Have the Libertarians put forward any candidates for the 2008 election? Michael Badnarik ran in 2004 but I haven’t seen nor heard anything about a 2008 nominee.
– IG
The party’s website lists a number of libertarians running for various offices throughout the country. There is no mention of anyone running for president yet. My guess is that they don’t have anyone running at the moment.
Wayne Allyn Root has declared his candidacy for the Libertarian nomination. Poker player Greg Raymer is running for the VP slot although I’m unsure how coordinated their campaigns are.
Not an LP insider so this may not be inclusive. Nor do I know whether any of these folks are serious or not. But if you do a google search, I am sure you can find campaign websites.
Wayne Allyn Root
Steve Kubby
George Phillies
Christine Smith
Barry Hess
There won’t be a candidate until the LP convention in Denver. But as I understand it, its not all that hard to get in. Not sure what it takes to be a delegate and help choose the nominee yourself.
If you’re talking small-l libertarians, rather than capital-L Libertarians, then Ron Paul probably fits the bill.
They had Ron Paul in 1988 who at the time was (and of course is again) a GOP Congressman. Aaron Russo (not a household name, but a reasonably successful Hollywood producer) ran in 2004 but lost the nomination to Badnarik.
By and large, the nominees have been Libertarian true believers, not celebrities of any sort. I don’t know of anyone with a big name that has expressed any interest in being an LP candidate.
Seems to me they would do well to nominate Ron Paul again. He has received a lot of good press via the Republican debates. He would surely do better than some no-name apparatchik.
Of course, I have an ulterior motive. I would like to see a Libertarian candidate capable of bleeding off some Republican votes, just as the Green Party did to the Democrats in '00.
They can’t nominate him if he doesn’t seek their nomination. Well they can, but there is no indication that he would accept it. And it might be embarassing to have him publicly reject a nomination that he didn’t seek.
Perhaps after the Republican process plays itself out, he can come back and say that he is interested. But he still has to run for re-election to Congress (unless he has decided to pack it in) and I am sure that he would rather do that as a Republican in a nice safe Republican district than as a Libertarian.
That’s what back channels are for!
Howard Stern ran as a Libertarian candidate at one point. But it was for Governor of New York not for President.