(Because somebody called me this morning and woke me up at the ungodly hour of 8:30am on the first day I’ve had to sleep late in three weeks) I watched Meet the Press this morning and heard Ralph Nader announce that he is running for president. Nader, who will celebrate his 74th birthday next week, has no doubt been planning this run for a while. His website, which he mentioned several times in the interview, is up, and includes a significant amount of content, including a comparison of his stands on the issues versus those of the other candidates.
Much noise has been made about Nader’s effect on the 2000 election. But this ain’t 2000. As the result, I doubt if Nader will have any negligible effect on the election. Nader’s appeal just isn’t what it was in 2000.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
Topics at a Glance Dataset Abstract
http://roperweb.ropercenter.uconn.edu/cgi-bin/hsrun.exe/roperweb/Catalog40/Catalog40.htx;start=TopSummary_Link?Archno=USVRS1992-NATELEC
Title Voter Research and Surveys: National Election Day Exit Poll, 1992
[Study# USVRS1992-NATELEC]
Survey Firm Voter Research & Surveys
Survey Sponsor ABC News/CBS News/NBC News/CNN
Field Dates November 3, 1992
Sample Exiting Voters
Sample Size 15,490
Variables 114
Here is your fair vote link;
http://www.fairvote.org/plurality/perot.htm
Money quote…..
Analysis: Perotís vote totals in themselves likely did not cause Clinton to win. Even if all of these states had shifted to Bush and none of Bushís victories had been reversed (as seems plausible, in fact, as Bush won by less than 5% only in states that a Republican in a close election could expect to carry, particularly before some of the partisan shifts that took place later in the 1990s ñ Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, South Dakota and Virginia), Clinton still would have won the electoral college vote by 281 to 257. But such a result obviously would have made the race a good deal closer.
Thanks for the links, NND. The first, unfortunately, does not let one have the data without being a member or paying $400 — not likely. (I’ll try to see whether I can get the data set through work — at least now I know where to look.) The second is the same one I found, which was based on an analysis of the preceding and following presidential elections, NOT on exit polls.
In any event, the only president elected with a lower percentage of the popular vote was Lincoln — and the Union fell apart. 🙂