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On Rick Jensen today this occurred. Ask him for the podcast… More later….
In today’s News Journal there is notice that Pam Scott had influence upon the letter announcing the compromise Chris Coons and Stoltz Reality worked out regarding the Barley Mill Plaza.
I just want to point out that this is not odd. I do it all the time. When an agreement is going to be made public, it is common practice to have the attorney’s on both sides trouble shoot it, play devil’s advocate, fling it against the wall to see if anything loose will fall out.
There is nothing more embarrassing than rolling out a plan whose flaw is immediately picked out by the public, and the whole plan has to then be rolled up and fixed.
This is why we send drafts back and forth to each other and ask for their approval, and if they choose to make changes they send it back to us for our approval.
This is a standard protocol in business and is nothing shady at all. Trying to make it into something sinister and heinous won’t stand. It is what we all do. It is how things work.
Just sayin’.
Courtesy of Facebook.
The Greek track star was booted off the Olympic Team. No, it was not because of the Euro… It was because of her slur against Africans. People need to keep their mouths shut. I was glad the Olympic Committee was adhering to high standards.
Later, another report came across the wire. This one actually had translated what she had said…… It was something like …”with so many Africans here, the West Nile Mosquitoes will be able to dine on local food.”
I read it again, because that didn’t sound horrible.
“with so many Africans here, the West Nile Mosquitoes will be able to dine on local food.”
I HAVE to be missing something…. I read it real slow.
With….. so…..many….. Africans….. here, .. the….. West….. Nile…. Mosquitoes…. will…. be….. able…. to…..dine…. on …..local…. food..
Didn’t see it that time… I tried reading it real fast.
Withsomany Africans here, theWestNileMosquitoes willbeabletodineon localfood.
No it is not in delivery…. Is there something racist about West Nile Mosquitoes?
Google Search of West Nile Mosquitoes lists these locations…. Massachusetts, Connecticut, Atlanta, Rockville, and Illinois. Someone just died of it in Arizona. These mosquitoes are all over America, and it appears they bite white people as well as nonwhites too. Oh, crap. They just found one in Tom’s River!!!!! Now even I’m worried. I saw one on my arm earlier today….
Is the joke in regards to the Nile River? It is, after all in Africa. But is that pejorative? After all, most of us associate the Nile with Ancient Egypt, where mankind began civilization. The Nile almost has a regal nature to it. Do we preach defamation when someone says “Mississippi”? or “Missouri”? or “Ohio”? They are rivers too… How about… “Amazon”? Ooooh. There is pejorative turn of a word. That makes me think of tall scantily clad Lucy Lawless. … If there was a mosquito disease originating in Jefferson County outside of New Orleans, and we said, the same thing when the Saints come up to Philadelphia to play… ” With so many Saints fans here in Philadelphia, all our Jefferson County mosquitoes will have local cuisine.” ( I would have added) “I hope they didn’t lose their tolerance for cayenne.”
Would I be cast off an Olympic Team?
The Phillies play the Colorado Rockies at home next on September 7,8,9th. Must I pencil myself a note never to say… “Rocky Mountain spotted fever” on those three days? Especially if to do so is….to lead me “to express my heartfelt apologies for the unfortunate and tasteless joke I published on my personal Twitter account. I am very sorry and ashamed for the negative responses I triggered, since I never wanted to offend anyone, or to encroach human rights.”
Or if I go up to New London, Connecticut, I must be very careful not to think of ticks and if I do get bitten by one on the back of my hairline, while there, I must be very careful not to say in the local’s presence… Lyme Disease. Old Lyme is only a couple of towns west of New London. I wouldn’t want to offend anyone, or encroach human rights.
Encroach human rights? How.
How does either statement encroach human rights? Does either statement bring down people from Colorado or Connecticut?
Are you a bad person just because there is a disease that originated in your country? If so, all Africa is doomed. And so is South America. And syphilis came from the New World! So we are all in this together.
Mosquitoes dine on everyone, myself included. They ARE color blind.
Where is the racist remark? “There are so many Africans here?” Should she have said Negroes? or blacks? Do we take offense when we get called Americans while we are abroad? “kick that bitch off the team. We are United Staters; not Americans. Everyone in the Western Hemisphere is a damned American…”
I’m struggling here. Someone help me out. I’m trying to think of a slur made at Americans that would require an apology and a kick off the Olympic Team… and for heavens sakes, I just can’t think of one.
Basically her point is…. Gee, there are a lot of Africans here… Yeah.. duh… it’s the Olympics……
You take that and put it with the fear of West Nile, which in Greece is at a higher preponderance than here in the US.
The Olympics must have the highest standards. Without question. But there is the other standard, the one requiring a burden of proof. It appears all we have to have is a prosecutor and boom, a sentence is levied.
And this is not one occasion. Nancy Grace on Fox is a case. Bloggers comments are another case. Everyone has an opinion. No one stops to look at facts. They judge based on one or two words in the question. “Sure, if someone slurs a race, they should be thrown off the team. I say throw them off the team. We need to make an example so powerful it never happens again!” Hey, everybody! Let’s judge by popular opinion and not the facts.
Everyone has an opinion before anyone knows what she said. The implication is: “oh, it doesn’t matter what she says. If someone complains and thinks it is derogatory, then that is what matters. Whether it is derogatory or not, is inconsequential. After all, how can she not be guilty, if someone complains?”
Uhhhhh. perhaps the person doing the complaining is simply not that smart? If affects 50% of the worlds population you know?
I remember saner times.
Courtesy of Facebook
The story goes that Warren Buffet, rather worried about his investments early 2008, wanted to talk to God… God told him to use his phone and he’d send him the bill… He got and paid the $333 million dollar charge. His investments flourished, too… That would be the end of the story, except he was down in Sussex County recently, following up first hand on a corporate case being processed out of Georgetown… once again, he asked God for the right to call, and agreed to accept the charges… When he got his bill, he was fuming… He was only charged 25 cents… “God”, he said, “you ripped me off on that first call, big time!”… God said, “Warren, don’t you get it? In Sussex County, that’s a local call…”
Local call or not, Sussex County is weighing in on whether to say a prayer before County meetings or to not… Here are a few takes on that policy: one, two, three, four……
As someone who grew up where prayers were always said before football games and county meetings, it isn’t a big deal…… That is, as long as everyone agrees it isn’t a big deal. You don’t see prayers before meetings conducted in New York.
Not because New Yorkers are heathens, but because in New York, you have a multiplicity of religions, so praying a prayer from one of them, is a slap in the face for all others…
Why it’s even an issue in Sussex County is because the Positive Growth Alliance, has been building condo’s like ants, and lots of people who did not grow up in Sussex County, now live there. Many have different ideas of religion than those who’ve always been there all their lives…
If everyone believe in the same version of God as does David Anderson, then of course, duh, why are we even arguing about it… Of course we’re going to pray to God to guide us through this meeting.. That’s what He’s for!
Suddenly, thanks to Rich Collins and the Positive Growth Alliance, we have tons of people who do object to having David Anderson’s version of God, one who dislikes Homosexuals, and one who casts pox on Democrats, one who believes married people should have sex only when they have children, one who believes sex between animals is immoral, one who believes taxes are caused by the devil, one who believes that nature was made to bulldoze and pave with a combination of petroleum and gravel. … one who believes that oil companies have the divine right to pollute oceans, one who believes that animals were made for us to kill. … one who believes a national religious holiday should fall on the first day of deer season.. one who believes pick up trucks and baseball caps are proof that homosexuality is a sin,… on who believes killing someone with a gun is not a sin, but taking that gun away for the safety of others is…
(yes, I’m having fun and talking tongue in cheek)…
The point I’m making is that Sussex County is changing; and it is changing mostly thanks to Rich Collins and the Positive Growth Alliance.
Can you make new citizens join the current religion? If so, then by all means, just like the days of old, they will see no qualms in having a tiny prayer before the meeting.
But if they don’t want to join that religion, then, to force one group of religious people to impose their prayers on others, is not American…In fact, it’s kinda creepy…
If in an effort to show fairness, the Sussex County decided they would do prayers from all religions in alphabetical order, when they came to “B” and hit Buddahism, giving an Buddahist prayer before the session, most of those in the audience would be saying WTF! This is our nation, why do we have to listen to such crap…
Which is… exactly what those Buddahists think, who have opened a business in Millsboro, and have come before the county to ask for a variance on something or other that is in their antiqued code….
So… If it is unnatural for a Baptist to suffer a Buddahist prayer, it is equally unnatural for a Buddahist to sit through a Baptist prayer…
It’s not about one religion being right and the other wrong. It’s about who the citizens are that make up Sussex County. If you want to blame anyone over this controversy, the blame solely lies with those who built up Sussex County and brought in all these new people to begin with… Now that they are here, we have to make Sussex County as fair to them as New York, is fair to us, when we take our business up there……
Positive Growth, huh? Depends on your version of positive I guess………….
The News Journal was apparently prodded from above, to finally give in and show some publicity to the forces, led by the Sussex County developer’s community, to apply pressure to Pete Schwartzkopf….
This has nothing to do with the upcoming election.
This does have to do with pressuring Pete to vote the developers line in the state’s General Assembly whenever “their” bills come up for a vote…
One can tell this is true by it’s timing… Why now….. No voter in hell (or Sussex County), cares about elections this early. Resurrecting an old Pink Floyd cliche... and applying it to Pete Schwartzkopf this close to the end of the legislative session, can be for one reason…
Intimidation…
Now Pete, brushes this off. As well as he should… Let us look at the evidence we have and just what exactly it means….
We have a truck, a billboard, pamphlets, a website.
The website is free, anyone can do that. The pamphlets depending on the number, could be done for $10.00… The billboard, we learn, is free. The only expense so far, is the truck.. Perhaps?….
That depends on Chuck Gritton. I would venture to guess that this was done at company expense. No sums changed hands?
So what looks like an attempted protest, is simply the whinings of one or two pathetic people… One is Christian Hudson, a developer who won’t rest until Sussex County looks like Harlem…
These developers intimidated Sussex County for years… To my knowledge, only two men, and one women, have been brave enough not to kowtow to them, and say no…
The entire state of Delaware owes Pete Schwartzkoph considerable thanks, for keeping our beaches in competent hands….
Who are these people? These people want to build with no environmental laws. They don’t care what damage is done to the land. These people don’t care how long you have to wait to get onto your highway, or how long you have to wait for the light to go green, and then, ten feet later, stop at the next stop light… They don’t care. All they care about is selling the land they got for nothing and making themselves too much money to spend in their lifetimes… For that, all of Sussex County has to suffer..
They have taken a page from Osama Bin Laden. When you don’t have support, use money to wreak havoc. In a sense, they have resorted to terrorist tactics.
Terrorist tactics? Isn’t that a little extreme?
Let’s look at it. Let’s compare Osama Bin Laden to say, whoever is trying to pressure Pete Schwartzkoph.
Both work in secret, with a small cadre of close assistants, who move through society incognito.
Both are fanatic about minority opinions that no one even cares about.
Both, have no concern for collateral damage or the innocent people who suffer from their actions…
The bottom line, is that their statements are so ludicrous, they can’t make them in public without getting laughed off stage…
Pete raised taxes in Sussex County? As all astute people know, the budget is compiled by the Joint Finance Committee… Pete has not even a member of the Joint Finance Committee since the Legislature changed in 2008. Back when he was a member, Republican controlled the House, so the following people, who if this accusation is to foolishly to be believed, all deserve Pigs-On-trucks attached to their names…. Oberle, Amick, Cloutier, Booth, Miro, and Wagner
These are the people who need to get blamed for your raised taxes… Not Pete Schwartzkoph.
For more silliness, you can find them here…
Their website fails to mention that because of the mismanagement caused by developers such as Christain Hudson and his supporters, our state was facing a shortfall… It costs every citizen less to pay a tiny residual in taxes, than have to pay full price for those services they now get for free..
Pete is on the right boat. Those terrorists who can’t debate in public without losing the second they open their mouth. are not…
Bottom line.
This is just fun and games by two pathetic people, who have this bone to pick with Pete Schwartzkoph…. No one should take it seriously… especially the News Journal….
Hi, we’ve been pulling 5 passages from the budget for each post, and posting them without discussion… That will come later each time you read something that raises your eyebrows…. With out further ado…
1) Title XIV of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 enacted by the federal government creates a State Fiscal Stabilization Fund (SFSF). This Act provides funding from the SFSF for a Flexibility Block Grant in the amount of $13,121.1 ($5,554.7 GF, $7,566.4 Federal ARRA Funds). These funds shall be allocated to schools based upon the September 30, 2009 Unit Count. These funds are provided in an effort to allow districts the flexibility to achieve savings in areas that do not negatively impact the classroom or cause a decrease in the number of classroom teachers beyond what would normally be associated with a reduction in force. Each school district and charter school has the ability to use their SFSF allocation as they deem appropriate within the federal guidelines; however, districts are strongly encouraged to utilize these resources to preserve jobs and advance educational reforms such as increasing teacher effectiveness and providing targeted, intensive support and interventions for struggling schools.
2) Section l of this Act provides an appropriation to the Office of the Controller General (0l-08-02) for Contingencies: Legislative Council. Requests from the Chairs of Standing Legislative Committees for professional staff assistance shall be submitted to the Legislative Council for approval or disapproval. Approvals for professional staff assistance shall be allowed within the limits of the appropriation and as provided by guidelines established by the Legislative Council.
3) Notwithstanding provisions of 29 Del. C. § 6102(r)(2) and § 6102(r)(3), for Fiscal Year 2011, the sum authorized to the Education Expense and Property Tax Relief Fund shall be allocated using State Fiscal stabilization Funds and is to be allocated as follows. These funds are subject to the guidelines and reporting requirements of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009:
4) For the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2010, any local school district that has had two consecutive failed current expense tax referendums during the time period July 1, 2008 to January 1, 2011, is authorized to exercise the cash option on Academic Excellence units up to the total number of units provided under that program. This provision will apply for Fiscal Year 2011 only. In addition, districts meeting this criteria are authorized to utilize funds derived from this cash option to pay local
salary supplements. Any district that has had a successful current expense tax referendum subsequent to two consecutive failed current expense tax referendums is ineligible for the provisions of this section.
5) Amend 14 Del. C. § 1722(c) by deleting said subsection in its entirety. Section 384. It is the intent of the General Assembly that the Department of Education shall be permitted to exercise its authority pursuant to 14 Del. C. §515(g) to directly manage a school to be operated at the location currently served by the Maurice J. Moyer Academy. The Department’s authority will take effect on July 1, 2010, immediately following the expiration of Moyer Academy’s charter, and will extend until June 30, 2012. The Department shall have the authority to contract with K-12 Classroom DE, LLC to operate the school from July 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011, notwithstanding the
23 provisions of 29 Del. C. Chapter 69, and to take all other actions necessary to operate the school. The Department shall issue a request for proposals for a third party to operate the school from July 1, 2011
25 through June 30, 2012. Said school shall be funded pursuant to charter school funding laws, including the provisions of 14 Del. C. §508 and §509.
….. and now Steve Newton of Delaware Libertarian is bowing out….
Forgive me for getting some out of order, but his name now goes up on the wall next to those of Dana Garrett, Mike Matthews, Jason Scott, Shirley Vandever, Dave Burris.
All gone, leaving only these few greats are still left: Nancy, Tommywonk, Kilroy, LiberalGeek, Pandora, David Anderson, & Hube.
The era over which these giants roamed was between the elections of 06 and 08. Some started earlier, but these few individuals were the only source of information during that time stamp.
Today, the News Journal has lost its paternalistic viewpoint touting the union of construction labor and developers formerly known as the Delaware Way, and is actually reporting news ahead of bloggers for a change. Likewise today, WDEL has both on its morning show with Al Mascitti and afternoon show with Rick Jensen, steered discussion away from the likes of (who?) Sean Hannity… and Al Loudell has kept us abreast of local politics in ways unheard of before bloggers began typing in their briefs…
So in a way, since these bloggers were successful back then, today they are not as vital as they once were… Many saw their blogs as the only way to get the truth past the News Journal censors, those higher ups who would not publish any truth that showed an elected official in bad light….
Those studying this phenomena will see that there was much agreement between bloggers on both sides of the aisle… It was very rare for this group to be divisive over the prime issues of this state’s business.. All of them were for Atkins removal. All of them were for beginning offshore wind in Delaware, … All of them were for the slowdown of work force housing… all of them were for the betterment of Delaware’s educational opportunities…
Of course we quibbled on who would become the next president, but that is to be expected… No family lives without arguing at least once…
There were rises and falls among each giant’s influence… But at the core of each individual was the feeling that each had a unique insight into the current problem staring us down, and wrote about it with an urgency that turned out usually to be correct… And usually, if agreement was not forthcoming by the first comment, by the end of the comment thread, some form of agreement among the blogger’s roundtable, was visible…
As politicians came to realize the News Journal wasn’t changing, they began contributing to these giant’s pages, giving substance in ways unheard of among those writing for the Community Board of the News Journal… Reading the blogs gave us a real time insight into the workings of our state government in Dover……
But it was the wind controversy that elevated the giants to their current stature… Only the blogs could get the message out that Delmarva was incredibly concerned about losing control of their monopoly, and that wind power for Delaware would by offering competition, lower our energy prices. And they did, so well, that the entire legislature at the end of their 2007 session, voted unanimously to approve of the landmark agreement between Bluewater Wind and Delmarva Power….
Some of us think that they, shaking in their boots, didn’t dare vote otherwise… For bloggers have long memories as well as does the public….
But these giants among men, did more than just push wind. They publicized the eminent domain controversy. They scoured local politics. They broke the work force housing pact apart. They clamored against Atkins, forcing him to resign. They dogged the SEU. They picked apart candidates so much that those who had flaws, couldn’t win. Dana Garrett could be heard almost weekly on WVUD.. Tommy Noyes, for a while was a weekly guest on Al Loudell’s award winning newscast. They OOGAcised the fight for open government, forcing one flustered legislator to call out for a prayer dedicated to just for the bloggers, asking for their salvation of their souls… Apparently those prayers were answered; for by their souls we have open government today….
But amongst the best, the very concept of government was debated back and forth, no doubt as it once was during the beginning of this nation during its infancy… Torture, domestic spying, gun ownership, thieving Vice Presidents, all had their day in court upon these pages….
And today, there are new names who in the years ahead might be considered to be the giants of this contemporary time zone..
Deldem, RSmitty, El “S”, Donviti, Cassandra, all came into prominence after the defining moment of passing the wind act…. As well as Sussex Green, Red Water Lily, Mourning Constitution,… all of which became big as the 2008 election season came upon us….
And from the ranks of commentators came a Sussex County Councilwomen, a candidate for a House seat, as well as a last minute candidate who took on Mr. Pam Scott, and began nailing his shoes to the floor…. Miro had a contender for once; that commentator speaks up often…
Steve Newton will be missed.
With his passing is the last of the great thinkers… Today, we have bullets fed to us… But Steve took on all other blogs, all other commentators and wrote posts about them… Steve looked at everything with fresh eyes…. Giants can do that, since they see things from way up…….
I won’t go in to praising Steve… for I’m here to call attention to the passing of a era. Perhaps those times when benevolent giants roamed our state, will be considered by us dying men and women, to be the glory times we hark back to, the second we close our eyes for their last time…..
For when you look back as what we’ve done, the word “giants” is not really a bad moniker….
I was economizing till the end of the month, and was about to use the editorial page of the New Journal for substitute toilet paper, when I saw Ron Williams had digressed on Markell’s speech, which I “cliff noted” in the post below….
His take was ass backwards, archaic, and so old school, that it caused a cascade of thoughts that prompted me to put them down..
In essence, Ron Williams’ take proves that the union, building trades, developers, and old school Democrats, have past their prime…
It is fine to criticize positive thinking, especially if one can provide an better alternative..
Ron Williams can’t, and with that realization, comes the knowledge that the inevitable will come to pass.. A corner was turned with the cross registration that occurred last spring and the removal of John Carney from the Democratic top spot, has meant a sea change in leadership that is sweeping across this state…
The new blood that has matriculated into the Senate and our House, would be better advised to see the trends developing now, and shift their allegiance to the Markell factor, and distance themselves from the conglomerate of old Democratic supporters mentioned above… Because their can be no going back to the old Adams, DeLuca, Minner, Sharpe, McDowell, McCloskey, Roy contingent that dominated state politics for the first three quarters of this decade…
The world has changed… Ron Williams gives us proof in his entertainment piece…
He starts with the idea that Markell began his speech backward…
Of course a journalist always leads with the headline and fills the body with junk… so from that perspective, a backwards person looking at a well formed speech, just might think that the lead should be first, and fluff at the end…
However, those of us that really have to argue and convince others, for real, not just to look good in print, know that an argument is meticulously and creatively structured, so it convinces rationally and emotionally at the same time… Markell’s aim is to sell the CORE prosperity agenda as deliverable.. He does.
His 4000 words describe the need, the tools required, the solution, and the action required to deliver it.. That seems to be lost upon Ron Williams, which if he was reading the speech solely through the eyes of an extinct dinosaur, would be only looking for the parts that relate to his own self preservation…
He derides the eduction of 40 and 50 year olds who will lose their jobs soon.. Unfortunately, he fails to realize that he may soon join them… Who wants to read irrelevance anymore…
What is relevant is that people are losing jobs in the private sector. There is therefore too little money to pay for those in the public sector… Markell’s plan makes sense… If you can tweak it so some may pay less of a share because of their low income, and that is politically more acceptable than the offer that each will accept the same percentage, fine… Fairness is commodity that varies its value upon it’s perception. What one person perceives as fair, another may not. As long as a “fair” method is achieved to scale back the human cost to our state government, then that is the ultimate accomplishment has been achieved.
Since he has nothing substantial to offer, Ron Williams then asks questions… Questions that were asked in December, January, February, March, and April… and have already been answered ad nauseum by everyone else… Yawn…
Examples?
“So why not structure salary cuts based on income”… Because 8,000 hurts a 100,000 earner as hard as a $2320 cut hurts a $29,000 earner… At least the below poverty earner can use other sources to substantiate his income; food stamps, WICK, CHIP for example…. as well as earn EIC when his taxes come around… (I need to do the math.. It occurs to me that he could be better off…after all Federal benefits are added in)…
“and what about that 8 – 10 %…” It is the required amount to meet the $330 million target…
“What about a sales tax?” What good will Delaware shopping be with a sales tax on large purchases? Out of state consumers, why drive here at all? Implementing a sales tax will cause gross sales to decline and taxes on decreased incomes because of those decreased sales will subsequently decrease, aggravating our problems, not solving them..
And of course, the defeatist comes out in the gambling piece… His second to last paragraph can essentially be summed up as this.. Despite both a primary and a general election, this state is really run by the gambling consortium and Markell has no power against them…
Had that mentality existed in the early days of the union movement, when all odds were stacked behind Pinkerton’s men, then today, there would not even be union members reading his column in the paper…
As it is, somewhere in the New Castle County sewer system, his words, and his picture, are currently drifting along with their appropriate company….
kavips 