The Pew Research Center released a 4-candidate presidential poll on October 28. Among registered voters, the results are: Obama 52%, McCain 36%, Nader 3%, Barr 1%, other and undecided 8%.
Among the 15% of respondents who say they have already voted, the only results given are Obama 53%, McCain 34%. That leaves 13% unaccounted for, and they couldn’t be “undecided”, since they already voted. See here for all the results.
The Constitution Party national ticket is Chuck Baldwin for president and Darrell Castle for vice-president. In Kentucky, however, the ballot lists someone else for vice-president, Robert E. Thornsberry. The reason for this is that when the Constitution Party filed its petition in Kentucky, it realized that it needed a signed declaration of candidacy from whomever it wanted on the ballot for vice-president. Since the papers were being filed on the deadline, and it was too late for Castle to sign such a document, the party made a quick pragmatic decision to have Thornsberry (a party activist) sign up for vice-president instead, since he was present at the filing. Kentucky petitions don’t list vice-presidential candidates, so at that moment the party was free to choose anyone.
A Vermont gubernatorial debate was held in Burlington on the evening of October 27. Republican incumbent Governor Jim Douglas surprised everyone by not showing up. The debate went on without him. Participants were Anthony Pollina (independent, endorsed by the Progressive Party), Gaye Symington (Democratic nominee) and Peter Diamondstone (Liberty Union nominee). There are three other candidates on the ballot, all independents, who were not invited. See this article for more details about Douglas’s non-appearance.
Guam is the only U.S. possession that votes for president in the general election. Since Guam has no electoral votes, the presidential vote might be termed a “beauty contest”. This year, the Guam presidential ballot only lists Barack Obama, John McCain, and Bob Barr. In 2004, there were four choices. The same three parties, and independent Ralph Nader, appeared in 2004.
Since Guam is on the early side of the International Date Line, the Guam votes are known by Tuesday morning in the United States proper. However, even though Guam has been holding a presidential vote in November ever since 1980, the U.S. news media never report the vote on Tuesday, election day, even though they could report it.
This year, 23 presidential candidates are on the ballot in at least one state. That is the highest in U.S. history except for 1992, when there were also 23. Generally there are more such candidates in periods of great public unhappiness.
Here is a list, with the predominant party label for each, and the percentage of the voters that will see their names on the ballot:
Barack Obama, Democratic, 100.0%
John McCain, Republican, 100.0%
Bob Barr, Libertarian, 94.5%
Ralph Nader, independent, 85.2%
Cynthia McKinney, Green, 70.5%
Chuck Baldwin, Constitution, 59.8%
Gloria La Riva, Socialism and Liberation, 26.8%
Roger Calero or his stand-in James Harris, Socialist Workers, 25.0%
Brian Moore, Socialist, 21.5%
Alan Keyes, America’s Independent Party, 18.1%
Charles Jay, Boston Tea, 10.0%
Gene Amondson, Prohibition, 9.6%
Thomas Robert Stevens, Objectivist, 8.0%
Richard Duncan, independent, 4.6%
John Joseph Polachek, New, 4.3%
Jeffrey Boss, Vote Here, 3.0%
Jeffrey Wamboldt, We the People, 2.5%
Ron Paul, Taxpayers/Constitution, 2.0%
Jonathan E. Allen, HeartQuake ’08, 1.7%
Bradford Lyttle, U.S. Pacifist, 1.7%
Frank McEnulty, unaffiliated, 1.7%
Ted Weill, Reform, .9%
George Phillies, Libertarian, .6%
