On July 2, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney was asked if he would agree to inclusive general election presidential debates, if he is the Republican nominee. The questioner, Larry Reinsch, prefaced the question by pointing out that there has never been a presidential election with more than 7 candidates who were theoretically able to be elected.

Romney responded to the question about whether he would agree to a general election debate that included all candidates who could theoretically win by saying, “Not necessarily. I’ll take a look at who the field is. Part of it is up to the broadcaster, as to who they want in. So, for instance, I’ve argued for a field that was a little narrower in one of the last debates, and they said, ‘No, no, we’re gonna bring everybody in’, a larger field, so as…the broadcaster has some say, I guess the Presidential Commission has some say…I’ll be deciding what I want to do later, but I’m not gonna make that call today.”

Reinsch then pointed out the virtues of letting the American voters hear about all the candidates who are running. Romney responded with a reference to the fact that at least one candidate for the Republican nomination, John Cox, has not been permitted into the Republican primary season debates so far, and said, “We have to draw the line somewhere, clearly if Mayor Bloomberg gets in, he’s an Independent Party candidate, he’s gonna have a place on that stage…but you can draw the line where you think you have a candidate that can be viable, that has a prospect of winning, so they took a good look at some numbers and polls that they have 1% of the population or something, because you’ve gotta draw the line somewhere, because there are probably hundreds of people running, so you gotta say who is viable. But I’ll make that determination down the road.”

Of course, Romney’s remark about hundreds of candidates shows he wasn’t listening when he had been told that there has never been a presidential election with more than 7 candidates who could theoretically won the election.

On June 30, former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney addressed 350 people at a Georgia NAACP fundraising dinner. According to the AP report, she delivered a fiery speech criticizing Democrats in Congress for failing to stop U.S. involvement in Iraq, ignoring the victims of Hurricane Katrina, and failing to impeach President Bush. McKinney specifically criticized Speaker Nancy Pelosi and members of the Congressional Black Caucus. McKinney is pondering whether or not to seek the Green Party presidential nomination in 2008.

Five minor parties in Michigan have formed the Michigan Third Parties Coalition, which has a website at www.mithirdparties.org. Three of the parties in the coalition are already on the ballot, and two are not. The five parties are Constitution, Green, Libertarian, (those three parties are on the ballot), and Reform and Socialist (those two parties are not on the ballot).

The Coalition wants ballot access improvements, and will lobby to reduce the number of signatures needed for a party to get on the ballot, and also for the ability of a party to get on the ballot in just part of the state, if it can’t get on statewide.

The Coalition also wants more inclusive campaign debates.

Michigan has one of the easiest laws in the nation for a party to REMAIN on the ballot, once it has qualified. Of course, that is no comfort to the parties that aren’t on the ballot. The petition for a party to GET on the ballot is more difficult than the average state.

The Reform Party was qualified in 2004, but it was unable to place any nominees on the ballot because two separate groups (each claiming to be the legitimate party officers) submitted different slates of nominees, and the Michigan Secretary of State refused to decide the issue. Because the party had no candidates on the ballot in 2004, it was unable to poll any votes for any nominees, and so was disqualified.

One flaw in Michigan law that the Coalition has not mentioned so far is that Michigan is one of the few states that refuses to let qualified parties change their name. This injures the Constitution Party, because Michigan still insists on calling it the “U.S. Taxpayers Party”, which was that party’s name until 1999, when it was changed to “Constitution Party” by the national convention.