the only 2012 Paul proponent who now supports Sanders.