Libertarian Party presidential nominee Bob Barr may be the spoiler candidate in 2008 winning enough votes that Republicans think should be theirs to cost John McCain the election leading to a Barack Obama win. Many polls are showing Obama winning the early voting by the high single digits, but the Republicans fabled 72-hour project had not kicked in, and the same polls show McCain pulling even with Obama among those who have not voted. Politics1.com gives all of the "undecided" vote to McCain. Obama's poll numbers have dropped after his paid infomercial, and McCain's campaign has belatedly gained its stride.

As Rasmussen put it in their May poll including Nader and Barr, "Rasmussen Reports does not typically include the names of minor third party candidates because early polls tend to dramatically overstate their ultimate level of support. However, it is occasionally useful to review the possibilities and explore what impact these candidates might have on determining the next resident of the White House." In their latest poll, Rasmussen says 2% plan to vote for a minor party presidential candidate. That vote will not be harmonized evenly across the country and will have a determing effect in some states as Rasmussen explained.

Here is a look at some of the states where the minor party candidates may play a role deciding who gets sworn in as president in January:

In North Carolina, a Civitas poll (October 27-30) gives Obama the edge over McCain 47% to 46% with Barr getting 3% of the vote (up 2 points from their previous poll).

In Indiana, a Survey USA poll (October 27-30), puts the state tied at 47% each for McCain and Obama with Barr getting 2%. The Republican leanings of the state helps McCain, but Obama leads with independents. The votes for Barr are likely to be greater than the vote difference between the two major party candidates.

All of the candidates have devoted a lot of attention to the bellweather state of Ohio. Most polls put the state in the tossup category with Obama having a slight lead. Rasmussen (October 26th) and Ohio Newspaper Organization (October 18-22) polls both give Nader 2% and Barr 1% of the vote (with 0% going to McKinney). The Ohio Newspaper poll also gives Nader and Barr their best support from 30-45 year olds, high school graduates, with 3% of those earning $40-60,000 a year going to Barr and 3% of Ohioans earning less than $20,000 supporting Nader. Barr does best in rural Southeast Ohio at 4% with Nader pulling 4% in Northwest Ohio.

In Barr's native state of Georgia, Obama's only chance of winning is for Barr to poll a significant number--which may happen. Insider Advantage (October 27th) gives McCain a one point lead with Barr also getting 1%. Strategic Vision (October 20-22) gives Barr 2% of the vote. Survey USA (October 11-12) gives "other" 4% (up 2% from their previous poll) pulling 5% from liberals and conservatives and 11% from independents.

A Montana State University poll (October 16-20) gave Ron Paul 4.2%, Barr 1.0% and Nader 0.7%. Ron Paul is also on the ballot in Louisiana.

There are other states with demonstrable minor party support. Barr is getting 1.3% in Texas, University of Texas (October 15-22). A Suffolk University poll (October 27-29) in New Hampshire gives Barr and Nader 1% each (McKinney gets no support).

USAElectionPolls.com also lists September state polls for Barr, Nader and McKinney. Barr averaged 4% in Missouri and Colorado, 3% in Virginia, Pennsylvania and Nevada, 2.5% in Florida, 2% in Iowa and New Mexico, and 1% in Michigan and Wisconsin. Nader averaged 3% in Wisconsin, 2.5% in Indiana and Florida, 2% in Nevada, 1.5% in North Carolina, and 1% in Iowa and Missouri. Although McKinney did not register any measurable support in any October state polls, she averaged 1% in Ohio, Florida, North Carolina and Indiana in September. The site added a placeholder for Chuck Baldwin, but there were never any polls for them to add to his page.

Speaking of geography, the Republicans are offering an all Western ticket (Arizona and Alaska) against the all Eastern Democratic one (Illinois and Delaware)--but the Libertarians have a balanced one (Georgia and California).

These four states of North Carolina, Indiana, Ohio and Georgia have a combined total of 61 electoral college votes--more than California and Nevada combined. Montana, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota, Virginia and Florida may also tilt one or another based on minor party totals.

If the election is close and Obama wins, it will likely be because of the support Barr garnered from votes Republicans will think McCain should have one. If there is an Obama electoral landslide, it will certainly be aided by Barr's strong showing. Aside from introducing an untold number to the Libertarian Party, Barr's possible two million votes would be the most significant LP victory ever.

J. Bradley Jansen was a legislative staffer for U.S. Congressman Ron Paul from 1997-2001. He is director of the Center for Financial Privacy and Human Rights of the Liberty and Privacy Network (but views expressed here are his own), which is part of Bob Barr's Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances.

Reader Comments:

Posted By: HLM
Date: 2008-11-02 11:14:35

What rubbish! First, there is no LP candidate from California. Second, this is the first time the LP is running two candidates who aren't explicitly libertarian but conservatives. 

 Finally, the analysis is crap. Barr is a non-entity in this election. He destroyed the party base by chasing many real libertarians out of the party. He brought in conservatives only interested in hurting the Republicans to make them go to the far Right where Barr resides. He raised very little money, less than less-known real libertarians who have been nominated. He's misstated libertarian positions repeatedly (advocating state rights over individual rights for instance). And, in general, he's run a pathetic campaign.

 My quess is that he'll be lucky to reach 0.5% of the vote on election day. This libertarian, a former LP candidate, is staying home this time and Barr was the main inspiration for that. He's probably euthanized the party. 

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-02 17:20:42

HML,

If you're going to use your comments as therapy, fine, but my facts are right: WAR is registered in California.  You have not made one factual correction to my analysis.  I, and many hundreds of thousands of other libertarian Americans, did not vote for Badnarik but will be voting for Barr.  

We appreciate having a credible alternative this year.  That said, I do not agree with all of the campaign's decisions--but no one ever agrees with all of any campaign's decisions.  The Barr campaign staff (for all of their faults) have run a better campaign than Ron Paul's presidential misadventure.

Report violation

---

Posted By: ken
Date: 2008-11-03 05:15:09

All this is coming out as I predicted.

The real story is Libertarians giving Obama the election.

Unfortunately, the right-wing LNC deliberately set out to destroy the affiliates. About half of the state affiliates are non-functional.

Smith is no LP stalwart. her website included calls for universal healthcae re and attacks on ‘libertarian anarchism,’ which is the conservative-LRC codeword for any position they don’t like based on a voluntary approach. badnarik was the same, and helped introduce barr to the party, so all this is suspect.

Barr is doing in polls as well or worse as Badnarik.

Now Barr has done a radio interview where he calls for women to be executed for abortions, including raped children, apparently. Goodbye, LP women.

Libertarians are voting Obama in this election. Many are saying better a weak ally than a traitor who stabs you in the back. Even the Economist is writing about it, though there is total silence on the LP controlled groups and blogs.

Report violation

---

Posted By: Ian Woofenden
Date: 2008-11-03 08:18:25

The flaw I see in this discussion is the assumption that any candidate owns any vote.

 

If voters choose Barr, Baldwin, or Donald Duck, they have not taken a vote that belongs to any other candidate, nor have they given the election to any other candidate.

 

Obama does not own Nader's votes, nor does McCain own Barr's votes. Free elections mean that people get to choose who they vote for.

 

The concept of  "spoiler" assumes that the two-party plutocracy is a given, a right, and the norm. If I believed in conspiracies, I'd wonder if the Dems and Repubs had gotten together secretly to coin the term and send press releases and articles like this to the press.

 

We will never get beyond our two-party facade (really one government party) if we continue to think and write this way. We need other parties to break out. We need coalitions to form. We need 34 percent of the vote for less government, less war, less empire, and more individual freedom of choice. We could make a great start by stopping this non-sensical "spoiler" rhetoric.

Report violation

---

Posted By: EM of the GOP
Date: 2008-11-03 10:43:00

After what my party the GOP did to Ron Paul, we deserve to loose.

I hope that the GOP Neocons enjoy the country that they have left their/our children.

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-03 12:05:22

RCP currently lists these states as tossups (with Barr's support in parentheses): Arizona (7% in June), Montana (1% October), North Dakota (no data), Missouri (4% in September), Indiana (2% October), Ohio (1% October), Virginia (3% September), North Carolina (2% October), Georgia (1.7 October) and Florida (2.5 September).

Polling for Barr are monthly averages taken from USAElectionPolls.com.

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-03 13:05:02

Latest poll (PPP) for Georgia put Barr at 2% which is the difference between McCain and Obama.  Barr gets the support from 1% of whites, 2% of African-Americans, and 4% of "other" as well as 1% each from Democrats and Republicans and 5% from Other, and 5% of 18-29 year olds. 

The 4% the LP candidate for the senate in Georgia will likely cause a runoff next month.

The PPP poll for North Carolina shows Barr swinging the state to Obama with Obama up 50% to McCain's 49% and Barr at 1% (Barr's support is 0% from Dems, 1% from Rs and 3% from other).  Reuters has McCain up 49% to Obama's 48% with 3% for other/not sure.  

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_NC_1103173.pdf

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-03 14:36:30

AP analysis of Barr possibly tipping Georgia:

Two polls show a surprisingly tight race. One from Mason-Dixon Polling and Research Inc., sponsored by NBC, shows McCain with a lead of 6 percentage points among the state's likely voters. A CNN/Time/Opinion Research poll has McCain up 5 percentage points. When the pool of voters is widened to include registered voters, Obama grabs a 3 percentage point lead.
The CNN poll also shows Barr, the Libertarian Party nominee and a former Georgia congressman, drawing up to 4 percentage points.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iK4dJ-HsUqmliefIvmdG6W7sJANQD945L7SG0

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-03 14:44:08

WND has a long article on Barr who claims he's not a spoiler:

http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=79923

 The article points out that in states like Indiana (and there are others as outlined in this article here) where the support for Barr will be larger than the vote differential between Obama and McCain.

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-03 15:04:35

Rasmussen, which generally does not include third party choices in their polls, puts several states as tied (Ohio, Missouri) or within one point (Florida, North Carolina) or McCain and Obama.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/fox_rasmussen_polling/fox_rasmussen_swing_state_polling_november_2_2008

Report violation

---

Posted By: Bradley in DC
Date: 2008-11-04 00:48:12

Thanks to BAN, Utah 5-Candidate Presidential Poll
On November 1, a Deseret News/KSL-TV presidential poll was released. It is based on 1,205 voters, sampled between October 24 and October 30. Results: McCain 57%, Obama 32%, Baldwin 2%, Barr 1%, Nader 1%, undecided or refused 7%.

In 2004, the presidential vote in Utah had been: Republican 71.5%, Democratic 26.0%, Nader (independent) 1.2%, Constitution .7%, Libertarian .4%.

Report violation

---

Posted By: Chris Baker
Date: 2008-11-04 21:58:36

Barr definitely is not a spoiler. Like all previous LP candidates, he was completey irrelevant.

 

Report violation

---