Carl Anderton – Page 5

District 37 House: the five contenders

For my final look this round at local races, I decided to do both Districts 37A and 37B in one feel swoop, mainly because the District 37A is already set in Sheree Sample-Hughes. She had a free ride once Delegate Rudy Cane dropped out days after the filing deadline, but it’s also worth seeing how she’s set financially to begin her sure re-election run in 2018. I’ll get to her in due course.

Meanwhile, in District 37B there is one real race. Although the top two would normally be declared the winners, a state law prohibits two members from the same county in this two-person district which spans four counties. So the two contenders from Talbot County, Democrat Keasha Haythe and Republican Johnny Mautz, could finish 1-2 but only the winner would be seated. I’ll begin with that race. (link)

While Johnny Mautz has far outraised his opponent, the cash on hand is surprisingly close because Mautz had to survive a primary while Haythe did not – in fact, she has only filed one actual report (the Pre-Primary 1 report in May) while spending less than $1,000 in the last two reporting periods. She attested to this through Affidavits of Limited Contributions and Expenses, better known in the game as ALCEs. Obviously she’s had some spending since she has a website, but it doesn’t rise to the level of filing the paperwork.

Keasha’s report is fairly vanilla, although it would be interesting to know who pays for her website. As far as the small amount she’s raised, the $1,000 contribution from Rudy Cane’s account provides the most insight. She’s the perfect contrast to Mautz as all her contributions are local.

On the other hand, Mautz’s report reminded me of Mary Beth Carozza’s in District 38C because a huge portion of the seed money for both has come from connections they’ve made in Washington, D.C. But while Carozza’s local share has increased over the last several months, Mautz maintains his tremendous haul from friends in the Capital region. Over 60 percent of his total individual contributions come from outside the district, but not much comes from businesses and none from LLCs.

Mautz has also picked up some non-individual donations: $1,000 from the Republican Leadership Council of Talbot County, and PAC donations from the Maryland Farm Bureau, Licensed Beverage Association PAC, and the Maryland Dental PAC. He’s also received transfers from two federal accounts belonging to current Congressman Doug Collins of Georgia and former member Jim Saxton of New Jersey, as well as $500 from the NCPA Legal-Legislative Fund (which represents community pharmacies) and a cool $4,000 from the National Shooting Sports Foundation.

But the eye-popper is the fact Mautz has gone into six figures for spending – more than any other candidate in either District 37 or 38. Over $63,000 has gone just for printing and nearly $14,000 for media, generally to local businesses. (The folks at Bay Imprint and Poore House have made a lot of money from Johnny this election.) One other interesting expenditure is $9,750 to Public Opinion Strategies for a poll back in April. (Full disclosure: Johnny’s payment to me for his sidebar ad should be on his next report.)

So Mautz is the undisputed spending leader in this race. In contrast, the other Democratic contender, Rod Benjamin, is running the ultimate low-budget campaign because he’s neither raised or spent above $1,000 as a serial ALCE filer.

So that leaves me Christopher Adams, who’s also paid for advertising here. His figures are a little bit hard to follow, since a lot of his contributions and expenditures are tied up as loans. He took out and paid off a $20,000 loan from Value Enterprises, LLC and borrowed from his own personal coffers to replace the $20,000. So in truth he’s raised $11,370, with an 11% portion from LLCs and about 1/4 from out-of-district.

Adams has spent on some interesting items, with the biggest being $19,000 to Scott Strategies. He’s also transferred out some good-sized amounts on other entities and races: $500 apiece to the Caroline and Dorchester County Republican Central Committees (although the latter is mis-identified as the Democratic one), as well as to District 38B hopeful Carl Anderton. As far as media goes, I’m a line item along with an ad in the Salisbury Independent, among other things. But if you threw out the loan repayment, Scott Strategies would be well over half Christopher’s spending.

Finally, let’s look at the unopposed Sample-Hughes.

As you can see, the biggest part of her contributions is the $6,000 she received from the coffers of Rudy Cane. It’s worth noting that Cane’s campaign account was closed out as he distributed over $47,000 to several groups – local candidates Sample-Hughes, Haythe, unsuccessful Salisbury City Council candidate April Jackson, and Wicomico County Councilman-elect Ernest Davis all got something from Cane, as did the House Democratic Committee Slate ($13,242.40.) However, Rudy also gave $20,000 to Shore Up! (a local advocacy group) and distributed $13,000 between three local churches.

Sample-Hughes also received small donations from several local Republicans, such as her fellow Wicomico County Council members John Hall and Matt Holloway, along with Sheriff Mike Lewis. The Maryland Farm Bureau PAC chipped in $500 to her as well. She received very little from businesses, nothing from LLCs, and hardly anything from outside the area.

One thing I noticed is that her fundraising expenses were barely covered by the money raised, but aside from that it’s the sort of a report one might expect from an unopposed candidate. Fortunately, that $6,000 from Cane is about all she’s got so any 2018 contender isn’t far behind in the money race yet.

So that’s how District 37 shapes up. The next report is due October 24, just days before the election.

District 38B House: Conway vs. Anderton

It’s hard to knock out someone who’s been in politics for over half of their life, but in District 38B Delegate Norm Conway, who at 72 years of age has held elective office since 1974, has a challenger in 41-year-old Delmar Mayor Carl Anderton, Jr. (Put another way, Anderton was but a mere toddler when Conway was first elected.) It’s also hard to knock out someone who has as much in the campaign bank as Norm does, but Carl is getting some help on that front as well. (link.)

There’s no question that Conway has many of the same financial traits as fellow Democrat Jim Mathias: a plethora of businesses and PACs support his effort to remain in the House of Delegates. But it’s interesting to note that, after putting in a spate of local contributions dated January 7 of this year to be placed in the 2013 report (from a January 5 fundraiser in Willards, which ironically is now outside his district) and comply with the law prohibiting fundraising during session, Conway’s local contributions have all but dried up since that January accounting. Conway has raised less than $5,000 in individual contributions since the January report, with significant money coming from Rickman Firstfield Associates ($1,000) and PGA One Charles Center, L.P. ($2,000.) Rickman Firstfield is connected to William Rickman, who owns Ocean Downs and has been implicated in skirting Maryland’s ban on casino owners donating to political candidates. PGA One Charles Center works back to asbestos lawyer Peter Angelos, owner of the Baltimore Orioles.

It’s worth asking why they care about a local Delegate race, particularly since 96.4% of Conway’s individual contributions since his January report have come from outside the 218xx zip code area.

In that light, Anderton’s is for all intents and purposes a local effort: no PAC money and only a small percentage out of the district. Granted, the largest single donation comes from the vast coffers of Congressman Andy Harris, who gave $4,000, but that pales in comparison to PAC money finding its way to Conway. Others who have helped out Anderton are fellow Delegate hopeful Christopher Adams in District 37B, Wicomico County Council candidate Marc Kilmer, and Anne Arundel County Councilman Jerry Walker. Politicians have also transferred money to Conway: Wicomico County Council candidate Ernest Davis, Delegate Patrick Hogan (a Republican), and Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamenetz have chipped in.

But a consistent 25 to 35 percent of Conway’s take comes from Maryland PACs, with some of the largest contributors being the Baltimore Gas and Electric PAC ($1,000), Comcast PAC of Maryland ($1,000), Health Policy Leadership Alliance, the PAC of the Maryland Hospital Association ($1,000), Medical PAC Maryland ($1,000), SEIU Local 500 PAC ($1,000), Maryland Realtors PAC ($1,300), and the biggest by far: MSEA’s Fund for Children and Public Education PAC – the teacher’s union gave Norm a cool $5,150.

So it’s sort of telling in a way that Conway spent a tremendous amount of money on fundraising, spending over $17,000 to create just over $41,000 in individual contributions with events in Salisbury, Willards, and Annapolis. (For the Annapolis one he used our old “incumbency protection” friends at Rice Consulting, which received $4,361.93 for their trouble.) Meanwhile, the $15,880 on media was actually for billboard advertising with Clear Channel.

Conversely, Anderton seemed to have a lot more bang for his buck when it came to fundraising, spending $1,156.48 to generate $12,966.01 in individual contributions. EVO was his choice for venue, as he spent the entire sum there. All told, it’s worth pointing out that since the January report Anderton has outraised Conway $10,366.01 to $8,462.50 – granted, there were 90 days where Conway could not fundraise but practically all of the local money over the timeframe has gone to the challenger. (As full disclosure, I’ve chipped $10 into the Anderton effort although I didn’t attend a formal fundraiser.)

I was driving home yesterday along U.S. 50 when I noticed a Conway billboard – whether it’s the one he paid $15,880 for or one subsequent is not important. But on it Conway cited his “Eastern Shore Values” as a reason to be re-elected, so it’s funny that most of the money he’s used to pay for it comes from people who likely don’t share those values because they live in Annapolis or other parts of the state. Food for thought.

Next week I wrap up the series with a look at the District 37 House races. I’m just going to do one post and look at all five contenders.

The Eastern Shore Victory Headquarters is christened

After a week’s delay caused by the untimely passing of Sylvia “Cookie” Harris, wife of our esteemed Congressman, we finally opened our local Republican headquarters to a crowd of about 75 people.

The old Mister Paul’s Legacy had been spruced up after several months of inactivity for a new purpose: to assist in getting local Republican candidates into office.

Of course, a number of candidates and elected officials were there, along with supporters. Inside there were signs and information for all the local hopefuls who had dropped anything off, as well as a table for the top of the ticket.

And while the star of the show was rightfully going to be gubernatorial candidate Larry Hogan, local folks were indeed showing a lot of passion for their favored downticket candidates.

There was even love for our volunteers spread around inside with little messages like this.

Our presentation began, though, with an emotional update from Mark McIver on how Andy Harris was doing after the sudden passing of his wife. The “terminal optimist” was holding up all right and was getting ready to once again make himself available to help local Republicans emerge victorious. It led up to a moment of silence for both Cookie Harris and Dr. John Mautz, the father of District 37B Delegate candidate Johnny Mautz. The elder Mautz, an Easton dentist, died suddenly yesterday morning.

Wicomico County Republican Club president Jackie Wellfonder had the honor of introducing the guests of honor.

We actually went in reverse of the common political ceremony, because Larry Hogan spoke first.

Eschewing the safety of the podium, Hogan complemented the local workers for putting together the “nicest and most luxurious” headquarters in the state. Not bad praise from a guy who rides around in this:

(By the way, it does have a Maryland license plate. I checked.)

Hogan went on to stress that “this is a team effort” and that “this victory center is here to try and elect great Republicans.”

And while he called the reaction and response to his campaign “tremendous” Larry also pointed out the feedback from the minority community, noting that in Baltimore City he often heard the refrain “no one cares about us” and that politicians don’t come to the area for their input.

It led into his bread and butter message: that after 40 tax hikes and zero economic growth – a statistic Larry called “simply unacceptable” – things were so bad that the majority of Marylanders were fed up with the direction things were going. He cited a recent poll which stated 71% of Marylanders think taxes are too high and 62% would like the state to go in a different direction. His hottest giveaway item was “Democrats for Hogan” stickers, said Larry.

Our voters were angry, Larry explained, while theirs are complacent. “We’re driving some big turnouts,” he continued. And while he thought of his campaign as the air force, he realized that what we were doing was trying to provide the infantry for the fight. We can “send a loud and clear message” if we all work together, Hogan concluded.

We had heard a lot of what state party Chair Diana Waterman had to say when she appeared at our recent Republican Club meeting.

But Diana wanted us to get as much turnout as we could, even if it meant going against the principle of opposing early voting. “Embrace it and make it ours,” she said. Our candidates were “strong” and “ready to serve,” but “as Larry said it’s all about turning out our vote.” We needed to get past the old saying about not discussing politics with our neighbors and instead pester them to vote, and vote for our side.

Had David Warren alerted me to what he would do with the Coke can, I would have grabbed a shot of him with the visual aid.

But Warren made the case that he said no one else had adequately made. That can of Coke, he pointed out as he popped the top, was something not available on Howard County property because Howard County Executive (and Brown running mate) Ken Ulman had placed a ban on sugary drinks. “Imagine Ken Ulman and Anthony Brown doing your health care,” the Howard County native warned.

David focused on local races as well, bringing up a recent visit by three people from the Frederick area who had driven three hours here to help our folks out. As he pointed to the signs festooned on the wall behind him, he stated that “your guys represent you. The other guys represent Annapolis.” He also warned that “we don’t do this in 2014, we’re done.” It was also important to re-elect Larry in 2018 so we controlled redistricting, David added.

Today was a day to “eat, drink, and do selfies” but we had to step away from our comfort zone and work hard for the last 58 days of the campaign, Warren concluded.

Speaking of selfies, a number of candidates got to pose with Larry before he left. But first we had the official ribbon cutting.

The one shot of the several that I took that I decided to use here was the District 38 team. I encourage you to send these folks to Annapolis! From left to right it’s District 38C candidate Mary Beth Carozza, Delegate and District 38 Senate candidate Mike McDermott, Larry Hogan, District 38B candidate Carl Anderton, Jr., and Delegate Charles Otto of District 38A.

But the last one was special. Forty years ago, said Hogan, Blan Harcum helped Hogan’s father on his campaign, so he makes it a point to renew acquaintances when here in Wicomico County.

So the headquarters is off to a good start. But after the food, drink, and selfies we need volunteers to help run the shop but more importantly assist with the campaigns. The headquarters is open 10-8 on weekdays and 10-7 on Saturday, according to Warren.

To borrow a phrase from a local candidate, let’s get back to work.

WCRC Crab Feast 2014 in pictures and text

Every year I go to the WCRC Crab Feast I take this shot because I like it.

The same seems to be true about the Wicomico County Republican Club Crab Feast, as people come back year after year because they enjoy the event. Whether it’s the crabs…

…the company…

…or the chance to talk one on one with many of their elected officials, they line up to get their crabs when the event opens.

For those who didn’t care for crabs, Muir Boda was cooking up some mean burgers and hotdogs.

And it’s not like people don’t know where it is located. This was after David Warren put out a batch of Andy Harris signs.

As always, we had a silent auction table. It didn’t seem like we had quite as much as we have in previous years.

But they still lined up to put in last-minute bids. There was one rule, though: no hovering.

A trend the event has had the last couple years is the move away from candidate remarks, which used to be a staple of the event. Once upon a time, candidates would get a couple minutes but now we just figure they will mix and mingle. This was true last year and pretty much remained the same, with two exceptions.

One was a reminder from our county chair Dave Parker about the Patriot’s Dinner with Allen West on September 27.

We also heard from retiring Orphan’s Court Judge William Smith, who thanked us for 12 years of support and urged us to vote for the one Republican on the ballot, Grover Cantwell, as well as the two incumbents who opted to run again. They’re both Democrats, but one – Melissa Pollitt Bright – was at our event. Considering the good judge turns 91 soon, he’s earned a retirement.

Naturally, there were a lot of local candidates there for at least part of the event, so here are some shots I took. In the first example, here are two folks with a pretty good chance to be representing us in Annapolis, Johnny Mautz and Mary Beth Carozza.

Mary Beth was all over, speaking to a lot of voters and other candidates. Here she’s with County Council District 2 hopeful Marc Kilmer (center) and Central Committee-elect member Greg Belcher.

It must have been the shoes Mary Beth had on.

Under a tree, District 3 County Council candidate Larry Dodd was speaking to WCRC President Jackie Wellfonder.

Jackie also took the time to pose with District 38B Delegate candidate Carl Anderton, Jr. (left) and Wicomico County Sheriff Mike Lewis.

Far and away, the most popular person there was our Sheriff, fresh from national headlines about his pro-Second Amendment stance. As Jackie would put it, Lewis was a “rockstar” and photos with him were in demand.

A candidate looking for a return to County Council after four years away, John Cannon (pictured with his lady friend) was talking to Lewis about recent shooting incidents.

So while it was hot, fortunately the rain didn’t hit until last night and the event went off without a hitch. Many of these participants will reconvene later today at the opening of the Eastern Shore Victory Headquarters here in Salisbury. The crabs? Well, we had just a couple bushels left to sell at the end and killed the beer kegs, so people must have been satisfied with the event.

Next year the event should take place in the midst of our municipal campaign and the early stages of a race for a 2016 U.S. Senate seat, so it will likely have a much different feel. But as long as the crabs are steamed just right, people will still be here to enjoy it.

A question of semantics

I’ve written and researched a lot this week (and already laid some groundwork for next week) so this will be short, sweet, and to the point.

Yesterday I got an e-mail announcing a local event:

Michael —

Please join us Sunday (9/7/14) at 4:00pm for the Grand Opening of our Lower Shore HQ!

HOGAN FOR GOVERNOR HQ
4:00PM
1801 North Salisbury Blvd
Salisbury, MD 21801

Stop by and see Larry and pick up your Hogan supplies!

As a member of the Central Committee, I’ve been referring to this building as the Lower Shore Victory Center, or just “headquarters” or “Mister Paul’s” (the former occupant.) The Wicomico County Republican Club calls it the “Eastern Shore Victory Headquarters.” Did I miss something?

Do Republicans want Larry Hogan to win? Well, all but three percent of them did in a recent poll. But the last time we had a Republican governor, there was something missing: party development. All of the effort and money went toward getting Bob Ehrlich re-elected and not so much in candidate grooming and local campaigns which could have used the help. So we ended up with a debt-ridden party without a bench, and I’m not interested in a repeat of that mistake.

So I have a problem with being invited to the “Hogan for Governor” headquarters, even though that will be one of its primary functions. To a lot of local people, it’s more important to elect Addie Eckardt and Mike McDermott to the State Senate, Carl Anderton, Jr., Christopher Adams, and Johnny Mautz to become our newest Delegates, and Bob Culver as our County Executive. Many of my friends are pounding the pavement for those races, figuring Hogan can take care of himself – so why is he looking for all the credit? (It also just dawned on me that it would be a complete turnover in those particular positions, something sorely needed.)

Maybe it’s just bad optics to me. But it’s worth remembering that Hogan didn’t win this county, David Craig did.

So I’m hoping that when Larry comes down, he will refer to it properly as an Eastern Shore Victory Headquarters and not “his” headquarters. When you need 65-70% of the local vote to have a chance, a little respect goes a long way.

And while I’m thinking about Hogan, a few words about his fundraiser with Chris Christie. Do I agree with Chris Christie on a lot of issues? In a Presidential sense, not really. Does it bother me that Larry Hogan is bringing him to Maryland to fundraise? Absolutely not. Christie isn’t my cup of tea, but if it raises a lot of money that’s good for everyone.

On the other hand, Allen West is more my cup of tea and he’ll be here later this month. So save the date of September 27 and your pennies because these events will be helping three different entities: West’s Guardian PAC (which is supporting, among others, Dan Bongino), the state GOP, and the local party units.

Let’s get back to work

Yesterday, in my thoughts on an unrelated subject, I alluded to the massive loss of jobs in Maryland. Turns out it was worse than I thought – based on the unrevised Bureau of Labor Statistics totals, 16,286 fewer people in Maryland were working in July than June, adding 10,057 to the ranks of the unemployed.

The state compiles this data for Wicomico County as well, and I thought it would be instructive to note the June totals for the last several years. It’s worth noting that employment here normally tops out in July, with June usually a close second. The numbers are readily available for the period 2009-14, which covers the trough of the recession and the recovery.

So here are the June totals since 2009:

2009 – 49,271 employed, 4,556 unemployed (8.5%)
2010 – 49,548 employed, 4,856 unemployed (8.9%)
2011 – 49,160 employed, 5,030 unemployed (9.3%)
2012 – 49,585 employed, 4,759 unemployed (8.8%)
2013 – 48,991 employed, 4,526 unemployed (8.5%)
2014 – 48,760 employed, 3,964 unemployed (7.5%)

Over the five-year period, the unemployment rate went down 1 percent, but the number employed also went down by 511.

Just as a comparison to use a (generally) worst-case scenario, here are January numbers:

2009 – 47,015 employed, 4,722 unemployed (9.1%)
2010 – 45,526 employed, 5,669 unemployed (11.1%)
2011 – 46,838 employed, 5,393 unemployed (10.3%)
2012 – 46,758 employed, 5,178 unemployed (10.0%)
2013 – 46,806 employed, 5,066 unemployed (9.8%)
2014 – 46,711 employed, 4,338 unemployed (8.5%)

Over that five-year period in the month which is generally the nadir for local employment, we still lost 304 jobs although the rate deceased 0.6 percent.

But it’s estimated that Wicomico County gained 2,163 people between the census in April, 2010 and the 2013 estimate. So how are those people supporting themselves on 300 to 500 fewer jobs?

The title of this piece comes from a tagline and hashtag that District 38B candidate Carl Anderton, Jr. has been using during his campaign. While state numbers have fluctuated due in large part to changes at the federal level, the number of jobs in this area really doesn’t depend on the mood of the federal government. Instead, much of it is influenced by the policies at the state level and, judging by the figures, it’s pretty obvious that what’s being tried isn’t working – particularly if you’re one of those who had a job and lost it.

It’s often forgotten that the government doesn’t necessarily produce anything nor does it create value. Even in cases where infrastructure is being improved (such as the airport runway I described a few days back) the actual work is contracted out to a private company. But that private company has to follow additional rules and regulations to access that federal money, ones which may not apply in a truly private transaction – oftentimes there is a prevailing wage provision, for example. Meanwhile, we also have to pay the bureaucrats who reviewed the grant application, wrote the specifications, and so forth. The airport is receiving $5.53 million, but it may have cost taxpayers $7-8 million with the overhead involved.

Simply put, the Washington bureaucrats served as a conduit and a filter, meaning they received their cut first. Sure, this project will create a handful of construction jobs but imagine what the overhead could have done. It’s pretty much the same when Annapolis or local government is involved, since they get their cues from higher levels.

There are a number of economic drivers which this area relies on: agriculture (particularly poultry, with the feed stock being an integral part of this), tourism, and to a small extent, technology (thanks to spillover from Wallops Island.) Here’s where we really need help from the state:

improving transportation by using the gas tax we pay to actually build the needed bypasses and through routes to make access easier for tourists and getting goods to market more efficiently for producers;
leaving alone our true environmentalists, the farmers, by allowing them to use their land as they see fit and reforming the transfer of development rights to a generational term rather than perpetual;
creating a sales tax-free zone to allow us to compete directly with Delaware for retail sales;
finally, putting an end to blaming farmers for environmental problems and looking at common-sense solutions for cleaning the Chesapeake Bay. Work on the problems we know we have and put a moratorium on new regulations until we can determine how well the ones we have in place work.

Larry Hogan addresses some of the problem in his new video:

But the other side of that is reining in the Maryland Department of the Environment and Chesapeake Bay Foundation, neither of which Hogan addresses. That’s okay, though; I’d rather not telegraph those sorts of moves.

I have often seen complaints from the other side (of both the Bay and the political spectrum) that we on the Eastern Shore take more from the state than we give to them. For the sake of the argument, let’s say that’s true.

One has to ask, then, why this is the state of affairs? The people of the Eastern Shore seem like the hard-working, prideful sort who don’t like the thought of handouts. All we want is a chance to shine and do what we do best – left to our own devices, we can prosper and lead the state.

But there are those who like the Eastern Shore just as it is, preferring it remain rural and backward so they can look down on us and refer to us as the state’s “shithouse” as they fly through on the way to their beachfront Ocean City condo. Those are the people who need to be on the outside looking in politically in order for us to succeed.

WCRC meeting – July 2014

We don’t always hold a meeting in July, but since it is an election year and we like to give candidates a chance to update us on their platform, the Wicomico County Republican Club heard from the guy who predicted “I’m going to be your next County Executive.”

Obviously the voters will have their say on this in November, but Bob Culver laid out a compelling case for himself once we got through the usual business of the Lord’s Prayer, Pledge of Allegiance, and introduction of distinguished guests. The latter list was somewhat shorter now that the primary is over. We also heard the Treasurer’s report and got a quick update from our President Jackie Wellfonder.

Welffonder revealed that “we do have a headquarters, finally.” Once the building is turned over for our use and a few minor modifications made in the way of utilities, we should be up and running soon. It’s the former Mister Paul’s Legacy on North Salisbury Boulevard.

She also introduced the man who would be running the headquarters, David Warren. In this cycle he’s done work for the Ron George and David Brinkley campaigns, but instead of taking up an offer to go back to the Midwest (he worked for the RNC in Youngstown, Ohio in the 2012 election and had an offer to go work in Michigan this time) he came here because “I view this as a huge opportunity…(District) 38 is a very winnable district.” He was also complementary to Jackie, citing her as “one of the reasons I stayed.”

Wellfonder, for her part, called Warren “an asset to us because of his experience.”

We then turned the meeting over to Culver, who vowed to “bring back a government you can trust…government needs to work for you.”

If elected, his missions would be to sustain and diversify our local economy, improve workforce training and skills while recruiting within Maryland for new employers, and insuring the proper infrastructure – not just physical infrastructure, but including the environment and education as well. He also noted that our community is judged by how they take care of the elderly and less fortunate. And, as music to my ears, he wanted County Council to send him a proposal for an elected school board he could sign on to.

But while he won’t necessarily clean house, he did want to do things differently in various county departments. He would work more closely with Council on the budget, though, and try to change the “sense of entitlement” in certain quarters of government. Culver also promised to work toward a term limit for County Executive, believing two terms was plenty.

In Dave Parker’s absence, I read a Central Committee report he submitted. It talked at length about the upcoming Allen West Patriot’s Dinner on September 27, although we were also trying to work with the state on a Super Saturday the week before or after.

With fewer candidates because the primary weeded many of them out, we only had a few updates. A common theme was their door-knocking as most were getting out in the community. We heard from Circuit Court Judge candidate M.J. Caldwell, County Councilman Joe Holloway from District 5, County Council District 2 hopeful Marc Kilmer, County Council District 3 candidate Larry Dodd, and Delmar Mayor and Delegate aspirant Carl Anderton, Jr.

Another concern raised by some was how some opponents will get outside financial support, even on a more local level.

Tom Taylor brought up that candidates can take advantage of PAC-14, the local cable access channel, and discuss issues with host Phil Tilghman.

Shawn Jester mentioned some recent events Andy Harris was involved in, including the District of Columbia marijuana controversy and the Eastern Shore boycott that “fizzled out” as well as the possibility of housing illegal aliens in Westminster, which won’t happen. Harris also sponsored a well-attended event in Worcester County dealing with emergency preparedness.

Plans for the Crab Feast were moving along, but more volunteers were sought, said Joe Ollinger. The event will be held September 6 at Schumaker Pond.

With that and the reminder we next meet August 25, we broke into our usual post-game kibitzing. Most of the people stick around for that, so when you consider we have a pre-event social time at Cellar Door Tavern and linger for awhile afterward, it makes for a full evening. Those who are Wicomico County Republicans and want to get engaged in the local political scene should make a Monday night of it next time.

Snapshots of an election

To be honest, I took these photos on Tuesday intending to add them to my coverage – then promptly forgot and posted it anyway. But it doesn’t hurt to have a second look back before moving forward. There’s really not going to be a lot of fresh news until after the Independence Day holiday anyway, plus it also proves the adage that every picture tells a story.

So I’m going to lead with this one I also posted to Facebook.

It’s interesting to see this pile of Anthony Brown signs, which as I recall were pretty much all of the Brown signs I saw. Now one person suggested that they were originally set within the 100′ limit then relocated against the tree, which is possible – but I doubt it. Instead, my thought was someone left the pile of signs earlier that day or the previous night intending to have the first volunteer at the site place them in the morning – sort of like someone decided to have a insurance exchange website intending to have the thing actually work and not waste millions of dollars.

If you don’t get the small details, the large stuff bites you in the ass.

Speaking of signage, I did not count how many signs were out there on the grounds of the Civic Center, but I would suggest the ratio was perilously close to one for every other voter. Interest seemed to be quite low.

I took that picture about 5:00 after I arrived about 4:30. (This was an election day I had to work – I couldn’t alter my schedule enough to avoid it.) There were literally three people working the polls when I got there – M.J. Caldwell’s wife Pam, a lady representing Circuit Court appointee Jimmy Sarbanes, and Jim Jester, who was doing double duty with an Andy Harris shirt and Mike McDermott sign. This is one of the busier polling places in the county, and only three people were there.

If I saw 100 people vote in the time I was there, it was a lot.

Speaking of M.J. Caldwell, the Republican voters of this county need an education. I would expect about 60-65% of Democrats to blindly support someone named Sarbanes, but 43% of Republicans? Really? Someone selected not on qualifications, but on name recognition by a political hack governor we can’t stand? Get real. That has to turn around in November.

Even the news coverage was lackadaisical. Channel 47 did a live remote, but they never came out to talk with us. They probably showed the pictures of an all-but-empty polling place to an audience which can be charitably described as second-best in the market.

In terms of poll workers, it did pick up after a time. Jackie Wellfonder came along to work this poll.

Turned out the face-to-face didn’t do either of us much good because we got about the same amount of votes, and that wasn’t enough.

Josh Hastings was unopposed in his primary, so all he had to do was await the winner on the GOP side.

His opponent will be Larry Dodd, who had someone there eventually but he wasn’t the social type.

Having worked polls a few times here, I know that after about 7:00 it’s pretty well done for the night. So there were a gaggle of people with Hastings who got to talking down the way on the Democratic side, and a few of us for the GOP. It’s not like we had voters to convince, as maybe 20 stopped by during the last hour.

At the very end, Carl Anderton dropped by to retrieve his signs as did Jim Mathias. They had a nice conversation, although I didn’t get a picture. I was even bipartisan and helped Jim pick up some of the Democrats’ signs.

I was in a group which went on to The Cellar Door to check on the returns, but it wasn’t really a good night for most of us as you now know.

There were a couple things I learned, though. First and foremost is that Facebook is worthless as a campaign aid unless you want to pay through the nose. Social media isn’t really social anymore; it’s become commercialized like everything else. I had 60 likes for my Facebook page, which isn’t much but it at least gives me insight on how my posts did. (By comparison, Jackie Wellfonder also had a similar page and got 100 likes – but about 60 fewer votes.)

I placed a total of 41 posts on the page, although there was one I shared multiple times. My total reach was 2,718 – it’s about 66 per post. Ironically, my best post insofar as Facebook is concerned is the last one I think of as my concession speech, which reached 298 people. A little late, don’t you think? But if you figure a good number of those 66 per post see my stuff time after time, it’s not all that efficient for the investment.

I didn’t have thousands of dollars laying around to get my Facebook page up to 100,000 likes as Change Maryland did, and we only know about the last 30,000 or so because the campaign paid for those – Change Maryland was close to 70,000 when Hogan made it official. So who knows how much he paid for that promotion? More than I had in my pocket.

Anyway, social media isn’t really the way to go. But what is?

The second thing I found out is that the public seems to be unmotivated to find out what people really stand for. In race after race, I saw that those who spelled out their platform in the most complete manner lost to those who were a mystery to voters but had name recognition. It also didn’t necessarily matter how hard you worked – if John Cannon or Matt Holloway went door-to-door I didn’t hear about it, but Muir Boda did and got 18% of the vote to show for it. Tyler Harwood went door-to-door with Greg Belcher (in the same group which at times featured Carl Anderton, ~~Marc Kilmer~~, and Boda) and finished dead last for Central Committee (Greg was 8th.) Hard work wasn’t its own reward, and no good deed went unpunished – or so it seemed. (Nope, Marc corrected me – it was just his lit, not him.)

In short, I’m not sure I did my job very well on a local level. If I have a mission to educate voters, it looks like I have to work a little harder on it – and so I shall. I suppose the one thing about being a lame duck is that I have no election to worry about anymore, so I can speak my mind perhaps a little moreso than political correctness may dictate.

One source of relief is that I have a smaller range of people to keep up with for November. I think we could have done somewhat better coming out of this primary, but at least now I know whose feet I’ll have to keep to the fire and who I should be able to count on with a minimum of supervision.

A thin case of semantics

I haven’t weighed in much on the Senate District 4 primary race between incumbent David Brinkley and challenger Delegate Michael Hough except to point out that Hough’s score on the monoblogue Accountability Project has been significantly better over the last four years as part of my summary within.

But the Maryland Pro-Life Alliance is reaching back 18 years to reinforce its belief that David Brinkley is pro-abortion, as they dredged out a procedural vote on a 1996 bill which would have banned partial-birth abortion in the state. It was a bill which failed in committee, so its sponsor tried to bring it back as a substitute bill and Brinkley voted against consideration, as did a handful of other Republicans whose names I recognize from that long-ago session.

I also noticed another name among the opponents, and that was Addie Eckardt. I don’t think she’s pro-choice in the least, but it’s interesting that the Senate version of that 1996 bill was co-sponsored by Richard Colburn.

Now I can better understand the logic of equating a vote for a budget which happens to have abortion funding as a tiny proportion of the whole, or not advocating more for the advancement of the PCUCPA bill – which didn’t even get a committee vote – than using this particular vote to paint a candidate with that broad of a brush. I know my opinions on some subjects are different now than they were in 1996, in particular the so-called War on Drugs and term limits, so this is an overreach in criticism as I see it. What Brinkley didn’t vote for in 1996 isn’t as relevant as what no one got to vote for in 2014.

Something that was voted on in 2014, in both the Senate and the House, was an amendment to remove taxpayer funding for elective abortions. Needless to say, neither version passed as the House amendment from Delegate Susan Aumann failed 84-48 and the Senate version lost 29-16. The sponsor of the Senate version? David Brinkley. This is based on information from Maryland Right to Life, which did a three-vote scorecard covering both the Brinkley and Aumann amendments as well as an amendment from Delegate Tony O’Donnell to limit taxpayer funding of third-trimester abortions. Delegate Hough went 2-for-2, as did most other Republicans in the House (Delegate Robert Costa didn’t vote on the O’Donnell amendment and Delegate Bill Frank missed both votes), while all but one Republican voted for the Brinkley amendment – Senator Allan Kittleman was the lone no vote. (If only the GOP were as united on several other issues, but I digress.) They also pointed out the failure of PCUCPA to get a vote.

This is what I mean by seriously reaching. It’s pretty likely that a Republican will be pro-life to one extent or another; on the other hand pro-life Democrats are few and far between. Of course, the Maryland Pro-Life Alliance could pick almost any of those standard-issue Democrats as the “Pro-Abort Legislator of the Year;” my choices would be the committee chairs who wouldn’t even give PCUCPA a vote.

Some may say I’m the pot calling the kettle black given my criticism of certain Republicans in various races. My beef is generally in one of two categories: issue obfuscation or pandering to a particular audience. Thus I have a preference for candidates who spell out a platform which is bold. Say what you will about Heather Mizeur’s views on the issues, but at least she makes no bones about being way out on the last strands of that left-wing feather and clearly states her reasoning.

But there is a point where the perfect becomes the enemy of the good. The pro-life movement could do far worse than have David Brinkley re-elected, so maybe the MPLA should train its fire where it will do more good. Check out the pro-abortion votes from Norm Conway and Jim Mathias, for example – wins there from Carl Anderton, Jr. and Mike McDermott, respectively, will do far more good for the pro-life community than this internecine squabble.

A day in a campaign

It wasn’t my personal campaign, but having a couple political events scheduled the same day and a few extra dollars in my bank account (thanks to new advertisers) allowed me to make some of these gatherings and assist these great candidates.

District 38B candidate Carl Anderton, Jr.

For example, District 38B candidate Carl Anderton, Jr. held court downtown at Main Roots Coffee with a few supporters and friends. It was a relatively intimate gathering as it served as a way station between a parade in Mardela and door knocking in the morning and an afternoon Vietnam veterans event in Salisbury.

The parade was the beginning of the day for these two candidates, Christopher Adams of District 37B (holding the Coke) and District 2 County Council candidate Marc Kilmer. You’ll see Marc again in a few paragraphs.

Carl made sure to thank me for telling the truth about the MSEA Conway/Mathias flyer, although another attendee brought up the irony that the budget Conway and Mathias voted for also robbed millions promised to teacher pensions. The discussion was interesting and it allowed me to meet and speak with a person I’d not previously met who is a fan of this site.

I also spoke to Jackie Wellfonder, who introduced me to Tweetdeck. Maybe I’ll start making heads and tails of Twitter now, although the 140 characters is a problem for me. Consider that the previous sentence was just a little over 140 characters by itself and you’ll see my issue.

This afternoon’s event was the latest of a series of coffees Anderton has had at Main Roots, which ironically lies a short distance outside Carl’s crazy-quilt gerrymandered district.

But the story isn’t over yet, as I went home for a couple hours before heading over to my Central Committee cohort Bob Laun’s new place to be greeted by this spread.

I’m told that Bob and his lady friend prepared it all themselves. Complements to the chefs – it sure beat rubber chicken.

The event was on behalf of Marc Kilmer and drew about 30 people. It would have drawn one more but he couldn’t make it and I was told to relay a message to Marc and crew, which I did. (I know the sender reads this site, so I can be cryptic like that and know it was received.)

Unlike some other fundraising events, there weren’t formal remarks by the host – instead, Marc smartly circulated between the gatherings which naturally sprung up in various areas inside and outside the house. Having two young children to look out for helps in that regard as well.

I did catch up to Kilmer, who’s on the left in this photo, with host Laun in the center and Delmar Commissioner Bunky Luffman on the right. Bunky is Anderton’s campaign manager so I saw him at both events, too – same goes for Anderton, Shawn Jester, Jackie Wellfonder, Christopher Adams, and Muir Boda.

As I noted, many of those there had also been at the Mardela parade in the morning, so we were regaled by tales of several candidates and how they fared there.

While there wasn’t anything earth-shattering said at either event, I did get a good quote from Anderton at his coffee. We were discussing how I was frustrated about Larry Hogan’s reticence to address more than a few issues, and I noted I wasn’t a one-issue guy. Carl isn’t either: “I’m not a one-issue guy, I’m an eighty-issue guy,” he said, referring to the number of tax and fee increases we’ve endured over the last several years.

And while it’s not necessarily related, watch me tie this in to my point. I was walking over to Main Roots from where I parked down Main Street, when I saw this development.

If that building looks familiar to my readers, let me remind you of where I was on a Third Friday two years ago. Ironically, I wrote then about another failed restaurant that begat yet another failure before its current iteration as Roadie Joe’s.

But we face a choice this year. Surely the owner of this new enterprise has tied his dreams – and probably a fair share of borrowed money – into this forthcoming restaurant, slated to open in June per this piece at the One Salisbury blog. (That’s how I knew to look for it.) There’s no doubt the business will sink or swim on the quality of its food and service, but the question is how much of an incentive or boost can the state and local government give this entrepreneur by assisting him as needed, staying out of the way the rest of the time, and not penalizing him if he’s successful by punitive taxation? After all, he could have just as easily opened in Delaware.

If we stay on the same old path we’ve trod over the last eight years, it’s likely to act as an economic headwind which will make success far more elusive. But going in a different direction might just open the door enough for him to break through and make Echelon a success. Those candidates I supported today – and other conservatives of like mind – will be the ones who can help him be successful if the other ingredients are present.

WCRC meeting – April 2014

We didn’t have our president, who got struck in traffic returning from across the Bay, and our slated speaker had a conflict and sent his regrets. Even the treasurer had to take a rain check on the meeting. Yet the remainder of us persevered and we had our last meeting until the day before the June 24 primary hearing from a number of candidates who may well reach the end of the electoral road that day.

But Shawn Jester did a fine enough job running the meeting – with a little help from his right-hand man – that we learned a few things along the way and made a couple decisions.

With no speaker, once the formalities of doing the Lord’s Prayer, Pledge of Allegiance, and welcoming of guests were out of the way, we immediately cut to Dave Parker’s Central Committee report.

Parker told us that one of our own received an award from the state party, and as if on cue our Charles Carroll Award winner strode in the door. For a half-century of service, the state GOP honored Wicomico County’s “Mr. Republican” Blan Harcum. It was the “highlight of the convention,” said Parker. Harcum later added that it was “invigorating” to see so many new people in Bethesda.

But a lot of other things went on as well: the resolution condemning HB1513 was approved by unanimous consent, which was a rare time the procedure was done correctly, said Dave. He added that Diana Waterman helped play a part in the bill’s demise. Dave also assessed the bid for regional chairs as “not ready for prime time,” although it had been tried on a couple prior occasions. All in all, Parker called it “a good convention.”

Dave then passed out the flyer for the Allen West event in September, and explained how things would work that day – at least tentatively. We don’t know the sequence of West’s events before and after ours, so those details need to be firmed up.

Although it was not as well attended as we would have liked, Parker also called our Lincoln Day Dinner “successful.” It highlighted the “best crop I’ve ever seen” running for office.

I interrupted the flow a little bit by asking a question whether we should try to schedule a Super Saturday based on the West visit, figuring it would be a draw for other counties. The reason I brought it up at this meeting was that I knew we wouldn’t have a WCRC meeting for almost two months, so they should be aware if it comes up as a Central Committee issue.

Yet there were a number of events on the horizon for the post-primary summer, said Dave: the Tawes Crab and Clam Bake and our Farm and Home Show topped the list, with the WCRC Crab Feast coming in the weekend after Labor Day (as we were reminded later.) We also needed to set up our headquarters with some new volunteers. Before the primary, the MDGOP is sponsoring a forum on May 31, to be televised by WMDT-TV, Channel 47.

One other missing ingredient we needed to begin work on, concluded Parker, was a “get people to the polls” plan. Woody Willing pointed out early voting was June 12-18 at the Civic Center.

From there, we heard from all the candidates in the room regarding their campaigns. Among the door-knocking, fundraisers, and events, there were a few highlights.

Dr. Mark Edney, who is running for Central Committee and was one of our proxy carriers, remarked about his “great weekend at the convention” and the “ton of energy” there. He also raved about Sunday’s event for Mary Beth Carozza that he attended.

Delegate Charles Otto, who serves with scheduled speaker Mike McDermott in the House of Delegates, asked us to remember he still represents Wicomico County until the second Wednesday in January. He noted that at least 56 of the 141 Delegates next year will be new, as the others either retired or sought new positions, also assessing the state faced “challenging times” because they were increasing spending 4.8% while revenues were only increased 1.8%.

Dr. Rene Desmarais, a candidate for Delegate in District 37B, remarked on his interesting weekend as well. He was at the convention Friday night before departing to a medical conference on Saturday where he heard from four gubernatorial candidates, plus Jeannie Haddaway representing David Craig. While he said the Republicans all did a very good job, Desmarais called Doug Gansler “incoherent” and noted Anthony Brown made promises for the next 8 years he couldn’t keep over the last 8 – Brown also refused to answer questions, added Rene.

Circuit Court candidate M.J. Caldwell was late – he had come from a First Baptist Christian Church meeting with over 600 people on police concerns. He pointed out the vast gulf of experience between himself and his recently-appointed opponent, and stated he was “highly recommended” by the state bar – a distinction his opponent did not share.

(Personally I think if the guy’s last name were Jones he wouldn’t have sniffed a judgeship.)

Introducing himself to the group, District 37B hopeful Allen Nelson made the case that Martin O’Malley was a “scary individual” who was painting industries as villains. He brought up what he thought was a better idea – in Delaware, farmers have significant input in creating regulations.

Two events brought up by candidates will be held the same day, May 10: District 38B candidate Carl Anderton, Jr. is hosting a meet-and-greet at Main Roots Coffee and County Council District 2’s Marc Kilmer will have his event later at the residence of Bob Laun. Anderton also touted the new balanced budget for Delmar, which came with no tax or fee increases.

Carl also believed his leadership of the Maryland Municipal League was a “great experience.” And when challenged later about what to tell a Republican Norm Conway supporter, Carl pledged to speak with this gentleman himself.

Speaking for the David Craig campaign, Ann Suthowski said that the gubernatorial candidate will kick off a day in Salisbury Thursday at the annual Prayer Breakfast before meeting with public safety officials and granting a pair of media interviews.

With the candidates covered, we reviewed some past events.

Shawn Jester believed the Salisbury Festival was “a fantastic event” but it brought up the need for a new party banner to replace one that’s several years old and looks it. We voted to do just that.

And on a question which was brought up by membership, we decided not to take a formal position on city redistricting, although a few members who spoke up (including me) supported the five-district idea. It brought up a brief discussion about candidate recruitment, with Larry Dodd conceding “we fell asleep at the wheel” for a couple cycles. Our next chance will be the fall of 2015.

First, however, we have to get through this cycle. Because our usual fourth Monday falls on Memorial Day next month, as is common, we will not meet again until primary eve June 23. Attendance may be back to normal as candidates will be working the streets hard for last-minute votes.

Martin O’Malley’s (not-so) greatest hits – how about a new song?

Returning once again to a familiar role of thorn in the side and burr under the saddle, Change Maryland and Larry Hogan took the occasion of the final legislative session under Martin O’Malley to remind us of his underwhelming record of “accomplishments” over the last long eight years, wrapped up in one release. All we needed was the bow, as Change Maryland remarked that:

They broke promises to state workers by diverting $200,000,000 from pension funds to plug their budget gap.

They’ve eviscerated local arts funding to hike the film tax credit for Hollywood millionaires.

They raided the Transportation Trust Fund then raised gas taxes to pay for mass transit.

They hiked income taxes on families, small business and large employers.

They blew $125,000,000 of our tax dollars on a health exchange website that still doesn’t work and was never needed in the first place; today, more Marylanders lack health insurance than when O’Malley-Brown took office.

More than 73,000 residents have had their health insurance policies cancelled and tens of thousands more have seen massive increases in their premiums and deductibles.

They put the teacher union bosses that bankroll their political machine ahead of students, parents and classroom teachers.

They’ve badly mismanaged the education budget, as a result inner city schools are falling farther behind, state SAT scores are down and elementary school reading aptitude is flat. And, even the teacher union said their rollout of Common Core was a mismanaged “train wreck.”

Their job-destroying tax hikes on the so-called rich and small businesses – those individuals earning $100k or more – backfired, missing revenue projections.

Some entry level jobs will pay a little more but there will be fewer of them.

There’s a federal investigation into the Anthony Brown Health Exchange but state lawmakers aren’t issuing their findings until well after the primaries.

Thousands of employers are now “paying their fair share” in taxes albeit to Virginia and the Carolinas; about 6,500 companies have left Maryland taking with them more than 100,000 jobs.

Likewise, more than 31,000 Maryland residents left for more affordable states, taking $1.7 billion each year out of our economy; among these were thousands of seniors on fixed incomes who can no longer afford to retire near their families.

It costs you more when it rains and more again when you drive to the beach.

Describing the O’Malley era as one where, “(i)n nearly every quality of life measurement our state is worse off than it was seven years ago… even areas that showed modest improvement came at a horrendous financial cost due (to) Martin O’Malley and Anthony Brown’s mismanagement and one-party rule in Annapolis,” it’s clear that Hogan isn’t too enamored with the last seven years.

But while Hogan strives to “get the government off our backs and out of our pockets so we can grow the private sector, put people back to work and turn our economy around,” we’re more or less supposed to take his word for it. Obviously some of these items he complains about from the outside will be ones he may well find useful when he takes over the governor’s chair. For example, he (or anyone else for that matter) will have to figure out how to backfill the pension funds, live with the increasing minimum wage (which, for all his charms, he won’t be able to get the General Assembly Democrats to rescind), and roll back taxes and fees to previous levels yet keep the budget in balance. That aspect may actually be the easiest because he would set the budget. Unfortunately, we’re stuck with Obamacare for at least the first two years of anyone’s term, and probably longer.

However, I have a prediction for you. If the budget gets smaller – or even if it’s level-funded – you will hear a howling like you’ve never heard before from the special interests, press, and Democrats (but I repeat myself) who will be out marching in the streets against the heartless Republicans. Remember why we had a Special Session a couple years ago? It was because we passed a “doomsday budget” that was “only” $700 million higher than the previous one, and despite GOP objection we ended up raising spending another $500 million. Again, that was with a budget increase! Heaven help us if we actually proposed spending less money!

So those we elect in 2014 need to be ready and be stiff of spine because those Annapolis fat cats are going to come after us. We threaten their existence on the government teat and they know it. Having a $125 million boondoggle of a health exchange isn’t helping, which is why that scandal is being swept under the rug just as fast as the broom can collect the dirt.

In this part of the state we have some opportunities to chip away at the Democrats’ overall advantage. We’ll have to wait until 2018 to win back the District 37A seat – which will be held for the time being by a woman who I predict will have the same reliably far-left voting record as her predecessor – but aside from that we can speak our piece by ejecting two members of the General Assembly who will occasionally vote the right way when they get the hall pass to do so, but can be replaced by two members who we know will stand up for our interests. We can confound the Democrats’ cynical redistricting ploys by elevating Mike McDermott to the Senate and getting the fresh new ideas of Maryland Municipal League president Carl Anderton, Jr. into the House of Delegates.

Changing the state means pulling our weight, and the Eastern Shore can do most of its part by leaving just one Democrat east of the Chesapeake for the next four years.