Mississippi is a part of this election’s historic firsts
The bizarre ballot flap between former Gov. Ronnie Musgrove and temporary U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker continues, although I’m not sure why this has become the fight du jour between the two candidates for Trent Lott’s old Senate seat.
Musgrove has his knickers in a bunch that the race between him and Wicker will appear – as special elections typically do – near the end of a long ballot in November. He fears “ballot drop-off,” that people will get tired of voting before they get to the end or something.
Musgrove has won a round in court, but it looks like Wicker, Gov. Haley Barbour and Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann will appeal to the state Supreme Court.
I just have one question: Why? Why all this fighting over this?
I just read an entry on the Y’all Politics blog that sums up my consternation: “Why would Ronnie Musgrove seem poised to die on this particular hill of ‘ballot placement’? Who really cares about this? For a candidate that wanted to talk about earmarks and the price of gasoline, his campaign has now irrevocably shifted the news cycle for at least the next 14 days over legal wranglings over ballot placement.”
Compounding Musgrove’s problems on this, Y’all says, is the fact that Barbour has a record of “stomping” Musgrove at the polls and in court and that the judge who ruled in Musgrove’s favor at the lower court level “has been overturned more times than a pancake at IHOP.”
Many believe Musgrove should be trying to make this race about more substantial issues and trying to cash in on the strength of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.
But, no, here we are with the candidates focused on a fight over where their names go on the ballot. Go figure.
Geoff Pender
9/14/8
Magnolia Tribune
