Third Party Watch

The official Press Release:

The Green Party of the United States will offer a sharp rebuttal to President Bush’s January 31 State of the Union address and also to the Democratic Party’s responses to the President’s speech.

Representatives of the Green Party will emphasize the party’s demands to bring U.S. troops home from Iraq immediately and for [...]

This article by Alvaro Vargas Llosa sheds some light on the Libertarian Movement’s rapid and stunning success in Costa Ricas. Llosa is a Senior Fellow and director of The Center on Global Prosperity at the Independent Institute. He is also the author of Liberty for Latin America.

The rise of the Libertarian Movement [...]

From The Contra Costa Times…

An appeals court Thursday dismissed a Libertarian Party activist’s legal challenge to federal airport regulations requiring passengers to show identification before they can board planes.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected claims by millionaire John Gilmore, an early employee of Sun Microsystems Inc., that the policy constituted an illegal search [...]

It looks like anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan is considering a run for US Senate, but there’s no mention of the Green or Libertarian parties… it seems that everyone is looking for her to make a Democratic primary challenge to Dianne Feinstein.

From KESQ:

Cindy Sheehan says she’s considering running against Senator Dianne Feinstein to protest what she [...]

News of a pair of recent ballot access victories in New York and Texas come to us from Ballot Access News.

In New York:

On January 27 (Friday), late in the day, U.S. District Court Judge John Gleeson declared unconstitutional the ballot access requirements for candidates seeking a place on major party primaries, for the office of [...]

One of the better “reformist” Libertarian blogs around, Liberty for Sale, has gotten quite a nice facelift.

http://www.libertyforsale.com

New polling numbers today look good for the Libertarians in the Costa Rican Presidential election that will be held next Sunday. If a candidate captures more than 40% of the vote then there will be no run-off.

That looks highly possible since…

Óscar Arias Sánchez could once again win the presidential election in Costa Rica, according [...]

This is a bit of disappointing news…

From the SF Chronicle:

Marijuana advocate and former gubernatorial candidate Steve Kubby, a fugitive for several years, was arrested at San Francisco International Airport on Thursday night on a plane that arrived from Canada, San Francisco police said.

Kubby co-authored “Why Marijuana Should Be Legal” with marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal and [...]

Over the next week or two I’m cleaning out some old boxes I have in my closet. I’ll be posting a bunch of auctions on eBay and I figured I might as well share them with the readers of this blog as well. Some third party political items will probably work their way [...]

Aaron Russo’s new film is called “America: From Freedom to Fascism” and it will be screened twice this weekend in Arizona.

The official Press Release:

Aaron Russo cut a swath through the entertainment industry as a club owner, concert promoter, manager and award-winning producer of such film hits as “The Rose,” “Trading Places” and “Teachers.” His latest [...]

This article in the Billings Gazette lays out what will be a bitter re-running of the Montana State House race that Rick Jore lost by only a few votes in 2004.

Jeanne Windham and Rick Jore, whose recount of the 2004 vote in House District 12 was decided by the state Supreme Court, both plan to [...]

This will be the final Canada-related story for a while… I promise.

From the CBC…

The only MP who will sit as an Independent in the next session of Parliament is a controversial former Quebec City radio host known to his fans as King Arthur.

André Arthur won the riding of Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier with almost 40 per [...]

Conservative Party site
5,370,903 votes for 308 candidates, won 124 seats (gain of 26)

Liberal Party site
4,477,217 votes for 308 candidates, won 103 seats (loss of 30)

New Democratic Party site
2,590,808 votes for 308 candidates, won 29 seats (gain of 10)

Bloc Québécois site
1,552,043 votes for 75 candidates, won 51 seats (loss of 2)

Green Party site
665,940 [...]

I just received this email from someone claiming to have been the National Chairman of the American Patriot Party. I say “claiming” because the group seemed to be so fractured that I’m not really sure who was in charge.

Notice:

The National Office of the American Patriot Party has closed. Lack of funds and increasing [...]

From CTV’s live streaming newscast, currently leading or elected…

Conservatives – 120 seats
Liberals – 97 seats
Bloc Quebecois – 50 seats
New Democrats – 25 seats
Independent – 1 seat

The Green who was apparently leading earlier tonight has fallen behind.

With early and incomplete results streaming in from around Canada it appears that, at this moment, the Conservatives have defeated the sitting Liberal government. Additionally, one independent and one Green Party candidate are leading in their races.

More updates to follow…

Will the Liberal government fall to a new Conservative one? Will the Greens with their first seat? How will the NDP and Bloc do?

Should be an interesting one. We’ll have some early results after 10pm Eastern time.

It looks like Michael Badnarik’s Congressional campaign has already raised a whole lot of money… and spent almost all of it.

The latest campaign finance report filed with the FEC covers the period up to December 31st.

Since entering the race, the Badnarik campaign has raised an impressive $83,624.79. Of that, the campaign had net operating [...]

If you’re thinking of attending this year’s Libertarian Party national convention you’ll be pleased to know that the convention’s official website has been launched.

Check it out at:
http://www.lpconvention.org

Ok, so this is actually stolen from Ron Gunzburger’s Politics1 “Site of the Day” for today… but it’s very much worth mentioning.

The Libertarian Party’s candidate for governor of Minnesota has an excellent campaign website.

Whoever is running the website and graphic design elements of her campaign needs to be promptly hired by every other major Libertarian [...]

It appears that the Minnesota Independence Party has lost State Senator Sheila Kiscaden to the Democrats.

From Ballot Access News:

On January 8, Minnesota State Senator Sheila Kiscaden changed her membership from the Independence Party to the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party. She had been elected to the State Senate as the Independence Party nominee in 2002. She will run [...]

Republican State Senator and 2005 independent gubernatorial candidate Russ Potts came within a single vote of losing his committee chairmanship as some within in his own party attempted to exact revenge on him.

From The Daily Press:

State Sen. Russ Potts, who enraged fellow Republicans with his feisty but failed campaign for governor, narrowly survived a revenge [...]

Several days ago we brought you the story of a Democratic city councilman in Burlington, Vermont who was seriously considering an independent big for mayor. Now it appears that Andy Montroll will remain a Democrat and not run as an independent in this election.

The article from the Burlington Free Press:

City Councilor Andy Montroll won’t [...]

I just wanted to remind everyone that the LP’s new online training tool, the Libertarian Leadership School, is still registering people for classes.

Even if you’re not planning to run for office this year… or heck, even if you aren’t a Libertarian… this looks to be a really good experience for anyone who wants to brush [...]