[joe fonebone]

I forgot about fred.....I have a poster of him with his fist balled up and it says...Kill the Terrorists, Protect the Borders, Punch the Hippies......I kinda liked him, if only he would have really tried.....sigh

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

I always saw Fred as a Beltway insider. He was a big McCain buddy and somewhat of a RINO himself. Of course, he would have been WAY better than what we have now.......But having all those candidates like Fred in there taking away votes, we let McCain slip in through the back door.

[kevkrom]

.I kinda liked him, if only he would have really tried.....sigh

He did. The "no fire in the belly" is a canard that is easily disproven by looking at how he campaigned -- the only candidate to make more campaign appearances than Thompson was, oddly enough, McCain.

No, what did Thompson is was the depressing fact that you have to have all of your ducks (i.e., endorsements, "ground game", etc.) lined up well in advance before you jump in. That killed him in South Carolina, the one state that he had to win.

Joining the race (officially) on the later side shouldn't be a problem if you've already put the pieces in place. It's only trying to get in late without having any real infrastructure that seems to be insurmountable.