Out of over 100 responses, Dr. Eric Wargotz had 49% of the vote (with 58 votes), with Jim Rutledge being his closest competitor. Jim garnered 37% of the vote with 44 supporting him. Corrogan Vaughn trailed with 15 votes (13%) while Daniel McAndrew had 1 vote for him.

It was interesting how the count transpired as Wargotz, Rutledge, and Vaughn started out fairly even through the first 40 to 50 tallies. But once each competitor had about 12 to 15 votes apiece (aside from McAndrew), the Wargotz total started surging to a point where he had a significant lead (over 60% of the total) before Rutledge came on at the end to even things out somewhat.

In truth, though, this survey may have been a little premature as word has leaked out of a fifth competitor, former Delegate Carmen Amedori of Carroll County. Since Wargotz seems to be the frontrunner, it would appear that he has the most to lose from her candidacy, but he noted that it’s “not for me to judge ones qualifications. Others will do that. May the ‘best’ candidate prevail.”

I’m thinking this will be a three-way race if Amedori gets in, but it’s anyone’s race among the three with Wargotz as the frontrunner. Since I’m not aware of any scientific poll on the race yet, mine could be the closest idea of just how the candidates are faring with campaign organization and name recognition.

But an Obama administration stung by a series of electoral losses has put out the call for Plouffe to come back on board to a more active role, placing him in charge of stemming the red tide of GOP victories. The Democrats are pinning their hopes on a political veteran whose role isn’t clearly defined; in many respects he is the counterpart to Republican political advisor Karl Rove.

Yet Rove was constantly vilified by the left as a sort of puppetmaster. Obviously he was fairly successful for a time as President Bush garnered enough electoral votes to win in 2000 and was re-elected with a clear majority.

But the Rove magic wore off in 2006 and 2008 because the message being portrayed didn’t square with actions of the Republican Congress or the Bush White House, and John McCain opted to use a different set of advisors.

According to an article in today’s Washington Post by Chris Cillizza, Plouffe’s view on the election of Scott Brown in Massachusetts was that, “everyone would agree that the definition of Brown should have happened a lot sooner and a lot more clearly.” In other words, they didn’t lie, obfuscate, and smear Scott Brown enough to assure Martha Coakley could win despite her terrible campaign.

The disadvantage Plouffe has, of course, is that millions of those who voted for Obama expecting “hope” or “change” have been smacked in the face by the terrible recession and the handling of health care reform which goes farther than a majority of Americans wish to see. It will also be more difficult to have a compliant media covering every single Congressional race rather than focusing on one overriding contest – while Plouffe can do his best to control the overall message, each election can turn on local issues.

But it’s obvious that the selection of Plouffe to help run the Democrats’ campaign is their answer to the Republicans’ nationalizing a local election, as they did with Scott Brown in Massachusetts. And since the new Obama agenda seems to be one of placing him back in campaign mode (as opposed to a leadership role) it’s apparent the Plouffe influence has already been placed into play.

Yet had the House and Senate concurred earlier on a health care reform bill agreeable to both Brown’s election wouldn’t have mattered nearly as much. Instead, each body designed legislation to pass their own side and in the end the differences were irreconcilable. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi finally threw in the towel, saying the one chance Obamacare had – passing the Senate bill as it was in the House – couldn’t draw the required 218 votes. A main sticking point was that the Senate bill lacked the prohibition on the federal government paying directly for abortions. That provision allowed the House to pass their bill with just two votes to spare and gave it the barest bipartisan fig leaf as GOP Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana was the lone Republican in favor.

Undeniably, part of Brown’s appeal was the prospect of killing Obamacare by being the 41st Republican vote and denying Democrats their supermajority. In the election’s aftermath, petulant Democrats threw losing candidate Martha Coakley under the bus for running a terrible, gaffe-prone campaign and openly spoke about changing the filibuster rules to allow Democrats to maintain their hammerlock, perhaps needing just 55 votes instead of 60. Decades ago, a compromise measure lowered the limit from a 2/3 majority of 67 Senators to the current 3/5 majority.

Cooler heads prevailed, though, and now the consensus on health care reform is to deliver it in a piecemeal fashion by removing some of the most objectionable portions and focusing on areas where broad agreement exists, such as eliminating the right to deny coverage for preexisting conditions. But gone will be the ability for Democrats to fashion closed-door deals such as the one exempting union workers from a tax on so-called “Cadillac” health insurance plans.

While Republicans were pleased about picking up a Massachusetts seat for the first time in nearly 40 years, the prospects of becoming the majority party in the Senate this fall are fairly slim. Of the 36 Senate seats up for consideration (there are special elections to fill unexpired terms in Delaware and New York), 18 of the seats are Republican and 18 are held by Democrats. To even things out, the GOP would have to sweep the seats they’re defending and win half the available Democratic seats – a tall order to be sure. The prevailing conventional wisdom at the moment pegs GOP gains of 2 to 4 seats, which would leave them still significantly in the minority.

But an enhanced Republican presence in the Senate would curb the radically statist agenda thus far presented by President Obama, creating a similar effect to the 1994 midterm election which tempered President Clinton’s ambitious plans for health care reform. In order to win his own reelection, President Clinton tacked to the center and the strategy paid off in 1996.

Given what Obama has proposed and already enacted, though, moving to the center may be a little much to expect out of him. The 2012 Presidential election will likely see Obama run for a second term against two opponents: the Republican nominee and a “do-nothing” Congress which thwarted much of his ambitious agenda to remake America.

For that, we can thank Scott Brown and Massachusetts voters who hoped for a better change.

Michael Swartz, an architect and writer who lives in rural Maryland, is a Liberty Features Syndicated writer.

This latest effort for LFS cleared back on January 27th.

Today would be President Ronald Reagan’s 99th birthday. In honor of this occasion, we…hope that Democrat leaders in state government will discover tax cuts as an avenue to spur economic growth in Maryland and lead the state out of the recession.

Unfortunately, Maryland has pursued the opposite course. As the state was entering a severe economic recession, General Assembly Democrats allowed Governor Martin O’Malley to foist the most historic, massive tax increase on our citizens.

Businesses already hammered by the recession were crushed by O’Malley’s anti-business pursuit of higher sales taxes, personal income taxes, corporate taxes and motor vehicle excise taxes. At the same time, O’Malley was adopting more stringent regulations that have added to the cost of doing business in Maryland.

In three short years, Maryland’s ranking as a state favorable for economic development has plummeted from 24th to 45th.

This was the biggest one-year drop ever in the history of the rankings and was based upon the tax hikes initiated by O’Malley: “Maryland’s drop from 24th to 45th out of 50 states on the Index is attributable to an increase in most of the state’s major taxes for FY 2009. They raised the corporate income tax rate to 8.25% from 7%, the sales tax rate to 6% from 5%, and the cigarette excise tax to $2.00 from $1.00 per pack. Maryland also created four new income tax brackets, raising taxes on filers earning more than $150,000 per year. The state’s top personal income tax rate is now 6.25% (up from 4.75%); that’s on top of a weighted average local option rate of 2.98%. Maryland now has by far the worst personal income tax in the country, with a significantly lower score than second-place California.”

With these kinds of rankings, it is obvious that Maryland needs a turn-around artist with the talents of President Reagan.

(snip)

An economic program for Maryland’s future must include a rollback of taxes and government regulations combined with true restraint on government spending in the FY11 budget.

For more on President Ronald Reagan and his successful economic policies, check out the links on our website at www.mdsenategop.com.

Having said that, I’m not sure Bob Ehrlich is a Ronald Reagan but should he be restored as governor I’m certainly hoping that the Republicans in the General Assembly keep him on the straight and narrow with more or less conservative principles.

But rolling back the tax increases would be a fine start. The governor would have control of spending given his power to create Maryland’s budget, but eliminating the taxation would force whoever creates the budget to do it prudently. Of course a prudent budget and taxation would help draw businesses back to Maryland, although eliminating some overregulation would also be a great help, and it’s there I’m not sure Bob Ehrlich would be forceful enough. Then again, having a Governor who rolls over for every last whim of the envirolobby isn’t doing much for us either.

Ronald Reagan carried Maryland as part of his 49-state landslide in 1984, so it’s obvious that a conservative message, well crafted, can carry the day in our state. The best way for Maryland Republicans to honor the memory of Ronald Reagan would be to fight for conservative governance he would be approving of.

Some other changes I’ll have to make is reducing the size of pictures and videos so as not to crowd the first column on the right-hand side in future posts. That’s all right, just have to remember this once I do new posts (no need to go back and reinvent the wheel.)

Now, though, I have to figure out just how to get some of the other elements into this setup like my Site Meter and other elements. But I have nowhere to go now so this afternoon I may be able to work this out.

It’s a work in progress, but I think you’ll like it. The trick will be taking the items I’ve put onto what is a pretty much dinosaur theme (Journalized Sand dates from WordPress 1.x) and attempting to fit them into a newer design with widgets. Hopefully it will be smooth but I doubt it!

One snowblind person seems to be President Obama, who met with the GOP last weekend in Baltimore. Here’s the Republicans’ perspective on the event.

Something tells me there’s not a lot of common ground because I think Obama wasn’t sincere when he came to see them. Does “we won, you lost” ring a bell?

Here he changes up on health care. Maybe you can’t keep your plan as he said you could?

We know his budget is an upcoming train wreck, too. Washington News-Observer caught up to Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan discussing the FY 2011 budget blueprint submitted by President Obama.

And Rep. John Fleming of Louisiana hasn’t figured out where the tax cuts Obama promised are.

Turning to more local politics, one member of the General Assembly told a gathering I was at that they didn’t do their job in reining in Governor O’Malley. State Senator Allan Kittleman addressed this group just before the March on Annapolis.

Later, he gave the GOP response to the State of the State address.

Last but not least this video is in honor of my anniversary with Kim (our first date was one year ago today!) One of her favorite songs just happened to be done by Agent 99 back in December at the 12 Bands of Christmas show, so as a little gift to her and the rest of you I’m featuring it. No, it’s not exactly romantic but she does like the song!

Hopefully the snow will be gone for the next edition of FNV!

Anyway, the Wicomico County Lincoln Day Dinner originally scheduled for tomorrow night has been postponed thanks to the massive snowstorm we’ve really yet to experience. (Here in Parsonsburg it is snowing – and has been since noon – but not sticking yet.)

The key to a reschedule date will be when we can get the featured speaker, Bob Ehrlich, to return (and get the same venue.) Once we have a date then we can discuss refunds for those who cannot attend on the new date.

Until then, I guess you will be left to your own devices on how to entertain yourselves tomorrow night.

Perhaps the 20,000 fewer jobs are outweighed by the increasing number of “discouraged” workers who have stopped looking. The same BLS figures that calculated 20,000 jobs lost (and revised December’s figure from 85,000 lost to 150,000 lost) also showed the number of discouraged workers jumped by 136,000.

That number is borne out by the increasing number of long-term unemployed as a percentage of the total unemployment picture. While the average duration of being unemployed was only 19.9 weeks last January (when Obama took office) the latest survey shows unemployed Americans being off 30.2 weeks.

It sort of goes in with the old saying, “figures lie and liars figure.” Since government employment is now at an all-time high, the private sector unemployment rate keeps going up. Guess it follows the flow of capital.

Update: the folks at Political Math help me figure this out (a little.)

217 House Democrats voted to extend the nation’s debt ceiling to $14.294 trillion, but Frank Kratovil wasn’t one of them. I guess that once again he drew the hall pass from Nancy Pelosi to vote no, which was iffy because the measure only passed 217-212. (There were 5 who didn’t vote, which leads me to wonder where the empty seat is. Since 2 of them were Democrats – Gutierrez and Murtha – they would’ve likely had a majority anyway.)

Delmarva was well represented on the bill as all three representatives (Castle, Kratovil, and Nye of Virginia) voted nay. Needless to say, aside from the Republican Roscoe Bartlett, the remainder of Maryland’s feckless Congressional delegation had no problem putting their grandchildren further into debt.

Since the bill passed the Senate earlier (before Scott Brown could be sworn in and possibly create a cloture roadblock) it will soon be on President Obama’s desk.

While it’s good that Kratovil voted as he did and he deserves kudos, the question needs to be raised: if Frank Kratovil (and, for my friend Melody Scalley down Virginia way, Glenn Nye) are now trying to portray themselves as Republican-lite, why not just elect the real thing in November?

In my post last night I briefly mentioned the heartache of the local construction industry as far as maintaining its job number went, and in discussing the proposed purchase of 5 acres for additional parking I alluded to new state stormwater regulations. A little-noticed release from the Maryland Senate Republican Caucus did a nice job of tying the two together with a nice bow on top:

The construction industry has been hit especially hard by job losses in Maryland. An analysis by the Department of Business and Economic Development estimates that 45% of Maryland’s total job loss has been from construction employment (Economic Pulse, September 2009)

To be successful, a jobs strategy for Maryland must focus on measures to stimulate private sector growth in the construction industry. Instead, the O’Malley administration is proceeding in exactly the opposite direction. 

(snip)

Overzealous bureaucrats have devised stringent new regulations without a grandfather clause. Those few businesses attempting to recover from the economic downturn by financing projects in the pipeline will be dealt a second blow in May 2010 when all projects would be required to meet these new standards.

The new regulations have infuriated legislators who voted unanimously for the 2007 bills (SB 784 and HB 786 – Stormwater Management Act of 2007). The proposed regulations far exceed anything imagined by the legislators that supported the legislation. Legislators also questioned why MDE Secretary Shari Wilson failed to appear in Annapolis and respond to their questions this week.

If the O’Malley Administration is serious about job creation, the Governor will direct Secretary Wilson to change these regulations. First, existing projects that have already applied for environmental permitting need to be grandfathered under the old rules. Second, the regulations must broaden the scope of what is considered redevelopment so that developers are not prohibited from using 50% of the site for open space (which obviously does not make sense in some very dense urban areas in places like Baltimore City).

Otherwise, the only new jobs created under the O’Malley employment strategy will be those directly funded by federal bailout monies. The private sector will continues to be too over-taxed and over-regulated to lead the recovery for Maryland’s unemployed.

The one bone to pick I have with the bearer was not assuming MDE would do the worst possible job of kowtowing to the environmentalists – the bill shouldn’t have passed unanimously because allowing bureaucrats license to do their damage is a sure invitation to the disaster we’ll have once May comes. But it did and the damage will be done.

I’ve contended before that the state should put a moratorium on new environmental regulations for at least a half-decade until we can truly determine whether the laws in place are working or not. Instead, those who “measure” the quality of Chesapeake Bay tend to have a vested interest in seeing more regulation so they put a thumb on the scale in favor of more restrictions. I doubt some of the more militant types wouldn’t be above fudging the data in order to slow or stop development in Maryland – there’s a lot of money involved in that version of hiding the decline.

One decline we can’t hide is the decline in development and employment since the crew currently in Annapolis was placed in charge. It is indeed time to go back to the drawing board and draft regulations which give the construction industry a chance to thrive. Aquatic life is important to this state, but to me jobs are a priority.

The (unemployment) problem in Maryland is compounded by the fact that there are fewer private sector employers: “About 139,000 employers were counted by the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation at the end of 2009, the lowest number since 2004. Just as population typically grows, the number of employers opening for business usually outpaces closures, but not last year when a net of 2,900 employers were shuttered, according to the agency.

In other words, the number of businesses which closed up shop or relocated to other states outpaced the number of new businesses or those relocating to Maryland by 2,900. Being familiar with the building and construction industry it wouldn’t surprise me if the lion’s share of these closures weren’t small construction contractors who couldn’t survive a three-year (and counting) downturn in the building industry.

To me, this is the highest priority which needs to be addressed. Unfortunately, the state isn’t lending a helping hand by making most employers pay an artificial prevailing wage for state contract work while both the state and federal governments create a fiscal policy which sucks money out of the private sector and redistributes it to friends through the public sector.

Seemingly the new solution being offered at both the state and federal levels is a one-time tax credit for hiring workers off the unemployment rolls. While the idea of cutting taxes borrows from the conservative’s playbook, there is a difference in the approach which is telling.

First of all, a small tax incentive of $3,000 or $5,000 (depending on plan) only covers a small portion of the salary and benefits of a full-time worker. If a median yearly salary is $40,ooo and average for health insurance is about $13,000 this break covers less than 10 percent of the sunk cost of having an employee for a year. And obviously there has to be work for this employee to do – he or she needs to create production or provide a service which is at least as much as their financial burden and preferably more in order to cover overhead.

Currently the average of hours worked per week in the private sector continues to stumble along near its all-time low of just over 33 hours per week. Granted, the average has only declined by about 0.8 hours from our days of 5% unemployment just two short years ago but this drop is statistically significant because less overtime means less need to hire new workers. On a personal level, my overtime was significant the first year I lived here but declined steadily thereafter – first due to an influx of new hires but then because work dried up. Now we live in the age of furloughs and reduced hours, and that reduction in income eventually creates a stagnation and decline in demand for consumer goods.

The state of Maryland also is begging for federal help to cover its unemployment insurance shortfall, and Fedzilla is only too happy to help – IF Maryland changes some of its laws to better reflect the federal idea of what they should be. In the old days, that was called extortion. I think a better idea would be to repeal the law passed last year allowing part-time workers to receive benefits.

Another idea to bring back capital would be to repeal the so-called “millionaire’s tax” that was put in place in 2008 as a substitute for the ill-advised “tech tax.”

While we’re at it, let’s encourage the utilities to lower their rates by dropping out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and repealing the renewable energy portfolio requirements, while allowing them to build new power plants to address Maryland’s growing energy needs. We could even make these laws effective once utilities agree to the rate reduction as incentive for them to follow through.

Obviously there are a number of ways Maryland could work to make itself more amenable to business growth. Supposedly they have the top-ranked schools in the nation and the state lies within the largest concentration of population in the nation as the southern terminus of the Boston to Washington megalopolis, so the market is practically ready-made.

Yet we lost a net of 2,900 business entities last year and our unemployment rate increased at a time when most other states are holding steady or decreasing. If it weren’t for the rapid expansion of Washington, D.C. Maryland might be an economic basket case mentioned in the same breath as California, New York, or Michigan. The official motto of “One Maryland” tends to assume that the whole state works like the I-95 corridor areas do and nothing can be further from the truth – in reality I believe we have at least three Marylands, and only one is showing some semblance of thriving (hint: it ain’t the Eastern Shore.)

I know it’s almost hopeless to ask this edition of the General Assembly for prudent across-the-board tax and regulatory relief, but to me as an armchair economist with some understanding of history that seems to be the ticket to prosperity. States with lower burdens on business tend to attract them while states who, consciously or unconsciously, punish entrepreneurs tend to drive them into the arms of other states.

If the idea of having each state be its own little laboratory of governmental policies is still holding true, I think we can easily figure out that the O’Malley/Democrat formula of tax, spend, and regulate is a noxious brew. It’s time to scrap that experiment and start over with new ingredients proven to work in other states. To do otherwise is to risk falling farther behind in the great economic race.