3rd Party State

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

What State will be the first to vote for a 3rd party candidate? When will it happen?

In what election?  Currently, Vermont elects a socialist Congressman. Vermont might also elected a "Progressive" Governor this year who is a protege of Bernie Sanders...although he is running as a Democrat just for this election.

Connecticut, Maine, Alaska, and Minnesota have all had 3rd party or Independent Governors in the recent past.    But all of these were much more "cults of personality" than legitimate 3rd party movements.

And for the libertarians, if you guys want to be taken seriously, stop running candidates in every election that fail to get 1% of the vote.  You're just embarrassing yourselves when you keep whining about not being respected as a major party, but never backing it up at the polls.  If you're really serious, move to New Hampshire and restart your crusade at the local level.  

For any third party to ever make a dent, they will have to win some local elections, and then, state-by-state, convince state legislators to change the vote counting rules to something like preferential voting.  The Libertarians, Greens, etc, will never get anywhere with first-past-the-post.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

What State will be the first to vote for a 3rd party candidate? When will it happen?

The next most likely IMHO is WI with a Libertarian win.  Maybe this year, maybe next.  Might have to wait until Ed Thompson wins the governor's race, and people can accept that the world will not dissolve into anarchy if a Libertarian comes into power.

Whether we win or not, we aren't going away.  We are close to a breakthrough.  We are building our party from the ground up.  We are now winning city and county elections on a regular basis, and state office wins are becoming more common.

We're here, we're near.  Get used to it.

The Libertarian got 0.26% of the vote in the 2000 presidential election in Wisconsin.   The Libertarian won't break 1% there in 2004 or 2008.

How do libertarians expect people to trust their ideas about government when they are so freakin' delusional about political realities!  

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

I'm sorry, but there are people on this forum who actually think Badnarik might WIN THE ELECTION.  
It's as though they have absolutely no contact with the world around them.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

And for the libertarians...If you're really serious, move to New Hampshire and restart your crusade at the local level.

That's the idea behind the Free State Project.

Yes, I know.  I think this is the best ideas the libertarians have ever had.  

Third parties need to start by establishing a small geographic base of support.  They can't expect to grow by running candidates everywhere that get 1% and thinking that somehow they will magically transform that into a win somewhere.