Mere Politics

CNN Shenanigans

Did anyone notice that the only one of the Youtube questioners in Wednesday night's presidential debate who got the opportunity to speak at the debate itself was the gay gentleman?  He was handed the mike and proceeded to expound his position to the nation.

Is CNN going to give the floor over to someone from the religious right during the next Democratic debate?

Strategery: John David Dyche's Blueprint for Republican Disaster

John David Dyche has the perfect banner for Kentucky Republicans to rally 'round after their defeat at the polls earlier this month: a white flag.

In yesterday's Courier-Journal, Dyche argues that Republican lawmakers who oppose casinos "should hold their fire in Frankfort during the legislative session and instead campaign against the amendment come autumn of 2008."  In case you're wondering, that is when, if a pro-casino constitutional amendment were to pass in the General Assembly session early next year, casinos would be dumping millions of dollars gained from the losses of people in other states to promote a "yes" vote on an amendment in Kentucky.

Until Dyche came along, it had always been thought that occupying a strong position was the best way to situate yourself before a battle.  But Dyche has another idea: put yourself in the weakest possible position, making yourself as vulnerable as possible to the enemy.  Too bad Sun Tzu never thought of it.

"Casino foes can make it perfectly clear that in putting an amendment before the voters, they reserve the right to vigorously resist its passage at the appropriate time."  Ooh.  That'll scare the bad guys.  And what exactly is the "appropriate time" for a Party to stand by its principles?  Is it before or after the ceremony for signing the unconditional surrender?

Had Napoleon employed this strategy, he wouldn't have had to wait so long for Waterloo.  He could have gotten it over early in his career and began his retirement on St. Helena while he could still enjoy the weather.

"Republicans may be able to bargain their consent to a gambling referendum into Beshear's backing for something they support," says Dyche, "or his tacit commitment not to recruit opponents or campaign against those who cooperate."  This is called the "Sell Your Supporters Down the Road" strategy.  I have consulted my dog-eared copy of von Clauswitz's On War, but I'm having a hard time finding it.

I could have sworn it was in there.

I was trying to think where I had seen such a show of concern for the person who had fallen on hard times.  Where was it that I had seen advice of this caliber directed toward the hard pressed?  And then it came to me:

Job's Comforters.

Okay, so Dyche's no Karl Rove.  Maybe he could make something of himself as a constitutional scholar.  But alas, here too he seems to be operating at a slight disadvantage.

Dyche seems to be under the impression that Kentucky has a referendum process, when, in fact, it has a process of amending its constitution that involves the ratification of the voters.  Lawmakers are supposed to vote for an amendment because they think it is a good idea, not because they want to punt.  We have a representative democracy, which means lawmakers are actually supposed to exercise their best judgment of what is good for the Commonwealth.

It's a word that Dyche might want to add to his political vocabulary. It's called "statesmanship."

I would call on Republicans to resist Dyche's siren song, but the sirens were reputed to have actually sounded good.  No one needs to tie themselves to the mast here.  The danger isn't coming from someone on shore, but someone who is ostensibly part of the crew: Dyche is a Republican himself. 

In such a case, my recommendation is to find a good, sturdy plank.  But don't make it too long: we don't want him to have to walk too far.   

The Kentucky Left's "Two Minute Hate" on Global Warming

In his classic novel, 1984, George Orwell writes of the "Two Minute Hate": a periodic event in which members of the Party are gathered together before a video screen featuring images of Emmanuel Goldstein and his followers: the enemies of the State. Participants are worked up into a frenzy of hatred and vitriol directed against people who, later in the story, turn out to be completely fictional.

So worked up do the participants become during the Two Minute Hate that they even attack the telescreen in front of them. The object of this political ritual is to solidify the support of each individual to the Party by uniting them in hatred against its enemies.

For the increasingly strident Tolerance Police, the rhetorical equivalent of the Two Minute Hate is becoming a daily event.

The most recent object of their hate is State Rep. Jim Gooch, who landed himself on the national news by holding hearings at the state capitol questioning one of the left's new dogmas: global warming. The telescreen is turned on, images of Gooch, ensconced in his chair as head of the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee appear before the audience (courtesy of the KET), and then they start into their jeering and cursing, eventually working themselves up to such a fever pitch you wonder whether they'll hurt themselves.

It is becoming a frequent, and increasingly alarming sight.

Now I too am against the rape of the environment, particularly as it manifests itself in things like mountaintop removal. Besides being bad stewardship of the land, it's just plain wrong.

To say that global warming is happening, or that global warming is the result of human activities--or that it can be corrected by human actions whether it was caused by them or not--are not unreasonable positions, whatever you think about their accuracy. What is unreasonable is the level of personal acrimony and ad hominem vitriol that are increasingly being employed by those who believe these things.

In a recent Louisville Courier-Journal editorial Gooch was term a "a global warming denier."  Ooh.  Did you catch the rhetorical allusion there?  Sounds very similar to "Holocaust denier" to me.  So now people who have legitimate beefs with the mistake-riddled rhetoric of Al Gore are akin to David Duke.

Got it.

"Jake" over at Page One Kentucky, an increasingly intemperate voice of the political left in Kentucky, insists, "Rep. Jim Gooch needs to resign immediately."  Why?  Because this "embarrassment," this "uneducated...fool," this, ...this "idiot" disagrees with "Jake" on a controversial environmental issue.

Check.

Then there are the gals over at "Kentucky Women: Power, Passion, and Politics" (with an emphasis on the "Passion"), who recently announced, "Speaker Jody Richards, it's time for Rep. Jim Gooch to be removed off this committee!"  A suggestion in response to which Speaker Richards kindly patted them on the head and told them he didn't think he ought to do that, and didn't they have some cookies to go bake or something?

Okay, he really didn't say that last part, but it would have been fun to see their reaction if he had.

And besides, you don't "remove" someone "off" something, you just "remove" them--one possible reason the word 'Grammar' does not appear in their title along with the words 'Power', 'Politics', and 'Passion'.  And why should we be such sticklers about a linguistic trifle?

Let's cut to Larry Dale Keeling.  Larry, are you there?  Go ahead Larry:

Introducing the main speaker at an interim legislative committee meeting Wednesday, Chairman Jim Gooch mistakenly pronounced what should have been a silent 's.'

As a result, Viscount ("v’-kount," according to Random House Webster's College Dictionary) Christopher Walker Monckton became a "vizz (rhymes with fizz)-count."

Although Rep. Mike Cherry, D-Princeton, got it right when he later addressed Monckton, several other lawmakers on the panel repeated the "vizzcount" mistake often during the course of a lengthy meeting.

Thanks for that report Larry.  The Herald-Leader's Larry Dale Keeling will be back next week with a report on he, personally, pronounces the words 'Versailles' and 'Athens'.

In the Two Minute Hate there is no time for reasoned discourse or for the presentation of evidence for your position, which is why none of Gooch's critics even bothered to offer any in any of their criticisms of him.

The sole exception was Randall Patrick, the editorials editor of the Winchester Sun.  He at least made the attempt, although not a very spirited one.  "Maybe the reason the chairman didn't invite any scientists," said Patrick, "is because it's hard to find one who doesn't believe global warming is happening at an alarming rate and is caused in large measure by the burning of carbon fuels."

C'mon, Randall, how hard did you look?  Ever heard of Reid Bryson, Emeritus Professor of Meteorology, of Geography and of Environmental Studies, Senior Scientist, Center for Climatic Research, The Gaylord Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies (Founding Director), the University of Wisconsin, Madison?  Huh?

Apparently not.   It just so happens he's widely regarded as the father of climatology.  Here's what he says, despite his nonexistence:

All this argument is the temperature going up or not, it’s absurd. Of course it’s going up. It has gone up since the early 1800s, before the Industrial Revolution, because we’re coming out of the Little Ice Age, not because we’re putting more carbon dioxide into the air.

Or how about Carleton University science professor Tim Patterson, who says that global warming will not bring about the downfall of life on the planet, and that much of recent research indicates that “changes in the brightness of the sun” are almost certainly the predominant cause of global warming since the end of the “Little Ice Age” in the late 19th century?

He must be imaginary too.

And what about Timothy Ball, professor of climatology at the University of Winnipeg and Chairman of the National Resources Stewardship Project in Canada, a group that argues that "CO2 is very unlikely to be a substantial driver of climate change and is not a pollutant," and that "global climate change is primarily a natural phenomenon..."?

Want more?  Go visit the NRSP's website for a long list.

And why should Patrick mention scientists who he could easily have googled on the Internet when he could simply repeat discredited claims by Al Gore about "an article in Science magazine in 2004 found that out of 928 randomly selected peer-reviewed articles that have been published in scientific journals over a 10-year period, not one doubted that human beings are the cause of climate change"?

Is Patrick aware that an English social scientist reviewed the methodology used in that study and found that the author did not actually read all 928 studies, but only the abstracts?  In reality, only about 50 of those studies said it was a crisis, and some actually disagreed, the remainder saying it was unknown.

Does that prove the global warming is not a problem or that humans aren't contributing to it?  No, of course not.  But it does prove that there is a legitimate debate in the scientific community about it and that people who disagree with the scare talk on global warming are not ipso facto a bunch of crazies.

But it's hard for people to know this, so loud is the screaming and hollering during the Two Minute Hate.

New school chief a mixed bag

Reports are that State Rep. John Draud (R-Edgewood) will be getting the nod from the State School Board as Kentucky's new Education Commissioner.  Here are a few pluses and minuses of a Draud administration:

• PLUS: Draud has immediate credibility in the General Assembly.  Having been a legislator, and one who, although a Republican, has not been partisan in his attitude, he has working relationships in the legislature he can use to further his goals in the legislature. He also brings with him a knowledge of how the General Assembly works--no mean skill for state bureaucrat who has to work with lawmakers.
• MINUS: Draud lacks a dynamic personality.  Okay, let's put it this way: he isn't exactly Mr. Personality. He can be cold and aloof.  What he gains in legislative experience, he could lose here. Not that previous School Commissioners have ever given any evidence of having been to Charm School.  Thomas Boysen was probably the best in this regard, wowing legislators with his California glamour--although they finally saw through the glitz.  Bill Cody was so relationally inept that I had a better relationship with David Karem (the one who traditionally toted the Department of Education's water in the Senate) than he did.  Go figure. And I don't think the last one even tried to do this.  What was his name again?
• PLUS: Draud has strong credentials in school administration.  He's a successful school administrator. 'Nuff said.
• MINUS: He is a card-carrying member of the state education establishment. Alright, I admit it: to think that someone from outside the establishment (like Penny Sanders) would ever even be considered for the position is whistling Dixie.  Still, don't look for any big shakeups in Kentucky's education system. Draud was one of those who, during the big battles over education reforms in the late 90's, didn't seem to want to listen to any appeals for change.
• PLUS: Draud is not a shill for the teachers unions.  He is a school administrator, and school administrators are not traditionally beholden to the KEA.  This will come in handy later when Beshear starts issuing payoffs to the teachers unions for supporting him in the election.  He also has experience dealing with the unions and so presumably knows how to deal with them.

All in all, a mixed bag.

Lexington abortionist indicted for fraud

Word now comes that Dr. Hamid Hussain Sheikh, Lexington's infamous abortionist, has been indicted by the State Attorney General.  According to the AG's press release, Sheikh "committed fraud by performing abortions and disguising patient visits as fetal ultrasounds for normal pregnancies, which he billed to Medicaid."  Additional charges could come because of the unsanitary conditions found in his office.

It is sort of ironic that the crime Dr. Sheik is getting indicted for isn't half as bad as what he does legally on a daily basis. I guess it just goes to show that, in our culture, taking human lives is fine--but only so long as you have your paperwork in order and your floors swept.

Reason to home school #5672

You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension. A dimension of sound. A dimension of sight. A dimension of mind. You're moving into a land of both style and substance of things and ideas. You've just crossed over into ... the Jefferson County School District.

Yes.  The state's largest school district has just entered the Twilight Zone.

The Jefferson County School District is including gays and lesbians in its hiring protections and the Louisville Courier-Journal isn't totally comfortable with it.  Do they wonder whether this will detrimentally affect students?  Do they think that maybe giving hiring protections to people on the basis of what they do rather than who they are sets a bad precedent?

Nope. Instead, they appear to be wondering why cross dressers were left out of the policy. According to the CJ, a committee of the school board

had been asked by the Fairness Campaign of Louisville, as well as by several gay, lesbian and transgender employees, to include both sexual orientation and transgender status in the district's employment and harassment policies.

Transgender includes transsexuals, cross-dressers and others whose appearance does not match their birth gender.

"This has been a big issue for a very long time," said board member Debbie Wesslund, chairwoman of the committee. "We decided to include sexual orientation at this time, but decided to hold off on making a decision about transgender because, as of right now, gender identification is both a new and broad definition."

In the Twilight Zone, it is apparently impermissible to speak in language that displays any moral clarity.  The only problem with letting cross dressers into the classroom to teach children is because the name they go under is "new and broad."

Has it occurred to anyone that the very people who want to teach sex education to our kids are slowly rendering themselves incapable of telling the difference between boys and girls?

Now watch.  Anyone who refuses to find this new policy completely acceptable is going to be called a hateful bigot.

Wait!  This just in, the folks over at bluegrassroots.org have just called dissenters from the new Twilight Zone policy "hateful bigots."

Gosh I'm good.

My article on media bias in today's Herald-Leader

My opinion piece on media bias appeared in today's Lexington Herald-Leader.

O Brothers! Stop the senseless leadership!

Over at Kentucky School News and Views, Richard Day criticizes Joe Brothers, the head of the State School Board, for moving ahead with the appointment of a new state schools chief in the face of a request from new Governor Steve Beshear to restart the process of hiring a new commissioner. 

Now I can see how someone could criticize the school board over this, but I'm not sure I understand how you could do it using Day's argument.  His criticism is that the Board is " railroading this choice."

Huh?

The position has been open for almost a year and its functions being performed by an assistant commissioner.  The one thing you can't criticize the Board for is "railroading this choice."  The only resemblance Brother's actions bear to locomotion as we know it is that Brothers appears to finally putting the cars back on the track after a train wreck.

I was critical too of the Board's Barbara Erwin fiasco, but I have a hard time feeling bad about how the Board has conducted itself since Brothers took the reins of the Board.  Finally, there seems to be some real leadership happening on education, and then, what do people want him to do?  They want him to stop it.

Just cut it out!  Someone needs to put a halt to this senseless leadership!

I don't see where this Board has any obligation under law or conscience to lay down and play dead simply because another governor is about to take over.  Every governor gets his chance to select his own members.  But, guess what?  It's not his turn yet.

And does anyone doubt that when Beshear does get his hands on the Board he's going to fill it with shills for the teachers unions that helped get him elected?  Let's hope not, but I'm not hopeful.

Maybe Day could articulate what obligation this board has to scratch everything it has done so far in the selection process because

In fact, one of the reasons I have heard offered for why the board is elected rather than appointed is to insulate it from the shifting winds of politics.  Yet now there are some people who want Board members  to wet a finger and stick it in the air.

And how much you want to bet these are people who would be having a fit if it was an incoming Republican governor who wanted immediate control over the Board's agenda?

Cheves misses the real story of the election: media bias

In a recent article, John Cheves attempts to analyze the Fletcher campaign's actions in the closing days of the gubernatorial campaign to play what Cheves calls "the gay card."  But Cheves missed the real story--a story in which he himself was a player.

The Fletcher campaign conducted a calling blitz in the waning days of the campaign informing voters of what C-FAIR, a gay rights organization, said in its endorsement of him that Steve Beshear would do once he took office.  The calls featured the voice of Pat Boone.  When word of the calls got out, Kentucky's  liberal press corps, knowing how such information might be received by Kentucky's largely conservative voters, went into full panic mode. 

It was the first recorded instance of anyone actually being terror-stricken by Pat Boone.

When it endorsed Beshear, C-FAIR claimed that he would support gay adoption, gay rights laws, and the recognition of same-sex relationships. The organization also said Beshear would reinstitute gay rights provisions for executive branch employment that would place "sexual orientation" on the same level as race, gender, and religion in state hiring procedures.

Now these positions are pretty common fare for gay rights groups, but it would have been the first time a candidate for Kentucky governor supported them, and would be unusual positions for a gubernatorial candidate to take in a state that just 3 years ago passed the Marriage Amendment by a record margin.  You would have thought the claim by C-FAIR would be big news.

Instead, the media was almost completely silent. 

But when the Fletcher campaign began its calling campaign, all of a sudden reporters swung into action, one describing the calls as "gay-bashing," despite the fact that he hadn't even heard the calls--and despite the fact that the calls said little more than what C-FAIR was saying on its own website. In fact, another series of calls, which did not come from the Fletcher campaign, but from an anonymous entity reporters dubbed the "robo caller", directed recipients directly to the C-FAIR website. 

What was the media so upset about?  And why, when they refused to report what C-FAIR had said on its website in the first place, did it get upset when others did little more than point it out themselves?  Why was it not a story when C-FAIR said it and a scandal when Fletcher said it?  Would the Fletcher campaign (or, for that matter, the robo caller) have bothered if the media had been doing its job in the first place and reporting the news?

Where were John Cheves and his colleagues when C-FAIR made the initial claims?  Under normal circumstances, when reporters smell something potentially embarrassing to a candidate, they pounce.  Why didn't they in this case?

The Beshear campaign was obviously trying to keep a low profile about the C-FAIR endorsement.  It was mysteriously absent from the Beshear campaign's list of endorsements on its web page.  And when Bill Bartleman of the Paducah Sun finally walked through the veritable picket line of reporters who were refusing to report the original story, he asked Beshear's spokesperson Vicki Glass specifically about C-FAIR's claims.

The representative of the candidate who said in his TV commercials, "One thing I promise you, you'll always know where I stand" responded: "No further comment."  Mark it down as the first broken promise of the Beshear administration--and he hadn't even been elected yet.

Had a group as far to the right at C-FAIR is to the left endorsed Fletcher, would the media have waited until the Democrat's campaign pointed it out so say anything about it?  And would it then have launched off on its own campaign to discredit the Democratic candidate for bringing it up?

Not likely.

Had Fletcher spoken to a militia group, for example, ten bucks says the Herald-Leader and the rest of the state media would have been blaring it from the housetops as soon as it could get its hands on the story.  But when a story would embarrass the more liberal candidate, the media's hands are good for little else than sitting on.

One of the things Cheves and other pro-Beshear reporters seemed to be so upset about was that the robo-caller did not identify himself.  But who is worse? A person who refuses to identify himself but is willing to tell you the truth? Or a person who is willing to identify himself but refuses to tell you the truth--despite the fact that that's his job?

Cheves is right about one thing: the calls did little to help Fletcher, but that was largely due to the fact that he did little on social issues during his entire administration, and only began taking a stand when he saw the buzzards circling.

Finally, Cheves and his colleagues were equally disinterested in perhaps the most worrisome revelation of all.  Yes, the Fletcher campaign hired Pat Boone to do a recorded phone message.  But when asked about the calls, Beshear responded that Boone should stick to singing.  And then, ominously, he added, "I still enjoy listening to his music." 

If that's not enough to strike fear into the hearts of Kentuckians, I don't know what is.

Why Beshear will fail to get casinos in Kentucky

Some people seem to think there is a good chance that the issue of casino gambling will make it on to next year's ballot.

They're wrong.

In an article in yesterday's Courier-Journal Tom Loftus and Stephanie Steitzer discussed the chances of a gambling measure passing in next year's General Assembly.  Although the article did not postulate what chances such a bill might have, it did give the impression that it has a much better chance than, in fact, it actually has.

Here is why such a bill stands little chance of ever making it through the 2008 legislative session:

First, most senators don't really want to vote on this issue. In the CJ article, the focus was put on how many people would vote for it if it made it to the floor.  But that's not the question.  The question is whether it will ever make it to the floor.

Most of the Republican senators quoted as being on the fence might very well have to vote "yes" if it gets a vote, but it won't get a vote because those same senators don't want to vote at all.  With one or two exceptions the Republican senators who are uncommitted will be telling Senate Republican leadership behind the scenes not to let the bill out. 

Think about it: either way they vote, they lose.  Most of them don't want the bill, but are in districts in which voting "no" would be costly.  In fact, in many cases, it would be costly whichever way they voted.  There is no benefit to them of voting either way.

Senate President David Williams, the leader of the Republican caucus, is not going to put so many of his members in such a difficult position.  That's one of the reasons Williams has become such a popular leader of the Republicans in the Senate: he protects his members.  His caucus will be made up mostly of members who oppose the bill--and those who don't oppose it still, in large part, don't want to vote on it.

If the bill does come out of the House, watch for Senate leadership to put the bill in the Licensing and Occupations Committee, chaired by anti-casino Sen. Gary Tapp.  Tapp will be more than happy to sit on the bill until the clock runs out.  Licensing and Occupations is the natural committee for a casino bill to land, so nobody will be able to say it was sent to the wrong committee.

Second, it is in David William's political interest to kill any casino bill. Many observers think David Williams has gubernatorial aspirations, and it won't do him any good if he gets pushed around by the new Democratic governor--and that's exactly what it will look like if Beshear is able to push a casino bill through the Senate.

If Williams is going to distinguish himself as the heir apparent for the Republican nomination for governor in 2011, he has to show that he can successfully stand up to Beshear.  If he doesn't, there is a passel of other aspirants ready to take his place.

Third, it is not a forgone conclusion that the House will pass a bill. The primary reason for not passing a bill in previous sessions has been that House leaders did not want to have their members cast a politically risky vote if the Senate was not going to hear the bill in the first place.  But it should be clear by February that that situation has not changed. 

Besides, if House leaders are smart (and that is also not a forgone conclusion), they're going to be asking themselves if it is in their best interests to put what amounts to a controversial social issue on the ballot.  They well remember what happened in 2004 when the churches were emptied and they lost seven seats.  They have to be looking at polls taken after Fletcher's anti-casino commercials which show a majority of Kentuckians voting against such a measure and asking themselves whether they want to clean out the churches again and lose seats.

Add these factors to the continuing dilemma pro-casino forces face--either putting casinos on tracks, in which case they lose the support of legislators in areas that do not have tracks since there is nothing in it for them, or allowing them outside of tracks, in which case they lost the crucial support of the tracks--and you have a hard row to hoe for casino interests.

In any case, it is an easy decision for David Williams. He can continue to consolidate his control over his caucus by doing what his members really want him to do: kill the bill.  And he can establish himself as the top Republican gubernatorial contender by showing he can beat Beshear.

It all comes down to what David Williams does, and there's no reason to think he will let a bill out--and every reason to think he won't.