Pres. Bloomberg? I think not.

New York City’s Mayor Bloomberg announced his leaving of the Republican Party fueling suspicion that he is going to run as an independent for the 2008 Presidential Election. I immediately thought to Minge’s comment about the emergence of a third party in U.S. elections. Although Mayor Bloomberg is not setting up a third party, it does make people wonder if he can pull the election off and stick it to the two dominant parties. And the news today was doing its fair share of speculating.

Every election I can remember (with the exception of Dukakis vs. Bush 41) has always had a third party boogie man. And I can always remember conversations in which people would get this glassy eyed look and imagine what it would be like if a third candidate could beat the Republican and Democratic candidates. Even as a young person, I never gave much thought to anyone who didn’t have an “R” or “D” after their names. They simply weren’t important. The only reason you paid any attention at all, for practical reasons, was to figure out how much they were going to take from the two parties.

In my memory, the only person who seemed to have any kind of success was Ross Perot who ended up taking 19% of the popular vote yet none of the electoral votes. I was still too young at the time to make any type of guess as to why he would be an attractive choice. All I knew was that my Dad said that he was going to vote for him and I’ve always thought my Dad to be a loyal Republican. Still, the thing is with American elections, you need to come out on top in the various states for those electoral votes. In an essentially a three way race such as Perot was in, 19% is a respectable number for an outsider but still, you need to be in the 30’s.

The next notable is Ralph Nader whom I have mentioned before in a response to Minge. Ralph Nader was blamed by Democrats as costing them the election. Had he not run, or at least had he not been on the ballot in Florida, the election would have gone to Al Gore but that's not necessarily true.

Should he decide to run, would Mayor Bloomberg be a Perot or a Nader? Considering the fed up attitude that seems to be against the two parties, a number of news commentators have said that he could be a problem on the scale of a Perot. However, I have not heard one who would dare think that the mayor would actually become president. I highly doubt it at well as it requires the electorate to abandon their entrenchments and believe that someone who is not a Republican or Democrat could actually win. I just don’t see him being attractive to the Republican base (which never really considered him to be a Republican in the first place) or the Democrat base. Many democrats see this upcoming election as being handed to them on a silver platter by President Bush and they aren’t going to risk giving up on their candidate for Bloomberg.

Sorry Mayor, but you are wasting your time and money.