It's starting to look like it.

Backers of a California ballot initiative that would drastically increase Republican chances of retaining the White House in 2008 have raised $1.2 million, including $316,000 in eight days this month -- and supporters say they're on pace to qualify for the vote in June.

The group, California Counts -- Make Your Vote Count, reported Tuesday it had raked in $855,000, mostly from a handful of huge contributions, according to a filing with the California secretary of state's office.

It's been estimated that the initiative's backers would need to raise $2 million to fund the gathering of the required 434,000 signatures by November 29 at a rate of $4/signature. It's not clear how they intend to reach this signature goal when they're so short of that financial benchmark, although their signature gathering by mail efforts (documented here and here) may be part of the story. Or their confidence may be a bunch of bluster. But thanks to my colleagues at The Courage Campaign, we do know that the signature gatherers are using any dirty tricks they can to maximize their signature gathering.

Courage's Erik Love makes videos.

As you can see in the video, the petitioners said that their petition would "help children with cancer," and then proceeded to instruct well-meaning students to sign several petitions that were attached together on a single clipboard.  The petitioners clearly tried to obscure the language on the petitions, using a rubber band to make it difficult for anyone signing to read beyond the first page.  When pressed, the petitioners described some of the other issues (besides curing cancer) they were advocating, but their descriptions of the petition language on eminent domain and presidential election reform was unclear or inaccurate.

You can watch the video HERE.

This suspicious (at best) activity has been reported to the Secretary of State's office, so between that and an inevitable constitutional challenge, even if backers do succeed in collecting enough valid signatures by the deadline, this initiative's placement on the ballot is not a done deal, but their continued financial viability and the confidence of the backers should be a concern. I'm confident the newly mature and organized California netroots can beat back this right-wing power grab, but it would be a shame to have to spend our time and resources doing so.