Back in the spring, lots of folks got a laugh out of Texas Governor Rick Perry for suggesting that Texas secede during a tea party protest. It looks like he might not have been kidding. Perry has formed an organization called the Texas Nationalist Movement which advocates secession. They held a rally on the steps of the state capitol recently. One speaker really needs to check his history facts out before clutching the mic.
Matthews also takes a look at McDonnell’s thesis and dancer Tom Delay.
Are these people in Texas serious or are they just trying to illustrate a point? I have heard several people say they are just going to revolt. Several had elaborate plans to do so. What does all of this mean? Would it have happened if McCain were president?
The Farmer’s Almanac 2010 goes on sale September 1. It predicts an extremely harsh, cold winter this year. The Farmer’s Almanac, which has been printed since 1818 says that ‘numbing cold will predomintate the nation’s midsection.’ Oh joy.
The almanac, which has been published since 1818, issues annual forecasts using a formula based on sunspots, planetary positions and the effects of the moon.
This winter, the 200-page publication says it’ll be cool and snowy in the Northeast, bitterly cold and dry in the Great Lakes states, and cold and snowy across the North Central states.
It says the Northwest will be cool with average precipitation, the Southwest will be mild and dry, the South Central states will be cold and wet, and the Southeast will be mild and dry.
The almanac’s forecast, however, is at odds with the National Weather Service, which is calling for warmer-than-normal temperatures across much of the country because of an El Nino system in the tropical Pacific Ocean, said Mike Halpert, deputy director of the NOAA Climate Prediction Center in Camp Springs, Md.
It all boils down to who you are going to believe. Winter is winter. Make sure you have a warm coat, hat and gloves. We aren’t even through hurricane season yet. That isn’t over until November 30. We are at the half way point.
Meanwhile, the much-anticipated Tom Ridge book The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege…And How We Can Be Safe Again is due out tomorrow. That ought to start everyone fighting. Hard cover is $17.15 Kindle is $14.29 for those of us who like instant gratification.
A 93 page master’s thesis written in 1989 on file at Regent University has gubernatorial candidate hopeful back-pedalling like crazy and asking Virginians to look at his record. Well, that isn’t so good either. We see …well…a mirror image in some cases.
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What is the blogosphere all a’twitter over? McDonnell’s master’s thesis, in which, according to the Washington Post, he has some rather conservative ideas that just won’t fly in the 21st century:
[H]e described working women and feminists as “detrimental” to the family. He said government policy should favor married couples over “cohabitators, homosexuals or fornicators.” He described as “illogical” a 1972 Supreme Court decision legalizing the use of contraception by unmarried couples.
The paper also lays out a 15 point action plan that the Republican Party needed to adopt in order to protect the family. During his 14 years in the General Assembly, McDonnell attempted to pass legislation on at least 10 of his suggested goals that he has laid out in his research paper: abortion restrictions, school vouchers, “convenant marriage,” tax laws that favored married couples to name a few. As late as 2001 he voted against a law that would end wage discrimination between men and women.
Candidate McDonnell attempted to distance himself from this extremist drivel:
McDonnell added: “Like everybody, my views on many issues have changed as I have gotten older.” He said that his views on family policy were best represented by his 1995 welfare reform legislation and that he “worked to include child day care in the bill so women would have greater freedom to work.” What he wrote in the thesis on women in the workplace, he said, “was simply an academic exercise and clearly does not reflect my views.”
McDonnell also said that government should not discriminate based on sexual orientation or ban contraceptives and that “I am not advocating vouchers as there are legal questions regarding their constitutionality in Virginia
That fact that anyone in America would think most of these ideas are the business of government or acceptable in modern society is preposterous. The title of the thesis speaks to the problem: “The Republican Party’s Vision for the Family: The Compelling Issue of The Decade.” I don’t want the Republican Party’s Vision for my family!
Subscribing to these ideas that promote discrimination and UN-equal rights for women, gays, single people and who knows who else, at any time in his adult life, makes McDonnell unacceptable as a candidate for governor. Leopards don’t change their spots and a make over won’t cut it.
Not chosing sides here myself. Neither would be my candidate. But, does Jeff Frederick have a valid point of view? As I recall, McDonnell was one of his harshest critics.
Prince William police Officer Heath Oyler was just running radar over in Yorkshire. Minutes later he was a hero.
Some driver was speeding–doing 45 in a 25 mph early this morning. Officer Oyler turned on lights and sirens but the driver did not stop. The police officer decided not to chase the speeding car. Instead he followed him at safe speed. He came upon the car which had crashed and was billowing smoke from the engine. The driver attempted a getaway on foot but couldn’t get far because of his injuries. At this point, he informed the officer that his baby was in the car. (Thus becoming eligible for the father of the year award–NOT.)
Officer Oyler immediately attempted to remove the child. The door was jammed and he had to go to the passenger side to get the baby from its car seat. Quick thinking, Officer Oyler, and good decision making that probably saved lives.
This officer should be highly commended and should receive special recognition from the BOCS since he sure won’t be getting a raise. The driver should be pulling some major jail time for endangering his child and putting his own safety above that of his child.
Here is Corey Stewart’s email so readers can contact him to recommend Officer Heath Oyler for meritorious recognition. [email protected]
[UPDATE: Several readers have emailed me that they have gotten very positive responses from both Corey Stewart and Chief Charlie Deane. It is good to know our county leaders recognize the outstanding achievements of their employees and that they respond so quickly.]
Yesterday, while watching the Senate side of the Capitol steps fill with staffers, congressmen, and senators, to bid a farewell to Senator Kennedy, I watched a rather quiet exchange. Some woman near the top left hand side of the stairs held a rather large flag. Green/White/Orange
I immediately recognized it as the Irish Flag. Holding an Irish flag seemed an appropriate thing to do considering it was a Kennedy send off–recognition of one’s roots is not a bad thing. Before I realized what was happening, some other woman, quietly went over, said something to the woman, and the flag was lowered from the view of cameras. I assumed that there was some protcol that prevented the flags of other nations from being flown on the steps on the Capitol.
Does anyone know anything about this type of protocol? I was unable to find it. It seemed like an odd thing to get corrected over, given the circumstances. It was handled quietly and discretely. I am just very curioius. Was it appropriate to unfurl an Irish Flag at the Capitol during that brief Kennedy ceremony?
Rodney Thomas has lived in Charlottesville all his life. He went to Lane High School and as a freshman, was president of the Young Republican Club in 1958, the year Governor Lindsay Almond closed the school rather than integrate it.
“We got along fine,” he says of African-American students. “I think it was a pure government thing to force down people throats. Blacks had the best school. We loved to go over there [to Burley].”
In his office at Charlottesville Press, he’s listening to “The Schilling Show” when a reporter arrives. A book he’s reading currently– The Hunt for Confederate Gold by Thomas Moore– is on his desk.
The author, Thomas Moore, also of Charlottesville, is chairman of Southern National Congress. You have to check this one out for yourself. It appears to be Uber-nativist as well as other things. SPLC appears to have nothing on this organization.
What’s so unusual about finding someone who feels like Rodney Thomas does? Nothing other than he is running for Rio Magisterial District Supervisor in Albemarle County against the Democratic incumbent, David Slutzky. (No, I am not kidding.)
The healing that the Virginia Tech community keeps having to jump start has been disturbed once again. 2 students were found shot in the Jefferson National Forest. The bodies of Heidi Lynn Childs, 18, and David Lee Metzler, 19, both of the Lynchburg area, were found in the parking area of Caldwell Fields by a passerby. The campgrounds are about 15 miles north of the VT campus.
Both were good students, athletic, and highly thought of. Both students lived off campus. Ms. Childs father is with the Virginia State Police.
How much more tragedy is Tech going to have to endure? The state university was the site of a horrible massacre in April, 2007. Last January, one student beheaded another at a coffee shop on campus. Now both of these young people were found dead at a campsite popular with VT students. When is enough enough?
10 Prince William County schools will get 35 trailers. Trailers absorb student overflow when there aren’t enough classrooms for the given amount of kids. This practice has gone on for years in Prince William County.
Prince William County will soon have 400,000 residents so the need for additional school space comes as no surprise. What does cause surprise is the fact that several members of the planning commission of Prince William County took it upon themselves to admonish the school system for not holding public hearings over putting in classroom trailers.
HUH?
Either a school has enough classroom space or they don’t. If they don’t, and all closets and cubby holes have been filled with desks/kids/teachers, then trailers go in. Shouldn’t the planning commission be planning and not overstepping its bounds with the school system? Here is the first affrontery as printed in Manassas News and Messenger:
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I think the schools would do itself a favor to solicit and encourage as much public input as possible, so those decisions are made with the highest level and highest degree of public information,” said chairman Gary Friedman, who was the lone dissenter on the 10-trailer request for Glenkirk Elementary School.
“Citizen input is an invaluable part of this process,” said Brentsville District commissioner Ronald K. Burgess. “I have seen this commission turn on a dime as a result of citizen input.
It sounds silly, but it is, in fact, true. In this month of May, fifteen years ago, Ted Kennedy became the first Senator to communicate with constituents over the Internet. Back in 1993, this was no small feat. At the time there were no congressional offices connected to the Internet. (The House launched a pilot program on June 2, 1993, hooking up seven members to an Internet network.) One dedicated staffer and the technology hubs of MIT and other top-level educational institutions made Kennedy into the first digital Senator. Here’s the story (which you can read about in more detail Chris Casey’s book, The Hill on the Net):
For weeks now there has been concern that outside agitators have been attending townhall meetings, not to obtain information, but to disrupt and bully the individuals holding the meetings. Other attendees who might want to learn more about healthcare proposals or various other plans being considered for legislation are also bullied and talked over top of and drowned out.
Many folks have argued that this is not happening or have attempted to justify the conduct of various people who have been been captured on film by the media. Randall Terry is a professional outside agitator who showed up at Congressman Jim Moran’s town hall meeting last night.
Congressman Moran had a difficult time even talking with the crowd. He insisted that those from the 8th Congressional district be let in first. That seems fair enough. About 3000 people got inside the meeting hall in Reston. He had invited former DNC chair Howard Dean to his meeting as a special guest. It is doubtful that he got a word in edgewise either.
Chief outside aggitator dissident was Randall Terry making a horse’s rear end out of himself as usual. This guy shows up everywhere to shoot off his big mouth and to make a fool of himself. He has been at the Terry Schivo nursing home, he followed President Obama to Notre Dame, and now he wants to stalk Jim Moran it seems. His main theme still seems to be abortion but I think he chose the wrong venue for protest.
[W]hen Dean took the stage, he was met by a deafening din of boos and catcalls, which pushed Moran over the edge.
“I’m sorry but I can’t even hear the governor and I’m sitting next to him. There are hundreds of people in this gymnasium who can’t hear him because of a handful of people,” Moran said. “These folks are not from the 8th District, they don’t really belong here, and I’m going to ask them to leave.”
Protestor Randall Terry, the founder of anti-abortion group Operation Rescue, who had warned local media he planned to make a ruckus, particularly infuriated the congressman with his screaming accusations that Dean was a “baby killer.”
Moran offered Terry five minutes of floor time to ask a question in exchange for quiet, but Terry refused and was muscled out of the meeting, as the crowd chanted, “Kick him out.”
Here is a brief video of the crowd behavior last night.
Finally Congressman Moran was able to hold a 45 minute session where he and Howard Dean tried to brief the crowd:
He also sought to explain what he called “myths” about the bill, including the rumor that the bill would fund death panels encouraging ailing elderly patients to consider assisted suicide.
“Nothing could be further from the truth,” Moran said.
“Liar, liar, liar,” a crowd member screamed.
This is not civilized behavior. How does anyone expect to find out about anything? How many would be comfortable attending a meeting with some of these thugs like Randall Terry?
The Lion of the Senate has passed on. Edward Moore Kennedy died late August 25, 2009. Senator Kennedy was the second most senior member of the senate. He was 77.
Senator Kennedy, fondly known as Teddy or Ted, saw both triumph and tragedy in his life. His oldest brother died in WWII. Both of his other brothers were assassinated. He was involved in a plane accident that nearly took his life and an automobile accident that took someone else’s life and destroyed any chances he might have had to become president.
Kennedy was one of the most effective lawmakers in the history of the senate. He was a champion of health care issues for many years and he fought for women’s rights, health issues particular to women and against violence towards women. He worked continually for education. Despite growing up in a priviledged home, he always strove to pass legislation that helped those less fortunate.
The senior stateman from Massachusetts electrified the Democratic Convention a year ago, August 25, 2008 when he made a surprise appearance. His niece, Caroline Kennedy assisted him.
Echoing his speech to the Democratic Convention as an unsuccessful candidate for president in 1980, Kennedy concluded: “The work begins anew. The hope arises again. And the dream lives on.”
Senator Kennedy’s life was not without controversy. Please remember that this post is a tribute to one who served his country for nearly a half century.
Administrators at Sinclair Elementary School arrived at work Tuesday morning to find parking lot vandalism-a new form of grafitti not seen in the area before. Some clown had written KKK and a swastika using grass sod. Serious here folks. The symbols were were spelled out using these organic materials.
A roving blog reporter notified Anti admin of the vandalism early this morning. The incident had been reported on Channel 5 from their helicopter but no video was up at the time of this posting. Insidenova.com broke the story just minutes ago.
On the one hand, the incident is foolish enough that we can blame kids and call it a prank. Removing grass sod is a lot easier than removing paint from the brand new parking lot at Sinclair. On the other hand, hate sentiments, regardless of who places them, cannot just be dismissed as kids playing a prank. Hate symbols are hate symbols. These symbols are not appreciated nor wanted in the Sudley/Westgate neighborhood.
Regardless of why, regardless of who, the incident was criminal in nature and disturbing. Are racial feelings that strong in this community? Why are they spilling out at one of the 4 schools in this neighorhood? When people feel free to blast others for being Hispanic, Black, Jewish and do it in front of their kids, isn’t this the kind of behavior we should come to expect? Perhaps we need to think more before we speak.
[UPDATE: Picture of vandalism to sod. The kids, 1 black 3 white teenagers spelled out KKK, White Power, and layed out a swastika. ]
HAA! is an acronym for Healthy Americans Act, introduced first in January, 2007 and resubmitted it again last February when the health care debate cranked up. HAA! is a middle ground proposal, given to me tonight by Slowpoke, with whom I gently spar daily. It is worth reading and considering. If you are like me, the Obama Health Care Plan is a great mystery. I haven’t hear through the din yet. Check this out.
[H]e derides Republicans for using the same playbook they did during the Clinton years — drawing the debate into sideshow topics like death panels and tax hikes.
“I think for a lot of [Republicans], they could care less,” McAuliffe said, when asked if the White House was wasting its time trying to recruit bipartisan support. “They aren’t interested in reforming health care. Their interest is bringing the Obama administration down. That is clear. Many of them have publicly said that.”
By Paul Blumenthal on 05/22/08 
Administrators at Sinclair Elementary School arrived at work Tuesday morning to find parking lot vandalism-a new form of grafitti not seen in the area before. Some clown had written KKK and a swastika using grass sod. Serious here folks. The symbols were were spelled out using these organic materials. 
