As of late afternoon on October 10, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has not issued a ruling in the case called In re the Substitute Nomination Certificate of Bob Barr as the Libertarian Candidate for President. Barr is on the ballot in Pennsylvania now, and absentee ballots with his name on it have already been mailed. Last month, the Commonwealth Court had kept Barr on the ballot. One presumes that if the Pennsylvania Supreme Court disagrees with the Commonwealth Court, that it would have acted by now. All the briefs have been before that Court since October 2.

The case against Barr depends on the concept that substitution is never supposed to take place unless the stand-in truly expects to be the ultimate nominee, at least originally. But the substitution process in Pennsylvania and other states, as used for minor party and independent presidential campaigns, has always been about putting a stand-in on the petition who knows that he or she is just a stand-in. The stand-in technique is a device to make it possible for a petition to circulate before the party has held its national convention.

The site www.thirdpartyticket.com, as of the morning of October 10, says 9,309 individuals have pledged to donate some amount of money on October 16. As soon as 10,000 individuals have pledged, the plan will swing into operation. The money will be used to pay the expenses of hosting a presidential debate at which every candidate who is on the ballot in states with a majority of the electoral vote will be invited.

On October 9, many news sources that are hostile to Barack Obama announced that Barack Obama was a member of the New Party in the 1990’s. These news sources then say that the New Party was “socialist” and sometimes they even say the New Party was “Marxist”. Here is a sample.

The New Party changed its name to the Working Families Party in 1998, the same year it set out to run candidates. The Working Families Party is so mainstream, it mostly supports Democratic nominees, but this year it has also cross-endorsed Republican candidates for state legislature in every state in which it is running legislative candidates. The party has legislative candidates in New York, Delaware, and Connecticut. All three of these states permit fusion. The following statistics refer to state legislative races. In Delaware, the party has cross-endorsed three Republicans; in Connecticut it has cross-endorsed two Republicans; in New York it has cross-endorsed eleven Republicans.

The cross-endorsed Republican legislative nominees in Delaware are: Terry Spence, William Oberle, and Vincent Lofink. In Connecticut the Republican nominees are John Kissel and Leonard Fasano. In New York the Republican nominees are Thomas Morahan, George Maziarz, Fred Thiele, James Conte, Joseph Seledino, Robert Barra, David McDonough, Thomas Alfano, Anthony Nunziato, Dede Scozzafava, and John Kaczorowski.

Most of the Working Families Party nominations go to Democrats. The Working Families Party stands for the same political goals that the AFL-CIO stands for. Some Republicans in state legislatures are friendly to labor’s goals, so the Working Families Party is generally willing to cross-endorse such Republicans.

The Working Families Party cross-endorsed Al Gore in New York in 2000, John Kerry in 2004, and Barack Obama this year.