Question of The Day

What can third party candidates do to gain more exposure?

Panelist Matt Cavedon:

Third parties need to recruit more well-known candidates, especially ones with independent wealth who can afford to properly advertise. Ross Perot was highly successful because he was a successful entrepreneur with vast reserves of wealth. Bob Barr has pretty good name recognition and credibility from his days in the Gingrich Revolution. Ralph Nader is a respected consumer advocate.

Third party candidates need to find an area of overlap between the two major party candidates and exploit it. Perot was a phenomenally successful third party candidate because both the GOP and the Democrats were seen as favoring higher taxes and bigger government. Perot came along gunning hard for traditional right-wing economics, balanced budgets, and limited government intervention in the economy and social policy. He scored big because of his ability to find a niche most Americans believed in already. In 1996, the Contract with America was the GOP platform. It incorporated his main ideas, and the GOP swept Congress.

If I were a third-party candidate now, I would seek to exploit conservative social views. Somebody like Mike Huckabee could do very well in this climate, given that he is socially conservative and economically liberal. Although he will not buck the party establishment, you will see more of his type moving towards leadership in a more populist GOP.

Ron Paul’s folks also hit the nail on the head as far as appealing to what people already believe in. The GOP nominally stands for limited government, laissez-faire economics, delegation of social policy to state authorities, and non-interventionism abroad. By pointing out the vast discrepancies between what the GOP ideally supports and what the Bush Administration has practiced, he became a cult idol.

The trick is not in adopting totally extremist positions about revolution, allowing sixteen year-olds to vote, legalizing acid, disbanding the army, releasing all prisoners, banning alcohol, deporting all illegal immigrants, and giving every citizen grenades from the government. That is the kind of idiotic crap that makes people immediately dismissive towards the modern third parties.

Panelist Robert Burack:

Third party candidates are notorious for their criticism of modern mainstream media. Much of their criticism is justified: major media outlets have largely ignored candidates who aren’t running in the two major political parties. However, third party candidates are often too eccentric to be truly viable in a country as shallow as ours can be.

Third party candidates need to learn to be media-savvy. Ralph Nader, Bob Barr, Ron Paul, Mike Gravel, and Ross Perot have been successful because they’ve understood how the media works, and how they can use that to their advantage. They were perceived as quirky, not insane. They had considerable speaking skills: which is everything in television.

Luckily for third party candidates, more and more Americans receive their political news from online sources. This is a real opportunity for lesser know candidates to get their message out. Was Mike Gravel’s “rock” video odd and hilarious? Absolutely. But did it encourage more people to head to his website and check out what his candidacy was about? You bet.

Add your thoughts in the comments section.