Connecticut GOP Needs an Enema

 It should be blatantly obvious I support Rob Simmons in his Senate campaign to replace epic thief Chris Dodd in Connecticut. I’ve stated pretty strongly I think, my opinion on his opponents.

Sadly, the Connecticut GOP in a move both embarrassing to real Republicans and insulting to someone like Simmons who has given his entire career to public service, voted to get behind WWE former CEO Linda McMahon as their Senate candidate. On the surface, I can claim to be completely shocked and appalled by this horrific misstep, but I understand how it happened.

McMahon has the dough, plain and simple. She is a shiny new penny and Rob is the tried and true gold standard. Unfortunately, shallow people fall for the wiles of a shiny new penny almost every time. It is wrong and it’s disgusting when applied to politics, but it is fairly predictable. And, although there is a plethora of things I would like to say about the delegates that get sent to these conventions and allowed to vote, I am going to keep my mouth shut and just rant on other topics.

I say it was predictable because after all it was McMahon’s $16 million bucks of research money which turned the spotlight on Dickie Blumenthal’s (the Democratic challenger), lies about being a Vietnam Veteran when he wasn’t. That was a pretty serious blow to Blumenthal’s campaign and whilst Republicans should be grateful for it, it is no reason to get behind someone who is even more despicable than Blumenthal.

Blumenthal is a sneaky little weasel that has been able to keep his shenanigans from being uncovered by the liberal press. He is a master at staying under the radar screen as far as his actions go. However, he is also brilliant at staying in the spotlight by attending ceremonies and innocuous events. That’s a politician not a public servant. Held to his actual record, Dickie would look pretty evil, ineffective and an amazing waster of taxpayer dollars.

McMahon, well, her character is displayed right out in the open with no filter whatsoever, and she is arrogant enough to believe people will toss aside the image she portrayed as the CEO of a violent, deviant sex promoting and vulgar company in favor of a more caring obsequious Senator-type visage. Those millions are obviously serving her well in this image makeover she has been crafting over the last 18 or so months. She has been able to dazzle the Republican delegates and intends on doing the same for Connecticut voters.

Where the GOP really F’ed up is in buying into the money over message principle. Yes, money does win elections. However, tactically speaking, when you have a candidate with both the ability to raise a considerable amount of money from his potential constituents and has the right message and ability to deliver on that message, then you have a real winner. McMahon may have the personal dough to throw at this thing, but she lacks the integrity, knowledge and ability to empathize with real people.

As the man says: you can’t fix stupid and although this is a blaring injustice on the part of the Connecticut GOP, there is hope.

Simmons has spent virtually nothing getting his message out and the result is he only lost to this scumbag by just over 100 delegate votes. That’s impressive and should serve as a harbinger of how Simmons does business. It also means that he has a campaign fund large enough to merit a primary. That is good for Connecticut voters. I am willing to bet Rob’s message will sink in more with real voters over the types of political hacks that vote in conventions. (Oops, I let my opinion slip there. I will do a post on delegates sometime in the future.)

Primaries kind of suck. They cost a lot of money and cause hard feelings within their respective parties. Time and time again, allies who could be productive in congress with each other working on real issues, become enemies and the whole Democratic process becomes more screwed up. In this case though a primary is warranted as I and many others believe the duped delegates do not represent what real voters want in a candidate.

Simmons will have to pull out all the stops in fighting McMahon in a primary, but he can do it. His people are going to have to put together the right kind of message delivery in terms of serious content mixed with a little mud slinging. What Simmons has in his favor is the fact the mud is for real when it comes to McMahon and not just a bunch of low blows thrown out there to garner support.

I urge all Connecticut Republicans tired of the systematic belittling of our wishes by this Government to go out and vote for Rob and toss this piece of garbage, attention seeking jackass out of the political ring and back into the gutter where she belongs. That way we can start working on punting Dickie Blumenthal into retirement and save us all a lot of dough.

G.I. Dickie

Here’s a tip: If you are going to run in a Senate race and one of your opponents is a decorated War Veteran, don’t falsely claim you served in the same War, you know, unless you really did.

Back in my home state Connecticut; the race is really cooking for Master Thief Chris Dodd’s soon to be vacant Senate seat. I love this race because the comedic value is gigantic. Two of the candidates are amusing as hell.

We have a horrendous purveyor of sex, violence, and all manner of depravity in Linda McMahon, a Republican and part owner of the WWE. Then there is Attorney General Dick Blumenthal, a Democrat who has a penchant for suing and bullying small businesspeople because he doesn’t have enough game to stand out on the National playing field, and has darkened the doorway of the Attorney General’s office since Christ was a Corporal in the foot guard. 

Fortunately, in Connecticut there is an anomaly to political races all over the country; a candidate people can actually get behind with confidence. Republican Rob Simmons. From all the words I have committed to Simmons you would think I was working on the campaign, or was just otherwise kissing his ass. Well, I am not a campaign worker and I have no need to brown nose the man, it is just so rare that a real public servant throws their hat in the ring.

Seldom do I get to showcase a solid and committed candidate. I know in these times it isn’t en vogue to get behind a successful, older white male, considered to be part of the “establishment”. But, there are a few good ones left and Rob is one of them.

I said it before and I will state it one more time, it is almost insulting that Simmons has to suffer battling two such candidates for a seat he is so obviously more qualified to have.

However, this post is not about Simmons qualifications, you can read about that here: http://blogofirreverence.blogspot.com/search?q=simmons&updated-max=2010-02-09T20%3A25%3A00-08%3A00&max-results=20

What I want to talk about is Dick Blumenthal falsely claiming, or at least having alluded to serving in Vietnam. The New York Times recently published an article explaining what Dick Blumenthal’s time spent as a Marine really looked like in opposition to what he says at ceremonies and campaign stops.

Par example. Here is a quote from a 2008 address to Veterans and Senior Citizens in Norwalk, CT:

“We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam. And you exemplify it. Whatever we think about the war, whatever we call it — Afghanistan or Iraq — we owe our military men and women unconditional support.”

The Times claims the truth is Dickie did everything he could to avoid Vietnam and he did, successfully. Dickie received five deferments, so he could attend Harvard, which on its face isn’t really a big deal, a lot of soldiers did the same thing. However, when it looked like the last deferment might not happen, Dickie worked hard to land himself a far less dangerous gig with the Marine Reserve. You know what those guys do? Arrange perilous local activities and events like organizing Toys for Tots campaigns.

Here is the Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18blumenthal.html

Dickie is pretty disgusting at baseline in the way he manipulates and uses ambiguity in his speeches in order to speak out of two sides of his face. He would like you to think he is Joe Lieberman-esque only without Joe’s ability to give frank, honest assessments that may not be popular with his constituents. Dickie wants to make everyone happy even though he has no intention of doing that in actual practice. He will smile at you while twisting the knife up under your rib cage. Oh wait, he’s not trained to do that, but I bet he can wrap up a toy GI Joe nice and pretty.

Using ambiguity or flat out mis-truths when speaking of time served in the Military is particularly disgusting. I don’t care if as a politician you play fast and loose with facts when it comes to shoring up your platform, that’s SOP and people will either see it for what it really is, or not. But, when you claim to have served this country overseas in the line of fire when you haven’t, well, that is particularly despicable and steals away a little piece of valor from all those who have given their lives, limbs, or sanity to make sure we all deservingly or not, get to enjoy the lives we do. 

We reap what we sow in this life and I am glad that FINALLY someone has exposed Dickie for what he really is; a brilliant user of language as power, media savvy about his image and more importantly a dishonest, egotistical, hypocrite whose time in public office should have run out years ago.

Ironically, it was not the NYT that came up with the research, which led to their article. Big surprise, it’s not like they would ever have said anything negative about Dickie on their own. It was Linda McMahon’s crack research team that provided the leads for the NYT to run with. Her campaign likes to brag that they have $16 million to toss at tactical research avenues in order to discredit her opponents. I see this as good for Simmons as he has nothing to hide or run from. For Blumenthal, all I can do is laugh. McMahon’s money is exactly what was needed to expose him for what he really is.

As I finish up this post, it is T-minus 9 minutes until Dickie gets on TV and explains himself. This should be good. Expect an update.

Rob, I hope you sent a nice Thank You note to Linda. She just may be the best thing your campaign has seen yet!

UPDATE:

And, this is his reply:

http://www.wtnh.com/dpp/news/connecticut/blumenthal-admits-he-misspoke-about-vietnam-era-service

Lame.

Well, you can't defend the indefensible. There was a great moment during the news conference during the introduction where the presenter referred to an event for veterans where Dickie stood in the rain giving a speech for 4-5 minutes. This was supposed to show Dickie's true commitment to his country and Veterans and diffuse the issue at hand. Damn, that's good stuff right there!

And, Then There Were Three, Arrested That Is

I always prefer writing on the larger political issues that affect us all, yet the most disturbing, ludicrous, and wildly entertaining stories seem to always occur at the local levels.

Remember the story about the Mayor, the Police Chief, and the Kidney? You can find it here: http://blogofirreverence.blogspot.com/2010/04/good-police-chief-bad-mayor.html Well, there’s an interesting side story that gives some insight into the type of person the Mayor featured in the article is, and whom she surrounds herself with.

It seems the Mayor of East Haven, CT, the only Mayor in the State of Connecticut to ever be arrested by her own Police Chief (oh, by the way her Assistant was arrested with her) and consequently took a very vague opportunity in which to put said Chief on leave, has been the impetus for the perfect trifecta of political arrests. Her Assistant Director of Administration and Management has been arrested for criminal weapons possession, theft of a firearm, and fourth degree larceny in the neighboring town of Branford.

Ralph Mauro the arrestee appears to have a penchant for illegal sub machine guns and stolen shotguns as well. As I often like to say; no innocent man buys an illegal gun. Or, in this case, steals one! Of course, one must remember until he goes to court these are only "allegations".

I am all about 2^nd Amendment rights and even though I am not a member of the NRA, I have no problem with those who are. That is as long as their weapons are legal and…uh…not stolen. This person is obviously an idiot at baseline, but let me tell you about what one of his responsibilities as the Mayor’s political shill are.

In the position of Assistant Director of Administration and Management, Ralph Mauro is responsible for such things as controlling the purse strings for the Police Department. How about that? Interesting, huh?

Ten years ago this guy was fired by previous Mayor Joe Maturo, also mentioned in the above referenced blog post, for stealing Town time, carrying a gun, (surprise, surprise) and eavesdropping on his co-workers at the City Hall Finance Department. He’s considered a real grade A scumbag by anyone’s standards and is the perfect example of who not to have in a public position of power.

For some further perspective into the case of Lenny Gallo, the Police Chief who was put on leave by the Mayor after a preliminary, actually BEFORE a preliminary report of a Justice Department investigation into the East Haven Police; consider this, Mauro denied the Chief money for training and personnel. What was in the Justice Department’s preliminary report; the recommendation for more training and personnel. Something every police department in America could use but doesn’t have the funding for. This report could have been sent to any department in the United States and would have been accurate.

Here is a copy of the report:

http://media2.wtnh.com/_local/documents/DOJ.pdf

My point in this case is my outrage that someone such as this, hired by an idiot Mayor has the power to deny a real public servant the funding needed to protect his town and its residents, and then is orchestral by association in the suspension of said public servant who has committed no crime or has causality for which to be reprimanded. That's a complete outrage.

So, to reiterate we have a Mayor, her Assistant Erica Berg, (some say her lover, but I won’t comment on that) and some gangster wannabe in a dangerous position of power, all arrested within one year. Yet, we have a well-respected Police Chief whose only desire is to do his job and protect his Town, sitting at home on administrative leave. Nice. Real, nice.

Normally, I bristle at the idea of litigating what should essentially be a personnel and Human Resources issue, but in this case, I hope Lenny sues the pantsuit off of East Haven and gets a huge chunk of change because he deserves it. And, quite frankly, the Town deserves the hit for electing this piece of garbage Mayor in the first place.

Incidentally, the Mayor has be unavailable for comment on the Mauro situation and no action has been taken on the part of the Town to keep this miscreant away from Town Hall. In fact, Mauro showed up for work the next day. The Town's lame excuse was that the arrest is a personal issue and not job related and they wanted to see how the situation played out. Really? So, you couldn't give Lenny the same courtesy and wait for the full Justice Department Report before taking action? Apparently, in East Haven it's OK to be a thief and carry around guns illegally, but if you are an honest Police Chief with a legal gun by the way, you get stripped of your badge, weapon, and car and get sent packing. Seems fair. in the alternate evil universe! As the kids say, WTF and OMG!


These kinds of witch-hunts are what really get in the way of the progress of not just Towns, but the country as a whole. Egos, agendas, corruption; all bad business.

By the way, as I was placing pictures onto this post, I felt like I was creating a new Rogue's Gallery. Nice work East Haven!