18 Comments - Follow the money - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 7:47 am: What’s Garcia afraid of? Let the voters have their say on this, chances are it’ll die and his side will have won. This guy is becoming such a whiner it’s hard to take anything he says seriously….btw, how much time/support has he given to Topinka, is that why she’s mum????? - Yellow Dog Democrat - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 8:17 am: Follow the money — There’s nothing to be “afraid” of. It’s called the rule of law. If a proposition doesn’t meet the legally required number of signatures to appear on the ballot, it doesn’t deserve to be there, any more than a candidate who can’t muster the required number of signatures. If you don’t like the requirement, change it for everyone, but I’m a little tired of listening to folks demand special treatment when those same folks whine all the time about how gay Americans are demanding special treatment. You guys are hypocrites. - Cassandra - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 8:54 am: Given the seriousness with which many Illinoisians apparently view the issue, I’m surprised that their leaders would be stupid enough to submit a lot of invalid signatures. Wonder who is getting paid to pull all this together. Apparently, they are not worth their pay. I find the marriage issue totally boring but I have no problem with seeing it on the ballot. But, if allegations of tons of invalid signatures are true, the issue’s advocates need to take a look at themselves. - Follow the money - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 8:58 am: Not as tired as we are of hearing from you YDD…I never gave my position on the issue, but once again, you paint with a big brush. But, as expected, you see my question Garcia and make the connection I have a stand….thought you were smarter than that…guess not. - Coloradem - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 9:26 am: I have yet to hear a compelling argument as to why voters should have any say on this issue at all. How many folks who are married on here consulted with the electorate on thier choice of spouse? - grand old partisan - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 9:28 am: I’ll acknowledge that I am just as guilty as anyone of this, but isn’t the “hypocrite” thing getting a little over-played lately? It seems to me that this has become a sort of catch-all attack and counter-attack by both sides this campaign season. YDD – Who is asking for special treatment? Certainly no one according to any quotes or statements made here. Neither Dave Smith nor ‘Follow the Money’ are in any way advocating a compromising of the “rule of law.” Smith just wants to make sure that the signatures on his petitions do not receive an undue or disproportionate level of scrutiny by election authorities. No harm there, right? And ‘Follow the Money’ simply pointed out that Garcia is a blow-hard. And let’s face it, that is just brutal honesty, if nothing else. It’s obvious that he is borrowing from the Kerry playbook: lay the groundwork for a perception that the votes (or, in this case, signatures) are suspect and invalid from the start and in a way that would only discredit the outcome if you do end up losing. Rich is right, though. Both sides are being obnoxiously overconfident in this drive. When they’re done validating, someone is going to look pretty stupid. My guess, based on the fact that Alan Keyes did get some 10x more votes than Protect Marriage Illinois needs signatures, we’ll probably be seeing this on our ballots in November. - the Other Anonymous - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 9:34 am: Follow the Money: I don’t think that Garcia is unduly afraid of the proposition winning. Besides, winning in this case means little — it’s not a binding proposition. But any interest group would want to avoid a statewide fight. Why should Equality IL spend millions on this ballot initiative if it doesn’t even have the requisite number of signatures? On the other hand, I probably agree with the proposition that Garcia is not the best possible spokesman for gays and lesbians. But he did earn the right to speak for the community. - cermak_rd - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 9:47 am: I’m surprised they were unable to gather more sigs. Their goal was 500,000. The challenge process is a normal part of any signature gathering effort. Many people will feel compelled to sign and are too embarassed to admit that they are not registered to vote. Also, given the hijinks that these efforts tend to engender, I’d be surprised if some of the sig gatherers weren’t trying to sabotage the effort. - Dusty - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 12:53 pm: Let’s just put it on the ballot and have the vote, what’s the problem with that?? Let us decide, we’re the voters. - cermak_rd - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 1:02 pm: Dusty, Because we have a procedure for ballot initiatives. If we open the door for this issue, then any clown with a crackpot idea could clutter up our ballot with the opium-induced ramblings of his inner legislator. That’s why. - Team Sleep - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 1:04 pm: It’s sad that politics is starting to come down to technicalities. The 2004 election - at the local, state and federal levels - was nothing but lawyer after consultant after expert after poll watcher. - Lt. Guv - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 1:16 pm: Blissfully - non binding. - Shouldn't Talk - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 1:31 pm: cermak_rd … don’t want clowns with crackpot ideas proposing laws? Then why do we have a general assembly and a u.s. congress? - Yellow Dog Democrat - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 4:31 pm: GOP — when the IFI asks that they be allowed to remain on the ballot, even though they have not filed the required number of legitimate signatures from registered voters, that to me is asking for special treatment. They have repeatedly begged that no one review their petitions for legitimacy, through the press and on their website. And I agree that there are probably more than enough conservative voters who support the anti-gay American initiative, but that isn’t the test of a petition’s legitimacy. It may not be fair, but we know that lots of people lie about being registered to vote, lots of people make mistakes about being registered to vote, and occasionally people fraudulently sign petitions using someone else’s name. It does happen, and that’s why most successful petition drives file at minimum twice the required number of signatures and three times to be safe. Given the rather narrow cushion the petitioners gave themselves and the fact that 10,000 signatures have already been tossed by the ISBE, my bet is that we won’t be seeing this on the ballot this November. My bet is that the drive’s backers will fire whomever botched this effort so badly, try to keep the issue alive for a couple more years, and be back in ‘08. - Anon - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 5:01 pm: Yellow Dog Democrat, this is the first time I’ve written, but good heavens, you say things that are not true, and more concerning, can be verified that they are not true. When you allege that IFI begs not to have their petitions scrutinized, that is not true. When you say that IFI did not file the required number of signatures, that is not true either. (They filed more than the required 283,000 number in May.) I understand everyone has a right to their own opinion, but you undercut yourself when you say things that are untrue. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 5:33 pm: Anon 5:01 — Here’s some quotes from the IFI, from a release titled “IFI Challenges Homosexual Group Not to Block Statewide Vote on Marriage Protection Referendum”. You can call it “challenging”, but it sure seems like begging and pleading to me: “Illinois Family Institute Executive Director Peter LaBarbera today challenged homosexual activist Rick Garcia not to try to stop the Protect Marriage Illinois (PMI) referendum from getting on the ballot, saying, ‘Since Garcia claims the polls are on his side, why would he block a popular vote?’” And I didn’t say that they didn’t file the required number of signatures, I said they didn’t file the required number of legitimate signatures. I think it’s pretty safe to conclude from the IFI’s pleading that they don’t believe they’ve met the statutory requirement either, otherwise why would they care that the petition signatures are being reviewed? What other conclusion can you draw, since they should be overjoyed if they think Garcia is wasting his time and money? - grubnednarb - Thursday, Jun 8, 06 @ 6:53 pm: Anyone who has any experience circulating petitions knows that it can be difficult to avoid a substantial percentage of invalid petition signatures,no matter how hard you try - particularly if you are not personally acquainted with each person signing the petition, and if you don’t have specific knowledge regarding their voter registration status. When you ask people if they are registered to vote,they routinely reply affirmatively because they have been registered somewhere, sometime in their lives. Unfortunately, many people don’t realize that their voter registration is invalidated after they move. A high percentage of the subject petitions were gathered in the Chicago metropolitan area. I have volunteered for FAIR several days a week the last several weeks. It’s primarily a matter of checking the voter name and adrress shown on the petition with the statewide registered voter database. A substantial percentage of the pettion signers were not registered at all or were not registered at the address listed on the petition. There are a variety of other potential technical deficiencies on these petitions. Simply put if a person is not registered to vote at the adreess shown on the petition, the signature is worthless for ballot qualification purposes. Based upon the small, but representative sample of pettions I have reviewed, I predict it is highly unlikely that enough singatures were gathered to qualify for the November ballot, despite the “best and honest efforts” of the Protect Marriage organizers. - grand old partisan - Friday, Jun 9, 06 @ 8:15 am: Yellow Dog - are you “challenging” the IFI to forfeit their legal right to defend their petition submissions? Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.