In her “Political Fix” blog on the St. Louis Post-Dispatch website, Jo Mannies profiles Libertarian vice presidential nominee Wayne Allyn Root, “a Las Vegas oddsmaker by profession” who “breezed into the St. Louis area today as part of a two-day swing through the state to raise money and his ticket’s profile.” In the generally favorable piece, Mannies said Root said Nevada “offers the best example of what works best. There’s few taxes, and lots of personal freedom. Legalized gambling and prostitution helps provide the income needed to pay for the services that all Nevadans — religious or secular — enjoy, he said.”
Mannies adds that with polls now showing presidential nominee Bob Barr “with the support of six percent of this fall’s likely voters, he and Root are hoping they can reach 15 percent — enough to get them into the presidential debates this fall. f they succeed, Root says that means he could find himself back in St. Louis for the vice presidential debate at Washington University on Oct. 2.”
Root spoke at a “meet the candidates” event here in St. Louis today. I thought he did pretty well. I kidded him a little about his energy level being down (he was still hyper as hell, just not so much as usual). He’s been hitting it pretty hard.
On the Q&A, not as good as the speech. He took a pounding on Barr’s global warming thing and bobbled it before lapsing into his own “drill, drill, drill” spiel, and then got hit from both sides of the immigration issue. Chewed up pretty good, but I will say that today he took the hard stuff like a man instead of playing the patented Bob Barr “at the first sign of negativity, run like hell for a position nobody could possibly have a problem with” routine.
He also handled the inevitable Federal Reserve question quite well. He agreed that the Fed should be eliminated, etc., but then pointed out to the insistent “this is the most important issue ever” querent that 99% of Americans don’t give a rat’s ass about it and that candidates have limited time and need to spent that time talking about the issues that 99% of Americans do care about.
Honest opinion? Root will probably never be my cup of tea (pun intended), but from what I’ve seen so far he’d have been a better presidential nominee than Barr has been.
“Is Barr ever going to include Root’s name on his site’s logo?”
Is that even a good idea? Root isn’t exactly a great part of the ticket.
At any rate, if Root finishes 2008 without looking like an important part of the Barr campaign, it’ll be harder for Root to to get the nomination in 2012 (which is a good thing).
“Is Barr ever going to include Root’s name on his site’s logo?”
I wouldn’ t hold my breath. I don’t think Barr even likes Root, he just needed him to secure the nomination.
Is Barr ever going to include Root’s name on his site’s logo?
“Is it just me, or is Root campaigning more than Barr now?”
It’s just you. I’m glad to see Root campaign more. He was all but invisible for the first month after winning the nomination.
“..is Root campaiging more than Barr..”
If your information about the campaign is coming from anti-Barr websites, all you are going to see is Barr misteps. There is really no alternative to looking at his website if you want to know his schedule.
Barr has been to Nevada and Oklahoma. He will be going to Texas and NH.
Is it just me, or is Root campaigning more than Barr now?