Tag Archives: Mike Castle

Mike Castle: Pro-Repeal?

Mike Castle held a fundraiser with pro-repeal Republican Senator Orrin Hatch. The Republican discipline on health care reform is starting to disappear though. Some Republicans like Mitt Romeny (who is having trouble explaining why the MA individual mandate is o.k. but the national mandate is not), Rep. Mike Pence and Sen. Jim DeMint want a complete repeal. Other Republicans just want to repeal part of it. And in a move that we didn’t see coming, but should have, Chuck Grassley is now trying to take credit for the bill. Grassley has obviously been reading from Castle’s playbook.

The DSCC and the Delaware Democratic Party are asking the obvious question: Mike Castle where do you stand?

“Republicans in Washington want their Senate candidates to run on the repeal of health care reform, and many like Mark Kirk, Kelly Ayotte, and Trey Greyson have succumbed to the pressure from the establishment,” said Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Communications Director Eric Schultz. “Others, like Mike Castle, Jane Norton, and John Boozman have dodged the question. We believe that every Republican should be clear on if they would support the repeal of health care reform if elected to the Senate. If Mike Castle is going to look voters in the eye and pledge to repeal health care reform which will have afforded coverage to 109,000 Delawareans, eliminated the doughnut hole for seniors, offered tax credits to small businesses, lowered the deficit, and ended appalling insurance practices – then good luck to him.”

“Castle has already shown he is completely beholden to his caucus, with votes to defeat this health reform bill, the recovery act, and even a recent bill to bring more jobs to Delaware,” said Katie Ellis, Communications Director for the Delaware Democratic Party. “Now that key members of his caucus have vowed to repeal the bill, will Castle stand with them or middle-class Delawareans? Delaware voters have a right to know Castle’s position on this issue.”

Of course, it shouldn’t really be a question. Mike Castle voted against the health care reform bill, just like every other Republican in Congress. For a reminder, take a look at what a repeal would do:

Seniors

– An immediate $250 rebate for the roughly 24,800 Delaware seniors who will hit the Medicare Part D ‘donut hole’ would be revoked
– 140,000 seniors will see higher Medicare premiums and have to pay more for preventive health care

State Budget

– $1.12 billion in affordability tax credits to 69,400 Delawareans would be forfeited*
– $395 million in federal Medicaid funding would be lost*

Small Businesses

– 10,500 small businesses will not get tax credits to help them afford coverage for their employees this year.

Individuals

– Insurance companies will continue to deny coverage to the estimated 11,006 Delawareans with pre-existing conditions
– Family insurance premiums would increase by $1,720-2$,450**

Children & Young Adults

– Insurance companies will still be able to deny coverage to children with pre-existing conditions
– 83,010 young adults who would have been able to stay on their parents’ insurance plans this year would now be denied coverage

[Ed note: edited for clarity 9:51 AM]

Mike Castle’s HCR Response — The Unbelievable Lameness of Faux Moderation

As xstryker noted last night, Mike Castle definitely voted no for HCR and its reconciliation bill. Castle’s office put out a press statement on last night’s historic vote, that should be read in it’s entirety to fully comprehend how badly he is managing to maintain any moderate cred while marching lockstep with his party. But let’s take a look at a few things here:

The debate about how to reshape health insurance in order to reduce skyrocketing costs, and increase access, has dominated the attention of Congress for the past year. While there are many areas of agreement, Congress and the American public remain divided and it is easy to see why. While I am glad the “deem and pass” procedure was abandoned, and the House of Representatives allowed an actual vote on the bill, I feel strongly that Congressional leaders and the President have missed a real opportunity to take incremental, bipartisan steps that recognized the concerns of Americans who feel as though they will foot the bill for widespread reforms that they do not embrace.

See the problem? We get another unenthusiastic recitation of his party’s talking points on this thing, certainly. But how can you have “many areas of agreement” with the HCR and then call for small, incremental steps to get this done? There was little about this effort that was small, unless he wants to count the 200+ Republican amendments included to this thing. But either Castle is trying to dog whistle his party’s sense of entitlement (you have to do what we say or it doesn’t count!) or he hasn’t been paying attention. And note the faux concerns for what Americans feel about this — there are alot of Americans genuinely confused about what is in this bill. And that is a real failure of Democrats for not messaging this thing properly; of Republicans who lied about this non-stop AND the media who did little to help their audiences sort out fact from fiction. More on that in abit.

Throughout the debate, I have advocated for common-sense policies that aim to lower costs and expand access, without compromising the quality of American medicine or raising taxes on the American people. I have urged leaders to consider legislation to drive down the costs of care first, in order to increase access and coverage through affordability.

Oh really? The only thing I can remember is the wellness thing — which wouldn’t have been especially effective at expanding access, might lower costs for people who are healthier and also lets somebody — government or insurance company decide if you are taking care of yourself well enough to get those lower rates. Other than this, Castle has been largely AWOL during this thing. (BTW — did anyone hear Castle speak last night? I didn’t, but wasn’t completely glued to my computer screen all day.)

While there are policies embedded in this legislation that have bipartisan support, they are buried under budget gimmicks that threaten the long-term solvency of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security– the existing entitlement programs that are draining the federal budget based on their current obligations. Health care reform will impact the lives of every American, our federal budget, and 1/6 of our economy. Reform should hold insurance companies accountable, eliminate barriers to competition and quality care, promote prevention, and drive down health care costs. To ignore the costs and enact unrealistic and misleading legislation will only prolong our health care challenges for generations to come.

Budget gimmicks? These are budget gimmicks that Mike Castle voted for:

  • BushCo Tax Cuts — the gimmick here was wiping out budget surpluses, replacing them with structural deficits (meaning they never got paid for), and letting them expire in 10 years to, you know, make the deficits look smaller;
  • BushCo War Expenditures — this was a double counting scheme, where they got to vote for a bloated Appropriation for the DOD AND they got to vote for a War Supplemental. The gimmicks here would include a backdoor funding mechanism for the DOD (increasing the pool of funds funds for Halliburton, Blackwater, et al) AND bypassing the annual budget ceiling in order to spend more money on the DOD.
  • BushCo Estate Tax revisions — this effort reduced he amount of federal estate taxes levied on weather people. Except to make the deficit numbers smaller (and to not have to pay for this), they let the tax drop to 0% this year and return to its 2001 levels in 2011.

In other words, Mike Castle spent the last decade voting for budget gimmicks, but it was OK because His Party Told Him To. But here he is pretending that no one will remember any of this stuff and count of this fake moderation to tide him over.

He ends with more talking points on how to change this bill. Some of that is worth doing, but none of that would cover 30M+ people for health insurance. None of it. And like the rest of his caucus, Mike Castle bailed on any real substantive discussions about this bill — if they cared about long term cost controls, they could have been heros everywhere by joining in the process to work this out. Instead, they want to pretend that this little stuff actually stands in for making major reform work better. This is the price of a policy of Obstruction Only. A policy that Mike Castle is fully committed to. And as you listen to him claim to be trying to influence process, remember that he is specifically lying to you. Because it is the policy of his party to Just Say No to Everything — a policy that has nothing to do with the lives of Delawareans — because his party has judged that to be in their best interests. Working towards common sense solutions means you have to work with the other party to have some impact. And as long as he isn’t doing this — because this is the will of his party — you aren’t watching anything near moderation.

Castle On The Attack

Mike Castle’s attack machine appears to be stirring. Yesterday I saw this message on Twitter:

Dozens of NCC employees to be laid off in July as a result of Coons’ budget. Read more: http://tinyurl.com/yazxuxg http://fb.me/sUhrYIPW

I couldn’t get the first link to work, but the second link leads to the same message on his Facebook page.

It’s a bit ironic that Castle is criticizing Coons for cutting jobs considering Castle voted against the jobs bill (the one he said he’d support). If I were Chris Coons, I’d blast this Castle hypocrisy far and wide since Coons is having to deal with the fallout of Castle’s and the GOP’s economic policies from the lost decade.

Also, completely predictably, Castle announced that he’s voting no on health care reform.

If you want to know what kind of Senator Mike Castle will be, all you need to do is follow his Twitter feed. He’ll continue to vote with the GOP while making noises about caring about the people of Delaware. Then he’ll vote against our interests anyway.

No Quarter

This post is an odd one to write because all it is is a rather long answer to one trivia question: Who wrote the bill which created the most successful commemorative coin series in the history of the United States? This post has nothing to do with my dislike of Mike Castle as he has only proved himself to be an eager lapdog of the Republican Party leadership over the last decade. This is trivia only.

One of Castle’s jewels in his limited legislative crown has been the State Quarters series which  earned the U.S. Treasury some $4.6 billion. Back in 2003, the Director of the U.S. Mint said, “Congressman Castle was the catalyst, authoring the legislation that launched this remarkable program, the most popular in United States Mint history.” Funny thing about Mike Castle and the Quarter . . .  but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Back in mid-90s the Citizens Commemorative Coin Advisory Committee was in serious trouble. There were several commemorative coins that actual lost money. Who can remember the World Cup Tournament Dollar or the U.S. Capitol Bicentennial Dollar?  When the Subcommittee on Domestic and International Monetary Policy met in July 1995 things were bleak for the U.S. commemorative coin program, very bleak..  Chairman of the subcommittee Mike Castle said:

We are here today to review the entire commemorative program. It may be that radical measures must be taken to preserve the taxpayer from risk in a program that is heading out of control.

If that is determined to be the case, this Congress will need to take the action necessary to rectify this situation. Above all, we were elected to preserve the taxpayers’ interest.

But all of that changed with the testimony of numismatist Harvey Stack:

. . . we could do the first 13 States and issue new commemorative coins every year or two that would commemorate the other States as they came into the Union, and then cover at least the first 50 States. It would be historical.

Mike Castle’s response:

I might say it is a brilliant idea, Mr. Stack. Delaware was the first State.

In one breath Castle recognized a great idea, and then said something true, but truly stupid. And just to piss off Glenn Beck, it should be noted that Stack’s idea originated with a Canadian commemorative coin series. Two years later in September 1997, Mike Castle introduced HR 2414 50 States Commemorative Coin Program Act. The act passed the House but never made it to the floor of the Senate. So, here is the question again, but this time with the answer.

Q: Who wrote the bill which created the most successful commemorative coin series in the history of the United States?

A: Senator John Chafee of Rhode Island

Why did Chafee’s legislation win out over Castle’s? Given the dismal history of the U.S. commemorative coins, Chafee’s legislation gave the Secretary of the Treasury an escape clause, an opportunity to terminate the program if it wasn’t making any money. Castle’s did not.

The Secretary shall take such actions as may be necessary to ensure that minting and issuing coins under this section will not result in any net cost to the United States Government.

Considering that cost was Castle’s major concern back in 1995, it is odd that he did not include this in his legislation. However we’ll save that question for another time because  as I said at the beginning of this post that all I was doing was asking and answering a simple trivia question.

Mike Gave Us Quarters

You will remember when I first came to Delaware Liberal, my new compatriots were kind enough to allow me to bring over a logo I used on my old blog “Daily Delaware,” the one with the Caesar Rodney quarter. I did not learn until many months later that our illustrious founder Jason330 was kind of reluctant to do that, since Mike Castle was the author of the 50 States Commemorative Coin Program Act of 1997 that created the 50 State Quarter Program, and since Jason330 was Mike Castle’s mortal enemy. I felt kinda bad about that.

I was put in mind of that after reading the latest Kavips:

If you haven’t followed closely, the local media is pushing for Castle. Which means … if you want change, Mike Castle is exactly the person you do not want to vote for.

If you like inaction, people who say one thing and vote another, and prefer someone who sells Delaware out in a heartbeat to the whims of the National Republican Party, then Mike Castle is your man…

If you have ever heard Chris Coons speak, you know he is the future of Delaware. Running New Castle County, is a thankless job… especially during a time of financial collapse. But for 10 years, Chris Coons has done just that… While Mike Castle was wandering the halls of Congress sort of like Spinal Tap lost in the labyrinth of passageways underneath their venue, Chris Coons was getting things done with less…

Sometimes you have not to look at what was accomplished, but at how much was accomplished out of nothing… and that will probably be the legacy of Chris Coons during this decade.

Chris Coons built something out of shrinking revenues. Mike gave us quarters…

Now that is a slogan. It must be something to spend nearly 2 decades in Congress, and your crowning legislative achievement is redesigning the quarter. Thanks Mike.

New Senate Poll Gives Castle A 18 Point Lead (Updated)

A new poll from Daily Kos/Research 2000 gives Mike Castle a lead of 18 points over Chris Coons:

Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 2/22-24. Likely voters. MoE 4% (10/14/09 results)

Senate

Mike Castle (R) 53 (51)
Chris Coons (D) 35 (39)

Castle has a +30 favorability rating, Coons is +27.

Favorables, for what it’s worth: Castle is at 65%-32% (was: 64%-30%); Coons 52%-25% (was: 34%-8%). Castle’s favorables for a Republican in a blue state are unsurprising when you remember that Castle has served in statewide office since 1981 — as Delaware’s Lieutenant Governor, Governor, and since 1993 its lone representative in Congress. Against someone who’s as much a fixture in Delaware as tax-free shopping, friendly treatment of corporations and screen door factories, New Castle County Chief Executive Chris Coons indeed has an uphill battle in store.

Coons has obviously increased his name recognition, but still lags behind. This race will be an uphill battle for Coons and I think he can win, but he needs to start generating some excitement. I think that excitement starts with the grassroots Democrats.

This race may be an interesting one, because it’s a photo-negative of a lot of the other races. Will Castle be able to generate the excitement in the Republican base that we’re seeing in other states? He’s the opposite of a diehard, teabag conservative. Castle is obviously counting on support from independents and Democrats to get elected. Can he count on them? Castle will be the establishment candidate, the de-facto incumbent. Can Coons take advantage of that fact?

There’s some danger for Castle, I think. His election number (53%) is significantly lower than his approval number (65%). To me that’s saying that at least 12% of people who approve of him aren’t voting for him. The same can be said for Coons’s numbers, but his name recognition is lower. I think this poll is also saying that last few weeks of bad publicity for Castle have not taken a toll on his popularity.

These results look fairly similar to the Rasmussen results released yesterday:

* Castle leads Coons 53% to 32%. 8% prefer some other candidate (O’Donnell?? Anti-Coons or Pro-Biden sentiment?) and 8% are unsure.

This feels about right to me, in that I feel the Castle-Coons race is a 50-40 race at the moment, with Castle as the favorite. I really want to see the partisan breakdown here, though.

* Coons has a 43% favorability rating, versus a 35% unfavorability rating. 22% don’t know who he is or are not sure.

* Castle has a 65% favorability rating, versus a 30% unfavorability rating. 4% live in caves.

UPDATE FROM DELAWARE DEM: Here are the full crosstabs, with favorability ratings for all sorts of Delaware pols.

Daily Kos/Research 2000 Delaware Poll

Research 2000, MoE 4%, Feb 22, 2010 – Feb 24, 2010

FAVORABLE/UNFAVORABLE

  VERY FAV FAV UNFAV VERY UNFAV NO OPINION
COONS 24 28 17 8 23
CASTLE 26 39 19 13 3
O’DONNELL 16 17 18 21 28
CARNEY 22 25 13 9 31
COPELAND 9 12 13 10 56
CULLIS 5 5 8 10 72
WHARTON 21 27 22 16 14
MARKELL 23 31 17 13 16
CARPER 22 30 18 15 15
KAUFMAN 17 23 15 12 33
OBAMA 27 32 20 16 5

 

Chris Coons

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 52 25 23
MEN 49 29 22
WOMEN 55 21 24
DEMOCRATS 74 10 16
REPUBLICANS 23 47 30
INDEPENDENTS 50 22 28
18-29 56 22 22
30-44 54 24 22
45-59 50 26 24
60+ 48 28 24

Mike Castle

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 65 32 3
MEN 70 28 2
WOMEN 60 36 4
DEMOCRATS 43 53 4
REPUBLICANS 87 10 3
INDEPENDENTS 79 19 2
18-29 58 37 5
30-44 64 33 3
45-59 67 30 3
60+ 70 28 2

Christine O’Donnell

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 33 39 28
MEN 35 36 29
WOMEN 31 42 27
DEMOCRATS 16 57 27
REPUBLICANS 59 13 28
INDEPENDENTS 31 40 29
18-29 25 43 32
30-44 32 41 27
45-59 34 38 28
60+ 38 36 26

John Carney

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 47 22 31
MEN 44 26 30
WOMEN 50 18 32
DEMOCRATS 69 6 25
REPUBLICANS 16 49 35
INDEPENDENTS 48 14 38
18-29 50 20 30
30-44 49 21 30
45-59 45 23 32
60+ 43 25 32

Charlie Copeland

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 21 23 56
MEN 24 21 55
WOMEN 18 25 57
DEMOCRATS 12 30 58
REPUBLICANS 34 13 53
INDEPENDENTS 20 24 56
18-29 17 26 57
30-44 20 25 55
45-59 23 21 56
60+ 24 21 55

Fred Cullis

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 10 18 72
MEN 12 16 72
WOMEN 8 20 72
DEMOCRATS 5 23 72
REPUBLICANS 17 11 72
INDEPENDENTS 8 19 73
18-29 6 20 74
30-44 10 19 71
45-59 11 18 71
60+ 12 16 72

Ferris Wharton

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 48 38 14
MEN 52 35 13
WOMEN 44 41 15
DEMOCRATS 30 59 11
REPUBLICANS 73 18 9
INDEPENDENTS 49 26 25
18-29 43 44 13
30-44 46 40 14
45-59 50 36 14
60+ 51 34 15

Jack Markell

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 54 30 16
MEN 50 34 16
WOMEN 58 26 16
DEMOCRATS 77 8 15
REPUBLICANS 21 66 13
INDEPENDENTS 56 22 22
18-29 59 26 15
30-44 55 28 17
45-59 52 31 17
60+ 50 35 15

Tom Carper

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 52 33 15
MEN 48 37 15
WOMEN 56 29 15
DEMOCRATS 75 10 15
REPUBLICANS 20 64 16
INDEPENDENTS 53 33 14
18-29 57 28 15
30-44 53 32 15
45-59 51 34 15
60+ 48 36 16

Ted Kaufman

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 40 27 33
MEN 37 32 31
WOMEN 43 22 35
DEMOCRATS 65 8 27
REPUBLICANS 6 60 34
INDEPENDENTS 39 18 43
18-29 43 23 34
30-44 42 25 33
45-59 38 28 34
60+ 38 31 31

Barack Obama

  FAV UNFAV NO OPINION
ALL 59 36 5
MEN 53 41 6
WOMEN 65 31 4
DEMOCRATS 86 10 4
REPUBLICANS 19 74 7
INDEPENDENTS 63 32 5
WHITE 52 43 5
BLACK 91 4 5
18-29 67 29 4
30-44 61 34 5

QUESTION: If the election for U.S. Senate were held today, for whom would you vote for if the choices were between Chris Coons, the Democrat, and Mike Castle, the Republican?

  CHRIS COONS MIKE CASTLE UNDECIDED
ALL 35 53 12
MEN 32 58 10
WOMEN 38 48 14
DEMOCRATS 61 24 15
REPUBLICANS 6 87 7
INDEPENDENTS 27 61 12
WHITE 30 61 9
BLACK 58 16 26
18-29 39 46 15
30-44 37 52 11
45-59 34 55 11
60+ 31 57 12

QUESTION: If the election for U.S. Senate were held today, for whom would you vote for if the choices were between Chris Coons, the Democrat, and Christine O’Donnell, the Republican?

  CHRIS COONS CHRISTINE O’DONNELL UNDECIDED
ALL 47 31 22
MEN 43 34 23
WOMEN 51 28 21
DEMOCRATS 75 8 17
REPUBLICANS 12 65 23
INDEPENDENTS 43 29 28
WHITE 42 37 21
BLACK 71 4 25
18-29 50 27 23
30-44 49 29 22
45-59 46 32 22
60+ 43 36 21

QUESTION: If the election for Congress were held today, for whom would you vote for if the choices were between John Carney, the Democrat, and Charlie Copeland, the Republican?

  JOHN CARNEY CHARLIE COPELAND UNDECIDED
ALL 46 29 25
MEN 42 33 25
WOMEN 50 25 25
DEMOCRATS 72 8 20
REPUBLICANS 10 59 31
INDEPENDENTS 45 28 27
WHITE 41 35 24
BLACK 70 2 28
18-29 49 25 26
30-44 48 27 25
45-59 44 31 25
60+ 42 33 25

QUESTION: If the election for Congress were held today, for whom would you vote for if the choices were between John Carney, the Democrat, and Fred Cullis, the Republican?

  JOHN CARNEY FRED CULLIS UNDECIDED
ALL 50 26 24
MEN 47 30 23
WOMEN 53 22 25
DEMOCRATS 77 7 16
REPUBLICANS 11 53 36
INDEPENDENTS 52 25 23
WHITE 45 31 24
BLACK 72 2 26
18-29 54 22 24
30-44 52 24 24
45-59 48 28 24
60+ 45 30 25

QUESTION: If the election for Congress were held today, for whom would you vote for if the choices were between John Carney, the Democrat, and Ferris Wharton, the Republican?

  JOHN CARNEY FERRIS WHARTON UNDECIDED
ALL 45 35 20
MEN 41 38 21
WOMEN 49 32 19
DEMOCRATS 75 9 16
REPUBLICANS 7 72 21
INDEPENDENTS 40 34 26
WHITE 40 41 19
BLACK 70 5 25
18-29 49 30 21
30-44 47 33 20
45-59 44 36 20
60+ 40 41 19

Demographics

MEN 283 47%
WOMEN 317 53%
DEMOCRATS 269 45%
REPUBLICANS 195 32%
INDEPENDENTS/OTHER 136 23%
WHITE 476 79%
BLACK 102 17%
18-29 84 14%
30-44 196 33%
45-59 217 36%
60+ 103 17%

Liar Liar Pants On Fire

Mike Castle has been on the defensive lately. He’s become the posterboy for Republican hypocrisy, especially the “trash and grab” strategy of trashing the stimulus while showing up to take credit for projects created by the stimulus. He comes off as quite defensive in this WHYY interview:

Castle also defended himself against accusations that, while voting against the stimulus, he’s shown up at events touting stimulus spending in Delaware.

“I certainly did not vote for it, and I’ve said that at every single appearance I’ve made.” Rep. Castle explained, “Having said that, I’ve said also, once that stimulus bill passed and the money was appropriated, I wasn’t about to let it all go to another state if I could get something for Delaware. I consider that to be the absolute correct way to proceed.”

The Delaware Democratic party dug up this video of Mike Castle at the Fisker event. The Fisker deal was funded with stimulus money, and Mike Castle even thanks Obama and Biden in the speech (about 1:30 in the video).

I didn’t hear anything in that speech about how he opposed the stimulus, did you? Oops! Nice try, Mike Castle but Castling isn’t quite working for you anymore is it?

Ed. note – There is a dispute about how much the Fisker deal was funded by stimulus funds. Most funding came from a 2007 law, but Biden states that stimulus funds were used as well. More info on this topic would be appreciated.

Castling

[Ed. note – cassandra_m contributed considerably to this post.]

2009 presented quite a dilemma for Mike Castle. The Republican party required obedience from all its members for their policy of no to succeed, but Mike Castle needed to keep his moderate credentials for his voters in Delaware, a blue state. Mike Castle knew what he needed to do though, he needed to practice political Castling. In chess, castling is a defensive move where the King and the Rook change places to protect the King. Castle decided to vote no to saving our economy, along with almost all of his party, but wanted to get credit for money that comes to his district. Thus Castling was born – the Republican “trash and grab” strategy. Trash the stimulus and take credit for the benefits of the stimulus in his home district. Or, as liberalgeek described yesterday:

Isn’t “Castling” a move in chess that changes positions in a way that covers your ass?

Yes, yes it is.

Political Castling: a defensive move in politics, perfected by Mike Castle, where the politician switches positions, depending on the audience and what is popular at the time.

Today is the anniversary of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Conditions at this time in 2009 were crazy – we didn’t know whether we were about to plunge into another depression. The newly-inaugurated Obama administration proposed ARRA to help stabilize the economy and to put Americans to work. They managed to get the bill through Congress with the help of very few Republicans (and after significant weakening of the bill). Mike Castle voted with all House Republicans against the bill.   Then proceeded to come home and take credit for some of the benefits.  That’s the Castling move — saying one thing to your buds in DC and coming home to say something else to us.  But let’s take a look at what Mike Castle is telling his party in DC is so bad, but telling us is really good:

The most recent ARRA Interim Report (pdf) submitted by Lt. Governor Matt Denn to the Governor provides a good summary of the impact of of ARRA funding to Delaware’s economy (and a good summary of what Mike Castle voted against):

Delaware entities had been awarded approximately $1.48 billion in ARRA funds as of January 14, 2010. Of that amount, $968 million is administered by the State of Delaware, and as of January 14, 2010 the state had spent or encumbered at least $360 million of that amount. It is important to remember that this $968 million does not include significant portions of the stimulus package which are not administered by the state, including funds that are directed to local governments, funds that are made available directly to private entities, funds made available directly to colleges and universities, and personal income tax cuts.

Of the $968 million directly administered by the State of Delaware:

  • 36% went to closing the state’s budget deficit, mostly via increased in the federal government’s share of Medicaid
  • 19.5 % were sent directly to public education — local school districts, colleges and universities — expecting that maintaining teaching resources would be a priority use of these funds
  • 15% were allocated to DelDOT for transportation and transit projects
  • 10% awarded to programs helping Delawareans in economic distress (food assistance, unemployment, worker training)
  • 4% for weatherization projects
  • 4% for clean water and drinking projects
  • 3% for public housing construction and enhancements

(You can see a list of the grants as of 12/31/2009 here.) These percentages are approximate and do not include direct awards to local agencies like the COPS program or housing assistance for the families of wounded or killed soldiers or research grants. And as noted above, this report doesn’t even count up the amount of money returned to Delawareans in the form of tax relief, COBRA assistance, home buyer tax credits and so on.

It is tough to remember that this time last year, this economy was in freefall. The $1.4 billion sent to Delaware from ARRA helped to fill the hole left by that freefall. It was likely not enough, but it definitely kept this economy from getting a lot worse, and helped minimize draconian cuts in education, Medicaid and vital infrastructure improvements. Mike Castle has been regularly sending out press releases and showing up for check awards for projects directly funded by ARRA — he needs to tell us how much better off he thinks the state would have been without the $1.4 billion infusion over the last year.

Mike Castle Flip Flops on Stimulus Funds

Rob Tornoe

Flip Flop. Anybody remember when you couldn’t fire up the news without hearing this about John Kerry? And even though that charge was mostly untrue about Kerry, Flip Flop is a good description of Mike Castle’s position towards Delaware stimulus projects. He votes against them, then shows up to take credit for them.

He put out a press release back in January announcing the award of $495,297 in federal funds for food and shelter programs in Delaware and another $4.7 million for homeless assistance programs in New Castle and Wilmington. And when asked about this (the NJ article seems to be behind their archive wall now), Castle sent out his spokesperson to re-write the provenance of those appropriations — claiming that these funds came out of the regular appropriations process.

That is, of course, untrue. HUD notes that the Continuum of Care funding comes from ARRA monies, while the Emergency Food and Shelter grant comes from FEMA ARRA monies.

So maybe in honor of the Olympics, Mike Castle has invented a new flip flop move — vote against a program, take credit for the benefits of the program, then pretend that all of these new benefits are from the normal appropriations. Maybe you guys can help me give this new move a name.

And let’s remember last week’s NJ article on Castle’s flip flop on the wastewater project that he is delightfully posing with the stunt check for:

Voting against the money but taking credit for getting the projects funded is a real Flip Flop.

And I’m hoping that someone starts asking Mike Castle how effective he thinks he can be if he goes to the Senate to say one thing and come back here to tell us something else all together.

(Many Thanks to Rob Tornoe who gave me permission to post up his excellent cartoon here. He is the Best Cartoonist in Delaware and his work appears weekly in all of the Dover Post Papers locally, including the Community News.)

Coons for Senate’s Bad Start

I just got an email from the Coons campaign.  The topic of the email was PayGo. Seriously?

Look, I like the idea of PayGo, but here’s how Coons puts it:

Every week, I’m watching Congress debate incredibly important issues that impact Delaware, even though they often don’t get much press attention. Last week, the House of Representatives voted to reinstate “pay-as-you-go” rules. It doesn’t sound exciting, but these rules make it much more difficult for Congress to increase spending or cut taxes unless they also vote for a way to pay for it. It’s an important tool to keep Congress from over-spending or enacting reckless tax cuts, and when George Bush and his congressional allies abolished these rules in 2003, it paved the way for the massive budget deficits that have troubled us for years.

As someone who has introduced tough budgets as New Castle County Executive, I’m troubled by these deficits; as Delaware’s Senator, I’d fight to keep “pay as you go” rules. Indeed, I was disappointed to see every Republican member of Congress vote against these common-sense rules.”We need leaders willing to make the tough calls, especially when taxpayer money is on the line.

How many times does Coons mention Mike Castle?  Zero. He doesn’t mention that Mike Castle is a Republican member of the US House.  I guess that we are supposed to infer that Castle is one of the useless Republicans that opposed PayGo.  It’s looking like Coons isn’t serious about kicking Mike Castle’s ass to win this.

Look, Chris, if you want to win this, you have to point out that Mike Castle votes against the interest of Delawareans time and time again.  You have to challenge Castle at every turn.  You have to point out his hypocrisy every chance you get.  Failure to do that, sends the message that you are just running to hold down the fort for Democrats, not trying to win the damn thing.