Comments on: Who Will Be New York Independence Party Nominee for President?

By: Alex Englemann

Alex Englemann — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 16:45:50 +0000

I do believe that those from New York may be forgetting that their good fellow Frank MacKay also claims in other States to be the Chairman of the Reform Party National Party, this in addition to the National Independence Party and the State Independence Party.

This depsite the fact a Court Order says otherwise and a Court Supervised Convention has been held.

Perhaps those in New York should also be ware that this bloke may well be spending their Party’s treasury on his “Reform Party” adventure to a tune of thousands per month, has anyone made inquiries?

By the way, why would a 3rd Party nominate the candidate of one of the major parties?

MacKay attempted to have his brownshirts in the Reform Party throw out Party Members in that Party who stood in the way of his sham and attempt to have multiple crowns on his seven heads, on false charges of say so called nice things about a major party candidate, now MacKay is going to nominate one of them and that is fine and dandy??

It seems that these issues and questions are reasons Big Mac Mackay cared not to attend court Hearings for fear of being called to the stand and having to answer the age old question of where the money went, that is the NY State Party’s money.

By: billvanallen

billvanallen — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 10:11:22 +0000

the NYS assembly (as well as senate and county subdivision) districts are not constitutional(based upon the NYS constitution legislative districting article) — a long legal battle has been up and down the state and federal courts for at least 5 years and is now at the USCA 2nd Circuit. So a legal challenge could be considered — among many other matters — to challenge the IPNY state committee districts — both old and new — and its convention structure selecting a nominee for US president within two weeks.

By: NYer

NYer — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 03:58:30 +0000

SteveZ: I didn’t mean to imply you were a liar, only that you were mistaken, so I apologize for a poor choice of words. But I do not appreciate you’re putting words in my mouth about the Libertarian Party just to say others would disagree or that I’ve “erred” or “forgotten” things when that’s not the case at all. I wrote only one short paragraph about your post and it was completely true and correct. I’m sorry I couldn’t read your mind to know that when you said 1996 you really meant a combination of 1994 (the only time Goisano petitioned), 1998 (when the party got the third line) and 2002 (when there was a write in vote in a different party). Someone else thought you meant 2006. My point was that Golisano never had to get the Independence line by a write-in vote and never had to petition to get on the ballot except the first time, in 1994. The party was born in 1994 because, to the best of my knowledge, that’s the first time they ever ran any candidate for any office, unlike the Libertarians (perhaps I’m mistaken, but I would never, never, never, never trust Wikipedia for any details). I don’t know what may have happened in 1991, but half a dozen people sitting around a kitchen table doesn’t make a party unless there’s cake and balloons.

By: Steve Z

Steve Z — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 02:06:11 +0000

Well NYer and Nancy, what I wrote was simply a typo. What I meant to write was 1998, not 1996. If you were as well versed in Independence Party history as you state, you should have picked up on that when I wrote that it was the year that the Independence Party took over the third place line from the Conservatives, when the CP split the Pataki vote with the Republicans, and the IP outpolled them with Golisano. (This is easily verifiable by checking it on the NYSBOE site. That’s not a history revision as you state.) I’m not sure why you’re bringing up 1994 when the IP became ballot qualified as I never stated in my post that ballot qualification happened in the year I mistakenly wrote, 1996, or the year I meant, 1998. In fact, I never mentioned it at all. But even though they became ballot qualified in 1994, they still didn’t get the third party line from the Conservatives in that year as the CP outpolled them by about 100,000 votes. (That, too, is easily verifiable by a trip to the NYSBOE website.) In short, when the IP took the third ballot line was the issue, not when they became ballot qualified as you tried to infer.

I’m also not sure what you mean when you say the IP was “born” in 1994 as the IP was actually started in 1991. (Again, easily verifiable by a Google search on the party and clicking on any number of links, such as Wikipedia.) Are you saying a party in NY isn’t really a party just because they aren’t ballot qualified? As an example, are you saying the Libertarian Party of NY isn’t born yet just because they aren’t ballot qualified, even though they have been active in the state for a number of years and have regularly placed candidates on the ballot for Governor and President? I think a number of people on this site would disagree with you.

And Nancy, nobody here, including me, is denigrating the IP. You’re telling me how their strength is going from door to door and all that. I think I said that, by implication, when I stated that IP members are a powerful voting bloc of over 300,00 members where many of them vote for their IP endorsed candidate and are truly independent of the Reps and Dems. However, the issue was why candidates on the IP ballot do so much better in NY than across the country, and your answer of door to door organizing doesn’t answer that. It may explain why the IP gets their candidates on the ballot and why they have good structure, but my answer of 300,000 members who back their endorsed candidate answers the question much better. Also, your getting involved in semantics. The IP is a “line” just as much as any other party in NY is a “line”, even the established Dems and Reps. Anyone on this site will tell you that the term “line” is interchangeable with the term “ballot”. I addressed the fact that the CP is a party when I used the term “enrolled party members”. Maybe you didn’t pick that up when you read the post (or didn’t read it).

Lastly NYer, I’ll give you the fact that I erred about the write in ballot on both the Conservative and IP lines. However, you erred too, since again, if you were really knowledgeable about IP history, you would have immediately known I just missed the year as that happened in the 2002 primary. (I’m still not sure why you automatically assumed I was talking about 1994 when I never even mentioned that year in my post.) In 2002, the IP actually endorsed Pataki as did the Conservatives. (Again, this is easily verifiable by a Google search.) Since Golisano was not a Conservative, the only thing he could do was pass an “opportunity to ballot” and have CP voters write his name in. He lost by over 15,400 votes but did create some upheaval in the party. On the IP side, since Golisano was a registered IP member, he passed a petition to force a primary, which included having his name on the ballot. There was no need for a write in. Yes, I did err on that too as I forgot he was a registered IP member at the time. However, I consider that a minor error since the main point was that Golisano was NOT the endorsed candidate of the IP nor did he just pass a petition to become the endorsed candidate. He only gained the endorsement after forcing a bruising primary and beating Pataki by 546 votes. (Again, all vote totals can be verified on the NYSBOE.) I’m surprised you didn’t remember that since that was only 6 years ago and was one of the most exciting statewide primaries in the last 10 years.

I guess the moral of this story is never write a long post while being tired from the double whammy of waiting three hours on a golf course waiting for the foursome ahead of you to finish, and watching my beloved Miami Dolphins lose yet again. I apologize to the regular readers for this long post, but I had to clear up some confusion, as well as defend myself from being called a liar.

By: Mike Drucker

Mike Drucker — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 23:03:16 +0000

The vote is 9/21 in Albany by the 300 State Committee members. But it will be done with mostly proxys which McKay holds a super majority.

By: Mike Gillis

Mike Gillis — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 17:17:32 +0000

When will the decision be made?

By: Nancy Hanks

Nancy Hanks — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 03:31:47 +0000

Agree with NYer. To add, the power of the IP derives from the door-to-door organizing that independents have been doing in NYC for 35 years, and the smart partnerships with many courters of the independent vote. I just came in from a doorknocking shift in Queens, where we are running a grassroots democracy/local control campaign to support and organize our membership in the face of Frank MacKay’s opportunistic hackery.

The Independence Party in New York City is not a “line” — it’s a genuine organization of independents who are concerned about democracy and think that the IP should be a tool of the voters, NOT an appendage of a major party sold to the highest bidder.

That’s why the IP has done so well in NY up till now. We’ll see if the success continues, or if partisan hackery trumps the power of ordinary people – once again.

By: Richard

Richard — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 03:25:36 +0000

SteveZ can defend himself, but I think he meant to say “2006″, not “1996″.

By: NYer

NYer — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 02:28:04 +0000

SteveZ in item 12 is completely making up history. There was no election for governor in 1996 and Tom Golisano never got the Independence nomination through a write in vote. He petitioned to get on the ballot in 1994 like any independent candidate. Because he got more than 50,000 vote minimum the Independence Party was born.

The party is fundamentally changed from 4 years ago. Frank MacKay now completely controls the party by proxy at the state level. Whoever he likes gets the nomination and it looks like he likes McCain, possibly because of some deal or just because he favors Republicans this year. I will be shocked if McCain is not the nominee. Everything else is for show.

By: Richard

Richard — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 01:53:55 +0000

When two New York parties back the same presidential candidate, they simply coordinate so that their slate of electors is identical for both parties.