Prohibition Party Presidential Candidate Says He'll Probably Vote for McCain

According to this Orlando Sentinel newspaper story, Prohibition Party presidential candidate Gene Amondson said he will probably vote for the Republican nominee for president.

It is almost always a mistake for any minor party candidate to say that he or she will vote for a major party opponent. In 2004 the Green Party lost a great deal of status when its vice-presidential candidate, Pat LaMarche, was erroneously quoted as saying she might vote for the Democratic ticket for president. She did not say that.

The newspaper says the Prohibition Party won’t be on the Florida ballot this year, but actually the Prohibition Party presidential candidate probably will be on the Florida ballot this year, the first time that party will have been on in Florida since 1924.


Comments

Prohibition Party Presidential Candidate Says He'll Probably Vote for McCain — 14 Comments

  1. AMONDSON IS A MENTAL CASE.NO JOKE HE HAS SPENT TIME IN A INSTITUTION. THE WHOLE DAMN BUNCH IS CRAZY THINKING WE WILL EVER RETURN TO PROHIBITION.

  2. LaMarche did indeed say she was considering a vote for Kerry and was quoted in a newspaper saying it. She later recanted when Greens were angered at the statement.

    As for Amondson voting for McCain, McCain should celebrate the extra vote with a beer.

  3. I’m not sure why the paper said that Gene won’t be listed in Florida, since the paperwork has been filed there already.

  4. It shows you how brain washed the people are. Four elections now, if we don’t vote Republican the world will come to an end. How sick people are.

  5. How foolish of him! Perhaps he should write in the late Earl Dodge instead!

  6. Find the quote.

    The only thing that ever said that was a headline written by an editor who wasn’t even at the press conference that the headline was about.

    Please do a better fact check on your stories.

  7. Let me get this right: The nominee for the Prohibition Party is voting for the nominee for the Republican Party, whose wife’s fortune comes from an alcohol distribution company. Yet another thing that makes you go HMMMMMM!!

  8. Gene Amondsen is a reasonable man who understands that he is unlikely to be on the ballot in his home state. Four years ago, Prohibitionists urged votes for the Constitution Party in states where they were not on the ballot.

  9. Gene Amondson ought to think about possibly getting on the ballot in Washington, his home state. It’s 1,000 signatures, which must be gathered at fixed locations.

  10. Isn’t Gene Amondson from Alaska? They count presidential write-ins up there, don’t they? Why wouldn’t he write himself in? And the mention of Cindy McCain’s booze fortune is correct, and ironic to boot.

    As for Pat LaMarche, she most certainly did make that famous statement, and I know because I heard her say it, on Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now! program on Pacifica Radio.

  11. OK, mea culpa, I “misremembered” that interview, as Hillary Clinton would say, although Ms. LaMarche’s evasive responses to Amy Goodman’s questions still stand as rather bizarre, and as much of a confirmation of the so-called “safe states” strategy as you can find out there (a strategy David Cobb kept denying during the campaign, by the way).

    Can you imagine the Green Party vice presidential candidate this year, whoever it is, saying that he or she doesn’t “have a right to tell voters in swing states how to vote?” That’s the line that got people so angry. Of COURSE she has that right…as a candidate for vice president that’s her JOB. I mean, DUH. What was the point of the Cobb/LaMarche campaign even trying to get on the ballot in those states if their own candidate didn’t think she “had a right” to urge people to vote for her?

    Here’s a transcript of that part of the interview – which speaks for itself – from http://www.democracynow.org/2004/10/7/left_out_in_cleveland_three_vp. Does this sound like a candidate who’s going all out to get as many votes for her ticket as possible, or like a candidate who’s trying to have it both ways and encourage people to do whatever it takes to get Bush out of office, i.e. vote for Kerry (without actually coming out and saying so)? And what if she had been a resident of a state where she DIDN’T “have the luxury” of voting for herself (and what a contemptuous phrase that is anyway)? What if Pat LaMarche were from Pennsylvania or Florida? Would she have even bothered to run for vice president?

    AMY GOODMAN: Pat LaMarche, who are you voting for for president?

    PAT LAMARCHE: Well, I live in a district of Maine—we are the only other state besides Nebraska where we split our electoral votes. I live in a part of Maine where Kerry has about a 20% lead, so I have the luxury of voting for myself and David Cobb for president. But we are very sensitive this year. The Green Party is very sensitive to the fact that George Bush is the worst president in the history of time. He has serious competition for that title. He needs to go. I feel like we’re on the titanic with George Bush, there are no lifeboats. I’m interested in getting a few of the women and children off.

    AMY GOODMAN: You’re telling people in swing states to vote for John Kerry?

    PAT LAMARCHE: I’m telling people in swing states that I don’t have a right to tell them how to vote, but that I certainly understand their feelings and their feeling of immediacy and necessity, especially in the progressive community to eliminate George Bush as president of the United States. I think the world is looking for us to do that. I think right now, we have gotten off on the hook a little bit by the fact that we might just have the world’s worst president by accident, but if we re-elect him, it’s on purpose.

  12. Gene Amondson has a home in Alaska and a home in Washington state, but he is registered to vote in Washington state.

  13. Bob Wayne, we still HAVE Prohibition, a la the “War on Drugs.” So, obviously, it’s not TOO far-fetched.

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