13 possible US presidents !?

daveza

daveza

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During a period of boredom I researched the US 2008 elections.

Lo and behold McCain and Obama aren't the only candidates.

I had a vague recollection of Ralph Nadir - but apart from him there are 10 other candidates standing for president.

A prize to anyone outside of America ( and probably in America too ) who could name these candidates and the parties they stand for.

The full list:- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_third_party_presidential_candidates

One question - why do they bother ?
 
daveza said:
One question - why do they bother ?
Click to expand...
Because they do have an impact on the election.
Independents get votes that would normally go to the two big dogs and research has shown that election results have been influenced by this.

Would you prefer all opposition parties withraw in SA because only the ANC can win?
 
zeb said:
Would you prefer all opposition parties withdraw in SA because only the ANC can win?
Click to expand...

Not at all.

But apart from Nadir and Barr who may get 5% of the vote in total.... and in fact Nadir may have cost the dems the 2000 election which gave us the Bush years.

The SA system can't be compared to the US ' two party state '. Our 'opposition parties ' have a considerable impact.
 
The 2 big parties are sometimes limited in what they say and how they attack each other, and these other candidates are sometimes used as proxys for the bigger parties to get messages across they don't want to use in their own campaigns.
Say for instance the Republicans want to say that Obama is a radical pro Muslim blah blah, they would get either directly or indirectly one of the other candidates to portray that message.
Also, even though none of the names mean anything to you, they may have influence in the state they come from, and it could be enough to swing the vote in that state.
Whereas these candidates probably have zero chance in becoming a passenger on airforce 1, they still have more than enough influence.

With the USA IQ borderline average, it would be interesting to see what would happen if there was an independent called Barak McCain....
 
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