The Bar is Set Too High, in Virginia, and Arkansas

 Trouble with Numbers: Perry falls short in Virginia

Texas Governor Rick Perry and Former Speaker Newt Gingrich have failed to qualify for the ballot in the GOP Presidential Primary in the state of Virginia.  GOP voters in that state will be limited to Former Mass. Governor Mitt Romney or Congressman Dr. Ron Paul.

Requirements for ballot access were pretty stiff in the Old Dominion.   The primary requirement was 10,000 authentic voter signatures.    Incidentally, that is also where the bar is set in Arkansas for a new political party to get ballot access, or an independent running for statewide office to get ballot access.

Many Republican members of the state legislature signed a letter supporting Perry in his Presidential run.  That included Kim Hammer, who sponsored a bill making it even harder for new parties to get ballot access than it was previously.

So I have to ask them, if your own Presidential candidate, who has raised about $20 million and is Governor of a gigantic state, can't meet the 10K bar in a huge state like Virginia, then how is it fair that you guys are for imposing that hurdle on independents running for state wide office or third parties seeking ballot access in Arkansas?   Please spare us any complaints about how the requirements in Virgina are too burdensome until you ease those same requirements on the folks here at home.  More and more of us are not satisfied with the representation we are getting from either of the DC-run political clubs that have jointly led this nation to impending ruin.

There are no problems with more voter choice that can't be solved with instant run off voting.  In fact, the alleged "problems" with more voter choice are really just artifacts of the flawed "first past the post" method of determining election winners.    Funny how the parties don't use first past the post in their own party primaries, nor when electing their own officers, but impose it on the rest of us for all offices above the county level.