Louisiana elects its state officers in the odd year before presidential election years. This year the Louisiana state election is on October 20. The Times-Picayune, largest newspaper in New Orleans, has a story on the 12 gubernatorial candidates here. Among the 12 is T. Lee Horne, who will be the first Libertarian Party candidate for Louisiana Governor ever; and Belinda Alexandrenko, who is the candidate of a party she created called Hope for America Party. She was the Reform Party candidate for Governor in 1999; in that election she polled 8,978 votes, or .7%.

If no one gets at least 50%, there will be a run-off among the top two in November 2007.

Leaders of the U.S. House of Representatives have decided not to bring up HR 811 for a vote this week, and it probably won’t be brought up at all unless the sponsors can demonstrate that the bill has enough commitments to pass. HR 811 is Congressman Rush Holt’s bill to require vote-counting machines to have a paper trail.

Ohio has a very peculiar law concerning who can circulate petitions. Anyone can circulate for a new party, but only a registered voter in Ohio may circulate for an independent candidate. On September 19, a U.S. District Court refused to rule on the issue of who can circulate an independent candidate’s petition. The court ruled that the plaintiffs don’t have standing. The case is Nader v Blackwell, 2:06cv-821. Nader may appeal.