“Blind Skwerl” Ron Williams Finds Nut Re Ad-gate; Shills For Tom Gordon
This is just a quick link with a note that I’m sure we’ll be talking about Rong Wiliams column this for a bit.
One of my fellows can revise and update this post, but let me just say that Williams has been so wrong for so long that I don’t have a teacup’s worth of faith in his “internal poll” reading abilities.
One more thing. I think Rong’s treatment of Protack is a bit much. Mike P did nearly beat Jan Ting. I mean, I’d say that he is at least a cut above Mike Miller.
And Mike Miller was your endorsed candidate. Twice.
Mike Protack’s near defeat of Jan Ting wasn’t about a surge in his own popularity. We ran a single-issue law professor, who was wishy-washy on life/choice. If he was a Democrat, we’d have been salivating. Please note that I like Jan Ting – he just doesn’t make a good candidate.
At this point I think Rong’s treatment of Protrack is in danger of adding to Mike’s anti-hero brand image.
If I were a Republican I’d be inclined to vote for Mike P as a way of telling Williams to go jump in a lake.
If you were a Republican, I’d go jump in a lake.
/Snark
Actually, let’s give this a try.
The other guy in the Dem primary, Mike Miller, doesn’t stand a chance and everybody knows it except, of course, him.
“whatshisname”
Jason, I think that wRong’s poll-read is quite apt. Wassa matta? DLC Golden Boy’s aggressive tax increases do matter to New Castle Countians. That he is joined at the hip with all of Pam Scott-Paul Clarky’s land use code dilutions is something yet to get much press play (Basiouny is unlikely to report anything that taints Coons) so it can’t be factoring into the negatives Coons is getting.
I am surprised that Progressive DEMs like Coons so much. He is a great speaker. I will give him that.
Bring Tom back he did a great job and was a victim of a Bushie AG
I don’t know what is more absurd. Gordon running again or you supporting him Nancy.
Remember that Protack has threatened Williams and the NJ with lawsuits before, specifically for this characterization four years ago:
Radio for the homeless
There is no greater waste of time in this political year than listening to WDEL’s Rick Jensen trying to fake a legitimate interview with bogus Republican candidate for governor Mike Protack. Jensen, who more often than not comes off as one of the more politically knowledgeable talk show hosts in the state, needs to lighten up on the Federal Communication Commission fairness doctrine and realize that Protack is a spooky, unmoving candidate whose monotone makes for awful radio.
That Jensen legitimizes Protack’s bizarre candidacy is a first in the annals of Delaware politics. We’ve always had our wacko candidates, tolerated and ignored at the polls by clear- thinking voters, but Protack is uniformly disliked by other card-carrying Republicans. Democrats love him.
Even Dave Graham, the mysterious third candidate for the Republican nomination – is he still a candidate? – has stayed behind the scenes doing whatever luckless wannabes do.
When Protack announced his candidacy for governor to an unimpressed small crowd on the street in front of the law offices of Fuqua & Yori on Return Day four years ago, no one took him seriously. Even fewer take him seriously today. Protack got his latest shot on the Jensen show after he called in — as he’s done before — to rebut statements or ask questions of Jensen’s guest. In this case the guest was Bill Lee, the endorsed Republican candidate for governor.
According to accounts, Jensen had the sense to cut Protack out and promised him another day of free babbling.
In Protack’s defense, he does have one known road sign, planted in a state right-of-way off Rockland Road and Del. 141. One day that sign will be as worthless as the faded Fed Theft and George Wallace stickers that can still be seen on rotting utility poles.”
My, how times have changed. Four years ago, Mike Protack was a crank, and Dave Graham was a non-entity. Today… well, today no one would confuse Rick Jensen with being “politically knowledgable.”
Yeah, supporting Gordon taints Nancy’s good government street cred.
Forget Williams. Check out the front page love letter to Gordon.
Nancy should be given a pass. It’s not that she loves Gordon, it’s that she hates Coons.
Liz Allen, of course, is another story altogether.
I didn’t the dead tree edition today. Is it bad?
What’s with the NJ’s love affair with Gordon. I know WIlliams is a willing dupe – but Gordon can;t have the whole place snowed…can he?
Al Messcitti is the other story. Al can’t seem to get his facts straight. You can check out his rantings on Indepth Delaware July edition.
Rather than deal with the issue of Family Court, and John Flagherty as our guest, telling the truth about all the work that was done by him, Karen Hartley Nagle and the horrific family court system, Al as he is notorious for, takes a shot at Gordon.
I hope you will all read Messcittis comments and then read Susan Gordons commentary, and tell me if you still believe Al has “all the truth” on all subjects.
Al, rather than your silly sneak attacks that Liz Allen is another story all together….want get more specfic? I see your ability to read my mind, and the internal workings of my computer and research are haunting you.
You have a “dog in the fight” and the dog is the News Journal and its creepy, shadowy, yellow journalism. The fact that NJ would not retract an issue that is a proven fact, see Susans Gordons comments, says a great deal.
Sure, Liz, I’ll get more specific. You’re a joke — a long-running, unfunny joke that never ends. You believe anything anyone tells you as long as it hints at deep, dark secrets and conspiracies against “we the people.” You’re a leftover ’60s radical wannabe who never lets a lack of facts or perspective get in the way of proclaiming her own brilliance. And of course, you’ve never done anything to support your wildly overinflated ego.
Have I left anything out?
Actually, I don’t hate Coons or even Clark particularly. I do hate Pam Scott…heh.
The greed of Saul Ewing is a slime that seems to be the joyful beverage of county government from executive to council. We have a problem here folks and your pocketbook and your quality of life is yours to lose.
I interrogated Gordon for six hours over three meetings before endorsing him for executive. Juxtaposing his background in providing the UDC and growth-control against their total reversal of the last four years left the equation in favor of dumping Coons and Clark for Gordon and Dunn. It’s the math not the personalities.
I never thought it was about personalities — Gordon wins that battle hands down. When I say you don’t like Coons, I don’t mean his personality — I mean his policies and action.
This is about what people are willing to overlook. You interviewed him for six hours. Great. But how much time has elapsed? It was years before I found out some of the things Gordon told me were lies. And, of course, he has spread lies directly about me — the one repeated over at DWA is just the latest iteration of one he has spread for years. That I find quite difficult to forgive.
I also find difficult to forgive the fact that Tom Gordon has never even accepted responsibility, let alone blame, for any of his actions. It’s always someone else’s fault. For all his shortcomings, Coons at least takes responsibility for what he’s done, without justifying it by saying “Everyone before me did the same thing” or “Everyone’s picking on me.”
And by the way, the UDC is not the unalloyed force for good you seem to believe it is. It is an incumbent protection plan — by never allowing council to vote against a project that makes it through land use, all you have to do is rig up the land-use department and presto! Your project cannot be stopped. Yes, it removes the expense of lawsuits — but those were often the only way of delaying or killing projects that met the rules but were unpopular with the neighbors.
What amazes me is the absolute lack of leadership the GOP is showing by not going after the ‘vulnerable’ races, such as County Executive, Insurance Commissioner, various Dem Senators. Instead, it appears they’re putting all their time and effort behind Lee, who may have his good points, but is one of those horses who can post 99-1 odds and still not get a bet.
Dist: I think it’s because they don’t have any choice. And I’m not sure it’s bad leadership when nobody steps forward to run in these races, unless by bad leadership you mean the failure to recruit and nurture young prospects 10 years ago.
Consider this. Across the country Republicans are in disarray because their most conservative members spent the past 12 years trying to purge the party of moderates. This hit particularly hard in Delaware, where a majority of the upstate Republicans are socially moderate. Now that the country is turning away from the divisive culture wars, the GOP is screwed because they don’t have other issues.
For the local expression of this schism, look no further than Mike Protack. He started out as a social conservative, and though he’s added layers of camouflage over the years, it still shows through sometimes — witness his blue-nosed swipe at Bill Lee for bar-hopping. Delaware’s GOP has never been dominated by social conservatives (indeed, the national party never was, either, which is why it’s willing to look the other way at all the closeted gay Republicans in Washington), and it doesn’t want Protack to win because it would make the party even less able to compete.
The GOP’s problem is that the conservative takeover of the party has led to a situation where you practically have to take a loyalty oath to get in. You can’t be uncommitted on Roe v. Wade, you must oppose it. You can’t be of the opinion that the government sometimes needs to raise cash through taxes; you must oppose that. And on and on it goes, through a gauntlet of issues that would have any rational person saying, “Who needs this much grief to join a party that’s outnumbered 2 to 1 in the first place?”
*years of no increase in taxes a county surplus upgraded county services . who else can match his record. None other than Tom Gordon so put your petty hatred aside and admit that the county functioned better under his stewardship .
It’s not petty hatred, TT. Yes, he worked the county machinery better than anyone before or since. But one of the reasons he did and could was the political power he amassed by inserting himself into electoral politics. The ends do not justify the means.
“For all his shortcomings, Coons at least takes responsibility for what he’s done, without justifying it by saying “Everyone before me did the same thing” or “Everyone’s picking on me.”
Your take is friendlier than mine on this. He does say that Gordon never left him w/ a surplus but w/ a deficit, although Chancery Court determined in the suit that Korn brought against the county that Gordon did indeed leave a surplus. That settles it as far as I’m concerned–a court of equity certified surplus.
Therefore, who is Coons blaming for HIS deficit problem? In today’s paper he blames Gordon in part. I don’t get it.
Take a look at where Coons has been dumping some of the money:
In a storm water amnesty program that spent down millions to fix problems tied to bad facilities (the developers should have been held in ‘clean hands’ liability if not the communities) in order to make room for all of the infill and extra growth in norther NCC.
In the wasteful comp plan process that was a sham. The end results were mostly what the county and development lobby were already asking for.
In continuous construction of ‘good enough for now’ facilities like the millions that went into expanding the Hockessin Library when there is a PAL Center across the road to have accomodated the needed usage. And the now-building of a brand new Kirkwood HWY Library. Where is was not very large, was it necessay to spend so much in a full scale replacement when there are so many small and servicable libraries in the system and none in much of developing southern NCC?
The squanderous over-runs on the new public safety building in Minquadale. Is there no spending controls in place in this adminstration?
Not to mention the huge salaries of Coons’ election staffers and HIGH DEM pals and the fantastic pensions they are pulling out of tax coffers.
Dana: When DEFAC talks about a “surplus” (or a deficit for that matter), it’s referring to a single year’s budget — that is, when the state had a $200 million deficit, it was the gap in funds coming in vs. going out this year. Back in the ’90s, when the state had a surplus, that referred to revenue over and above expenditures for that year.
When the Gordon administration reported a “surplus,” it wasn’t in per-year budgeting; they were reporting the amount of money the county had in the bank. For several years in the ’90s, the county brought in far more than it spent, allowing it to bank this extra cash. (By its own definition of a “surplus,” in fact, the Gordon administration entered office with a surplus of nearly $100 million, the amount that was supposed to be kept in a separate sewer fund, as I understand it). When it refers to the surplus it built up, the Gordon administration follows its own, non-standard-understanding usage of the term. Indeed, if you look back at the news stories of the period, you’ll see that the county never reported its budget in the same way other governments do.
The county began spending more than it took in two years before the end of Gordon’s second term. In his last year, expenditures exceeded revenues, IIRC, by something like $7 million. It used the money in the bank — the so-called surplus — to plug the gap. It’s still doing that.
Again, it’s been years since I looked at this stuff and I’ve cleaned out those files, but IIRC the turning point on this came right after Gordon’s re-election, when the county started hiring more people and gave a new round of contracts to the unions. Coons laid all this out when he got elected — unchecked, the county would now be spending about $35 million a year more than revenue, and that estimate was before the housing crash.
Gordon didn’t care, because after the end of his second term he was supposed to be preparing for a run for governor, and it was going to be fueled by the vote-gathering union machine he built up. You can see the residue of its effects in the two unions who have endorsed him.
I don’t for one second believe he has some secret plan for turning around the county’s finances. The first time around he benefited not just from a robust economy but political ties to a number of prominent Democrats in Dover, particularly Bob Gilligan. Because Gordon commanded fear and respect for his ability to get “volunteers” from the unions to help win elections, he got people like Gilligan to help engineer the state takeover of “nonperforming assets” that got a lot of expenses off the books, and the re-jiggered transfer tax formula that gave the counties an extra one-half percent of that revenue.
What Korn won his lawsuit on was the fact that there was nothing in county law allowing the buildup of so much cash in the bank. Before the last year of his administration, when Gordon scandalously gave away tens of millions of taxpayer dollars at no benefit to county taxpayers, the “surplus” in the bank amounted to more than 100% of the county’s annual budget. In other words, money that could have been given back to taxpayers in the form of reduced taxes was stockpiled for use by Gordon, and use it he did. One of the court findings that was underreported was the annual inclusion of something like $5 million in funds that could be used at the county executive’s discretion — “slush funds,” as Korn termed them. These were the funds that a News Journal story in the ’90s was referring to when it showed all sorts of purchases were being made outside the normal bidding process.
Try being more open-minded. He’s never going to tell you the straight truth, Dana, and he’s a very charming guy.
“In April 2005, after an audit report disclosed the existence of a $650,000 surplus in the County’s Light Tax Fund, the trial court allowed Korn to supplement his complaint
by adding a challenge to the Light Tax Fund surplus.”
page 4
http://courts.delaware.gov/opinions/(bnka0fbrx4l3haaefgpnu455)/download.aspx?ID=90020
I don’t think the question is IF Gordon left office w/ a surplus but, rather, the telling question is why is it so important to DENY that Coons left office w/ a surplus. What critically hangs on that denial?
I don’t understand the question.
Al: you are a heartless, angry little man who actually believes your own stories. When someone puts a little fact in your face, you call it “irrelevant”. You need to do a little soul searching Al, you are obsessed with the Gordon story! You are obsessed against anyone who supports him, and demonize everyone who does.
Fact is Al, Gordon caught you on your incorrect little story at the NJ, and you were sent home to write a column.
Now you can be as venomous as you wish. I know for a fact that you have tried to slime me, with your factless demonizations, trying to paint me as you do everyone who objects to your so called “vast knowledge”.
If I were Susan Gordon I would sue the shit out of you. You an a radio talk show host (meaning you can make up lies from whole cloth, and spread them as truth), an entertainer (and not really great at that), you are rarely prepared and deliver “fluff pieces” as news.
You use the public airways as your “public denounization chamber”, believing you are the “Star Chamber”, and your so called words of wisdom, and vast knowledge gives you the right to ruin people’s reputations, just cuz you feel like it.
I feel sorry for you Al, you really need to up the meds!
“Fact is Al, Gordon caught you on your incorrect little story at the NJ, and you were sent home to write a column. ”
Anyone with a grain of sense would know this isn’t true. You don’t get “sent home to write a column” because a major story has a couple of minor errors in it. Indeed, I’ll be happy to go into the details of that story on this morning’s show, because Mr. Gordon is lucky he wasn’t indicted for some of the actions taken with county credit cards. Thank you for bringing it back up so I can further discredit Mr. Gordon for his brazen behavior.
Quite frankly, Liz, this story you are peddling is a lie, and if anyone sues anyone, it’s going to be me suing you and Mr. Gordon for continually spreading it. Mr. Gordon has been informed that this isn’t true and he keeps spreading it. You, of course, have no money, so you aren’t worth suing. Mr. Gordon is another story.
You are a vicious, petty person with anger-management issues, who personally attacks anyone who disagrees with you, and pretty much everyone in Delaware knows it. You and Tom Gordon deserve each other.
very interesting stuff here.
i agree, Williams is in the wrong.