Elon Musk and the third party opioid
I see where Elon has announced that he’s starting a third party. Setting aside the problem that he backed Trump in the last election and was in the tank with the Trump administration blowing up the federal government with DOGE, what are we to make of this?
Ross Perot was the most successful third party presidential candidate in modern US history and he didn’t get a single electoral college vote. Does Elon believe he can improve on that?
Look, if you want a third party in America, you’re gonna have to build it from the ground up. You’ll need to get a bunch of your people elected to Congress and governorships. That’s how political parties work in America (don’t know about South Africa).
My guess is that Elon is still high on his own ketamine stash and six months from now, it blows up like a SpaceX rocket.
If, like Ross Perot, he manages to draw votes away from Republicans and help Democrats, that’s not all bad.
I know you said “modern U.S. History” and perhaps I am in denial about my age, but George Wallace was quite successful in 1968 running under the American Independent Party banner. Everyone remembers his segregationist views, but his general anti-liberalism views found favor in the South and Midwest and Trump followed his playbook. The difference is that Wallace could not take over the Democratic party, while Trump took over the GOP. In any rational universe, Trump would have been the third party candidate, but the GOP was ripe for the plucking after a black guy was elected President twice. We will see if the cultists come out in the midterms and in 2028 when Trump is not on the ballot. They have not in the past and while there has been much wailing about the feckless Democrats, I can see a future where Musk party might pick up the pieces of a disintegrating GOP. Under those circumstances, his party could be the second party and the GOP reduced to the third party. I have to believe that would benefit the Dems in the short run, but most of it would be due to the end of Trump’s political career.
@Terry,
As John Bowman’s comment implicitly acknowledges, Perot was the most successful by the metric of popular vote. Since his votes were more uniformly distributed, he got no EC votes while Wallace, who was a regional candidate, was able to pick up EC votes. Both were protest candidacies, not real third parties.
Ultimately, this is trivial pursuit and elides my point, which is that trying to created a 3rd party only by running for POTUS is a fail. Third parties are only sustainable when the third party runs candidates for Congress, state legislatures and governorships and wins. The POTUS Jesus model for third parties won’t work, no matter how much money is behind them. At most, you’ll elect a POTUS who can’t get anything accomplished because neither house of Congress belongs to his/her party.
Hey Joel, I tried to reply earlier but got bounced because I used my phone and could not prove I was a human. I agree with you, which is why I drew the distinction between Wallace and Trump who are basically the same. Wallace tried to run as a Democrat in 1964 and got nowhere hence the 3rd party run in 1968 which got him in the conversation but still in third place. In 1972, he was back to running in Democratic primaries and was doing quite well in the Midwest–second to McGovern in Wisconsin and a blowout win in Michigan, but Arthur Bremer ended that run with a gun in Maryland.
Fun fact, I attended a Wallace rally in Appleton Wisconsin in late April 1972 along with a 1000 of my fellow students. We filled every seat and his supporters could not get in. No one said a word and Wallace could have been speaking to an empty room. He was clearly frustrated but had no basis to make a complaint.
Anyway, Trump’s magic was taking over the GOP and I question where the GOP will be without him. Musk is not going to run for President but he can finance insurgents at the state and Congressional level and if he gets Republican rats fleeing a sinking ship, he could be a potent political force. I doubt whether he has the discipline to do that but then I doubted Trump too.
Terry:
Madison was the liberal place to be. Barkley Rosser would talk about the southwest part of Wisconsin being an area which would predict which candidate would win.
If you get outside of Madison and Milwaukee, the world change to conservative. Not too sure what Appleton was like (anymore). Great state to live in though. Good camping and schools.
@Terry,
Musk can’t run because he was not born in the US. He’s not interested in building a party. Trump didn’t build a party, he elbowed his way into an existing party and turned its brand into a cult.
Any conservatives fleeing a sinking GOP ship will find a home in the Democratic Party, which is now the party of Rockefeller conservatives. There is no significant liberal party in the US today.
Wallace picked up 45 electoral votes – winning 5 southern states – in 1968, so he might be considered to be the most successful 3rd party candidate by that metric. Frankly, though, Elon isn’t even going to win Silicon Valley, where he is widely despised except by a select circle of fanboys, whose worship of him is about as nonsensical as a typical Trump voter’s worship of Trump.
John:
I believe there is a minority which may not consider Musk to be a citizen. Although, he is a citizen of Canada and South Africa besides the US. I am wondering how Trump may take him on and if he will. I have no respect for either.
Trump would blow us up to get even.
I have been thinking about starting the Stealers Wheel party. Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am stuck in the middle with you. I figure playing that song and “Freebird” at every campaign rally should get me to 270 electoral votes regardless of my platform.
@Mark,
Hey, go for it. You’ll probably do as well as Elon Musk and Pat Paulson.
Mark:
Yeah, the Elon, Pat, Mark trio . . .