Who's running third-party this year?

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if gravel runs libertarian, that's my vote for damned sure.

Gravel never seemed very libertarian to me, but then maybe I'm just a different variety of libertarian from him. Gravel kind of scares me with some of his proposals, but I have to respect that he stands firmly for his ideals without backing down.

Gravel is fairly Libertarian because he supports the fair tax and is against foreign interventions and has positions similar to the LP on many other issues.

Of course, he isn't 100% Libertarian, but he is most of the way there, and he certainly isn't wanted among the Democrats, so where else could he go? He's basically the Ron Paul of the Democrats.

He's probably more Libertarian than Ron Paul, who doesn't support abortion rights or gay marriage.

Gravel is also the only candidate that supports the National Initiative for Democracy which would give citizens the power get laws on the ballot.

i always took his stance on gay marriage as that it was something that the indvidual states should decide.

meaning the gay populations could just move to boston and san fran and be happy.

He's a fundie creationist, so I doubt it. He's not really the second coming of Thomas Jefferson people made him out to be.

Actually, that claim doesn't seem entirely off from his position. He shows signs of wanting the government out of personal arrangements of that nature and has opposed attempts to define marriage.


Not necessarily, he favors single payer health care, dislikes free trade, favors a number of labor regulations such as the living wage and claims 100% rating with AFL-CIO which usually is a sign of favoring labor regulations, and takes a weaker stance on gun rights.
http://www.ontheissues.org/mike_gravel.htm
Now, all of those things are signs of lesser libertarianism, especially given the fact that libertarianism as a philosophy seeming to have no stance on abortion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertaria ... n_abortion with many libertarians divided on the issue due to the individual rights orientation of libertarians(actually according to an unscientific poll taken by libertarians on libertarians, they are as divided on the subject as the mainstream) and one could make a case for it using the oft-referenced non-aggression principle. The libertarian party does stand pro-abortion but rather moderately so As well, Ron Paul's stance on gay marriage is more neutral than opposed, he shows signs of disliking intervention in states rights and personal arrangements.
Not only that, but on the issues, also describes Ron Paul as more libertarian than Gravel as Ron Paul is described as a moderate libertarian in political philosophy, while Gravel is a libertarian-leaning liberal.
http://www.ontheissues.org/tx/ron_paul.htm Part of this may be the inaccuracies in the "on the issues" quiz, but these go against both sides.

So he believes God created the universe? Big deal. He isn't trying to force his beliefs on anyone. That's his own personal beliefs, and why the hell should that count against him?

At least he is against the police state that America is turning into. If you want to dislike him because of his religious beliefs, fo ahead, but I personally think his political positions are far more important. I'd take a religious nut anyday just as long as he is against big government.

Abortion doesn't factor into Libertarianism in any way. One can be pro-choice or pro-life and still be a Libertarian because the party platform and the philosophy behind it make no particular stand on it either way. Both sides of the issue are "right" in their own way.

And besides that, Ron Paul only wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade and make it a state issue. He doesn't want to make it illegal at the federal level because he doesn't believe that is a constitutional right for the federal government. So he would just let each state decide. Obviously, many states in the bible belt would move to ban it, but most states would probably carry on as they do now where it is allowed but usually with restrictions.

And while many would disagree with me on this, I strongly disagree with the view that abortion is one of the most serious issues facing the country at the moment. Abortion is not an issue that factors into my voting decision in the least. I'm neither a rabid feminist nor a rabid fundamentalist so I'm kinda neutral on the whole issue and whichever way the wind blows on it doesn't matter to me either way. I would much rather see the constitution restored and for the income tax to be abolished.

How come Ron Paul didn't seek 3rd party nominations?

He wanted to stay in the Congress seat.

If that were the case he simply wouldn't have run for President at all. It's not like he's going to be elected President by running third party, so he'd still have his Congressional seat. I think the reason is that a long-shot bid for the Republican nomination, though unlikely to succeed, always has a better shot than a third-party run for the presidency.