Posted on 12/25/2011 4:41:06 PM PST by smoothsailing
December 25th, 2011
There are currently many news stories and blog discussions about the Virginia presidential primary ballot access law. Some large blogs, such as Red State, have over 300 comments about the story. Some defend the current Virginia ballot access laws on the grounds that in past presidential elections, a fairly large number of Republican presidential primary candidates managed to qualify.
But what has not been reported is that in the only other presidential primaries in which Virginia required 10,000 signatures (2000, 2004, and 2008) the signatures were not checked. Any candidate who submitted at least 10,000 raw signatures was put on the ballot. In 2000, five Republicans qualified: George Bush, John McCain, Alan Keyes, Gary Bauer, and Steve Forbes. In 2004 there was no Republican primary in Virginia. In 2008, seven Republicans qualified: John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson, and Alan Keyes.
The only reason the Virginia Republican Party checked the signatures for validity for the current primary is that in October 2011, an independent candidate for the legislature, Michael Osborne, sued the Virginia Republican Party because it did not check petitions for its own members, when they submitted primary petitions. Osborne had no trouble getting the needed 125 valid signatures for his own independent candidacy, but he charged that his Republican opponent’s primary petition had never been checked, and that if it had been, that opponent would not have qualified. The lawsuit, Osborne v Boyles, cl 11-520-00, was filed in Bristol County Circuit Court. It was filed too late to be heard before the election, but is still pending. The effect of the lawsuit was to persuade the Republican Party to start checking petitions. If the Republican Party had not changed that policy, Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry would be on the 2012 ballot.
The Democratic Party of Virginia has been opposed to the strict law on primary ballot access, and has been in the habit of collecting signatures for all Democratic presidential candidates recognized by the party. In 2008, the state party collected 7,300 signatures for all its candidates, thus easing the burden on them and requiring them to collect only 4,000 to 5,000 on their own.
From other FR posts apparently both Paul and Romney have submitted at least 15,000 signatures. Probably should be enough to cover deletions.
Her and her husband were returning from the ballot verification (the story doesn't say that, a blogger made the connection:
RPV Volunteer killed in crash, husband with life-threatening injuries
>> So you guys are all saying it would be ok if someone that needed 10k signatures just had a bunch of fake names? That nobody should bother to check the signatures? What about our fight to stop the libs from doing the exact same thing in elections? >>
With due respect, that’s a poorly constructed argument and a false choice. No one said to have just a bunch of fake names, so your statement is ridiculous. Second, to equate a bureaucratic registration requirement that serves no purpose with actual voting and voter fraud is a very poor argument.
Seriously, have you ever stopped to think how stupid this requirement is in the first place? I mean put aside the technical application of the rule (and you said law, it is NOT a law) for a minute.
There is no reason for this to even exist. It is rules for rules sake. It is the ultimate in meaningless bureaucracy. It makes zero sense for the party who is supposed to stand against meaningless bureaucracy to tie itself in knots over meaningless bureaucracy. There is no reason to add this cost to a political process.
Think big.
Doesn’t this Bolling have some kind of connection with GWB?
Being “legal enough” and “being politically astute” are two different things. Time for the Board members to move back to Baltimore County.
He didn't. He's a Mitbot. So is Bolling.
All of these guys gotta' have some less than savory connections somewhere ~ the AG is in charge of moving in on them for that although we'd probably need a federal prosecution looming ~ and there the problem is that the Obots will protect them.
Heartless bunch.
Your link to Tea Party Nation requires membership sign-up to see.
Could you summarize what is there for the non-members?
Do what the I candidate did - demand equal treatment to all parties -
soetoro/soebarkah/shabazz/bounel/obama the Democrat should be held to the rules too. He is NOT an article 2 natural born citizen thus ineligible to be the pres. Disqaulify obama and remove him from or keep his name off the ballot!
“Tea Party Nation is a social network”
No thanks.
And what wasn’t noted in this story is that the Romney and Paul signatures were not checked.
It has been explained that under the 15,000/600 and up signature policy Romney’s petitioners were not validated.
Why weren’t Paul’s? Did he also get more than 15,000 signatures with more than 600 from each district?
Thanks for your words of support! I live near George Washington’s Mt. Vernon, and I shudder to think what he would say about what’s going on in his home state.
Newt is my first choice, Perry my second BTW - they just need to suck it up and move forward from here.
Given Bollings involvement in this, and McDonnell's complicity, I think ALL Republicans across the nation should become alert to the fact we have professionals at work here who are so corrupt there's no trick so low they won't bend their backs to do.
Just think of it like Obama is running as a Republican who looks like Mitt. We know you can't trust Obama's friends; well, you can't trust Mitt's friends and associates either.
He’d say “Send out more likker”.
You know, something occurred to me. What if VA is going to seriously crack down on RAT election fraud and needs proof that they intend to penalize BOTH parties?
Fingers crossed that’s the case.
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