Have These People Forgotten Where They are Running for Office?

GOPAC Advertisement for District 24 GOP candidate

If you look closely, you can see the GOPAC address in this browser screen shot. H/T Adam Feiler.

UPDATE: HD-21 exact advertisement for the GOP candidate there. See Vivian for more.

Who Is Running The DPVA?

In recent days, we have heard about the hiring of many fine people for Creigh Deeds campaign. Several of them are veterans of political campaigns in Virginia and elsewhere. Some, however, are top-level officials with the Democratic Party of Virginia (DPVA). This is troubling to me for several reasons.

When the never-ending election season turned to the 2009 elections for Delegates, Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and Attorney General, there was a lot of talk about winning back the other house in the Virginia Legislature, the House of Delegates. Since then, we have seen a carnival-style primary election season that sucked all the money and air out of the activist base in Virginia. After what seems like years between January and June, our question was answered and we have a ticket of great, qualified and dedicated people.

My good friend Vivian Paige published an article last night that spurred this train of thought. I had been thinking along the same lines, although in the recesses of my brain. Vivian asked some of the same questions I am, namely, “Who will ensure our majority in the House of Delegates?” We both agree that of equal importance to electing a Democratic Governor is electing the majority status in the House of Delegates.

The House of Delegates has more contested races this year than it did in 2007. Today, I believe the total is 69.

Here’s a question. With the large number of House races this year, who will be doing the usual jobs of Levar Stoney and Jared Leopold? These races need to be worked by the party, and from what I have seen in previous House election years, they couldn’t cover the races they had with a full complement of people at DPVA. In one instance at the end of the election season in 2007, a literature drop was scheduled at little or no cost to the party. Unfortunately, unless you lived in Northern Virginia, Roanoke, Danville/Martinsville or Hampton Roads, there were no events listed. This is inexcusable.

The whole of western VA, aside from a few areas like Roanoke and Danville, are routinely written off. Prince Edward County went for Obama last year. Will we see any sort of focus on Southside areas outside the ones I mentioned? Not likely.

Without the House of Delegates, there is a real good chance that redistricting would happen under the rules and carving knife of the Republican majority. We can’t let that happen to Virginia for ten years, because we couldn’t adequately staff our organizations. We can’t let it happen to Virginia’s people either, they are pushed to the economic limit now, along with the usual headaches. We especially can’t allow it to happen to the children that have no say in any of this. They deserve a good education and good health care, and a reasonable government that does the things that help people.

Will we rise to the occasion? I am hopeful, but I am not optimistic.

[Edit: Text was added that had been inadvertantly left out. Also, categories were added. 06-19-09]

Governor Kaine Acts on Legislation

RICHMOND–Governor Timothy M. Kaine today announced that he has vetoed several bills passed by the 2009 General Assembly. Additional action on legislation will be announced in the coming days. Legislators are scheduled to consider the Governor’s actions during a reconvened session on Wednesday, April 8, 2009.

Governor Kaine released information on his vetoes of the following legislation:

Death Penalty

SB 1069, HB 2358, SB 961, HB 2638, SB 1409

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto , Senate Bill 1069, House Bill 2358 , Senate Bill 961 House Bill 2638 and  Senate Bill 1409, which expand the capital murder statute to increase the number of offenders who would be eligible for capital punishment.

“Virginia is already second in the nation in the number of executions we carry out. While the nature of the offenses targeted by this legislation is very serious, I do not believe that further expansion of the death penalty is necessary to protect human life.”

Guns in Bars

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto ,Senate Bill 1035, which would allow persons to carry concealed weapons into restaurants or clubs that serve alcoholic beverages.

“Allowing concealed weapons into restaurants and bars that serve alcohol puts the public, the employees, and our public safety officers at risk. I take seriously the objections of law enforcement to this measure.”

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto SB877, which would allow retired law enforcement officers to carry concealed weapons into restaurants or clubs that serve alcoholic beverages.

“While it makes sense for current law enforcement officers to be permitted to carry their firearms when in such establishments, there is no compelling reason for retired law enforcement officers to have weapons in locations where alcohol is served.”

Lie Detectors

HB 1613, SB1374

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto HB1613 and SB1374, which would allow unlicensed law enforcement officers to operate new, unregulated lie detection devices.

“I proposed an amendment to HB 1613 that would have allowed additional devices, but regulate them in a way similar to the existing rules for polygraph machines. Unfortunately, that amendment was defeated by the House.“Untested, unregulated devices should not be used in police investigations. Law enforcement conceded as much when they added an amendment prohibiting the use of these machines in internal investigations.

Guns

”Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto House Bill 1851, which would create a new exemption to Virginia’s one handgun a month law.

“The new exemption would apply to active duty service members, whether Virginia residents or not. Because holders of valid Virginia concealed weapons permits are already able to purchase more than one handgun per month, House Bill 1851 only extends the ability to buy more than one handgun a month to nonresidents or those Virginians unable to obtain a concealed weapons permit.”

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto SB1528, which would allow the firearms training required to receive a concealed weapons permit to be completed online.

“The state requires an applicant for a concealed weapons permit to take a written safety test to demonstrate that the individual understands how to use a weapon in a safe manner. Allowing the testing to be done online would weaken the ability of the Commonwealth to determine who is actually taking the test and open up opportunities for individuals to receive a permit under fraudulent circumstances with no guarantee that they can use a weapon safely.”

“Pursuant to Article V, Section 6, of the Constitution of Virginia, I veto House Bill 2528, which unnecessarily interferes with the operations of local governments.

“Specifically, the bill prohibits local law enforcement from choosing to conduct voluntary gun buyback programs and then destroying the weapons. “Some localities have found this program to be effective in reducing the number of illegal firearms in their communities. It is not a mandatory program, and law enforcement in each locality have made the decision whether such a program is desirable in their own county or city.There is no compelling reason for the General Assembly to take this decision out of the hands of local law enforcement.”

Clarke Hogan Retires – Breaking

Vivian Paige is reporting that Clarke Hogan, Southside Republican, will retire and not run for reelection this year.

One question: Where is the Democratic challenger?

More as this develops.

UPDATE: Vivian Paige has other sources as well. Check her out. ~8:41PM~

Large Protest March in Farmville Today

(You might think that this wasn’t very large, but by local standards, it was. I mention below the strained look on more than a few faces.)

It was a great day to go for a walk in the bright Spring sunshine.

Protesting in front of the Prince Edward County Courthouse on Saturday.

It was also a great day for a civil rights struggle in Farmville to be addressed, and that’s what we did. 150-200 people gathered, young and old, tall and small, to protest the building of a private immigrant detention center (prison) in Farmville. This protest almost didn’t materialize when Farmville made it very difficult to get a permit for the protest. At the urging of the Virginia American Civil Liberties Union, Farmville recently changed their clearly unconstitutional requirements for a protest permit. A representative of the group The People United asked for a protest event permit, and was initially told by the Farmville Police Department Chief that the group would need to see the Town Manager or Town Council. The problem with that was that the Police Chief was the person to whom someone applies for a permit, even though Chief Dunnavant had said that wasn’t the case.

Local area politicians have taken money from private prison companies, so the hope was this would also send a message to those who would make it easier to train private prison guards by allowing the developer or operator of the facility to train them at a facility owned by the people of the Commonwealth, through their government. No donations from any company should drive the legislative agenda in Virginia.

This was the first time since the 1950′s that Farmville had seen a protest like this, or any public protest at all possibly. During the 1950′s, there were protests surrounding Massive Resistance, and earlier, the Davis -vs- Prince Edward County suit from (I believe) 1951-52. There were plenty of surprised looks, and looks that didn’t seem so friendly today while we walked the route of the protest. I wonder what they were thinking.

A great point was being made in the speeches today that proceeded the march: Indigenous people of North America are the target of widespread harassment and jail, after their ancestors had lived right in this area for thousands of years. Barry Carter, my friend from Virginia Organizing Project, spoke eloquently about the frame in which so-called ‘immigrants’ are in, and the preferred frame we should all recognize: ‘Native Americans’ are exactly who we are talking about, not the pejorative terms ‘illegals’ or ‘illegal immigrants’. When I look at the whole argument while keeping this in mind, I can better understand the dynamic and range of this problem.

The Farmville Police blocked traffic for us today, and everything generally went off without incident. No counter-protesters, no yelling at the protesters went on; just lots of interested and interesting looks, and lots of fun and pride in talking back and making our opinions known.

A few of the photos I took are in this article and I will most likely put up another story as a photoblog to include more of them.

This felt really good.

One of Saturday's signs at the protest march.

Protesting in downtown Farmville on Saturday.

HB1687 Removes Protections For Consumers In Automobile Transactions – Action Alert

Thursday afternoon, the Senate Transportation Committee will take up this bill, HB1687, which removes the consumer protection from the transaction of purchasing a vehicle. There has been complaints from both parties’ citizen activists about this bill, patroned by Delegate John Cosgrove (R-Chesapeake).

Basically, this bill removes the protection of the Uniform Commercial Code from the purchase of a motor vehicle. If a dealer wanted to exercise their statutory or contractual rights to cancel a purchaser’s contract to buy a vehicle, before the application for title has been submitted to DMV in the name of the purchaser, that dealer may do so without claim of possession by the purchaser. In other words, no rights to get a trade-in vehicle back, no return of money given as a down payment, and without any other protection afforded the consumer in VAC Title 8.9A, Commercial Code for Secured Transactions.

This bill would remove a long established body of law that protects both the business community and the consumer by providing rules for the transfer of property in default.

The bill would also create a situation where there would be two types of reposession and two types of consumer in reposession; one with the protections and rules of Article 9 (secured transactions), and those without such protections for either party.

No guidance is provided in this bill for the Courts or others, including law enforcement personnel and auto dealers, on what would replace the protections offered in the Commercial Code.

Delegate Cosgrove seems like he might be providing a service here to one of his biggest donors, the Virginia Automobile & Truck Dealers Association.

$6,050 Va Auto Dealers Assn
$500 Carmax Auto Superstores Inc

That information is from 2007-2008. If you look at VPAP records for the seven years from 2001-2008, it is a different picture.

Amount	Donor
$21,250	Va Auto Dealers Assn
$1,400	Va Independent Auto Dealers
$1,300	Greenbrier Dodge
$1,000	Greenbrier Chrysler Plymouth
$550	Don Comer Ford Inc
$500	Carmax Auto Superstores Inc
$300	Greenbrier Oldsmobile
$250	Gordon Motor Auto Sales Inc
$200	Green Gifford Car Center
$150	Freedom Ford Inc

$26,900 from auto dealers since 2001.

Now comes the action portion of our program. This bill will be debated, such as it is, tomorrow in the Transportation Committee, at 2 PM. Below are the members of the Transportation Committee:

Members

* Sen. Yvonne Miller (D-5) Chair
* Sen. Harry Blevins (R-14)
* Sen. Creigh Deeds (D-25)
* Sen. Edd Houck (D-17)
* Sen. Robert Hurt (R-19)
* Sen. Henry Marsh (D-16)
* Sen. Ryan McDougle (R-4)
* Sen. John Miller (D-1)
* Sen. Steve Newman (R-23)
* Sen. Chap Petersen (D-34)
* Sen. Phil Puckett (D-38)
* Sen. Ralph Smith (R-22)
* Sen. Patsy Ticer (D-30)
* Sen. Frank Wagner (R-7)
* Sen. John Watkins (R-10)

Please call these Senators and ask them to not pass this horrible bill. Obviously, this is a ploy by friends of the automobile sales industry to turn things to their favor by making sure consumers have no voice.

Other articles on this bill: Vivian J. Paige
(Related) Bearing Drift

These Legislators Like Private Immigrant Prisons and Inhumane Treatment

They must, because they voted 22-0 to pass along a bill that permits employees of private prisons to train at a Commonwealth-funded training facility in Lynchburg. I have written about this before, in terms of the sponsor of this bill, Watkins Abbitt.

You will notice that none of the legislators live in this area, and will not be needlessly bothered by the typically inhumane treatment in our prisons, private or not.

The bill, HB2624, benefits the Geo Group, a company who specializes in private prison administration. Lack of medical care at their facilities has caused 2 riots in the last 70 days, (one facility) in Reeve County, Texas.

Clay Athey (R-18 )
William Barlow (D-64)
Danny Bowling (D-3)
Bill Carrico (R-5)
Ben Cline (R-24)
Todd Gilbert (R-15)
Morgan Griffith (R-8 )
Charniele Herring (D-46)
Bill Janis (R-56)
Terry Kilgore (R-1)
Lynwood Lewis (D-100)
Scott Lingamfelter (R-31)
Don Merricks (R-16)
Paula Miller (D-87)
Dave Nutter (R-7)
Charles Poindexter (R-9)
David Poisson (D-32)
Jim Scott (D-53)
Beverly Sherwood (R-29)
Jim Shuler (D-12)
Roslyn Tyler (D-75)
Tom Wright (R-61)

It doesn’t matter to me who is on this list, Democrat or Republican. This is a bad idea, and one that will allow this private immigration prison to go forward in Farmville. Shame on them, every one of them.