In 1992, Ross Perot, who ran as a third-party candidate, stripped votes away from George H.W. Bush and essentially handed Bill Clinton the White House. Eight years later, Ralph Nader siphoned votes from Al Gore, handing the White House to George W. Bush. In other words, third-party candidates don’t often win. Instead, they split the vote of the party to which they are ideologically closest. In the Senate battle in Arizona between the hard-left Mark Kelly and the Trump-endorsed Blake Masters, Marc Victor’s libertarian spot on the ticket was going to hurt Masters. So, Victor withdrew and endorsed Masters.

In the rough and tumble, and very expensive, world of American elections, the people who run, even when they display humility, must have solid egos. Often, during the campaign, depending on the feedback they’re getting from those around them and from the media, “rock solid” may transform into “inflated.”

Another thing candidates need is to be filled with hope and optimism, at least about their own chances of winning. Nobody gets into a political race hoping he’ll lose. And everybody imagines some wonderful “tortoise and hare” moment that sees him come from behind at the last minute to sweep the race.

Those two mindsets—ego shading into arrogance and hopefulness shading into delusion—mean that it’s very easy for a third-party candidate to look at the situation on the ground, see that he can’t possibly win, and nevertheless choose to run the race to its end. And as noted at the head of this essay, that can spell disaster for the major candidate most closely aligned with that arrogant, egotistical third-party candidate.

Image: Marc Victor, a genuine patriot. YouTube screen grab (cropped).

Marc Victor, the libertarian Senate candidate in Arizona, is neither arrogant nor egotistical. Instead, he is a clear-eyed patriot who looked at the numbers and made a hard call—he dropped out of the race and endorsed his Republican opponent, Blake Masters:

Arizona Libertarian Senate candidate Marc Victor has exited the race and endorsed GOP nominee Blake Masters.

Masters is in a close race to unseat incumbent Democrat Sen. Mark Kelly.

Most polls show Masters trailing Kelly by single digits, including one by a local Fox TV affiliate that show Kelly leading 45-43% with Victor holding 6%, which indicates that his exit could impact the outcome of the Nov. 8 contest.

"I believe it is in the best interests of freedom and peace to withdraw my candidacy and enthusiastically support Blake Masters for United States Senate," said Victor, who made the comment after talking to Masters about his decision.

Victor deserves a lot of praise for putting country over self. That’s a rare quality, especially nowadays. I believe that Arizona’s libertarian voters recognize the wisdom behind his sacrifice and, instead of refusing to vote at all, cast their votes for Blake Masters. They will have the wisdom to recognize that their, and America’s, situation would be infinitely worse if Kelly continued as one of Arizona’s U.S. Senators.