Mike Ramone’s pesky creditors are at it again–this time to the tune of over $1 million. Not counting County sewer taxes. A dog-bites-man story if there ever was one, as the News-Journal probably has a standing hed on file for Ramone’s fiscal travails.
This is a great opportunity for D’s and I fully expect them to win…waitaminit, what’s that, Ramone is running unopposed? Really?
I blame Delaware Liberal, yes, our blog, for not pointing out how competitive this seat should be.
What’s that? We did? I did? You mean:
and here?
Ramone’s explanations, if one can call them that, call into question his ability to serve competently:
“Probably, I didn’t understand it (the terms of the loan) as well as I should have,” Ramone said. “Shame on me, that was my fault.”
and
Although he concedes “they have paperwork that I signed that says they are right,” Ramone said he had not requested that the swap be rewritten and called the bank’s action “a bait and switch.”Despite that, Ramone said, “Because I’m an elected official I kept paying them. … I thought it was the right thing to do.”
Can one read something into those statements other than (a) ‘I didn’t read or understand what I was signing’ and (b) ‘Had I not been a public official, I wouldn’t have paid them’?
Don’t worry, though. Ramone demonstrates that he’s capable of personal and professional growth, which is why, he claims, he deserves to be in office:
Ramone said this experience is “a learning curve for me that I think is extremely valuable” in his role as a legislator.“I can represent small-business people and say, ‘Let me tell you what we’re going through,’ ” he said.
Except, uh, for the inconvenient facts that Ramone’s much-chronicled money woes long predate the current economic downturn, and it’s not likely that many small business people want to have this serial debtor speaking for them in Dover.
Seriously, can some ‘responsible’ Democratic official explain to me how this serial debtor was allowed to escape w/o an opponent? As Shakespeare (I think) once wrote, “The past is prologue.”
The 21st RD Committee and whomever is responsible for candidate recruitment at the state or county party level have handed a seat to the R’s that should have been theirs for the taking.
The proper term, if I read the small print properly, is ‘political malpractice’.