You were all anticipating this news... Waiting on this announcement and knowing it would generate all of the excitement of turtle marathon!
The Draft Bloomberg site is up, with a surging
527 signatures!
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzz...
On the bright side for the left? His candidacy will likely only hurt them if Hillary is the candidate. There are too many on the left that would refuse to vote for her if she is the nominee for the Dems, IMHO.
But regardless of the candidate for the GOP, given their especially weak crop of candidates this election cycle, a "Mike Bloomberg for President" third party run will siphon off a lot of their usual voters.
[update] Since I posted this yesterday the signatures have climbed to a mind boggling 865 signatures... The media ought to have Bloomberg out ahead of Edwards in the horse race soon with this kind of support.
[update deux] I just wanted to put Bloomberg's support in perspective compared to a snapshot of the reality of how America really feels. Representative Wexler was seeking 50,000 signatures for his Impeachment efforts last month. In a matter of hours he had surpassed that number.
As of 10:43 AM today (Sunday, December 15th) Wexler has amassed more than the 50,000 signatures he was looking for:
After about 24 hours Wexler had reached 67000 signatures. As of today (January 16th - a month later) here are the numbers for Wexler's Impeachment petition:
We are now at about 30 hours into the "Draft Bloomberg" campaign and he has 890 signatures... All of the excitement of a turtle marathon.
2 comments:
To answer the question about "spoiling" an election, you must consider the candidate, the platform, and the state of the country at each time in history when another major choice has been presented.
The most recent third party attempts to win the presidency, such as those pursued by Buchanan, Nader, Thurmond, and Wallace, and Perot where ultimately spoilers. But, each of these candidates ran either a single-issue platform or a fringe platform with the intent to disrupt and divide the country.
Our country responds to the call when we are in time of need. Never before have we been simultaneously confronted with so many issues crucial to future of our country that are not being resolved by our government, such as the economy, education, health care, immigration, Iraq, and senior entitlements, to name a few.
It is when we are in a time of trouble that best reflects the need for a third choice and new leadership. The Civil War, Great Depression, and Pearl Harbor were moments of truth in this country when bipartisan leadership led to cooperative governance. In 1854, a third party called the Republican Party was formed primarily over the split in the Whig Party over the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Over the next two years, Whig Party members disbanded and the Democrats fractured, many of them joining the Republicans. This Republican third party elected their first president in 1860, Abraham Lincoln.
A third choice will appeal to the 35-40% of voters who call themselves independent, the Republicans and Democrats who are open to new ideas and leadership, and the millions who have stopped voting out of disgust.
I updated the post to put it all into perspective for you! :)
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