Month: July 2008

The Richmond Times-Dispatch can’t see the forest for the trees.

Or they’re just incompetent; take your pick.

Consider a recent “news story” from Jeff Schapiro about the recent General Assembly special session. First the intro:

Shame on our short-timer governor, Tim Kaine. How dare he berate the legislature for doing nothing on transportation.

On the contrary, the General Assembly was enormously productive during the six days in June and July it was, ahem, at work.

Belying the perception they are deadbeats, Virginia’s worthies actually passed nearly 120 measures. Some were important — to someone.

Yes, yes, no one cares, details please:

One was essential to making this a truly special session. It allowed legislators to pay themselves about $120,000 — for again ducking a $1 billion problem.

Wow, $120,000, which is only 0.00034% of the state’s budget, and that’s calculating the percentage using FY07 expenditures.

And considering there were 140 legislators working for 48 hours (six days), that’s only $17.86 a hour. (A lot of legislators are lawyers, for example, and would be making a heck a lot more at their office, for comparison.)

Right now, you have a state that spends $35,442,393,597.43 a year in their budget (again, FY07 numbers [Auditor of Public Accounts]). At what point, is enough enough?

From FY03 to FY07, the biggest growth, by percentage, in the Commonwealth’s budget has been in Capital Outlay Projects (126.19% increase), Education (45.57% increase), and General Government (35.78% increase) (Auditor of Public Accounts, different link). Who thinks we can find some cuts in there?

Meanwhile, transportation funding has only increased by 6.69% in the same time period (Ibid).

In the same time period that transportation only increased by 6.69%, the total statewide spending increased by 26.84%.

Back to RT-D:

The House version was carried by Del. Phil Hamilton, R-Newport News, an inartful dodger carrying water for the big companies angling to run, for fun and profit, vast hunks of the Hampton Roads road-tunnel-and-bridge network.

As Christina Nuckols, of The Virginian-Pilot, reminded her readers: Those firms are represented by lobbyists who sit in the privy council of Speaker Bill Howell, ensuring Republicans receive only objective, dispassionate advice on what could prove a giant government giveaway.

Oh my God! Those evil “big companies”!

They have some nerve employing people and giving them a paycheck for work! Those saps that work for those evil “big companies” should just quit, get on welfare, and live off the government.

What’s even worst is that the companies hire people (lobbyists) to represent themselves to the legislature. Those bastards should be executed for using their First Amendment rights.

Remember that hating corporations is #82 on Stuff White People Like.

The legislative calendar included some somber business: bills by Dels. Chris Peace, R-Hanover, and Albert Pollard, D-Lancaster, naming bridges over Interstate 95 in Caroline County for troopers Robert Tinsley Lohr and Robin Lee Farmer, both killed in the line of duty in 1978 and 1981, respectively.

Is that a complaint or what? The renaming of the bridges was requested by the Caroline County Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Tony Lippa. The idea was originally proposed by a private citizen of Caroline County, Roger Cavendish.

Delegates Peace and Pollard, along with Delegate Orrock and Senator McDougle, also introduced a resolution celebrating the life of Mildred Jeter Loving.

Are you going to bitch about that too, Jeff?

How about Bill Howell, et al., introducing a resolution celebrating the life of Fredericksburg Police Officer Todd Bahr, who was killed in the line of duty on June 6th?

Going to bitch about that one too, Jeff?

And there were tributes to war dead. Del. Adam Ebbin, D-Alexandria, and Sen. John Watkins, R-Powhatan, sponsored separate memorial resolutions for Army Lt. Col. Jim Walton, who fell in Afghanistan last month in an attack on his convoy.

Again, is this a complaint?

Veterans of Operation Iraqi Freedom would qualify for special license plates, under a measure by Del. Bill Janis of Henrico. The VMI guy and former naval officer is on the partisan special-ops squad of the House GOP Caucus.

Does that mean the license plate shouldn’t be allowed?

A prospective governor was honored by another. Sen. Creigh Deeds of Bath, running for the 2009 Democratic nomination, introduced a resolution “celebrating the life” of the late Bill Battle. Battle, defeated for the 1969 Democratic nomination, lived in Charlottesville, on the eastern edge of Deeds’ sprawling, sylvan district.

The problem?

The business of the just-adjourned session covers four pages on the General Assembly’s Web site. Some of it is heady stuff — not.

[Blah, blah, blah, blah…]

All are appointments with a $200-per-meeting paycheck. Unlike the other day, maybe the senators will actually earn it.

Okay, I guess that all the preceding was a complaint.

Does anyone notice that this reporter has time to go through and check out every little resolution that the General Assembly dealt with and proceeded to complain about the unimportance of them?

Did he write a story about the transportation bills that were dealt with? No, of course not; those aren’t important.

Is this not the very height of irony?

First, these resolutions probably take about a minute of time in each house of the General Assembly.

Second, while Jeff was tracking down every resolution the General Assembly dealt with, he missed the following:

The Republicans went from wanting (unconstitutional) regional taxes imposed on Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads to offering a no-tax solution: The Republican solution include appropriating money to NoVA and Hampton Roads from airport fees and taxes and port revenues to pay for the transports needs that are partly caused by the airports and port!

Where’s the story about Jeff Frederick’s bill that would give money to localities to pay for their own roads instead of giving money to the monstrosity that is VDOT (HB6025)? That bill didn’t even make it out of the House.

How about the bill that would implement the 2002 Governor’s Commission on Efficiency and Effectiveness that died in the House Rules Committee (HJ6061)?

How about the the great idea for the state to stop paying for roads in subdivisions (HB6041)? Why should I be paying for someone else’s subdivision roads that I and 99.99% of the state will never see or use?

How about the bill that would required an independent audit of the monstrosity-known-as-VDOT (HB6023)? The Senate refused to act on that bill.

RT-D had time to nitpick about every little resolution that was passed by the General Assembly, but couldn’t do their jobs and actually tell the people what did occur during the session.

While I was picking on the Richmond Times-Dispatch, D. J. McGuire was skewering The Free Lance–Black White Hole.

He also took care of another act of outright incompetence by RT-D here.

Pardon the following pop culture post.

On television, now that the writer’s strike is over, the good television shows (that means no Grey’s Anatomy, guys) will be back on. Of course, with the possibly of an actors strike, who knows.

But anyway, my shows to watch:

Stargate Atlantis‘s fifth season has already started on SCI FI (first episode was on July 11th).

Can a show unjump-the-shark? Find out on the fourth season of Prison Break when it premieres on September 1st.

The Shield‘s final season is slated to start September 2nd on FX.

Season two of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles will start September 8th on FOX.

The last season of Battlestar Galactica will return in 2009 with the possibility of a couple webisodes in late 2008.

There has been talk of webisodes for Farscape for at least a year now, but little concert details as of yet.

And in the movie arena:

The new Batman movie, The Dark Knight, will premiere on July 18th.

The best science fiction show ever, The X-Files [die Trekkies], returns in The X-Files: I Want to Believe on July 25th.

At least he didn’t rob and kill three people.

Some New Orleans paper:

With minutes left in the last shift of his 35-year New Orleans police career, Sgt. Bobby Guidry received a call from a supervisor telling him he had been suspended for wearing the wrong uniform shirt, the veteran officer said.

The Police Department confirmed the censure Tuesday, though it quibbled with the term “suspended.” Rather, Guidry is “under investigation for wearing the wrong uniform,” said Police Department spokesman Bob Young.

Instead of the standard-issue all-black uniform, Guidry, a veteran officer in the city’s Uptown 2nd District, chose the powder-blue uniform shirt that he wore to work for more than three decades.

He viewed it as a simple statement, not an affront to rules or department leadership.

“Eighteen people died in the line of duty in that powder-blue shirt while I was with the department,” Guidry said. “I went to each of those funerals. I wore that shirt on a Saturday, on my last day, out of respect for them.”

(H/t: Matt “threat to democracy” Drudge)

I make the quip about robbing and killing three people because Antoinette Frank, a NOPD officer, robbed a Vietnamese restaurant in New Orleans and shoot and killed three people, including an off-duty police officer who was working as a security guard, back in the ’90s.

She was later identified as the perpetrator, after a surviving witness who she didn’t know was in the building identified her, when she had the gall to respond to the call.

Time has more.

Adrian Fenty, Cathy Lanier, Interim AG Peter Nickles Resignation Watch, Day 27: 36,000 registered handguns unaccounted for.

WTOP:

As the District prepares to begin accepting applications for handgun permits, police are having a tough time finding tens of thousands of guns already registered in the city.

About 41,000 handguns are registered in D.C., but more than 36,000 of those guns are owned by residents who registered prior to the 1976 ban.

On WTOP’s Ask the Chief program, D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier says police don’t know where the 36,000 registered handguns are because the department has not done an audit of registered guns.

I thought registration of firearms would end all gun crime in the whole wide world according to the moron politicians out there.

If they have no idea where said registered firearms are, how the heck is that going to stop crime?

Add Pamela Gould (and/or her editor) to the list of people that should be fired at The Free Lance–Dog Trainer.

She joins the distinguished list that includes reporters Ellen Blitz, Jeff Branscome, Frank Delano, Keith Epps, Robin Knepper, and editors Dick Hammerstrom, Laura Hutchison, Phil Jenkins.

From an article written by Pamela Gould about the abduction, robbery, and presumptive murder of Yong Hui Zhang*:

An online check of court records by The Free Lance-Star turned up no criminal charges for either suspect [Jermaine Montgomery or Marcey White] in the Fredericksburg region or in the Tidewater area, Southampton or Sussex.

Well you guys did an excellent job of checking the independent city of Franklin**, the very jurisdiction they were arrested in!

A Jermaine Montgomery with the birthday of September 16th has been charged with the following in Franklin:

A felony charge of credit card fraud which was reduced to a misdemeanor charge of “petty [sic] larceny” which resulted in a deposition of guilty on December 3, 2007 (case number: GC07002067-00).

A felony charge for illegally obtaining a credit card number was dismissed on December 3, 2007 as well (probably a plea bargain involved there) (case number: GC07002069-00).

A pending case for a show cause for failure to pay restitution (case number: GC07002067-01).

On November 30, 2007 he was found guilty of a seat belt violation for a eight to fifteen year old as well as having no driver’s license (case numbers: GT07001731-00 & GT07001732-00). He was found not guilty of operating an uninspected vehicle (case number: GT07001732-00).

And of course, that isn’t the only error in the story unfortunately (or fortunately for me since it gives me something to write about):

Under state law, a slaying in the commission of another felony, including abduction or robbery, qualifies for a charge of capital murder and a possible death sentence.

You would think that a newspaper would do a little due diligence and bother doing some research before they start throwing the words “capital murder” around.

First, not every “slaying in the commission of another felony” is capital murder. You may be thinking of felony murder Ms. Gould. Felony murder (§ 18.2-33) is punished as second-degree murder in Virginia (“punishable by confinement in a state correctional facility for not less than five nor more than forty years” [§ 18.2-32]).

While, yes, a “willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing of any person in the commission of robbery or attempted robbery” is considered capital murder (§ 18.2-31(4)), a capital murder charge for abduction requires the “willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing of any person in the commission of abduction […] when such abduction was committed with the intent to extort money or a pecuniary [monetary] benefit or with the intent to defile the victim of such abduction” (§ 18.2-31(1)) [emphasis mine].

Just so you know Free Lance–Dog Trainer, you could hire me as an ombudsman or editor to keep you guys straight.

*Get your own link. I refuse to link to that sorry excuse of a newspaper.

**Not to be confused with the county of Franklin, which is located in southwestern Virginia.

Stafford BOS manages to please absolutely no one.

Which is always a politician’s goal, right? :)

The Stafford BOS voted to impose a Business and Professional Occupancy License (BPOL) tax starting in January 2010.

Well, from the right side of the aisle, here’s what D. J. McGuire had to say about it at The right-wing liberal:

Indeed it is, and there is hardly a tax more damaging than BPOL, which is a tax on revenue, not profit. Moreover, this business crippling tax was first implemented for emergency purposes only – to let Virginia counties recover from the damage done by the War of 1812.

Yes, you read that right – the War of 1812.

So now, both anchor counties in the Fredericksburg area will be reeling from tax increases: property taxes in Spotsylvania and BPOL is Stafford. The local economy is in deep trouble.

Also from the right side, there’s Eric Martin at Rappahannock Red:

Stafford County Democrats George Schwartz, Joe Brito, Bob Woodson and Harry Crisp have approved a highly controversial businesses tax, called the Business, Professional and Occupational License or “BPOL” in a meeting that stretched until later than 3:00 am!

These liberals call it a “revenue generator” for the cash-strapped jurisdiction, but let’s be clear: RAISING TAXES IS NOT A REVENUE GENERATOR- it’s a TAX INCREASE!

And from the left side of the aisle, there’s Dan Smolen at Fred2Blue:

The proponents will tell you that BPOL was intended, among other things, to stabilize the wild year-to-year fluctuations in Stafford County’s revenue stream and make sure that there would always be enough money in the annual budget for schools, public safety, and other requirements. We were told that its passage would end the yearly bickering over school funding.

Yet, we now hear the resulting package – negotiated on, then voted in 4-3 by the seven bleary-eyed board members – earmarks all of the revenue from BPOL for transportation improvement. From the FL-S:

The entire board, however, agreed that revenue generated by BPOL will be used to upgrade county roads and help pay the debt service on a potential transportation bond.

So much for stabilizing school-funding.

The next local election in Stafford in November 2009 should be interesting as both D. J. and Dan point out as well.

UPDATE: Dan Smolen posted the following comment, which I’m adding so neither I or anyone else take his original post out of context:

Tim, per the headline of this post, I think the characterization that no one is pleased is inaccurate.

While I and other “Pro-Business Dems” remain opposed to this version of BPOL (because it is regressive, a bureaucracy that in the end won’t raise that much in revenue, possibility punitive to small but growing businesses, and because the timing of the passage of BPOL in a recession is truly ill-advised), there actually are many supporters of BPOL in Stafford (Democratic, Independent, and Republican).

Really, this is not a left/right issue, although the Stafford BOS members in Republican the minority would have anyone believe that. As sure as the sun comes up tomorrow, they will continue to make political hay of it. Truth be told, the rhetoric on both sides (pro-BPOL vs. anti-BPOL) remains way overmodulated.

We do need new revenue in the county, for sure, and lots of it. Our schools and our critical services are severely underfunded.

We pro-biz Dems are not making our pro-BPO friends happy with our public skepticism. But being small-business owners first, politicians second, we must do all that we can to support the business community and encourage new businesses to arrive in Stafford, and stay.

That’s what will generate the revenue we need.

He brings up an excellent point about the bureaucracy involved. How many additional positions are going to be required at the Commissioner of Revenue’s Office and/or Treasurer’s Office to properly assess and administer these new business’s taxes?

Yong Hui Zhang found dead in Sussex.

Richmond Times-Dispatch:

The body of a Fredericksburg deliveryman who was abducted Thursday night was found last night in a remote area of Sussex County, Fredericksburg police said.

Yong Hui Zhang, 24, disappeared sometime after 9:30 p.m. Thursday while making deliveries for his family’s restaurant, China Express at 1500 Jefferson Davis Highway in Fredericksburg.

Zhang was found shortly after police arrested suspects Jermaine Montgomery, 34 and Marcey White, 36, in southeastern Virginia. His car was found not far from his remains, authorities said.

Montgomery and White were arrested shortly after 5:00 p.m. at a Wal-Mart in Franklin, police said. Zhang’s family contacted police at 10:15 p.m. Thursday when he did not return from his last round of deliveries.

One of Zhang’s deliveries was to a vacant apartment at 202 Charles St., police said. Police believe Zhang was ambushed and assaulted there.

Montgomery and White have been charged with abduction, conspiracy to commit abduction, carjacking, conspiracy to commit carjacking, credit-card theft, and conspiracy to commit credit-card theft, Fredericksburg police said.

A third suspect was in the Wal-Mart with Montgomery and White at the time of the arrest. Police said there are no charges against that person.

Zhang’s cause of death has not been determined yet, police said.

“We are deeply saddened by this tragic turn of events,” Fredericksburg chief David Nye said in a statement. “Our hearts go out to the Zhang family for their terrible loss.”

Suspects arrested in the abduction of Fredericksburg delivery driver.

Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Two suspects wanted in the abduction and robbery of a Fredericksburg delivery man were arrested in the city of Franklin shortly after 5:30 p.m. today, Fredericksburg police said.

Jermaine Montgomery, 34, and his girlfriend, Marcey White, 36, were arrested at a Wal-Mart in Franklin, said Natatia L. Bledsoe, spokeswoman for the Fredericksburg Police Department.

Yong Hui Zhang and his vehicle are still missing. His bronze 2004 Nissan Sentra had Virginia license plates JPB6401, police said.

“Locating the victim and his vehicle are our primary concern at this moment,” Bledsoe said.

Zhang’s family reported him missing Thursday night after the 24-year-old left the family’s restaurant to make deliveries.

Police said Montgomery used Zhang’s credit card at the Four Mile Fork Shell station in Spotsylvania County shortly after the delivery driver was reported missing.

“We remain hopeful of a positive outcome to these horrific circumstances for Mr. Zhang and his family,” Fredericksburg Chief of Police David Nye said in a statement today.

Anyone with information is urged to contact the Fredericksburg Police Department at (540) 373-3122.