Perennial multi-party Missouri candidate Martin Lindstedt, known for his rants against various racial and ethnic groups, lost a federal appeal Friday related to his 2004 campaign for the Missouri governorship.
Lindstedt, from the southwest Missouri town of Granby, sued just before the Republican primary in August 2004, complaining that Matt Blunt, then secretary of state, had not allowed him to use his nickname -- "Mad Dog" -- on the ballot. Blunt also had not included a link to Lindstedt’s campaign on the state’s official website. Lindstedt’s website, now offline, was a collection of his pro-militia writing.
Recognizing that it was too late to reprint the primary ballots, "Mad Dog" asked a federal judge for an unusual remedy: He requested that the court order Blunt’s name on the November general election ballot to be listed as Matt "Runt" Blunt.
In May 2005, a federal judge threw out Lindstedt’s suit, noting that it violated a federal court rule prohibiting lawsuits filed solely for the purpose of harassment.
In his own court filings, Mad Dog admitted that he filed the suit "so that it would be picked up by the news and entertainment media, and thus make of Defendant Blunt an object of ridicule and contempt."
Lindstedt appealed the dismissal to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. After he paid the $225 docket fee "under protest," the court ruled Friday that the district court was well within its rights to dismiss the suit.
The failed appeal is one of Lindstedt’s lesser problems at the moment. He is best known statewide for his multiple runs for public office have included campaigns for governor as a Libertarian in 1996; for U.S. Senate on the Reform Party ticket in 2000; U.S. Senate as a Republican in 2002 and for governor as a Republican in 2004. He advocates racial purity and the separation of racial and ethnic groups.
His views are so strident that last year he was booted out of a white supremecist group. The Neosho Daily News quoted Pastor Morris L. Gulett, of the Church of the Sons of YHVH, saying Lindstedt was ousted for "writing and distributing some very disturbing ideas," including "skinning alive of prisoners and execution by slow torture."
"I cannot in good conscience allow anyone who promotes such ungodly behavior and tactics to carry a valid ordination certificate that bears our church standard and my signature. Nor can I in good conscience allow anyone who promotes such ideas to carry a valid membership card that bears the standard of the Legion of Saints. We are sons and daughters of the Most High YHVH, not street thugs." This from the leader of a white supremacist group!
In Newton County, however, Lindstedt is best known for for his arrest on charges of first-degree statutory sodomy and a resulting circus in Circuit Court.
Posted by Mark Morris and Kit Wagar 3 p.m.
In fairness to the Libertarian, Reform and Republican Parties, it should be noted that Lindstedt was never the nominee of any of those parties. Each party's voters selected a different candidate over Lindstedt in their respective primary elections.
Posted by: St Louis Oracle | June 16, 2006 at 09:16 PM
Don't you mean "Rules of CIVIL Engagement" rather than "...Civic Engagement"???
Posted by: ME Bryan | June 17, 2006 at 12:45 AM
Good point. But I wanted to lift the definition beyond just being polite to each other to the idea that we're all in this together as citizens. Does that make sense? If not, I'm open to changing it.
Keith Chrostowski, KC Buzz Blog editor.
Posted by: Keith Chrostowski | June 17, 2006 at 10:10 AM