Free Republic

A majority of voters say Libertarian Bob Barr, a potential spoiler for Republican John McCain's presidential hopes, should be included in the three presidential debates scheduled in the fall between Barack Obama and Mr. McCain, a recent Zogby poll says.... The online poll of 3,339 likely voters found that 55 percent of voters nationwide - including 50 percent of Republicans and 69 percent of independents and 52 percent of Democrats - want Mr. Barr, a Republican turned Libertarian, to participate in presidential debates... Mr. Barr is sensitive to allegations that he is playing the same spoiler role for Republicans that...

and therefore did not fully vet the candidate they shoved down everyone's throat. I am the first blogger to blog about Obama's abortion vote and how it would become the october surprise...they have michelle obama on tape defending live birth abortion, and raising money for it too...(they called this "the whitey" tape, but its far better than just that kind of a boring thing...she is on tape defending sucking the brains out of babies who live through late term abortions). This is the greatest gift pelosi and dean can give to the republicans they work for. It took alot of...

Sam Stein of The Huffington Post reports that the Independent Green Party of Virginia gathered enough signatures to get New york City Mayor Michael Bloomberg on the ballot in that state as a candidate for President without the knowledge of Bloomberg. The group also placed former Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul on the ballot as Bloomberg's running mate.

On Friday, August 15, the Bob Barr campaign attempted to have the Secretary of State authorize local clerks accept late filings of signatures. Don Cookson of the Secretary of State’s office indicated that there is no provision to authorize such a late filing. The signatures filed by the August 8 deadline amounted to 3,200, short of the 4,000 valid signatures required. The Libertarian Party is expected to go to court to force the state to accept the late signatures.

...Debuting at No. 1 this week is "The Obama Nation," a 304-page tome on why the United States should not elect Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., as president. Jerome Corsi, the notoriously famous seer of conspiracy, is the arranger and choreographer of this dance of literature. ...The aim is to keep Obama out of the White House, not put Republican Sen. John McCain in it. Corsi writes that he's voting for Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party, apparently wanting to dispel thoughts this printed work is the product of collusion with the GOP.

Barack Obama and John McCain are scheduled to make a joint appearance Saturday at Saddleback Church in Orange County, Calif. No other candidates have been invited, which has ticked off Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr. Russ Verney, campaign manager for the former Georgia congressman, has just sent out a mass e-mail saying Barr will seek a court order to require the church to invite him, too. Which perhaps is an odd thing for a Libertarian to do — asking a judge to determine whom a church should invite into its sanctuary.

Nader plans rallies for conventionsBy Sam Youngman Posted: 08/12/08 01:40 PM [ET] Perennial also-ran Ralph Nader is planning to hold a rally at both the Democratic and Republican conventions aimed at securing him a place in this year’s presidential debates. Nader’s “Super Rallies” are scheduled for Aug. 27 in Denver, where the Democrats are gathering, and Sept. 4 in Minneapolis during the Republican convention. The Nader campaign said in a release that it is expecting 5,000-7,000 people at the rally in Denver. The campaign is asking attendees to contribute $10 for an advance ticket and $12 at the door. Many...

Today we update North Carolina where there's a bit of a surprise. * North Carolina: Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole's leads Democratic challenger Kay Hagan 46 percent to 41 percent with Libertarian Chris Cole drawing 7 percent and 5 percent undecided in a SurveyUSA poll conducted Aug. 9-11. This is the first time SurveyUSA included Cole in its poll, and it observed: "Hagan is flat, Dole is down. Cole gets 11% of male votes today, siphoning key votes Dole needs to win. Cole gets 12% of young votes today, siphoning key votes Hagan needs to win. Cole gets 9% of the...

WASHINGTON – Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader is quietly making headway in his third bid for president. He clinched a major victory last Saturday by getting on the California ballot as the nominee of the Peace and Freedom Party. In 2004, Nader was on the ballot in only 34 states, and that did not include California. With the major-party candidates in a close race, Nader could have an impact, perhaps as dramatic as in 2000, when the then-Green Party nominee received more than 97,000 votes in Florida, which Democratic nominee Al Gore lost by 537 votes to George W. Bush....

Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader is again slamming Barack Obama. ABC News reports Nader says Obama will not make the kind of African-American president that he and other civil rights supporters had hoped for. "People who have fought the civil rights battle... would often talk about, 'look what would happen if we had an African-American president'... it doesn't look like it's going to be what we all thought it would be," Nadar said. Nader also says he lost respect for Obama because the senator opposed the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. Nader told the Rocky Mountain News...

Ralph Nader, the former Green Party candidate and scourge of many Democrats who blame him for Al Gore's defeat in 2000, earned a place on the California ballot Saturday as the newly minted candidate of the Peace and Freedom Party. Nader won the party's presidential nomination over the spirited challenge of a socialist candidate, Gloria La Riva, in an eclectic gathering of the political left in a Sacramento hotel. The crowd at the Peace and Freedom convention was minuscule when compared to the crowds who will greet John McCain at the Republican convention at the Xcel Energy Center in St....

Bob Barr "very serious" about running as Libertarian By: SGT News | Submitted on: 04/03/08 SOUTHERN ARIZONA (SGT NEWS) - Former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr will likely announce this weekend that he intends to run for the presidency under the Libertarian Party ticket, and plans to mimic the small government and Constitutional principles that Republican Ron Paul focused on earlier in the campaign season. “Ron Paul tapped into a great deal of that dissatisfaction and that awareness. Unfortunately, working through the Republican party structure, it became impossible for him to really move forward with his movement,” Barr said of Paul....

HARRISBURG - Ralph Nader has landed a spot on the Pennsylvania presidential ballot again. The question is, can he keep it this time? Nader, an independent who was knocked off the ballot by Democratic challenges in 2004, submitted nearly 55,000 signatures to the Department of State yesterday. That's more than twice the number needed. The department counted and reviewed 24,665 signatures, the number needed for third-party candidates to place their names on the fall ballot, spokeswoman Leslie Amoros said. In 2004, a group of Democratic voters challenged Nader's petition and Commonwealth Court ruled that a majority of the signatures were...

Bob Barr, the U.S. presidential candidate of the Libertarian Party, said the Bush administration's diplomatic engagement with Iran is "long overdue." Iran appears to be years away from possessing nuclear weapons, giving time for diplomacy to work, Barr said in a release. He said that war with Iran would be a disaster. "American troops in Iraq would be at risk. U.S. citizens would be targeted for terrorist acts," he said. "Tehran could retaliate against Israel. Oil shipments would be disrupted, causing energy prices to soar even higher. Allied states in the Persian Gulf would be vulnerable to attack. Chances for...

In fact, as much as he despised Clinton, Barr thinks President Bush is worse. "What George W. Bush has done to the fabric of our constitutional government, to separation of powers, to a government of limited powers is absolutely unforgivable," he said. That prospect is greatest in Barr's home state of Georgia. Obama is already running ads targeting an untapped pool of African Americans and younger voters. State polls suggest Barr's single-digit following pulls mostly from McCain. "If Barr can win 5 or 6 points of the total vote -- it's an if but it's conceivable -- then Obama could...

The fringe candidates in this election cycle – Cynthia McKinney of the Green Party, Bob Barr of the Libertarians, Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party, Ralph Nader in his independent run – all to some extent rely on deeply paranoid conspiracy theories to power their campaigns. In this, they honor a long and embarrassing tradition for third parties, who have usually blamed their own lack of power or influence on the diabolical plots of some secretive group or another. In fact, the first significant third party in American history arose from fears that a popular fraternal organization actually constituted a...

Workers World newspaper in the past has supported the candidates of Workers World Party running for national office in the U.S. presidential elections and who have put forward a revolutionary socialist program. This time we are taking the unusual step of endorsing the candidacy of Cynthia McKinney because these are unique times and this is a unique candidate.

Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr praised Al Gore on Thursday for his commitment to addressing climate change and said he has met with the former vice president several times to discuss possible solutions. In a speech Thursday at Constitution Hall in Washington, Gore said that he has also discussed climate change with presidential candidates Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). Both McCain and Obama believe that action needs to be taken on global warming and have separately criticized the Bush administration for its approach on the issue. Barr said he believes the most effective energy solution will...

The judiciary is becoming an important election issue. John McCain is warning conservatives that control of today's finely balanced Supreme Court depends on his election. Unfortunately, his jurisprudence is likely to be anything but conservative. The idea of a "living Constitution" long has been popular on the political left. Conservatives routinely dismiss such result-oriented justice, denouncing "judicial activism" and proclaiming their fidelity to "original intent." However, many Republicans, like Mr. McCain, are just as result-oriented as their Democratic opponents. They only disagree over the result desired. Judge-made rights are wrong because there is no constitutional warrant behind them. The Constitution...

HARRISBURG - The tentacles of the Bonusgate scandal have spread to past presidential politics. Buried deep in the grand jury report, released last week, that led to the indictment of 12 people are details of what is described as a "massive" effort by House Democrats to oust the independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader from the ballot in 2004. * * * In light of the grand jury revelations of political work conducted with taxpayers' money, the candidates and reform advocates want a federal investigation into the ballot challenges, which they now think were the result of the criminal conspiracy that...

Controversy has always been Cynthia McKinney's trademark. This election season, she may have finally found her perfect political home. Last weekend, the 53-year-old former Georgia congresswoman clinched the Green Party's presidential nomination; 35-year-old hip-hop artist and activist Rosa Clemente will be her running mate. A firebrand politician best known for her impolitic statements during her more than 20 years in public life, McKinney has had a mixed electoral record as a Democrat in her district in recent years. After 10 years in office, she was upset in 2002 by fellow Democrat Denise Majette, re-elected in 2004, and ousted again in...

John McCain is expected to have New York's Conservative Party line in the November presidential election, which could provide him with symbolic value nationally but not enough votes to win in a Democratic-leaning state where recent polls show Barack Obama with a comfortable lead. New York Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long said in an interview today that the expected September endorsement of McCain would be "a plus" for the Arizona senator among conservative voters around the country because New York is the only place with a statewide ballot line for the Conservative Party. McCain has clear conservative credentials - leadership...

Former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura (I) announced Monday night that he would not launch a third-party bid for Senate. The former professional wrestler, who served one term as governor beginning a decade ago, said on CNN’s “Larry King Live” that he “isn’t going to run, at this moment,” and that it would take an act of God to get him to file by Tuesday’s filing deadline. He said God has never spoken to him before. “If between now and five o’clock, maybe God comes and speaks to me like he did the president, and tells me I should run like...

Jesse "The Body" or "The Governor" Ventura is making his announcement tonight on Larry King Live if he will be running for Senate from Minnesota against Norm Coleman (R) and Al Franken (D).

p>Well, you can add another candidate I won’t be voting for in November to my list; Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution party who has all but pulled a John Kerry and insulted our troops by inferring that they are part what he calls the “lunacy� of the Iraq War. By correlation, if the mission is “lunacy� than those that are willingly supporting it and singing up for the job must be “lunatics�. Baldwin decried “the bi-partisan complicity that has allowed the illegal, immoral, unconstitutional war that has resulted in the slaughter of four thousand American soldiers and untold innocent Iraqis�....

(CNN) -- The liberal environmentalist Green Party nominated former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney as its presidential candidate Saturday. Cynthia McKinney represented a suburban Atlanta, Georgia, district for six terms as a Democrat. Cynthia McKinney represented a suburban Atlanta, Georgia, district for six terms as a Democrat. McKinney, 53, held off three rivals to win the party's nomination during its convention in Chicago, Illinois. She picked journalist and activist Rosa Clemente as her running mate.

For those voters who think Ralph Nader and Bob Barr are too conventional, the Green Party this weekend named former Rep. Cynthia McKinney, D-Georgia, its 2008 presidential nominee. At the Green Party's nominating convention Saturday in at the Chicago Symphony Center, McKinney received 313 out of 532 votes cast in the first round of balloting. "I am asking you to vote your conscience, vote your dreams, vote your future, vote Green," McKinney told the convention's 800 or so attendees. "A vote for the Green Party is a vote for the movement that will turn this country right-side-up again." McKinney, a...

The U.S. Green Party, which captured far less than 1 percent of the vote in the last presidential election, chose former Democratic Rep. Cynthia McKinney as its 2008 presidential candidate on Saturday. McKinney, 53, will be joined on the ticket for the November election by vice presidential candidate Rosa Clemente, a hip-hop artist and activist. McKinney received 313 out of 532 votes cast at the party's nominating convention in Chicago, party spokesman Scott McLarty said. In 2004, the Green Party drew 119,859 votes, or 0.1 percent of the total, finishing in sixth place behind the two major parties and three...

This non-partisan, national grassroots lobbying organization working day and night on issues pertaining to border sovereignty, recently updated their online 2008 Presidential Candidates score card.On a variety of (15) issues relating to Immigration, the group ranked Presidential Candidate CHUCK BALDWIN of the US Constitution Party, as "EXCELLENT" in all categories.Coming in second place with a high report card was Libertarian Party's CONGRESSMAN BOB BARR.

Libertarians Favor Obama and Other Looks at Election 2008 Libertarian voters make up 4% of the nation’s likely voters and they favor Barack Obama over John McCain by a 53% to 38% margin. Three percent (3%) would vote for some other candidate and 5% are not sure. These results, from an analysis of 15,000 Likely Voter interviews conducted by Rasmussen Reports, challenges the conventional wisdom which assumes that strong support for a Libertarian candidate would hurt John McCain.

Throughout his political career, whenever anyone called him a liberal, Ed Koch would always respond: “Yes, I’m a liberal, but with sanity.” The eventual mayor of New York City first demonstrated that sanity in the Democratic Party reform movement of the early 1960s, when a group of prestigious New Yorkers led by former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Senator Herbert Lehman booted the party regulars—the so-called “machine politicians” who had dominated the Democratic Party for decades—from power. As a young soldier in that movement, Koch ousted the head of Tammany Hall, Carmine DeSapio, from his position as Democratic district leader...

In an interview with NPR's David Welna that ran today former Gov. Jesse "The Body" Ventura, Ind-Minn., says he will run for Senate, challenging incumbent Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., whom Ventura defeated for governor in 1998, as well as Democratic nominee and former Saturday Night Live humorist Al Franken. Ventura, born Jim Janos... Ventura had a stormy tenure as governor and horrible relations with the Minnesota press corps. Thus, it was the June issue of a local wine magazine where he chose to drop hints about his pending campaign. Ventura called Franken an opportunist and a carpetbagger. "He hasn't lived...

In an interview with NPR's David Welna that ran today former Gov. Jesse "The Body" Ventura, Ind-Minn., says he will run for Senate, challenging incumbent Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., whom Ventura defeated for governor in 1998, as well as Democratic nominee and former Saturday Night Live humorist Al Franken. Ventura, born Jim Janos, tells Welna that the main reason he's running is because of Coleman's support for the war in Iraq. "That's the reason I run," he says. "I run because it angers me...All you Minnesotans take a good hard look at all three of us. And you decide: if...

All part of his daring master plan to make his name as widely reviled among the right as Ralph Nader’s is among the left. Polls in Georgia and North Carolina over the last two weeks show Mr. Barr winning 8 percent and 6 percent respectively of the presidential vote, and in both cases helping keep likely Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama within striking distance of Mr. McCain in those states — which, taken together, account for more electoral votes than Florida, Pennsylvania or Ohio… [InsiderAdvantage pollster Matt] Towery said North Carolina and Georgia are exactly the places that Mr....

WINSTED — This is the only town in America this year where you could have found, on a recent Monday evening, a presidential candidate out for a walk with a lone reporter. Eschewing entourage or fanfare, dressed in a plaid shirt and gray slacks with sensible walking shoes, renowned consumer advocate Ralph Nader, a Winsted native, briskly strode past milestones of hometown memory, stopping now and then to chat with passers-by. "Hey, Ralph," one woman hailed, extending her arm in a friendly wave. Several fans approached for handshakes and in one case, a hug to embrace Winsted's most famous son,...

He has been called a spoiler. A would-be Ralph Nader. A thorn in the side of Senator John McCain and the Republican establishment. None of it bothers Bob Barr, the former Republican congressman from Georgia turned Libertarian Party candidate for president, who gleefully recounted what he says a group of Republicans told him at a recent meeting in Washington: Don’t run. “ ‘Well, gee, you might take votes from Senator McCain,’ ” Mr. Barr said this week, mimicking one of the complainers, as he sat sipping Coca-Cola in his plush corner office, 12 stories above Atlanta. “They all said, ‘Look,...

Barack Obama's campaign manager said former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr, running for president on the Libertarian line, could play a crucial role in winning Obama the presidency. He said Barr could play a particularly large role in two states: Alaska and Georgia. Alaska is "one of the states where we think Barr can get 6,7, 8 percent," Plouffe said. "Barr will get some votes [in Georgia,. If barr were to get two percent in most states, our belief is he’ll get four percent here, most of it coming out of McCain’s hide."

John McCain's trailing Barack Obama in new poll by quite a solid margin. Is the presence of libertarian candidate Bob Barr in the election only adding to that deficit? Watch tonight, 7 and 9 ET.

Former Republican Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia has accepted a presidential nomination from the nation's third-largest political party and GOP officials say that could mean trouble for their party in the fall election. The Libertarian Party has selected Barr, also a former federal prosecutor, as their candidate, and Republicans think he could siphon off votes from their party's presumptive nominee, Sen. John McCain of Arizona. Though is bid is definitely a long shot, Barr - who made a name for himself in leading the U.S. House's impeachment of President Bill Clinton - could exploit unease felt by traditional conservatives leery...

You read that right. The leader of the Bill Clinton Impeachment Team in the House says Bush is SO much worse than Clinton ever was. Check it out in this fascinating MobLogic.tv video. Barr also talks about the history of his mustache, civil liberties, privacy and other important topics. (video link- http://www.moblogic.tv/video/2008/06/20/bob-barr/)

I've heard from a number of freepers in recent threads telling me, "A vote for a third party candidate is a vote for Obama". In an attempt to FINALLY put that idiocy to rest, I'm devoting this thread solely to that subject. "Let logic prevail!", I always say. Well, there IS no logic to the above statement IF the voter in question (who has decided to vote third party in '08) 1) is not a registered Republican and 2) was never going to vote for McCain in the first place Remember 1992, when Republicans (as many of them still do)...

Election '08: The word is that Barack Obama is a mainstream politician who sometimes attracts fringe leftists. The record tells a different story — that he has sought out radicals. What does that say of his agenda?It's natural to be skeptical of excessive claims about Obama's radical associations. After all, there are so many. But one bears attention — because it helped him get his start in politics. In 1996, he won an Illinois state senate seat on a "fusion" ticket of the Democratic Party and leftist group called the "New Party." The New Party, founded in 1992 with 7,000...

While most Republicans are likely to consider Rep. Ron Paul of Texas a mere pest, his devoted followers could be a problem for Sen. John McCain in November. Paul, the GOP congressman with the squeaky voice but with a following of vocal supporters, will not go away. He's suspended his presidential campaign but his crusade goes on. Paul got into the presidential race with no chance of winning. But his opposition to the war in Iraq, his isolationist foreign policy, and his leave-us-alone views on the domestic front won him faithful supporters during the debates earlier this year. Based on...

AUSTIN, Texas — Republican Ron Paul ended his rebel campaign Thursday night and announced a new effort to help elect libertarian-leaning Republicans to public office around the country. "With the primary season now over, the presidential campaign is at an end. But the larger campaign for freedom is just getting started," Paul told supporters in a letter posted on the website of the new group, Campaign for Liberty. "We will be a permanent presence on the American political landscape," added Paul, who announced his move during a rally coinciding with the Texas GOP State Convention in Houston. "That I promise...

Upon hearing that Rep. Ron Paul has ended his campaign for the Republican Presidential nomination, Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party candidate for president, issued the following statement: "Congressman Ron Paul has fought tirelessly in both the Libertarian Party and the Republican Party to minimize government power and maximize individual liberty. I want to thank him for all that he has done for liberty in this nation, and encourage him to continue his fight through whatever avenues he sees fit." Barr represented the 7th District ofGeorgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003, where he served as...

From Barr 2008: Washington is filled with rumors of pending American or Israeli military action against Iran, says Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party candidate for President. But “an attack on Iran would be unnecessary, counterproductive, costly and dangerous,” he warns. Our own intelligence services tell us that Iran is not actively working to build a nuclear bomb and is years away from having nuclear weapons capability. “There is no imminent threat, and only an imminent threat can ever justify a preemptive strike,” insists Barr. “The tragedy in Iraq demonstrates the counterproductive consequences of initiating war without any compelling justification.” Although...

Did you see the latest CNN-Opinion Research poll? Yup, there's Ralph Nader and homeboy Matt Gonzalez at 6 percent. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, here comes Ralph V (yes, he's run five times for president.) Libertarian candidate -- ex-GOP Rep./Clinton Impeachment Czar Bob Barr -- knocks down 2 percent. The other guys? Oh, yeah, them. Barack Obama edged John McCain 47-43 when Ralph was counted. If he wasn't, Obama's lead is 49 to 46 percent. The skinny on the CNN poll: CNN dipped their wick into the elecorate June 4-5 by phone-interviewing...

Say it ain't so Joe. I mean, Hillary. I don't believe it. But my friends in Obama-land, the place where all good Democrats are, or are heading to, are worried. The concern is that Hillary could take a page from the book of one Joe Lieberman, once and former good Democrat, and decide that having lost out on his party's nomination to someone he couldn't see winning a general election, the better option (for him) was to run himself in the fall. Which he did. And won. Beating the liberal Democrat who had beaten him in the primary.

According to the video below, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey has said that “many Republicans will vote for Libertarian candidates in House races.” The Washington Times is reporting that former House Whip Tom DeLay’s wife plans to pull the Bob Barr lever on Election Day: Tom DeLay will vote for John McCain but the former House Republican leader said his wife, Christine, is planning to vote for Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr. “I’m trying to convince my wife not to do that,” the Texas Republican told editors and reporters at The Washington Times on Friday. “She said it publicly...

For conservatives unhappy with McCain as our candidate, I've heard a few mention Bob Barr as an alternative for their protest votes. Make sure you know who your voting for before you do so, and make sure if your protest is that of principle that you share the same principles with whom you pull the lever for. For some conservatives, Bob Barr's teamwork with the ACLU to fight against the Patriot Act and the NSA's terrorist surveillance program is enough to drop consideration. He has also sided with the ACLU on the immigration issue, opposing local law enforcement from helping...