Barr still working on W.Va.

Though the state is one of the hardest for him to obtain ballot access, Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr's campaign is still collecting signatures for W.Va.

As the H-D reported on the 31:

Party spokesperson Andrew Davis said they are shooting for 22,000 signatures, although just more than 15,000 are needed to pass the initiative.

In ballot access efforts, campaigns generally try to collect a great deal more signatures than the required number, as many are thrown out when officials review them. I worked for a third party in 2000 and our goal was to get 50% more than we needed, so that we had a cushion when they got reviewed.

Third party watch

Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr was on Ed Schultz's radio program a few days ago. He said he is likely going to appear on the ballot in 49 out of 50 states.

He didn't mention the one he's having trouble with is the Mountain State.

His deputy campaign manager Shane Cory talked to West Virginia Public Radio about their efforts:

He said West Virginia is one of the toughest states for the third party candidate to get on the ballot. To qualify, Barr must get signatures from 2% of voters from the 2004 election. That’s more than 15,000 signatures.

“For us, it was a matter of resources,” he said. “We had not planned to make an effort in West Virginia. It was only in the last two weeks when we said, we can send in the manpower and we can make a valid attempt to get on the ballot in West Virginia.”

Independent candidate Ralph Nader's campaign turned in their signatures this week.

Cynthia McKinney of the Green Party will get the Mountain Party ballot line (as the Mountain Party's Jesse Johnson bombed in his own bid for the Green nomination).

Photo: Bob Barr, Libertarian Party presidential nominee, gestures as he answers a question during a news conference in Oklahoma City, Tuesday, July 15, 2008. AP

Quickies

- Pollster.com has a good map up on their front page showing how the Obama-McCain polls break down state-by-state and how the electoral vote stands if the election were held today.

- Ralph Nader's supporters have turned in signatures for ballot access in W.Va.

From AP:

The Charleston Gazette reports that petitions containing 7,500 signatures of state voters were submitted to the Secretary of State’s Office on Friday. More than 17,000 signatures were turned in previously and county clerks across the state already have validated more than 12,000.

To get on the November ballot, Nader needs 15,118 valid signatures of registered West Virginia voters.

Barth gaining on Capito?

AP had a story today on the race between incumbent Republican Shelley Moore Capito and Democratic candidate Anne Barth for W.Va.'s 2nd District U.S. House seat.

As the campaign continues, the race is being seen as more and more competitive. The Democrats have listed it as one of their "Red to Blue" targets and national leaders are helping Barth with fund raising.

The Gazette reported last week that Capito is outraising Barth, but as today's AP story shows, political observers like Charles Cook have to keep changing their rankings of the race as Barth closes in.

AP (via the H-D):
Noted national political analyst Charles Cook, for instance, upgraded the race from "Safely Republican" to “Likely Republican” after West Virginia’s May primary and then to “Lean Republican” earlier this month.

Capito has never really faced a serious challenge in her time in office. She won election to the seat vacated by Bob Wise in 2000, largely due to the the fact that Democrats had a lousy and unpopular candidate in James Humphreys.

She beat Humphreys again in 2002 and, in 2004 and 2006, she faced an underfunded candidate and then a challenger with no serious backing from the national party.

Though she won both times, the numbers hardly indicated she was invincible for future races.

Now she's facing Barth, who ran Sen. Robert C. Byrd's office for nearly twenty years and has the national party's backing and support.

And it's a hostile political climate for Congressional Republicans this year.

The way things are going, we may see this win in the "toss-up" category very, very soon.

Suggestions

Politico has picked 5 places Obama and Clinton should go when they campaign together next week.

#4 is Mingo County, W.Va.

(excerpt)
Mingo, like many of its neighboring counties across the border in Kentucky and nearby in Virginia, didn’t simply reject Obama. It had a visceral loathing of his candidacy — delivering just 8 percent of its vote to him, compared to Clinton’s 88 percent. Race clearly played a role in that result, so bringing the Obama-Clinton roadshow to Appalachia would be an important step toward bridging that racial gap, not to mention a sign that he is not writing off Kentucky and West Virginia just yet. The media coverage of such a politically daring and conciliatory stunt would be almost unimaginably fawning, though the out-of-the-way location would likely diminish the size of the media pack.

Photo: AP

New W.Va. general election poll

McCain leads by eight.

Rasmussen:

John McCain begins the general election season with an eight-point advantage over Barack Obama in West Virginia. The first Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of this general election match-up shows McCain attracting 45% of the vote while Obama earns 37%.

Though 8 points isn't as much as I would have thought. A good deal of the Clinton voters are sticking with the Democrats. Still, a strong early lead for McCain.

To put it in perspective, here are Bush's numbers from 2000 and 2004 (rounded off).

2000
Bush - 52%
Gore - 46%

2004
Bush 56%
Kerry 43%

DCCC thinks Capito can be defeated by Barth

As posted at Daily Kos, The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has released it's red-to-blue list of districts they think can be flipped in the House elections.

Kay Barnes (MO-06)
Anne Barth (WV-02)
Darcy Burner (WA-08)
Robert Daskas (NV-03)
Steve Driehaus (OH-01)
Jim Himes (CT-04)
Christine Jennings (FL-13)
Larry Kissell (NC-08)
Suzanne Kosmas (FL-24)
Eric Massa (NY-29)
Gary Peters (MI-09)
Mark Schauer (MI-07)
Dan Seals (IL-10)