Category: 2009 election

Witch-hunt in the 99th House District.

I first got wind of this little witch-hunt at the 1st Congressional District Republican Committee meeting on December 11th. I was sitting in the back of the room when Bill Kling (Crabill’s campaign manger) went to up Larry Kile (King George County Republican Committee Chairman), who was sitting about ten feet away from me, and starting talking. While I couldn’t hear everything that was being said I did hear, “Caroline”, “Jeff”, “censured by the central committee”, and “not going to be Chairman much longer”.

See, that’s the problem with loud mouths: They don’t think — if they ever think — to check to see who’s around them before they starting running their mouths. The even funnier part was when it came to introduce any guests that were present at the meeting: I introduced myself and Larry Kile responded clear as day from ten feet away: “Ugh, that’s him!” That quote now graces my subtitle and will be staying there for a while.

Then there was the 99th Legislative District Committee meeting on December 14th. After spending over an hour hurling insults at the bloggers, at the statewide candidates, and at Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) Chairman Pat Mullins, the committee went into executive session.

After executive session, the committee voted 4–0 (Jeff Sili was at a School Board meeting from what I’ve heard and not present to vote) directing the Chairman, R. Allen Webb, to draft and send a letter asking that Caroline County Republican Committee Jeff Sili be censured and removed as Chairman of the Caroline Committee.

His crime? Not supporting Catherine “OKC Truther” Crabill in her run for Delegate.

Um, Jeff Sili is the only person that’s expressed an inkling of common sense and intelligence in this whole fiasco. The Caroline delegation unanimously voted against nominating the OKC Truther as a Republican. The Caroline Committee also decided that her name shouldn’t be included on their sample ballots for the district. And that decision was definitely clairvoyant because the day of the election, Catherine Crabill’s supporters were responsible for the theft of several Democratic signs, which were replaced with her signs, at the Bowling Green Town Hall (the district’s polling place). Definitely the type of campaign I want to associate myself and my committee with.

But, of course, the folks on 99th District Committee would vote for David Duke if he had an R by his name and harshly attack anyone that dared to oppose his candidacy (“He shares out values! His opponent is anti-family!”, etc.). I notice they decided not to formally request that Bob McDonnell, Bill Bolling, or Ken Cuccinelli be censured (for Pat Mullins see below). They also don’t seem to have a problem with Chris Saxman, who openly endorsed Delegate Pollard for reelection.

Apparently the true Republicans in the district (not the ten people that show up for the 99th District Committee meetings) weren’t too upset with Bob McDonnell’s opposition to Crabill since he won with 69% of the vote in the district (Bolling got 66% and Cuccinelli got 67%) .

The 99th District Committee also approved a motion, again 4–0, directing Webb to draft and send a letter “expressing displeasure” at RPV Chairman Pat Mullins for his refusal to support the OKC Truther.

Hopefully Pat Mullins gives them the Dick Cheney treatment (anyone else remember what Cheney said to Patrick Leahy?).

Cross-posted at On The Right and Virginia Virtucon.

My ballot picks.

These should be pretty obvious but anyway:

Governor: Bob McDonnell

Lieutenant Governor: Bill Bolling

Attorney General: Ken Cuccinelli

99th District: Hamilton “Ham” Sandwich, Esq. (write-in candidate)

97th District: Chris Peace

And for the voters in the Lee Hill District of Spotsylvania County: D.J. McGuire

Lee Hill District (Spotsylvania County): Vote D.J. McGuire for Supervisor.

Time for some carpetbagging commentary:

Everyone in the Lee Hill District, regardless of whether they’re Democrats or Republicans, should be voting for D.J. McGuire for Supervisor.

Why? While this race has been characterized as a referendum on VRE in the media, VRE is just a small part of the issues facing citizens in the Lee Hill District.

While everyone else is cutting back in their personal and business budgets (because of the way the economy is going) with pay cuts, less hours, and less jobs, Gary Skinner believes that you should do with less while the government does with more.

There have been nine property tax increases in Spotsylvania in the last thirteen years.

Skinner has supported five tax increases (including increases on property, personal property [car], and business furniture, but excluding VRE) during his two years on the Board and has helped to enact three. In one case, Skinner voted against a personal property (car) tax increase because the rates was too low.

All these increases were passed on 4-3 margins, so it shows how important a single seat is.

Last year, when the revenue were coming up short in the Spotsylvania, what did Skinner propose instead of cutting the county’s budget? A midyear tax increase. Thankfully, the other supervisors realized how bad this would be for the county.

At which point does the government have to do with less? With Skinner in office, it looks like never.

While Republicans and even a lot of Democrats (including former Governor Doug Wilder and Delegate Albert Pollard) all have realized how bad it is to increase taxes during a recession.

It kills economic growth and makes your county last on a list of perspective locations to locate a business. If your county has had nine property tax increases in thirteen years, it’s a pretty good chance that you’re going to get a tax increase at least every two years.

Would you build or start a business in a location like that?

D.J. realizes that if you want to attract businesses to your locale, you need make your county favorable to businesses, and you do that by keeping taxes low.

You also don’t enact draconian regulations regarding how a commercial property is supposed to look, something that Gary Skinner was a proponent of.

And there’s the outright logical flaws by supporters of Skinner and VRE. “Well, the gas price is the same in Fredericksburg (which has VRE already) and Spotsy!” Really, then where the heck is the money coming from?

Money doesn’t grow on trees and gas stations don’t print their own money (they’re not the federal government), so if they’re keeping the gas prices the same, that means they’re losing money (they don’t make money on gas to begin with), cutting personnel, or declining to upgrade equipment or infrastructure.

No matter what, it’s a bad net result for the county.

And why would you want VRE? To help a few thousands people to get a subsidy to ride on a train? And do you realize how bad VRE is and how hard it is to get to your place of work after you get to Springfield or Union Station? If you work in Manassas or Herndon, you’re SOL unless you want to be sitting on a dozen buses to get to work.

D.J. wants to bring jobs to Spotsy by keeping taxes low instead of subsidizing someone’s train ride. For every person that uses VRE, over 2.5 people use vanpooling. D.J. also wants to make it easier for vanpoolers by making it easier to create parking lots and keeping the personal property (car) tax low.

D.J. also wants to bring a fire and rescue station to the district (the largest one in the county), which currently lacks a single station. This is something that D.J. first proposed and to which Skinner immediately jumped on yelling “me too!”

It’s for all these reasons that people like Bill Bolling, Ken Cuccinelli, and local Congressman Rob Wittman have all endorsed D.J. McGuire for Supervisor and I’m happy to join with them in endorsing him.

99th district: Make sure you write in Ham Sandwich for Delegate.

The 99th district is at an important milestone.

Will our district continue to support the tax-hiking policies of the current Delegate, Albert Pollard, or will we support a candidate that supports our conservative principles?

Will we vote for a “Republican” candidate, Catherine Crabill, who believes, amongst other things, that the federal government was responsible for the Oklahoma City Bombing, or we will vote for a sane person to be Delegate?

Don’t embarrass our district tomorrow by voting for Pollard or Crabill.

Vote Ham Sandwich, a strong supporter of Bob McDonnell, Bill Bolling, and Ken Cuccinelli and a true conservative for the 99th.

Cross-posted at Virginia Virtucon.

Victims and families of victims of the Appalachian School of Law and Virginia Tech shootings endorse Albert Pollard for delegate.

The Shad Plank (the Daily Press’s blog) has the details.

Interestingly, Pollard has also secured the endorsement of the National Rifle Association (NRA).

Does Creigh Deeds et al. know anything about the Fredericksburg-area?

On October 17, 2009, Creigh Deeds, Gov. Tim Kaine, and Lieutenant Governor candidate Jody Wagner will all be appearing in Fredericksburg at the University of Mary Washington at 4:00 p.m.

What else is happening on October 17? Why, the Bowling Green Harvest Festival. Yeah, the same Harvest Festival that attracts around 15,000 people, even if it happens to be raining.

Nice one, Creigh.

Does this count as an in-kind contribution for Delegate Phil Hamilton from Old Dominion University or one of its employees?

As you may notice, I have a contact form on this blog that allows people to send information to me if they are so inclined. I often get inane stuff through it and yesterday was no exception.

A “john smith” sent this comment via the contact form last night:

Contact the EEOC: Floundering Newport News Candidate desperate for help, skirts Americans with Disabilities Act

I have been hearing rumors for some time that Democrat trial lawyer Robin Abbott has been disappointed in her ability to gain any traction in her race against Newport News Delegate Phil Hamilton. Prominent local Democrats like former Del. Alan Diamonstein and Mayor Joe Frank have been lining up in support of Hamilton. So, it is no surprise that the word on the street has been that Abbott is highly frustrated by her inability to recruit volunteers and raise money.

The most recent proof of Abbott’s trouble is a part time job posting at Christopher Newport University that lists a contact in Tennessee to call or e-mail about receiving hourly compensation to go door-to-door for Abbott.

But, Abbott may be running into some trouble with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The job posting seems to imply that it discriminates against individuals with physically disabilities. The Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits qualified individuals with disabilities from being discriminated against by potential employers.

According to the EEOC’s website, “An employer is required to make a reasonable accommodation to the known disability of a qualified applicant or employee if it would not impose an ‘undue hardship’”. It would seem that Abbott should really give individuals the opportunity to compete without prejudging them based on a disability.

Abbott’s campaign appears to believe that money will buy them anything in elections. This isn’t the first time that the Abbott campaign has had to resort to money to try and make the campaign a success. Several bloggers noted in September that Abbott’s law firm appeared to have used contributions of up to $50,000 to statewide Democratic candidates in order to attract their scrutiny of Hamilton.

Abbott’s law firm, Consumer Litigation Associates (CLA), has been serving as her life-line to keep the doors open on her campaign. According to vpap.org, CLA and its lawyers have donated over $100,000 to Abbott as of August 31st. CLA has also donated $70,000 to Minority Leader Ward Armstong’s PAC who turns around and makes sure that her staff gets paid.

CLA must be looking to get something back from Abbott in Richmond to be throwing money around so indiscriminately. But, this race is starting to look bleak for Abbott. There are less than 5 weeks till Election Day. Hamilton has been on television for over six weeks. Abbott has been throwing mud like crazy. So far people don’t seem to know who she is, what she stands for, or even what district she is running in.

Now, I have no idea what this guy is talking about (seriously, dude, I live in Caroline County, you might want to try one of the Hampton Roads blogs) but the first thing I do when I get these type of e-mails is to check the sender’s IP address.

Care to guess who the IP address is registered to? Well, the IP address 128.82.43.237 is registered to Old Dominion University according to the American Registry of Internet Numbers.

Wasn’t it ODU that hired Delegate Phil Hamilton after they received money through a budget amendment that Hamilton sponsored?

Just sayin’.

Ham Sandwich asks the National Rifle Association to reconsider their endorsement of Albert Pollard.

The campaign of Hamilton “Ham” Sandwich, Esq. released the following statement on the news of the National Rifle Association’s (NRA) endorsement of Delegate Albert Pollard:

“I disagree with the National Rifle Association’s endorsement of Delegate Albert Pollard. I have always been a strong advocate of the people’s right to keep and bear arms. While I do not own any firearms currently — nor do I have the physical ability to use a firearm — I believe that I would be a better advocate of Second Amendment rights in the Virginia General Assembly than either Delegate Pollard or Ms. Crabill,” said Ham.

When asked about Sandwich’s philosophy on gun control, Sandwich said: “It’s simple, I believe that noncriminals and noncrazies should be able to purchase and carry firearms. Criminals and crazies — on the other hand — shouldn’t have access to guns.”

“Ham personally filled out the candidate questionnaire but he accidentally left a mustard stain on the paper and the NRA said that the questionnaire was illegible,” said Sandwich’s campaign spokesman Timothy Watson.  “We’ve submitted another copy of the questionnaire and we feel confident that the NRA will recognize that Ham is a strong defender of the people’s right to keep and bear arms.”

Ham, a Virginia native, is running as a Republican write-in candidate in the 99th district. The district includes the counties of Lancaster, Northumberland, Richmond, Westmoreland, and King George, as well as the Port Royal and Bowling precincts in Caroline. He is a member of the Virginia Bar (Golden Phoenix division) and a partner in the law firm of Dill & Gallinger. He is married and lives with his wife and children in Bowling Green, Virginia.

You can learn more about Ham Sandwich by visiting his website at http://www.votehamsandwich.com/, which is in the process of being updated from his 2007 run for Commonwealth’s Attorney in Prince William County.

The esteemed Democratic nominee for Attorney General, Steve Shannon, doesn’t know the difference between a police department and a sheriff’s office.

The Spotsylvania County Sheriff’s Office recently arrested and/or indicted a number of individuals as part of an online sting that was done over the summer. The Democratic nominee for Attorney General, Steve Shannon, released this press release regarding the sting:

Fairfax– Steve Shannon, candidate for Attorney General, today commended the Spotsylvania police department for their work in finding and charging 15 child predators in an Internet sting.

[…]

“Spotsylvania’s police department is to be commended for their fast and thorough work in bringing these twisted individuals to court and making their community safer for kids,” Shannon said. “As these arrests show, Internet predators are often hiding right in front of our eyes, living in our towns and even working in our schools. When I’m Attorney General, I will make sure that our law enforcement officers have the training they need to conduct stings like the one in Spotsylvania, rooting out Internet predators, and bringing them to justice.”

The problem? Spotsylvania County doesn’t have a police department, it has this thing called a “sheriff’s office”. See, the voters go to the polls and elect this guy called the “High Sheriff”, who gets to administer and run the office for four years. In jurisdictions that have police departments (all jurisdictions have Sheriffs, even if all they do is court security), the Board of Supervisors or the City Council hires a police chief on a contract who gets to run the department autonomously (in theory).

It isn’t as if this type of stuff is some obscure trivia that the chief law-enforcement officer in the state shouldn’t know. It’s kinda germane to his qualifications and skills, if elected, as the next Attorney General for this state.

If Steve Shannon knew the differences between sheriff’s offices and police departments, as well as which jurisdictions have police departments, maybe his opponent, Senator Ken Cuccinelli, wouldn’t be getting the coveted endorsement of the Fraternal Order of Police today.

UPDATED: What the heck is the First Congressional District Republican Committee smoking?

UPDATE: Chairman Tom Foley of the First Congressional District Republican Committee had this to say in an e-mail:

Dear Mr. Watson,

At its June meeting the committee authorized $1,500.00 to each of the three challengers running  either against an incumbent or for an open seat in the district.

The 3,000.00 you cite is not correct.  I looked up the SBE report, and upon inquiry have been told that campaign staff filed that report with SBE in person and were instructed to show the single contribution in two places. It is now being corrected.

Okay, but this raises an even bigger issue: If Catherine Crabill received only $1,500 from the committee and not $3,000, that means her campaign committee currently has a balanced of -$480.61, which isn’t possible either logically (since she discloses no debts) or under state law.

CORRECTION: The math actually works out correctly with the removal of the second $1,500 contribution from the committee.

The campaign finance disclosure reports covering July 1 through August 31 for most candidates were released today by the State Board of Elections and there were some surprises in Catherine Crabill’s report.

On July 13, 2009, the First Congressional District Committee contributed $1,500 to Crabill’s campaign. On August 24, 2009, ten days after Bob McDonnell, Bill Bolling, Ken Cuccinelli, and Pat Mullins publicly repudiated Crabill and her campaign, the First Congressional District Republican Committee contributed another $1,500 to her campaign.

There are so many things wrong with this I don’t know where to start: First, the committee contributed money to a candidacy of someone that’s obviously insane and believes that the United States government was responsible for, inter alia, the murder of 168 people, including 19 children, in the Oklahoma City bombing. Do I need to stay more? Do the values expressed by Crabill match those held by members and chairman of the First District Committee?

Second, why is the committee contributing money to the candidacy of someone that doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning? As a sidenote on point two, doesn’t incumbent Rob Wittman have two Democratic challengers running against him in 2010? Am I the only person that thinks they could find a better use for this money they’re blowing on Crabill’s campaign?

Third, why is the committee supporting this Crabill which serves to hurt the candidacy of McDonnell et al.? Are they blind to that fact or do they just not care?

All told, Crabill raised $4,538.95 during the reporting period and has $1,019.39 on-hand. Meanwhile, Delegate Albert Pollard raised $14,101 and has $16,301.36 on-hand.

Cross-posted at Virginia Virtucon.