1992
1994
1998
Below: Denny Lane
Dale Duane Wilkinson, November 20, 1966 (Park Rapids, Minn.) -
VP candidate for Vermont Grassroots Party (aka Grassroots Party) (2000)
Running mate with nominee: Dennis Lane (1947-2013)
Popular vote: 1044 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538
The campaign:
The Vermont Grassroots Party was formed in 1994 and dissolved in 2004. They ran a slate of candidates for statewide and federal offices.
VGP Presidential candidate Dennis "Denny" Lane spelled out his platform in a long advertisement shortly before the election-
My energy, environmental, drug and foreign policy views all overlap. I want an energy policy that is clean, renewable, sustainable and safe. I want American farmers to grow hemp as biomass to produce methanol, methane and charcoal. Methanol gas at 75 cents a gallon to fuel our cars, methane to heat ur industrial plants and charcoal for the industrial midwest to burn instead of dirty coal producing acid rain, can be produced by using hemp. I want end America's oil addiction and change from a fossil fuel to a hemp based economy. This will change our foreign policy. No more war for oil! Let's get rid of OPEC and the oil cartels who overcharge us to drive cars and heat our homes. I also favor development of small scale hydro, solar and wind energy so that we are energy self-sufficient. Hemp has over 50,000 industrial uses besides being food, fuel, fiber and medicine. I want to end cannabis, hemp aka marijuana prohibition to allow for the use of the most versatile premier plant on the planet. We had a "noble experiment" prohibiting the drug alcohol from 1919 to 1933. It gave rise to crime, corruption and violence. We are doing the same thing today- spending $150 billion annually on the War on Drugs and have arrested over 14 million people since 1965 on cannabis charges. To show how upside down our country has become, our founding fathers- Washington and Jefferson (premier hemp farmers of their time) would have Mt. Vernon and Monticello stolen under forfeiture laws and they would be executed under current federal law. I am against the New World Order- i.e. One World Government and am against the global plantation masters and international banksters who run the show. We must retire America's debt and preserve our inalienable rights. We must reprioritize our spending, restore the Bill of Rights, end partisan bickering and gridlock and make government work for the people and not the other way around. When a government fears its citizens we have democracy and when the citizenry are afraid of government we have tyranny. Power to the people! Remember a wasted vote is one that is cast for someone whose principles you don't share and if you vote for the lesser of two evils you still wind up with evil.
Lane's running-mate was Dale Wilkinson, the chair of the Grassroots Party in Minnesota. Like Lane, Wilkinson had also run for state offices as a Grassroots candidate.
Only on the ballot in the Green Mountain State, the Lane/Wilkinson ticket placed 5th out 10 on the ballot with 0.35% of the vote there. In the event that they somehow won the national election, Wilkinson's age would have been an issue since he would have been 34 on Inauguration Day, a year shy of the required age mandated by the Constitution.
In 2001 Denny Lane resigned from the VGP. His next run for pubic office was under the Libertarian Party banner (for Vermont Auditor) in 2002. In his younger years Lane had been a William F. Buckley/Barry Goldwater Republican.
Election history:
1992 - Minnesota State Senate (Grassroots Party) - defeated
1994 - Minnesota Secretary of State (Grassroots Party) - defeated
1998 - Minnesota House of Representatives (Grassroots Party) - defeated
Other occupations: machine operator
Notes:
2000 was Wilkinson's final run for office from what I can tell.
