We might have a third and final Illinois Republican nominee. And after Alan Keyes called Dick Cheney's daughter a "selfish hedonist" because she has sex with her partner just for the fun of it (those lesbians can't breed, you know), maybe that's a good thing. I think I overestimated the value to the state and the nation from a Keyes-Obama debate. Keyes may have a top-tier vocabulary, but that's about it. He'd be a better preacher than a candidate, as people in a church want to hear about morality all the time. Not so much the electorate.
And by the way, I guess we are *all* selfish hedonists in Mr. Keyes' eyes. At least those of us who have had any sexual experience that wasn't exclusively about making a baby. That man needs to loosen up. Get a massage or something.
So, back to the pending legal challenge. The State Board of Elections is scheduled to start to deal with this on Friday (see their agenda and notice). Usually, the Board appoints a hearing examiner to deal with the objection, set up a briefing schedule if there are legal arguments, and schedule any inspections of the voter registration rolls. Here, since time is a bit short, they might try to deal with the objection immediately and dismiss it at Friday's meeting.
Jeff Trigg has been all over this story, along with uber-commenter Vasyl Markus, Zorn, Eric Krol and others I'm forgetting.
It still isn't clear to me what the substance of the objection to the Resolution to Fill a Vacancy in Nomination is. Krol reports that it's based on what Jeff pointed out early on -- the resolution was notarized on the 4th but clearly not filled in completely until the 9th. Jeff has copies of the relevant documents on his blog here. We don't have a copy of the objection -- now there's a good reform: posting objections online as soon as they are submitted -- so we don't really know what the objection is based on. It could be whether Alan Keyes satisfies the residency/domicile requirements of a candidate. You need an intent to establish a permanent residence (not a 60 day residence, as far as I know). Alan Keyes doesn't have that.
Jeff is wondering who is behind the mysterious Leonard De Clue's objection. (Is this turning into a mystery novel? The dude's name is *clue*.) He has Oak Lawn ties to the Lipinksi organization, and the Lip has shown himself to be quite agile with the Illinois Election Code. What's in it for Lipinski, the most Republican-friendly Democrat in the state congressional delegation? Maybe a favor to all those non-fundamentalist Republicans who are humiliated by Keyes. Who knows what Lipinksi is going to do after he retires? If he'd like to run the RTA, he could use some Republican support. Maybe by sending Alan back to Maryland, he provides a courtesy to the Republicans that he's friendly with. And sometimes these Southwest Side Dems are big on courtesy to the GOP -- remember it was Speaker Madigan that muscled through the original exemption in state law that allowed the Republicans to hold their convention about 9/11 in New York City in September. It's increasingly evident that Alan Keyes is a fundamentalist anchor pulling down the state ticket, and single-handedly helping suburban women everywhere self-identify as a Democrat. (Notice the Trib article that reported the highest percentage ever of Illinois voters self-identifying as Dem?) Getting rid of him helps the Republican Party.
Jeff speculates that Obama's campaign is involved. That makes no sense. First, Lipinski was an early and enthusiastic backer of Dan Hynes. Second, as nutty as Keyes is, there's no reason for the risk-averse Obama campaign to open up the contest to someone new. The election isn't over until November 3rd, and it is possible for someone else to win. That window is really closing fast, but if Jim Edgar ran, then it could be close. Then again, maybe it's too late for anyone to beat Barack this year. (I sure hope so). In any event, Obama's campaign would prefer Keyes to an unknown candidate.
I hope I can make the Friday meeting. As Vasyl said, it will be very interesting to see who DeClue's attorney is. And if anyone has a copy of the objection, please post it somewhere!
[Update: It's a nothing objection. You can see it at www.archpundit.com . Oh well. So much less interesting!]
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