There is a venerable American tradition of establishing "third parties" and running candidates for Federal offices on their tickets. They have the
potential to siphon votes from candidates of the Democratic and Republican parties, although there is little evidence that they have often or ever changed the results of Presidential elections. For example, most analysts agree that Nader's run for the Presidency did not contribute to Gore's defeat and that Perot's run did not account for Clinton's win over George H. W. Bush.
I think of third parties as announcing the presence of fringe political groups that have the potential of reshaping the two major parties. An emerging third party is somewhat interesting in that regard: the
Justice Party. Whether it succeeds in fielding candidates at the Presidential level remains to be seen; if it does so, it would seem to draw votes from the left.
Its nominee will be
Rocky Anderson, former mayor of Salt Lake City. He is now Director of
High Road for Human Rights and is clearly one of the most liberal of Utah's politicians. Others involved include
Kevin Zeese (a peace activist) and
Margaret Flowers (a pediatrician advocating for single-payer health care). For Flowers,
see also.
So far, I have been able to find the proposed platform of the Justice Party only on the weird Web site, FourWinds10. It specializes in news about Prosperity Packs, the amazing Iraqi Dinar revaluation, alien saviors, and conspiracy theories of several kinds. I have sometimes found myself to be in agreement with a position taken in one of its articles (such as its opposition to the military detention law), just as I sometimes find myself in agreement with Ron Paul. FourWinds10 is consistently anti-Semitic and usually anti-Obama.
Despite that, its article on the platform of the Justice Party may be accurate. Listing only four of the 15 proposed "Platform issue areas," I find myself to be cheering them on and wishing that the Democratic Party would heed them. Many references are to
October2011, an Occupy Washington Web site. The Justice Party may become the political favorite of the 99%/Occupy Wall Street movement, particularly if Democrats continue to pay little heed to the legitimate complaints of that movement.
Quote:
1. Corporatism -
http://october2011.org/pages/corporatism firmly establish that money is not speech, corporations are not people, only people have Constitutional rights, end corporate influence over the political process, protect people and the environment from damage by corporations.
...
8. Healthcare – create a national, universal and publicly financed comprehensive health system.
9. Education – all people have the right to a high quality, publicly-funded and broad education from pre-school through vocational training or university.
...
11. Environment -
http://october2011.org/blogs/kevin-zees ... ber2011org - adopt policies which effectively create a carbon-free and radio-active free energy economy and that respects the rights of nature.[*]
There will undoubtedly emerge other third party efforts before the 2012 election. It might be very interesting to track them, knowing full well that their candidates cannot win but might nevertheless influence the major parties.
[*] This concept may merit its own thread.
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Give 'til it doesn't hurt no more, folks! 
I'm not feeling the love here, people! 
I can see why. There is a portentously lengthy post under the title "Is Germany responsible for the financial crisis?" and it all turns out to be the fault of the Jooos:
