On January 15, a Subcommittee of the Virginia House Elections & Privileges Committee passed HB 105 unanimously. Current law says that write-ins in general elections should not be counted unless it appears that a write-in candidate might have received 5% or more of the vote. The bill changes that, so that write-ins would only be counted if it appears that a write-in candidate might have won the election.

Virginia does count all presidential write-ins for declared write-in presidential candidates, and HB 105 does not appear to affect presidential write-ins.

Political Scientist Hans Noel has this commentary in the Washington Post, about U.S. political parties, ideology, and polarization. The thesis is that the U.S. has long been divided by ideology. If parties didn’t seem polarized in the past, that is because there were liberals and conservatives in both major parties. But in recent years, “sorting” has been carried out, so that today, virtually all liberal politicians are Democrats and virtually all conservative politicians are Republicans.

Noel has written a book, “Political Ideologies and Political Parties in America”, which will be in print in February 2014.

The Pennsylvania Department of State web page now has this device to enable potential candidates to print their petition forms. Thanks to Larry Otter for the link.