Larry Bragman, a city councilmember in Fairfax, California, has this op-ed in the May 27 issue of the Marin Independent-Journal about California’s Proposition 14, the top-two measure on the June 8 ballot.
Bragman is a member of the Green Party.
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The New York Times has this neutral story about California’s Proposition 14, the top-two measure. It is unfortunate that the story does not mention that Proposition 14 increases the requirements for parties to remain ballot-qualified. That is one of the most significant characteristics of Proposition 14, but no newspaper has mentioned that aspect in a news story except for the San Francisco Chronicle, which has mentioned it twice now.
The story is on the front page of the May 27 paper copy of the New York Times. It is continued on page three and includes a fairly large picture of Governor Schwarzenegger and Lieutenant Governor Abel Maldonado.
On May 25, leaders of the New York Independence Party voted to list Andrew Cuomo on its primary ballot for Governor. Because it is overwhelmingly likely that no one else will qualify for that primary ballot, it is a virtual certainty that the Independence Party’s gubernatorial nominee will be Cuomo. Cuomo is also virtually certain to be the Democratic Party’s gubernatorial nominee. See this story. The New York primary is September 14.
In 2008, the New York Independence Party nominated John McCain for President. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.
New voter registration data for the 29 states (plus D.C.) that have registration by party shows that Libertarian registration has risen 8% since October 2008. UPDATE: the original post said Libertarian registration was up 11%. At the time I wrote it, I had current official data for all but two states, Massachusetts and Florida. For those two states I had used unofficial data. Now I have received the official data, and it turns out my unofficial data for Florida had included inactive voters, and the unofficial data for Massachusetts had been wrong for another reason.
All other nationally-organized parties lost registrants. The number of registered voters in the 29 states (plus D.C.) that have registration by party declined since October 2008, because states purge their lists in between elections.
The June 1, 2010 printed Ballot Access News will have a table showing the number of registered voters in each state, in each party. More voters are registered Libertarians now than ever before. Between October 2008 and this spring, Libertarian registration rose in 19 of the 23 states that tally Libertarians. It declined in four states, Colorado, Nevada, Oregon, and South Dakota. The decline in South Dakota isn’t surprising because the party has not been on the ballot there since 2006.
The Kentucky Libertarian Party has never placed a statewide nominee on the ballot in any year, except in presidential years. To do so requires 5,000 signatures, due in early August. The only Libertarian Party nominees for U.S. Senate in Kentucky history have been in presidential years, when the presidential petition can include a U.S. Senate candidate as well.
Now, however, the party is considering running someone for U.S. Senate in 2010. See this story. The party disagrees with Republican nominee Rand Paul on the issue of same-sex marriage, and foreign policy, and other issues. The party is irked that the media assumes that Paul’s views match Libertarian Party views, and if the party ran its own nominee, the press would stop making that mistake.