The Conservative Political Action Conference straw poll results for president in 2012 are featured in this story. Ron Paul placed first, with 31%, followed by Mitt Romney at 22%, and Sarah Palin at 7%. Thanks to Jack Ross for this news.
Reply
On February 20, James Traficant said on his radio show that he is no longer a Democrat, that he is an independent, and that he may run for Congress this year. See this story. Thanks to Carter Momberger for the link. Traficant was a 9-term Democratic member of Congress from Ohio.
Also see this story, which says that Traficante is too late to get his name on any primary ballot in any event, but he is free to file as an independent if he does so by early May. He would need about 2,500 signatures in the typical U.S. House district.
On February 18, James Hedges, a long-time activist in the Prohibition Party, declared his candidacy for the party’s presidential nomination in 2012. He is the only person who has won a partisan election as a Prohibition Party nominee in the last 50 years. He was elected Assessor of Thompson Township, Fulton County, Pennsylvania, in 2001, and re-elected in 2005.
The Prohibition Party is ballot-qualified in one state, Florida. Hedges is 71 and lives in Big Cove Tannery, Pennsylvania, in Fulton County. He has been active in local government and in civic groups, and was once a member of the United States Marine Band in Washington, D.C.
On February 25, the Maryland Senate will hear SB 240, in the Education, Health, and Environmental Affairs Committee. This bill amends the law on petition validity, repealing the requirement that signatures on petitions must be an exact match of how that signer is registered. The bill has 19 sponsors. If it is signed into law, it will end lawsuits that are now pending in both federal court and state court.
On March 11, the same committee will hear SB 710, by Senators Andrew Harris (R-Cockeysville) and Jamie Raskin (D-Takoma Park), lowering the party petition from 10,000 signatures to 5,000 signatures.
The February 20 issue of the Columbus Dispatch has this story about the Libertarian Party’s 2010 campaign in Ohio. This is the first year that the Libertarian Party has been on the ballot in a mid-term year in Ohio, as a party, since 1982.
The story does not mention the other ballot-qualified minor parties in Ohio this year, which are Constitution, Green, and Socialist. Ohio has never before had six ballot-qualified parties with their own primary. The highest number of parties with their own primary in the past has been four.