Americans Elect is, according to its website, "a nonpartisan nonprofit whose only mission is to let the American people directly nominate their choice for president."
AE is largely, and secretly, funded by Wall Street types who support what Justin Elliott of Salon has called "a kind of pro-establishment, 'why can’t we just all get along by agreeing to dismantle Social Security'-style centrism."
AE has spent many millions getting on the ballot in about 15 states, including some biggies like California, Florida and Ohio.
AE is currently holding "the first national online presidential primary in U.S. history," open to its 400K or so members.
Online voting began four days ago.
Guess who's winning.
Who else but Bircher Ron Paul, whose few fans are dedicated freepers of polls like this.
As of now, Paul has 919 votes.
The rest of the Top Ten are:
Jon Huntsman, 635
Bernie Sanders, 452
Barack Obama, 346
Mike Bloomberg, 277
Buddy Roemer, 225
Stephen Colbert, 205
Gary Johnson, 160
Jon Stewart, 135
Elizabeth Warren, 108
None of these people, AFAIK, have expressed any interest in being a third-party, Wall Street candidate for President.
But even if they did, and they won the online poll, it wouldn't matter.
Because the AE board of Wall Street types will decide who gets the AE ballot line, no matter what its members say.
Two things stand out about that Top Ten List -- first, the number of votes shows that this well-publicized national effort has so far garnered fewer votes than most state legislative races, and second, is this all about trying to draft billionaire Bloomberg?
My cynical quess is that the AE board will ignore the online voters, and give their ballot line to Romney, who none of their members have voted for yet, but is closest to the "pro-establishment, 'why can’t we just all get along by agreeing to dismantle Social Security'-style centrism" of this bogus Wall Street outfit.