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[SecularMotion]

Phantom party thwarts independent voters

When Valerie Schechter showed up to vote in the presidential primary on Feb. 5, she expected to take a Democratic ballot and vote for Hillary Clinton. But a poll worker noticed that she was registered as a member of the Interdependent Third Party.

"I'd never even heard of it," she said.

It's no wonder. The party has no website, no phone number, no chairman, no platform. Its last known candidate was a gadfly from the tiny town of Adams who ran unsuccessfully for the state Senate in 2002 on a promise to slash water and sewer rates. He is now deceased.

And yet his party, almost miraculously, is thriving. According to state officials, 2,380 Massachusetts voters are registered members of the Interdependent Third Party. The apparently moribund political group is now the second biggest of the 18 officially recognized minor parties in the state, having swelled its ranks by 31 voters since 2006.

The reason has nothing to do with the residual appeal of the failed Senate candidate, William P. Foley. Instead, election officials trace the party's growth to voters, like Schechter, who filled out voter registration forms at the Registry of Motor Vehicles.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/03/01/phantom_party_thwarts_independent_voters/