uvAggravator2.0

Cheryl Simmons, who circulated and signed off on 123 pages of signatures to a petition to get a change of government in Arlington County on the November ballot, is a felon and therefore not eligible to vote, the county said today. Only residents able to register to vote are permitted to collect signatures for ballot initiatives, according to county law. More than 2,200 signatures on Simmons's pages had to be disqualified, bringing the total number of verified signatures to 10,815. The petition needed 14,350 signatures to get the change of government issue on the ballot. Lindberg said she was in the final stages of validating the more than 16,000 signatures turned in two weeks ago when she learned, through Virginia law enforcement officials and the State Board of Elections, that Simmons had been convicted of embezzlement charges and had previous convictions that had been downgraded. The change-of-government petition was an


Virginia - Initiative - Government - Petition - Law

A longtime immigration advocate and lobbyist blasted Corey Stewart, chairman of the Prince William Board of County Supervisors, for proposing legislation Thursday that she said would "go far beyond the Arizona law by criminalizing even the simple act of seeking shelter by a person here without authority." Claire Guthrie Gastañaga, a former chief deputy attorney general of Virginia, said Stewart's proposal will "foster nothing but a disrespect for the law, do nothing to make us safer, will render people homeless and hungry, will tie up our courts with frivolous lawsuits by vigilantes and interfere with the ability of law enforcement to focus on real crimes and real criminals." Stewart introduced a proposal, dubbed the Virginia Rule of Law Act, earlier Thursday that would enhance police officials' power to capture, detain and deport illegal aliens; curb illegal day laboring; and create specific state penalties for illegal immigrants. Virginia, known for some


Law - Immigration - Arizona - Virginia - Police

Cheryl Simmons, who circulated and signed off on 123 pages of a petition to get a change of government in Arlington County on the November ballot, is a felon and therefore not eligible to vote, said Linda Lindberg, general registrar of Arlington County. Only residents able to register to vote are permitted to collect signatures for ballot initiatives, according to county law. More than 2,200 signatures on Simmons's pages had to be disqualified, bringing the total number of verified signatures to 10,815. The petition needed 14,350 signatures to get the change of government issue on the ballot. Lindberg said she was in the final stages of validating the more than 16,000 signatures turned in two weeks ago when she learned, through Virginia law enforcement officials and the State Board of Elections, that Simmons had been convicted of embezzlement charges and had previous convictions that had been downgraded. The change of


Virginia - Government - Initiative - United States - Petition

Gov. Bob McDonnell will hit the road next month to sell his plan to privatize the state's 332 liquor stores. McDonnell (R) will hold eight town hall meetings across the state starting Wednesday. Stops will be in Roanoke, Norfolk, Chester, Fredericksburg, Fairfax, Harrisonburg, Danville and Bristol. The governor formed a commission to consider closing some of the state's 130 agencies, putting more forms online, eliminating annual reports and selling the state's liquor stores. McDonnell's staff recently unveiled four options for privatizing the state's liquor stores: selling all of the state's alcohol assets to a single company; having firms take over the state's existing stores; offering licenses to the 3,000 businesses that sell beer and wine; and auctioning an undetermined number of licenses to the highest bidder. Thursday his staff announced the commission has postponed its final full meeting from Aug. 26 to Sept. 13 to allow more time before members


Bob McDonnell - Privatization - Chester - United States - Business

The Environmental Protection Agency has denied Virginia's petition challenging its finding last year that the agency should regulate greenhouse gases because they cause global warming and endanger human health. Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II had filed one of 10 petitions asking the EPA to overturn the finding. He simultaneously sued the federal agency over the finding, but the court had put the legal proceedings on hold while the EPA went through its administrative review process. Cuccinelli has responded to the EPA's decision in a statement: The Attorney General has reviewed the EPA's press release announcing its denial of the rehearing petitions pending before the agency. When the Office of the Attorney General has fully reviewed the ruling the Attorney General will make an additional statement. One thing, however, is immediately apparent, the reviewing court is likely to find the decisions fatally flawed procedurally because the agency has reviewed and


Attorney General - Ken Cuccinelli - United States Environmental Protection Agency - Environmental Protection Agency - United States

. . . the Constitution would be trashed.

And they were right! —

The Obama administration is seeking to make it easier for the FBI to compel companies to turn over records of an individual’s Internet activity without a court order. . .

________
* As Glenn Reynolds likes to say.

U.S. Sen. Mark Warner's turn on "Top Chef D.C." last night was fairly brief. (His verdict on one dish he sampled from a contestant chef, "I thought it was good, but then, it was like ... not.") But for those who followed the discussions last week about whether the former Virginia governor is a "foodie," check out this bonus clip now available on the Bravo Web site, in which Warner (D) addresses that very question -- posed to him by MSNBC's Joe Scarborough. In the clip, he mentions losing money on his King George vineyard and several restaurants. "I've got a graduate degree in how to lose money in the business," he jokes. Meanwhile, a spokesman said Warner had no comment about whether Alex stole Ed's pea puree.


MSNBC - Top Chef - Joe Scarborough - Virginia - Bravo

Corey Stewart, chairman of the Prince William Board of County Supervisors, released legislation today that outlines how Virginia can crack down on illegal immigration yet avoid the pitfalls Arizona has faced with its controversial immigration law. Dubbed the Virginia Rule of Law Act, the legislation enhances police officials' power to capture, detain and deport illegal aliens; curbs illegal day laboring; and creates specific state penalties for illegal immigrants. Like the Arizona law, Stewart's legislation states that law enforcement officials are required to check the status of anyone who is detained if there is "reasonable suspicion" that they are here illegally. Stewart, however, said his law will stand up in court because unlike Arizona, Virginia won't make it illegal for people not to carry their immigration documents with them. He also said there is a more conservative judiciary system in the commonwealth than out west. "This same model [was] used in


Law - Arizona - Illegal immigration - Immigration - United States

Well, how about that. It appears that privately insured Americans are using fewer medical services these days. Patient visits, drug prescriptions and procedures were down in the second quarter of 2010 compared to year-ago levels, reports the Wall Street Journal.

Weak demand could put downward pressure on spiraling health care costs and insurance premiums, the WSJ suggests. And what could be behind this remarkable change? Health economist Paul Ginsburg attributes some of the new behavior to the weak economy. But, he adds, “This could go beyond the recession. Being a less aggressive consumer of health care is here to stay.”

Perhaps this has something to do with it: More Americans are buying high-deductible health plans that make them bear a bigger share of the cost of their medical services. Eighteen million people have such plans compared to 13 million last year, according to the Journal. Believe it or not, people exercise more discretion and care as consumers when they have to pay for medical services themselves! Imagine that. They don’t go to the doctor as often — presumably cutting back on more frivolous trips — and they look for better deals when buying pharmaceuticals.

Most extraordinary! Who could have predicted it? Is there some body of thought that could explain why people consume more of a product or service when someone else is paying for it, and consume less when they pay for it thmselves? Could the field of economics shed some light on this perplexing question?

Finish reading this blog post on the Boomergeddon blog.

It's too early to do any analysis of the impact of Wednesday's court decision blocking the implementation of the most controversial pieces of Arizona's new immigration law, and efforts to adopt similar measures in Virginia, Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) said Thursday. As he has in other recent interviews, McDonnell did not offer a clear answer on whether he believes Virginia should adopt a similar statute, which includes a provision requiring immigrants to carry documentation showing they are in the country legally. Instead, McDonnell noted that Virginia has already adopted legislation that includes some of the same provisions as are contained in the multi-part Arizona law. "It's too early to get any comment on what's going on out there," McDonnell said on his monthly appearance on WRVA radio's Ask the Governor program. "This is a preliminary injunction by one federal district judge, who hasn't even ruled on the merits of whether


Law - Arizona - Bob McDonnell - Virginia - Injunction

Editor, The New York Times
620 Eighth Avenue
New York, NY 10018

To the Editor:

I appreciate the sub-headline, appearing on your website, to a report on the BP oil spill: “The oil is clearing much faster than expected, but concern remains over the unseen effects” (“On the Surface, Gulf Oil Spill Is Vanishing Fast; Concerns Stay,” July 28).  Being an economist, I’m accustomed to looking beyond the visible effects of economic and political actions in order to take account also of unseen effects that often swamp that which is immediately seen.

But a source of frustration when reading your pages is the frequent failure of your writers to do the same.  For example, whenever minimum-wage legislation is discussed in your pages, your writers see only the obvious – namely, higher hourly take-home pay for low-skilled workers who have jobs.  Your writers remain blind to the unseen effects on these workers - namely, fewer job opportunities or worsened work conditions.

Likewise with stimulus spending.  It’s easy to see the immediate, beneficial consequences of more government spending.  The unseen consequences, however - such as higher, enterprise-discouraging taxes in the future - are treated either as though they don’t exist or as if they are unquestionably minor in comparison to the seen effects.

There can be no doubt that the unseen consequences of economic and political activities on the environment deserve our attention.  The same is no less true for the unseen consequences of these activities on the economy.

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Professor of Economics
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA 22030

Related: Sumner’s essay on the forgotten man:

The type and formula of most schemes of philanthropy or humanitarianism is this: A and B put their heads together to decide what C shall be made to do for D. The radical vice of all these schemes, from a sociological point of view, is that C is not allowed a voice in the matter, and his position, character, and interests, as well as the ultimate effects on society through C’s interests, are entirely overlooked. I call C the Forgotten Man. . . .

If government really wants to help breathe life into the economy, there’s one simple and effective step it hasn’t taken, but should: Stop standing on the economy’s neck.

The Institute for Justice has a new report on The Power of One—one entrepreneur, that is. It examines the lengths aspiring businesspeople have to go through just to get permission to give other people jobs.

Some of the stories have to be read to be believed.

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who to judge from his twitter feed had been eagerly awaiting Wednesday's court ruling on Arizona's new immigration law, said he has "mixed" feelings about the decision. U.S. District Judge Susan R. Bolton issued an injunction blocking the most controversial parts of the law from going into effect Thursday. Cuccinelli (R) filed a friend of the court brief along with attorneys general in eight other states supporting the Arizona law. Cuccinelli tweeted on Saturday that he had a "big week coming," citing the upcoming Arizona ruling among other expected developments this week. The Obama administration has argued Arizona overstepped its authority with the law, which required law enforcement to check the immigration status of anyone they believed might be in the country illegally.


Arizona - Law - United States - Immigration - United States federal judge

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II (R) will give $55,500 in campaign funds to state veteran's charities, an amount that matches donations Cuccinelli received during his campaign from a Florida man associated with a charity under investigation in at least three states. Cuccinelli was the largest recipient in Virginia of donations from Tampa-based Bobby Thompson. Thompson was a founder of the U.S. Navy Veterans Association, whose solicitation practices have been questioned across the country. Law enforcement officials, for instance, have said that they have been unable to locate many of the officers and staffers of the organization listed on official charity documents. Other Virginia politicians, including Gov. Bob McDonnell (R), House Speaker Bill Howell (R) and Sen. Patsy Ticer (D), announced that they would donate money they were given by Thompson months ago. Cuccinelli had resisted, indicating that Thompson had not been convicted of wrongdoing. Last month, Cuccinelli said he


Virginia - Ken Cuccinelli - Virginia Attorney General - United States - Bob McDonnell

Partisans on both sides of the aisle can look forward to seeing their elected officials featured in slightly unusual television appearances in coming days. Tonight, U.S. Sen. Mark Warner (D) will appear on an episode of Top Chef, joining MSNBC commentators Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski as a guest judge. Warner is the only senator who will be featured on the show this season, which taped in D.C., though we've seen promos for upcoming episodes that indicate House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will appear at some point. Meanwhile, Richmond residents should keep an eye out for Greta Van Susteren on Monday. The host of Fox News' On the Record will visit the state capital that day to tape a segment for her show with Virginia Attorney Gen. Ken Cuccinelli (R), according to his people. Cuccinelli has appeared on Van Susteren's show several times but has always before visited her studio


Greta Van Susteren - Joe Scarborough - Mika Brzezinski - Fox News Channel - MSNBC

Derek Kravitz reports on the Dr. Gridlock blog that U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) has once again urged Virginia transportation officials to reduce toll fares on the Dulles Greenway, calling fare hikes in recent years "highway robbery." It's a common refrain for Wolf, a longtime critic of the Greenway plan who has said the toll road has been unfairly aided by the "poorly drafted" 1988 law and heavy lobbying at the state level against proposals that would put an inflation-based toll-increase structure in place. Wolf sent a letter Wednesday to Virginia Transportation Secretary Sean T. Connaughton. Greenway fares now cost as much as $4.50 each way during rush hour commutes. Read the full entry at Dr. Gridlock.


Virginia - Toll road - Road - Virginia State Route 267 - United States

Fairfax County officials are pushing to ban smoking at all public bus shelters, eight months after Virginia's restaurant-and-bar smoking ban went into effect. The ban would address the "health implications of breathing secondhand smoke," said Fairfax Supervisor Jeff C. McKay (D-Lee), the board's transportation committee chairman. Virginia's no-smoking law was approved by the General Assembly in February 2009 and went into effect last December. The District and Maryland have similar state laws regarding smoking in restaurants and bars. The Virginia Clean Air Act allows localities to institute "reasonable no-smoking areas" at publicly-owned or leased facilities and bus shelters qualify as buildings under Virginia's building code. The Board of Supervisors voted unanimously late Tuesday to draft an ordinance for final adoption. In December, Virginia joined the District, Maryland and dozens of other cities and states by effectively outlawing smoking inside restaurants and bars. Under the law, owners could allow smokers to


Smoking ban - Passive smoking - Board of Supervisors - Health - Tobacco

Reps. Gerald Connolly and Tom Perriello are both freshman Democrats from Virginia, and they vote together more often than not. But occasionally an issue will surface that makes clear that the two men represent very different districts and constituencies. At an event Wednesday morning sponsored by the centrist Democratic group Third Way, Connolly and Perriello split on the question that is causing tension within the Democratic caucus -- whether to extend President George W. Bush's tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans, or let them expire at the end of the year as scheduled. Connolly's Fairfax-based 11th district is the most affluent congressional seat in the country, based on median household income, and he warned his fellow Democrats that the issue might not be the slam-dunk some think it is. "I honestly think it's a danger," Connolly said of the tax debate. "I part ways, I think, with the dominant view


Virginia - Tom Perriello - United States - George W. Bush - Democratic Party

Gov. Bob McDonnell addresses the boy scouts at the 2010 jamboree. Photo courtesy of the governor's office President Obama may not be planning to speak at the 100th anniversay of the boy scouts' jamboree today in Virginia, but Gov. Bob McDonnell wouldn't miss it. McDonnell was a boy scout. His two sons were boy scouts. And his wife, Maureen, and all three of their daughters were girl scouts or brownies. The jamboree began this week at Fort A.P. Hill in Bowling Green, less than an hour from Richmond. Held at that location since 1981, it will the last time the event will be held in Virginia. In 2006, McDonnell (R) fought back against the ACLU, which tried to end the jamboree, arguing that the Defense Department's financial support of the event violates the separation of church and state. He called the lawsuit an "attack by the left wing on


Scout - Virginia - Fort A.P. Hill - Boy Scouts of America - Bob McDonnell

A new poll from Rasmussen Reports shows considerably stronger approval numbers for Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) than a poll released last week by Virginia Commonwealth University. The Rasmussen poll indicates that 64 percent of Virginia voters approve of McDonnell's performance as governor, with 29 percent approving strongly. Only 33 percent disapprove of his performance. Those numbers are essentially unchanged, the polling agency notes, since February, shortly after McDonnell took office. The poll showed McDonnell more popular with men than women, more popular with whites than African-Americans, and more popular with Republicans than Democrats. It indicated 68 percent of voters who do not affiliate with either party approve of his performance. The Rasmussen poll surveyed 500 likely voters. Households were surveyed using recorded messages rather than live interviewers--the Washington Post's polling unit believes the latter produces more accurate results. The VCU poll from last week used a combination of live and


Washington Post - Rasmussen - Virginia Commonwealth University - Republican - Democratic

We Americans love to lock people up.
As "The Economist" recently notes, the U.S. has an incarcerated population of 2.3 million, which is bigger than the entire population of individual 15 states. The rate of incarceration in the United Kingdom is one fifth of the U.S. a ninth what is is in Germany and a 12th of Japan's (assuming comparing the U.S. with other advanced industrialized countries doesn't defame them.)
With this as a backdrop, Virginia is about to start incarcerating even more people, but not necessarily Americans. They are foreigners who are undocumented or are here legally but have broken laws that can range from rape and murder to gambling or hoisting a brew in a public parking lot.
The newest depository for such people is in the small college town of Farmville which gained fame in the late 1950s for closing its entire school system rather than moving on with court-ordered integration. Next month a new $21 million facility operated by a private company opens to house foreign people.
The jail will house 584 immigrant detainees and eventually grow to 1,000 inmates with criminal records, some of whom will have been snagged by the federal "Secure Communities" program that uses advanced biometrics to identify foreign nationals or foreign-born individuals who might have criminal records.
But are we talking talking murder or loitering? The Web site of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency states that the program is supposed to tag only those with serious criminal records. But since 2008, according to a Texas immigration lawyer, it has been used to detain and deport thousands of undocumented workers for minor transgressions such as gambling.
The other curiosity about the jail is that its origin is as much a business opportunity for entrepreneurs as a public service. It is being built by the Richmond-based Immigration Company of America, which has no experience running prisons. The firm has operated a taxi service to haul detained immigrants from jail to court for several years.
ICA's executives include Richmond businessmen Ken Newsome, Warren Coleman and Russell Harper. Newsome is a prominent contributor to Republican political causes and was a major contributor to former Republican Gov. Jim Gilmore. When I wrote about ICA in September, its executives would not talk to me, referring my inquiry instead to Farmville Town Manager Gerald J. Spates -- an unusual way of handling public scrutiny, to say the least.
Furthermore, the ICA alien depot has been on shaky financial ground. A year ago, banks declined to finance it, and the firm has gotten funding from the public in the form of money received by Virginia in a 1998 settlement with four major tobacco companies.
To make up for its lack of experience ICA plans to hire away guards and other prison personnel from a state-run, regional jug a short distance away in the Farmville area. The ghost of one dead immigrant hangs over that facility, however,
In 2008, a German man named Guido R. Newbrough, an Air Force brat who had lived most of his life in the United States and resided in Northern Virginia, was picked up in a sweep of immigrants previously convicted of sex crimes. (The well-publicized effort was organized by then-attorney general Robert F. McDonnell.) After his 2002 sexual battery conviction, Newbrough served his sentence and underwent therapy, but he was arrested in the sweep nonetheless.
He died in a state detention jail in Farmville in November 2008 of a heart ailment after complaining to guards of pain. Fellow detainees say he was thrown to the ground and placed in isolation before his death.
The Right Wing Media Network would have us believe that jails like ICA's are needed because of the crime rampage caused by foreigners, legal or illegal. Such beliefs can only fuel the arguments of the anti-immigrant lobby.
But what are we really doing here? Arresting and detaining improperly documented bus boys? Or are they Hannibal Lecters who happen to speak Spanish? If we believe the Economist, it probably doesn't matter because we Americans like to lock up just about anyone.
What Virginia and the United States need is comprehensive immigration reform, not "private" prisons built partly with public money by politically connected businessmen who have never run a jail before.

Former Sen. George Allen (R), U.S. Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) and Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) have all confirmed that they will speak at Virginia's first annual Tea Party Convention in October, a convention organizer said today. Federation of Tea Party Patriots Chairman Jamie Radtke said 35 to 40 local chapters will be jointly hosting the event at the Richmond Convention Center on Oct.8-9. She said 3,000 to 5,000 participants are expected at the event, which will culminate with a presidential straw poll. There will also be seminars on history, current public policy and grass-roots activism. "The goal is for Tea Party people from all over Virginia to be able to meet each other and interact in fellowship," she said.


Ron Paul - Ken Cuccinelli - Virginia - George Allen - Tea

Northern Virginia officials are starting their own working group to tackle the bevy of funding and traffic concerns connected with the upcoming Defense Department base closure and realignment. Problem is, the so-called Northern Virginia BRAC (Base Realignment and Closure) Working Group sounds very similar to a group that has been formed -- one started by former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner (D) in 2005 and which handed down a series of overarching recommendations several months later (PDF). Funding issues and traffic concerns over the planned realignment of Defense jobs along the Interstate 95 corridor in Northern Virginia have lingered for years, and officials are still unsure where more than $400 million in needed ramps, widened roads and soundwalls will come from. But Alexandria officials have been particularly worried about the loss of thousands of jobs to Fairfax County areas because of the move.


Northern Virginia - Virginia - United States - Fairfax County Virginia - Alexandria Virginia

Gov. Bob McDonnell said Tuesday that he is pushing to privatize the state's 332 liquor stores because it can provide a "windfall" for Virginia's transportation needs. "I want to ask for public support on that because ... licensing the stores will generate a lot of money that I can put right upfront into transportation maintenance,'' McDonnell said on his monthly call-in radio show on WTOP this morning. McDonnell (R) is considering four ways to privatize the stores: selling all of the state's alcohol assets to a single company; having firms take over the state's existing stores; offering licenses to the businesses that sell beer and wine; and auctioning an undetermined number of licenses to the highest bidder. The governor said today that the proposal could bring in $300 million to $500 million (though he and his staff have previously mentioned higher estimates) while continuing to bring in as much as


Virginia - Bob McDonnell - Business - Wine - Privatization

A curious development:

At its peak last month, the oil slick was the size of Kansas, but it has been rapidly shrinking, now down to the size of New Hampshire. . . .

The numbers don’t lie: two weeks ago, skimmers picked up about 25,000 barrels of oily water. Last Thursday, they gathered just 200 barrels.

Still, it doesn’t mean that all the oil that gushed for weeks is gone. Thousands of small oil patches remain below the surface, but experts say an astonishing amount has disappeared, reabsorbed into the environment.

“[It’s] mother nature doing her job,” said Ed Overton, a professor of environmental studies at Louisiana State University.

Parts of the Chesapeake Bay are dirtier than an unflushed toilet. Six times dirtier, in fact.

The head of the Virginia Conference of the NAACP lashed out at Sen. James Webb (D-Va.) Monday, three days after Webb stirred controversy with an op-ed piece suggesting most government diversity programs should be abolished because they "marginalized" white Americans. In a Wall Street Journal column published Friday, titled "Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege," Webb complained that "the supposed monolith of White Anglo-Saxon Protestant dominance served as the whipping post for almost every debate about power and status in America." As he has repeatedly in the past, including during his 2006 campaign, Webb said that affirmative action programs made sense for African Americans who suffered from the legacies of slavery and Jim Crow laws but not for other ethnic groups and recent immigrants. Webb's column drew attention but did not spark much vocal criticism Friday, other than from former Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder. But now King Salim


Wall Street Journal - White Anglo-Saxon Protestant - Affirmative action - United States - African American

Gov. Bob McDonnell's jobs commission made 115 interim recommendations today when it met for its second time at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College in Richmond. Recommendations include the creation of a tourism development fund to provide gap financing for locally endorsed and supported tourism projects; the development of think tanks with academic institutions that carry on the economic strategies and target sectors at the state level; and the communication of regulatory and legislative changes to small businesses and entrepreneurs that affect their businesses. The full list can be found here. Commission "recommendations are very important to helping us decide what additional improvements and investments we need to make in our current economic development programs to make certain that we do everything we can to get Virginia's economy moving again," said Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, the state's chief jobs creation officer, who co-chairs the commission. McDonnell, who was just back from


Virginia - Bob McDonnell - Economic development - J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College - McDonnell Aircraft

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) will headline a fundraiser Monday evening for Patrick Murray, who is challenging U.S. Rep. Jim Moran (D) in Virginia's 8th Congressional District. Murray spokesman Michael Lane said 150 people have said they will attend the reception, which will be held at a private home in Alexandria and is expected to raise about $15,000 for Murray's campaign. The controversial and conservative attorney general could be considered an odd choice for a Republican candidate running against a 10-term incumbent in what is widely considered Virginia's most liberal district.


Virginia - Ken Cuccinelli - Congressional District - Attorney General of Virginia - Jim Moran

Andrew Breitbart gets Breitbarted:

When Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, chairman of the National Lieutenant Governor's Association, flies to Biloxi, Miss., this week for the group's annual meeting, he will get a first-hand look at the impact of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The conference planned more than a year ago, titled "Recovery, Rebuilding and Renewal," was to focus on emergency management but has taken on a new meaning in the face on the Deep Horizon accident. The lieutenant governors will hear from state officials and be offered a site visit as well as participate in several other days of meetings and events. The full schedule can be found here. Virginia taxpayers will pick up the tab for Bolling and Deputy Chief of Staff Mike Hardy. Cost for commercial airfare and hotel is about $2,500, according to Bolling's office. His wife, Jean Anne, will also travel with him but will pay her


Gulf of Mexico - Mississippi - Oil spill - Emergency management - Biloxi Mississippi

From The New Republic:

Gov. Bob McDonnell will speak to U.S. House Republicans Tuesday morning at the Capitol Hill Club, a GOP social club in Washington. Phil Cox, McDonnell's senior adviser, said McDonnell will speak about running a model campaign and delivering on his campaign promises in his first six months in office. Republicans, eager to duplicate McDonnell's success in the 2010 midterm elections, have been trying to line up the governor since his 17-point win over state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds in November. McDonnell was supposed to speak to U.S. House Republicans in January at their annual retreat, "Winning Back America," in Baltimore, but canceled at the last minute because of an impending snowstorm that was supposed to leave as much as a foot of snow in parts of the state. Tuesday night, McDonnell will headline a fundraiser for former state senator Dino Rossi, who is running against Democratic U.S. Sen. Patty Murray


United States - Republican - Washington - Capitol Hill Club - Baltimore

Here’s one from Chap Petersen. It’s rather more . . . deferential than one might expect if George Allen had written the same piece bewailing the plight of the downtrodden white man. 

Ditto the reaction from Vivian Paige.

Blue Virginia even calls it courageous. (Oh, and would have used some different adjectives, too.)

Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations!

WaPo is full of good stuff today!

Lets start with the front page of Business:

Household Economics writer Michelle Singletary (The Color of Money) sketches out “What Sherrod was telling us” in a column with that subtitle. The money graf:

There is a disturbing and widening gulf between the rich and the poor in America. And it would be even wider except for the fact that so many middle-income families have borrowed their way to a comfortable lifestyle. They are just a paycheck, a divorce or a heath crisis away from financial ruin.

Read it all here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/24/AR2010072400146_pf.html
Just for you, Peter.

By the way the online version of the story is titled “Race isn’t the problem – economic inequality is.”

This was the theme of Jim Bacon’s post “Webb Shatters the Mold” on Friday.

No one had commented on Observer’s note at end of the comment section on the Webb post. EMR suspects no one saw it so here is a copy:

“Peter:

“You should not be so stern with Mr. Bacon or Senator Webb.

“They are both trying to face the reality of the widening Wealth Gap and the fact that ‘affirmative action’ is being gamed by those at the top of the food chain with out respect to race.

“The question they are both trying to answer is: How can wealth be redistributed equitably?

“As Joseph Pulitzer said: “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings.”

“And Jawaharlal Nehru noted: “The forces in a capitalist society, if left unchecked, tend to make the rich richer and the poor poorer."

“Most of those who now have “a lot” got it by not paying their fair of the total cost and at the expense of either the less well to do or the environment.

“Give credit to Mr. Bacon for trying to find an answer.

“As Groveton says, it will be hard to do.

“Observer”

Perhaps it should have been:

“Give credit to Mr. Bacon for pointing out that Senator Webb is trying to find an answer.”

Item two from today’s WaPo:

On the same page as Singletary’s column there is one by Ezra Klein titled “Digging into finance’s pay dirt.” Klein argues that Broke, USA needs to be read along with The Big Short .

The later deals with what those at the top of the Ziggurat did to cause The Great Recession, Broke, USA documents what those in the middle and at the bottom did to provide the funds.

Same song, second verse: It is the little guy that is having to pay and, as someone said recently:

The Wealth Gap is not sustainable in a world with instantaneous communications, mass literacy and weapons of mass destruction.

EMR thought he had seen a second sentence for the Pulitzer quote cited by Observer. Sure enough it reads:

“The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.”

That is a perfect segue to a third item in today’s WaPo.

Check out this book review in the Outlook (Opinion) section: The review by Andrew Higgins is titled “China, a capitalist machine with a communist engine” about The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Rulers. (“China’s ruling party has disentangled itself from ideological chains.”)

Sounds like Pulitzer’s worst of all possible worlds.

Is it time to focus on Regional Resiliency, Import Replacement and DeGrowth?

EMR

Josh Dent is an early victim of Obamacare. The lanky, shaven-headed machine operator likes the medical insurance plan his employer, Acorn Sign Graphics, provides him. But under the newly enacted Affordable Care Act, his insurance policy will get less affordable. A provision in the law is putting his insurance company out of business, and whatever replaces Mr. Dent’s current policy will likely be much more expensive.

The way the 29-year-old sees it, Acorn will have to cut benefits or cut pay. One way or another, he figures, the switch to a new insurer will cost him.

Steve Gillispie, Acorn’s president, is distressed by this unexpected development. A year and a half ago, he was facing premiums of $150,000 from an established insurer, up from $80,000 just three years before. Then along came Richmond, Va.-based nHealth. The start-up company, launched with the mission of making consumer-driven health care a reality, rescued him with a plan that kept premiums below $90,000 yearly. The plan insured his 35 employees against hospital expenses, created a $1,500 deductible for doctors’ fees and set up health savings accounts (HSAs) for employees to pay for what the health plan did not. “For most employees,” Mr. Gillispie says, “it netted out money in the pocket.”

Lower insurance charges helped Acorn survive the recession without laying off any of its employees or cutting their compensation. Going back hat in hand to one of the dominant insurers in town, Mr. Gillispie fears, will add tens of thousands of dollars to his cost structure. Profit margins are tight in this slow-growth economy, but he hates to pass on the higher insurance costs to his employees, many of whom are paid $14 to $16 an hour. “Most of these people are living hand to mouth as it is,” he says. He still does not know what he will do.

Such is the unintended consequence of Obamacare, which overhauled the health care industry with the goal of making medical insurance more affordable and accessible to all. The provision that is causing Acorn Signs so much heartache is the so-called 80/20 rule, which requires all insurance plans to pay out at least 80 percent of premiums in benefits. The goal behind the rule is to punish insurers that let administrative expenses get out of hand. In practice, the law punishes innovative, entrepreneurial companies like nHealth that kept premiums low. Read the rest of the column here.

(This column was originally published Friday in the Washington Times, and has been republished on the Boomergeddon blog. Illustration credit: Alexander Hunter for the Washington Times.)

Perhaps it is the lure of the impossible -- everlasting life.  Perhaps it is the mind candy fun that religion is.  Perhaps it is the delusional mind-set inherent in the minds of religious believers.  Or, most likely, it is the failure of science teachers in the middle and high schools to impress upon their students the realities of the scientific method.

According to an online story, Scott Rigell will not debate Kenny Golden.  Why?  Fear is the only reason that crosses my mind.  It has been my experience that an unwillingness to talk is a sign of weakness of that person's stance.  Golden, Rigell fears, would expose the weakness of Rigell's stances on the issues.