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Rick Perry sues to get on VA ballot

RetiredOC

Campaign Veteran
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Dec 21, 2009
Messages
1,561
There you have it, Rick Perry didn't make the ballot for Virginia and now he is suing.

According to Rick Perry the requirements in VA to get on the ballot are too "unrealistic." Seems realistic enough if everyone who's ever been on the ballot for Virginia has...well....been on the ballot.

Ron Paul complied with the requirements....Mitt Romney complied with the requirements...but because Rick Perry didn't it is unrealistic? Seems real enough for me.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/onpolitics/post/2011/12/rick-perry-virginia-ballot-/1

images
 

Brimstone Baritone

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Mar 26, 2010
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Leeds, Alabama, USA
Some states are pulling shenanigans like changing the criteria to be a write-in candidate, or whether write-ins will be allowed at all. Perhaps this is one of those situations?

If not, let him sue. The vote will be over and the new president in office before anything comes of it.
 

skidmark

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Valhalla
http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/.../28/1/paul-top-gop-primary-ballot-ar-1572784/

Virginia Repub Party will require Primary voters to sign loyalty pledge to support Repub candidate in the General Election. Unenforceable, but should prove to be fun for Dems hoping to sway the outcome.

http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/...to-relax-ballot-rules-but-not-jus-ar-1571606/

Few phrases are as aggravating as the tiresome bromide "rules are rules."
When those rules appear to stifle democracy, we all have good reason to question them.

I guess so, especially for a dyed-in-the-wool liberal Demoncrat [sic] like Williams, who seems afraid of the two Repub candidates that did make it to the Primary ballot.

http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/...ely-to-change-law-to-allow-gingri-ar-1569616/

Newt Gingrich wants Virginia legislators to change the law in time for him to start a write-in campaign for the March 6 presidential primary.
But that appears virtually impossible, for practical as well as political reasons.
Meanwhile, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is calling on the legislature to lower the hurdles for ballot access. Virginia's process, under which only former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Rep. Ron Paul qualified for the primary, "screams out for making our ballot more accessible," Cuccinelli said

I'm surprised at the AG. Up till now he's been fairly upstanding, even when his favorite policy, program or candidate was getting gored. If Ron Paul can collect a minimum of 10,000 total signatures, with at least 400 from each Congressional district, I fail to see how the process can be that overwhelmingly inaccessible.

There are lots of reasons to be upset about Mitt being a candidate for anything better than garbage collector. There are lots of reasons to believe that Ron Paul is unelectable in spite of being the one whose voting record is closest to the desires of 2A gun-nut single-issue voters, Tea Partiers, and most of the other loonybin voters. But having a campaign staff that cannot get out there and collect 10,000 discrete signatures (with at least 400 in each Congressional district) does not seem to be reason enough to try and circumvent, change, or ignore Virginia's rules for getting on a Primary Election ballot. It does, by my way of reasoning, seem likle a good reason for kicking butts and possibly replacing underperforming campaign staff.

Politicians who desire to go the first route, as opposed to the latter, diminish or completely destroy whatever confidence I might have had in them. It makes me think if things don't go their way after they are elected they might just do that sort of thing - again.

stay safe.
 

thebigsd

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Quarryville, PA
Does anyone know how long these current requirements have been in place? All of the other candidates that we have been able to vote for in past elections went through this process. The only reason Perry (or anyone else) is not on the ballot is because he did not try hard enough. There are current 8 million people in VA wich means he only had to get .125% of the population to sign a petition. That doesn't sound at all unreasonable to me.

http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/51000.html
 

Steeler-gal

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Fairfax County, VA
http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/.../28/1/paul-top-gop-primary-ballot-ar-1572784/

Virginia Repub Party will require Primary voters to sign loyalty pledge to support Repub candidate in the General Election. Unenforceable, but should prove to be fun for Dems hoping to sway the outcome.

That means anyone who wants to vote must sign a form at the polling place pledging to support the eventual Republican nominee for president. Anyone who refuses to sign the pledge will be barred from voting
Is this really for real? They can actually stop us from voting if we don't sign some ridiculous pledge?
 

skidmark

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Valhalla
Is this really for real? They can actually stop us from voting if we don't sign some ridiculous pledge?

As much as the phrase grates on my ears - yes they can! Why are you surprised about that?

The primary election is to determine the candidate that one politcal party will advance as their [first ballot] choice in the National Republican Convention to pick a candidate for the General Election. It's their party in all the senses of that word/phrase. The use of state election officials and polling places and machinery is more of a convenience than anything else - keeps the party from having to buy their own gear, keeps the process somewhat orderly, and takes counting the ballots out of the hands of party apparatchiks so the loser will feel more confident that they lost fair and square as opposed to some political chicanery.

What will keep many Virginia Democrats out of the Republican Party Primary Election is their sense of honor - that if they signed that pledge they would feel beholden to abide by it and actually vote for a Republican in the General Election. Other Virginia Democrats will not cast votes because nobody came by in a bus to take them there and then buy them lunch.

I know I'm old and a curmudgeon, but don't they still teach basic civics in school?

stay safe.
 

Baked on Grease

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Joined
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Messages
629
Location
Sterling, Va.
As much as the phrase grates on my ears - yes they can! Why are you surprised about that?

The primary election is to determine the candidate that one politcal party will advance as their [first ballot] choice in the National Republican Convention to pick a candidate for the General Election. It's their party in all the senses of that word/phrase. The use of state election officials and polling places and machinery is more of a convenience than anything else - keeps the party from having to buy their own gear, keeps the process somewhat orderly, and takes counting the ballots out of the hands of party apparatchiks so the loser will feel more confident that they lost fair and square as opposed to some political chicanery.

What will keep many Virginia Democrats out of the Republican Party Primary Election is their sense of honor - that if they signed that pledge they would feel beholden to abide by it and actually vote for a Republican in the General Election. Other Virginia Democrats will not cast votes because nobody came by in a bus to take them there and then buy them lunch.

I know I'm old and a curmudgeon, but don't they still teach basic civics in school?

stay safe.

No, they don't. I didn't have any understanding of goverment even after 12th grade Gov't class, and local/state wasn't covered in the least.

One thing I want to change if I get elected is to make civics and american history and political science required throughout all of high school. So that by the time you attain adulthood you have been imersed in politics for 4-6 years and ready to vote with confidence.

As it is now, you don't even know the actual structure of the union by graduation. The common thought is that Feds are the all knowing all powerful and can order a "lower" power to do anything they want, as in the state answers to the fed for everything and has no real power.

Tis a shame, especially since this mentality gives alot of percieved power to those who would abuse it on a national level.

Sorry to go off topic, but Skid did ask.



Sent using tapatalk
 

thebigsd

Founder's Club Member
Joined
Mar 23, 2010
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3,535
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Quarryville, PA
A judge has declined Virginia's motion to dismiss. He set a trial date (January 13) to hear oral arguments for the preliminary injunction that Perry is seeking. He also ruled that other candidates have until January 6th to join the lawsuit if they so choose.

Cite.
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
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Valhalla
Oh, this is going to be rich!

Legislators say changes to Virginia’s election laws are virtually impossible in time for the primary. State law requires that absentee ballots be mailed by Jan. 21 – 45 days ahead of the election.
(from an article cited above)

So even if this federal judge declares the current laws invalid, the GA would have to amend them to meet whatever ruling the judge issued - unless we are going back to Reconstruction practices of federal judges issuing fiats that the State has no appeal or opportunity to make law to come into compliance with.

For all you gloomers/doomers out there who have been wondering when it might be time to dig up the guns you buried out in the woods - this is not going to be it because no matter what the outcome I see a SCOTUS decision forthcoming. This should be easier to decide than who voted for Chad.

The only positive thing I can see about the whole situation is that the candidates for whatever reason feel the decision is going to be close enough for the vote of a state such as Virginia to be necessary for a win.

In the meantime -
popcorn.gif


stay safe.
 

Steeler-gal

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Oct 29, 2011
Messages
560
Location
Fairfax County, VA
Saw this update this morning
http://www.wtop.com/?nid=120&sid=2687442

There is more fallout over a loyalty pledge Virginia Republicans are asking primary voters to sign when they vote on March 6.

Virginia's voters do not register with a party, and they can vote in either party's primary. But, anyone who tries to vote in the 2012 Republican primary must sign a loyalty oath promising to vote Republican in the fall.

Delegate Bob Marshall, R-Manassas, says that may be a violation of the law because the Virginia State Board of Elections approved it too close to the primary date.

"That may not within the 90-day window, and I am trying to talk to an attorney to see what we can do here," he says.
 

MAC702

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Nevada
Any candidate seeking a party nomination should be able to get popular support (as opposed to media and strictly money support) in the fashion that Virginia requires. If all states had such a requirement, only the PEOPLE'S choices would be among those to vote for. What a friggin' concept.
 

KBCraig

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Aug 7, 2007
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4,886
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Granite State of Mind
And now Cuccinelli jumps in...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...ral-intervenes-in-gop-primary-ballot-dispute/

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is intervening in his state's presidential primary dispute and plans to file emergency legislation to address the inability of most Republican presidential candidates to get their name on the ballot, Fox News has learned.

Meanwhile, four GOP candidates on Saturday joined fellow candidate Rick Perry's lawsuit against the state, urging the Board of Elections to either allow them on the ballot or at least refrain from taking any action until a Jan. 13 court hearing.
 

celticredneck

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Joined
Jul 23, 2008
Messages
168
Location
Amelia County, virginia
At the Richmond gun show this past October, there was only one candidate who had workers collecting signatures to put their man on the ballot. My wife and I both signed their petition. It wasn't any of the ones complaining about Virginia's election laws. It was Ron Paul. If his supporters can get out to events like that and collect signatures, why can't Perry and the rest do likewise?
 

Tess

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Joined
Jun 15, 2006
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3,837
Location
Bryan, TX
And now Cuccinelli jumps in...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...ral-intervenes-in-gop-primary-ballot-dispute/

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is intervening in his state's presidential primary dispute and plans to file emergency legislation to address the inability of most Republican presidential candidates to get their name on the ballot, Fox News has learned.

Meanwhile, four GOP candidates on Saturday joined fellow candidate Rick Perry's lawsuit against the state, urging the Board of Elections to either allow them on the ballot or at least refrain from taking any action until a Jan. 13 court hearing.

Apparently it's hit him he's no longer a legislator, and he's flip-flopped (hmmm......): http://www.bearingdrift.com/2012/01/01/breaking-cuccinelli-backtracks-on-ballot-access-change/
 

jayspapa

Regular Member
Joined
Jul 27, 2008
Messages
313
Location
South end of the state, Illinois, USA
This law suit makes me very proud of the ones who want to win our vote to be leader of our country. They wouldn't get out and do what was required to get their names on the ballot so now they want a "do over" .


How would they lead this country if they can't even manage to get their name on a ballot like everyone else does ?
 

MAC702

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Location
Nevada
On the other hand, it does show Perry to be a little more "typically" American.
 

MAC702

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Location
Nevada
We need some no-name Joe to all of a sudden show up and demand that he, too, wants to be on the ballot, but only decided too recently to get enough signatures to qualify. He should demand to join the lawsuit, or submit an IDENTICAL one of his own.

When he is rejected out-of-hand as obviously preposterous, it can be pointed out that except for being more famous, Perry, et. al. have done basically the same thing.
 
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