The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:51, 13 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

American Third Position Party[edit]

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Non-notable political party which has not received significant news coverage and is not on the ballot in any state; sources cited are mostly self-referential, and Google News search does not provide any better ones. MelanieN (talk) 04:18, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions. —MelanieN (talk) 04:21, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This party has not yet contested any elections under its own name. This tends to suggest it is not notable. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 05:32, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment No general elections have been held since this party was created in January of 2010, ergo it would be virtually impossible for it to have contested any elections under its own name. KevinOKeeffe (talk) 06:02, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Numerous primary elections have been held. The January 2010 founding date is clearly inaccurate, since the party applied in November 2009 to gain recognized status in California. I don't know how to reconcile these dates; this is not the only internally contradictory information in the article. --MelanieN (talk) 14:06, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

With regard to Melanie's comment, I would note that the primary elections held this year would not generally have been related to the A3P party. In most states, minor or new parties are not eligible to hold primary elections even if they want to; more typically, they submit petitions to get their candidates on the general election ballot. So it's not the A3P's failure to participate in the primaries that leads me to think they are not contesting any elections, but their failure to qualify for the general elections. The article says, "However, the party failed to qualify and is not on the ballot in California or any other state." The deadline to qualify for the November general election ballot has already passed in every state. [1] A party founded in January 2010, or earlier, would have had time to qualify for the ballot in most states, if it had had enough supporters and the desire to qualify. So we can already say in September, with regard to Kevin's comment, that this party is not contesting the general election in November. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 15:26, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep This article presently includes sixteen (16) evidentiary citations in its References section, including mainstream press coverage from the New Hampshire Union Leader, Concord Monitor, and the Long Beach Press-Telegram, as well as Ballot Access News, and the office the California Secretary of State. KevinOKeeffe (talk) 06:13, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Eight of the 16 "evidentiary citations" are to the group's own website. The California Secretary of State reference [2] merely indicates that they applied for ballot status. It lists them as one of 16 "non-qualified political parties" who have made such an application. (The 16 non-qualified parties listed by the Secretary of State also include the Resurrection Party, the Utopia Manifesto Party, and the We Like Women Party - no, I am NOT making that up.) As noted in the article, the group failed in their application for ballot status and will not be on the November ballot.--MelanieN (talk) 14:06, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, not to invoke WP:OTHERSTUFFDOESNTEXIST, but just to place the Secretary of State claim in context: fourteen of the sixteen "non-qualified parties" listed at the SecState reference do not have Wikipedia pages. The only ones that do are the Reform Party, which used to be highly notable, and this one. More evidence that a party doesn't automatically become notable just because it files an application with the Secretary of State.--MelanieN (talk) 16:25, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. The party's notability doesn't stem from the fact that it applied to the California secretary of state, but from the amount of coverage it's received in reliable sources, as well as the fact that it has some high-profile leaders and supporters (including Olympic gold-medal winner Bob Richards). I don't agree with or support their political views at all, but they are certainly notable enough, if only just barely. They haven't been giving any indications that they will be going away anytime soon, either (see WP: PERSISTENCE). Stonemason89 (talk) 20:43, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment In addition to Mr. Richards, there's also Kevin B. MacDonald and James Edwards. KevinOKeeffe (talk) 07:07, 3 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: The subject of the article has its own category ([[3]]). I think it would be weird to have a category pertaining to a political party but no article about that party. Thus, while I personally think both the article and the cat are worth keeping, I also think that if this does end up failing AFD, then the category should be deleted too. Stonemason89 (talk) 20:46, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. These minor far-right parties spring up all the time then disappear again. The sources are either primary sources, or mentions in local newspapers, one of which points out that the same group started another party in May 2009 to much the same fanfare, and now its website is dead, though a cached version shows it used the same images and captions as this new one. [4] If the party is still active in two years, and there are good sources, then we can reconsider. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:14, 2 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Their website is decidedly NOT off-line, as I just verified a moment ago. See for yourself: | American Third Position party website — Preceding unsigned comment added by KevinOKeeffe (talk • contribs)

I wrote that one of the local newspapers said the same group set up a political party last year, and the website for that one is already dead. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 07:32, 3 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, /ƒETCH COMMS / 00:44, 6 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, it has several mentions in newspapers and is being run by high profile people (as admitted by those who oppose this even). All in all adds up to make this notable. Mathmo ^Talk 08:26, 6 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - I advocate the lowest of all possible barriers for inclusion of actually-existing political parties, their leaders, and their youth sections. This is the stuff of which encyclopedias are made. This party exists, ergo I advocate its inclusion on the basis of per se notability. —Carrite, Oct. 6, 2010.
Weak Keep - loathsome though their politics may be, having looked through the sources, I believe they (specifically the coverage from the Long Beach Press-Telegram, Orange County Weekly, Concord Monitor and New Hampshire Union-Leader) provide just about enough evidence to demonstrate that this is a notable party. There are concerns about the brief duration of the coverage, though - I'm not sure whether they've achieved lasting notability, but that can be re-assessed at a later date. Robofish (talk) 21:41, 10 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.