Nate Silver, author of the 538 blog carried by the New York Times, says here that it is conceivable that Jon Huntsman might be an independent presidential candidate in 2012. Even more plausible is that Huntsman might be the eventual presidential nominee of Americans Elect Party. Thanks to Nancy Hanks for the link.
Ballot Access News
Edited By Richard Winger
John Huntsman has absolutely NO chance of winning the GOP nomination. He’ll get voted out and will run as an independent.
Silver gives him 30-to-1 odds of taking the nomination, and says that it is “almost as plausible that it will be” as an independent; in other words, slightly worse than 30:1.
And I think it is even less likely that he’d accept a nomination from American’s Elect. What reason do you have to think that that’s MORE plausible? I don’t see any upside for him, just for AE.
The reason it’s more plausible he would be the Americans Elect nominee, instead of an independent candidate, is that (1) I perceive he is a very good fit with the views of Americans Elect backers; (2) for Huntsman, it would be so much easier to be the Americans Elect nominee than an independent candidate, because it would save him a gargantuan petitioning hurdle.
Do you really think Americans Elect would pick Huntsman over Nader? Just what exactly are “the views of the Americans Elect backers?”
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“Americans Elect” is far to conservative, ie Centrist, than Mr. Nader. And I think it is unlikely that Mr. Nader will run for office again.
It is easy enough to find out what AE is all abt. And I agree that a John Huntsman is much more appelaing to AE’s centrism.
I thought some states had laws that forbade candidates from appearing on a different label than their primary label, no?
#7, John Anderson ran in two-thirds of the Republican presidential primaries in 1980, but he still got on the ballot in all 50 states in November 1980 as an independent candidate.
And the states haven’t since changed laws to prevent that from occurring again?
The only states that try to ban “sore losers” for president are South Dakota, Mississippi, Ohio and Texas, and there is no precedent on how to interpret Pennsylvania law.
I don’t believe those bans are constitutional, though. The true candidates in November are candidates for presidential elector, and they aren’t sore losers. Presidential candidates’ names on ballots in November are not on the ballot in their capacity as candidates, but as markers or labels for competing slates of presidential elector candidates.
Imagine if we were to abolish presidential candidates names from appearing on the ballot and instead return to listing the names of the individual electors who are running. This would obviously require the district ticket in each state. It is feasible since there would be no more than three electors (1 congressional, 2 at large) per ballot-qualified political party on the ballot, plus a few independents here and there. Perhaps 20 names for president. Each of these folks would have to campaign for themselves. That would take a substantial amount of money out of politics!
The Donkeys would LOVE having Mr. H. run for Prez.
See 1992 and Perot.
One more minority rule Prez – like Clinton in 1992 ??? Duh.
#10 In Texas, it is the independent candidate who files for the presidency. He includes the names of his vice-presidential candidate and the presidential electors, along with their authorization.
In 1980, Texas had a May primary, and John Anderson did not appear on the Republican ballot.
Huntsman would actually be a great candidate. Too bad that the Ron Paul army will end up voting in Paul Senior as AE’s candidate despite whatever platform or important issues are identified by the AE delegates to focus on.
SWP (Socialist Workers Party) says that they SWP have a constitutional (freedom of association and free speech) right to use the state SOS and boards of elections certified election ballot(s) — i.e. NYS-BOE — to place knowingly ineligible candidates for POTUS on the general ballot.
Richard will blog the story see “The Militant” http://www.themilitant.com/2011/7524/752450.html
#15, I hope to see a copy of the SWP court filing.