Category: Spotsylvania County

Crazy teabaggers unite!

The following is a letter from Anna Yeisley, a member (or head?) of the “Spotsylvania County Campaign for Liberty” (the Ron Paul offshoot groups) and “Spotsylvania Patriots”; she’s also a member of that nut group, founded by Herb Lux, the “American Patriots Committee”:

Dear Senator Warner [same letter sent to Senator Webb]

Please vote NO on Senate version of Health Care bill.

What should worry every American and you, Senator [Warner/Webb] as our Virginia senator, are how chronic illnesses and cancers are increasing despite alleged advances in medical science.

There is a growing voice of common sense that links our diet with the rise and increasing incurrence of cancer and life threatening illnesses. Our medical establishment disparages the illness and cancer reversing benefits of changing our diets from animal product based to plant based. This simple inexpensive change has been reversing countless cases of chronic disease and cancer, yet the American Medical Association (backed by pharmaceutical, surgical equipment corporations and the meat and dairy industry) refuse to release statistics that show that dietary changes can be as effective (and for some people, more effective) than standard toxic drugs and body deforming surgeries to treat cancer and other life threatening diseases.

Our Congress and government have allowed the AMA to stifle evidence and confuse statistics to force our nation’s physicians to treat all disease and illness with toxic drug treatments. Do you realize it is illegal to treat cancer with any other treatment other than surgery and/or chemotherapy? Many physicians are speaking out against the ineffectiveness of treating dietary caused cancers and illnesses with toxic drugs and deforming surgeries that many of our physicians KNOW will never cure, but instead create more illness and chronic ailments and more likelihood for cancers to return.

The AMA is behind this push for governmental involvement in health care. If they had their way, there would be no cancer prevention taught to anyone so they and the corporations they represent can continue to make billions of dollars in revenue in aggressive and toxic and body deforming treatments and surgeries. At the same time, more and more physicians are waking up to the realization that lack of nutrients and toxic chemicals in our food, air and water is what is causing the majority of cancers and chronic illnesses.

You can’t treat toxicity with more toxicity!! With chemotherapy treatments costing anywhere from $800 a day to $80,000 a week – can you see the lucrative incentive in making it illegal to treat cancer with anything but toxic drug treatments? Particularly considering that 1 in 2 people will get cancer in their lifetime?

If our established medical establishment cannot see the connection between a high fat non nutritional diet and cancer and chronic disease, and relate dietary changes to reversing a good majority of life threatening cancers and illnesses; then what good is this medical establishment???? What do they know? They are ignorant and so consumed with making billions of dollars from established medical treatments that they refuse to see the death and disability caused by their ignorance.

Pushing health care upon this nation is AMA’s way of using government to continue to cover up the importance of a plant based diet to health and recovery. They are determined to use government to force Americans to be treated by invasive aggressive and often unnecessary surgeries (for our own good?) NO! For the good of the out of control and ever more powerful pharmaceutical and medical establishment.

Our nation must return to an agricultural commodity base where food is grown on our soil, free of chemicals, pharmaceuticals, steroids, growth hormones, petroleum products and governmental intervention. We must return to a state of balance and health that will only come from returning to our agricultural roots where the family farm was the norm and not just a memory.

The decisions you are making every day will affect our future as no other decade. Your most important work as every other senator is to return this state to an agricultural commodity base by encouraging our citizens to consume a plant based diet to help us regain our strength, balance and health economically, physically and spiritually.

God created this planet to care for human beings. Pure food and water is elementary important to the health and life of human beings, to Americans, to Virginians and to every individual created by God.

Governmental health care will continue to move our nation away from health and towards a nation of a sick and weak citizens dependent upon drugs and tax payer funded health care in order to function.

Please vote down the Senate version of this health care bill and view with suspicion those who are pushing for it.

I urge you to view the documentary called, “Healing Cancer” available from Netflix. There is indisputable evidence all over the world that a plant based diet reverses disease and cancer. Countries all over the world accept this premise but it is rejected by our American medical establishment.

We are not safe in the hands of physicians who cannot connect high fat non nutritional diets to ever increasing incidents of illness and cancer. We are not safe with governmental mandated health care particularly if it as heavily influenced by the traditional medical establishment as is this Senate version ‘health’ care bill.

Common sense is crucially important in this nation. The Senate health bill is all about the money to be made by the traditional medical establishment that is doing so little in restoring this nation’s health.

Anna Yeisley

There’s so much good (i.e., crazy) stuff there you have to read the whole thing.

And would you be supposed to hear that she also endorsed Catherine Crabill’s candidacy in the 99th District? Shocker, right?

Some of my brethren on the right and in the small-l libertarians are annoyed at the rampant anti-intellectualism being displayed by both the GOP and their “friends” in the teabagger coalition. While I agree with them — to an extent — after all, who finds a claim that “[t]he federal government is gang-raping the people” to be a persuasive argument?

A bigger issue I see is the rampant neo-Luddism and anti-science sentiment being displayed by the crazies on the far-right: “Vaccines are bad!1!” “They caused autism!!1!” “We don’t care if dozens and dozens of studies say otherwise!!1!”, etc. And this is just another perfect example.

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.

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.

WTF: People linked to al-Qaeda in Spotsylvania County and a (probably unrelated) attempt to bring down Dominion Power lines?

The Jawa Report linked to a copy of a report from the Virginia Fusion Center (PDF) which was posted on the Canadian Free Press‘ website which has these gems in it:

Enclaves of Salafist ideology adherents have been identified in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads areas.10

[…]

According to 2009 public safety survey data, the counties of Fairfax and Spotsylvania reported awareness of individuals potentially linked to al-Qa’ida living, working, or otherwise linked to their jurisdictions.13

[…]

10 (LES) 2009 VFC Threat Assessment Survey: Fairfax County, City of Falls Church, , Spotsylvania County, VSP Division 1)

[…]

13 (LES) 2009 VFC Threat Assessment Survey:

And those aren’t the only interesting parts. Further in the report, it documents incidents regarding threats to critical infrastructure and includes this incident:

Suspicious activity reports concerning Virginia’s Energy Sector include:

[…]

  • In February 2009, two camp propane tanks at the base of two high voltage Dominion Power tower legs were set on fire in Spotsylvania. The tanks had duct tape over the propane  cylinders, and a separate container had been placed at the base of one of the tower legs and ignited. Numerous wooden matches, a cigarette butt, gasoline, and a light oil substance were also found. According to officials at the scene, if the propane tanks had been approximately 12″ higher and fully engulfed and ignited, the resulting fire could have caused a tower collapse.450

[…]

450 (LES) Spotsylvania County Sheriff’s Office Situational Awareness Bulletin dated February 12, 2009

Pictures of the devices used and the damage caused can be seen on p. 164 of the report as well.

I haven’t read through the whole report but I’ll post anything else interesting I find.

And the point of sentencing guidelines is what exactly?

From The Free Lance–Star:

A Spotsylvania County man was sentenced yesterday to 10 years in prison for the repeated molestation of his 15-year-old daughter.

He pleaded guilty last fall to incest, sodomy, aggravated sexual battery and indecent liberties of the girl after his wife, the girl’s stepmother, hid video cameras in the family’s home after suspecting abuse.

[…]

[Defense Attorney Eugene] Frost asked the judge for a five-year sentence. The sentencing guidelines called for a midpoint of a 19-year active sentence.

But Beck deviated to a much lesser sentence than that recommended in the guidelines.

The total sentence given to the man was five years for each of the indecent liberties charges, life in prison for the sodomy and 20 years for both the incest and aggravated sexual battery.

Beck though, suspended all but two years on each conviction.

He also ordered that part of the time the man spends in jail be at a facility that offers sex-offender rehabilitation.

What exactly is the point of having sentencing guidelines when the judge essentially ignores them, especially when it’s for a crime like this?

Hopefully the next time Judge Beck is up for reappointment someone at the General Assembly remembers this and gives him hell for it.

D.J. McGuire’s statement on Fredericksburg GM Powertrain plant’s closure.

For those that are unaware, fellow blogger D.J. McGuire (aka The right-wing liberal) is on his way to victory in his campaign for the Lee Hill Supervisor seat in Spotsylvania County. I also did a post awhile back detailing why he’s the best candidate for the district regardless of whoever decides to run against him.

He had the following statement regarding the recent announcement that the Fredericksburg (technically, Spotsylvania County) GM Powertrain factory would be closing:

D.J. McGuire, Republican nominee for the Lee Hill Supervisor, released this statement in reaction to the announced closing of GM’s Powertrain plant on Tidewater Trail.

Like many other Spotsylvanians, I was disappointed by the news of the closing of General Motors’ Powertrain plant. I see the plant every day on my way home from work, and it has been a symbol of the county’s openness to success in industry and prosperity for its citizens. I am sad to see its apparent demise. Just three years ago, GM was investing more capital into the Powertrain factory, so this action also comes as a surprise. Given GM’s current status, I hope and expect that both the company and the Obama Administration will be very open about the reasoning behind this decision.

Of course, GM is in need of serious adjustment, and no one can be certain what action, if any, the county could have taken that would have led to a different outcome. However, this is a good time for Spotsylvania to reflect on its recent actions, which certainly didn’t improve the outlook for business in general or the Tidewater Trail plant in particular.

Since GM’s last infusion of capital into the Powertrain plant, property taxes were raised 11% (on average); the personal property tax rate was raised more than 25%; and the business furniture/fixture tax rate was raised 19%. While avoidance of these recession-aggravating measures may not have saved Powertrain, at the very least it would have reduced the risk and the cost to GM for keeping it open – and would certainly do the same for future users of that space. Moreover, if (however unlikely the possibility) the plant was closed for more political reasons, the aforementioned tax increases could very well provide Washington with some of the justification it would use to claim otherwise. It certainly won’t help the future users of that plant, or any other businesses struggling to get through this recession here in Spotsylvania.

In any event, it is time for Spotsylvania to recognize its place in the national and global community, and to acknowledge that it cannot over-tax, over-spend, and over-regulate in a vacuum. That is why, should I be elected Lee Hill Supervisor this November, I will:

  • Refuse to support any real estate tax rate above equalization
  • Keep a close eye on county spending to avoid future tax increases and where possible allow for reductions in tax rates, be it for real estate, BPOL, furniture/fixtures, machinery/tools, heavy equipment, personal property, etc.
  • Work with my fellow Supervisors and the Planning Commission to scale back (and, if possible, repeal) the recently imposed commercial design standards (a.k.a. the “HCOD design standards”) as soon as practicable

The GM Powertrain plant may stay open until late next year. I cannot say whether or not the above plans will save it – and truth be told, it would not be sensible to bend county policy simply to aid one employer. However, we can (and I believe we must) use this as a wake-up call to make Spotsylvania a friendlier county for established and rising businesses – including the business that is and/or will be at 11032 Tidewater Trail.

For more information, contact D.J. at dj@djmcguire.com

A “What. The. Frak.” newsday in Spotsylvania County.

The first story from The Free Lance–Star:

A 19-year-old Spotsylvania County man pleaded guilty yesterday to sexually assaulting a four-year-old girl and will spend a year in jail.

Jonathan Anderson admitted to touching the girl inappropriately on several occasions.

[…]

In exchange for his guilty plea, prosecutor Crystal Montague dropped three other related charges: forcible sodomy, animate object sexual penetration and inanimate object sexual penetration.

[…]

Anderson didn’t deny having inappropriate contact with the victim and told the girl’s family “I’m sorry” after he was caught, according to the agreement.

Someone touches a girl “inappropriately on several occasions” and he only gets sentenced to a year in jail? More than likely the guy will only have to serve 50% of the time and will be out on the streets in six months.

Story numero dos, also from The Free Lance–Star:

The parents who allowed their children to live in a home with feces-covered walls pleaded guilty yesterday to a misdemeanor charge.

Eugene Mongold, 28, and Amanda Nichole Mongold, 24, had been charged with three counts each of felony child neglect.

But Spotsylvania County prosecutor Edith Minn agreed to drop two of the charges and reduce one to contributing to the delinquency of a minor in exchange for their guilty pleas.

[…]

She said they have already completed parenting classes and have cleaned up their home from the clutter and dirt their three children were living in.

Anyone else thinks it’s absolutely amazing that parents have to be taught that having feces covered walls=bad? Also mentioned in the story was that the children were found naked and emaciated. Do parents also have to be taught that also=bad?

Seriously, what the hell is wrong with this area? Actually, what the hell is wrong with that Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office?

And yet there’s still only one choice for Lee Hill District Supervisor in Spotsylvania County…

Welcome to my first foray into local Spotsylvania County politics; why do I have a feeling that this is going to end bad?

As my readers (all three two of you) may know, fellow blogger D.J. McGuire has announced his run for the Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors for the Lee Hill District. I hadn’t gotten a chance to write up a post about his announcement, but I did add him (with a link to his website) to the “2009 candidates I support” box on the right.

D.J., who’s a Republican, is running against incumbent supervisor Gary Skinner (Independent), who was elected in 2007. (For those that are curious, Spotsylvania has adopted staggered election terms for supervisors which is why Skinner’s term was only for two years. This election will be for a four-year term starting in the beginning of 2010 and finishing at the end of 2013.) Vince Onorato, who previously served on the board from 2004 through 2007, running as an Independent in 2003, and as a Republican in 2007 where he lost to Skinner, is trying to get back on the Board by running as an Independent this year according to The Free Lance–Star’s Dan Telvock. ((Telvock, Dan. “”Vince Onorato is back…sort of”.” [Weblog Spotsy govt.-the odds & ends] 3 Mar 2009. The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co.. 6 Mar 2009 <http://www.fredericksburg.com/blogs/view?blogger_id=21&p=1236103465>.))

In a county that has suffered (yes, that’s the right word) through nine tax increases in the past thirteen years, D.J. is pledging when he’s elected to not vote for an increase in taxes.

What is Gary Skinner’s philosophy on tax increases?

After Spotsylvania County finished doing reassessments last year, the proposed equalization rate — the rate at which citizens, on average, would see no increase on their taxes — was $0.56 per $100 of assessed value. In the proposed budget by the County Administrator, the proposed tax rate was $0.62/$100. When it came time to advertise a tax rate, Gary Skinner proposed to advertise a $0.65/$100 tax rate, a rate two cents even higher than the County Administrator’s proposed rate. Five of the other supervisors barked at this idea, and instead the county advertised a $0.62 rate. ((Telvock, Dan. “Spotsy faces budget pain,” The Free Lance–Star 30 Mar 2008. The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co.. 6 Mar 2009 <http://fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2008/032008/03302008/367039>.))

When it came time to vote on the tax rate, one supervisor made a motion to set the tax rate at the equalization rate of $0.56, Gary Skinner voted against this motion repeatedly. Skinner then made a motion to set the tax rate at $0.62 — the maximum rate that the county had advertised — and this motion passed 4 to 3. ((“Board of Supervisors Meeting, April 10, 2008, Minutes.” Spotsylvania County Home Page. Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors. 6 Mar 2009 <http://www.spotsylvania.va.us/DownloadFiles/Minutes/bos/041008.pdf>.))

After Gary Skinner voted for over a 10% tax increase for Spotsylvania County citizens in a single year, and the county was still running a deficit due to the economy and the county’s spending, Skinner was the lone supervisor to vote against proposed spending reductions in September. Skinner, based on the report in The Free Lance–Star, openly proposed raising taxes in the middle of the year to make up for the deficit that had developed. ((Telvock. Dan. “Spotsy cutting budget again,” The Free Lance–Star 24 Sep 2008. The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co. 6 Mar 2009 <http://fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2008/092008/09242008/413140>.))

With Gary Skinner’s tax-and-spend policies documented, let’s turn to Independent-turned-Republican-turned-Independent (I think that’s the right order) Vince Onorato:

Back when Vince Onorato was on the Board in 2004, Onorato seconded and voted for a motion to set the tax rate at $0.87/$100, an one cent increase in taxes compared to the proposed $0.86 equalization rate. Luckily, this motion was defeated by the Board 5 to 2. ((“Board of Supervisors Meeting, April 27, 2004, Minutes.” Spotsylvania County Home Page. Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors. 6 Mar 2009 <http://www.spotsylvania.va.us/DownloadFiles/Minutes/bos/04272004.pdf>.))

In 2005, Onorato voted to raises taxes again, this time from $0.86/$100 to $0.89/$100 . ((“Board of Supervisors Meeting, April 12, 2005 Minutes.” Spotsylvania County Home Page. Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors. 6 Mar 2009 <http://www.spotsylvania.va.us/DownloadFiles/Minutes/bos/04122005.pdf>.)) That was a 3.5% increase in taxes for county residents.

So, in two years, Onorato voted to raise county residents taxes by 4.7%. Unfortunately, only in one of those cases was a tax increase averted.

If Spotsylvania County residents don’t want to see their taxes go up once again, vote for D.J. McGuire in November.