On November 7, Saskatchewan Province in Canada held provincial elections. The Saskatchewan Party, which had been formed in 1991, won a majority in the provincial parliament. It ousted the New Democratic Party, which had been in power since 1991. The 2007 election resulted in 37 seats for the Saskatchewan Party and 21 seats for the New Democratic Party. The Liberal Party, which contested ten seats, and which is one of Canada’s two major parties, did not win any seats.

Canada has easy and equal ballot access rules for all parties, new and old alike. Even though Canada (like the United States and Great Britain) does not use proportional representation for its important elections, one sees that in a nation with decent ballot access laws, new parties do sometimes succeed in winning power.

On the evening of November 8, the Michigan Democratic State Executive Committee met. The party had said it would decide at that meeting whether to organize caucuses to choose delegates to the national convention. However, that item was taken off the agenda. Michigan Democrats probably want to gather more facts on whether it is possible for the legislature to cure some problems with the presidential primary.

State law requires the party to tell the state by November 14 whether it will participate in the primary.

The legislature, if it has time, could do one of 3 things: (1) repeal the presidential primary; (2) amend it to cure the legal defect on who gets to see the list of participants; (3) amend it to force all major party presidential candidates to appear.

These three possible changes are not mutually exclusive. Concerning possible change (3) above, many states automatically place presidential candidates on primary ballots if those candidates are discussed in the news media. Michigan is free to amend its law to follow this policy. The existing Michigan law permits candidates to withdraw. Barack Obama, John Edwards, and certain other Democrats withdrew from the Michigan primary because the national Democratic Party doesn’t approve of the Michigan primary date, although Hillary Clinton remained on the Michigan ballot. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.

On November 5, Cynthia McKinney announced she will try to qualify for primary season matching funds. Candidates who are seeking the nomination of any political party (no matter how small) may obtain primary season matching funds if they raise $5,000 from each of 20 states. McKinney has not formally said that she is seeking the Green Party presidential nomination, but since she has actively sought to place herself on Green Party presidential primary ballots, she is a de facto candidate.