Time for a Third Party – a Ron Paul/ Joe Miller ticket

By Bernie Quigley

For The Hill on 1/6/11

President Obama announces today the appointment of Bill Daley to be the new chief of staff, ditching the left for the middle. It shows him to be a Trickster, a man without principles. But The Hill today reports that only 31 percent of Americans now identify themselves with the Democratic Party. Possibly that is why. But with a little Mao Theater at Mile High Stadium, the horde could swing back by 2012. The Democrats now will “look good.” The Republican will attempt to repeal Obamacare; they will fail and look weak and vengeful. And the pendulum will swing again.

I have no hopes for the Tea Party in Congress. Already in D.C. and here in New Hampshire there is hubris in the air. These problems are structural and have been growing for 50 years and longer. The likelihood of this new Congress having any impact would be as likely as that of Martin Luther had he joined the College of Cardinals in Rome. It is time now to go alone.

I recently received an email from the prominent Libertarian writer Nelson Hultberg saying anybody with a lick of sense realizes there's no difference anymore between the Democrats and Republicans. “Both preach big dictatorial government to the people, and they do so relentlessly. Thus many Americans now realize that we need to open up the process and offer a small government vision as a third choice.”

The question is how we bring about such a goal, he asked. Many hurdles to a third-party exist, and many objections among conservatives to even begin such an attempt exist.

He says it is assumed that Ron Paul will run again for the Republican nomination in 2012. But is he likely to get the nomination against party luminaries? No.
Ron Paul needs to think "Independent Crusade" in the manner of Ross Perot in 1992, he says, which would get him into the National TV Presidential Debates. The importance of this is that it puts Paul in front of 70 million voters on the major networks.

For Ron Paul to create a successful Independent run, he will need to find a promising conservative to team with as his VP candidate and do what Ross Perot and James Stockdale did in 1992. It goes without saying that he must be a man with gravitas and big league political experience, which unfortunately Stockdale was not, writes Hultberg.

I agree that such an Independent run could electrify the country and the time for such an initiative is now. It would sweep into the TV Presidential Debates in the same fashion that Ross Perot did in 1992. But in our day, with independents at 38 percent, outpacing Dems by seven and Republicans by nine, it could actually win.
I could think of no one better to replace Stockdale in a Paul run which parallels Perot’s than Joe Miller, West Point grand, Yale Law School, Iraq combat veteran. Because there is something else about Dr. Paul: He was born in 1935. He is 75 years old. Joe Miller was born in 1967. He is 43.

Ron Paul is our century’s Gray Champion, the singular elder who stands up and says no, not now, not never and faces down tyranny. He awakens a new generation, but that generation must find a younger leader. I can’t think of a better man for the job than Alaska’s Joe Miller.