There is one other candidate for President that isn't getting a lot of attention and that's Evan McMullin whose the youngest candidate to run for high office in recent memory. He's the former chief policy director for the House Republican Conference in the U.S. House of Representatives and a former CIA operations officer. McMullin describes himself as a conservative alternative to Trump and Clinton whose currently running as an Independent.
In terms of his policy issues he's pro-free trade and wants to keep Gitmo open while supporting tax border security and tax reform. McMullin agrees with the provision of the Affordable Care Act covering those with preexisting conditions but believes that we also need to do better than the Affordable Care Act. He believes in "traditional marriage between a man and a woman" while respecting the Supreme Court's decision to legalize gay marriage nationwide.
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Won't even be on the ballot in most states. Seems to have gotten exactly zero on the only poll he's been in. Completely irrelevant.
That depends on how hard he campaigns in states where he is on the ballot. Back when he name came up, people were wondering if he could play spoiler in the handful of states (namely Utah from what I remember) that would throw the result to Hillary Clinton.
I doubt I'll ever hear anything about him outside this thread since he missed the Arkansas window by a long shot, but who knows if he campaians hard enough, he may at the least build name recognition for future political endeavors.
If he spoils a state like Ralph Nader likely did in New Hampshire in 2000, he'll be remembered for a long time to come.
Given that he set up his campaign HQ in Salt Lake City, I'm buying the idea that he's there just to keep Gary Johnson from winning Utah. He is on the ballot on so few states, but it's not a coincidence he's on the ballot in Utah. McMullin is a Mormon and a stock neoconservative (which is why people like Bill Kristol and the rest of National Review are stumping for him). He is the perfect candidate to win votes in Utah.
The ultimate nightmare for Republicans is *not* if Hillary wins the election in a blowout, but rather Johnson winning Utah. If Hillary wins, the GOP simply comes back in 2020 while they stonewall Hillary for four years. But if Johnson wins Utah, that would be a historically defining moment that would give Libertarians actual legitimacy as being the first third-party to win a state in almost 50 years. The last time a third party won states was 1968, when George Wallace won a bunch of Southern states. Not surprisingly, Wallace's presidential run came with a massive, massive political realignment in the US that saw Democrats lose the South for good. If Johnson won Utah (and even another Mountain West state or two), there would likely be another political realignment that would shift the narrative to the GOP being a dying party seeing as they lost their safest state to a third party.
Given that he set up his campaign HQ in Salt Lake City, I'm buying the idea that he's there just to keep Gary Johnson from winning Utah. He is on the ballot on so few states, but it's not a coincidence he's on the ballot in Utah. McMullin is a Mormon and a stock neoconservative (which is why people like Bill Kristol and the rest of National Review are stumping for him). He is the perfect candidate to win votes in Utah.
The ultimate nightmare for Republicans is *not* if Hillary wins the election in a blowout, but rather Johnson winning Utah. If Hillary wins, the GOP simply comes back in 2020 while they stonewall Hillary for four years. But if Johnson wins Utah, that would be a historically defining moment that would give Libertarians actual legitimacy as being the first third-party to win a state in almost 50 years. The last time a third party won states was 1968, when George Wallace won a bunch of Southern states. Not surprisingly, Wallace's presidential run came with a massive, massive political realignment in the US that saw Democrats lose the South for good. If Johnson won Utah (and even another Mountain West state or two), there would likely be another political realignment that would shift the narrative to the GOP being a dying party seeing as they lost their safest state to a third party.
This is completely delusional. There is zero chance, McMullin or not, of Johnson winning Utah. Even if Johnson did win Utah, it's not suddenly going to bring down the GOP, nor is it going to make people start taking the libertarian party seriously. McMullin set up shop in Utah because it's his home state, which, combined with being a Mormon, makes it the only place he has a chance of even being on the radar. It's not a clever ploy to shut down the libertarians. No one cares about the libertarians.
The New York Times disagrees, although... it's not Republicans that care that much about Gary Johnson at this point.
Personally, I don't know why Evan's even running. I looked into his winning strategy (his long shot strategy is play spoiler to every candidate so that the House of Representatives will choose him,) and as the link says, no one really thinks that he even thinks it will work. My best guess is he really running on moral grounds of trying to provide people another option to vote for someone other than Trump with a clear conscious.
I've been hearing more about him too since he made the ballot in Arkansas. Here though, I think Evan McMullin will probably cut deeper into Gary Johnson than Donald Trump.
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~~~~~
McMullin is interesting. I live in Utah and the support for him is very strong. He's already upended Gary Johnson and is also cutting into Trump's numbers, since after the whole PussyGate thing a lot of Mormons around here are not interested in voting for him. However, the support for Clinton is still relatively strong in SLC and among the women here. If McMullin gets more popular there is the distinct possibility that the conservative vote gets split among 3 candidates and allows Clinton to carry the state.
Fun to think about, even though it has basically no chance of happening. These weird electoral corner cases always seem interesting to me.
The most interesting thing about that article is it lays the basis for how to beat Duverger's Law under the current US system, which is what any 3rd Party will need to be able to pull off to have a realistic chance of putting a candidate in the White House unless a major party spontaneously combusts... which is also likely, but I feel would actually qualify as a new party filling the void replace said major party more than put a third one on the map.
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~~~~~
So here's a discussion I think would be interesting to have: McMullin vs. Clinton, who should win?
Not who would win, because that's actually a thing that's going on, and Clinton is in very good position to win against McMullin and everyone else running for president by a landslide, but who should win, and why?
So here's a discussion I think would be interesting to have: McMullin vs. Clinton, who should win?
Not who would win, because that's actually a thing that's going on, and Clinton is in very good position to win against McMullin and everyone else running for president by a landslide, but who should win, and why?
Hillary Clinton. Then again, I'm borderline Green Party, so the two issues I gravitate to first are environment and government reform. In my cursory glance of his Issues Page, his environment and energy position attacks renewable energy and oncoming climate catastrophe because Obama. I saw nothing regarding addressing the broken campaign finance system, and instead talked about restoring the Constitution as the Founding Fathers intended (you know... minus the part where they deliberated meant "living document" to mean as we would say today an "evolving document.") Positions I favor may be in there, but until I find them or they are shown to me, that's a 1-2 K.O. for me.
From his issues page, it seems that he believes in the "religious freedom" dogwhistling that's a cover for discrimination against the LGBT community, and as a member of that community I can't say that he should win if it leads to us becoming second class citizens again. So for the good of the marginalized among us, I'd have to say Clinton.
From his issues page, it seems that he believes in the "religious freedom" dogwhistling that's a cover for discrimination against the LGBT community, and as a member of that community I can't say that he should win if it leads to us becoming second class citizens again.
Apparently also anti-abortion. Those two are pretty significant issues for me.
He's a standard-issue Republican who's only running because Trump isn't. The "Who should win?" question is going to break down along the familiar battle lines.
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He's a standard-issue Republican who's only running because Trump isn't. The "Who should win?" question is going to break down along the familiar battle lines.
I agree. Evan McMullin's only relevant because Donald Trump imploded. The two candidates that should be concerned about him right now are Trump and Gary Johnson because McMullin's publicity of becoming competitive in Utah put him on the national stage (much like it revived this thread and killed the joke about me getting his name wrong and telling people not to care.)
McMullin deadlocking the electoral college is a fever dream, and the only states where he's on ballot and competitive (is he even in double digits in other states where he's campaigning?) are red states. That means one of two things: 1. He splits the vote in red states turning them blue or 2. He turns red states… FiveThirtyEight is using purple, so I'll stick with that even though my color of choice would be pink, by winning those states. Either way, McMullin takes electoral college votes that were never going to Clinton anyway.
And in both scenarios, he helps Clinton get to the White House. I don't think Clinton can squander her lead in the four…ish weeks left to the point where McMullin can make a case before the House of Representatives, even with Wikileaks continuing to target her campaign.
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~~~~~
So McMullin may be looking to build a new center-right political party. Nothing concrete yet (source is Buzzfeed, so take that as you will). I think that's kind of interesting, tbh. In my personal opinion, it would be nice to have a party that wasn't careening towards the abyss by embracing policies and ideas that grow more outlandish by the day.
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In terms of his policy issues he's pro-free trade and wants to keep Gitmo open while supporting tax border security and tax reform. McMullin agrees with the provision of the Affordable Care Act covering those with preexisting conditions but believes that we also need to do better than the Affordable Care Act. He believes in "traditional marriage between a man and a woman" while respecting the Supreme Court's decision to legalize gay marriage nationwide.
https://www.evanmcmullin.com/
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
That depends on how hard he campaigns in states where he is on the ballot. Back when he name came up, people were wondering if he could play spoiler in the handful of states (namely Utah from what I remember) that would throw the result to Hillary Clinton.
I doubt I'll ever hear anything about him outside this thread
since he missed the Arkansas window by a long shot, but who knows if he campaians hard enough, he may at the least build name recognition for future political endeavors.If he spoils a state like Ralph Nader likely did in New Hampshire in 2000, he'll be remembered for a long time to come.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
The ultimate nightmare for Republicans is *not* if Hillary wins the election in a blowout, but rather Johnson winning Utah. If Hillary wins, the GOP simply comes back in 2020 while they stonewall Hillary for four years. But if Johnson wins Utah, that would be a historically defining moment that would give Libertarians actual legitimacy as being the first third-party to win a state in almost 50 years. The last time a third party won states was 1968, when George Wallace won a bunch of Southern states. Not surprisingly, Wallace's presidential run came with a massive, massive political realignment in the US that saw Democrats lose the South for good. If Johnson won Utah (and even another Mountain West state or two), there would likely be another political realignment that would shift the narrative to the GOP being a dying party seeing as they lost their safest state to a third party.
This is completely delusional. There is zero chance, McMullin or not, of Johnson winning Utah. Even if Johnson did win Utah, it's not suddenly going to bring down the GOP, nor is it going to make people start taking the libertarian party seriously. McMullin set up shop in Utah because it's his home state, which, combined with being a Mormon, makes it the only place he has a chance of even being on the radar. It's not a clever ploy to shut down the libertarians. No one cares about the libertarians.
The New York Times disagrees, although... it's not Republicans that care that much about Gary Johnson at this point.
Personally, I don't know why Evan's even running. I looked into his winning strategy (his long shot strategy is play spoiler to every candidate so that the House of Representatives will choose him,) and as the link says, no one really thinks that he even thinks it will work. My best guess is he really running on moral grounds of trying to provide people another option to vote for someone other than Trump with a clear conscious.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/300554-utah-poll-trump-clinton-tied-mcmullin-within-striking
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
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http://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/MonmouthPoll_UT_101316/
538 has also started showing McMullin in their Utah forecast:
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/utah/
Poor Gary Johnson can't catch a break.
Fun to think about, even though it has basically no chance of happening. These weird electoral corner cases always seem interesting to me.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
Not who would win, because that's actually a thing that's going on, and Clinton is in very good position to win against McMullin and everyone else running for president by a landslide, but who should win, and why?
Hillary Clinton. Then again, I'm borderline Green Party, so the two issues I gravitate to first are environment and government reform. In my cursory glance of his Issues Page, his environment and energy position attacks renewable energy and oncoming climate catastrophe because Obama. I saw nothing regarding addressing the broken campaign finance system, and instead talked about restoring the Constitution as the Founding Fathers intended (you know... minus the part where they deliberated meant "living document" to mean as we would say today an "evolving document.") Positions I favor may be in there, but until I find them or they are shown to me, that's a 1-2 K.O. for me.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
I agree. Evan McMullin's only relevant because Donald Trump imploded. The two candidates that should be concerned about him right now are Trump and Gary Johnson because McMullin's publicity of becoming competitive in Utah put him on the national stage (much like it revived this thread and killed the joke about me getting his name wrong and telling people not to care.)
McMullin deadlocking the electoral college is a fever dream, and the only states where he's on ballot and competitive (is he even in double digits in other states where he's campaigning?) are red states. That means one of two things: 1. He splits the vote in red states turning them blue or 2. He turns red states… FiveThirtyEight is using purple, so I'll stick with that even though my color of choice would be pink, by winning those states. Either way, McMullin takes electoral college votes that were never going to Clinton anyway.
And in both scenarios, he helps Clinton get to the White House. I don't think Clinton can squander her lead in the four…ish weeks left to the point where McMullin can make a case before the House of Representatives, even with Wikileaks continuing to target her campaign.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
Then again, it's Rasmussen, so who knows.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2016/utah/election_2016_utah_president
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
Yeah, the numbers are all over the place - YouGov had Trump up 17 a few days ago.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
http://media.wix.com/ugd/3bebb2_98fe8b3559f64960a573ecad7dc22ec9.pdf
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer