As expected, on April 24, the Arizona House passed SB 1430, which makes the deadline for independent candidates and new parties worse. See the April 23 posting for more detail.
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On April 25, MySpace.com and Mark Burnett announced that they will team up to produce a new Internet/Television show, similar to other reality shows, for potential independent candidates for president. Mark Burnett produced Survivor, The Apprentice, The Contender, Rock Star INXS, among other hit “reality” TV shows.
It is thought that Wayne Allyn Root (who is seeking the Libertarian presidential nomination) has been aware of this coming development, and plans to participate.
The show will immediately begin to search for a host TV network. It expects to begin searching for applicants in September 2007. The show would air in early 2008. The winner would receive a prize of $1,000,000, but the money could only be used for political activity. The show will be interactive, meaning that viewers and MySpace users would give feedback to the contestants and together would determine the winner.
A somewhat similar attempt was tried in 2003, called “The American Candidate.” However, the producers of that show were intimidated into banning actual candidates from participating in the show, because of fear of the federal campaign finance laws. “Independent” is resolute that it will not buckle under and that it wants actual candidates to participate. “The American Candidate” was supposed to have run on the Fox TV network, but in the end Fox dropped it and it only ran on Showtime.
On April 25, MySpace.com and Mark Burnett announced that they will team up to produce a new Internet/Television show, similar to other reality shows, for potential independent candidates for president. Mark Burnett produced Survivor, The Apprentice, The Contender, Rock Star INXS, among other hit “reality” TV shows.
It is thought that Wayne Allyn Root (who is seeking the Libertarian presidential nomination) has been aware of this coming development, and plans to participate.
The show will immediately begin to search for a host TV network. It expects to begin searching for applicants in September 2007. The show would air in early 2008. The winner would receive a prize of $1,000,000, but the money could only be used for political activity. The show will be interactive, meaning that viewers and MySpace users would give feedback to the contestants and together would determine the winner.
A somewhat similar attempt was tried in 2003, called “The American Candidate.” However, the producers of that show were intimidated into banning actual candidates from participating in the show, because of fear of the federal campaign finance laws. “Independent” is resolute that it will not buckle under and that it wants actual candidates to participate. “The American Candidate” was supposed to have run on the Fox TV network, but in the end Fox dropped it and it only ran on Showtime.
All three briefs have now been filed in the U.S. Supreme Court in Kidwell v City of Union, Ohio, no. 06-1226. The issue is whether government can spend public tax dollars to advertise for or against an initiative. The 6th circuit had ruled 2-1 that governments may spend such money. The next stage is that the U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether or not to take the case.
On April 23, a U.S. District Court in Tallahassee, Florida, decided that a jury trial will be held starting June 18, 2007, to help determine who are the legitimate national officers of the Reform Party. The case is Reform Party USA v O’Hara, 4:05cv426. The lawsuit was filed in 2005 by Charles Foster, Ruben Hernandez and Beverly Kennedy in the name of the Reform Party, against three other groups which hold themselves out to be the national officers of the Reform Party.
This lawsuit is probably the first lawsuit in U.S. history in which a court will determine who the national officers of any political party are. There have been hundreds of lawsuits over the centuries to determine who the state party officers are, of various state parties, major and minor. But as far as is known, this is the first such lawsuit over national party officers. Thanks to Jerry Heinemann for this news.