The Kristol Lack Of Clarity

Bill Kristol is trolling Twitter with hints that there will soon be a third party candidate for president.  Ooooooh, how exciting!  Except, not really.  The deadlines for getting a third party candidate on the November ballot have already started to pass.  At the end of the next ten days it will already be too late for states with about ten percent of the electoral votes.  That means that an independent would have to run as a write in candidate in those states.  There are states with more than that amount which have filing deadlines in the following month.  Since there is no campaign or party structure to support the independent candidate, it is highly unlikely that he or she will be able to meet the requirements to get on the ballot in the bulk of these early-deadline states.  That would leave this new third party independent off the ballot in states that could provide close to half of all the electoral votes needed for victory in November.  Another way to put that is simply this:  IT'S TOO LATE FOR ANOTHER CANDIDATE TO HAVE A CHANCE TO WIN.

So we have Bill Kristol and the remnants of the #NeverTrump movement trying to beat Trump with their Independent so that they can hand the White House to Hillary Clinton.  It's hard to understand why long-time Republicans are so intent on putting Hillary in control.  Of course, it may be that Kristol is just sending out these tweets to try to stay relevant now that his group has failed so miserably among Republicans.   I hope that is the reason.  After all, spite and self-promotion are still better than delivering the nation to Hillary.  One move is just petty and stupid while the other borders on insanity.