LiberalNation
11-02-2008, 11:15 AM
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081102/ap_on_el_pr/third_party_candidates
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – It's lunchtime, and Mary Goode is leaning toward voting for Republican John McCain. By dinner, she admits she might be for Democrat Barack Obama.
But there's no chance that on Election Day she will be for any candidate from a third party.
"This election is too important," said Goode, a 43-year-old accountant from Charlotte. "That would just be like throwing my vote away. I'm not going to do that."
Without billionaire H. Ross Perot and his flip charts, Bill Clinton might not have won the White House in 1992. If Ralph Nader hadn't won 32,000 votes in Florida, Al Gore might have moved into the Oval Office in 2000.
But this year, neither Nader, former GOP Rep. Bob Barr — running as a Libertarian — or any of the other small-party candidates who have qualified for the ballot in some states appears likely to play the role of spoiler.
"In some sense, there are some purists who say you have to vote for what's right. You just can't vote for the lesser of two evils," said Dennis Goldford, a political science professor at Drake University in Iowa.
"But with the economy in the situation it's in, I don't think people feel like they have the luxury of just shopping around. They're saying: 'Somebody has to fix this in a hurry and you know it's not going to be one of these third-party guys.'"
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – It's lunchtime, and Mary Goode is leaning toward voting for Republican John McCain. By dinner, she admits she might be for Democrat Barack Obama.
But there's no chance that on Election Day she will be for any candidate from a third party.
"This election is too important," said Goode, a 43-year-old accountant from Charlotte. "That would just be like throwing my vote away. I'm not going to do that."
Without billionaire H. Ross Perot and his flip charts, Bill Clinton might not have won the White House in 1992. If Ralph Nader hadn't won 32,000 votes in Florida, Al Gore might have moved into the Oval Office in 2000.
But this year, neither Nader, former GOP Rep. Bob Barr — running as a Libertarian — or any of the other small-party candidates who have qualified for the ballot in some states appears likely to play the role of spoiler.
"In some sense, there are some purists who say you have to vote for what's right. You just can't vote for the lesser of two evils," said Dennis Goldford, a political science professor at Drake University in Iowa.
"But with the economy in the situation it's in, I don't think people feel like they have the luxury of just shopping around. They're saying: 'Somebody has to fix this in a hurry and you know it's not going to be one of these third-party guys.'"