No Labels, no fables, no third-party betrayals
In 2016, we had the Clinton v trump election. And trump won via three states swinging to the Repub vot via the anybody but trump or Clinton. There is not argument here and I have presented the data several times. Disney characters, other nonliving entities, pets, and other characters were voted for in the national election. The vote for “others” went up 4-6 times in 2016 as opposed to 2012 and dropping again in 2020. The three states in which this occurred were Michigan (where I was living), Wisconsin (where I had lived previously), and also Pennsylvania. Dems knew in Michigan there was trouble severall weeks before the election. The national party did not respond to calls for help.
Here we are again with “No Labels” more than likely promoting the likes of Senator Joe Manchin and on and off again Democrat. Normally voting for “Others” constitutes about 1.5% of the vote except in 2016 when it was 3 to 4 times that numeric. This is the fear in 2024. Read on . . .
No Labels, no fables, no third-party betrayals, substack.com, Robert Reich
I couldn’t sleep last night. I made the mistake of looking at a lot of voting data before bedtime and then reading some of the BS being put out by the third-party group “No Labels,” as well as by my old friend Cornel West, who’s now running for president as the Green Party candidate. It was a mistake. It’s now 2 a.m. where I am, and I’m loaded for bear.
Let me be absolutely clear. Third-party groups such as No Labels and the Green Party are in effect front groups for Trump in 2024 and should be treated as such.
No Labels has pledged to spend $70 million to support a third-party candidate in 2024 who could easily draw enough votes from President Biden to tip the presidential election to Trump.
No Labels has already qualified as a presidential party that can run candidates on the ballot in 10 states, including in both Arizona and Florida. Already, Joe Manchin is flirting with the idea of running as a third-party presidential candidate under the No Labels banner.
If you believe that No Labels exists in order to encourage bipartisanship, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to sell you.
No Labels — which claims to be a centrist organization — will not reveal its donors, one of whom is reportedly the conservative megadonor Harlan Crow. Politico reports that No Labels has brought on a major Trump donor as an adviser in the pivotal battleground state of Florida.
But whatever it says it aims to be, No Labels will help Trump.
So will every other third party claiming to be in the “center” or on the “left” — including the Green Party, which is already on the ballot in the two key swing states of Michigan and Wisconsin and whose most likely candidate for president is Cornel West. And the People’s Party, especially if Robert F. Kennedy Jr. becomes its nominee.
The reason they’re all front groups for Donald Trump is that the upcoming 2024 election is likely to be nail-bitingly close even as a two-way race between Trump and Biden.
The good news is that Trump loyalists don’t represent a majority of the electorate — which is why Trump has lost the popular vote in both his presidential runs and did not top 47 percent in either.
So, as long as the anti-Trump vote is unified behind Biden, Trump cannot win, as Biden demonstrated in 2020.
But if a third-party candidate takes even a small part of the anti-Trump vote away from Biden, Trump is likely to be returned to the White House.
Consider the five states most likely to decide the 2024 election in the Electoral College — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. In 2016, Trump narrowly won each of them, giving him the presidency. In 2020, these five states narrowly tipped in the other direction, giving Biden the presidency.
Biden’s razor-thin margins in these five states in 2020 came from a massive anti-Trump vote.
In all of these states, at least 1 in 3 Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump. In Wisconsin (where the Green Party has already secured a spot on the 2024 ballot), 38 percent of Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump. In Arizona (where No Labels has already secured a spot on the 2024 ballot), 45 percent of Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump.
Biden has no margin for error. Even a small drop-off from his 2020 anti-Trump vote would make him vulnerable.
Just 44,000 votes out of more than 10 million cast in Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin — less than half of 1 percent — were the difference between the Biden presidency and a tie in the Electoral College that would have thrown the election to the House of Representatives, and hence to Trump.
If candidates from No Labels, the Green Party, and the People’s Party peel off just 15 percent of the anti-Trump vote from Biden, and Trump’s base stays with him, Trump would win all five swing states comfortably and return to the Oval Office.
These third parties are already putting out rubbish about “voting your conscience” and “giving the people a real choice.” It’s cynical propaganda designed to obscure the reality that any anti-Trump votes they pull away from Biden will only help ensure a Trump victory.
If No Labels were a legitimate third party rather than a Trump front, it would withdraw from all ballots for the 2024 election. If Cornel West and the Green Party had positive intentions, they would do the same. The rest of us must spread the word about the dangers of these third parties.
If Trump wins the GOP nomination for president, as seems highly likely despite (or because of) his coming trials, all Americans who believe in democracy must unite behind Joe Biden — to ensure that Trump, in the words of then Rep. Liz Cheney, “never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office.”
Please spread the word. Now.
‘I made the mistake of looking at a lot of voting data before bedtime and then reading some of the BS being put out by the third-party group “No Labels,” as well as by my old friend Cornel West, who’s now running for president as the Green Party candidate.’
— Robert Reich
“I made the mistake of … reading some of the BS being put out … by my old friend Cornel West, who’s now running for president as the Green Party candidate.”
Only a Robert Reich could write such a mean-spirited, false statement. Cornel West is probably the most important contemporary philosopher in America and is not to be belittled and demeaned.
So negative partisanship elected Biden, and we should applaud and encourage that to the point of suppressing the speech of West, Kennedy, Manchin, etc.?
@lj,
LOL! Whoever is supposedly suppressing the speech of West, Kennedy, Manchin, etc is pretty damned incompetent!
Agreed but that seems to be his argument.
Their acts of running fr president may or may not be speech; what it definitely is is an act likely to help elect Trump which should be resisted for that reason.
Yes
And if, just if, for some oddball reason, Drumpf uck isn’t the Repub nominee, it’ll be the ticket for him to step onto. Everyone sees this and not unreasonably so as a third party negative effect on Joe and the Democrats, but it could as easily be a third party negative effect on the traditional Repubs
We’re counting chickens before the eggs are even lain …
Feels implausible to me that West is going to cost Biden any votes. Way more likely West voters do not vote at all than vote Democratic if West were not on ballot. If West’s campaigning is any indication, a West voter has to think Biden advances a miserable agenda for the nation. No Labels may be different, but Reich seems to imply that it potentially splits the “anti-Trump + anti-Biden” votes unfavorably to Biden. Getting rid of Biden seems a more reasonable approach if that’s the actual worry here. It’s now after Labor Day and compared with Trump 2020 I see next to no Biden effort going into 2024, so I think this happens, but when? Soon, and there’ll be a lot of rushing around but time for candidates to make primary campaigns. Way late and it will be ‘oh migosh, we will have to go to the convention with all these disappointed Biden delegates and hope their collective wisdom finds the right nominee.’ I could be wrong though.
How does it feel
to look out across this golden land
and realize your life
depends on people
you have no faith in?
Biden is definitely putting in effort to sell the economic progress from his legislative successes but current polls suggest it isn’t selling. Others have pointed out he’s really in no different position than were Reagan, Clinton, and Obama at this stage of their presidencies. Beyond that is the fact that polls have not been very good on political issues recently (cf. the midterms).
Jackd
can’t trust anybody can you?
matbe too obvious to mention but 1) whether or not the media is biased the R’s are doing a far better job of getting their message out, especially with the help of the Left: “Biden is too old” “he sold out the environment” “a black man who is ‘woke’ {even though there is no such thing) is the best choice for President to undo centuries of American racism” we need to stop the war in Ukraine” …oh, etc.
only thing polls tell you is how effective your advertising is.
note, “media is”
Who should I trust and why? The only polls that matter, if any of them are reliable, are those from the swing states where the election is won or lost.
Jack:
Do you believe Michigan is still a swing state? And no one would in the public theater would realize what Biden pulled off with the economy. Supply has caught up with Demand. We should see a natural fall off of the need for Labor and increasing its supply. Powell will never be another Volcker as the circumstance is different.