Can The Two Party System Come To An End?

The two party system is seriously broken when we were given a choice as terrible as Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton for president. More people voted for third  parties in 2017 than in other recent elections which lacked a big name candidate, but others see third party voting as futile. It is a sign that the two party system might be due to collapse when an establishment writer such as David Brooks writes a column about The End of the Two-Party System.

While I don’t entirely accept his rational for this, it is clear that both parties are divided. True conservatives don’t fit into a party led by Donald Trump. True liberals and progressives, including many supporters of Bernie Sanders, don’t fit into a party led by an authoritarian right warmonger like Hillary Clinton, or a party which consider her fit for its nomination. Brooks concluded his column writing:

Eventually, conservatives will realize: If we want to preserve conservatism, we can’t be in the same party as the clan warriors. Liberals will realize: If we want to preserve liberalism, we can’t be in the same party as the clan warriors.

Eventually, those who cherish the democratic way of life will realize they have to make a much more radical break than any they ever imagined. When this realization dawns the realignment begins. Even with all the structural barriers, we could end up with a European-style multiparty system.

The scarcity mentality is eventually incompatible with the philosophies that have come down through the centuries. Decent liberals and conservatives will eventually decide they need to break from it structurally. They will realize it’s time to start something new.

We do need something new, regardless of whether it is for the reasons which Brooks discussed.

There are structural barriers as Brooks noted. Earlier this month The New Republic looked at Why America Is Stuck With Only Two Parties:

It wasn’t always like this. There was a time in American politics when it was relatively easy to jump-start a new political party and get it into the mainstream. That was how the Republican Party—the only third party in American history to become a major party—displaced the Whigs (along with several smaller parties) between 1854, when it was founded, and 1860, when it propelled Abraham Lincoln to the presidency.

It took three things to create a party back then: people, money, and ballots. Parties were responsible not only for recruiting and nominating candidates for office, but they also printed and distributed their own ballots (typically with the help of partisan newspaper publishers). Thus, there were very few barriers to entry: Candidates didn’t have to petition to appear on a ballot, and new parties were free to endorse candidates from the more major parties, so their nominees ran less risk of being labeled spoilers. Essentially, parties could contest for power just as soon as they had backers and supporters. This was what happened to the Liberty and Free Soil parties in the nineteenth century: Starting in the mid-1840s, as the two dominant parties—the Whigs and Democrats—hewed to the pro-slavery forces in their ranks, these new formations sprouted quickly and began gathering anti-slavery advocates.

In 1848, Free Soil nominated former President Martin van Buren after the Whigs supported slave owner Zachary Taylor for president, and got 10 percent of the national vote. Crucially, they were able to do this after the Whig convention that summer because there were no legal obstacles to getting him on the ballot. Six years later, in July 1854, the Republican Party held its first convention and swept the Michigan statehouse and executive branch that very same year. By 1856, its presidential candidate John Fremont won a third of the popular vote and 114 electoral votes.

That’s no longer possible: Today, third parties can’t mount their own presidential bids after they learn whom the two major parties have nominated—there simply isn’t enough time between the end of primary season and the general election to gain meaningful ballot access in enough states to win an Electoral College victory. Evan McMullin, the former CIA operative who ran for President in 2016 as an anti-Trump alternative to Hillary Clinton, was only able to get on the ballot in 11 states because he entered the race so late. It would’ve been easier in the 1800s: McMullin wouldn’t have had to collect millions of petition signatures and hire expensive lawyers to get on the ballot.

The article went on to how the two major parties use ballot access to make it difficult for third parties to compete. The two major parties also conspire to prevent competition in other ways, including restricting access to the debates. While true that these are major obstacles, knowledge of how the major parties maintain their monopoly also presents strategies to work at to achieve change.

Ultimately bigger changes such as rank order voting would be helpful. This would enable voters to choose more than one candidate, with their vote transferring to their second choice if their first choice is eliminated. The idea is to allow people to vote for a third party without feeling like they are wasting their vote. Voters might vote for a Green Party candidate first, and then have their vote go to the Democrat next. This pattern might often be seen, but in  2016 I probably would have voted for Jill Stein and then Gary Johnson, only voting for candidates opposed to our pattern of perpetual warfare. It is also hoped that with ranked order voting more people would vote third party, leading to better third party candidates, with them ultimately being able to win.

There are no doubt major obstacles to third parties actually challenging the major parties. It is debatable as to whether this is a better or worse strategy than to try to reform the major parties, but the two strategies are not mutually exclusive. Despite the major obstacles, we are closer to changing the system than at many times in the past. Dissatisfaction with the major parties is at a new high, with many young voters having no affiliation with either. The internet changes the rules, both for fund raising and campaigning, reducing traditional needs for the old party structures. The internet has the potential to alter politics as it has altered a lot of commercial activity.

Even if a third party does not become a major party, third parties have historically had their value in influencing the major parties, which desire their votes. Seeing the loss of votes to a third party could keep the Democrats from continuing to move to the right. On the other hand, people practicing lesser-evilism voting it makes it easier for the major parties to continue on their current path–which led to a choice as terrible as Trump v. Clinton.

Junk Both Major Parties

Jennifer Rubin is right about the Republican Party, but her recommendation to junk the Republican Party applies to both parties. The specifics differ but the general principles apply to either party. The conservative columnist wrote:

I get asked a lot what I think is the future of the Republican Party. These days, with increasing conviction, I say that it doesn’t have one. You need not look beyond the Roy Moore allegations to understand why it’s better just to start from fresh…

I would like to think that Americans have gotten a good look at this Frankenstein-esque party and will repudiate it in 2018 and 2020. I still carry the belief (bolstered by Tuesday’s election) that most Americans have not lost their minds and souls.

Evan McMullin, the independent conservative 2016 presidential candidate, says, “It’s time for the GOP to start over with new leaders, new solutions, new strategies, and a new commitment to basic human decency and American values.” I would add: And a new name, a new logo and …  well, just junk the whole thing. Its brand, as they say, has been tarnished, and virtually none of its political leaders possess the moral judgment and intellectual honesty to hold office in the future.

What will be the excuse for enabling Trump and sticking by Trumpism, for sublimating every other value to tribal protection? The GOP needs the Senate seat. We can’t let the left win. But the Supreme Court! These are not defensible arguments if your highest priorities are democracy, decency and the rule of law. They are the childish arguments of people who see politics as a game in which you always root for the home team.

How could one “rebrand” this, or trust these people again? I find it hard to imagine how. So the future of the GOP? It’s either a nationalist front party or a battleground mostly between Trumpists and strident ultra-right-wingers whose platform (repeal Obamacare; corporate tax cuts; reckless foreign policy that imagines war with Iran and/or North Korea are viable options) is unacceptable to the vast majority of the country. It’s not a civil war in which I’d have a favorite side.

In short, the GOP, I think, is kaput. The real question is what sprouts up to fill some of that space, the ground occupied by those who favor reform conservatism; responsible internationalism; free trade and robust immigration; tolerance and the rule of law; and market economics with an ample safety net. I don’t have the answer. I only know it cannot be the GOP.

While the specific issues might vary, so much of this could be changed to liberals/progressives and the Democratic Party, including in response to liberals who used the Supreme Court as justification for voting for a corrupt warmonger like Hillary Clinton despite how she has spent her career undermining liberal values.

Donald Trump Is President-Elect Because The Democratic Establishment Picked The Wrong Candidate

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Democrats might be doomed to continue to lose if they fail to understand why they lost the 2016 election. Hopefully Clinton aides are not typical of the party as they are now blaming everyone other than their candidate. Politco reports on how they blame James Comey, as well as other factors:

Most Clinton supporters agreed that was part of it. But it wasn’t just that.

So much of the campaign’s energy was spent explaining inherited issues, they said, like the paid speeches Clinton delivered to Wall Street banks, pay-to-play accusations about the Clinton Foundation, and fallout of Clinton’s decision to set up a private email server at the State Department. “They spent their time protecting her, explaining her, defending her, with all these issues, the speeches, the Foundation, the emails — that became the energy of the campaign,” sighed one longtime Clinton confidante.

The paid speeches and the glitzy fundraisers, they said, did not paint a picture of a woman connected to the real suffering in the country. But that, they said, was just who Clinton was after so many years in the spotlight. “Her outlook is, ‘I get whacked no matter what, so screw it,’” explained one longtime confidant. “I’ve been out here killing myself for years and years and if I want to give the same speech everyone else does, I will.”

What the Democratic establishment which rigged the system for Clinton miss is that all of these problems were predictable and should have been considered before giving Clinton the nomination. All of these problems are based upon Clinton’s actual actions. They are not fabrications of the right wing media as Clinton apologists often claim. I was writing blog posts for months before the nomination warning how risky it was to nominate Hillary Clinton. Michael Moore predicted Trump would beat Clinton in July. Among the major reasons was The Hillary Problem:

Our biggest problem here isn’t Trump – it’s Hillary. She is hugely unpopular — nearly 70% of all voters think she is untrustworthy and dishonest. She represents the old way of politics, not really believing in anything other than what can get you elected. That’s why she fights against gays getting married one moment, and the next she’s officiating a gay marriage. Young women are among her biggest detractors, which has to hurt considering it’s the sacrifices and the battles that Hillary and other women of her generation endured so that this younger generation would never have to be told by the Barbara Bushes of the world that they should just shut up and go bake some cookies. But the kids don’t like her, and not a day goes by that a millennial doesn’t tell me they aren’t voting for her. No Democrat, and certainly no independent, is waking up on November 8th excited to run out and vote for Hillary the way they did the day Obama became president or when Bernie was on the primary ballot. The enthusiasm just isn’t there. And because this election is going to come down to just one thing — who drags the most people out of the house and gets them to the polls — Trump right now is in the catbird seat.

Democrats clearly picked the wrong candidate. Bernie Sanders was beating Trump by double digits in head to head polls, while Hillary Clinton was at best barely beating him. If Sanders was the candidate we would not have faced any of these scandals. Bernie Sanders could have attracted the votes of those voting for change, including those voting due to economic anxieties.

Fredrik deBoer wrote in The Washington Post that Bernie Sanders Could Have Won.

Donald Trump’s stunning victory is less surprising when we remember a simple fact: Hillary Clinton is a deeply unpopular politician. She won a hotly contested primary victory against a uniquely popular candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders. In her place, could he have beaten Trump?

That Clinton has unusually high unfavorables has been true for decades. Indeed, it has been a steady fact of her political life. She has annually ranked among the least-liked politicians on the national stage since she was the first lady. In recent years, her low favorability rating was matched only by that of her opponent, animated hate Muppet Donald Trump. In contrast, Sanders enjoys very high popularity, ranking as the most popular senator for two years in a row. Nationally, his favorability rating is more than 10 points higher than Clinton’s, and his unfavorability rating is more than 15 points lower. This popularity would have been a real asset on the campaign trail…

But turnout matters in a close election, and here she suffered significantly compared with President Obama in both 2008 and 2012. In Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties in Michigan, the heart of Detroit’s black voting bloc, Clinton won 55 percent of the vote — compared with 69 percent for Obama in 2012. Meanwhile, it was in Michigan that Sanders won his most shocking primary victory, probably through the same forces that hurt Clinton on Election Day: Her agenda did not seem to offer much hope to those hurt by deindustrialization and outsourcing. We can only guess how much better he might have performed there, or in Ohio and Pennsylvania and Wisconsin (which he also won in a surprising primary upset) had he been the nominee. But there is little doubt now that his success in the Rust Belt was a canary in the coal mine for the Clinton campaign, a now-obvious sign that she was in trouble.

Indeed, turnout overall was a major problem for the Clinton campaign; though not all votes are yet counted, it’s clear that Clinton received millions fewer votes than Obama in several states, while Trump frequently received more than Mitt Romney did in 2012. Nor did Clinton enjoy the benefits of party crossovers. There was much talk of “Clinton Republicans” who would, in the spirit of the Reagan Democrats, cross party lines to oppose Trump. But according to the exit polling of the New York Times, more Democrats crossed over and voted for Trump than Republicans crossed over and voted for Clinton. Sanders, notably, never had trouble drawing crowds, and in the Democratic primary campaign, turnout rebounded from 2012 lows. Whether that rebound was a result of voters’ enthusiasm for Sanders or the opposite is hard to say; what’s clear is that Clinton wasn’t able to get out the vote herself and that she lost both Democrats and independents to Trump, while Sanders had notorious luck with independent voters.

Some Clinton apologists are blaming her loss on third party votes, but most of these votes were not from people who would have ever considered voting for Clinton. Many of those making the argument use bogus assumptions that Clinton would have received the third party vote if they were not on the ballot while Trump was not affected by votes for Gary Johnson and Evan McMullen. In reality Trump lost around the same number of votes to third party candidates as Clinton did.

Aaaron Blake looked at how the math does not support the claims that Stein and Johnson cost Clinton the election. Besides, Clinton was never going to get the votes of most of those who voted for Stein and Johnson. To argue that Clinton could have won with their votes is as nonsensical as saying Clinton could have won if she received the votes of those who voted for Donald Trump. Mathematically true, but the argument makes no sense in the real world.

Those who made the mistake of backing Clinton for the nomination need to learn from their mistake and look at why people felt that Hillary Clinton was too abhorrent to consider voting for. Stein and Johnson were both on the ballot in 2012 but they did not stop Barack Obama from winning. Clinton’s bigger problem were not those who voted for third parties, but Democratic voters who either voted for Trump or stayed home. As Paul Waldman pointed out, “She got 6 million fewer votes than Barack Obama did in 2012, and nearly 10 million fewer than he did in 2008.” That is despite everything we know about Donald Trump.

Hillary Clinton thought she could get people to turn out to vote for her by showing how awful Donald Trump is. Her campaign centered on attacks on Trump, rarely providing any good arguments to support her. While she was right that voters had a low opinion of Trump, she failed to recognize that voters had a comparable view of her. This was a no-win strategy with Clinton as the nominee.

Democratic Elector States He Will Not Vote For Clinton In Electoral College

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An elector in Washington has reminded us of another way in which this strange election year can become even stranger. AP reports that an elector (photo above), who had supported Bernie Sanders, states he will not vote for Hillary Clinton in the electoral college:

A Democratic elector in Washington state said Friday he won’t vote for Hillary Clinton even if she wins the popular vote in his state on Election Day, adding a degree of suspense when the Electoral College affirms the election results next month.

Robert Satiacum, a member of Washington’s Puyallup Tribe, supported Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary. He said he believes Clinton is a “criminal” who doesn’t care enough about American Indians and “she’s done nothing but flip back and forth.”

He said he has wrestled with what to do, but feels that neither Clinton nor Republican Donald Trump can lead the country.

“She will not get my vote, period,” he said in a phone interview with The Associated Press.

Unless Clinton should show a further drop in the polls, I doubt that the electoral college vote will come down to a single vote, but yesterday I did show a plausible scenario in which it was a near tie. This scenario showed a tie or Trump winning by a single vote, but if this is plausible then there are also possibilities in which Clinton wins exactly 270 electoral votes and the loss of one will prevent a victory. If one elector is saying this publically, there is also the possibility of other electors doing the same, in both parties.

Third party candidates also have a  small chance of winning a state, which could prevent a major party candidate from reaching 270 electoral votes. This has been the hope of both Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson, who is very unlikely to win a state, and independent Evan McMullin, who has been polling well in Utah. Some Sanders supporters are also hoping that he can win Vermont on write-in votes, but chances of that are very remote with Sanders not even campaigning.

If no candidates obtain 270 electoral votes, the election will be decided by the House of Representatives, a scenario not seen in the United States since the last season of Veep, or in reality occurring only in the 1800 and 1824 elections. Members of the House can choose between the candidates with the top three number of electors. Supporters of third party candidates, along with some Sanders supporters, hope that members of the House will reject both Trump and Clinton and vote for their candidate, choosing the third place finisher. Someone who receives even a single electoral vote from an elector such as the one in Washington could come in third and be in contention. The vote is by state, coming down to which party dominates each state’s delegation. Republicans will win unless there is a Democratic sweep this year in Congress far beyond what anyone thinks is possible.

While any scenario involving anyone other than Clinton or Trump becoming president is highly unlikely, the most likely of the remote possibilities would be if Johnson or McMullin win a state, or if some Republican electors vote for an establishment Republican such as Mike Pence or Mitt Romney for president. Then there is a remote chance that House Republicans could wind up voting for someone other than Trump. If Republicans are divided, there is also the possibility that Democrats could join in support of a Republican other than Trump.

Update: Think Progress reports that a second elector from Washington has said they might not vote for Clinton. On the one hand, it is understandable that a pro-Clinton site such as this would be very upset by the prospect. On the other hand, Democrats should have thought through the ramifications of nominating a candidate as unfit to be president as Clinton.

Record Number Doing Google Searches For Write-In Voting

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With both major political parties nominating candidates who are unacceptable for the presidency, I’ve noted before that more people than usual are looking at third party candidates this year. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are both ethically unfit to be president, and neither are likely to address major issues such as the expansion the warfare and surveillance state since 9/11. Donald Trump runs as the outsider, but is inconsistent, and often incoherent on the issues, and has unique ethical issues, including a history of assaulting women. Hillary Clinton is much better than Trump on issues of concern to women, but otherwise is the candidate of the neoconservative status quo who would take us back to the horrors of the Bush years, and who epitomizes everything which is rotten in politics.

With the major party choices so poor, CNN reports that many voters are looking at another alternative, write-in votes:

Americans have expressed deep misgivings about both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton throughout the course of the presidential race. This week, their distaste is showing up in their search behavior.

Google Trends data indicates that the online searches for “write-in” surged over the last week by more than 2,800%, hitting a record high since 2004. The states with the highest rates of search are not battlegrounds, but Republican and Democratic strongholds…

Related searches to “write-in,” according to Google Trends, largely focus on two politicians, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Pence, the Indiana Republican. Searches for “is Bernie Sanders a write in candidate” spiked 2,750% in the last week while searches for “write in Mike Pence” spiked 2,400% in the last week.

Results though are different in the states. In Utah, for example, where a recent poll found Clinton and Trump tied with independent candidate Evan McMullin only four points back, the volume of searches for “Mitt Romney write in” grew by 4,000% in the last week.

Google Trends data don’t show what caused this trend, but the campaign trail was rocked on Friday after a 2005 video tape surfaced featuring Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in a vulgar and sexually aggressive conversation about women. Trump later apologized for the remarks — first in a video and later during during Sunday night’s debate with Clinton — but since then has been rebuked and abandoned by members of his own party. Some called for Pence, Trump’s running mate, to lead the ticket instead.

Meanwhile, Clinton’s campaign has it’s own set of problems; WikiLeaks began releasing thousands of hacked emails from the account of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta. Some of the emails, including one that suggested a senior campaign aide had communicated with government officials about the release of her State Department emails, led to accusations of collusion from Trump and other Republicans.

Seeing Donald Trump fall so far behind Clinton in the polls should put an end to the arguments of voting for Clinton based upon fear of Trump. That was never a very good argument as, regardless of how terrible Trump might be, those of us who disagree with Clinton on the issues, and who do not feel she is fit to be president, should not be denied our democratic right to vote for a candidate who is closer to our beliefs. There is far less reason to fall for “lesser evilism” when there is no longer a realistic pathway for Trump to win 270 electoral votes. The possibility of Evan McMullin taking Utah’s electoral votes out of the Republican column makes the chances even more remote. Gary Johnson is also taking votes from both Trump and Clinton.

While many on the left are considering write-in votes for Bernie Sanders, I would prefer to see votes go to Jill Stein. Stein has similar views to Sanders on economic issues, and has argued more forcibly on foreign policy. Stein, along with Gary Johnson, has also been a strong advocate of ending the drug war. Regardless of any comparison between Stein and Sanders, a vote for Stein will have greater impact. A vote for Sanders would purely be a protest vote. On the other hand, if Jill Stein could get 5 percent this year, which is possible if more Sanders supporters would vote for her, this would qualify the Green Party for matching funds in 2020, and assist with ballot access. With the Democratic Party moving so far to the right under Hillary Clinton, we need a viable party on the left to either force the Democrats to consider liberal and progressive issues, or to provide an alternative.

Unpopularity Of Major Party Candidates Could Lead To Increased Ticket Splitting

Trump Clinton Celebrity Death Match

With his act which was so successful in Republican primaries failing miserably in the general election campaign, Hillary Clinton is expected to easily beat Donald Trump as things stand now. Of course there is still a long way to the election and things could possibly change. Just yesterday more email came out which Clinton failed to release demonstrating corruption involving the Clinton Foundation, and further violations of the ethics agreements Clinton made prior to confirmation as Secretary of State. In a normal year, or if the Democratic Party stood for anything other than getting elected, this would preclude Clinton from being considered for any elected office. Maybe Donald Trump will get his act together and even manage to look like a credible alternative in the debates, similar to  how Ronald Reagan established himself as a legitimate candidate. More likely, Trump will continue to alienate more voters and possibly see states which have not voted blue in decades go to Clinton.

If we assume that current predictions of a humiliating loss do come true, this leads to the question of what happens to the rest of the Republican Party. There is increasing speculation that a Clinton landslide could lead to Democrats taking control of one, and possibly both, Houses of Congress. Some Republicans have gotten desperate enough to promote an independent candidate. Republicans also hope that more voters will split their tickets and vote for Clinton for president but still vote for Republicans down ticket. The Washington Post discussed this today, noting that Rob Portman is trying to align himself with the Clinton campaign in Ohio.

Portman is betting that a significant number of Ohioans in this turbulent election season might do something voters have not done in a long time: divide their preferences between the two parties as they work their way down the ballot. Breaking that pattern may be key to the survival of some endangered Republicans and possibly to the GOP’s hopes of holding onto its control of the Senate. It’s a clear acknowledgment of the fear that Donald Trump is pushing some voters away — and of the threat he poses to the rest of his party…

Split-ticket voting, once commonplace, has in recent elections grown rare in this polarized country. In 2012, for instance, only 6 percent of congressional districts — just 26 out of 435 — went for one party in the presidential race and another in picking a House member.

It was the lowest rate in 92 years — and a far cry from the zenith of split-ticket voting, which happened in Richard M. Nixon’s landslide of 1972, when 44 percent of the districts in the country voted one way for president and the other for the House.

Ohio is a good example of the trend. It has not split its preferences for the White House and the Senate since 1988, when it voted for both George H.W. Bush and to reelect then-Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D).

There are some signs that Portman may be succeeding. The latest NBC News-Wall Street Journal-Marist poll, for instance, shows the senator holding a five-point lead over the Democratic nominee, former governor Ted Strickland, despite how Clinton has pulled ahead in Ohio by a similar margin…

That both parties have nominated relatively unpopular candidates for president is the main force that could disrupt what has become the typical straight-ticket dynamic.

Trump has higher negative ratings than any standard-bearer in history; were he not in the race, that dubious distinction would go to Clinton. Also scrambling the equation is how more and more leading Republicans are turning their backs on Trump.

While the article stresses the unpopularity of the two major party nominees, it failed to discuss two important points. The first is that Clinton is distrusted by a significant majority of voters. Just as people voted for Nixon in 1972 but also voted for Democrats in Congressional races, there might be many voters who vote for Republicans down ticket to put a check on a president they justifiably distrust. While Clinton might have difficulty getting other Democrats elected on her coattails, a Democrat with a higher approval rating such as Bernie Sanders might have brought a strong liberal majority into Congress.

Secondly, it should be a lot easier for voters to cross party lines this year. While Donald Trump does not follow conservative orthodoxy, an old DLC Democrat such as Clinton, who also embraces neoconservative foreign policy, and is generally conservative on social issues, provides a good match for Republican voters. Neoconservatives have been moving towards Clinton over the last few months, preferring her to a more isolationist Donald Trump who has criticized their ideas for interventionism in countries such as Iraq, Libya, and Russia. Wall Street is also happy to have Clinton in office. Clinton’s biggest problem will probably be with small businessmen and those hurt by trade agreements she has supported, but Trump’s erratic behavior could limit the loss of potential Democratic votes which Clinton might otherwise experience.

Another option which was ignored is the possibility of voting for third party candidates such as Jill Stein or Gary Johnson for president, and then possibly voting for major party candidates down ticket.

While most talk is naturally about the current election, Republicans can also look ahead to a potential rebound in 2018 and 2020. Clinton has benefited this year from a primary system which was heavily tilted in her behalf, and an exceptionally weak general election candidate. If she continues her current practices of dishonesty and attempting to avoid accountability for her actions, Democrats could find that a victory under the conditions of this election is not to their long term benefit.

Republicans Show More Honor Than Democrats In Seeking Independent Alternative To Trump & Clinton

Evan McMullin

There is yet one more candidate in the presidential race. Many conservative Republicans, showing more honor than Democrats, have decided to take action in response to their party nominating a candidate who is unfit to be president. Anti-Trump Republicans have been talking about having a conservative Republican run against Donald Trump. They object to both the racism and xenophobia which many on both the right and the left object to. Conservative Republicans also object to a Republican candidate such as Trump who seems to reject neocon foreign policy and who has expressed support for preserving Social Security and universal health care. Plus he doesn’t have his heart into homophobia and restricting abortion rights enough to satisfy social conservatives.

I would think that at least one well-known movement conservative, or a member of Congress who wants to expand his name recognition, would have taken up the offer to run. Instead they have had to settle on an unknown candidate. The only taker was Evan McMullin, “a CIA veteran and chief policy director of the House Republican conference.” McCullin has had a number of tweets I agree with, criticizing Trump for his xenophobia and authoritarianism. I also agree with his recent tweet on Clinton: “Hillary Clinton fails the basic tests of judgment and ethics any candidate for President must meet.”

Beyond his basic criticism of Trump and Clinton, McCullin doesn’t have much to offer. His website is still fairly vague, justifying his candidacy on the failings of the two major party candidates:

Hillary Clinton is a corrupt career politician who has recklessly handled classified information in an attempt to avoid accountability and put American lives at risk including those of my former colleagues. She fails the basic tests of judgment and ethics any candidate for President must meet. Moreover, she only offers stale economic ideas like the same old top-down government control that has brought us eight years of historically low growth.

Donald Trump appeals to the worst fears of Americans at a time when we need unity, not division. Republicans are deeply divided by a man who is perilously close to gaining the most powerful position in the world, and many rightly see him as a real threat to our Republic. Given his obvious personal instability, putting him in command of our military and nuclear arsenal would be deeply irresponsible. His infatuation with strongmen and demagogues like Vladimir Putin is anathema to American values. We cannot and must not elect him.

Millions of Americans are not being represented by either of these candidates; those of us who care about the strength of the military and intelligence services find little to embrace in either Trump or Clinton.

Americans who believe in limited, Constitutional government that is smaller, smarter, and more accountable view both Clinton and Trump as symbols of corruption and excess that provide no hope of basic competence in the federal government.

Beyond this, it is basic conservative Republican thought, including expressing opposition to abortion. From newspaper accounts it does sound like he might not be as anti-immigration as the GOP mainstream.

He obviously cannot win, and I have my doubts as to whether he has time to meet the 15 percent threshold to make the debates. At this point Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson has an outside chance of making it, sometimes polling over ten percent, and Jill Stein of the Green Party will need a strong show of support from Sanders supporters in order to make it.

This does seem primarily motivated by the determination of some conservative Republicans to keep Donald Trump from winning. He is a Mormon who is concentrating on Utah. Perhaps, with Clinton polling better than usual in Utah and some other red states, he could take enough Republican votes to enable Clinton to take those states. Some conservatives might be hoping he could actually win some states and  prevent both Trump and Clinton from winning in the electoral college, and then become president by winning the support of a majority of House Republicans by being preferable to Trump.

While such scenarios beyond making it even harder for Trump to win sound far fetched, I do have to give conservative Republicans some credit for standing up for their principles in opposing a candidate who is clearly unfit to be president. If only Democrats would show such commitment to principle. It is hard to overstate how disgusted and disillusioned I am in the Democratic Party for nominating someone as unfit as Hillary Clinton to be president. It is as if the Democrats had nominated Dick Cheney.

If it wasn’t bad enough that the Democrats nominated a neocon interventionist who echoes Donald Trump on suppressing civil liberties, they have no qualms about embracing a culture of corruption. There is overwhelming and indisputable evidence as to Clinton’s dishonesty and corruption, yet the Democratic Party still nominated her, and many of her supporters still claim she is innocent of all wrongdoing.

Hillary Clinton was shown to have acted improperly and having lied about her actions in the State Department Inspector General Report. The FBI report showed that pretty much everything she has said about the email scandal publicly has been a lie. Newspaper fact checkers have also repeatedly verified this. The press has also revealed that Hillary Clinton failed to honor her agreement to disclose all donors to the Foundation as Secretary of State and that she has unethically made decisions regarding parties contributing to the Foundation and/or paying unprecedented speaking fees to her husband.

While Clinton has moved to a large lead in the polls, there is talk that Clinton could still lose because of an “October surprise” from WikiLeaks. Democratic leaders and the Clinton campaign probably wouldn’t be so worried about an “October surprise” if they didn’t realize how much damaging information they have been trying to hide.

It is certainly understandable that people would want other choices this year. It is disappointing that it is some Republicans and not Democrats who are promoting their principles rather than pure partisanship.