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Letter to the editor

Bloomberg bid for White House would face hurdles

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published June 21, 2007

WASHINGTON - If billionaire businessman Michael Bloomberg decides to make an independent run for the presidency, he will face legal, financial and organizational hurdles.

The New York mayor is a man without a party after leaving the Republicans this week, six years after he stopped being a Democrat.

The nation has a long history of failed third-party candidacies. Getting on the ballot in all 50 states is tortuous. Participation in televised debates requires a high threshold of support. And getting out the vote is challenging without the help of major-party organizations and their armies of volunteers.

The last independent candidate to gain significant support, Ross Perot, drew considerable national attention in 1992 and 1996 but failed to pick up a single electoral vote - even though in 1992, his best-performing year, he spent $29-million and wound up with 19 percent of the popular vote.

Bloomberg's announcement Tuesday that he was giving up his Republican affiliation during a campaignlike West Coast tour is fueling speculation that he will enter the 2008 race as an independent, even though he says he has no plans to do so.

Despite the poor track record for third-party candidates, the 65-year-old mayor might have the best shot of any recent independent candidate, even better than Perot, "because he wouldn't be running against an incumbent president, " said Pat Choate, who was the Texas businessman's 1996 running mate.

Perot ran against the first President George Bush in 1992 and against President Bill Clinton in 1996.

Presidents can always count on a certain percentage of the vote just because of hard-core supporters and the aura they carry as sitting presidents, even if their approval ratings are low, said Choate, a political economist and author.

Furthermore, "You have real disillusionment with both political parties, " Choate said. "Bloomberg might just do it."

This will be the first wide-open election - with neither a president nor an incumbent vice president in the race - in more than half a century.

It is also a time when disenchanted Republicans are showing a lack of enthusiasm for the current candidates. Some Republicans want Fred Thompson, the actor-politician from Tennessee; others are pressing former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Democrats are generally content with their choices, though a few would like former Vice President Al Gore to run.

Polls also show low approval ratings for the president as well as Congress, and dissatisfaction with the direction of the country.

Bloomberg appears poised to tap into this malaise. In his California appearances, the mayor criticized both parties and their presidential candidates for pandering and timidity. "The big issues of the day are not being addressed, leaving our future in jeopardy, " he said Monday at the University of Southern California.

A recent nationwide survey by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center found that, while the New York mayor is relatively well-known, his appeal is very modest. While almost two-thirds of American voters know who Bloomberg is, only 9 percent of those who have heard of him said there's a good chance they'd vote for him. Another 23 percent said there was some chance, but more than half of American voters said there's no chance Bloomberg would get their vote.

Bloomberg doesn't have nearly the national reputation of Republican Rudy Giuliani, his mayoral predecessor, said Fred Greenstein, professor emeritus of politics at Princeton University. Nor does he have "the kind of messianic quirkiness that Perot had."

"So I don't know what's in it for him other than reducing the size of his estate by financing a national campaign, " Greenstein said.`

But while he may not be that bold a leader, "with $500-million to spend" he can be a formidable contender, said Chris Kofinis, a Democratic consultant unaffiliated with any presidential candidate.

The mayor has done little to deflect the presidential speculation now swirling around him. "The more people that run for office, the better, " he said Wednesday.

[Last modified June 21, 2007, 00:16:08]