The website Third Party Watch has been purchased by Richard Viguerie, effective May 19, 2008. Viguerie has long been interested in political action outside the two major parties, even though he has also been very much involved in Republican Party politics. In 1976 he and others tried to organize a campaign for a conservative revolt against the Republican Party, given that the Republican Party had just rejected Ronald Reagan and instead nominated Gerald Ford. He is the author or co-author of two books, America’s Right Turn and Conservatives Betrayed. The latter book is an attack on the Republican Party.
Ballot Access News
Edited By Richard Winger
Hmmmmmmmm. More proof that Third Party Watch is actually [Austin Cassidy, Stephen Gordon] Conservative/ Neocom/ Libertarian Watch. Told Ya So.
I am not sure what to make of this.
Ever hear of a self-fulfilling prophecy Don? How about the law of unintended consequences?
I don’t trust it. This spells trouble for the site, I think.
Viguerie has an agenda, and I don’t know what it is. Google his name with Ron Paul’s for a trip down an interesting rabbithole of bandwagonjumping.
I’v met Viguerie, and he’s a nice guy—but Im not sure what to make of this.
Im hoping he just wants the profit…not to change the site or content at all.
From my experiences on TPW, I wouldn’t say that neocon would be a good word for most of the site’s content and contributors (though definitely a commenter or two). However, it definitely trends towards the conservative and libertarian side, though the addition of Steve Tash of the Socialist Party of Michigan as a contributor has helped that a little bit. Content aside, it is somewhat disappointing that there are many people who comment on the articles there that can’t seem to mention a candidate’s name without making some sort of inflammatory change, and I would say reflects poorly on the the conservative/libertarian/constitutionalist community. Especially since I’m assuming that most of the people who post on that site are rather older than I am…
Perhaps he’ll spend the money on a very needed CSS designer.
Viguerie’s first choice for president in 1980 was John Connally, the former Texas governor, Nixon treasury secretary, and Lyndon Johnson protege. Viguerie said that Ronald Reagan was a good spokesman for conservatism, but that was about it.
I recently figured out why Viguerie was a Connally admirer, when I learned that he grew up in Texas.
Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran and now-Gov. Haley Barbour were also early Connally supporters. Barbour had backed Reagan over President Ford in ’76, but he said that Reagan was too old to be president in 1980.
“In 1976 he and others tried to organize a campaign for a conservative revolt against the Republican Party, given that the Republican Party had just rejected Ronald Reagan and instead nominated Gerald Ford.”
Absolute revisionary claptrap fed straight from Viguerie’s own press-kit.
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“Mail-Order Presidents”, Time Magazine – June 16, 1975, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,917520-2,00.html
Identifies Viguerie as being a fundraiser for George Wallace in the AIP, and as fronting Wallace the money for the initial direct-mail push.
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“Coming Out Swinging”, Time Magazine, August 30, 1976, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,918235-1,00.html
States that Viguerie was a candidate along with Lester Maddox in the 1976 AIP National Convention.
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Clearly Viguerie had left the Republican Party, and was not even a party of the Reagan insurgency in 1976.
Fred Church Ortiz:
Ever hear of ‘spot lighting the obvious’, Frederick? How about the ‘Fox News Law’ of ‘Fair and Balanced’?
So you espouse changing things by cozing up to the power elite —instead of challenging them? So you see ‘brown nosers’ as vectors of change? Ya ever hear of the French phrase ‘Agents Provocateur’?
No Don, I don’t. I also don’t consider running around complaining that your personal enemies or pet projects are ignored to be the basis for judging someone’s worth, or that personal attacks based on conjecture and circumstance are the basis for argument. The shit’s hit the fan now, and I don’t think it had to.
The Agent Provocateur Award: Frederick Temple Ortiz:
My opinions are my opinions and should be challenged.
My reportings are documented, documented, documented and if you have some specific item that I can shoot down, possibly with first hand information —-plz fire away!
[Out side of California, other national and state groups in the so called reform movement claim that the Reform Party of California had little to do with the start up and execution of the historic recall of corrupt insider Democratic presidential hopeful Gray Davis. Jeff [State Party Chair] Rainforth was in the thick of things from the beginning! I was the one and only kick off speaker at all three state wide Dump Davis rallies, starting in February 2003 and going on inspite of the invasion of Iraq! Before that, three of us from Citizens For A Better Veterans Home join the usually power elite boot licker[s] in picketing Davis’ late December [2002] pre swearing in Photo Ops and Sound Bytes!]
What conjecture? Folks contradicting themselves when I was a first person witness to the original statement and the following lie? [Hey, if it is Bonsia and the Emperor has no clothes, then the job of the citizen activist[s] is ‘to keep you mouth open’! If you are such a little ‘go along’ weenie, why do you visit an obvious anti establishment site?
Duck, Hillary, Duck, sniper fire……..
I heard Richard speak at the CP National Convention. He championed Bill Buckley Jr. and Newt Gingrich! Yuck. At one point he was almost booed off the stage. If not for Christian deferance and charity he would have been lynched.
Verdict: International Socialist (or wlling dupe thereof), and as David Rockefeller would say “And proud of it!”
Here’s the thing Don, I don’t have anything on you personally, but it’s pretty damn tough to parse what the hell you’re getting at. It’s completely possible, even likely, that I’ve simply misunderstood what you’ve been trying to say.
I remember that Rainforth was involved from the beginning of the recall, and I respect the role everyone played in getting killing that wad Davis’ career, from Issa to the RP to the old lady that took my signature. *But what do Rainforth or the recall have to do with this?*
What contradiction was there, to what statement and what lie, and why were you there, and who’s the other guy? Am I the go along weenie or is Hillary? Is this the anti-establishment site or is TPW? The old TPW or the tragically Viguerized one?
Frederick, ya see “Don Lake” or “Citizens For A Better Veterans Home” —–just skip down. Whom is forcing you to read my blogs? You remind me of the grilled survivor crawling out of the desert being offered a tall sweaty, iced glass of water —while repeatedly pushing it away!
My friend, Don Lake, speaks and writes very bluntly – to the point of being rude, actually. He often uses personal insults of politicians to make his point rather than stick to the issues. He does not always get his facts correct either.
The recall of Governor Gray Davis was an absurd action and an abuse of justice and the political system. It never should have happened. Governor Davis was a Vietnam War hero and an excellent leader for our state.
Regarding Third Party Watch: Who really knows what is going to happen with it? I don’t even visit that site much anymore. My name for it is “Bourgeois Conservative Party Watch.” It is pretty much a waste of time.
Wow… this is interesting. 🙂
I want the water, Don. I’m very thirsty. I just don’t want to build my own desalination plant to get it.
Phil of the John Kerry persuasion: Gray Davis, the second sitting governor in national history to be recalled, was possibly the worst California chief executive ever.
War hero? Some EXAGGERATED copter rides into the bush!
He could have been the 2005 elected federal chief executive, even if losing California’s electors…..
We dodged that bullet. If he was that terrific a governor, why has he not bounced back electorial? Hey even Nixon, whom some deranged souls still think was ‘an excellent leader’, almost beat Brown, did beat HHH in 68 and clobbered a true war hero, McGovern, in 72,
For a ‘third party person’ in Democratic leaden California, who would support ANY Democratic candidate in any election year after 1984, you must love both Davis [a horrible excuse for a human being] AND Nixon!
#9: “Clearly Viguerie had left the Republican Party, and was not even a part of the Reagan insurgency in 1976.”
The conservative third party efforts began after Reagan lost the ’76 Republican nomination to President Ford, but Reagan would have nothing to do with such efforts. In his ‘Conservative Digest’ magazine in the late ’70s, Viguerie was pushing John Connally for the ’80 GOP nomination.
Viguerie once ran for lieutenant governor at the Virginia Republican Convention. That was at some point after 1976.
#18: Nixon lost to Gov. Pat Brown by nearly 300,000 votes in 1962. I believe it was 54% to 46%.
Don Lake wrote:
For a ‘third party person’ in Democratic leaden California, who would support ANY Democratic candidate in any election year after 1984, you must love both Davis [a horrible excuse for a human being] AND Nixon!
Phil Sawyer responds:
Eugene J. McCarthy was on the California Democratic Party’s presidential primary ballot in 1992 and I was very active in his campaign. He should have been elected president of the United States!
Why did you write that I must love Richard Nixon, by the way?
Phil: Gene McCarthy was only 76 years old in 1992.
I’ve always wondered whether McCarthy would have run for re-election to the Senate in 1970 if Hubert Humphrey had not run. What do you think, Phil? It appeared to me that Humphrey’s candidacy may have scared Gene out of the race.
Senator Eugene McCarthy stated in 1968 that he would not be running again for his senate seat in 1970. I don’t remember the situation about Hubert Humphrey but if he ran in 1970 it was probably because McCarthy cleared the way for him to do so by not running himself.
Eugene McCarthy did attempt to regain a senate seat in 1982 but he did not win the Democratic Party’s primary election.
I remember McCarthy’s 1982 race, now that you mention it. He lost to Mark Dayton and his millions, and Dayton lost the general to Sen. Dave Durenberger.
Humphrey had been elected again to the Senate in 1970 and 1976, and he died in early ’78 at age 66. He ran for majority leader, and I think he lost to Robert Byrd.
In 1968, when Humphrey beat McCarthy for the Dem presidential nomination, a friend of mine had a big color poster of Humphrey on the wall of this room, which read, “Some people talk change. Others cause it.”
Humphrey lost the ’72 presidential nomination to McGovern.