It is interesting to hear Democrats' reactions to the Nader third party run.

Having long promoted the view that Nader was a spoiler in 2000, giving Bush the presidency, they are once again fretting about Nader playing a spoiler role. But, in this case, I think they can rest easy, any harm Nader does would have been done anyway.

The main Democrat fear seems to be that the partisans of the primary loser (whoever that may be) will run to Nader rather than endorse the Democrat candidate. And, granted, giving the polls out lately, it is possible that disappointed Democrats may flee to Nader, but, despite pundit comments, that is a good thing for the Democrats.

Why? Because McCain is a relatively centrist candidate. Had Nader not entered the race, those Democrats would not have voted for the nominee they dislike. The more left-leaning might have sat out the election, so whether they sit it out or vote for Nader is of no consequence to the Democrat nominee. The voters who do matter are the ones who would now vote for Nader but who previously might have crossed over to vote for McCain. In these cases, Nader's candidacy actually helps the Democrats, as Nader is drawing away McCain votes. Admittedly, it is a small group who could both vote for Nader and McCain, but there are some, mostly those who would vote for McCain as a protest vote against whichever Democrat is nominated.

Beyond the voters who would have abandoned the Democrat party anyway, I don't think Nader will be drawing off too many more Democrat votes, maybe a few at the far left fringe, but not many. Both Obama and Hillary have good hard-left credentials, so Nader won't be winning too much support running to their left. He may be able to drain a little support from Hillary among the anti-war crowd, but odds were good Hillary never had their votes anyway.

So, in the end, Nader really won't do much to the eventual Democrat nominee. If anything, by giving an alternative to voting McCain as a protest vote, he may be helping the Democrats slightly.

And, whatever tiny bit of harm he does may be offset by the "Nader of the right", Ron Paul.

Ron Paul has said nothing about a third party run, as far as I know, but it does seem inevitable. He still has his small group of die hard supporters, his disproportionately huge war chest, and his scheduled was already cleared all the way up to November, so why not run as a third party contender?

I don't doubt that the Libertarians would be happy to give the dubious benefit of their nomination to Paul, they did it before, and he was not half as strong then. So it would really take very little for Ron Paul to jump on the ticket. Of course, the chances of winning are as close to zero as one can get, but that hasn't driven him from the Republican primary, so why would it keep him from running in the general election?

And what would be the outcome of a Ron Paul third party run? About as little as a Nader third party run.

Ron Paul's supporters are not exactly your run of the mill Republicans. Many aren't Republicans at all. And the ones who are were not the sort of Republicans who would vote McCain out of party solidarity. Paul is attracting the doctrinaire libertarians and CFR/NAU conspiracy theorists who were never going to be in McCain's camp anyway. If Paul doesn't run third party, then they will probably sit this one out, or vote for the Libertarian candidate. If Ron Paul does run, then, he will be drawing on votes that were not open to McCain anyway.

Nor do I think Paul will draw many of the disaffected conservatives from the Republican party. First, his libertarian doctrine does not appeal to many of the social and defense conservatives who dislike McCain, so he will only have a chance to attract the economic and libertarian conservatives currently supporting McCain. And even among those, he really doesn't have a lot of hope. Anyone who has decided to support McCain despite personal disagreements has done so because of worry over what a president Obama or a president Clinton will do. Ron Paul has no hope of winning, so throwing a vote to Paul would effectively be handing the race to Obama or Hillary. Since many have chosen to support McCain precisely to avoid that outcome, why would they now turn around and vote for Ron Paul?

The only votes Ron Paul may add among the Republicans would be those who so despise McCain that they are willing to see an Obama or Hillary presidency. Of course, even among those, many would not embrace Paul due to his specific beliefs, but those who do are still not an issue for Republicans. Those voters were never voting for McCain, so whether they sit out the election or vote for Paul is irrelevant.

The only person who may stands to benefit from Paul opting out of running, and this is an odd one, is Obama. Should Obama get the nomination, and should Paul stay away from a third party run, Obama may stand to pick up some of the Paul supporters. It sounds strange, but it makes sense. Allow me to explain.

Obviously, the doctrinaire libertarians and the CFR/NAU conspiracists are not going to go from Paul to Obama*. But the young college idealists who backed Ron Paul because he was different and an agent of change may be up for grabs. Admittedly, Obama's sales pitch is quite different and his politics are quite far from Paul's, but he has the same sort of semi-cult campaign. As we have seen in other parts of life, those who join one cult often join another when they leave the first. Here I think the same may happen, those who mindlessly championed Paul for change could easily turn into those shouting "Yes we can" at an Obama rally. Not every one, certainly, maybe not even a majority, but I think some percentage of the young Ron Paul supporters may be open to switching to the Obama camp.

Other than that, I really see neither of the possible third party bids doing much to change the outcome of the race. Admittedly, what outcomes I do see are a bit counter-intuitive: Nader may take a little of the Democrat protest vote away from McCain, and Paul may keep some of his supporters from crossing over to Obama, but that's it.

In the end, I don't think we will be hearing anyone seriously saying "Nader handed this to McCain."** We may hear it, of course, but I doubt anyone will really believe it.

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* Need I add Paul's white power supporters are not going to switch to Obama either?

** I have to add one caveat. Everything I wrote depends on things staying mostly the same. Should the Rezko or Ayers scandals finally break big, or should Hillary tell a few more tall tales, it is possible the Democrats could finally get fed up and run to Nader in droves, deciding he is more electable than either candidate. So, my predictions are only valid so long as nothing dramatic occurs.