Minor Party and Independent General Election Discussion

[AltWorlder]

Is there anyone actually active in the Libertarian Party here who could get Jo Jorgensen to go to the Free and Equal debate? Like, who could petition the party central command or raise an inquiry about it.

[PSOL]

Hypothetically, with the Libertarian party having the amount of members that they have and the resources garnered from their wealthier members, the nominee doesn’t actually need to go to these kind of debates. For the primary, sure though as any exposure could be crucial.

That would leave five candidates on the stage if RDLF doesn’t show up. The American political heterodox would be the only thing on stage. While I guess Brock Pierce is basically a Libertarian stand-in, we’d get parties and individuals who are only small. 3 right wing to 2 left wing candidates talking for hours; we better get something out of all this time available on their hands.

[beaver2.0]

It's pretty amusing to see Libertarians talking about how Jorgensen isn't showing up to this debate so as not to jeopardize her chance at a stage with Biden and Trump.  Like she has any shot at that.

[AltWorlder]

New podcast about third parties: Gadfly podcast

https://player.fm/series/gadfly
https://www.buzzsprout.com/760511

[StateBoiler]

Does anybody know which states will only have Trump, Biden, and Jorgensen? I know Oklahoma has Kanye on. But which states will Jo be the only alternative?

To my reckoning: Nevada and South Dakota.

In all other states, there are additional parties, or the option to mail in parties like the Greens.

Going through candidates' lists of states on the Wikipedia page, I think for "only 3 names on the ballot" it's:

Montana, Arizona, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Indiana, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Virginia, Alabama, Georgia

Blankenship is on the ballot in Nevada.

[StateBoiler]

New podcast about third parties: Gadfly podcast

https://player.fm/series/gadfly
https://www.buzzsprout.com/760511

Some quite odd choices for episodes: 3-parters on the Natural Law Party and Alan Keyes.

[StateBoiler]

Alliance Party newsletter for October out. After sharing their ballot access, their goal they listed was to maximize their vote in Maine's 2nd district due to the ranked choice voting. Nice to have goals...

They're 1 of 5 tickets on the Maine ballot including the big 2, Jorgensen, and Hawkins.

[AltWorlder]

New podcast about third parties: Gadfly podcast

https://player.fm/series/gadfly
https://www.buzzsprout.com/760511

Some quite odd choices for episodes: 3-parters on the Natural Law Party and Alan Keyes.

I mean they're not the most contemporary choices but they work. Turns out Keyes has a very long and storied career. And it's good that there's anyone creating an easy to digest historical record of the NLP.

[PSOL]

One thing that has been interesting to me is merchandise offered by the campaigns. Now the only thing to note is that a few use Zazzle and are fairly similar in shirts offered, tote bags, lawn signs, etc.

The biggest deviation is from the PSL, who just offer a paper card with info on the candidates and party (lol, how fitting of a party accused of being Trotskyists, a lawn sign, and a button. This shows one of two things; the PSL doesn’t care about merchandise or it is too broke to offer anything else.

[Turbo Flame]

It's pretty amusing to see Libertarians talking about how Jorgensen isn't showing up to this debate so as not to jeopardize her chance at a stage with Biden and Trump.  Like she has any shot at that.

Even if Jo Jorgensen and Howie Hawkins doesn't have a shot at the election, they should be on the debate stage.

[AltWorlder]

Free and Equal debate is running late... not a good look. There's pro-Constitution Party people in the chat shilling Blankenship's book, ahahah

[PSOL]

Free and Equal debate is running late... not a good look. There's pro-Constitution Party people in the chat shilling Blankenship's book, ahahah

Is it still running late?

[AltWorlder]

It's working on Facebook

[PSOL]

Well I guess I will just have to watch the debate when there’s a full video then.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Interesting to see the stark contrasting views all at once. At least it's more civil than the Trump v Biden debate

[AltWorlder]

I feel like this is another third party debate agree-fest. They all come from different backgrounds and parties, but they're more aligned than not. Not unlike the Democratic primaries this year, except much easier to watch.

As personally terrible as Don Blankenship is, everything I've seen of his campaign this year including this debate makes him seem more moderate and mild than the Constitution Party is ideologically known for. Ironic, it almost makes him like Don B is doing the opposite of what Don T did to the GOP in terms of radicalization.

[PSOL]

I feel like the moderators could have asked more charged questions relating to the pandemic, economy, government styles, and climate that would really have differentiated these candidates.

Disappointing that in 2020 we didn’t get that.

[AltWorlder]

I hate to say it, but Jo Jorgensen being there would've made a huge difference by introducing a fun libertarian contrarian, even if she's not as strident as others in her party. And even Rocky de la Fuente, with his showmanship and faux-statesmanlike shtick, would've given it more energy and drama. Kanye West would've been unimaginable.

[PSOL]

I guess I’ll have to stick with online publications s•••talking about these parties instead of blows happening in real time.

[AltWorlder]

oh my gosh Don didn't even slip into far right paleocon semi-theocratic Constitution inflammatory rhetoric until his closing statement. What a missed opportunity for him to get into spats in the debate.

I need to rewatch this after they splice it into one video with audio that works in both channels, but I only saw some direct conflict between Brian Carroll and Gloria La Riva over abortion. They should just do a separate ASP-PSL direct debate. Brian didn't seem to get his pro-single payer, pro-welfare state, pro-Distributism message across. Would be funny to see them Gloria realize how fairly progressive he is on economic matters.

[Torrain]

Good piece from NY Magazine about the LP nomination this year, and how nominating jokers like Spike Cohen has undercut what’s left of the party’s dignity:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/amp/2020/05/libertarians-decide-to-become-a-joke-in-2020.html

[StateBoiler]

Good piece from NY Magazine about the LP nomination this year, and how nominating jokers like Spike Cohen has undercut what’s left of the party’s dignity:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/amp/2020/05/libertarians-decide-to-become-a-joke-in-2020.html

There's a section of right-wingers that really hate Cohen for some reason. Jorgensen wanted John Monds to be the VP nominee but Cohen narrowly won. I've not watched it but he apparently was excellent in the VP debate.

Incredibly error-ridden article.

Back in 1996, she was the running mate of Harry Browne, the Libertarians’ last presidential nominee before the party started running ex-Republicans like Bob Barr and Gary Johnson

2004: Michael Badnarik.

She won the 2020 nomination through a ranked-choice voting process that became unpredictable when yet another ex-Republican pol, Representative Justin Amash, withdrew from the race

It was not ranked choice voting. It was an exhaustive ballot until someone reached majority.

(an effort was made during the balloting to draft Amash, which he quickly quashed).

A bunch of people from mostly Michigan wrote him in. The Michigan delegation even said when going state by state in the 1st round of voting that Amash would not accept the presidential nomination but hoped he would accept theirs for Congress. That's not Amash quickly quashing an effort to draft him.

They're getting less votes than they were 4 years ago. This is true for every third party with the exceptions of De La Fuente, Carroll (both more ballot access) and maybe La Riva. But 4 years ago was far and away a huge high mark. The Jorgensen/Cohen can get 40% of what Johnson got 4 years ago and that should be considered a success against the benchline of the 2012 vote. But you're going to have people that point out how much they fell against the 2016 vote and say "see, we were right".

[PSOL]

https://mobile.twitter.com/HowieHawkins/status/1314400215756046339

I’m more than willing to accept the PSL from taking the electoral mantle away from the Green Party at this point. The reactionary boomer leadership, vaccine denialism, and allowing factions and state chapters to wreck your campaign shouldn’t be tolerated anymore.

[AltWorlder]

Wish there was a third party debate between the vice presidential candidates. Spike Cohen, Angela Walker, Darcy Richardson, Amar Patel would make an entertaining debate. Not as familiar with the other VP nominees.

[It’s so Joever]

I wonder if Colorado is going to have 22 candidates on their ballot again, or more?

When I was younger I assumed there were supposed to be a lot of candidates on the ballot each cycle(and that ballots are all-mail in) It’s strange knowing there are so many States with few third party choices.