I'm beginning to be cautiously optimistic that this will be a good year for third-party candidates in general, and Libertarians in specific. Why? Because unlike previous years these candidates are receiving regular press coverage in the MSM.
More than that, the coverage has been generally quite fair--treating Libertarians and Greens (and others) as real candidates, not freaks and geeks.
Case in point, this snippet from The Hill about third-party candidacies, which deals with Allen Buckley's Georgia Senatorial bid:
The situation is similar in Georgia, where libertarian Allen Buckley took 2.1 percent in the state’s 2004 Senate race and 3.6 percent in the 2006 lieutenant governor’s race. This year, he’s running against Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R), and he thinks he can take more, in part thanks to the libertarian presidential candidacy of former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr.
Buckley said he will likely take more votes from Republicans than from Democrats, unless the to-be-determined Democratic nominee doesn’t appeal to his base: “This time I’m hoping to do immensely better,” Buckley said.
Allen is also making news in Georgia with his press release on the Iraqi government's insistence that the US set a timetable for leaving the country:
Recently, Iraq’s Prime Minister, Nouri al Maliki, made a request (or demand) for a deadline for U.S. withdrawal from
Iraq.
Allen Buckley, the Libertarian Party’s U.S. Senate candidate, said the following about the requested withdrawal date: “Our country should embrace the opportunity to sit down with the Iraqis and create a time line for withdrawal. We have occupied Iraq for more than five years. It’s time to agree upon an exit plan so the Iraqis can take charge and responsibility for their country.”
Comments