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Bob Barr's Libertarian presidential campaign is poised to play a serious role in this year's elections, with early polls showing him taking away enough votes from Sen. John McCain to give Democrats a chance to win states that should be safely Republican.

So maybe it isn’t very “live and let live” for libertarians to assemble en masse in the hopes of exerting power. But some libertarians, feeling a little heady after their party’s national convention last weekend, are making a bold claim: this is the year their voting bloc will hold some serious sway in American politics. “We are in the beginning of a libertarian moment,” said Nick Gillespie, editor of Reason, the libertarian monthly. Meeting in Denver, the Libertarian Party chose as its new standard-bearer Bob Barr, the former four-term Republican congressman from Georgia who has already been branded a spoiler...

What happened The Libertarian Party nominated former Republican Rep. Bob Barr (Ga.) as its 2008 presidential candidate at the Libertarian convention in Denver over the weekend. The party is already on the ballot in 28 states, and Barr said he will get on the ballot in at least 20 more. National polls put his support as high as 7 percent, but Barr said he is "in this to win,” not be “a spoiler.” (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution) What the commentators said Libertarians are touting the Barr-led ticket as their strongest yet, said Andrew Malcolm in the Los Angeles Times’ Top of...

(CNN) – Former Rep. Bob Barr, the newly-selected Libertarian presidential nominee, rejected suggestions Monday that he could spoil his former party's chances of holding onto the White House. "There are two folks that are out to spoil the race here — it's Senator Obama and Senator McCain. They're setting out, I think, to spoil our chances," he told CNN's "American Morning." He added, "There are millions of voters out there that are not going to vote for Senator McCain, and we aim to reach those voters with the message of smaller government and more individual liberty." For years, Barr was...

Former Congressman plans to take the White House as Libertarian candidate Denver - The Libertarian Party has nominated former Congressman Bob Barr as its candidate for president for the 2008 election. "I'm sure will we emerge here with the strongest ticket in the history of the Libertarian Party," Barr stated in his victory speech shortly after being selected as the Party's nominee. "I want everybody to remember that we only have 163 days to win this election. We cannot waste one single day." More than 650 Libertarian delegates met in Denver from May 22 till the 26 for the 2008...

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll has shown a very close race between John McCain and Barack Obama. For most of the past week, they have been essentially tied with typically 4% of voters saying they prefer some other candidate and a similar number remaining undecided. A separate survey found slightly different results when third-party candidates were mentioned by name. In a four-way race, Obama earns 42% of the vote, McCain 38%, Bob Barr 6% and Ralph Nader 4%. Given those options, 11% were undecided. Barr and Nader were mentioned as candidates of the Libertarian Party and the Green...

Former Republican congressman Robert Barr of Georgia recently announced he is running for president as a Libertarian. This is a formidable development, and it's by no means out of the question that Barr could attract enough otherwise conservative voters to defeat John McCain and put Barack Obama in the White House. Of course, Obama has his own problems with possible rivals on the left side of the political spectrum. That hardy perennial Ralph Nader has already made it clear that he intends to run, and while he may be old news, even a poor showing by Nader on Election Day...

Could Bob Barr become this year's Ralph Nader, helping to "spoil" the White House ambitions of John McCain. The former Georgia Republican congressman announced he was seeking the Libertarian nomination for president this week, and immediately disputed that he is spoiling things for anyone. "The American voters deserve better than simply the lesser of two evils," he said as he outlined his platform to freeze discretionary spending and withdraw from Iraq. [Snip] Still, Republicans claim they aren't concerned by Mr. Barr's possible appearance on all those state ballots. But they should be. You can bet cable TV producers who are...