Politics – Page 310

Lichtman replies

Today I noticed in my moderation queue that Allan Lichtman did reply to my questions over the last couple days. Instead of leaving it in a comment that people may not notice, I’m going to reprint the comments in this article. The only change I’ll make is placing my questions in italics and I’ve respaced some of the answers’ subparagraphs for clarity. Aside from that, it’s the original answers untouched.

Question #1:
There are several schools of thought regarding the problem of illegal immigrants, or as some would call them, “undocumented workers.” Some solutions offered range from complete amnesty to sealing the border with a wall to penalizing employers who hire these workers. Currently there are competing House and Senate measures – in particular the House bill has spawned massive protests around the country. While I have listed some of the possible solutions, it’s no exhaustive list. What solutions do you favor for the issue?

I strongly oppose a punitive approach to immigration, including any laws like H. R. 4437 that could potentially punish teachers, clergy, social service workers and doctors who have a moral duty to serve all people in need, including the immigrant community. No American should be forced to choose between helping those people in urgent need of assistance because of excessive fear of facing penalties. I also favor a rigorous approach to citizenship for undocumented workers such as that provided in the Kennedy-McCain framework, much of which is incorporated in the current Senate bill.

Although I believe that we need to secure our borders I believe that only long-term approach to illegal immigration is a comprehensive North American solution to immigration and Homeland Security which would include the United States, Canada and Mexico working conjointly as a community on economic development, mutual security, infrastructure, education, and labor policy.

Question #2:
Another top-burner concern is the current spike in the price of gasoline. Again, this is a broad issue with many scenarios that can be played out. Possible solutions that have been bandied about in recent days are a temporary suspension of the federal 18.4 cent a gallon tax on gasoline and easing environmental restrictions on gasoline blends (as happened after Hurricane Katrina). Further down the road but possibly affecting prices on the futures market would be the approval of additional oil drilling in ANWR and the Gulf of Mexico. If you were elected, what solutions to this issue would you pursue and why?

With gas prices soaring above $3 a gallon it is time to stop talking about cutting prices and start taking action. The following is my plan for cutting prices at the pump for the people of Maryland and the nation, both now and in the long term. This is a real plan for change, not the purely rhetorical gesture made by George W. Bush:

1. Provide new powers for the Federal Trade Commission to investigate and crack down on price gouging by the big oil companies. Exxon made a record $36 billion in profit last year and recently paid out some $400 million to its retiring CEO, exploding the excuse that soaring pump prices are solely the product of rising costs.
2. Impose an excess profits tax on the big energy companies with an exception for profits devoted to research into and production of clean, renewable sources of energy.
3. Eliminate state anti-competitive laws, including the Maryland law, which prevents retailers from reducing prices below a specified minimum.
4. Enforce the anti-trust laws to increase competition in the heavily concentrated energy industry.
5. Adopt a plan now for converting a substantial component of the fossil fuel economy to clean, renewable sources of energy. Components of the plan would include:

o Adopt Fuel Economy Standards: We need to adopt real, loophole-free, fuel economy standards for motor vehicles, not the shell game that President Bush has proposed. Even a modest average 5 miles per gallon increase in real fuel economy could save more than 20 billion gallons per year by 2020, according to the Alliance to Save Energy.

o Flip the Subsidies: The government must flip subsidies, tax breaks, and research and development programs from fossil fuels to clean, renewable sources of energy. This would include repealing the $12 billion in subsidies to big oil and gas companies in Bush’s energy bill and devoting the proceeds to developing and producing alternative energy sources.

o Convert Government Fleets: We can begin to convert all government vehicular fleets to low emission, fuel efficient vehicles, including the latest in plug-in hybrid technology and bio-mass fuels.

o Upgrade Efficiency Standards: We need to upgrade energy efficiency standards for appliances and buildings and create incentives for conservation and the cogeneration of energy.

o Make a Commitment to Conservation: The U. S. spend less than $1billion a year on conservation measures, a substantial reduction since the Clinton years. We need a real federal commitment to conservation as well as leaders who will work with the American people to promote a new conservation ethic.

o Advance Research: The government must establish a first-class federal research program devoted to the development of alternative fuels and conservation initiatives.

We can reduce prices at the gas pump, put consumers ahead of excess profits for energy companies, and convert to clean, renewable sources of energy. It is a matter of will, not technology. As President Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone…”

Question #3:
Recently the news has featured ethics scandals involving GOP donor Jack Abramoff and former House member Duke Cunningham of California as well as Democrat House members William Jefferson of Louisiana and Allan Mollohan of West Virginia. If elected, what steps would you take to help eliminate ethical improprieties among our elected representatives?

Maryland needs a Senator who understands how corruption eroded our government and is ready to stand as a watchdog against practices that sell out the people’s interests to the wealthy corporations. As a Senator I pledge to fulfill that role and to accept no perks or benefits from special interest groups – no junkets to foreign lands, no weekends at lush resorts, no fact-finding trips that become golf holidays. As an educator I understand the importance of setting a role model for students. As a Senator I would do no less for the people of Maryland.

I would also propose much stricter regulation of lobbying than in the sham Republican proposal. Real reforms would ban privately-funded travel and all forms of gifts to lawmakers, restrict former members of Congress from lobbying for two years, and establish an independent ethics-oversight committee. The people’s interests should never be sold out for the wealthy corporate interests.

Question #4:
Along that same line, many people have seen the vast sums of money that seemingly are required to run for public office and were under the impression that campaign finance reforms such as those enacted with the McCain-Feingold bill were supposed to relieve this inequity. On the whole, however, the money trail has not ceased even with these laws. How do you favor strengthening these laws to make them more effective, or do you agree with some First Amendment advocates who think these laws should be eliminated?

The public financing of elections is the only way to curb the dominant influence of money on our politics. For their millions in campaign contributions wealthy corporate interests reap many billions in subsidies, tax breaks, and other forms of corporate welfare. The way to get rich in America is not to drill for oil or dig for gold, but to contribute to politicians.

Look at the campaign contributions accepted by his opponent, Congressman Ben Cardin, from the pharmaceutical and health products industry. For his 2004 re-election Cardin accepted $29,500 from the pharmaceutical and health products industry, far more than any other member of congress from Maryland, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. He accepted $8,000 from Pfizer alone. In 2003, he was the only member of Maryland’s congressional delegate to follow the lead of the pharmaceutical industry and vote against The Pharmaceutical Market Access Act, which would have authorized the importation of low-cost, safe prescription medications from Canada.

For his 2006 Senate campaign Cardin has accepted $40,000 from Constellation Energy, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. This is the company that is pushing to raise electric bills for their customers in Maryland by 72 percent. Overall he has raked in more than $63,000 from electric utilities.
You cannot serve both the common interests of the people of Maryland and the private interests of lobbyists and wealthy corporations. You cannot claim to be standing up to the pharmaceutical industry and the big energy companies when you’re raking in their cash.

I would ask: Which matters more: affordable prescription drugs, a decrease in living costs, reasonable gas and electricity prices, or swelling the already deep pockets of wealthy corporations?
As a candidate I pledge to take no PAC money from private corporations. As a Senator I pledge to take no perks, as indicated above.

Question #5:
While the above issues have captured the headlines, our War on Terror (particularly in Iraq) is never far from our minds. It goes without saying that the vast majority of us support our troops; but the question is whether you favor our current approach or something different in terms of sending additional troops, seeking more multinational support, or a complete pullout. Maybe your thoughts are someplace in between these listed or would be considered “out of the box” thinking. What approach would you favor?

Since announcing my candidacy for the United States Senate last September, I was the first Democratic U.S. Senate candidate to specifically propose and advocate a phased withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, with specific goals and timetables. My original timetable, announced at my campaign kickoff on September 28, 2005, I specified that troops be withdrawn from Iraq no later than the end of 2006.

Unlike some of my opponents, I have consistently and emphatically challenged President Bush’s pretenses for the war in Iraq, and his lack of strategy for victory in the region for the last three years. I have also shown my disapproval for the war by attending anti-Iraq War rallies, meetings, forums, and protests throughout Maryland and the D.C. area.

Occupation creates insurgency; only sovereignty creates stability, which cannot be imposed externally, by force. Our continued military presence in Iraq inflames the insurgency and makes Iraq a magnet for terrorism. The president says that Iraq is the front line in the war on terrorism. It was not, however, before his misguided invasion. The CIA’s own National Intelligence Council warns that Iraq and future conflicts “could provide recruitment, training grounds, technical skills and language proficiency for a new class of terrorists who are ‘professionalized’ and for whom political violence becomes an end in itself.”

It will take years of renewed diplomatic ties and an unobtrusive positive promotion of humane, Democratic values ultimately to end tensions in the region. Therefore, I propose the following:

Ending the War

• As a United States Senator, I would not support any funding for perpetuation of the war beyond 2006, except financial and logistical resources aimed towards bringing American soldiers home from Iraq.

• I would also sponsor a Senate Resolution specifically calling for the prompt withdrawal of American troops.

• As part of my withdrawal plan, the United States would make it clear that it has no ambitions for permanent military bases in Iraq or American control over Iraqi oil.

Reprioritizing our Military Objectives

• There are too many urgent needs at home which are being neglected because our financial, logistical, and National Guard resources meant for homeland security are stretched too thin worldwide.

• We must utilize our National Guard to strengthen our Homeland Security by better securing domestic transportation hubs and American borders.

• National Guard personnel can assist in the rebuilding effort of American cities recently uprooted by natural disasters.

Finding and Eliminating the Threats from al-Qaeda

• The terrorist group responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks is still the biggest threat to American security.

• America must refocus our efforts to find and eliminate Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaeda members worldwide.

Regaining American Credibility Throughout the World

• America must work proactively to restructure diplomatic ties with our allies and rejoin the world in multilateral initiatives to promote peace and protect our environment.

• I support the investigation into any unlawful abuse of detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison and Abu Gharab detention facilities.

• Those who break the law should be prosecuted, and conversely, any detainees found to be innocent should be freed.

• Promote positive Muslim-Judeo-Christian relationships in the entire Middle East, including in Iran and within the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. America needs to again provide real, proactive leadership to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict such as displayed under the Clinton administration.

Leading Iraq into the 21st Century

• Monitor the development of Iraqi forces with renewed support from our allies.

• Help Iraqis establish fair labor practices and vibrant local economy that will ease transition into the world economy.

• Promote strong public education and programs that emphasize democracy, international engagement, and tolerance of all cultures.

• As an expert on voting rights and democratic systems I would travel to Iraq as a Senator and offer my assistance in developing a working democracy.

• As a Senator I would introduce legislation for an investigation similar to that of the Truman Committee during World War II to assure that aid money is well-spent and wealthy, politically-connected corporations are not making illicit profits at the expense of the American taxpayers and the Iraqi people.

Question #6:
Related to the above question is the controversy over Iran’s nuclear program. The oil-rich nation claims that this program is for the peaceful use of generating electrical power for its citizens, yet on the other hand its leadership has threatened the nation of Israel with annihilation hinted as being from a nuclear bomb. While the President has the final decision, what course would you advocate he take (a pre-emptive military strike, diplomacy either through the UN or some other way, or leaving them alone as a sovereign nation) and why?

I strongly oppose a preemptive strike by the Bush administration. Such action would weaken the security of Israel, undermine the war against terrorism, overextend our already thinly stretched military and pose a grave threat to world peace. I have long proposed the carrot and stick approach to Iran, with negotiations that combine both real sanctions against Iran, with cooperation on meeting the nation’s alleged energy needs.

Question #7:
Back to domestic issues. One pillar or goal of the Bush administration was to enact Social Security reform in the second term, but it has stalled because of claims there’s no problems with the program and privatization reforms are simply a way to enable Wall Street to profit. Do you think the Social Security program is fine as it is, or what changes would you advocate happening with the program?

Social Security is a social insurance system – a basic income safety net for all working Americans. I will work tirelessly to strengthen Social Security and fight any attempts to privatize Social Security, which would cut guaranteed benefits and explode our national debt.

I also oppose “privatization-lite” as advocated by my opponent Ben Cardin. This misguided scheme would have the managers of Social Security, rather than individuals, invest a hefty share of your payments in the stock markets, rather than relying on bonds that bear the “full faith and credit” of our national government.

Privatization-lite would imperil the economic security of seniors and homeowners in Maryland. By, in effect, dumping government bonds to free funds for stock market investments this privatization plan would by simple supply and demand drive down the price of bonds and drive up interest rates, putting a drag on Maryland’s economy and eroding the property values of every homeowner in our state. The plan would reduce guaranteed Social Security benefits with private account benefits at the mercy of the ups and downs of the market. It would raise the administrative costs of Social Security by requiring a permanent new bureaucracy to handle private accounts and potentially subject its managers to political pressures on their investment decisions. Even worse would be “passive” investments by Social Security managers with no control over how corporations spend our money. If the market declined it would mean either a reduction in benefits or a government bailout, with money that we don’t have in times of deficit spending.

As the first steps to strengthening Social Security, I support committing Congress to stop the raid on the Trust Fund to finance other unrelated budget items, such as the mismanaged and seemingly endless Iraq War. Congress should pay back to the Social Security trust funds those money borrowed and spent for purposes other than Social Security programs.

I support rolling back the fiscally irresponsible Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans that are draining the Trust Fund.

I support a careful study of a variety of potential reforms that will address Social Security’s funding problems while ensuring that Social Security continues to meet its purpose of providing income protection and economic security to America’s working families. Possible solutions include lifting the cap on social security taxes, while exempting from taxation the first $10,000 of income to make the payroll tax both more progressive and more responsive to changes in the economy. The payroll tax falls most heavily on low and middle income workers, and today some 70 percent of workers pay more in payroll than in income taxes. That is unacceptable.

Question #8:
Some in Congress have raised the question of “pork” or excessive earmarks because our federal budget always runs in deficit and eliminating these earmarks would be a simple way to help balance the budget. But no Congressman or Senator wants to cut their district’s or state’s project. To balance the budget, would you consider sacrificing some of your district or state’s federally-funded projects or would you prefer measures to enhance federal revenues to meet the gap?

Although I oppose excessive earmarks or “pork,”which should be debated in the Senate, I would not sacrifice needed infrastructure projects in the state of Maryland. There are better ways to help balance the budget.

1. Develop a plan for bringing the troops home from Iraq and recouping for domestic priorities the enormous costs of the war.

2. End subsidy payments to corporations and farm price support payments to large agri-businesses. ($25 -50 billion)

3. Stop the administration from permanently abolishing the estate tax. Even keeping in place the an eased estate tax that affects only estates of $3.5 million of or more (5 out of 1,000 estates) with a 45 percent tax would save nearly $40 billion.

4. Improve tax collections and stop the administration from cementing in place tax cuts that affect only high-income filers and one-time bonus tax breaks for business, ($100-$125 billion)

5. Replace Bush’s confusing, wasteful prescription drug plan with a more efficient, user-friendly plan like the one developed by Boston University School of Public Health. ($40 billion)

6. Reform antiquated business practices at the Pentagon and eliminate needless and redundant weapons systems. ($60 billion)

7. Eliminate tax breaks to extractive industries and other unnecessary corporate tax breaks. ($20 billion)

Question #9:
Now to the question of trade. When I go to a store, many’s the time that I see a product is made in China – hence we run a large trade deficit with that nation. President Bush has advocated a hemisphere-wide free trade zone that would add Central and South American countries to the umbrella originally created by the NAFTA agreement a decade ago. Given these items, and knowing also that the number of manufacturing jobs in this country remains flat to slightly lower even in this era of steadily expanding employment, where do you stand – do you see free trading eventually shifting our economy to one mostly comprised of service and technology jobs, or do you feel we should take more steps to preserve our core manufacturing positions?

We must take steps to preserve and strengthen our manufacturing positions. Such steps would include eliminating the current tax incentives for shipping jobs and investments abroad. We should also strengthen federal support for small businesses that are the driving engine of our economy. We should drastically reduce dependence on the fossil fuel economy and move towards the development of a robust alternative fuels industries with the promise to improve the economy and create more jobs. We should reduce the deficit to keep interest rates under control and limit the financing of our debt by foreign nations. We should support workers’ rights to organize unions which increase the number of good, stable jobs and negotiate trade agreements only with adequate safeguards for labor and the environment.

Question #10:
This question should present you with the shortest answer. Given that in 2008 either you will be seeking re-election to the House and hoping for some coattails at the top of the ticket, or preparing to work with a new President (for the Senators), if you had a short list of 3 to 5 names you’d like to see seek the job, who would they be? Please note that they do not have to be candidates who are considered to be running for the post at this time.

Russ Feingold
Wesley Clark
Hillary Clinton
John Edwards
Mark Warner

I appreciate Mr. Lichtman taking the time and answering the questions, he did have the difficult position of being first and may not have thought I was being serious in my timetable. Now hopefully the remainder of these candidates will see the treatment Allan got and be forthcoming with replies.

A slice of the mighty Wurlitzer? What the heck does that mean?

Saw this before from someplace, but Soccer Dad wrote about it today so I’m following suit, what the heck.

I’m still trying to figure out if I’m painful to read to the liberal eye, funny, or interesting. But Cato, Publius and our MIA friends at Delmarva Dealings got a particularly unkind cut.

I do have to say that Salisbury and the Eastern Shore is representin’ though, we have 3 of the 15 that the blogger lists on the “Mighty Wurlitzer” side (in addition to DD and myself, he has Duvafiles too.) Not bad for maybe 1/8 to 1/10 of Maryland’s population.

And on the “Forces o’ Light and Goodness” side (blogs on the left side) he’s got 15 there as well. So whether consciously or not, he makes it appear the Maryland blogosphere is fairly even-sided politically. If we can get the electorate to break that way, the side I’m on could do some good things for this state – maybe even make it free again.

Looking for a little cooperation!

Let’s see…

You have the candidate links I have placed up top in the directory of links on the right side of this page.

You have the Ten Questions, which I’ve asked of each candidate running for federal office in this area. Soon a similar list will be sent to those running locally for state legislative posts.

Well, today I solicited a number of local political leaders from all of the state parties I could get contact info for in Dorchester, Wicomico, Somerset, and Worcester counties here in Maryland and Sussex County in Delaware. This included Republicans, Democrats, Greens, and Libertarians for both states, plus a couple other parties in Delaware. There’s also a number of Maryland statewide candidates I did this for yesterday, although that was a bit more difficult. I’d just like to be placed on a mailing list, folks, I’m not necessarily wanting to volunteer for you.

The idea is to put together a political calendar each week, where if there’s a candidate who’s speaking out on the issues, it’s an opportunity for all of you readers to get to see them in person and judge their qualifications for yourselves.

Obviously if you’re a regular monoblogue reader, you’ll know that I’m in the local Republican club. But as I wrote to these folks of other political stripes, just because I am the person who writes the views on monoblogue, I’m still fair enough to allow them to make the news. I’d be interested in getting to see some of the other people who are making the effort to avail themselves for public service – while I may disagree with their views diametrically, I do believe in free political speech.

So I’m leaving it up to those who are the movers and shakers in each area county whether they wish to participate (assuming of course I had their proper contact info.) But come about this time next Sunday (if I’m through with some personal business) I’ll debut the first weekly political calendar for the time period of June 12-20. This will continue up until Election Day of 2006.

If next week comes and I have no responses, then it becomes incumbent upon the loyal readers of monoblogue to ask what these politicians and parties have to hide?

Ten questions for…Allan Lichtman

Today is the debut of what I call the Ten Questions. A few weeks ago, I sent out a mass e-mail (or snail mail) to all those who had filed or intended to file (had websites) for the U.S. Senate (and local Eastern Shore U.S. House) seats that are being voted on in Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia. This e-mail contained a brief introduction and the Ten Questions.

To date, I have had two candidates answer these questions. A few days ago, I took all of the Maryland candidates and randomly selected an order for their answers to be published on monoblogue. Through the luck of the draw, Democrat Allan Lichtman got the opening slot.

But he didn’t answer the questions. So I had the dilemma of whether to simply write that he didn’t answer the questions and nothing more, or actually post the questions despite the fact he didn’t answer.

However, after rereading my post announcing the Ten Questions, I see that I promised to reveal them on June 2nd, and that’s today. So Allan Lichtman, you have a nice blog, but you failed to answer my questions. I may decide to be nice and post a late submission, but you’re at my mercy now.

I do want to say that I think the concept is sound, and I’m almost certainly going to come up with a different set of questions on the Maryland House of Delegates and Senate races in Districts 37 and 38 for those candidates. Perhaps a more localized setting will encourage participation – besides, I think the state government should be more important than the federal one anyway. That mailing will likely be in July once the fields are set, since I’m hoping that having the Bozman seat open up will encourage competition in both parties.

But here are the Ten Questions I asked the candidates for federal office. Feel free to ask them of your officeseekers if you read this blog from afar, all I ask is credit me (Michael Swartz) or link to my blog (www.monoblogue.us).

Question #1:

There are several schools of thought regarding the problem of illegal immigrants, or as some would call them, “undocumented workers.” Some solutions offered range from complete amnesty to sealing the border with a wall to penalizing employers who hire these workers. Currently there are competing House and Senate measures – in particular the House bill has spawned massive protests around the country. While I have listed some of the possible solutions, it’s no exhaustive list. What solutions do you favor for the issue?

Question #2:

Another top-burner concern is the current spike in the price of gasoline. Again, this is a broad issue with many scenarios that can be played out. Possible solutions that have been bandied about in recent days are a temporary suspension of the federal 18.4 cent a gallon tax on gasoline and easing environmental restrictions on gasoline blends (as happened after Hurricane Katrina). Further down the road but possibly affecting prices on the futures market would be the approval of additional oil drilling in ANWR and the Gulf of Mexico. If you were elected, what solutions to this issue would you pursue and why?

Question #3:

Recently the news has featured ethics scandals involving GOP donor Jack Abramoff and former House member Duke Cunningham of California as well as Democrat House members William Jefferson of Louisiana and Allan Mollohan of West Virginia. If elected, what steps would you take to help eliminate ethical improprieties among our elected representatives?

Question #4:

Along that same line, many people have seen the vast sums of money that seemingly are required to run for public office and were under the impression that campaign finance reforms such as those enacted with the McCain-Feingold bill were supposed to relieve this inequity. On the whole, however, the money trail has not ceased even with these laws. How do you favor strengthening these laws to make them more effective, or do you agree with some First Amendment advocates who think these laws should be eliminated?

Question #5:

While the above issues have captured the headlines, our War on Terror (particularly in Iraq) is never far from our minds. It goes without saying that the vast majority of us support our troops; but the question is whether you favor our current approach or something different in terms of sending additional troops, seeking more multinational support, or a complete pullout. Maybe your thoughts are someplace in between these listed or would be considered “out of the box” thinking. What approach would you favor?

Question #6:

Related to the above question is the controversy over Iran’s nuclear program. The oil-rich nation claims that this program is for the peaceful use of generating electrical power for its citizens, yet on the other hand its leadership has threatened the nation of Israel with annihilation hinted as being from a nuclear bomb. While the President has the final decision, what course would you advocate he take (a pre-emptive military strike, diplomacy either through the UN or some other way, or leaving them alone as a sovereign nation) and why?

Question #7:

Back to domestic issues. One pillar or goal of the Bush administration was to enact Social Security reform in the second term, but it has stalled because of claims there’s no problems with the program and privatization reforms are simply a way to enable Wall Street to profit. Do you think the Social Security program is fine as it is, or what changes would you advocate happening with the program?

Question #8:

Some in Congress have raised the question of “pork” or excessive earmarks because our federal budget always runs in deficit and eliminating these earmarks would be a simple way to help balance the budget. But no Congressman or Senator wants to cut their district’s or state’s project. To balance the budget, would you consider sacrificing some of your district or state’s federally-funded projects or would you prefer measures to enhance federal revenues to meet the gap?

Question #9:

Now to the question of trade. When I go to a store, many’s the time that I see a product is made in China – hence we run a large trade deficit with that nation. President Bush has advocated a hemisphere-wide free trade zone that would add Central and South American countries to the umbrella originally created by the NAFTA agreement a decade ago. Given these items, and knowing also that the number of manufacturing jobs in this country remains flat to slightly lower even in this era of steadily expanding employment, where do you stand – do you see free trading eventually shifting our economy to one mostly comprised of service and technology jobs, or do you feel we should take more steps to preserve our core manufacturing positions?

Question #10:

This question should present you with the shortest answer. Given that in 2008 either you will be seeking re-election to the House and hoping for some coattails at the top of the ticket, or preparing to work with a new President (for the Senators), if you had a short list of 3 to 5 names you’d like to see seek the job, who would they be? Please note that they do not have to be candidates who are considered to be running for the post at this time.

*************************************

These are the Ten Questions. So far only 2 of the 30+ officeseekers I sent them to have answered. In order to have honest debate in this country on real issues, I’m encouraging all who read this blog to ask them yourselves of those federal politicians who ask for your support.

Maybe if we all act together we can shift the debate from the 30 second commercial to the actual stances these politicians stake out. Even better, after they’re elected, we have them on record with their positions and can hold their feet to the fire once they deviate. If they’re doing it for good reasons, they owe it to the voters to explain the change of heart.

One thing that I’m really happy about in this 2006 election is the number of candidates who are trying to win these elected offices (in most cases.) So it’s time for the debate to begin – who will be our best and brightest public servants?

In print again

Today the Daily Times published my letter to the editor – as usual I hate the way they chopped it up. The editor and I need to have a chat about the proper use of paragraphs. And they always kill the lines I use to heighten the humor or irony in the letter.

This is the version I actually sent to them:

To the Editor:

Normally I’m not in the business of predictions – if I could predict the lottery numbers I’d be a much wealthier man. But one thing that is becoming clearer to me is that if an immigration bill is passed with certain provisions still in the measure, the backlash against Hispanics and Spanish-speakers in this country (legally or illegally) is going to make the anti-Muslim incidents after 9/11 look like a tea party.

Even before this letter was written, word was getting out about some of the less-than-onerous penalties that illegal immigrants will face from this bill. For example, I’d like the government to send me a check for $10,721.09. That would cover the last two years of taxes I paid, less refunds. If an illegal alien is allowed to only pay 3 out of his last 5 years in back taxes, why can’t I? Of course, I filed and paid my taxes in a legal manner.

And it’s not just the “undocumented.” Their employers are exempted from paying taxes that would be due as well. So it’s not necessarily that illegal immigrants would do the jobs Americans won’t do; it’s more along the lines that businesses sure clean up financially by hiring them to do the jobs Americans can do, but where the employers can’t skirt tax laws by hiring Americans!

Worst of all, for those who have suffered from identity theft by having their Social Security number allocated by someone who didn’t have the paperwork to get one the proper way, you get to watch the folks who possibly have ruined your credit escape without punishment. And to add insult to injury, they’ll also get to collect Social Security based on their time here illegally. Who among us thinks that, given the government’s track record on keeping information straight, someone isn’t going to have their Social Security check get based on the wages of the undocumented worker rather than properly credited for decades of better-paid sweat and labor?

Now if I, a born and raised American, attempted to misuse another’s Social Security number, there’s a possibility I could be fined and imprisoned – unless I’m misusing the number of a black Republican running for the U.S. Senate. Then I’d get a slap on the wrist; still, that’s more punishment than these lawbreakers would receive.

Personally, I’d prefer we work on tightening up the borders and actually enforcing existing laws on immigration. But all of this “reform” is a result of chasing the possible voting bloc that would be magically given a right that others who went through the process properly wait years to be granted. There may be 10 million, 12 million, or even 25 million illegal immigrants who would be allowed to vote in upcoming elections. But there’s untold millions who would see this travesty and unleash their power at the ballot box at anyone who’s pandered to the illegal influx just to win the next election.

I’m truly hoping that the backlash I spoke of above is only expressed at the ballot box, but I fear some Americans may seek another way to vent their frustrations.

See how much better that reads and sounds? Then again, that’s why I have this blog, because I’ve learned that editors of actual newspapers love to chop up my letters and make them look like origami sans the beauty.

To me, the immigration issue has become like affirmative action. Unfortunately, there’s an attitude in this nation that states that blacks who attain high positions must have gotten them through affirmative action rather than their own hard work. That’s only true in a minority of cases, but the stigma remains. This also holds true with minority “set-asides”, where a few companies have thrived simply by being owned by a minority, not necessarily by doing good work. That’s just like the old axiom that a woman sleeps her way to the top of the corporate ladder – rarely true, but believed by many nonetheless.

And just like I’d like to see affirmative action sunsetted out of existence, I’d like to see the illegal immigrant problem cease too. But to me that would involve enforcing the existing laws against employers, cracking down on Social Security number misuse once it’s found, and helping the Minutemen build their border fence.

It just takes politicians who have cojones. As Rush would say, a little Spanish lingo there. While the term is appropriate, the action is sadly lacking.

Signs, signs, everywhere (gang) signs…

Over the last week or so, and culminating in a public forum last Tuesday, the topic du jour on the local blogosphere was the gang problem in Salisbury and how to combat it. Unfortunately, I ended up missing both sides of the Tuesday gang forum presentation due to work and a previous appointment, but I read in Justice For All? here and here that it was a very good presentation.

With that, I became inspired to make a request to my local elected official, who happens to be the famous (or infamous, if you support the so-called “Dream Team”) Debbie Campbell. It went something like this:

Dear Mrs. Campbell:

In the last few days, there’s been quite a bit of discussion about what to do about the problem of gangs in Salisbury. At the same time, you have been one pushing for more accountability in city government, and by extension, those who own or seek to develop property in the city. It’s a sad fact that only about 1/3 of the dwellings in Salisbury are owner-occupied, right now I’m one of those 2/3 who rent.

But with owning property comes responsibility, and I’ve seen a lot of instances (either in person or on local blogs) where gang graffiti (or “tagging”) is allowed to remain untouched on buildings and structures. I know one element (albeit a minor one) of preventing gangs from establishing their “turf” is to paint over these tags and symbols as quickly as possible after they are applied. Further, leaving these symbols sets a bad example for property maintenance in that locality – one tagged house or outbuilding can start bringing a whole neighborhood down and embolden the “wannabe” youths who may become inspired to join up with a local gang.

I’m sure there are ordinances on the books regarding how landlords and other property owners maintain their property. But something I think should be added is a regulation that owners (or their agents) should regularly inspect their properties and eliminate this graffiti as quickly as possible, or after a period of time the city would fix it and charge the owner to do so. (Preferably the owner would take care of it, I know Salisbury’s city employees are already overburdened.)

While I am certainly in the libertarian camp of those who favor as few restrictions as possible on property use, I also find that the current risk to public safety from gangs does outweigh the right of the property owner to use his property as he desires. Something that does not seem to be shown enough in this day and age within Salisbury (and in many other places for that matter) is pride of ownership, and it’s going to take whole neighborhoods to combat this scourge we are facing.

One caveat: I would like to see this ordinance set with a sunset date, but this is only because I believe laws (at least those subservient to the U.S. and Maryland Constitutions) should be revisited periodically in order to determine their appropriateness for the conditions present at the time. Currently I’m of the opinion that such a law is appropriate, hopefully in a decade it may not be required anymore.

Since I’m no student of the law nor do I have a copy of the Salisbury city ordinances handy, I’ll leave it up to you and/or the city’s legal department to properly word what I’m describing as either a new ordinance or as a supplement to an existing one. But I appreciate your taking a few minutes to read my concern and thank you for your service in general.

Sincerely,

Michael Swartz
(address)

I sent this out on Wednesday, so far no response from Debbie Campbell. That’s a bit surprising, I have spoken to her on one other occasion and thought her rather courteous.

That brings me to another topic peripheral to the gang subject. There was this comment on JFA? in regard to a throwaway line Hadley posted endorsing Mike Lewis for Wicomico County Sheriff (clipped verbatim):

I’ll vote for Mike Lewis before I ever vote for major doris who does nothing but campaign at the expense of the citizens of this county. Pretending to be representing the Sheriff’s Office. Righttttttttttttt.

Like I said, I did not attend the gang forum so I have no opportunity to verify this – however, I did listen to the pair of interviews given on Bill Reddish’s WICO radio morning show and read the account in the Daily Times. Nowhere on those accounts was it mentioned that Major Doris was running for sheriff. She certainly had every opportunity to plug her campaign on the two interviews she shared with Dan Daugherty, but in truth she let him do most of the talking. So I’m assuming that at the gang summits, it wasn’t made obvious that she was in the running for the post.

Now I’ll grant that name recognition is a big part of the political game, but could it be that Sheriff Nelms delegated the task of handling the gang summit to Major Schonbrunner? It’s his opinion that she should take over the job when he leaves after this term, so why not give her the responsibility of putting the event together? Makes sense to me, and it ties in with her current administrative position within the office.

I’ve had a couple opportunities to speak with Major Doris for some length, and both times I’ve found her accomodating and willing to answer questions. If anything, I think she’s quite the low-key candidate and far from political.

As I’ve said before, if you think that the Sheriff’s Department is run well, certainly there are candidates from within representing both parties. If you want to shake the place up, again, both parties have at least one person with a law enforcement background that doesn’t involve the current Sheriff’s Department. But whoever wins is going to have to put up with a gang problem that we need to solve as a community.

I demand answers!

A little while back, I detailed that I was sending ten questions to each person running for federal office in our Delmarva region. With a U.S. Senate seat up for grabs in all three states and three House districts touching Delmarva, this worked out to about 33 different recipients, the majority of whom were running for the open U.S. Senate seat in Maryland.

Well, so far I have a total of TWO responses. Now I suppose I’ll be a little bit more forgiving of those folks in Delaware and Virginia, since they may not realize that folks from there do read monoblogue but the bulk of my readership is here in Maryland. Besides, with those seats not being “open” there’s only a small number of candidates involved (6 between the two states.) And I can’t vote for any of them, nor can most of my readers.

However, with those two states I am oh-for-6. If you count U.S. House candidates, it’s 0 for 12. And it’s not like I asked hard questions…maybe a bit detailed but that’s because I want thoughtful responses.

But I can call out those in my state who have refused to answer the Ten Questions. Let’s start with the U.S. Senate race (in alphabetical order, those who have either filed or have a website showing intent to run.) There are 19 people who fall in this category, let’s start with…

Ray Bly. According to what I read, you’ve ran before (unsuccessfully, of course.) So one would think that you’d know if you’re going to have a website, how about constructing the damn thing? I know you’re not spending the time answering my questions, that’s for sure.

Ben Cardin. What a surprise, a Democrat who’s afraid to answer anything but softball questions. Come on, I didn’t ask you about your lifetime ACU rating of 6 or anything like that. If you’re going to have such left-wing views, at least defend them to me and the readers on the Eastern Shore who you’ll likely ask to vote for you in November. I’m giving you the forum…

Earl Gordon. He’s one of two who did respond. The only problem I have is that the man sent me all 47 pages of his platform and I’ll have to actually work to find where he answered my questions!

Thomas Hampton. Who are you? What are you doing here? Actually, I do like your website in one respect: you have an area that says “if you have ten minutes, check out Key Issues first.” How about if you take an hour (if that) and answer my questions? I can bet that you’ll get more traffic with my website and those who will almost certainly link to it than you’re getting now.

James Hutchinson. As far as I know, you have no website. And since you haven’t answered my Ten Questions, why should anyone waste their time determining what sort of candidate you are?

Anthony Jaworski. I swear, some people just like to see their name on the ballot. My friend, you have zero name recognition. Maybe if you put out your views, you might get to more than an asterisk in the polls?

A. Robert Kaufman. Call me a compassionate conservative, but getting the snot beat out of you by an ex-tenant will get you a pass. Continue to recover on the campaign trail.

John Kimble. First of all, I would think that “kimbleforsenate” would be a much more accurate web name than “kimbleforcongress”. Or are you hedging your bets since you haven’t actually filed yet? Either way, you haven’t answered ten simple questions to my or anyone else’s satisfaction.

Allan Lichtman. To be honest, I really wish this guy would answer the Ten Questions, it would likely be interesting reading because he does have a great blog. Maybe there was a staff disagreement on how many paid people it would take to answer them?

Thomas McCaskill. According to your campaign site, you were the “Principal Co-Designer of the Global Positioning System (GPS)”. So you can’t use the excuse that you lost my Ten Questions, can you?

Kweisi Mfume. My questions do not discriminate on the basis of race, creed, color, religion, gender preference, which side of the bed you got out of this morning, or anything at all. Just honest questions on likely issues you’d face in the Senate that I’ve not received answers to from you to date.

Daniel Muffoletto. There’s something I would love to have you explain to me, and the Ten Questions would go a long way toward doing so: what the hell is a Green Republican? You claim to be one, let the voters know what the difference is in the format I present to all comers.

Josh Rales. From your own website: I also hope you will not hesitate to contact me with your ideas and questions … I want and need your ideas on how we together can achieve the results that Marylanders deserve.

I did. You haven’t answered them yet. As for my ideas, I have this nice little website that I write in once in awhile, it’s www.monoblogue.us.

Dennis Rasmussen. I actually cannot call him out quite yet – due to a snafu, I didn’t get his contact info until about a week after everyone else’s, so he got an extra week. He (or I should say his campaign coordinator) also promised a timely response, so I’m holding you to that Barbara.

Charles Smith. I mailed the Ten Questions to the post office box he shows as an address. Wonder if they are still there? Hope he’s better at answering his mail should he somehow pull off the victory.

Michael Steele. A black conservative Republican. Well, I don’t care if you’re black, white, or purple, what I care about is not ducking the questions I’ve asked of you and all the others who would be running for this office. Why should I support you and not someone else?

Let me tell you, I’m probably asking a lot fairer questions (and the same ones go to all involved) than anyone with the Baltimore Sun is going to ask. Quit being a gutless frontrunner.

Corrogan Vaughn. On your website you claim, “It is about People and Principles and not about Party or Politics! It is all about our citizens!!” No, it’s about answering my questions.

Daniel “Wig Man” Vovak. Responded the next day, way to go.

Kevin Zeese. I did get an e-mail from him saying that these were good questions and lots of work to answer them all. So I’m assuming I’ll have his answers in the next week.

And I’m not quite finished with my venom, I still have an incumbent Congressman and his challenger to contend with. Some would argue that there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the Republicans and Democrats, and in the First District race, given Wayne Gilchrest’s voting record, they just could be right.

But neither of them has bothered to answer my questions. Right now the race stands between Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Granted, neither has a primary opponent – but still, the campaign’s already begun and I’m sure the Maryland Democrats would like to push Gilchrest off the Hill.

Now here’s the lessons I’ve learned so far. Number one, coming up with good questions is hard work. I really tried to be as nonpartisan, “just the facts ma’am” as I can muster. I suppose I’ve succeeded when I have two Republicans who have responded and a Democrat and Green who have promised to.

Number two, the internet and blogs still have a long way to go to get respect. If I worked for the MSM I may have gotten more response so far…but does that mean my questions as an average Free State citizen (who happens to pay for server space and maybe has just a bit of writing talent) are less valid then ones from some reporter paid by the MSM? You never know just how far the answers could go, I’ve certainly done my share of linking when I see something appropriate.

Lesson number three is not really a lesson, just something I’ve thought all along but was hoping to be proved wrong. It appears that almost all politicians are gutless. They have a great time with hand-selected crowds and scripted 30 second commercials that show their warm and fuzzy side, but give them honest questions from a constituent (or an interested observer) and they’ll ignore them as best they can.

Of this group, the only one I have met was Michael Steele, and it was a brief handshake and nice to meet you moment. This was back when he announced his campaign in October – no tough questions, a fairly friendly crowd of mostly supporters, and pretty much a scripted event. I’ve been peripherally involved in politics long enough to see a lot of those – the crowd whoops it up in front of the TV cameras, holds up the signs, and you hope to get some face time on the local TV news and/or a glowing article in the local paper. Both major parties and their candidates are involved in these sort of events, so don’t construe this as picking on Michael Steele. (I certainly wouldn’t throw Oreos at him, at any rate.)

So I hope that this is inspiring to people who want to make a difference and decide to toss their hat into the ring. Yes, I’m likely coming across as insulting to some, but I’m quite frustrated with this lack of response – particularly from a lot of people who aren’t raking in the campaign contributions and don’t have the means for a 30 second commercial. Here’s an opportunity to have some free publicity.

As for the so-called frontrunners, aside from the party apparatus thinking they have the best chance to win, what qualifications do they have? If we send you to Washington, what are you going to do for (or to) the citizens of Maryland? I’m not one swayed by 30 second commercials, I want to know their stance on issues.

Despite the mess our electoral process may be this fall, still the majority of votes will be fairly cast by people who I hope vote for their guy (guess I can say that since the one woman dropped out of the race) based on their thinking through “who best represents my interests?” Please, people of Maryland, regardless of who you pull the lever for, let it be out of substance rather than flash.

I’m just a guy trying to help you out. So a little cooperation from those asking for our votes would be greatly appreciated.

WCRC meeting – May 2006

Tonight I did double duty so this blog post might just read like meeting minutes, all because I compiled them tonight. I think that’s known as secretary pro tem. Basically I was picked because everyone knows I write the blog post on the meetings anyway. And at least two of my fans were there tonight so I’m up late to get this done!

So I think I’ll copy the meeting minutes direct and place my thoughts within…also you don’t need to know some of the goings-on that a secretary has to record, like seconding and such. So here’s the blog version of our meeting this month.

We did the usual Pledge and invocation, approved last month’s minutes, and found out that our booth at the Salisbury Festival was “extremely successful”, the best performance in 6 years. So the treasurer’s report showed we have over twice our May 2005 balance.

As some of you might know, the Lincoln Day dinner for our corner of Maryland is June 9th, and the speaker will be Maryland Secretary of Business and Economic Development Aris Melissaratos. That’s going to make for a busy weekend, since the Lower Shore Women’s Republican Club has a fundraiser the night before and District 38A Delegate Page Elmore has a fundraiser the next night.

We also found out a longtime member is leaving us to be closer to his grandkids – this will open up a seat on the local liquor board.

Several elected officials were present at the meeting (Sonny Bloxom, Worcester County Commissioner, Phillip Gosnell, the “mayor” of Sharptown (his “official” title is different but same function), and both Gail and John Bartkovich (respectively District 3 on County Council and a GOP Central Committeeperson.) Candidates for office present included Bloxom, Jack Lord, and Michael James (all running for Delegate in District 38B); Ron Alessi for County Executive, George Ossman for Orphan’s Court, and Doris Schonbrunner for Sheriff. If Bonnie Luna had shown we would’ve been 4 for 4 in that 38B race.

At that point, the meeting was turned over to the featured speaker, Michael James. He certainly has made his presence known in the race:

Michael James's sign at Perdue Stadium.

It’s an eyecatching place for a sign if nothing else – figure 200,000 people will go to games this season, and maybe 40,000 to 60,000 will be eligible district voters. And the season works out almost perfectly for the campaign – it’s over just before our primary on September 12 (unless the Shorebirds go deep into the playoffs.)

He is one of those four GOP candidates vying for the two seats representing District 38B, which covers all of Worcester County and the eastern half of Wicomico County. It’s nicely gerrymandered in that I literally live on the edge of the district, one of the few Salisbury city residents to do so. The way the D’s and the courts set this county up as far as delegates go is completely nuts.

James first stressed the reasons why he was running: he cares about the issues, the time was perfect for him to run on a personal level, and he felt that the district was being “poorly represented” by Norm Conway and the late Bennett Bozman. In further remarks regarding Delegate Conway, James noted that Conway “votes how he’s told” and is “fighting for the union bosses” rather than fighting for Perdue employees, for example.

He continued by stating the current delegates voted for higher taxes, against Jessica’s Law (mandatory sentencing for sex offenders), and voted in 1997 to give away $250 million to Baltimore City Schools without any accountability – yet when the state wanted to take over the schools because of poor test results, Bozman and Conway voted against that. In a nutshell, James told the group that our delegates voted with Baltimore City, Prince George’s County, and Montgomery County more than they did the Eastern Shore. Those areas are among the “bluest” in Maryland (Kerry carried Montgomery County by 65 points as I recall) whereas we on the Eastern Shore are among the “red” areas along with the state’s western panhandle.

To put it in short terms, James said he stood for common sense, individual responsibility, and smaller government.

Two questions were asked: on who he’d prefer as a Democrat opponent, James was more interested in seeing a contested primary. I’m all for that anyway as a rule, let the voters decide rather than the party bosses (of whatever stripe) in Annapolis. Tonight was supposed to be the night the Worcester County D’s decided on a caretaker for the seat, but the final decision rests with Governor Ehrlich. On slot machines, James favored slots at the horse racing tracks, but with the exception of Ocean Downs. Because of the contentious slots issue, there was a rumor about a year ago that the Ocean Downs track would be moved out of that area and into a more receptive area for slots, either Pocomoke or Snow Hill (can’t recall which, but it would stay in Worcester County – just farther from the “family” vacation spot of Ocean City.)

James did add that he has connections in Salisbury as he graduated from the then Salisbury State University and his first general managing job was at the Sheraton here in town. He also has family members who hail from this area. To conclude, he said that he wanted his children to be able to get jobs here on the Eastern Shore, and the “Wal-Mart vote was a defining moment for me” to run for the job.

Hey, it was a defining moment for this blog too, so it’s not just him!

Then it was back to business for a bit. We had the appeal for members to upgrade their membership to the status of Elephant Club members. Also, there are two openings on the county Board of Education coming this June.

I noted this a few posts back (since I was there), but it was announced to the club tonight that as part of the spring GOP convention, it was decided that the counties of the Eastern Shore will have its own vice chair in the party apparatus. Of course, Wicomico County would like to forward a candidate for that post. I think we are the largest of the 9 Eastern Shore counties, so I’d say we should get the post.

Personally, I think they may need to split the Eastern Shore up into a northern and southern half, and get a sixth vice chair. But it may be population-wise we are the smallest group anyway.

There is no Wicomico County chairman for the Steele senatorial campaign. I know this got mentioned last month, and it seems like it’s hard to get people to step up for that. I already did the leadership thing once and found out I’m a better Indian than chief.

Ellen Andrews, who is also the county chair of the Ehrlich re-election campaign, then had a short presentation on the petition for referendum regarding the early voting acts passed by the General Assembly in 2005, with Governor Ehrlich’s veto being overriden in the 2006 session. About 52,000 signatures statewide are required to place this on the ballot, the goal for our county is 1,100 – currently they are at 178. As stated awhile back, I did indeed sign the petition, and I have two in my possession for additional signees.

Andrews also announced Governor Ehrlich’s campaign would sponsor a night with the Shorebirds on Saturday, July 1st. The $4 per person price includes the game ticket and an Ehrlich T-shirt. The plan is to sit in one section and show a mass of support. That’s actually a pretty good deal, I can do that.

I have one caveat though. Through the years, I have worked on several campaigns and thus have gotten candidate t-shirts. I think I’ve had 7 or 8, and so far the candidates I’ve had shirts for are 0-fer. It makes me feel like Bob Shrum must feel – granted all of these elections were in Toledo, and that city is at least 2-1 Democrat.

We also found out that the state board of elections told our county board that early voting was on regardless of the referendum (which means Linda Lamone is full of crap since I can tell you where the Board of Elections site says otherwise) and the county should be ready for 2,000 early voters a day. (My guess is that the poor inner-city Baltimore folks will have a nice bus trip to Ocean City during “second season”, with a few stops along the way. Just fill out your provisional ballots like this.) Also noted was that the GOP had gained 30 voters in the last month, while the Democrats had a net loss of 2.

The speaker next month will be County Executive candidate Bob Culver. I think we’re now down to a few “major” candidates who we haven’t heard from – we’re departing from what I’m told is custom and having summer meetings this year, that way we can hear from all who want to speak up. So the next few months should be interesting, especially if I have to take notes like I did tonight!

Odds and ends no. 5

Yes, it’s that time again. Just little stuff that won’t fill up a post by itself but I think is important.

First of all, it seems like our little area is getting some play politically from national figures, for whatever reason. Yesterday, Chief Justice John Roberts was in Cambridge to speak to a group of Maryland lawyers at their convention.

Then, according to the “Evans-Novak Political Report” from Wednesday:

The commencement speech at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is obviously seen as McCain reaching out the right for his ’08 presidential effort, but the truth is that he is reaching out everywhere. McCain, who likes to keep his weekends sacred at his Arizona retreat, will be at Dewey Beach, Del., Saturday for a fund-raiser by Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), leader of the House Republican moderates. (emphasis mine) McCain is unquestionably the early front-runner for the nomination.

What that doesn’t tell me (nor does Mike Castle’s website, it’s linked under the “Let the people decide” column) is just how much this little shindig would cost to attend, although chances are it’s way too rich for my blood. And besides, Castle is way too moderate for my liking.

And then we have this. Recently Marine Cpl. Cory Palmer was killed in action fighting the War on Terror in Iraq. This Seaford native is supposed to be laid to rest on Sunday.

But the funeral will not be without controversy as the fringe religious zealots of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas have been granted a permit by the city of Seaford to picket for 45 minutes during the funeral. It’s one of many such protests the group and its leader, the Rev. Fred Phelps, have mounted throughout the nation as part of an anti-homosexual crusade. Because of the military’s “don’t ask don’t tell” policy, funerals of our fallen have become targets for Phelps and his cult-like church family.

Actually, the suggestion given in the linked story was a good one – simply overwhelm the protests by a sheer number of people in attendance. I was thinking more along the lines of anyone who happens to drive a tractor trailer and would be willing to risk a parking ticket just park right in front of the protesting group.

The sad thing about it is that, in a family’s time of grieving, their son’s funeral is turned into a circus. Almost as bad will be the dutiful media coverage, which I’m sure is 90% of the reason the Westboro clan continues these activities.

It’s sort of odd to me that we don’t see a lot of “celebrity” starpower despite being relatively close to the nation’s capital. But sometimes I think we’re (by chance or perhaps by choice) the “flyover country” of the east coast. It’s an area where agriculture and aquaculture rub elbows, and because of that we have sort of a Midwest sensitivity with a touch of Southern redneck influence and a dash of New England maritime – an interesting mix of folks. Eventually the “come-heres” will gain a little bit of influence, but there’s probably still a generation or two left of that old-line Eastern Shore mentality remaining.

However, if I were an “old school” denizen of the Eastern Shore, I’d worry much less about the folks who come from the I-95 corridor and much more about the folks streaming in from below the Rio Grande corridor. Those who refuse to assimilate to our American way of life are by far the bigger threat.

You know, we should have thought of the overwhelming use of people a little earlier, perhaps during the “May Day” fiasco. Perhaps this is why we don’t see as much of the hoi-polloi here on the Eastern Shore. Could it be that the wealth of common sense exhibited by the common folk here is a turnoff to them?

Maryland Spring GOP convention: a report

The 2006 Spring Convention of the Maryland Republican party.

Jack Lord saw me here today and figured he’d be seeing the report in monoblogue…he was right!

This was the scene today just up the road in Cambridge at the Hyatt resort. While it was a beautiful morning along the Choptank River, almost 200 members of the various local Central Committees, candidates, and interested observers (like myself) sat in the convention hall to listen to the Party go about the nuts and bolts of its business.

Much as a meeting of the Wicomico County Republican Club (you can look in the archives for my reports on those), state chairman John Kane began the meeting by leading us all in the Pledge of Allegiance, along with observing a moment of silence for prominent Republicans who had passed away since the previous fall’s convention.

He then introduced the Republican candidate for Maryland Attorney General, Frederick County State’s Attorney Scott Rolle. After 12 years in that post, he decided to make the run for statewide office and was a beneficiary of current Attorney General Joe Curran’s decision not to seek re-election. At stake in this election is a streak of Democrat Attornies General that dates back to 1919.

Rolle emphasized the main points of his campaign would be dealing with kids and gangs; more specifically, a focus on crimes against children and working to combat the increasing gang influence in Maryland – a law and order Attorney General moreso than the incumbent. Captain Rolle also talked of his Army Reservist stint, which included defending Sgt. Michael J. Smith, who was convicted of using his dog to intimidate prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Instead of going to prison, Rolle said, Smith should be getting a medal pinned to his chest. This line brought an ovation from the gathering, including myself.

The keys to his campaign, Scott noted, would be name recognition and money. Not being from the main populated area of Maryland puts him at some early disadvantage on that, but initial signs were positive that the campaign would be successful.

After Rolle spoke, the meeting again turned to business, with various committees informing the meeting of their particular facets of the Party’s workings. Once complete, Kane gave his chair’s report.

His report stressed discipline – the Democrats would try to promote infighting among the Republicans, who would work best if they stayed focused on the overall goal. He also gave the assemblage word that, for the first time in many years, Maryland wouldn’t be written off by the national GOP. We’ll actually get some help from the national party because of the two high-profile races we have with Governor Ehrlich seeking reelection and Lieutenant Governor Steele looking to advance to the U.S. Senate.

Kane also took a few moments to question the wisdom of two pieces of legislation passed by the General Assembly, vetoed by Gov. Ehrlich, and overrode by the heavy Democrat majority. One was the “early voting” bill, where Democrats picked out the polling places that would open five days prior to the election. Claiming the bill was “fraught with fraud”, the chair also informed us that, of all the states that permitted early voting, Maryland was the sole state NOT requiring identification.

The other law is interesting. It was written by the Democrats to target one person, a gentleman by the name of Dick Hug. The legislation prohibits political fundraising by members of a college board of regents. As it so happens, Governor Ehrlich’s chief fundraiser was on the University of Maryland’s board, but had to resign last week due to this law. Even the regents who worked with Hug objected to forcing him from the board – but the law is the law.

The way I see it, legislation to punish success is terrible anyway. But had the law been passed to apply solely to any future appointees rather than those already in office, I wouldn’t be objecting to it so much nor would most people. But the Democrats in Annapolis have a problem with spite. They seem to have the attitude that they are entitled to rule the Free State as a personal fiefdom, and though the state elected a Republican governor it’s viewed as a fluke.

Back to the business at hand. After Chairman Kane finished, the national committeewoman, Joyce Terhes, gave her rendition of the state committee report. She was quite fired up, exhorting the attendees to leave “furious.” She was adamant about the media diminishing the accomplishments of the Ehrlich administration, and accused the Democrats, stating that they “can’t beat the governor legally” as she ripped into the early voting law.

After her remarks, Kane came back to introduce the next speaker but did comment on Terhes’ speech, adding that the early voting laws were “nothing but a screw job.” And he’s right, since the law as written has many flaws in it. It went back to another thing Terhes stated in her remarks where states with early voting are finding that turnout is not increasing as much as expected anyway. Add in the lack of an ID requirement and it’s no wonder that many, even the partisan media (in our case, the Baltimore Sun and Washington Post, neither friends of Governor Ehrlich) question the wisdom of our state’s early voting law.

Lewis Pope was the last of the committee speakers, he is the national committeeman. He devoted his time to the national scene. His message: turnout is important. (Duh!) Seriously, the party does need to get out the base. He also criticized the Democrats as a “party without strategy.”

Pope quoted the famous James Carville statement from 1992, “it’s the economy stupid.” But his twist on it was that no one is reporting on the good economic news. The accomplishments of the last five years economically aren’t being echoed as much as the boom in the nineties was.

Additionally, Pope cited the rise of black Republicans like Ken Blackwell in Ohio and Lynn Swann in Pennsylvania, not to mention our Michael Steele. Here I sort of depart from the party line in a way, because to me they are conservative Republicans, not African-American conservative Republicans. I’m not one who prides myself on seeking an artificial diversity, I just accept people as people. I liked Ken Blackwell in Ohio because he was a fiscal conservative and I couldn’t have cared less how much pigment he had.

But Pope also noted that he was the guy who was filler for the main speaker.

Governor Ehrlich addresses the GOP Spring Convention, May 13, 2006.

It was at this point that Governor Ehrlich arrived to a sign-waving, thundering standing ovation from the crowd, much as an annointed Presidential candidate would at the national convention. First of all, Ehrlich talked about some of the large and enthusiastic crowds he had seen at the party’s Lincoln Day dinners at various locations around the state. As part of his remarks later, he cited two key accomplishments: turning a $4 billion deficit he inherited into a $2 billion surplus while shrinking the size of government by 7%; and educational spending that assisted in improving the test scores for schools in 23 of 24 Maryland jurisdictions (more on that other one in a moment.) Included in his successes was the establishment of 30 charter schools in Maryland, despite objections from the teachers’ unions.

But his most passionate words were for what he called targeting empowerment. One program he was most proud of was an initiative to rehabilitate criminals, saying that the term “throw away the key is not a period, it’s a semicolon.” At some point, he continued, criminals do get out. So while they are incarcerated, it’s best in his eyes to assist them by treating their mental health and drug issues. It’s a program he wanted to expand, but Democrats in Annapolis stood in his way.

And while it might peg me as a squishy moderate, I can understand his point. There’s a vast number of people in jail who are there for making one stupid decision – maybe they consumed too much alcohol and caused a fatality while driving drunk; or they just happened to be in the car with others who robbed the gas station. If this is so, it is probably best to work to rehabilitate them, knowing the older and wiser people likely won’t make another mistake to land them in the state prison system. Obviously a hardcore murderer with a long record of criminal activity is a different story, they’ve been proven as a danger to civilized society.

Ehrlich also made the claim that the Democrats have tried to raise taxes by $7.5 billion while he was in office, but he managed to fend off those tolls on the hardworking citizens of Maryland. Further, he touched on the issue of minority business enterprises and his efforts to help those entrepreneurs out. But he cautioned that his administration is “not in the business of guaranteeing results, but guaranteeing opportunity.” This is all well and good, but it is one part of the Ehrlich administration I disagree with, again because I try to stay colorblind in that area. I don’t believe in discrimination for or against a certain race, religion, gender, or preference. To me, MBE’s are discrimination for the minority who simply got additional pigment.

The governor also issued four challenges that he and his administration try to address.

The first challenge is to “convince voters to operate outside their ‘comfort zone.’ ” Issues aren’t necessarily “Republican” or “Democrat” issues, they’re just issues that need to be addressed for the betterment of all the state’s citizens.

Second, understand the target audience. There’s a great number of moderate to conservative Democrats (yes, we still have a few “blue dogs” in Maryland) who pulled the lever in 2002 because he spoke to them on enough issues to convince them to vote for Ehrlich – I still occasionally see a “Democrat for Ehrlich” bumper sticker from four years ago. (This is particularly true of Eastern Shore voters, who heavily went for Ehrlich across party lines in 2002.) But the far left Democrats will not vote for any Republican and that has to be accounted for too.

Thirdly, compare and contrast the Maryland of 2002 against the Maryland of 2006. I heard that and immediately thought of President Reagan asking, “are you better off than you were four years ago?” In my case, yes. But I didn’t live in Maryland in 2002.

And finally, a challenge that seemed strange on first hearing but made sense after some thought. It’s engaging the problem, and if a mistake is made, let it be an aggressive mistake. Don’t make a “status quo” mistake. I look at it as saying to try different ideas and think outside the box – sometimes your failure is spectacular, but it did prove the point that the solution would not work, and the experience is a teacher. Don’t keep doing the same old thing that’s not working just because it’s all you know. I would cite the twin examples of Thomas Edison (how many screwups do you think he had before he found tungsten wire works for a light bulb?) and Henry Ford (who I believe named his earliest prototype vehicles in alphabetical order, thus the Model T had a lot of flawed predecessors.)

Another passionate portion of the address was Ehrlich’s thoughts on the Baltimore City Schools. This district is the one district that did not improve, so state law allowed a takeover of the district. This takeover was thwarted by the Annapolis Democrats, who didn’t want that slap at the teachers’ union in an election year. In fact, Ehrlich quoted some (unnamed) Democrats and the excuses they gave as to why they would vote to override his veto. Most pathetic to him was the one who told the governor he couldn’t support the veto because, “the AFL-CIO told me not to.” While Ehrlich waxed eloquent about how the unions helped to build Maryland while he was growing up, and union jobs enabled those who had them to acquire the means for their children to have a better life, he felt betrayed that the same unions wanted to condemn the schoolchildren of Baltimore simply to regain political power.

He concluded that, “(his administration is) about empowerment”, and said that the 10,000 dropouts from the 11 takeover target schools in Baltimore City over the last nine years were “a state failure.” One effort his administration was making was attempting to track what happened to these dropouts as far as criminal activity, employment, etc. Again, I have to disagree with the governor on the dropouts, because the state can only set the rules regarding truancy and help pay to provide the buildings and equipment where there’s an opportunity to learn – it is up to each individual student whether they want to take advantage of that chance or not. Some beat the odds stacked against them and prosper due to sheer will.

After Ehrlich left to another standing ovation, Howard County committeeman Anthony Wisniewski raised his hand. Upon being recognized by the chair, he made some remarks about being fired up by the proceedings. Thinking back to his Jesuit education, he advised the gathered GOP faithful that they need to “justify and defend your decision” to support the party. The impromptu remarks were an interesting prelude to what came next.

The agenda was suspended for debate on a change to the party by-laws that was deemed necessary to be enacted now, rather than wait for the fall convention. This change involved replacing the three vice chairs with regional vice chairs selected from each of five districts: northern, southern, central, western, and Eastern Shore. Some controversy erupted over the placement of some counties in odd districts (an example is the mostly rural southern region also including suburban Anne Arundel County), but the main gist of the debate centered on an issue that creates tension in any legislative body.

There were some who favored the change because it needed to be expedited, but others cautioned that they really had no idea what was being voted on, as the context was missing. This measure was rather quickly written up, and many’s the bad law written in haste, they said. It was sausage grinding at its finest as an amendment to table was defeated after a fashion, then other friendly amendments debated and voted on. Finally, after nearly an hour of discussion and wrangling back and forth, the proposal as amended received the blessing of the state convention.

As it turned out, I was situated between a couple of interesting people. Sitting in the back, I happened to have the aforementioned Dick Hug to my left (strange to have him recognized during the chair’s remarks – hey everyone was looking at me too then!) and to my right was the graceful and gracious candidate for District 38B, Bonnie Luna (with her husband Louis.) As mentioned at the start, Jack Lord was also in attendance, he’s seeking one of those seats also.

I had a fleeting thought about being recognized as more than Dick Hug’s seating neighbor but thought better of it. At one point, Chairman Kane was asking if there were any media. I briefly considered raising my hand and asking, “does pajamas media count?” But I figured, better not. You never know, I might be more than an observer sometime.

I’m no stranger to political gatherings, one of my duties as president of the Toledo Metro Young Republicans was to represent our group at state functions. So I traveled to Columbus for our state convention (along with other Ohio cities for seasonal meetings.) As part of our state convention, we had a few vendors selling their wares. It’s the reason I snapped this picture – seems there’s always a button seller someplace at a state political function, and Maryland is no exception to the rule.

Overall, I enjoyed my morning there. I think the people in the GOP were genuinely excited about this fall – I know, I was in amongst the hardcore believers, but these are also the folks who are leaders in their home counties. It’s my thought that they are the backbone of America, most of them just plain folks who don’t get their names in the papers but do their best to contribute to American society.

Among those attending were some folks who had spent time with the Democrat side as part of their political jobs. To a person, they said that the Democrats seemed to be a gloomy bunch, only concerned with the negatives of what they feel is wrong with the Bush presidency instead of trying to come up with a positive alternative vision for what they wanted America to be.

Tonight I was chatting online with a friend of mine who is a Democrat. But there were a lot of issues where it appeared we have at least some common ground…both pro-America and tired of political games being played rather than results achieved. While I’m sure we differ over our vision of what government should do, we both agreed that there are political scoundrels who inhabit both major parties.

But what I saw today was a lot of honest and caring emotion. Yes, we as Republicans can be pretty mean-spirited toward our political opponents (Lord knows I am at times) but it’s because we do give a rat’s ass about our country and we consider it still the shining city on the hill. What today’s gathering attempted to do is get us working toward electing the people we feel would bring us closer to the Reaganesque vision of America and try to return our government to one of, for, and by the people, not the special interests.

Ten questions…the trailer (a coming attraction)

A goal I set for year number two of my blogging was an effort to become a “one-stop shop” for political news and issues. At that time, I’d already began compiling a list of candidate websites (with their blogs if they have any) and I’m still adding to the list as they become available and I become aware of them. This is from both major parties, along with some from other parties (I have a couple Green Party candidates linked, for example.)

If there’s one thing I like to see, it’s campaigns and elections based on the issues, not on whatever mud they can sling in 30 seconds or less. Yes, negative campaigning works on a lot of people but I’m making an attempt to go deeper than that.

This year the U.S. Senate seat in Maryland has attracted a huge amount of interest. No fewer than 19 candidates have either already filed for the primary (or general in one case) election; in fact, we’ve already had one dropout. So there is no way that a debate to air their views on important issues facing our state and nation could happen between all these competing candidates. Or could it?

A beautiful thing about the internet is that it occurs on my schedule. If I want to post something, on goes the computer, bam! I connect to my server and some time later, what I think goes out over the World Wide Web. (Well, maybe not to Communist China and other such restrictive places.) Knowing that, I had an idea that I thought deserved a try.

That’s how I came up with what I call the Ten Questions. Once I came up with them, I decided to send a copy via either e-mail or snail mail to each declared candidate for the Senate seat in Maryland. But wait, there’s more! While writing them, I observed that these questions all touch on areas of national concern – so why not also involve our close-by neighbors in Delaware and Virginia? And why not House candidates too? Thus, the list was completed. The Ten Questions have gone to a total of 33 hopefuls who are running for the following:

U.S. Senate seats in Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia.
U.S. House seats in Delaware (at-large), Maryland’s 1st District, and Virginia’s 2nd District.

It’s the same area I attempt to link to on my sidebar. As of tonight, I already have one respondent who has answered these questions. But I gave all responders a deadline of May 31st to return these questions.

The reason for that cutoff is beginning on June 2nd, and commencing on each Tuesday and Friday throughout the summer, I will post one or two hopefuls’ answers to the Ten Questions. The idea is to give anyone who has placed his or her name into the mix for these seats an equal opportunity to answer the same questions. For my friends who read this in Virginia, on June 9th (the Friday before the primary) I will post all the Virginia responses in a debate-style format – the question posted along with each candidate’s response (or lack thereof). The same will hold true for Maryland and Delaware on Friday, September 8th – I’ll repost the various answers I put up over the summer in a similar format so one can easily compare and contrast each of the hopefuls.

So on June 2nd people will see the actual questions I’ve sent. But to whet the appetite, the topics covered include immigration/border security, gasoline prices, ethics, campaign finance reform, the War on Terror, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, Social Security, the budget with regard to “pork”, the question of free vs. fair trade, and their thoughts on who should run in 2008 to succeed President Bush.

This will be something for all my readers to look forward to I hope. By the way, once the questions are posted I welcome links so long as you credit monoblogue. And if you don’t happen to live in the area but want to quiz your federal officeseekers, all I ask is that if you use the questions you either provide a link to my site or credit www.monoblogue.us if you don’t provide a link (or in the print media.) Most bloggers are pretty cool that way.

So the campaign will begin in earnest June 2nd as we begin this forum. I think it’s going to be a good one. I don’t think I’ll replace those 30 second negative ads, but I’m going to try and score one for the clean campaign folks anyway.

Burying the competition

On an occasional basis I get the Liberty & Law newsletter from the Institute for Justice, which is a parent orgnization to a group called the Castle Coalition. I became interested in them last summer during the fallout from the Kelo decision.

The Institute for Justice generally takes the side of individual interests vs. government interference in free markets. In addition to their fight against eminent domain benefitting private interests at the expense of other private interests who create less government revenue, they advocated for school choice in Milwaukee, and in several states have fought against onerous campaign finance laws.

The latest issue has an article that hits close to home. The title, “Burying the Competition“, is a statement aimed at the Maryland funeral home cartel. It’s claimed that a funeral in the so-called Free State costs an average of $800 more than a funeral in another state (and funeral homes make 30% more income than the average US funeral home) because of laws restricting funeral home ownership to those who are licensed funeral directors (or those who acquire a state license to the tune of $250,000.) The court case that the IJ took up involves a man who owns a cemetery and built a funeral home intending to have his son, who is a licensed director, operate it. However, state laws prevented him from actually owning the funeral home, which would make him (in the state’s eyes) an unlicensed funeral director.

IJ points out that several attempts to overturn this oppressive legislation have been attempted in the General Assembly, but cannot make it out of committee because of the chair, Del. Hattie Harrison. Harrison is a longtime Democrat delegate (since 1973) representing District 45 in the Baltimore area.

I went to the campaign site Follow The Money (operated by a group called The Institute on Money in State Politics) and found out that in the last two election cycles that Maryland has records for (2002 and 2004) Delegate Harrison collected a total of $48,470. A good share of that did come from the funeral industry, just under $5,000. In the 2004 cycle (non-election) over half the money donated from the Maryland Funeral Directors PAC went to her, as well as the largest donation made by the Maryland State Funeral Directors Association. The 2002 money enabled her to be second out of the 10 candidates who ran for the District 45 seats in terms of money raised and easily win reelection.

It will be interesting to see how this goes. On the one hand, the funeral directors are expressing their free speech rights by donating to Delegate Harrison, who in turn, just so happens to scratch their back too. But on the other hand, the regulations are allowing a powerful group to block any efforts at competition.

The other interesting article in Liberty & Law was the first of a three part series on “Thinkers of Freedom.” The first part salutes economist Milton Friedman. I found it insightful as they focused on a little-discussed area of Friedman’s work, occupational licensing. Because I work in a occupation that is a licensed profession, that hit me close to home. Here’s why.

I graduated from college in 1986 with a four year bachelors’ degree in environmental design. Now that degree is what would be considered a “non-professional” architecture degree. The biggest difference between the degree I have and a five year Bachelor of Architecture degree comes down to 12 fewer credit hours of Studio time (two semesters’ worth) and maybe taking a handful of other electives. At my college, the BED degree actually took 8 more credit hours (136 vs. 128) to attain than a bachelors’ degree in any other field. But under the rules in force at the time, I was allowed to substitute an extra year of work experience for the year in academia to be eligible to sit for the architectural exam. Frankly, while I think Miami University is among the best of academic institutions and I learned a lot there, that year in the “real world” was a LOT more valuable.

So after a time of working and deciding that I did want to pursue professional registration, I did take and pass the Architectural Registration Examination in Ohio back in 1993 and finished the process in 1994. This test is given nationally (I believe California may be the lone exception, at least it was at one time), there is no “state” test. An architect in Hawaii has passed the same test that I did in Ohio.

But what kills me is that, even though I did pass the test, it’s a big hoop to jump through to be registered in another state. For this I blame an organization (or cartel if you will) called NCARB, the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards. What they have been able to get the various state legislatures to do is make an NCARB certificate mandatory to apply for reciprocal registration. One NCARB regulation is having the five-year B. Arch. degree.

Now I’m 41 years old and I’ve had a job in the architectural field for almost 20 years. Currently I’m a project manager for several active projects in various states of design and construction. As far as I’m concerned, all that year of “education” would do is line the pockets of some graduate school. Of course, NCARB will allow you to apply to get the equilvalent of the education standard as a BEA, or “broadly experienced architect.” The BEA process involves establishing an NCARB record (for a fee); paying another fee to NCARB to evaluate the degree you have; and finally, at my expense, submitting to a personal interview. All this is to get a certificate so I can simply apply for reciprocal registration in another state. Never mind that I passed the same exam the other architects in the state did.

I used to work for a man who got his architectural registration fairly late in life, in his 40’s. While he did take some college, the reason he was able to take the registration exam and pass it was through the many years of experience he had gained by working in the field. But in the 1990’s NCARB practically shut down that avenue of sitting for the exam and implemented what they call the Intern Development Program. Now an intern architect has to go through NCARB to sit for the exam, and those fees just keep adding up.

In my view, while it’s obvious that the practice of architecture does need a set of guidelines and qualifications, the regulations put in place by NCARB limit the opportunity for qualified people to enter the field. A prospective architect may well say to heck with all these fees and choose another profession.

Friedman shared many of my same views, noting that, “The overthrow of the medieval guild system was an indispensible step to the rise of freedom in the Western world…men could pursue whatever trade or occupation they wished without the by-your-leave of any governmental or quasi-governmental authority.” At one time, architects were granted the freedom to practice in their state and generally what was good for one state was just fine for another. It’s only through the interference of NCARB in this free market that competition has been curtailed.

I’m looking forward to the next two issues of Liberty & Law as they’ll profile their other two “thinkers of freedom”, Friedrich Hayek and Ayn Rand. They should be good reading.