Posted on 04/13/2008 8:26:43 PM PDT by Kurt Evans
Former Republican presidential candidate Alan Keyes has chosen April 15 to make a major announcement of his intentions, following indications he has broken with the GOP.
A life-long Republican who has increasingly cited the party's failure to match conservative rhetoric with actual performance in the political arena, Keyes said he will reveal his reasons for departing the GOP at a press conference scheduled for 8:30 pm ET, at the Best Western Genetti Inn in Hazleton, PA.
The event will be video-streamed live at Keyes' website, www.AlanKeyes.com.
Keyes added that he is looking to the Constitution Party as a possible home for his future efforts in politics, including a potential run for president in the 2008 general election.
"No other 'third party' is as well-established as the Constitution Party," said Keyes. "They've been around since 1992, and have built a significant grassroots presence among patriotic, Constitution-minded citizens — with a registered membership of over 350,000. Conservatives have a home in the CP that they can find nowhere else, given the decline in the Republican Party's credibility as a voice and vehicle for conservatism."
Regarding his potential third-party candidacy for president in the fall, Keyes said, "I believe people deserve a choice. They certainly deserve a conservative choice — something neither John McCain, Hillary Clinton, nor Barack Obama can offer voters. All they can offer is empty promises based on liberal track records."
Symbolic of Keyes' break with the Republican Party is a caricature of the GOP logo — upside down — on the front page of his website.
The Constitution Party will hold its nominating convention April 23-26 in Kansas City.
According to Dan Smeriglio, a Keyes supporter who is helping to arrange the event, the former Reagan administration diplomat chose to make his announcement in Hazleton because of the town's strong stance on illegal immigration.
"I understand a good portion of his speech next week will center on illegal immigration," Smeriglio said. Smeriglio and a group he represents, Voice of the People USA, have been vocal in opposing illegal immigration since Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta introduced the Illegal Immigration Relief Act in 2006 — thrusting Hazleton into national prominence in the movement to stem illegal immigration.
Keyes — who has a Ph.D. in government from Harvard and wrote his dissertation on constitutional theory — served as Reagan's Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations, as well as Ambassador to the United Nations Economic and Social Council, where he represented U.S. interests in the UN General Assembly.
The more I think about Dr.Keyes announcement tomorrow in Hazelton, Pennsylvania and why he chose that city, and what that city has done about illegal immigration
..I'm starting to get hopeful again.
If he runs on the illegal immigration platform...which NONE of the other candidates are doing...he will win.....Period.
He maybe needs to tone down his delivery a tad, but he has the chops to win if that's his goal.
He's a brilliant man, articulate, knows his Constitution front, back, sideways and has excellent credentials.
I will tune in tomorrow and hope.
THERE IS NO ONE ELSE I WILL VOTE FOR....NO ONE.
...I was going to write in Duncan Hunter....but if Dr.Keyes chooses to run, I will willingly support him!
“I’ve always like Keyes but I won’t anymore if he pulls one vote away from McCain.”
My favorite part of threads about third party candidate threads; when someone suggests that the GOP and it’s socialist-lite candidates are somehow “owed” conservative votes.
Votes are earned. And if the GOP doesn’t win because it can’t convince people to vote for it, then so be it.
I’m looking forward to the announcement. I hope that Bob Barr runs on the LP ticket as well.
I thought so, too. Until Keyes’ carpetbagging moment in Illinois.
“By the way, as a die hard Ron Paul supporter, I suspect I’ll be thrown out of here - or at least ridiculed - and if that’s the case, call this my swan song.”
I doubt you’ll be thrown out, and I hope you’ll decide to stick around. Things are going to get very interesting very soon if Amb. Keyes runs on the CP ticket and Rep. Barr runs on the LP. Which I think is bordering on the likely.
While I’m not a supporter of Rep. Paul, I’m sympathetic. Last I heard he wasn’t running on the LP ticket so I’m not seeing that his candidacy is all that relevant at this point. Maybe you know something I don’t?
Anyway, once we actually (again) have some conservatives in the Presidential race, albeit representing third parties, FR will become a very active. It’s all about the lurkers anyway.
Keyes might win a few districts in PA in the primary, but he has an absolute zero chance of ANY delegate voting for him in the Electoral College come November. The popular vote is meaningless in the POTUS election.
Everybody better start learning conversational Spanish, if you haven't already. No matter who is the next POTUS, the southern border will remain wide open. Quiero apostar dinero en que mi amigo!
I am voting for Keyes this November.
hillary and obama are running against each other in the dnc primary. Mccain is anticipated to be the nominee for the gop. How do the primaries work for a third party candidate? Who would Alan Keyes be running against? Just wondering.
It varies from state to state. The first nut to crack is getting on the ballot at all, much less in all fifty states. The only 3rd party that has accomplished being on the ballot in all 50 states recently is the Libertarian Party. The Libertarians also have the highest number of elected positions of any 3rd party.
What we have now is a duopoly.
Just as McCain is to conservatives.
Good for you Mr. Keyes. The exodus from the Republican Party is little more than a gathering trickle at the moment but I do suspect it will turn into a true exodus after the trouncing the party will take at the November ballot box. They will only have their liberally socialist wing of the party to blame for it. They won't be able to say they weren't warned.
LOL. Ain't that the absolute truth.
I'm strongly leaning in that direction. I cannot and will not vote for 'the Judas' Juan McCain, the Manchurian candidate and that can be banked on.
Then I will lend him praise for having done that. Again, not something I heard of. But then again, anything something happens to a pro-life group that doesn’t involve a bomb or a sniper rifle does not get into the news.
But, I think Alan has been a net-loss to the GOP and to the conservative movement since he has become just a constant critic and not somebody who offers any solutions (other than overthrowing the entire government, monetary system and foreign service).
That's baloney. Has nothing to do with anything Dr. Keyes has ever said or advocated.
This was part of an email sent out by the Keyes campaign today:
Stand your ground
By Helen Valois
Deputy Grassroots Coordinator
“You’ve convinced me that you are going to help put Hillary Clinton
or Barack Obama in the White House.”
This is how a friend of mine tried to wrap up a political discussion last weekend. The circumstances were unusual, even if the comment was not. Usually, you’ll find a lone Keyes backer being numerically outgunned by a bunch of RINOs. In this case, the sole McCain supporter found himself faced with an enthusiastic and well-informed circle of Keyes people.
It is interesting that he had nothing to say about our arguments themselves. A good guy at heart, he conceded the moral and civic points that we raised. Then, disappointingly, he fell back on the same old “lesser-of-two-evils” approach that the Republican leadership has been serving up for decades now. The idea that the only way to win is to concede defeat at the very outset, by backing a candidate who doesn’t stand for conservative principle in the first place, has itself come to fruition in the presumptive nomination of John McCain as the Republican candidate for 2008. Is this not, in and of itself, enough to convince us at last of the wrong-headedness of this approach?
This type of thinking constitutes textbook “enabling behavior,” in the vernacular of popular psychology. Just as the wife of an alcoholic is supposed to “save the family” by calling in sick for her hung-over husband, we conservatives are being pressured to “save the White House for Republicans” by facilitating the socialist mentality. “What are you trying to do, get me fired?” the husband demands, if she mentions any qualms. It is easy to see that, if he did lose his job, the fault would be his own and not hers. Why then can we not see that it is up to the politician to earn the conservative vote, and not up to the conservatives to put into office a politician who has chronically failed them?
The pressure to be political enablers needs to be staunchly resisted. The once-great Republican party has, in nominating John McCain, crossed the line from viable to suicidal, and many well-intentioned Americans know it. That is why they are saying they will not vote for him, even at the cost of not voting at all. Yet to allow the RINOs to effectively disenfranchise us is not acceptable, either. So, where do we go from here?
Before we look ahead, let’s look back. The Republicans are the heirs of the Lincoln legacy, but what does that truly mean? During the era of slavery, there was a party — the Democrats — that refused to stand against the ungodly and un-American evil of its time. There was another party — the Whigs — that let its opposition to slavery be watered down to the point of irrelevance. It was in this context that a third party known as the Republicans providentially arose.
Lincoln didn’t make it his life’s objective to rehabilitate a dying political party. During the nineteenth century crisis of the Republic, he saw to it that American identity and sovereignty — as well as the dignity and life of every American — was, in principle, preserved. There were challenges, and unspeakable sacrifice, but Lincoln’s cause was ultimately the cause of God Himself, and it was God who saw it through.
In our own time, we have again seen the American mission assaulted not only from without, but also from within. Socialism renamed “liberalism” has been foisting an ersatz version of our country’s character upon us, while the existing party structure has proven unable or unwilling to stand in the gap. God, however, is still able to achieve His designs for this world, and it is with Him that we must finally cooperate.
Alan Keyes, as you know, has ended his lifelong affiliation with the Republicans. This is a step the Ambassador has not taken lightly, and neither should any of us who are considering a similar move. He has chosen to seek the presidential nomination of the Constitution party, and he asks that you prayerfully consider supporting him in this path.
Many of you took the time to respond to the questionnaire we sent out regarding whether or not Alan ought to go third party. The overwhelming majority of responses were in favor of his doing so. You wrote:
* Alan has always been the best choice, and the Constitution Party is an exciting, hopeful option for the millions of disappointed Americans who do not know another choice exists.
* I will vote for Dr. Keyes based on his life’s work and not on his party affiliation.
* I have always voted Republican, but today we have no “life” protection under their party. It is a fearful thought to envision life under the domination of any current (major party) candidate.
* Either way, I am supporting Alan Keyes for President of the United States of America. I have voted for him before and I will continue to vote for him until elected.
* As a Republican it is hard not to fall in line, but if Alan Keyes joins the Constitution Party and runs as its candidate, I will not only vote for him; I will switch my party affiliation.
* Understanding all that he stands for, I will vote for Alan Keyes no matter what!
* We the people have no choice in this election. As soon as Alan Keyes makes it formal and runs on a third party ticket, I will be joining that party with him. True patriots have no choice.
Dr. Keyes has frequently noted that he is running for President because principled conservatives are being offered no way of participating in politics in this country without violating their own beliefs. To say that Alan is the “best choice” expresses this fact, yet inadvertently masks another reality. As Americans and as believers, we recognize that there are things that lie beyond the reach of our own decisions.
Keyes truly is the choice about which we have no choice; a vote in acknowledgment of that which cannot — strictly speaking — be voted on in the first place. We too hold certain truths to be self-evident. Among them are the fact that the lesser of two evils is still evil, and that if John McCain fails to be inaugurated next January, he and the Republican leadership will not need to look beyond the frames of their own mirrors in determining exactly who is to blame.
bttt
Golly. Hey, Allegra: how are the summer sock sales in Baghdad?
It crystallizes my thoughts!
I'm in.....I will join the Constitution Party if he will run.
It's that simple.
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