The short answer to this question is an unequivocal NO.

I can say this with certainty because first, the only third party candidate that I am aware of who has ever been elected President of the United States was Abraham Lincoln, and, second, since the Green Party, as of May 2008, has full ballot status in only 15 states plus partial ballot status in six others, there is no way Cynthia McKinney, as the candidate of that party can secure enough electoral votes to win the presidency.

While George Washington ran for President virtually unopposed (actually I don't think that he formally ran for President but was simply the unanimous choice of the first meeting of the Electoral College) every presidential election since Washington left office has been a contest between the candidates of two major parties with John Adams, our second president, running as the candidate of the Federalist Party against Thomas Jefferson the candidate of the Democratic-Republican Party (which is today's Democrat Party). From this came the tradition of our two party system. However, there was more than tradition at work here as, over time, state election laws have made it increasingly difficult for third parties to get on the ballot. This has been accomplished by means of complex registration processes such as requiring parties to provide petitions signed by a certain minimum number of voters before being placed on the ballot and then requiring the parties to run candidates for a certain minimum number of offices and achieve a certain threshold number of votes in order to remain on the ballot in future elections. As far as I know there are only two parties, in addition to the Republican and Democratic parties, who, in recent years, have managed to achieve and maintain ballot status in all 50 states and these are the Libertarian Party and the American Reform Party.

This fact, however, has not discouraged candidates or parties. I counted 61 political parties on the Project Vote Smart's Party Information page which lists them alphabetically from the America First Party to the Workers World Party along with links to their websites and other contact information. As of this writing (July 17, 2008) Project Vote Smart is still listing 318 potential presidential candidates remaining in the race, 254 of which have formally announced their candidacy and filed papers with the Federal Election Commission. Of course John McCain, Barack Obama and Cynthia McKinney are listed along with the other hopefuls which include some very optimistic people still seeking the Republican or Democratic nomination - talk about wishing for miracles!

Since it is certain from the start that a third party candidate cannot win, the question arises as to why anyone would go to the time and trouble to run as a third party candidate and why people would want to "throw their vote away" (at least that is how the media and two major parties describe it) on a third party candidate. These two questions can be easily answered with the phrase winning isn't everything.

Candidates of the two major parties have to pull together a broad coalition of people with differing opinions in order to win. While the political center shifts with the nation's mood and the Democrat and Republican parties tend to shift with it with the Republicans taking a position to the political right of center and Democrats to the political left of center. Minor parties, on the other hand, tend to take either a more clear cut ideological stance or support one or a few narrow causes. These parties can sometimes succeed in having their candidates win an occasional local or state office, but the best they have done, election-wise, is win a governorship or U.S. Senate seat. While these parties would like to win more elections, their real goal is to promote their agendas and try to nudge the public and the two major parties closer to their views. And, some of these parties have been very successful in advancing their agendas while still losing elections.

The biggest electoral success of the Prohibition Party, which continues to exist and run candidates for President, was the election of Sidney Catts as Governor of Florida in 1916 and Charles Randall to Congress from California during the same period. However, they also succeeded in generating enough support to get the Eighteenth Amendment passed and have it added to the U.S. Constitution in 1919, the result of which was Prohibition which made the manufacture, sale and distribution of alcoholic beverages within the United States (historical note: 2008 is the 75th anniversary of the repeal of the 18th Amendment and associated laws).

Another of example of winning by losing is the late Norman Thomas (1884 - 1968) who, between 1928 and 1948, ran for President a total six times and lost each time. I remember my Father once telling me about seeing Thomas being interviewed on TV following the 1960 election and, upon being asked by the interviewer whether, having run and lost so many Presidential races if he felt his life had been a waste, to which Thomas cheerfully answered that, on the contrary, he felt that his life and work had been a great success and pointed out that over the period in which he had run, all of the programs that he had spent his life campaigning for had been enacted under President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Democratic Party.

Currently, third parties often provide leverage for people on the left and right of the political spectrum to try to pull the Democrat or Republican party more in their direction, as votes for these parties are votes lost by the Democrat or Republican parties. Of course people can express their dissatisfaction with one of the two major parties by either voting for the other party out of spite or sitting out the election. However, it is difficult to differentiate between someone who votes for the candidate of one of the two parties because they agree with the party and candidate and someone of the opposite party who votes for that candidate because they are mad at their own candidate or party. However, by voting for a third party candidate who takes a strong position on the right or the left, the voter is sending a stronger and clearer message namely that the major party and its candidate are drifting to far toward the center and away from their left or right roots.

In a close election, too much defection to a third party can cost one of the other two parties the election. in the 1994 election Ross Perot did serious damage to the first President Bush by giving Republicans a way to vent their anger against the President for going back on his word and raising taxes. President George H.W. Bush never had the opportunity to run again but his son, President George W. Bush, got the tax cut message loud and clear.

This year the Cynthia McKinney, a former Democratic Congresswoman running as the Green Party candidate and possibly Ralph Nader, who previously ran as the Green Party candidate and may run as an independent (no party) or as the candidate of another party on the left, could attract a sufficient number of votes from Democrats who are not happy with Barack Obama to cost him the election. On the Republican side former Congressman Bob Barr, a strong fiscal and social conservative, running as the Libertarian Party candidate could pose a problem for John McCain as many conservatives are taking a wait and see attitude about Senator McCain. While neither the Green nor the Libertarian party has a chance of winning the Presidency one of them could end up taking credit for the Republican or Democratic candidate losing the election and that is a powerful message to both the loser and the winner.