So what do you think of Carla Howell? I know it's not a state issue but she's very popular within the LP and likely to be their candidate for President in 2004 (ideologically, she's aligned with Harry Browne) There's no disputing that Howell was out gloating and holding pep rallies after the MA election boards did what the LP CLAIMS to be against (use bureaucratic laws to restrict ballot choices) Not only that, she tried to INSIST she was the ONLY alternative to Ted Kennedy and wanted to undermine other actively campaigning 3rd party candidates (which the LP also CLAIMS they are against)
Nonsense. The two major parties created the bureaucratic maze, and it's perfectly legitimate to snicker when they get hoist on their own petard. The rules should be changed, yes -- but until then they should apply across the board.
Email, phone call and face to face pleas for challengers come from many different directions. Some are Republican Party Officials. Some are patronage workers whose personal loyalties are known. Some are uncontrolled volunteers. Some pleas are forwarded or cut and paste of pleas originated somewhere else. None of the pleas I have received seem to be from Lee Daniels. Many are from "Friends of Jim Ryan". Many imply it is a coordinated effort of the Jim Ryan organization.
It would be interesting if an investigative reporter (say a free lancer for www.illinoisleader.com) were to infiltrate the challenge effort, find out the facts, and make a name for himself as an investigative reporter.
HYPOCRACY is obviously a play on derivations. Yes, most of us are inconsistent when it suits our agenda. During the Ogilvie era, many Hispanics in the city were Republican. I supported RINO Lopez for alderman against an Ogilvie patronage worker and a machine Democrat. (We hoped the Republicans could unite in a runoff.) The RATS threw Spanish surnames off the list of registered voters; Then claimed that the Lopez petitions were invalid. The RATS hadn't even looked at the Lopez petitions. A hillbilly welfare mom I had recruited produced hundreds of hillbilly voter registrations, and thousands of Non-Hispanic petition signatures for Lopez. (This same welfare mom also worked for John Hosper with me.)
The RATS are especially aggressive against candidates that try to steal their base.
I don't know the facts of Carla well enough to comment.
Cal Skinner seems more Pat Buchanan than Libertarian. He wants to put in state prisons people who refuse to register and seek permission of the federal government to exist. Then he wants the federal taxpayers to pay for the state prisons to do this; and tells us it will cost us nothing. Then he calls this plan a for profit plan. That is Buchanan logic, not libertarian.
Buchanan logic: We have a mess in Washington. The mess in Washington is all the fault of illegal aliens. Let's make illegal aliens the scapegoat, rather than ourselves for being incompetent at the game of politics.