Irshultis: That was Roger McBride in 1972. He was a Virginia elector (a state Nixon won) who cast his ballots for John Hospers for President and Toni Nathan for Vice President. By the way, you can win a lot of money in bar bets by asking who was the first woman to receive an electoral vote. It was Nathan (whose real first name was Theodora). These were in fact the first Libertarian nominees. You have answered my question about what to do if you happen to be one of the 535 electors. But what should the rest of us do?

He also said Wednesday that abortion should be made illegal and that the woman should be punished criminally. Apparently that's your position too or you just don't care what positions he takes because he "tells it like it is."

You are as absolutely clueless on the Middle East as your Presidential pick, Mr. Trump. You know nothing about the area or its history or the regional politics, yet you want to start making deals with other peoples' land! You're like Clinton who shilled for Yassar Arafat at the Oslo Accords and forced concessions from Yitzhak Rabin. Here's a real quick summary of what happened there: the Palestinians got sovereign land and government rights over the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and the return of a whole bunch of terrorists from Israel's prisons. The conditions, however, were that they had to stop teaching their children to hate Jews, recognize Israel's right to exist, stop the terrorist attacks, and agree to the Egyptians monitoring the southern border to prevent weapons smuggling. (More here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oslo_I_...

Israel held up their end of the deal. The Palestinians didn't. The attacks stopped for a couple of months and then started right back up again with the Palestinians complaining that they didn't get enough land and that Israel needed to cede even more. Now there are almost daily attacks either from rockets or suicide attackers on the people of Israel. And all this while the Israelis have been giving jobs to many of the Palestinians because the Palestinian government spends the millions of dollars in aid money they get (some of it from the US) to build rockets and dig tunnels!

Peace only happens when both sides want it and the Islamic world does not want peace - either with Israel or anyone else. There is never going to be a settlement to the conflict over there until one side is obliterated. What we should be doing is looking at which of the two actually holds with the ideas of freedom and democracy and productive contribution to the rest of the world. It makes it a really easy decision which side to take.

That's crap and you know it. You're making up excuses to justify Trump's nasty response to yourself. What did Cruz say? His official response was that he thought Trump's wife was a wonderful woman and that real men don't attack women: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/po...

If you want to mislead yourself about the events and pretend that someone else is responsible other than who actually is, no one can stop you from ignoring reality.

What you and Michael dont seem to realize is that thev unwashed masses who alrerady get a cheque from the government are: 1, never going to vote it away and 2, aren't ever going to see a republican...or libertarian candidate speak in a debate. They are too busy watching talent shows on tv and reading tabloids in the checkout isle at wal-mart. If Jesus Christ ran on the republican or Libertarian ticket...they would not vote for him. On the other hand 40% of the population would vote for the devil if he ran as a Democrat. [By the way.... some of them wouldn't vote for Jesus if he ran as a Democrat, just because they are anti Christian.

Trumps base is people who are angry at the establishment, like me. I want less government, more accountability, and more competition. The repubs party IS the establishment. Bush expected a landslide but got no traction at all because he was more of the same socialism

God created the near-term so it's foolish to expect God to fix it. I agree the real problem is preventing government for getting the power to bestow favors. Trump or any other candidate this time will have zero possibility of eliminating cronyism. If trump did nothing but expose the cronyism for ,4 years, that would be a good thing. Hillary, the poster child for cronyism would simply hide it from us. This time it will be trump or hillary who is president. If Hillary wins, the country can't be saved. If trump wins We get some reprieve for a few years

There is still the Electoral College which was established for situations like this when so many have gone politically crazy. Electors may try to save the republic by voting contrary to for what they are appointed, somewhat like jury nullification. I only remember one elector doing it when one of Nixon's electors voted for the Libertarian candidate.

It is legal right now to have an abortion. Trump is saying if it's to be illegal, there should be legal consequences. It's going to be up to Congress and the courts to rule on the legality

It probably wasn't a good idea to split up lands with so much religious significance. I think after all this time it's something the news and Palestinians need to settle without the US involvement. We are just delaying a settlement

I would think by now that people would realize that Trump would be a very dangerous and careless president. He is the best political con man the way he has pulled so many into his endgame of fascism. He is NOT a Conservative or Republican. He is really just an ego on legs. He insults just about every group and has the worst speaking and presentation skills.

Good thread, and on this specific topic, Cruz is up by 10% in some polls in Wisconsin. The demographics there are similar to Michigan and Illinois, where Trump won big.

Optimistically, that may signal a turnaround in the last two weeks. And some of Trump's more recent antics, like rescinding his pledge to the the eventual nominee, may indicate he feels some heat.

You are correct, however I am afraid, based on the ample evidence of the entirety of human history, that government will continue to grow until the entire system collapses.

I am not sure at all, see above about free will. Are you saying that it would be a miracle for Johnson to get 3-4 million this time around? I wouldn't be too sure. Clinton and Trump are both pretty widely disliked. I know they will spend billions telling us the other one is the devil and not to "waste" our vote, but I think there is a reasonable chance that Johnson can reach that goal.