Good Morning!

Birthday weekend continues in TriSec Land....today is young Javi's birthday, and then we're off to see Brother Trisec (07/30) and his daughter (08/06) for a big blowout this afternoon...

But before things really get rolling, I wanted to take a brief look at a candidate for the presidency. You've probably got right-wing relatives. (heh, don't we all?). The likelihood is that they'll never come to the light, but if you talk to them without shouting, I bet you'll find they're not very happy with the party's selection this year.

We have a third-party candidate that's been making some inroads...the Libertarian Party has nominated former Georgia Republican Bob Barr for the presidency. However, the choice is not without controversy. Many hardcore Libertarians were up in arms over the selection; some viewed him as a carpetbagger and opportunist without any serious LP credibility. "The Powers", on the other hand, wanted a big name with recognition, in what others have called a last-ditch effort for relevance. (Disclaimer; TriSec belonged to neither wing of the party...I was supporting George Phillies for a time, but eventually got on board with Senator Obama).

Well, the wonder is that the party leadership may have been right. Bob Barr is polling in the 6-10% range nationally, and in some states has started to affect the Republican Nominee. If you haven't yet, check out Random's Blog Pool, but don't look at the two big names. Check out that yellow line at the bottom. For most states, it's been constant, but notice that whenever the yellow line bumps up, the red line bumps down?

But Bob Barr faces two challenges that don't affect the mainstream candidates. The first is ballot access. Because the major parties poll more than that magic 10%, they're granted automatic access in all 50 states. All third parties face a mountain of restrictive access laws (enacted by the major parties, why would they want to make it easier to vote them out?) most of which include some kind of signature requirement. The Libertarian party candidate currently appears on 33 of 50 state ballots, but clearly more effort is needed. I'm not counting on a President Obama to change the status quo...

The second, of course, is media coverage. I don't have to tell you that the major candidates are dominating the news cycle (at least until the torch was lit last night, now we'll get to see perky young pre-adolescent girls for the next two weeks [/squeezy]. Anyway, I checked "Google News" and there have only been 8 stories about Bob Barr since August 1. I think we get about 8 stories a second for the other two guys. I really don't know what Mr. Barr can do about that, short of becoming a mass-murderer, or maybe running naked through the halls of congress, or things of this nature. But that would put a damper on the campaign, wouldn't it?



Anyway...back to Bob Barr. I married into a Republican family (it always happens that way) and my father-in-law in particular is heavily involved in the state party and is a large donor. (During the 2004 campaign, they purposely displayed a framed picture of The "President" and Mrs. Bush and put up an award he had received a while back just to irritate me. (they both disappeared after the election.). Well, this year they just received their picture of Senator and Mrs. McCain....but mum-in-law doesn't want to put it up because "I can't stand him."

So....with every chance I get, I've been talking up Bob Barr to them. We're getting a wee bit complacent in the Obama camp, and we should maybe think about a different tactic to use on those hard-core friends and family that are Republicans. I'm certainly not advocating campaigning for Bob Barr, but every time they tell you something bad about McCain....mention Bob Barr.

To that end, I was planning on a side-by-side comparison today highlighting some of the differences between Barr and McCain (and Obama, too!) but since this has gone on a different tack, I'll save that for another day.

:peace: