There are various reasons that a party might want to schedule its convention either earlier or later in the year. But I would hope that one of the constraints they would take into account was the deadlines imposed by the various states for certifying their candidates. If they are legally required to certify their candidates by a certain date, they ought to schedule their convention to end before that date.

Still waiting to hear about it on the evening news.

I think almost every regular citizen would find this lawsuit too technical, as the Olympics pushed back the conventions. Maybe the election should have been pushed back to account for this 70 day rule. And do any of the other states have this rule, or just Texas?

But if the Republican Party was allowed to certify its candidates nine days late, Barr should request that, as an alternative remedy, the Secretary of State be ordered to accept filings from any candidate or party for any office that were up to nine days late this year. After all, if deadlines can be slipped nine days for a major candidate, there’s no reason they can’t be slipped nine days for a minor candidate too.

The Barr campaign NOT the Libertarian Party is providing funds for prosecution of the case. I know the folks in the Barr campaign will generously forgive my mistake.

More good news in the case. The Solicitor General of Texas attempted to stop the case dead with a letter to the court essentially asking them to ignore the case for any number of baseless reasons. In spite of the letter, the Supreme Court yesterday ordered the Texas Secretary of State and the Texas Republican and Democratic Parties to file responses to the petition by 3PM on September 22nd.

I’m rooting for the court to decide for the plaintiffs (Barr and Root), that will really highlight the pure hypocrisy of the two major parties when it comes to fairness and adhering to the process. 34 electoral votes potentially to the Libertarian Party!

————— from http://www.newsday.com/topic/ny-news_1001,0,5989985,full.story ——–

New Jersey’s election laws also pose problems. The deadline for candidates to file for the race has passed. New Jersey state law permits a political party to select a replacement candidate when a vacancy occurs on the ballot 51 days before an election. With that window closed, Torricelli filed an appeal with the New Jersey Supreme Court to allow for an alternative candidate to be placed on the ballot. In 1969, the New Jersey Supreme Court granted such an exception after a candidate died.

Republican Party officials plan to wage a vigorous legal challenge to the replacement effort, said Ginny Wolfe of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the party’s campaign organization. “For them to try to put a new person in the race just because they are losing is clearly against the law,” Wolfe said. “We will challenge that.”

1) That the Secretary of State missinformed the parties and the candidates about the law.

2) That waiting 3 weeks to file wasn’t timely.

Other then those two reasons I think the Texas courst will have to rule for Barr. Then the two parties have a couple of options. Change the law or go to federal court.

At any rate I think this will be amussing.

Since reportedly several Republicans had called Barr up and asked him not to run I have to wonder if they haven’t called him up and tried to talk him out of this?

Now lets suppose this thing blows up and becomes a media issue. Imagine the book deals.