Some Georgia Libertarians with a bully pulpit are savaging Republican Governor nominee Nathan Deal and helping his Democrat opponent, Roy Barnes, in the process. In their minds, it’s for the greater good — a chance to legitimize and make official the Libertarian party in the state while punishing Deal for beating their favored Republican candidate in the run-off.

Currently in the state of Georgia, a Libertarian candidate needs to collect the signatures of 1% of registered voters (approx 60,000 people) in order to be on the ballot. They aren’t allowed official qualification or participation in primaries.

Many Libertarians see this election as a great opportunity to legitimize their party. According to Georgia state law, once a candidate running on a third party platform garners 20% of the vote in a general election, they earn party status. Simply put: if the Libertarian candidate loses, and he will lose, but takes 20% of the vote, the Libertarian party would be on all state ballots going forward in perpetuity, they would get to qualify and run in primaries and forever split the conservative vote in the state of Georgia.

The Libertarian candidate is currently polling in the low single digits. If the Libertarians rally and get their candidate even 10% of the vote, it could force a runoff between Deal and Barnes. While a general election runoff may be entertaining for some Libertarians, that scenario has not historically worked out well for the Democrats; they have never won a runoff in a statewide race.

In fairness, many of the self-proclaimed Libertarians pushing this agenda and willingly cross-posting the left’s ginned up criticism and lampooning of Deal weren’t born when Ross Perot’s candidacy gave us Bill Clinton. Forgive them. They know not what they do.

Those of us with the maturity and the mileage know what a fool’s errand this is. In the hopes of reaching them with reason, (indulge me) I want to point just a few of the national implications of this race, as well as many other critical governor’s races this year, and specifically why we must have Nathan Deal as the next Governor of Georgia.

Redistricting: You don’t have to live in the Peach State to be affected by this race’s outcome; Georgia is one of 8 most important gubernatorial races in country due to redistricting. Whoever becomes governor of Georgia, as well as Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, New York and Wisconsin, will get to redraw their state’s Congressional districts.

We already know how Barnes would redraw those lines, he had a shot at redistricting in 2003 when he was a one-term Georgia governor. (That’s right. Georgians only wanted one term of Roy and voted in Sonny Perdue, the first Republican Governor since reconstruction, yet Barnes and the DGA would have us suffer him again.)

In 2003, then-Governor Barnes so unfairly favored the Democrats in his redistricting proposal that the Bush Department of Justice threw out his map and re-drew it.

Georgia is going to pick up one house seat in 2011. We don’t want that decision, or any other state’s redistricting decision, left in the hands of an Obama ally like Barnes.

Impact on Senate Races: There is a nearly 80% correlation between picking up a Senate seat and winning the governorship. Republican Senator Johnny Isakson is up for re-election this year in Georgia and is polling strong, but this correlation holds true in other states.

2012 Implications: We want as few Obama allies as governors during the last two years of President Obama’s administration as more unwanted legislation is forced upon us. We want Democratic governors even less during Obama’s re-election campaign.

It’s for these reasons and more that Hugh Hewitt listed Deal’s as one of the Top 20 Campaigns In Which To Invest Time and Money Between Now and November. Learn more about Nathan Deal here.

As conservatives, we expect the MSM, Democrat operatives, and liberal activists to try to torpedo our candidates and derail our grassroots efforts. Unfortunately, it appears that the “non-partisan” Larry Sabato has joined a growing number of right-of-center political pundits who feel compelled to furnish our ideological enemies with ammunition.

Sabato, Director of University of Virginia’s Center for Politics and frequent Fox News Contributor tweeted out this message on September 20^th:

It may be ethics issues more than Tea status that’s costing Rs some races: CO GOV, DE SEN, and maybe GA GOV & FL GOV.

Sadly, two days later, Sabato’s list was practically parroted in this statement by Nathan Daschle, the Executive Director of the Democrat Governors Association.

In a conference call with reporters, Daschle singled out seven GOP nominees — Tom Emmer in Minnesota, Nathan Deal in Georgia, Florida’s Rick Scott, Carl Paladino in New York, Bill Brady in Illinois, Paul LePage in Maine and Dan Maes in Colorado — to compare to O’Donnell [Delaware], the upstart Senate candidate who trounced veteran Rep. Mike Castle in last week’s GOP primary in Delaware.

“These are people who would not have won their primaries in any other year, and they are people whose fitness for office I question,” Daschle said.

While I doubt that Daschle literally received talking points from Sabato, it’s very unfortunate that it could even appear as though that could be the case.

Where Daschle questions these candidates’ “fitness for office,” Sabato’s tweet cites “ethics issues” and notes that these issues are “costing” Republicans some races. Last I checked, the election isn’t until November 2^nd.

As a Georgia voter and Deal supporter, Sabato is lending undue credence to trumped up ethical claims leveled at Deal, including a witch-hunt resulting from a complaint filed by the Soros-funded CREW and handed off to the Pelosi-created Office of Congressional Ethics while Deal was serving in Congress.

In recent weeks, local Georgia media has also made much over a $2.3M loan Deal guaranteed for his daughter and son-in-law. Due to their now-failed retail business, Deal’s daughter and husband were forced to file bankruptcy, leaving Deal responsible for the note, a commitment he’s publicly stated he will honor.

Perhaps the existence of “ethics issues” is wishful thinking on Sabato’s part because his preferred candidates lost? After all, Tea Party-favored candidate Christine O’Donnell took out liberal “Republican” Castle in the DE primary and Dan Maes in Colorado, another Tea Party favorite, beat out DC insider and former US Representative Scott McInnis.

As for whom Sabato may have favored in Georgia governor’s race, see this tweet from 9/22, nearly seven weeks after the run-off election and made the same day Daschle’s statements were published:

Can you imagine what Karen Handel is telling friends in GA? GOP made a big goof in nominating Nathan Deal 4 GOV in a squeaker.

Mr. Sabato, the GOP didn’t nominate Nathan Deal, the voters of Georgia did. Why would you comment on the race all these weeks later and in such a personal and divisive way if not to foment tension among the conservative base after a contentious run-off? Your remark only fuels the flames of alleged ethical issues and furthers the false Democratic narrative. Our Democratic opponents know best where to hit us because “non-partisan” pundits like Sabato give them a map.

Sabato is playing with fire, the Democratic nominee in Georgia is Roy Barnes, a past one-term governor, millionaire trial attorney and staunch Obama ally. Is Re-run Roy who Sabato would rather Georgians pick as their next governor?

Sabato has built a media career on being perceived as non-partisan and fair. If conservatives are to continue to view him as such, it would behoove him if the opinions he voices and quips he tweets didn’t serve our opposition.

For those of you not familiar with Nathan Deal, I refer you to this article in the Washington Examiner.