You people do not get it….Romney is going to win the nomination guaranteed if the “not Romney” vote is split up. The two party race means Paul might beat Romney (merely as a protest vote). This would be so monumnentally embarassing to Romney it might affect the general election.

Other candidates in Virginia helps the establishment politician!!

Govgirl on January 1, 2012 at 7:11 PM

Article 1 – The Legislative Branch; Section 10 – Powers Prohibited of States:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

I am from Texas, not Virginia, however as a conservative I have an interest in rule of law and the Constitution, regardless of state.

My “guy” is Newt Gingrich, who would almost certainly win if he were on the ballot.

As far as sending “teams”, that is complete nonsense, no candidate will send a home state team to gather signatures to each of 49 states. You hire people to do that, I’m sure Virginia has plenty of ballot signature companies who would have been overjoyed for the work, as well as volunteers.

Winning the presidency of the United States is a lot harder than gathering a few signatures to get on a primary ballot, if they cannot follow the simple directions and cobble up the basic organization to get that done, they have a lot more problems than a few lost delegates.

Rebar on January 1, 2012 at 5:13 PM

My apologies, section 10 does prohibit this of the state as well, however – ex post facto law, generally applies to criminal law, which this is not. There is no greater champion of the Constitution than Ken Cuccinelli, and if he thinks this will not be a violation of the Constitution, I would give him the benefit of the doubt.

Rebar on January 1, 2012 at 5:13 PM

The stipulation against ex post facto laws appears in Article 1, Section 9 – commonly tagged Limits on CONGRESS. Therefore it is CONGRESS that is prohibited from making an ex post facto law, not a state. Also, two questions just out of curiosity 1 – are you a Virginian, because if you are not, then you have no stake or say in this matter, 2 – who is your guy, Paul or Romney, because only supporters of those two have issues with letting the other guys be on the ballot. Also, 5 months is not a significant amount of time to collect signatures when VA also requires that all of those collecting them also be eligible to vote in the state. This means that you cannot send in a team to collect them for you, you must have people here, and getting a political organization up and running, organized and able to enlist volunteers to collect signatures in just 4 months is not an easy task.

If there is nothing inherently bad about it, how is there anything inherently bad about it outside of the fact that it exists?

gryphon202 on January 1, 2012 at 5:08 PM

I don’t understand the question.

Govgirl on January 1, 2012 at 4:36 PM

Ex post facto laws are inherently unconstitutional (Article 1 Section 10). Changing the law starting now, is fine, changing the law after the race is run, not cool.

More, 15,000 signatures in five months is a pretty reasonable standard for a national office. All the candidates were notified well in advance what the rules were. That it wasn’t Perry’s home state is a pretty silly point to make, by definition running for president means running in 49 states other than your own.

You also seem to not understand that Virginia is the home state of Newt, and that Perry had plenty of money to have spent on a competent state campaign manager with a budget that would assure compliance.

More – the time to lodge these complaints was before the primary started, not after. The law, like all laws, was public knowledge the moment it was signed. The state GOP knew the law and advised each campaign well in advance.

Rick and Newt failed, and should suffer the consequences of that failure.

It was properly legislated by the properly elected representatives of Virginia, and properly signed into law by the properly elected Governor of the state.

You might not like the law, but there is nothing inherently “bad” about it.

Rebar on January 1, 2012 at 4:12 PM

If there is nothing inherently bad about it, how is there anything inherently bad about it outside of the fact that it exists?

You might not like the law, but there is nothing inherently “bad” about it.

Rebar on January 1, 2012 at 4:12 PM

Something can be bad law, and not be “wrong” per se. I personally think that any law that makes in nearly impossible for a person to get on the ballot if they begin running less than a year before the actual voting day (in this case primary) ridiculous. Perry did not declare until August, and had 4 months to collect 10,000 signatures in a state that he is NOT from, and that requires not only valid signatures but that the COLLECTORS be able to vote here as well. That is ridiculous – why does it matter who stands in front of the grocery store with the clipboard? Why can’t they send in teams from the states where there support base is? Did you also know that VA does not allow its statewide candidates for Senate to being collecting signatures until today and that they are due mid-march? The rules are designed to allow the big money high profile candidates to make it on the ballot and exclude everyone else, that is bad law, and it needs to be fixed. Whether it is fixed in time to settle the presidential ballot issue is irrelevant to me. Sure, I would like to have someone else to vote for, since I like neither Paul nor Romney – but hey, I could always sit out the primary in protest too. If the VA legislature decides to change the law and make it retroactive for the presidential primary – that is between the CITIZENS OF VA and their legislators, NOT the entire country. So, all the Paul-bots and Mittens fans can put that in your pipe and smoke it. Cuccinelli is suggesting we exercise our STATE RIGHT to change our ballot qualifications. Pretty sure that is a Constitutional idea … just saying.

It doesn’t have to be a conspiracy to be bad law.

gryphon202 on January 1, 2012 at 2:16 PM

It was properly legislated by the properly elected representatives of Virginia, and properly signed into law by the properly elected Governor of the state.

You might not like the law, but there is nothing inherently “bad” about it.

Ballot access is in place for a reason, that some candidates fail to meet the legislated requirements, is a failure of them and their campaigns, not some “conspiracy”.

Rebar on January 1, 2012 at 1:21 PM

It doesn’t have to be a conspiracy to be bad law.

rodguy911 on January 1, 2012 at 1:13 PM

Err… no.

I guess the public schools have stopped teaching basic civics.

Ballot access is in place for a reason, that some candidates fail to meet the legislated requirements, is a failure of them and their campaigns, not some “conspiracy”.

Then you agree with the reason Paul endorsed Barr, Nader, McKinney, etc.

Dante on January 1, 2012 at 10:41 AM

Your assertion wouldn’t quite ring as hollow if Nader and McKinney were actually libertarian instead of liberal.

Yep. I’m beginning to think “scratch a Mittbot, find a lib”.

ddrintn on January 1, 2012 at 10:18 AM

They might be effective in dividing conservative support, but they really aren’t making the case for their candidate. I think the Romney plan for the conservative base is a lot like his plan for the family dog: strap us to the roof of the car and drive until we sh’t ourselves.

What’s conservative is not letting our lords and masters decide who we can and cannot vote for. If you like the state bureaucracy dictating your choices, well thats not what most people call conservatism. Maybe its what passes for libertarianism these days?

sharrukin on January 1, 2012 at 2:09 AM

Then you agree with the reason Paul endorsed Barr, Nader, McKinney, etc.

Cindy Munford on January 1, 2012 at 8:21 AM

Ah, after a complete read of the article, I see where the Dems come into play. Look! It’s that compromise thingy we hear so much of!!!

Romney would have lost will lose. I’d bet $100 on that. You can’t just shove a candidate down the throat of 50% of the electorate. Decadent as we have become, Americans still don’t take kindly being dictated to.

cane_loader on January 1, 2012

FIFY
BTW … I’ll see your 5 Benjamins and raise you 2².
The sheeple have been dictated to long enough.
“Ooo ooo what’s that smell?”
It aint “the smell of victory in the morning.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBksHaTQCbU

Some men are men, some poseurs are elected President.
It will be a continuation of The New Normal if Mittens takes the prize. He wouldn’t know napalm from Nepal.

~(Ä)~

Second, intentional or not, we see Romeny benefitting from the majority of the field getting shut out of the ballot — Obama’s favorite trick for winning elections back in Chicago. Finally, we get a tidal wave of Romney supporters flooding every thread, using the liberal’s favorite debating technique: calling anyone who doesn’t agree with them ‘stupid’.

bitsy on January 1, 2012 at 10:16 AM

Yep. I’m beginning to think “scratch a Mittbot, find a lib”.