Monthly Archives: April 2010

KWS Pre-Game Show

This afternoon is the hearing in Dover about the Insurance Commissioner’s job performance. The hearing is supposed to cover the denial of coverage for stress tests for Delaware residents and the Captive Insurance Bureau but I imagine a lot of issues will arise in the hearing. I know that our very own liberalgeek plans on attending so you might see live coverage right here on the blog.

The News Journal adds some fuel to the fire by publishing two front page articles on the IC’s office. One article is about the how the denial of a stress test by the same company that was evaluating requests by BCBS of Delaware may have led to a death. The other article covers some of KWS’s hiring practices, including the hiring of Kinion for the Captive Insurance Bureau and some shoddy RFPs. As you no doubt know, here at Delaware Liberal we discussed the shoddy RFPs last year. See posts here, here, here, here, here and here.

Delaware Insurance Commissioner Karen Weldin Stewart failed to conduct a publicly advertised search last year before handing out state consulting contracts worth more than half a million dollars annually to three people to run the Bureau of Captive and Financial Insurance Products.

Stewart and members of her staff acknowledge that no formal proposals were sought before contracts were signed with the consultants, who were supporters of Stewart’s 2008 election campaign.

Hey, we’re glad the News Journal finally noticed but these issues have been occuring since Stewart came into office.

Her office is a separate branch under the state Constitution from the executive branch topped by the governor and may not be subject to Office of Management and Budget regulations requiring formal bidding for such service contracts. OMB officials directed requests for clarification to a section of state code that did not clearly resolve the question.

Stewart’s office ultimately did issue requests for proposals (RFPs) for two positions — one for a lawyer, another for a marketer — after contracts were signed. That came after a request for RFPs by OMB. The requests for proposals elicited no response.

The IC’s office may be treated separately under Delaware’s Constitution but that doesn’t mean it’s not subject to oversight. Oversight is desperately needed in this case and I hope one outcome of today’s hearings is that the legislature addresses these loopholes.

Military Tea Party

What could possibly go wrong with this?

A new Tea Party group, Armed Forces Tea Party Patriots, has grown quickly since being launched last month by an active duty Marine Corps sergeant. The group, which vows to “stand up on the very soil we defended to preserve common sense conservatism and defend our Constitution that is threatened by a tyrannical government,” currently has over 400 members, who have signed up through its Facebook page, though many are not active duty military. And it has close ties to the broader Tea Party movement.

One of the things I’ve always admired about the Military was their ability to serve in a generally un-partisan fashion.  I’ve known liberal and conservative Military men and women, and when it came to politics duty always came first.  Pretty impressive.  Until now…

My oath was to the Constitution, not to the politicians, and that oath will be kept. I wont’ “Just follow” orders. There is at this time a debate within the ranks of the military regarding their oath. Some mistakenly believe they must follow any order the President issues. But many others do understand that their loyalty is to the Constitution and to the people…

Scary stuff.  Not because I completely disagree with the statement, but because this Military Tea Party is using these words politically.  This group isn’t concerned about the Constitution – or else they would have come into being during the Bush Administration.  This group is just more Republicans having a temper tantrum over losing an election.

To me, another impressive trait among soldiers is their unity.  They stick together, which is vital in combat.  So how does this Military Tea Party add to the camaraderie?  In my opinion, it doesn’t.  It takes a fundamentally cohesive group and divides it.  And I have to wonder how much an Obama-voting soldier can count on a Tea Party soldier in a foxhole?

Another Tea Party Racist

Carl Paladino is a prominent Republican developer in Buffalo, New York. He’s a member of the Tea Party and has decided to run for governor. From Paladino’s own website:

Mr. Paladino, 63, delivered a Palinesque populist message to a boisterous group of about 1,000 flag-waving supporters here, denouncing what he said was the government’s deepening encroachment into the lives of ordinary Americans.

“I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!” Mr. Paladino told a roaring crowd that had gathered at the Ellicott Square Building in downtown Buffalo, one of several office complexes in his commercial real estate empire in western New York.

“The government is in shambles, and we’re paying for it in unbearable taxes far, far above the national average,” he added. “Are you mad? Are you gonna take it anymore?”

The headline on Paladino’s website says “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

WNYmedia.com obtained a large batch of emails that Paladino had sent to a large group of people, including many prominent Republicans (the head of the Erie County Republican party, a Republican Congressmen and several Republican members of the state government are included). The emails are extremely racist, sexist and many are pornographic. [The link is NSFW– don’t click at work]

It’s been written countless times that Republican gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino is something of a walking contradiction. But let’s take him at his word that the tragic death of his son Patrick in 2009 caused him to re-assess his life, his past, and his values. He transformed politically from a fence-sitting opportunist to the conservative Republican tea-party-type he holds himself out as today. In his plea to the Conservative Party, seeking their endorsement, he touted his anti-abortion, anti-gay-marriage stances. He’s all about the family values, and even counted Governor Paterson’s admitted affair as evidence of Albany corruption – until the media found out about his own extramarital affair and child birthed out of wedlock.

…

Paladino purports to be the values candidate, but what will values voters say when they discover that he enjoys sending hardcore pornographic and racist emails around town?

Last week, we received a deluge of emails that Carl Paladino had sent to a veritable who’s who of Buffalo-area politicians, media types, hangers-on, hacks, and appointees. Mostly, these are chain emails with a long provenance, including hundreds of email addresses of current and past recipients.

Among the the emails sent around were a video of African dancers titled “Obama Inauguration Rehearsal” which originated on the Stormfront neo-Nazi website, a video of monkeys doing Irish-type dancing titled “Proof the Irish discovered Africa.” He sent some racist pictures as well including a photoshopped picture of the Obamas as a pimp and prostitute:

This is the least offensive image I could find in the Paladino emails. Why do these guys bleat on about family values when it’s obvious they don’t believe in them? Paladino did get at least one complaint about the emails from a recipient and his response was along the lines of I’m not racist, I hate everyone and Stephen Colbert’s “I don’t see color.”

Late Night Video — Big Bang Theory

Wingnuts swung into full manufactured outrage when President Obama announced the terms of the new START treaty he signed with the Russians. (The media wasn’t too far behind — I heard alot of factually wrong BS about this agreement once it was announced.) But here’s Jon Stewart reminding everyone that even St. Ronnie announced a goal of a world of No Nukes and showing up the real ridiculousness of the manufactured outrage. Keep this in mind as you hear these guys go to town with the usual fear and deception:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
The Big Bang Treaty
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Mike Castle Is A Hypocrite, Part Eleventy Billion

Unlike nemski, I like this new guy with the Coons campaign. He came out swinging today against Castle’s complete hypocrisy. Castle, who’s voted against providing jobs through stimulus and against unemployment benefits, is hosting a jobs fair.

“Congressman Castle voted against job creation many times before deciding to hold another jobs fair,” said Coons Communications Director Dave Hoffman. “This is another example of the Congressman trying to have it both ways. While I commend the Congressman for setting aside his anti-job voting record for a moment in order to take time helping out-of-work Delawareans identify job opportunities, people in this state are smart enough to realize they can do better than electing a U.S. senator who says one thing in Delaware and casts votes against their interests in Washington.”

Way to go Coons campaign! The story has already been picked up by the News Journal blog as well.

Teapartiers Less Popular Than the IRS

This can’t be possible! That’s what you are thinking, right? Well, you would be wrong. Because a FOX Noise poll tells me so:

Interesting, yes? Even while we have wingnuts and teabaggers in our own midst who would find something AOK with the killing of an IRS employee and the destruction of government property. This week teabaggers everywhere will be strutting their astroturfed and government subsidized stuff protesting taxes. They will claim that Americans are angry and fed up and just plain over a government that over taxes them. So when you hear that round of BS, remember this poll. This Fox Noise poll that indicated pretty clearly that Americans aren’t nearly as impressed with the Teabaggers as they are with the IRS.

Facepalm of the Day

In today’s Delaware Dialog, there is a post by Ginger Gibson that I have two issues with.

  1. David Hoffman, new to the Chris Coon’s Senate campaign, had his laptop stolen . . . from his car on Concord Pike. Leaving your laptop in your car?! In my humble opinion this makes Hoffman too dumb to work for Coons. Please, please send Hoffman back to DC.
  2. The headline of the post reads, “Small, wonder, big-city crime” is totally misleading. Big-city crime is now defined as the simple stealing of a halfwit’s laptop? Nah, not even close.

Well, the good news out of all of this is that sans-laptop, Hoffman’s ability to reek moronic havoc on the Coons’ campaign is severely limited.

Monday Open Thread

*Sigh* It’s Monday. I wasn’t quite ready for the weekend to end, but the weekend is always too short. At least it’s time for your open thread, so that means your Monday is already half over! What’s on your mind?

George Will admits that conservatives want activist judges. They want the right kind of activist judge – one that overturns laws conservatives don’t like.

On ABC’s This Week, conservative columnist George Will criticized conservatives for saying that they want judges who will strictly follow the law while simultaneously cheering decisions that overturn the work of elected officials:

There’s another test, and it’s wielded by my conservatives, and I think it’s mistaken. And that is, they say they’re against judicial activism. By which they mean they want the court to defer to the elected political branches of government. But if you look at what’s happened recently, the decision that most outraged conservatives was the Kelo decision on eminent domain. … The court did defer to the city government in Connecticut and it enraged conservatives. The recent decision that most pleased conservatives — Citizens United, overturning part of McCain-Feingold — was the court not deferring to the Senate.

That Mike Huckabee is quite a charmer. He gave an interview to a college newspaper and stated that gay adoption is an experiment and that gay marriage is like drug use, incest and polygamy.

“I think this is not about trying to create statements for people who want to change the basic fundamental definitions of family,” Huckabee told The Perspective, a magazine at The College New Jersey. “And always we should act in the best interest of the children, not in the seeming interest of the adults.”

“Children are not puppies,” he said. “This is not a time to see if we can experiment and find out, how does this work?”

…

“You don’t go ahead and accommodate every behavioral pattern that is against the ideal,” he said. “That would be like saying, well, there are a lot of people who like to use drugs, so let’s go ahead and accommodate those who want who use drugs. There are some people who believe in incest, so we should accommodate them. There are people who believe in polygamy, so we should accommodate them.”

At least if Huckabee runs for president again, we don’t have to worry about his superficial charm. His basic character is now out in the open for everyone to see.

At Least He’s Consistent

I’m not sure why National Review‘s John Derbyshire doesn’t get more attention from the blogosphere. He’s not as prominent as other conservatives but he is a fountain of misinformed cultural commentary. We talked about Derbyshire once before when he released a book and included a chapter about how women’s suffrage should be repealed. Derbyshire has also written about how the breasts of women in their 30s are hideous and women’s attractiveness is all downhill after the age of 19.

For reasons beyond my comprehension, Derbyshire was invited by the Black Law Students’ Association at the University of Pennsylvania Law School to give an address. He shared his “wisdom” with the group:

When the organizers first emailed me to suggest I appear on the panel, I told them that this is my view of the matter. I said that I was flattered to be invited to speak at such a prestigious institution, and that, having two teenage children, I am always glad to get out of the house for a few hours; but that racial disparities in education and employment have their origin in biological differences between the human races. Those differences are facts in the natural world, like the orbits of the planets. They can’t be legislated out of existence; nor can they be “eliminated” by social or political action.

How very “Bell Curve” of him. I’m amazed that the students didn’t walk out of the room after that statement. Perhaps they were curious to see how far he’d go with his hypothesis.

He tries to explain it “scientifically:”

First, the rational grounds. If a species is divided into separate populations, and those populations are left in reproductive isolation from each other for many generations, they will diverge. If you return after several hundred generations have passed, you will observe that the various traits that characterize individuals of the species are now distributed at different frequencies in the various populations. After a few ten thousands of generations, the divergence of the populations will be so great they can no longer cross-breed; and that is the origin of species. This is Biology 101.

Our species separated into two parts 50, 60, or 70 thousand years ago, depending on which paleoanthropologist you ask. One part remained in Africa, the ancestral homeland. The other crossed into Southwest Asia, then split, and re-split, and re-split, until there were human populations living in near-total reproductive isolation from each other in all parts of the world. This went on for hundreds of generations, causing the divergences we see today. Different physical types, as well as differences in behavior, intelligence, and personality, are exactly what one would expect to observe when scrutinizing these divergent populations.

I think he might be trying to say that races are different subspecies or something. I’m not sure where Derbyshire is getting his “facts” but there are many scholarly papers and books debunking the racism of books like the “Bell Curve.”

I looked online to see if there were any accounts of his speech, but could only find Derbyshire’s own account. His contention was that the moderator was mean:

My ten-minute address consisted of (a) five minutes of unfiltered race realism, right between the eyes, followed by (b) a plea to turn to good old American individualism and stop obsessing about group outcomes. This was followed by a sort of stunned silence, into which Madame Moderator interjected the remark that “Mr. Derbyshire is here as a private guest of Prof. Wax, not at the invitation of the BLSA.” This was not true. BLSA invited me, and I have the email trail to prove it. To his credit, David Williams, the BLSA officer who’d invited me, came up afterwards and apologized for the immoderate demeanor of our “moderator.”

This was followed by a sort of stunned silence – heh, I’ll bet.

Castle Fundraising Fails to Meet Expectations

“Our fundraising is pretty steady — it goes along at about a million dollars a quarter, and I expect that to continue in the next few quarters,” Castle told CQ Politics.

Well, I guess $826,000 is “about a million dollars a quarter.” But if there is one thing you don’t do in politics is throw precise words around when you really want some wiggle spin ready room. You don’t throw out the term “million dollars” if you do not expect to raise more than a million dollars. Like in Star Trek, when Engineer Montgomery Scott always multiplied his repair time estimates by a factor of four, so that he would be a miracle worker in Captain Kirk’s eyes. In political fundraising, you want to lowball your expectations so it is a story of success when your numbers are released. Here, you can argue that Castle failed to meet his own fundraising expectations. And if there is one thing in politics you don’t do is fail to meet your own self imposed expectations.

Now, $826,000 is an impressive figure by itself, out of context. But when you consider that Castle had over an extra month to fundraise this quarter over Coons (since Coons did not file his candidacy papers until February 2 or thereabouts), he only managed to outraise Coons by $191,000 in that extra time. Coons raised $635,000 from February 2 until March 30. If you average that haul over three months, as if Coons had filed his FEC papers on January 1, he would have raised $952,500, far closer to that “about a million dollars” benchmark, and more than Castle. Imagine those headlines.

If only Beau Biden had not waited from Thanksgiving until late January to announce his decision not to run.

Still, in that context, this is a very competitive money race.