The first person I called after Governor Charlie Crist announced he will run for the Senate as an independent was Dean Barkley of Minnesota. Mr. Barkley knows all about the obstacles facing a third-party candidate. A member of Ross Perot’s Reform Party, he served out the final months of the late Paul Wellstone’s Senate term. Running in 2008 as an independent, he won 15% of the vote despite raising a shade over $160,000. “I’m very glad Crist did it,” Barkley told me when I reached him by phone. “I don’t really care what his reasons are. It shows that the window for an independent movement is getting bigger and bigger. Most centrists or moderates don’t like either party. They’re basically exasperated with both.”
(more…)