Taken form a closed thread I was perusing:

Quote:

There are a great many viable candidates out there, but without money and press, their words are worth nothing.

This thought process baffles me. Just dissecting the sentence, the whole thought pattern fails any test of logical coherency.

1) A "viable candidate" is, by definition, someone who stands a realistic chance of winning.

2) You CAN NOT win, or stand a realistic chance of doing so, without converting the people to your cause.

3) In order to win, a candidate needs money and press capable of delivering their message to the masses.

Conclusion: A candidate lacking in money and press (or a backer that can provide them) is not, and can not be, what would be considered a "viable" candidate.


It's got absolutely NOTHIGN to do with maintaining (or being happy with) the Status quo, and EVERYTHING to do with understanding that impact on individuals here and there is utterly meaningless in the face of the sheer numbers present in the population centers of this country and the fact that we live in a "sound bite culture", where the numbers of people that DON'T BOTHER with the research very simply hideously outnumber those that do.....


Discuss. I need to see some other takes on this. I am INTENSELY discouraged with what I see as the failure of those that truly care about this nation to realize this. I'm sick and tired of my fellow conservative or libertarian minded folks going after each other via fifteen different candidate, and spreading themselves so thin that they have minimal impact at best. It's time to GET A GRIP people, and understand the numbers we're up against here......

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Obama is no more the Anti-Christ than George Bush is Sauron, sending his armies into Iraq searching for the One Ring.....

Dwarven gravitational theory states that enough ale will make anything fall down.

Madness does not always howl. Sometimes, it is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, "Hey, is there room in your head for one more?"

I think the person that originally posted that thought meant "viable candidate" as in someone that could actually make a difference for the people voting not the authority that supports and makes the media present the candidates that would keep the elites agendas in a good light.

Obviously voting people that are aware of an elite would not find the candidates they support as viable.

Again, though....if you can't win, then, in the "big scheme of things"....the candidate is simply not viable, and their impact is GOING to be neglibgible in practical terms.

It's got absolutely NOTHING to do with any sort of "eliteness" or portrayal of agendas or what have you, it's s simple function of the mechanics of numerical superiority.

I've tried to mention this same kind of sentiment in threads as well.

To apply this to Presidential elections a bit, if you look back at third party candidates over the last, oh, fifty years or so, you see that even the best qualified and best financed third party candidate stood little chance to win. The best being, of course Perot in 1992 and Wallace in 1968. Perot took almost 19% of the vote in '92 and Wallace 13.5% in '68. Pretty good, but since 1952 only four other candidates have managed to get over 1% (Schmitz in 1972 - 1.4%, Anderson in 1980 - 6.6%, Perot in 1996 - 8.4% and Nader in 2000 - 2.7%).

Like was mentioned above, the common complaint is that these third party candidates get no press and no money. Those are valid arguments, I guess. But the other side of the coin is this, take the balloon boy story a couple of weeks ago. Nobody had ever heard of those people, really, until that time and then they are everywhere. Everyone was talking about them, even if it was to say they were morons or whatever.

If a third party candidate had a message that was clear enough and different enough, he could get through. If the candidate was indded viable, had better ideas, I think he would get the press. People give the press way too much credit sometimes. You can manipulate them rather easily, Obama does it, Simon Cowell does it, when I worked in local public relations, WE did it on a local scale.

I'm not saying the Republicans and Democrats are the answer. But, if you are going to change the system, you will have to change it within the context of the two party system, at this point. There is too much power involved for a third party to get any kind of traction at this point. That might change, I don't know, but as it is now, that's the way I see it.

It's also why I voted for McCain despite my lack of enthusiasm for his campaign in 2008. He was the best chance to beat Obama.

Another argument that is laughable is the "I refuse to vote for the lesser of two evils" argument. It simply doesn't make sense.

For me, I look at the candidates, which one do I think is best and if that's a guy that absolutely can't win, I go with the next best guy. For instance, if a guy was running for, I don't know, let's say dog catcher here locally and I really sided with the guy on the issues, whatever those may be, but in this guys personal life he has had issues that would hurt him in the election and I felt he wasn't going to win, I'm going to look for the guy that can...

A lot of third party candidates I might agree with, but they can't win, not now. So, I'm putting my vote behind the guy that I agree with most and think has a shot at getting something done.

That's my 14 cents. I say 14 because that looks like a lot more than 2 cents.

To a certain extent it's money and press that get a candidate noticed,
but it's not the whole story. Frankly, I think the biggest reason that
a liberty minded candidate usually gets no traction is that Americans
are no longer liberty minded. Reagan was the last conservative
candidate that the Republican Party ran, and they have been moving to
left ever since. Why? Because the country is moving to the left.

Personally, I have no faith left in any party or candidate. It's disheartening.

Unfortunately, i'm with Tallt and it's depressing. Bush was raked for taking away our liberties but Obama has raped them and no one hardly squeaks. But that's a different subject.

It dont mean nothign to me!

I don't think the country is moving left. I think what is happening is, and this could be where a third party candidate could take advantage of this, the Democratic Party is moving left, and to take more of the middle, or attempt to, the Republican Party is moving to the center.

There is a group in the middle that wants strong national defense but a more liberal approach to domestic issues. They are being abandoned by the Democrats and the Republican Party of twenty years ago wasn't the place for them, but as some are absorbed into the party you end up with Republicans that are pro choice and the like.

I'm not sure people are more liberal today than they ever were and to be clear, I don't agree with the Republican strategy, you can't let go of core principals to gain mass appeal...

There may be some leftward sway, but by and large I don't see the country moving farther left. My opinion, of course.

I'm not sure I necessarily agree with the American people turning leftwards. I still believe this is a center-right nation, conservative or libertarian that is. Electing Obama was a momentary lapse in judgement and was just needed to remind the American people why limited government is better. I mean, recently, I read an article about having trouble filling up a room for a fundraiser for the governor in Massachusetts. In Massachusetts. It doesn't get worse than that for a Democrat, or even liberalism(Or socialism as it now is) in general. Also, a recent poll came out by Rasmussen Reports showing that Republicans are trusted on the top 10 issues more than Democrats, which includes abortion, healthcare, and education.

That's not too say I support Republicans. Same as Tall, I can't stand Republicans anymore because of their complete hypocrisy. Up in New York there's a Conservative Party member has overtaken the Republican easily and now it's down to him and the Democrat. In Virginia, the swing state that went to Obama, the Democrat running for governor, who Obama has campaigned for, is about to be beaten like a rented mule. And in New Jersey, there's a Republican running a good race. And these aren't these liberal or moderate ones, they're truly limited government people.

The Republicans are as much a problem as the democrats. I would support a third party, but I'd just hope the republican party as a whole can just remember why they won so big in 1994 and why they lost in 2006.

We can get away from the socialism, Obama has tainted it with all the other democrats, he's was just voted in for having a fancy voice and the last administration was horrible, like Carter.

Something interesting, Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party Presidential candidate from the 40s said "The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But, under the name of ‘liberalism’, they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”

Much of the nation is still conservative. But, from inside the schools, our students are being taught more and more the more leftist ways. Education is where any change starts, and our future generations are being taught that the Gov't. is the answer to everything, that your money is my money, that ethics and morality do not matter, and that the environment is more important than human life. I may not have been a substitute teacher for long, but I have seen this over and over--even in my local high school that is in a rural community here in the Bible belt.

In this day and age, I don't buy that candidates need money and "press." Especially since traditional press is on its way to an overhaul (is in the midst of one).

If this government is one that is based on a representative basis, than viable candidates, IMO, should only have to meet the criteria of having a following (with tangible leadership ability). I think there still needs to be a sense of unity among parties, but that's just lost to people these days.

But then, I didn't vote so feel free to ignore my position as that has become common policy among people.

I've been debating for awhile about whether to enter this thread and post my thoughts, since it's kinda' my statement that's up for discussion here, but so as to make clear what I was actually saying, and why I feel that it IS the truth, I figured I'd take the opportunity to make at least one post. Take it apart if you will, but I just want to make sure my thoughts are absolutely clear.

exo wrote:

Taken form a closed thread I was perusing: Quote: There are a great many viable candidates out there, but without money and press, their words are worth nothing. This thought process baffles me. Just dissecting the sentence, the whole thought pattern fails any test of logical coherency. 1) A "viable candidate" is, by definition, someone who stands a realistic chance of winning. 2) You CAN NOT win, or stand a realistic chance of doing so, without converting the people to your cause. 3) In order to win, a candidate needs money and press capable of delivering their message to the masses. Conclusion: A candidate lacking in money and press (or a backer that can provide them) is not, and can not be, what would be considered a "viable" candidate. It's got absolutely NOTHIGN to do with maintaining (or being happy with) the Status quo, and EVERYTHING to do with understanding that impact on individuals here and there is utterly meaningless in the face of the sheer numbers present in the population centers of this country and the fact that we live in a "sound bite culture", where the numbers of people that DON'T BOTHER with the research very simply hideously outnumber those that do.....

You're right Exo. To use the word "viable" was a poor choice on my part, but as it was in the midst of a heated discussion, I'll hope you can forgive that error. When I said viable, I was referring to someone whose thoughts and ideas could very well resonate with the American People, if said people had the knowledge of that candidate. How many candidates run for office every year? One? Two? Ten? Twenty? Why then, does the news media only focus on the three or four at the top of the two major parties? I'm not going to go the route of some and claim it's because they're in the pockets of the major parties. That's just silly. What I DO believe, however, is that these people are covered because their campaigns are the ones that create the greatest amount of sensationalism, which we all know is the lifeblood on which today's media thrives.

Now that said, you're right that there is a huge problem when third-party candidates keep in the shadows during the two/three years between election cycles, only to come out of the woodwork during the cycles. It is a mistake to claim that you've got a great alternative who has only just come on the scene...

But I don't think this is about (as some here would claim) a message that resonates with the people. Look at Gallup! Congressional approval (that is, approval of the two major parties) is lower than thirty percent! The latest Rasmussen poll shows that only twenty-nine percent of people strongly approve of the Obama Administration's job performance. Thirty-three percent, that is, only one in three, believe that our nation is headed in the right direction. So obviously, neither party, Republican OR Democrat, has the answers, and everyone knows it.

People need to wake up and do their own research, but they're not going to, and the news media will continue to focus on the candidates that draw the biggest cheers and biggest jeers, which is why Ron Paul got the little screen time that he did...

Anyway... That's about all I can think of at the moment. I'd be happy to discuss my line of thinking with Exo or anyone else who is *really* interested.

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No, FSW, I think you understand what I'm getting at perfectly well....You understand what it takes to get into office. What I have trouble comprehending is people's blind insistence on "if such and such would happen, then so and so would have a chance...", when it is PLAINLY demonstrable that the requisite circumstances very plainly ARE NOT going to happen.

I mean if "your guy" needs a special set of circumstances to have an impact, he's not viable. if he doesn't have the force of personality or message or the allies to MAKE those circumstances happen, he's inneffectual. anc folks that continually throw their support behind such candidates in essence render themselves and their own voices inneffectual. You're nto really accomplishing anything but to embolden more folks into supporting "their" guy (who is equally inneffectual), and any potential for real world change and impact ends up spread thin like a cobweb. Sure, they know it's there, but they don't pay it mu ch attention, and simply knock it out of the way........

BTW, i'm unsure exactly WHO authored the phrase that set me thinking, and franly, I'm not concerend with "who".....it's themindset that boggles me, simply because I don't understand how people can NOT see the "real world" impact of the process.....

I'm not seeing this center/right move.