On September 13, the Tennessee Democratic Party Executive Committee voted to invalidate the results of the August primary in the 22nd State Senate district, on the grounds that Republican Party sympathizers may have altered the outcome of that primary.

At the August primary, the vote had been very close. Incumbent Democratic Senator Rosalind Kurita defeated Tim Barnes by only 19 votes. Research showed that more than 700 voters in that primary were people who had chosen to vote in the Republican primary in each of the previous seven election years. Tennessee, like most states in the south, does not have registration by party. Instead, Tennessee has an open primary, in which any voter is free to choose any party’s primary ballot.

Normally no one would have done the research about who voted in a party primary, but Democratic Party officials were hostile to Senator Kurita because she had voted for a Republican, instead of a Democrat, to lead the State Senate last year. If Senator Kurita sues to overturn the ruling, the lawsuit will be a milestone in determining the power of political parties to control their own nominations procedure. Thanks to Clifford Thies for this news.

The Lyndon LaRouche movement publishes Executive Intelligence Review. This article, from September 12, expresses the point of view that no one running for president is worth supporting.

On September 13, Peter Camejo died. He was 68 and had been living with cancer for several years. Peter Camejo had been the Socialist Workers presidential candidate in 1976. Some years later, he rejected doctrinaire Marxism, but always considered himself a socialist. He was the Green Party candidate for California Governor three times, and he was Ralph Nader’s running mate in 2004. Although he had been born in the United States, his parents were Venezuelan and he grew up in Venezuela. He was on the 1960 Venezuelan Olympics sailing team. He was a successful financial planner and a very good orator.

Camejo was a fierce fighter for fair election laws and practices in the United States, and his death is a painful event. See here for Ralph Nader’s statement.