Predictions '08

At this point Joe Biden has a better shot than John McCain of becoming the next president of the United States, so I'll skip the race for first place and offer some educated guesses about how the more interesting candidates might fare:

Third Place: Ralph Nader's name recognition surpasses Bob Barr's, and he's currently outpolling the LP's man by about 2 percentage points. And no one ever went broke underestimating the electoral performance of the Libertarian Party. Nonetheless, if Barr draws mostly from the right and Nader draws mostly from the left -- which seems like a reasonable outcome to expect, though there are surveys showing Nader making inroads among right-wing populists -- then the Libertarian could come out on top. This time around, there are simply more disaffected conservatives than disaffected liberals out there.

Fifth Place: Chuck Baldwin should top Cynthia McKinney easily. You might at least expect her to do well in Georgia, the state that used to send her to Congress, but the Greens aren't on the ballot there.

Seventh Place: A month ago this would have been an easy call for Alan Keyes. But with Ron Paul's non-campaign polling 4 percent in Montana, he has a shot at it. If McKinney flops badly, he might even make it to sixth.

Last Place: Write-ins aside, I'm expecting Gene Amondson of the Prohibition Party to bring up the rear, despite his catchy campaign slogan: "Vote tradition, vote prohibition!"