Two presidential tickets filed on Friday's deadline day, giving Iowans nine candidates to choose from. The last minute additions are Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party and Brian Moore of the Socialist Party.
The Constitution Party started as the US Taxpayers Party, an umbrella group of several single state conservative parties. It changed names in 1999. Baldwin was the 2004 vice presidential candidate. He's running under different labels in some states.
The Socialist Party is the lineal descendant of Eugene Debs' campaigns of a century ago and elected, as Alice Cooper duly noted in "Wayne's World," three Socialist mayors of Milwaukee. The party faded almost to non-existence in the 1960s but has been an off and on presence on Iowa's presidential ballots since 1980.
Nine presidential tickets is about average for Iowa in recent presidential cycles. The most crowded ballot was in 1992 with 14 candidates.
The big news in Congressional filing was the non-filing by Democratic primary loser William Myers in the 4th Congressional District. There will be three-way contests in the 3rd and 5th Districts, and a four-way race in the 2nd. The U.S. Senate race is a two way contest between incumbent Democrat Tom Harkin and Republican Christopher Reed.
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