Badnarik the King-Slayer
Brian Doherty | October 25, 2004, 2:24pm
Robert Novak notes how the Libertarian Party is targeting Wisconsin as a swing state in which they could possibly cost Bush the election. (scroll down, item "Libertarians vs. Bush: toward bottom). They are asking, Novak reports, Wisconsin Dems to give them money, promising to use it to target conservatives dissatisfied with Bush.
I'm not entirely sure that costing Bush the election will bring people rushing toward the LP or rushing away from it in morning-after remorse, but it should be interesting. The LP itself hypes Badnarik's ability to kill Bush in this press release about ads the campaign is running on Fox. (Part of the idea, I suppose, is that it might make the GOP skew more libertarian in 2008--but with what candidate?)
It will also be interesting if the LP manages to get props for it even if they do. I can easily imagine a scenario in which Badnarik "costs Bush the election"--that is, in which his votes are larger than the gap between Bush's and Kerry's in a state whose electoral votes are decisive in the election--and the likes of the New York Times don't even make a big deal out of it, out of a general sense that the LP isn't much worth noticing. We'll see.
UPDATE: As Thomas Knapp points out in the comments thread, the Times' John Tierney just yesterday noted Badnarik's spoiler possibilities, in a piece I hadn't yet seen. Scroll down for "Nader nibble from the right" subhead.
Thomas L. Knapp | October 26, 2004, 2:35pm | #
Quoth Ben Masel:
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Let's play this out. Presuming Kerry takes the Electoral College by a hair, and in a key state or three, Badnarik represents the spread, are the Democrats interested in preserving a tactical alliance for 2006? What might they offer? Is Guns, Grass, and the Patriot Act enough? Play spoiler on Dem incumbents on the wrong side of those three issues?
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I'd like to make it clear that I am speaking solely as an individual, and not as a member of Michael Badnarik's staff in this whole thread. To put a finer point on it, I haven't had a great deal of input into the campaign's "overarching strategy" considerations, and my opinions here are my own, not those of the candidate or campaign manager.
That said, I see it like this:
I'm not looking for an ongoing "tactical alliance" with the Democrats ... or with the Republicans. What I'm looking for is potentially good outcomes, as follows:
1) If Kerry is elected, the GOP will almost certainly maintain a majority in the House of Representatives, as well as a slim majority or a filibuster-able minority in the Senate. I don't see either of these changing in 2006, either. The GOP will likely start showing some backbone. They will not give Kerry things that they cheerfully give a president of their own party (like $400 billion plus deficits, massive expansions in entitlements, massive expansion in federal education programs, etc.).
That's a fairly bankable outcome of costing Bush the election.
2) If Bush loses, and if that loss can be plausibly linked to Badnarik, the GOP will react in one of two ways. Either it will move in a more libertarian direction legislatively, and probably nominate more libertarian-leaning candidates at all levels and a more libertarian presidential candidate in 2008 (in which case we win), or it will direct considerable attention, publicity and debate toward the Libertarian Party, driving yet more support to us and solidifying our ability to determine the outcome even of elections we can't win (in which case, once again, we win). This election could effectively make libertarians into a voting bloc to be pursued rather than an annoyance to be ignored.
I think that that, too, is a fairly bankable outcome. We had a "mini-explosion" of that sort after costing the GOP a Senate seat in Washington and such. Costing them the White House will switch the size of the explosion from kilotonnage to megatonnage.
3) Regardless of whether Kerry will be a better president or not (and I think, as per above, that having a Congress of the opposite party will FORCE him to be), a powerful example needs to be set: If you spend like LBJ on a crack binge, expand entitlements, expand federal interference in education, engage in foreign military adventurism, etc. ... YOU WILL NOT BE RE-ELECTED. The quality of Bush's replacement is not strictly relevant to the need for this example. We do not shrink from hauling Jeffrey Dahmer off to jail for fear that Charles Manson will be the next tenant in his old apartment.
My initial impression of the Badnarik campaign was that it was a "get the most votes possible and damn the torpedoes" approach. However, after initial ad runs, polling, etc., it became clear to me that no matter what we did, our top potential continued to fall among Republican-leaning, rather than Democrat-leaning, voters in this race, and that that was the draw for media coverage as well. I assume that those at the top of the campaign drew the same conclusions from the same data and tailored further strategy decisions to fit by going after the votes that were most accessible. The "spoiler" thing started as a side effect; the media began grabbing it, and it moved to center stage. That's not a bad thing.
Regards,
Tom Knapp
libertarian larry | October 31, 2004, 3:26am | #
Bush out of office. Gridlock on the Potomac.
The LP gets credit. Win/win/win.
It's a very high risk strategy, though. By focusing virtually exclusively on swing-states, four of them, the LP/Badnarik Campaign has
put all of its eggs in a one-basket strategy.
Voters in those states are going to be far more cognizant of the "don't throw you vote away" argument, if they can make the decision of Bush versus Kerry.
With that factor & the four state focus, total votes for Badnarik could be abysmally low.
Then if Bush wins, anway, well, it's lose/lose/lose.
I didn't have to be that way. I'll mention just one thing. The Badnarick Campaign was confronted by a groundswell of support for buying $20K of ads on the "Daily Show". Jon Stewart is *the* hot topic these days, and, increasinlgy folks claim they are going there for the true news, minus the spin. plus the sarcasm and satire. $20 K was cheap for 30 spots, with the very likely outcome that Badnarik could have gotten on the show itself for his only national TV interview outside of C-Span.
With that possibility, that could have cracked the main-stream media blackout and
made Badnarik a "talking point".
Too bad, Fred Collins, MB's campaign manager, refused even to think about it, given his four-state strategy.
I'm going to disagree with my friend, Tom Knapp, about something. The four-state, steal votes from Bush strategy was *not*, as I see it, a careful analysis of polls, ect.
That strategy was "given" to us by CBS.com before Badnarik was even nominated. They've not mentioned the LP/Badnarik since,
but before the Convention they announced the LP's candidate could be a spoiler.
The LP fawned over that notice, and in the very first press-release after the Convention the strategy of "spoiling" for Bush was announced, long before there were any TV ads or polls.
Well, it's a done deal now. Whatever the outcome, I want to vehemently disagree with the claim that we have more appeal to conservatives than liberals. As I see it, except for the Ed Clark Campaign, we have **never** even come close to trying to appeal to liberals, not even in niches.
To bad, so sad,
larry fullmer Idaho
