Delaware Political Weekly: May 26-June 1, 2012
1. A Candidate For the Rest of Us?
To Be Determined. Long-time New Castle County employee Jonathan Husband announced that he would run for New Castle County Executive. Husband is the Engineering and Environmental Services Manager in the County’s Division of Special Services, and is also active in Fox Point civic activities. While I haven’t found him to be the most outgoing or responsive of public employees (I used to think, perhaps only half seriously, that you had to be special to get services from the Division of Special Services, as the Division didn’t exactly convey a great sense of urgency to constituents), he could well be the best alternative for the Anybody But Gordon Or Clark constituency, which includes me. I will be interested to see if he can put together a viable campaign in a relatively short amount of time, especially since he’s up against two people with campaigns going full-speed-ahead. Unsolicited memo to the candidate: Set yourself up as the alternative to incompetence and/or corruption of Clark and/or Gordon, and you’ve got a shot. If you don’t directly confront that dynamic of the race by contrasting yourself with Clark and Gordon head-on, you can’t win.
2. Where There’s A Will, There’s a McVay. And A Primary.
R’s are smelling Brad Bennett’s (alcohol-elevated) blood (level) in the electoral waters. You will recall that Ellis Parrott, a retired magistrate who has that Jim Vaughn bullet-head look, had filed as an R for Bennett’s 32nd District House seat. He now has company in the form of Will McVay, who has been regaling us with his definition of rent control over here. You may remember McVay for his pursuit of multiple ballot slots back in 2010. He reportedly sought more lines than Greg Allman had snorted. He’s now primarying the Parrotthead, while Brad Bennett hopefully isn’t wasting away again in Margaritaville.
3. Keith Spanarelli Has A Primary Opponent.
Tom Carper. Bet the Party’s not keeping his filing fee. Probably returning it to the banks that likely ponied it up as we speak. I’m begging you, Keith. Please do those “Who Is Keith Spanarelli?” billboards, maybe with a picture of Einstein pondering some eternal verity. Create an aura of mystery and intrigue. Don’t spoil the aura of mystery and intrigue by turning out to be someone who is…neither mysterious nor intriguing. Like the current empty suit (if you don’t count the $$’s bulging out of his pockets) occupying the Senate seat.
4. Lavelle Files for 4th Senatorial District.
He is expected to run against incumbent Sen. Michael Katz, although Katz has not yet filed, and you never know. Both campaigns have lots of $$’s in their respective coffers, and this should be quite the competitive race.
5. Rasslin’ Ron Faces Darryl Scott…
in a loser-leaves-town match? I hope not. Ron “The Honorable” Poliquin has signed on to ‘job out’ to Rep. Darryl “Dr. Destructo” Scott in a November matchup. Poliquin lost a Number One Contenders’ Match to Ron Smith in 2010, and Smith was pinned by Scott less than three minutes after the polls closed the bell rang. Look for Scott to dispose of Poliquin using Scott’s patented Bow-Tie Neckbreaker in November. (Ya gotta click the Scott link to understand that one…)
6. Sen. Marshall to Seek Reelection?
Sign points to ‘yes’. Rep. Helene Keeley, who would be Marshall’s most logical successor, has filed for reelection to her 3rd Representative District seat. I doubt that she would have done so unless she had pretty reliable information that Marshall has decided to run one more time.
7. Oy, McVay.
McVays come, McVays go. Will files for a House seat, and (presumed) brother Jess withdraws from the race for Kent County Register of Wills. To run his (presumed) brother’s campaign? Meaning that where there’s a Will, there’s a McVay, but where there are wills, there is no McVay. For today.
8. Filings, We Have Filings!
Incumbent D Senator Brian Bushweller (17th District); and Theo Gregory for President of Wilmington City Council.
That’s it for this week. What’d I miss, and whaddayathink?
Tags: El Somnambulo, Greg Lavelle Delaware, Jon Husband Delaware;, Keith Spanarelli Delaware, Rep. Darryl Scott Delaware, Ron Poliquin Delaware, Steve Tanzer Delaware, Will McVay Delaware
Jesse’s my Dad. Giving up the Wills race was supposed to be a gesture of good faith to the DEGOP allowing Mr. Parrott a graceful exit from the 32nd race. Some people have been preparing for this election since March of 2010, some of them have been preparing since Rep. Bennett’s misfortune. I fall into the former category. Unfortunately, the former magistrate didn’t go for the position as a clerk for the court of chancery, and his party was either unable or unwilling to show him the logic in that. I thought it made sense, but what are you going to do. I had intended to file in the Democratic primary before he showed up, but losing the Democratic primary and pretending to support him afterwards would have destroyed my soul.
Who REALLY cares about the Register of Wills race anyway? After Jesse filed, I heard talk from the DEGOP that both the state and county chairs were looking for a candidate to primary him. Over REGISTER OF WILLS! Jesse now carries the LP nomination for 16th Senate District and Governor. I also have the LP’s endorsement for the 32nd Rep District. If the DEGOP decides they REALLY don’t like libertarians running in their primaries, then we’ll need to have some cards to play. We may not be in a very good position to WIN on the Libertarian ballot line, but the DEGOP already blames (credits) us for their inability to perform in elections where we have a candidate. Why not take advantage of that perception?
The most important thing I’d like you all to keep in mind about my race is that even though I’m registered Republican and filed in their primary, that’s purely the result of ballot access and election laws passed in response to my 2010 election strategy. I’m still the Vice Chair for the Libertarian Party of Delaware. The DEGOP and I aren’t friends. They tried to kick me off of a committee I wasn’t even on back in April because they love me so much. I support none of their other candidates and giving them my pay to play filing fee required suppressing protests from my conscience.
Uh, OK.
Just giving you some more background, in case you wanted it.
There is no such position as clerk of the court of chancery. Register in Chancery was last an elected post about a decade ago. It’s now an appointed court job.
Are there any actual real, registered Libertarians in Delaware?
RoW is a clerk in the court of chancery, according to the Delaware Code.
http://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c025/index.shtml#2501
Yes, there are, enough of them to get ballot access, so some of us go through primaries to hit the incumbent parties where they live.
Will – that’s the duties, not the title. In Sussex, the ROW office is in a separate building from Chancery. It performs none of the typical “clerk” duties.
It would be nice if our utterly incompetent Department of Elections could be bothered to break out the party numbers, but the most they can do is show that “Others” are within 30-odd thousand votes of beating the Republicans.
I know it’s not the title, but it is, as you said, the duties. The RoW “shall act only as a Clerk of the Court of Chancery.” A former magistrate would be well suited to that, don’t you think?
Department of Elections does break out party registration totals if you ask for them. If you want an exact number, as of yesterday, there are 823 registered Libertarian Party of Delaware members. That doesn’t count the Libertarians registered with the GOP for Ron Paul’s campaign who didn’t get back during the window, or the libertarians registered Democrat, Republican, or unaffiliated because they don’t see the value in actually registering with the LP. There isn’t much of one, really…as long as we have 607 we’re on the ballot, and 5% obligates us to a taxpayer financed, state controlled primary. We consistently collect more votes than we have registered members, so I’m content with our numbers for now. Better organization would be helpful though.
With any luck, we can get enough of those “others” organized to finish suppressing the DEGOP and enable the DelDems to stop being…well…the way they are.
Shouldn’t have to ask for them. They should be tabulated in the online charts like for Ds and Rs.
Not going to disagree with you there. We’re obviously not as important as they are…
Some animals are more equal than others.
“He reportedly sought more lines than Greg Allman had snorted.” – Not brilliant, but a damn fine effort. Keep ’em coming.
“… where there’s a Will, there’s a McVay, but where there are wills, there is no McVay.” – Oy vey.
I was a registered Libertarian in the early ’90s. I’m pretty sure there were fewer than 100 of us in NCC at the time. Then I grew up.
I also got tired of weirdos showing up at my door asking me to attend a party meeting. Fuck you, creep! I just worked 14 hours/day, 6 days/week.
I think there’s just barely more than 100 now, but I’d have to check the numbers again to get you an exact count. We do still have some trouble getting people involved, but I’m calling 19 nominations out of our state convention this year an improvement on that.