In the news release, titled ‘Black Youth Mobs Terrorize Baltimore on Holidays,’ McDonough recounts a number of recent incidents where “innocent tourists and others” were attacked and beaten, including one where the video went viral on YouTube. These attacks seriously tarnish Baltimore’s image, says McDonough.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

Delegate Michael Smigiel:

“Did anybody here vote for somebody to create a quarter-billion dollar slush fund for you?” – reaction to a provision in the BRFA called the “Budget Stabilization Fund.”

“They’re telling us to move forward into a tax bayonet, pointed right at the heart of the middle class.”

“We’re going to be one Maryland united against these tax increases that they’re trying to put on us.”

“Only in ‘entitlement math’ is the fact that you’ve got a $700 million increase (but it becomes) a half a billion dollar cut.”

“A triple A bond rating means one thing: you’re willing to tax anybody, any amount, anytime. I would much rather have my freedom, I would much rather our counties have their sovereignty, then to have the burden of having to pay that $35 billion (in teacher pension liability) coming due.”

Introducing Delegate Mike McDermott: “Our next speaker has changed the way things are done in the legislature as far as speaking goes. They had to repaint the walls after Mike spoke the first session because he peeled a little of the paint off.”

U.S. Senate candidate Dan Bongino:

“Frankly, I’m tired of hearing about how Republicans – we’re this anti-government, anti-tax crowd. Folks, that’s nonsense. You know it and I know it. I will proudly give you my last dollar to fund our fighting men and women overseas…I will proudly fund our police, our fire, our teachers, our court system. But folks, I will be damned if I pay one more dollar to fund a cowboy poetry festival in Nevada.”

“We have all the gifts in the world (in Maryland.) Why are people leaving? It’s not us, it’s them…it’s him (Martin O’Malley.)”

“They like to classify people into ‘us’ and ‘them’, because if they don’t have victims they don’t have anything.”

State Senator E.J. Pipkin:

“(As of Wednesday, when the revenue bills pass) Martin O’Malley is officially the $2 billion governor.”

“One thing (Democrats) can never, ever stop: that’s the idea that we can have better ideas than what’s on the table, and we have the right to put them forward, and eventually our better ideas will win out.”

AFP Maryland head Charles Lollar:

“We have the arrogance of an administration that wants to take more money from you and I…it doesn’t work, you’re wasting more of our money.”

“It’s an issue about taking money from those who create opportunity and trying to give it to those who simply don’t want to create opportunity.”

“Whether it’s five people, 15,000 people, or 500 people – this is our state, this is our country, and you’re not going to take it without a fight on your hands.”

“We created the greatest economy on God’s green earth with sweat equity, an American spirit, and a belief in God that was greater than our own. And now my fear is…my daughters are going to inherit a state that does not understand the American spirit.”

“You cannot pursue happiness sitting on your rear end.”

To Governor O’Malley: “On our watch, you will not be able to continue to raise taxes and sleep peaceably because we’ll stand right outside your window…until you understand this is our state.”

David Craig, Harford County Executive and 2014 candidate for Governor:

“This is actually a doomsday session, not a doomsday budget. I could live with the budget that was proposed.”

“If you look at our history, we were called the Free State. Now we’re the Fee State. I’m surprised they didn’t charge you a fee to come here and stand and listen to this.”

“Please don’t die, because it’s going to cost you twice as much to get your death certificate.”

“We don’t have Democrats in this state – I get along with Democrats. We have ‘monocrats’ in this state. They just want a one-party state so they can run things.”

Delegate Mike McDermott:

“We have a governor that is increasingly putting the burden on our children’s children. Nonstop. It is the kids – today we were inside, and all the kids are taking the tour, and they’re walking around looking at history, and I’m thinking ‘you know what, every one of you poor kids is getting tagged for this.’”

“We’ve got the best schools that debt can buy.”

“When the governor moves you forward, just remember you’re walking a plank. That’s where we’re moving forward on, we’re moving on a plank.”

“Governor, if you’re not going to change your ways – if you’re not going to cut our taxes, if you’re not going to control our spending – then the next time you bring a budget in here, and we strike it, you strike the colors of the state of Maryland and you run up the Jolly Roger! Because this is nothing but a pirate ship! The only thing missing from the Governor and his staff is a patch over one eye and a parrot on his shoulder.”

Delegate Neil Parrott:

“Washington County, I look across the border – I see West Virginia. I see Virginia. I see Pennsylvania. And I see businesses, unfortunately, relocating or locating to those other counties instead of coming to Washington County.”

“We’ve got to stop this tax and spend attitude. It’s out of control. We also need to stop the one-party system in Maryland; it’s not working.”

“One other way – besides just winning elections – that we can change our state is something we haven’t used very much, but we just used it last year for the first time. They wanted to raise our taxes to give it to illegal aliens – that’s what they wanted to do and they still want to do it. Thanks to you all, last year we stopped that.”

“This year, I came to session thinking ‘you know, we’re (in a) $1.2 billion structural deficit,’ which just means this: we came to session thinking we’re spending $1.2 billion more than we’re taking in. That must be Governor O’Malley’s top priority…instead, he spent over half the session pushing through a bill to legalize same-sex marriage in Maryland.”

“This (Congressional districting) map is an example of politicians choosing their voters. We don’t want politicians choosing their voters, we the voters want to choose our politicians.”

Senator Nancy Jacobs, a 2012 Congressional candidate:

“Governor O’Malley does not live in reality. When was the last time this man bought a gallon of gas? Before he was here – on our taxpayer dime – he was in the City of Baltimore and they paid for his gas. When was the last time he bought a loaf of bread, or a gallon of milk? We should put him on one of those game shows and see if he knows the price of any of these things, because I don’t think he does.”

“I always thought that when (O’Malley) said we’ve got to move the state forward, that’s code for here comes another tax.”

“(O’Malley) has higher aspirations and they are costing the citizens of Maryland so he can go to Washington.”

Delegate Cathy Vitale:

“We didn’t pick the cuts. We didn’t select what was going to happen. The doomsday budget was carefully selected to cause you to come back here to fix the problem. Anybody figure out there’s a problem?”

“Decisions were made, it’s time to live with them. Go home.”

Delegate Gail Bates:

“Our beautiful State House dome is made of wood…do you know they don’t have a single nail in that? It was all put together with wooden pegs. Do you know why? There was a tax on nails, and they refused to pay it.”

**********

As far as actual results go, the protest didn’t do much. We’ll get the income tax on those who make a middle-class living, the tax on certain tobacco products, and other “revenue enhancements” we don’t need. But now we have them on record again, and you can bet votes from this Special Session will find their way to the monoblogue Accountability Project.

In the shadow of Government House, the Annapolis address where Governor Martin O’Malley resides, protest organizer Delegate Michael Smigiel led the group in shouting “No more taxes!” and presented nearly a dozen speakers who said their piece about the hastily-called legislative session Democrats felt was necessary to increase state revenue.

(continued on Examiner.com…)

By the way, the slideshow I compiled of the event is here.

I think I will also do a post of notable quotables from the event just for monoblogue so look for that in the next day or two.

But unless there’s an occurrence on an order even beyond the old political corruption saw of finding O’Malley in bed with a dead girl or a live boy – perhaps a case where the smoldering wisps of smoke emitting from the Paulette Faulkner case become a fire even majority Democrats can’t ignore – our governor will remain in office until early January of 2015. So it’s obvious the “eviction” is only symbolic.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

Editor’s note: My plan is to be in Annapolis covering the evening’s events, although all is subject to change and there’s a significant chance of rain in that area this afternoon and evening. I suspect the show will go on, though.

I wanted to start out with a rather comprehensive look by Accuracy in Media at voter fraud. In truth, this is less of an expose than a confirmation because we on the Right had been thinking about this for years, and some of these accounts have filtered down to a local level.

Now I’ve heard people claim that voting should be a privilege reserved to property owners or to those who pay taxes rather than receive goodies from the government. I don’t agree with that approach, but I think that perhaps if local election boards are running into a problem with last-minute registrations scant weeks before an election, the simple solution would be to simply move back the deadline. Honestly, if people wish to register to vote they’re going to do it well in advance of the election. This would also do away with the open invitation to fraud known as same-day registration.

But I also agree we should do away with motor voter laws and eliminate early voting. If people are serious enough to vote they already have the right to get an absentee ballot. To me it’s a waste of taxpayer money to spend thousands on multi-day elections when just 2% of voters participate.

And don’t even go there and tell me I want to suppress turnout, because I don’t. I want prospective voters to take their responsibility more seriously. The left always screams “voter suppression” whenever some common-sense idea like photo voter ID or those others above are introduced, but they are all in favor of oppressive campaign finance laws. Isn’t that monetary suppression? Hypocrites.

The report is well worth a read.

Along that same line, writers Peter J. Boyer and Peter Schweizer ask why certain corporate interests can go scot-free under the Obama regime while others are hounded by the Justice Department. That’s not to say that Wall Street is a batch of crooks by any means, but in politics perception is reality and the fact that Wall Street gave far more to Barack Obama than John McCain leads to the thoughts of pay-for-play and cronyism.

Speaking of entities which give Democrats a lot of money, Matt Patterson and Trey Kovacs of the Competitive Enterprise Institute asked in the Washington Times why unions just won’t let go if a bargaining unit doesn’t want to stay with them. Well, the answer seems pretty simple to me – as they write:

There is a reason why unions are fighting to hold workers against their will and challenging laws that bring greater freedom to the workplace. Union leaders need a monopoly on labor in order to bankrupt governments and corporations, and they require unfree markets to maintain their own power and wealth.

That goes in the category of “duh,” workers be damned.

And this is a video worth sharing, even if I don’t necessarily agree with the point.

Personally I would prefer Medicare eventually be phased out or devolved to the states, but I realize that’s a decades-long process. Having said that, though, it’s obvious that Obamacare is the wrong direction to go despite the fact it cuts Medicare. Paul Ryan’s not pushing seniors off the cliff.

Finally, I wanted to bring up the attention being paid to a national issue by our own Congressman, Andy Harris. In a recent release, he decried the abuse of taxpayer dollars by those here illegally:

Illegal aliens are filing false tax returns claiming numerous fake child tax credits.  Once our tax dollars are in the hands of illegal aliens, it’s impossible to get the money back.  Once I learned about this outrageous loophole that allows billions of dollars per year to be stolen from US taxpayers, I knew I had to act.

In November of 2011, I joined Rep Sam Johnson in introducing H.R. 1956, Refundable Child Tax Credit Eligibility Verification Reform Act, to close this loophole.   The bill is necessary because the IRS claims that they are simply following the law.  We had hoped that the IRS would act without legislation.

One would think that the White House would instruct the IRS to stop giving away tax dollars to illegal aliens scamming our tax system.  This is an urgent and immediate problem, especially as we’ve passed the tax filing deadline of April 15th.

The child care tax credits have grown from $924 million in 2005 to $4.2 billion last year.  H.R. 1956 will curb the fraud in this program by requiring the IRS to only allow this tax credit for children with a social security number.  H.R. 1956 was assigned to the House Ways and Means Committee and I am waiting for the hearing to be scheduled any time. (Emphasis in original.)

So my question is why there’s been no hurry to move this bill? I guess one would have to ask Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI) because it’s his committee. Perhaps his contributors would like the waiver to stand?

In truth, though, I think this is another in the series of ill-advised cautions by the Republican establishment to not risk alienating the Latino vote. Never mind that they turn off millions of voters who are concerned about the illegal alien problem – I’ll grant it’s less of a concern now that migration by illegals is now a net outflow due to a poor economy, but once conditions improve we may become a magnet once again.

Well, that cleans out my mailbox for the most part. Glad you stopped by for some original monoblogue content – I can’t put all my good stuff on Examiner because in all honesty I’m not sure their format would lend itself to such a post. That’s why I maintain this independent, conservative site!

But by all means you should subscribe to my Examiner page to get notice of when I do post there. I’m having fun juggling  all these writing plates! Haven’t broken one yet.

And a happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there. I wrote this yesterday so I could devote a little time to the moms in my life today, so enjoy.

As currently scheduled, events outside begin with a “picket line” being organized by the “We the People” group of Carroll County at 9:30 a.m. That effort – complete with “union dues” which will be collected for donation to the Maryland Food Bank – will give way to a noontime press conference by the Maryland chapter of Americans for Prosperity at the State House in Annapolis.

Later on, dueling – but not simultaneous – rallies will inhabit Lawyers Mall outside the capital late Monday afternoon. First will be a “Last Chance Rally for Tax Fairness” hosted by Progressive Maryland, beginning at 5:30 and lasting about an hour. They will be urging the General Assembly to pass the tax hikes necessary to forestall the so-called “doomsday budget” which only increases spending by $700 million over last year’s expenditures, as opposed to the $1.2 billion spending hike originally envisioned by Governor Martin O’Malley. Along with a significant increase in tax rates on high-income earners progressives would also like an increased tax on non-cigarette tobacco products, a toll which was included in the budget reconciliation bill which died along with the regular session at midnight April 9.

After the liberal side yields the field, once again those who oppose the prospect of tax hikes and believe the state can do more with less will begin their affair, the Rally Against the Doomsday Session. The event is scheduled for two hours, and is slated to start at 7 p.m. Obviously there could be a few counter-protestors at each event who stand in opposition to the side then holding court at Lawyers Mall.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

Harrison welcomed the forty or so who comfortably filled the room at a local eatery to Wicomico County, the “former home of the revenue cap.” After declaring it “effectively dead,” Harrison pointed the blame to two local members of the Maryland House of Delegates: Rudy Cane and Norm Conway. They were the only two from the Eastern Shore who voted in favor of Senate Bill 848, a bill which allowed the state to trump locally-imposed taxation limits like Wicomico’s revenue cap, provided the funds went to education.

(continued at Examiner.com, including a slideshow…)

By the way, if you had subscribed to my old Examiner sites you need to switch over to the new one. If you didn’t subscribe before, now is the perfect opportunity. Just click the “subscribe” button at the top and follow the prompt.

It’s highly unusual for a player just out of high school to make his pro debut with a full-season team. In the case of the Orioles, kids out of high school are generally ticketed for the Gulf Coast League Orioles, where the games are played during the day in front of sparse crowds.

But this year the Shorebirds are counting on three players who have made the jump from high school, and this week the position player of the group, Nicky Delmonico, is the Shorebird of the Week.

Delmonico didn’t sign until the last possible day in 2011 as he weighed the choice between taking the Orioles’ offer and playing at the University of Georgia. He opted to turn pro, but once he signed the Orioles saw little point in sending him to a minor league team for just a couple weeks so he’s making his debut here at Delmarva.

And since Delmonico comes from a baseball family – his father Rod was a coach at the University of Tennessee and his brother Tony is a Dodgers farmhand, with a second brother, Joey, playing at Georgia – it’s obvious the Orioles felt he could handle the full-season debut.

So far Nicky has done fairly well. After a bit of a slow start, his bat heated up to post current numbers of .264/2/18 with an OPS of .776 and 16 walks to go with 25 strikeouts. Plate discipline was thought to be one of Nicky’s strong points and he’s shown a decent eye at the plate for a raw rookie. Last year’s 6th round pick is just 19 (he’ll turn 20 in July) and the Tennessee native is holding down the first base position reasonably well considering he was drafted as a third baseman and projected as a catcher.

Those positions may well be in his future yet in all but three games he’s played in the field this year he’s played at first, with the remaining games at second base.

Obviously the Orioles don’t have to be in a hurry to move Delmonico up and unless he suddenly blooms into a .330 hitter it’s likely he’ll spend the 2012 campaign with the Shorebirds. Expect to hear a lot of ‘Crazy Train’ around Perdue Stadium because Delmonico selected it as his plate introduction song and he’ll be playing a lot.

Now a student at the University of North Carolina, Brendan has remained active in politics – enough so that he felt it “appropriate” to release a statement on his political future given the early entry of 2010 GOP Comptroller nominee William Campbell into the 2014 fray.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

Senator Richard Lugar will be ‘Back Home Again in Indiana’ come January as he was defeated in their Republican primary. After 36 years in office, the 80-year-old Lugar became a poster child for establishment, RINO Republican insider and out-of-touch politician. State Treasurer Richard Mourdock, a TEA Party favorite, defeated the incumbent and will likely be elected come November. While Obama won the state in 2008, his campaign concedes Indiana will likely be a Republican win six months from now and Mourdock has twice won a statewide campaign.

Mourdock and other conservative Republicans have important races in the eyes of the TEA Party, with the hope being they would drag Mitt Romney to the right if he’s elected. (Of course, if Obama is re-elected the composition of Congress may not really matter.)

North Carolina voters also performed a valuable service, showing Maryland how it should be done and enacting a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage by a comfortable 16-point margin. This should hearten Maryland advocates of traditional marriage, who now claim to be past the halfway point in gathering the required number of signatures to place the state’s same-sex marriage legislation on the November ballot. Supporters of gay marriage remain 0-for at the ballot box, although many believe Maryland could break their slump. (Let’s hope not.)

I’ll grant that not all TEA Party supporters are interested in social issues, believing they detract from the necessary push for fiscal conservatism that is the backbone of the TEA Party movement. But I believe that social conservatism goes hand-in-hand with fiscal conservatism, and this is an easier sell with a society based on traditional values. I really don’t care who sleeps with who, but I believe bending the definition of marriage in that manner would only lead to other problems and even more odious partnerships, like adult-child relationships or polygamy.

We’re about six months away from perhaps the most pivotal election in our history, and a chance to perhaps steer the country back in the right direction after four years of runaway spending, consolidation of executive power, and corporate/government cronyism gone rampant. Needless to say, we would have to have several elections in a row fall in the correct manner to undo all the damage done over the last century but 2012 has to be the first step on the journey. Let’s see whether the trends continue in the right direction.

In 2000 the Wicomico County Council, which at the time held both the legislative and executive functions of county government, enacted a huge property tax increase – a whopping 46 cents per $100 of assessed valuation – on county homeowners. Angered by the surge in both taxation and spending, county residents enacted a revenue cap later that year at the 2000 election. This cap limited the revenue from property taxes to an amount no more than 2 percent over the previous year’s take.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

While Republicans won’t have the votes needed to stop any tax proposal put forth by O’Malley and his Democratic allies, they can use the occasion as a cudgel to spread their message of fiscal responsibility. On Monday evening a planned rally will give voice to the opposition message that increasing taxes is the wrong solution to a budgetary problem that doesn’t even exist.

(continued at Examiner.com…)