Third Party Man: Doug Bailey

Political Players is a weekly conversation with the leaders, consultants and activists who are shaping American politics. This week, as Michael Bloomberg's staff continued to make noise about a possible independent run for president, as Chuck Hagel refused to rule out bolting his party for a national campaign, CBSNews.com turned to Doug Bailey, former Republican political consultant and a strong advocate for a third party "unity ticket" in 2008.

Doug Bailey: I think there is a temptation on the part of Democratic presidential candidates, for example, to have different position on CAFE standards in Michigan. I think it is true that the strength of the NEA, for example, is unduly prominent in the Democratic Party. I think that both parties have elements at their base which cause them to focus on issues that do, in effect, polarize the electorate. It's a little more obvious to see it on the Republican side. But that doesn't mean it doesn't happen on the Democratic side as well.

CBSNews.com: You've criticized both parties for being, and I'm quoting your Web site again, "excessively dominated by money." And yet any credible third party candidate would likely have to spend a tremendous amount of money in order to be serious. Michael Bloomberg, for example, is talked about as a credible candidate in large part because he'd be able to spend upwards of a billion dollars on a campaign. So, how do you square that?

Doug Bailey: There are two different ways of avoiding the power of special interest money. One is through a campaign funded by the candidate himself. Granted it's a lot of money, but on the other hand, at the end, he owes nobody anything.

The other way is to raise the money in small contributions via the Web. One of the more interesting aspects of Unity '08 is that if the ticket that has just been nominated in the 2008 Unity '08 Convention were to turn around and ask the 10 million delegates to consider making a contribution of $100 to the ticket that they just nominated, and 20 percent of them did so, then that ticket would end up with $200 million dollars from the first of July forward, which is plenty to run a substantial campaign.

CBSNews.com: Unity '08 says that both parties focus too much on their base "each of which represents only about 10 percent of the American people." And yet, Democrats won a majority of the popular vote in 2006 and the Republicans won a majority in 2004. They had to appeal to a lot of swing voters in order to do that, right?

Doug Bailey: Well, of course, they always get some swing voters. I think it's worth saying what you said just a little differently. My impression is that the Democrats did win a lot of swing voters in 2006 I think it is much more the Republicans losing that election than the Democrats winning it, but here is the central point: In 2004, there was an increase in voter turnout of 22 percent over 2000, which is a really remarkable achievement. And that happened because both parties focused on their base, did microtargeting to expand their base. And then did a massive job of turning it out.

So, it is the concentration on the base which is the dominant thing of current American politics. As opposed to what used to be the dominant thing, which is that you got 51 percent by bringing your party along but reaching toward undecided voters in the middle.

CBSNews.com: You divide the issues into two categories: what you call crucial issues, and what you call important issues. And crucial issues include terror and economic competitiveness and health care and education. Important issues, which you think have become too important, are gun control and abortion and gay marriage. And yet, if you elected a president, wouldn't he have to take positions on those issues? In other words, how do you make them go away?

Doug Bailey: Oh, you don't make them go away. The fact is that, of course, any candidate has to have a position on abortion, on gay marriage, on gun control and other issues that we call important, and maybe worthy of debate, but not crucial to the future, safety and well-being of the United States.

The question is not whether you have to have a position on those issues. The question is whether they're central to your campaign. And what we do believe is that in recent years a lot of wedge issues, which are effective with your base, have gotten a whole lot more attention than crucial issues, which are tougher.

CBSNews.com: What evidence do you have that the reason tens of millions of Americans don't vote is cynicism? I mean, aren't there studies that show that, ideologically, the people that don't vote are about same as Americans who do vote?

Doug Bailey: Well, I've come to believe that there is a study that will show anything that the people who designed the study wanted to show.

I think there's plenty of evidence to suggest that there are a lot of average Americans who don't vote. And I think it is also true that there are a great many people who take politics really quite seriously, who are cynical about the process, and don't participate.

And I'll give you one example. In 1992, when Ross Perot ran, there was a spike in turnout. Because there was another voice heard from that drew people to the polls who had not voted in past years.

So, I think, frankly, whether there are two parties or three or 23 or whatever in 2008, you're going to see an absolutely enormous turnout because I think the public has decided that this is probably the most important election in their lifetime, and it may very well be the most important election in their children's lifetime. I think turnout is going to be gigantic, even among cynics.

CBSNews.com: Aren't third party tickets usually a spoiler for one of the major party tickets? How would Unity '08 avoid that?

Doug Bailey: By winning.

CBSNews.com: Since Abraham Lincoln, America has never elected a third-party president — even when Teddy Roosevelt ran in 1912, having already served as president. Why do you think 2008 will be so different?

Doug Bailey: I believe that the public understands that the country is coming to a moment of truth where there are so many crucial issues in front of our government, and our government seems so incapable of dealing with any of them that for the future of the country and for the sake of the children we really have to get the political train back on track. That doesn't necessarily mean that we create a third party that could govern forever. It means that we fix the problem.

And that's what Unity '08 is designed to do. And I do believe that the way the American people will approach this election will be dramatically different from any that we've seen in our lifetime because they do understand that the future of the country is at risk here.

I mean it's not just terrorism. But it is health care, and it is education, and it is — you know, when Alan Greenspan says there has to be a third party to solve the deficit problem, when Tom Friedman says there has to be a third party to solve the energy issue as well as to solve the global climate change problem, you begin to understand that there are truly crucial issues. And the public perceives this. And Washington doesn't seem to be able to multitask, or even to deal with a single one of them.

CBSNews.com: Have any serious politicians besides Chuck Hagel and Michael Bloomberg considered running on Unity '08?

Doug Bailey: All of the conversation that we have had with anybody that has either requested a briefing or has been encouraged to receive one — including who has been in the conversation — is confidential and therefore we don't talk about it.

CBSNews.com: There's been some criticism that your group, based on these two candidates, Hagel and Bloomberg, is mostly disenchanted moderate Republicans. Is that unfair?

Doug Bailey: The fact is that what studies we've done of the make up of the delegate base that we're attracting seems to be that it is slightly more Democratic than Republican. So, who knows?

CBSNews.com: I heard that you're gearing up to do Unity '08 and not, as it were, Unity Indefinitely. So, the idea is it's just a temporary party?

Doug Bailey: That's correct. I mean, the first name for this was not Unity '08, it was Fix It '08. And we have changed that to Unity '08 but that was our first thought as to what it ought to be called. We want to achieve a one-time fix of a very severe political problem that we have, that the political train is off the track.

And the way to do that is for voters in the middle, but reaching far into both sides, to elect a president and vice president on a Unity ticket. So that both political parties understand that the political power that they need to address in every election, the swing vote — which should be determining every election — is in the middle.

And that there are crucial issues that those voters want the country to address. And frankly, if the parties get that message and adjust their ways, there's no need for Unity '08 in the future. If they don't get that message then at least one of them is probably going to go out of existence.
By Brian Goldsmith