West Virginia Blue
The Best Blogging Community in West Virginia Democratic politics, progressive policies, the good life and free living in Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.
Wow. So, that's what his suddenly scheduled trip to New Orleans is all about. John Edwards to announce at 1pm today that he's dropping out of race.
So much for a brokered convention scenario. It's possible that super-delegates will get to decide, but Edwards doesn't have enough delegates to make a difference.
Based on recent voting patterns, this helps Clinton. Clinton and Edwards have been splitting the white male demographic.
Apparently, Edwards is not making an immediate endorsement of either Clinton or Obama.
Patriots For Peace and Citizens Action Group
Launch a Presidential Straw Poll
On Sunday, January 27, 2008, at 3:00 pm, Patriots For Peace and Citizens Action Group held a press conference announcing the launch of a website for a straw poll for the presidential race.
The web-based straw poll we are launching (VoteWV.net) will give West Virginia voters a chance to express their choice for a presidential nominee prior to February 5th, when the primary races may be effectively over. In the process we are hoping to underscore the importance of the Iraq War, and its disastrous effects on the economy, as issues in this election.
By launching the website at the voter registration office, we want to stress the importance of West Virginians casting a real ballot on Election Day and participating in the political process at all levels. The Voter Registration office will be closed on Sunday, but we intend our brief gathering there to call attention the fact that many West Virginians feel closed out of the primary process because West Virginia is one of the last five states to hold their primary election.
From Huntingtonnews.net. It's bylined as a WV Democratic Party news release so I'm quoting it in full.
Charleston, WV (HNN) -- West Virginia Commissioner of Agriculture Gus R. Douglass Thursday, Jan. 17 announced his bid for an 11th term in office. The Mason County native has overseen the West Virginia Department of Agriculture (WVDA) since 1964, when he was first elected.
During the intervening years, he has seen the scope of the Department's duties expand to changes in society, trade, agriculture and the needs of the public.
"When I came into office, West Virginia was a dumping ground for poor-quality meats," said Douglass. "One of the first things I did to put a stop to that was to create a meat inspection division within the Department to oversee processing within the state and to let distributors know that their dumping practices would no longer be tolerated in this state."
Now know as Meat and Poultry Inspection Division, the group has, for nearly two decades, been ranked by USDA as the top program of its type in the country.
More recently, Douglass has focused on providing advanced personnel training and emergency response equipment to prepare the Department to act in the event of a terror attack on the food supply or the introduction of non-native diseases into the state such as the high-pathogenicity avian influenza that has sickened humans in Asia and Europe. Douglass' vision for the future of the WVDA includes new, top-quality laboratory facilities.
"The key to containing any disease outbreak - whether intentional or naturally occurring - is rapid detection. We have made great advances in our diagnostic capabilities in West Virginia, and I am proud that the Department is seen as a national leader in threat preparedness, but there is still so much work to be done in this regard," said Douglass.
Another of Douglass' initiatives is continued development of farmers' markets in the Mountain State.
"Farmers' markets are important because they help support our local economies and provide fresh, safe food for the citizens of the state. Decentralized food production is important to our nation's economic security, and I believe this trend is here to stay," he said.
Raised amidst agriculture in Grimms Landing, West Virginia, Douglass served as state and national president of the Future Farmers of America (FFA), was chosen as a West Virginia Star Farmer and later helped to organize and served as first president of the National FFA Alumni Association. He is also a 4-H All-Star. He holds a bachelor's degree from West Virginia University, an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from West Virginia State University and an honorary Doctor of Sciences degree from West Virginia University.
In addition to his position as Commissioner of Agriculture, he and his son Tom operate their 540-acre family farm in Mason County, specializing in beef cattle and grain production. He and his wife Anna Lee, also a 4-H All-Star, have four children, six grandchildren, two great-grandsons and three great-granddaughters. They belong to the Leon Baptist Church. Douglass is a Mason and a Shriner.
The 2008 W.Va. election period reaches the halfway mark today. The state elections site offers multiple search options to view filed candidates.
Here's the list of candidates who have filed so far. (As of 8am, January 18, 2008) First, for the national and state-wide offices:
U.S. President - D - Hillary Clinton U.S. President - D - John Edwards U.S. President - D - Barack Obama U.S. President - R - John McCain U.S. President - R - Ron Paul U.S. President - R - Mitt Romney
U.S. House of Representatives -- 2nd - D - Thornton Cooper - Kanawha
Secretary of State - D - Joe DeLong - Hancock
Secretary of State - D - Natalie Tennant - Kanawha
Secretary of State - R - Charles Minimah - Kanawha
Auditor - D - Glen B. Gainer III - Wood
State Treasurer - D - John D. Perdue - Kanawha
Commissioner of Agriculture - D - Oscar Wayne Casto - Berkeley
Commissioner of Agriculture - D - Gus R. Douglass - Mason
Attorney General - D - Darrell McGraw - Kanawha
Justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals - D - Menis E. Ketchum - Cabell
Justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals - R - Beth Walker - Kanawha
CHARLESTON, November 29, 2007 - Rep. Capito, Governor Manchin and the Deputy Secretary of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, Roy Bernardi, announce a $969,499 grant to support housing needs of West Virginians with HIV/AIDS
Over the weekend I asked, "Who will support Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (WV-02) in 2008?" I've seen supporters of hers from 2006 put up signs for Ron Paul along Route 9 in Berkeley County. The West Virginia Republican Club is indifferent to her election prospects. Where does she look for support?
The answer is surprising and, yes, disturbing. She's trying to bask in the reflected glory of our popular Democratic Gov. Joe Manchin!
There's some logic to this. Gov. Manchin enjoys 70-plus percent popularity. The Republican party cannot find a serious candidate to run against him this year. Meanwhile, the appeal of the Republican/GOP brand is at its lowest level since Rep. Capito entered politics. Is it no great surprise that she'd look to an old family friend for a boost?
Early last year Capito herself admitted it's unpopular to be a Republican. So why not try to ride to coattails of the country's most popular governor? "So what if he's a Democrat, it's not like I'm reminding people I'm a Republican anyway."
Proof is in the pudding search engine results
You would expect Gov. Manchin to appear quite often in news stories with members of the same political party. You would expect Gov. Manchin to appear in more news stories with politicians who have been in office for a long time. Here's how Capito compares with the rest of the W.Va. House delegation:
Co-appearance in Google news archives (for all years) by (Gov. Joe) Manchin and ...
Sens. Byrd and Rockefeller have been in office forever, no surprise they're constantly in the news with Manchin. What is a surprise is Capito finishing ahead of Dems. Mollohan and Rahall -- both of whom have significantly longer tenure in the House of Rep. than she does.
You might say, Rep. Shelley Moore Capito sure has a knack for getting herself in the news with Gov. Manchin.
Time for a new recipe
Gov. Manchin must not let this stand.
Despite any history of friendliness between the Manchin's and Moore's, the politics of Shelley Moore Capito and her Republican party are a direct threat to the interests of Manchin's Democratic party. As just one example, we've written a lot lately at this blog about the dangerous short-sighted thinking behind the W.Va. GOP's new "Unleashing Capitalism" platform.
We're working hard to send more and better Democrats to Washington in 2008. We're fighting to build a larger and stronger Democratic majority to support a Democratic president. We need Gov. Manchin to work equally hard to bring these goals to fruition. Gov. Manchin should start strongly supporting -- loudly, visibly, and frequently -- the election of Democrats to the House, Senate and White House in 2008.
Here at West Virginia Blue (see the user diaries over on the right-hand side bar), modernamerica thinks it's all about what Clinton did and Wabi-Sabi questions the "epic proportions" of her victory.
At DailyKos, diarist rimjob has a thorough analysis (with lots of pretty charts!) on reasons why the polls were so very wrong.
I get all my news from the Internet. For the TV-watchers out there, do you agree with Kevin Drum and Josh Marshall that older woman (in particular) were responding to the final 24-hours of media coverage of Clinton?
What next?
Whatever the reason for Clinton's unexpected victory, I'm thrilled by the outcome. I have no major emotional investment in the outcome of the primaries -- I'll happily support Edwards, Obama or Clinton in the general. The delegate counts actually mean something. For a political junkie like me, this is incredibly exciting.
Keeping our candidates in the news, turning out record numbers of voters, meaningfully involving more states in the process, these are all great things for democracy.
Update: Polls close at 8PM ET. Here's a site that looks like a good choice for online results.
-----------------
Here's your place to talk about all things related to the New Hampshire primary today. I'll keep making updates here as I find anything interesting today to add to the discussion.
To kick things off, this is the single best piece I've seen on the challenge Clinton faces in overcoming Obama's new-found position as front-runner.
Edwards current strategy appears to be informally teaming up with Obama to knock out Clinton... then survive long enough to take on Obama one-on-one... or, if both Obama and Clinton survive until the convention, Edwards may well have enough delegates to crown the victor.
Any predictions for today?
As far as I can tell, the conventional wisdom is an Obama victory, Clinton in second, Edwards in third. Something like 40-30-20 numbers.
On the Republican side the press is pushing McCain as a come-back kid with Romney and Huckabee fighting for second. If Romney finishes anything less than 10 points back from the winner he's in big trouble. Any decent showing from Huckabee is a win for him in the "non-evangelical" state of New Hampshire (never mind that he also has populist appeal, it's the evangelical angle that gets all the attention -- plus he's put almost no time or money into New Hampshire).
Tax reform and teacher pay are hot issues. Worker's compensation will receive attention. Gov. Manchin says the recently privatized system deserves more time. He'll probably get his way, even as Brickstreet undergoes some much deserved scrutiny.
It should be noted that this year's legislative agenda is expected to be light. With Gov. Manchin and 100 legislators up for re-election, don't expect anything controversial to be decided. Merely balancing the budget will be work enough.
Here are a few odds and ends in the news. Click on the links for more details on lists of legislative priorities:
"Coal and coal gasification will be a major issue this year," Chafin said. "We have a major plant coming into the district, but we have to be able to come up with a carbon sequestration plan. Producing gas from coal results in a lot of carbon dioxide, and we have to be able to deal with that byproduct."
* Besides teacher pay, another education-related topic on the horizon is a potential state-wide ban on unhealthy sodas and snacks in schools.
* The W.Va. GOP has a wish list long on tax cuts yet short on any suggestions for making up the resulting revenue short falls. I note with irony that the GOP also suggests -- now they're almost done replacing Dem judges with Republican ones -- we should elect judges on a non-partisan basis. Funny, that... it's like the pundit-class only calls for bi-partisanship after it looks like Democrats are going to have some real power, not during the years of highly partisan autocratic Bush rule.
Does anyone even care anymore about the West Virginia Legislature? According to our State Constitution, the Legislature only convenes for sixty calendar days within the first three months of each year. It is unfortunate to me that while the Legislature convenes next week, there have been scant postings on this website regarding the upcoming session. There have been few mentions of the session in any of the major publications in our State.
I watched WVU trounce Oklahoma, too. I even had an ongoing friendly rivalry with my boss (an OU graduate) about the game. I am actively researching the upcoming lawsuit by WVU against Rich Rodriguez. But, the business of the State Legislature is of much truer importance to our citizenry than the outcome of the Tostito's Fiesta Bowl.
So, I write this diary entry to encourage the moderators of this blog as well as its avid readers to begin posting more entries on the legislative session. This website has become, in my opinion, too heavily interested in non-local election coverage.
In November, I wrote a nationally syndicated column for Creators Syndicate entitled "The Huey Longs of Iowa" about both Huckabee and John Edwards. I once again noted that these two underdog candidates were competing in the Iowa caucus despite being outspent precisely because both men were running as bare-knuckled economic populists. As the only nationally syndicated columnist to write something like this, I was largely dismissed and laughed off by national political reporters, pundits and many readers, with most telling me the Iowa race was between only Romney and Giuliani on the Republican side, and only Clinton and Obama on the Democratic side.
Sirota's item has lots of links. Click the link above follow them to his earlier columns.
When it comes to Huckabee, all the talk is about religious conservatism, even as conservative publications like the Weekly Standard have very recently acknowledged that Huckabee's economic message is what has propelled him to victory. Similarly, when it comes to Edwards miraculously being in the middle of the race despite being outspent, all the talk is about the horserace. It is as if the Washington media and political Establishment will do anything to pretend that the public's anger at corporate greed and economic inequality simply does not exist.
They don't want to admit this anger exists because it fundamentally indicts the corrupt system that has allowed such economic oppression to flourish - a corrupt system brought on by the hostile takeover of our government by big money interests that I described in my first book. But, as they say, the numbers do not lie. They are there for all to see - and they prove what I and many progressives have been saying for years.
As I said at the beginning of the day, no matter what the final exact tallies, we the progressive movement - and We The People - are already winning.
Reading around the web this evening, the conventional wisdom now appears to be an Obama - Clinton - Edwards finish for Dems and a Huckabee - Romney finish for Republicans.
Of course, there's another possiblity not getting much discussion -- a tie. It's quite possible that support for the top 3 Dems will be so closely bunched as to decide nothing.
Update 2 from Carnacki: Someone heat up a big old serving of crow (but keep a watch on the carving knife) for former Senate Minority Leader and Republican blogger Vic Sprouse to eat. Remember how he mocked Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul for being against the Iraq war?
I've held off and held off and held off on this post, but it's time to set the record straight about Ron Paul.
First, let me say this, and there are a few avid readers of this blog who I respect, but simply don't support who they support. So, because of them, I have really held off writing anything negative about Texas Congressman Ron Paul because, well, he and his candidacy are irrelevant.
Now, don't get me wrong, I love people being involved in the political process. And, everyone out there has a right to their own opinions about who they support for President.
And, there is no doubt, the small amount of people who support Ron Paul are fervent in their beliefs.
At the beginning of the convention process, I said an outsider candidate with little support, but with a strong grassrooots organization, could come in and make a statement because of the wide open set-up of our new party primary convention.
Let's be honest here.
Any Republican advocating surrender and immediate withdrawal from Iraq, allowing that country to completely implode is not going to get more than 2% of the Republican Party. And, that's exactly what Ron Paul has.
How did Vic's favorite presidential candidate, uber war supporter Rudy Guiliani do?
Giuliani 3,053 4 percent
Paul 8,549 10 percent
Can Sprouse pick them or what? Now we're just dirty hippy bloggers proud to support whoever the Democratic nominee is and Sprouse is a professional Republican politician who likes to talk a big game about wars he'll never serve in.
But once again the amateur Democratic bloggers were right and the professional Republican politician was wrong.
I've never been one to say, "I hate to say I told you so." Heck, I love saying it most of the time. This is one of those times.
As Gorilla Monsoon would say, Stick a fork in Rudy Guiliani. He's done.
If Vic Sprouse tells you something, you can probably believe the opposite and be right every time.
Update 3 from Carnacki
I've said it before and I'll say it again, anyone of our Democratic candidates would be better than any of the Republican candidates. If voter turnout is any sign, many agree with me. Via kos, the Group News Blog:
Percentage of total vote
24.5% Obama
20.5% Edwards
19.8% Clinton
11.4% Huckabee (R)
When the 3rd placed Democratic finisher nearly doubles the Republican who ran away from the pack of other Republican candidates, it's a great sign for Democrats.
It's a highly instructive piece for anyone trying to understand why some candidates pick up strong Netroots support when others -- even with more progressive policy positions -- don't.
With a week remaining before the early state results arrive from Iowa and New Hampshire, John Edwards is starting to draw significant Netroots endorsements. In the last few days, I've read several:
I find it no coincidence that as John Edwards has (a) sharpened his populist rhetoric and (b) improved his standing in the race that (c) more progressive bloggers are ready to jump in with support.
Consistently, the candidates and politicians who have gained the most Netroots attention (Dean, Lamont, the veteran in Ohio whose name I can't remember now, Darcy Burner, Gore v. 2008, Senator Dodd v. 2008) are the ones who clearly articulate contrasts between Democratic and Republican values. Of the top 3 Democratic contenders, John Edwards is drawing the sharpest contrasts.
Copyright 2011 West Virginia Blue
Site content may be used for any purpose without explicit permission unless otherwise specified.
This site exists thanks to financial support from BlogPAC, dedicated volunteers and participation by members of this community. The views expressed at West Virginia Blue belong solely to their respective authors.
