Bob Barr wins the Libertarian Party presidential nomination

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

At the 2008 Libertarian Party National Convention in Denver, Colorado former Republican Congressman Bob Barr (GA) was nominated as the presidential candidate for the party. He served in Congress from 1995–2003.

Barr officially entered the race on May 12, two weeks before the convention amidst months of speculation. He won the nomination on the sixth ballot of the convention edging Mary Ruwart 324–276. Wayne Allyn Root was nominated as his running mate after losing on the fifth ballot and throwing his support to Barr.

Barr's main opposition in the Libertarian race highlighted his vote in Congress in favor of the USA PATRIOT Act in 2001 following the September 11 attacks. He has since renounced the vote, and has worked to repeal the act. Barr's candidacy was also seen by Libertarian "radicals" as an attempt by conservatives to take over the party.

Following his nomination Barr remarked that he "will not let [the Libertarian Party] down" and that it "will be a historic and positive campaign that will succeed." To detractors who say he will take votes away from Republican candidate John McCain, Barr stated that "If Senator McCain ... does not succeed in winning the presidency ... it will be because Senator McCain did not present, and his party did not present, a vision, an agenda, a platform and a series of programs that actually resonated positively with the American people." Party spokesman Andrew Davis described the situation among the electorate as "want[ing] and need[ing] another choice" and stating that "that choice is Bob Barr."

	I just ended my political career, from 15 years old to now, my political career is over, and it's no big deal.
—Mike Gravel

Barr's nomination made former Alaskan senator Mike Gravel — who recently switched from being a Democratic candidate to a Libertarian candidate for President back on March 25, 2008 — announce he is ending his political career.

Gravel said, "I just ended my political career, from 15 years old to now, my political career is over, and it's no big deal. I'm a writer, I'm a lecturer, I'm going to push the issues of freedom and liberty. I'm going to push those issues until the day I die."

Have an opinion on this story? Share it!

Sources

Brian Holtz LP Nominates Barr/Root, Chooses Officers Third Party Watch, May 27, 2008
Stephen K. Paulson. "Ex-GOP congressman Barr wins Libertarian nomination" — The Boston Globe, May 26, 2008
James Plummer Bob Barr and the PATRIOT Act Free for all (blog), May 26, 2008
"Libertarian Party picks Barr as US presidential candidate" — Agence France-Presse, May 25, 2008
Aaron Gould Sheinin That didn’t take long Atlanta Journal Constitution, May 24, 2008

Share this:

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License