Constitutional requirements to be eligible for the U.S. presidency:
1.) Be a native-born U.S. citizen, or born abroad to at least one parent who was a U.S. citizen at the time of birth.
2.) Be at least 35 years of age.
3.) Have lived in the U.S. for at least 14 years.
Starting just from this criteria, there are plenty of everyday people who are better write-in candidates than any of this flotsam pictured below :
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John F. Kennedy (D) won a narrow victory over incumbent VP Richard Nixon (R) in 1960, becoming the youngest person to be elected president. He was 43 years old when he was inaugurated.
JFK was assassinated in November 1963, most-likely by a CIA/ deep-state cabal that used Lee Harvey Oswald as a patsy. [1]
This right-wing coup directly preceded the escalation of U.S. dirty wars in Southeast Asia, along with increased FBI surveillance and police activity against its citizens at home.
Albert Thomas (D) was a congressman in Texas for 29 years, credited with bringing the Johnson Space Center to Houston.
Thomas is infamously pictured below, winking to LBJ after his Air Force One inauguration, with a grieving Jacqueline Kennedy in the foreground; lending proof to a vast military-intelligence conspiracy in the JFK assassination:
Significant political shifts by the ruling class are always to the right. Political reaction is triggered by popular reformist surges which are always perceived as a threat to ruling stability; and therefore must be beheaded, stifled, and beaten back with a vengeance.
A more-recent example of reaction in political history was in 1992, when the Democratic party was able to ride a wave of youthful discontent from 12 years of Reagan/Bush as Bill Clinton (D) handily defeated incumbent George H.W. Bush to win the Oval Office. This was followed by a Republican counter-attack in 1994, led by Southern Baptist congressman Newt Gingrich (R-Ga):
Bill Clinton was endlessly witch-hunted during both terms by hard-line Republicans, and the 42nd U.S. president was ultimately impeached by the House of Representatives on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice on December 19, 1998– for lying under oath about an extramarital affair. This first-ever impeachment of a U.S president is best understood historically as a blatant attempt by political conservatives to overturn the results of the 1992 & 1996 elections.
The theft of the 2000 U.S. presidential election was the culmination of a ruling class coup against the American people, as votes for Democratic party nominee Al Gore in Florida were ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court to remain uncounted. Many votes were unable to be counted or miscounted due to electronic voting machine errors, discrimination at the polling stations, and intentionally confusing ballots; the most infamous being the butterfly ballots from Palm Beach County, Florida– shown below:
An army of lawyers, party hacks and goon squads were quickly organized by the Republican party machinery to descend on Tallahassee, FL in order to tip the outcome to Bush:
On December 7-8, the Florida Supreme court listened to arguments from both sides and finally ruled for an immediate recount:
The U.S. Supreme Court then immediately stepped in, halting the tabulation of uncounted ballots, freezing Katherine Harris’ certification of a 537-vote margin in favor of George W. Bush.
On December 12, the U.S. Supreme court ruled in Bush v Gore that votes could no longer be counted due to a fictional constitutional technicality, thus handing Florida’s 20 electoral votes and the U.S. presidency to Bush/Cheney.
The Democratic party registered a mild protest, then vacated any defense of democratic rights, including the right to vote in Al Gore’s concession speech:
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Electronic voting should be monitored by all participants, and video evidence of voting machine irregularities is a valuable document in defense of democratic rights. Watch this video below from 2012, as a voter tries to check Barack Obama (D), but the machine insists on registering a vote for Mitt Romney (R).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzNALjzvuWw
Manipulation of ballot counting now appears to be the norm in presidential politics. The 2004 Edison-Mitofsky national exits polls predicted very different results than the official presidential election results. Bush won the official results by 2.5%, while exit polls predicted a Kerry victory nationally by 3% – a whopping 5.5% difference.
State exit polls predicted a Kerry victory in four states that Bush won – Ohio, Iowa, New Mexico, and Nevada – and a virtually even race in Florida, which Bush officially won by 5%.
The difference between the exit polls and the official results were statistically significant (outside the margin of error) in Ohio and Florida. In Ohio, Kerry lost officially by 2.5%, while winning the exit poll by 4.2%– a difference of 6.7%. Winning either Ohio or Florida would have meant an electoral victory for John Kerry. [2]
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This is how political election spending has evolved since 1990:
Since 2010, Super PAC money rules the campaigns [3]. The graph below shows the popular reaction to the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court decision; allowing unlimited individual, corporate, and union contributions into election campaigns:
A Gallup poll conducted Oct. 3-6, 2013, revealed 60% of Americans say the Democrat/Republican parties do such a poor job of representing the American people, that a third major party is needed. Only 26% believed the two major parties adequately represent Americans. [4]
Over the decades, state lawmakers from both major parties have developed stringent ballot access requirements to discourage third-party candidates and voter participation in the electoral process. The three largest minor U.S. political parties as of April 2015 are listed below. In reality, they are all just funnels & safety valves for either the Democrats or Republicans:
Libertarian Party: Founded in 1971: conservative (Republican) policy positions including lowering corporate taxes, allowing people to “opt-out” of Social Security, abolishing welfare, etc…
Green Party: Founded sometime in the 1980-90’s, through a series of fits & spasms; this Democratic party off-shoot promotes identity politics– feminism, LGBT rights, and anti-racism; along with greenwashed-for-capitalism versions of environmentalism, non-violence and social justice.
Constitution Party: Republican branch, established in 1991 and originally called the U.S. Taxpayers’ party; they believe the United States is a Christian nation and its moral compass should be the Bible.
The extreme right-wing Tea Party movement emerged in the wake of Ron Paul’s failed 2008 presidential campaign to win the Republican nomination, which eventually went to John McCain. (R-Ariz). Ron Paul is a two-time Republican presidential candidate, and the presidential nominee of the Libertarian Party in the 1988. Paul has been characterized as a kook by his colleagues, as well as the “intellectual godfather” of the Tea Party movement. [5]
Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) remains the Tea Party’s iconic figure:
Donald Trump is whom she most identifies with politically:
According to Richard Winger— editor of Ballot Access News and an expert in the field — there are probably fewer than half a dozen minor parties that will qualify for the presidential ballot in more than five states. “It will be Democrats; Republicans; Libertarian; Green; Constitution; Party for Socialism and Liberation; Justice and Socialist Workers Party; and no others, probably. The Socialist Party has a remote chance of also getting on as many as 5 states.” [6]
Anyone planning on going to the polls on November 8, 2016, should know that due to the Electoral College, voting for president only matters in “swing” states:
The red & blue states are already decided, and/or have too few electoral votes to be of significant value. Once the primaries are over, virtually all the campaigning will be concentrated in the swing states, shown in beige above.
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The truth is, none of the above-mentioned political parties represent the vast majority of Americans who work for a living, and are mostly struggling to make ends meet. Voting for (or lending any other form of support to) this sick farce only perpetuates the problem, which is the capitalist system itself. All these parties and their candidates represent & defend capitalism (with its program of war & austerity) to the bitter end.
Abstention from this demented charade, or writing-in your own candidate, are the only voting options that makes sense for the working masses. In the end, the workers of the U.S. (and the world) will have to form their own independent political party, finally giving a voice to their interests, as well as the greater needs of human society. This political program will have to be socialist & revolutionary in nature, in order to be successful.