Ross Perot in 1992
* The most successful third party candidate since the Bull Moose Party in 1912, Perot at several points was leading in the polls. In the middle of the campaign, Perot pulled out, claiming unnamed political dirty tricksters were out to sabotage him and harm his daughter. He rejoined the race, but by then it was too late. He finished with 18% of the popular vote and not a single state.
* Had he stayed in the race and listened to more experienced campaigners, there was a real possibility he could have won. Perot was a billionaire who could have easily outspent the others. George Bush Sr. was fairly colorless, a bland and uninspiring man that conservatives in his own party distrusted. Bill Clinton was a charismatic public speaker but with enormous personal failings. The first time most Americans heard his name was in allegations of an affair with model Gennifer Flowers.
* There was an enormous public desire for an alternative to the two party system, and still is. Perot had an enormous appeal with his plain spoken nature and reputation for being driven and getting things done. In his home state of Texas he pushed for education reform and managed to outmaneuver and defeat both major parties. Perot was drafted to run for president by public demand, and his followers tended to be politically moderate and not inclined to vote for either party.
* His two main mistakes were obvious. He withdrew from the race halfway through. He did so because of his paranoid conspiracy minded nature. Perot also claimed his security had some years earlier stopped a “ six man Viet Cong-Black Panther hit squad” sent to kill him for trying to rescue POWs still imprisoned in Vietnam. (The POW-MIA claim is itself a persistent but untrue rumor.) Molly Ivins, a Texas humorist, recalled that hit squad claim with amusement, noting there were only five Black Panther members in Texas, most of them police informers. More than a few observers noted Perot's personal hostility towards Bush Sr., since Perot believed Bush was covering up evidence of US POWs in Vietnam.
* If Perot had won, what kind of a presidency would this peculiarly conspiracy minded man have had? His main focus would have been on issues like term limits, campaign finance reform, and the deficit, as that is what he promised while running. But whatever the merits of these proposals he would have been enormously handicapped with no party in Congress to back him, a hostile and undiplomatic temper, and a tendency to imagine dark plots.
* As newsman John Chancellor commented, “The public seems to want to inflict him upon Washington.” The public was fed up with Washington's lack of action, and wanted someone who would bulldoze his way through. But because of his faults and circumstances beyond his control, most of Perot's efforts would have little chance to succeed.
* The one big exception is on drug laws. Perot eagerly embraced the War on Drugs, taking part in Nancy Reagan's “Just Say No” campaign. In an atmosphere of utter hysteria (See Section Five) Perot would have taken it farther than most. He called for harsher punishments even for less harmful drugs like marijuana, wanting a rating system on judges based on how hard their sentences were. Perot proposed martial law and blocking off minority neighborhoods, going house to house searching for drugs and drug users. Harsher drug laws mean more ruined lives, perhaps even his own drug war invasion of another nation. Where Bush Sr. invaded Panama, Perot may push for US troops sent to war in Colombia or Mexico.
* In 1993, Perot accused Clinton of trying to start a war or get involved in the civil war in Bosnia to distract others from his own problems at home. Unlike most major figures that get accused of being isolationist, Perot actually had a strong streak of it himself. But he was also a person who could be easily moved by emotional appeals and images, and tended to always look for the most direct, if not simplistic, solution.
* So we could expect Perot would absolutely refuse to intervene in first Bosnia, then Somalia, and finally in Rwanda, until he suddenly reversed himself each time and sent in as much of the military as possible. In Bosnia and Rwanda that would likely mean no intervention until dramatic photos made the evening news, followed by US bombers and troops, followed by leaving quickly, and the chaos resuming. Perot's own history is one of dramatic reversals, even mood swings, and that makes for an unpredictability that would cost the lives of US servicemen and civilians of whichever unfortunate nation he invaded.
* Perot often seemed out of touch and to always be looking for a quick or easy fix. For example, he spoke publicly of “surgical strikes” to take out dictators. That is a nice fantasy, but it does not exist in reality. If they were possible, everyone from Franklin Roosevelt to Obama would carry these strikes out. Should Perot try, he would either be drawn into campaigns of indiscriminate bombing, as Roosevelt did, or bombings as quick but ineffective temper tantrums, much like Reagan and Clinton both tried.
* The Reform Party continued after Perot's loss. Its best known success was electing Jesse Ventura, a wrestler, as Minnesota governor. Ventura was a crackpot. He had no interest in governing, hosting the absurd Conspiracy Files later. The Reform Party lurched wildly, running white supremacist Pat Buchanan in 2000, former Green Party candidate Ralph Nader in 2004, then obscure candidates. There is little reason to think the party will do better had Perot won.