I’m looking forward to getting a look at Vol. 19, No. 1 (2008), featuring these articles:

INTRODUCTION
Alan B. Morrison
PRIVATE ETHICS, PUBLIC CONDUCT: AN ESSAY ON ETHICAL LOBBYING, CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS, RECIPROCITY, AND THE PUBLIC GOOD
Thomas M. Susman
LOBBYING IS AN HONORABLE PROFESSION: THE RIGHT TO PETITION AND THE COMPETITION TO BE RIGHT
Nicholas W. Allard
ANONYMITY AND ITS DUBIOUS RELEVANCE TO THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF LOBBYING DISCLOSURE LEGISLATION
William V. Luneburg
LOBBYING AND CAMPAIGN FINANCE: SEPARATE AND TOGETHER
Richard Briffault
WISCONSIN RIGHT TO LIFE AND THE RESURRECTION OF FURGATCH
Paul S. Ryan
WEEDING THEM OUT BY THE ROOTS: THE UNCONSTITUTIONALITY OF REGULATING GRASSROOTS ISSUE ADVOCACY
Jay Alan Sekulow & Erik M. Zimmerman

The Washington Post offers this report. As I now understand it, Sen. McCain will need to spend all of this money before he is officially nominated by the RNC (an event that could conceivably be delayed because of Gustav). He cannot spend it on general election ads, but he can transfer the leftover money to the RNC or to other party entities.

Abigail Thernstrom has written this opinion piece for the LA Times.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer offers this editorial. It concludes: “What really worries the GOP is the possibility that Barack Obama’s campaign will use the overlap period to register thousands of young voters and get them to vote immediately. There’s nothing criminal about that.”

I’ve put up an entry on the Palin pick by McCain. I’m likely to continue putting up purely political/non election law posts there up to election time.

The LA Times offers this report. My earlier coverage of this issue is here.

A quick Google search shows that a number of commentators (including Andrew Sullivan and Dahlia Lithwick) have already compared presumptive Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin to withdrawn Bush Supreme Court appointee Harriet Miers.
To be sure, there are parallels, including criticism of both by David Frum (here and here) and Ramesh Ponnuru (here and here). But there’s a big political difference too: Miers infuriated the conservative Republican base, while Palin, if she appeals to any constituency in the party, appeals most to conservatives.
But suppose that because of the “heartbeat away” concerns, there is an outcry to replace Palin on the ticket. Could Sen McCain do so if he wanted to? Of course, if it happens before the convention vote, there would be no issue. But even after the convention, as far as the Republican rules go, the power to replace is right in the hands of the RNC, which surely would bow to a McCain replacement decision. Rule 9 provides:

Filling Vacancies in Nominations
(a) The Republican National Committee is hereby authorized and empowered to fill any and all vacancies which may occur by reason of death, declination, or otherwise of the Republican candidate for President of the United States or the Republican candidate for Vice President of the United States, as nominated by the national convention, or the Republican National Committee may reconvene the national convention for the purpose of filling any such vacancies.
(b) In voting under this rule, the Republican National Committee members representing any state shall be entitled to cast the same number of votes as said state was entitled to cast at the national convention.
(c) In the event that the members of the Republican National Committee from any state shall not be in agreement in the casting of votes hereunder, the votes of such state shall be divided equally, including fractional votes among the members of the Republican National Committee present or voting by proxy.
(d) No candidate shall be chosen to fill any such vacancy except upon receiving a majority of the votes entitled to be cast in the election.

Depending upon when such a replacement would occur, there could be state law issues. In Texas, for example (which has other problems right now with Democratic and Republican presidential candidate names on the ballot), any withdrawal of a candidate in fewer than 74 days before the election (we are currently 67 days before the election) results in the withdrawn candidate’s name remaining on the ballot.

Following up on this post, here is a press release from the law’s defenders.

Back on August 23, I noted the following:

Look at the Obama-Biden Domain Names on Sale at eBay
16 Domain names for a starting bid of $100,000. (Update: Here’s registrant info for this guy.) But ObamaBiden.com is owned by someone else.
This should be interesting.

I had been checking the bidding on these domain names and had not seen any bidders. But something interesting happened. Whether the organization paid anything or not I don’t know, but Obama-Biden.org now redirects to the American Issues Project. Yes, that American Issues Project—the one whose campaign finance issues I recently blogged about. And while Obama-Biden.com also goes to AIP, ObamaBiden.com has been bought (or given) to the Obama campaign, as it now redirects to the campaign’s official website.
I had corresponded with someone after my initial post who had been very involved on the internet side of earlier campaigns. The person made the point that campaigns are trying to build a brand and don’t need these other names. My response was that buying the names would keep them out of the hands of the opposition, which happened here.
On AIP itself, in today’s Wall Street Journal I’m quoted as saying that on the campaign finance/political committee question, “It really comes down to whether this organization has a major purpose of influencing federal elections…So far, it looks like that’s the only purpose of this group.” I see that most of the website is devoted to the anti-Obama ad. But the website does mention a number of other issues that the group at least purports to be advancing. We’ll see if they put their money behind those other issues.
UPDATE: One more for today. McCainPalin.com takes you to a page (owned anonymously) that praises Sen. McCain’s choice of running mate. The site takes advertising, though, and the banner ad when I went on the site was for Moveon.org’s promise of a free Obama 08 button to those who click on the ad.

The Wall Street Journal offers this report.

I offer some thoughts to Marc Ambinder. UPDATE: More bounce: Now Obama has an 8 point lead. These figures do not include polling from last night’s well received speech by Obama or Sen McCain’s bombshell pick of Sarah Palin. The earlier polls did not show an immediate Biden bounce, but we won’t ever know if a Palin bounce would be hidden in the continued uptick I expect to see after the speech last night.

“No more 2000s and 2004s! —The Republican Party mounted a coordinated, criminal campaign to steal the 2004 Presidential election — and it worked. Now, as another election approaches, you and I need to stand together to make absolutely certain it doesn’t happen again —We need your support to raise the funds now to make sure that ‘no voter is left behind’ on Election Day!”
—RFK, Jr., on the launch of this new website.
The hyperbole does not surprise me from RFK, Jr., given his earlier pronouncements, but the organization behind him consists of some mainstream Democrats.

Oy.

Ballot Access News has this report. For more, see here and here. I have no doubt that, if necessary, the Republican-dominated state legislature will fix this problem for Sen. McCain.