How to blow a whistle

Baltimore Sunpapers columnist Dan Rodricks does a great job – of agitating reasonable folks by jumping to conclusions in his column.

For instance, he has taken up the cause of a Police Officer who was fired for not only not reporting problems he identified as part of his duties, but instead making anonymous reports to the media that were sure to embarrass his employer, Governor Ehrlich, and assist the governor's opponent in the next election.

Like all of us, Rodricks has a blog that often continues the discussions he initiates with his columns. Sometimes the comments light my fuse. Like this one.

In response to Reader Tom Ryugo's questions, I offer:

Q1. Should John Dean have shut up and said nothing?

A1. John Dean witnessed and participated in criminal conspiracy. He should have left the room and reported his observations to law enforcement and Congress, before he was caught.

Q2. Should Anita Hill have shut up and said nothing?

A2. Anita Hill should have made a complaint of facts of the harassment that occurred so that an investigation could determine possible wrongdoing and appropriate actions could have ensued. I suspect she did and we can find that record. Oops! The first we heard from her was at the behest of the president's political opponents to smear a nominee to the Supreme Court. In turn, she received a left-liberal reward; she is a college professor.

Q3. Should the Secret Service agent who spoke up against Bill Clinton (have) kept his mouth shut?

Q4. Bill Clinton was convicted of Perjury on the basis of copious testimony collected under subpoena. No agent made anonymous allegations to the media. The agents did not testify to criminal acts. They connected the dots with their observations and the testimony of the victims to otherwise unwitnessed crimes. Similarly, the Impeachment of Bill Clinton was not as the result of sworn officers leaking information to embarrass the head of the Executive Branch. In all cases, the Secret Service Agents, sworn officers, followed the regulations of the agency and the law. They did place themselves outside of their sworn duty.

Q4. Should Linda Tripp have kept her mouth shut?

A4. Lind Tripp was not a law enforcement officer. She became aware of possible criminal activity and reported it. Thinking she was protecting herself and her friend, she committed a crime unique to Maryland by secretly tape recording the evidence that would lead to incriminating evidence. Bill Clinton could have spared us by keeping his mouth shut and not inviting Monica Lewinsky to do other than keep her mouth shut.

Q5.Should the soldier who found photos of Abu Ghraib have simply burned them?

A5. Found them? What were you doing during the aftermath of the Abu Ghraib story. The soldier deserved the Courts Martial. He was aware of what he should have recognized as behavior by members of the armed forces that violated the written code of conduct. He didn't report it. he made videos and still photographs and published them on the Internet because he thought they were cool and would give everyone a big laugh.

As an obvious and blatant conservative, I defend the Ehrlich administration for terminating an employee who was charged with keeping our facilities secure and protected who failed to fulfill his responsibilities. For that, he should have been disciplined. For violating the public trust, he deserved to have his employment terminated.

As a dyed in the wool liberal apologist dedicated to defending the O'Malley administration at all costs, often with full regard for the truth, I must stand and defend the governor for not giving this unreliable, untrustworthy, unethical former police officer a job, even though his goal of embarrassing Governor Ehrlich was noble, and it probably assisted the O'Malley election.

Next question, please.

Fame & Fortune through Immorality and Corruption

Alan Greenblatt, writing for Ballot Box, asserts that the most certain way for politicians to gain publicity is to act in an illegal, immoral or corrupt way.

It being Saturday morning in Maryland, I can't help but think of our Governor O'Malley. If he had made his claims about the Maryland budget to federal investigators, he would be eligible for charges similar to those faced by Scooter Libby and Martha Stewart. Can you say illegal? Maybe not.

When I think about the farcical Maryland General Assembly Special Session of October 2007, I can't help but think about the immorality of strong arming legislators to vote for tax increases in a declining economy, and adding huge government programs to a previously balanced budget while claiming there was a deficit. When I consider the claims of the O'Malley campaign to stop the 72% increases in our electric rates, I think of the immorality of the lie and the illegality of even considering such an action, a violation of both contract law and the laws of the state. Immoral? O'Malley? Completely!

When I think about the 37% and higher raises given to Governor O'Malley's inner circle, while limiting state workers to 2%, while 6% is the statutory limit. I think corruption. When I think about the refusal by Governor O'Malley to appoint a Secretary of State because the person he likes for the job apparently refuses to work for under $100k per year, I think corruption. When I think of the Department Secretaries brought back from the Glendenning administration, who previously accepted the salaries established, but now must have more, I think corruption.

When I think about Governor O'Malley I think a politician acting immorally, corruptly, and possibly, illegally. I can but hope that Maryland voters think of him this way too.

O’Malley and Spitzer: Comeback chances compared

The headline is a tease. However, the article was not, at least not when first posted forty-five days ago.

Check out Josh Goodman's take on the two governors before the Spitzer jump off the cliff.

Of course, O'Malley inoculated himself against the stories of marital infidelity by dragging his wife to a press conference and saying he did not do it. Why did he do that? It seems that a staffer, likely, baited a staffer of O'Malley's future gubernatorial opponent into a conversation about the topic on an internet bulletin board. O'Malley then accused the sitting governor of spreading the rumor of infidelity through his staff. In O'Malley's lawyerly mind, the act of the subordinate, a servant, in taking the bait was the act of the Governor, the employer. That is a difference between O'Malley and Spitzer, that and the arrogant hypocrisy of Spitzer.

O'Malley's vulnerability lies in his opponent's ability to continue to hang his sins around his neck.

A fair shake of the stick

My fascination with things electoral led me to the Governance Magazine blog, Ballot Box, a seeming little read gathering of writers focused on government.

A recent post there by Blogger/Reporter Alan Greenblatt asked the question about the Spitzer affair: Does it hurt the Dems?

One commenter, and there are not many to the Ballot Box, suggested that there would be no fallout if Spitzer had hung on and that the calls by Republicans in the New York assembly should have been fodder for attacks on Republicans fund raising. He ended with,"Nuff said." As if that would be the last word on this.

I would agree. Democrat falls from grace are generally handled gently and soon forgiven, if not forgotten.

On the other hand, Marc Foley, Senator Craig, and other Republican sinners are inserted into every stump speech of every Democrat running for any office. It looks like this:

"This Republican member of (insert governance body), this man who held himself out as in favor of family values, as a champion for law and order, as a moral light in the dark, was nothing more than (choose one - a closet homosexual, someone who would force himself on employees who were afraid to resist, a common philanderer - or insert your own) who attempted to force his hypocrisy on others. Well, my Republican opponent, although not charged or alleged to have done the same thing, aligns himself with (insert name of miscreant Republican) and the Republican party that tolerated this behavior for so long, protecting its member from public scrutiny merely to (choose one - retain, gain) a political majority that gave the republicans the power to do to you and your children as they pleased!"

Too much said. Too much unexamined hypocrisy. Too many watchdogs that are the dogs in the fight.

(The last four paragraphs were also posted as a comment to "Does it hurt the Dems?")

On the rocks or neat?

At the core of the problem between parties and unaffiliated voters is a desire to participate or not.

Since the third Presidential election, parties have been a factor. The activists who shared general beliefs in how a government should function joined and selected their best hope, a candidate who would garner wide affection from the voting population. Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists; Democrat-Republicans vs. Whigs; Democrats vs. Republicans, the list has, if anything, expanded over the centuries. Parties have always been collections of likeminded people who join in the pursuit of power.

What is different in the current unaffiliated ranks is that these folks have declared, in writing, that they do not want to be a part of any available recognized political party. I suspect that this arises more out of electoral-political-fatigue than out of a lack of identification with any party. In a word, "laziness" best describes these folks.

"Complainers" or "whiners" are the next best descriptors. In every state, a person can register to vote as affiliated or not. In every state, people are free to change their affiliation, or not, as often as they please. This lets the liberal-conservative look at a field of candidates early and join the party of their favored candidate. Likewise, the Conservative-liberal can join the party of the candidate carrying their desired banner and cast their vote in the primary election. Even principled party members can change form one party to the other when the choices of their stripe are unattractive as compared to the opposition party candidate. Instead of filling out the form to make the change for that permits them to make the choice, they complain that they had no say. They complain that the parties did not offer good choices for them. They whine about the partisan system.

In 2008, many in the parties are making the same complaints about their primary choices. For instance, Rudy G was the first Republican to announce and he did not appear on a ballot until Florida. Fred Thompson was leading all of the media polls but the voter polls eliminated him early. All summer and fall, we were subjected to debates between all the people in both parties who were destined to drop out as soon as the voters were to get a chance to say who they liked. By the time the second real voter polls came around ten viable Republicans had become two and ten viable Democrats had too.

In getting to this result, many state parties permitted people not in their party to vote in their primary. These partisan groups let people who disagree with them influence their candidate selection. They did not do this as a strategy to draw unaffiliated voters to a particularly desirable candidate. They did this as a matter of course. How can a state party permit unaffiliated and opposition party voters to select their candidate and then trumpet the results as an achievement?

Unaffiliated voters and those who choose parties that do not appear on primary election ballots turned their backs on the primary system. Their complaints are no more valuable that the opinions of small children who cry because they soiled themselves and become uncomfortable with the result. They are as teetotalers arguing about the taste of beer as compared to whisky.

Vinnie sets trap with wooden nickel as bait

Vinnie DeMarco has been a long time, yes ubiquitous, socialist to communist representative of programs that harm businesses and impose the will of a minority on the majority. He, and the Maryland Citizen's Health Initiative, building on the Democrat Party model of gathering small special interest groups to oppose or support a narrow issue, threaten legislators with the wrath of the coalition if their oppressive demands are not met.

Of the tools DeMarco has regularly employed are the red herring and the straw man. Here we have the classic red herring, with a side order of straw man and a newspaper reporter willing to give it undeserved credibility by running with it.

There will not be a President Bush for much more than two weeks when there is a Representative Harris. Oh, my! Perhaps there was a false premise in the DeMarco argument, too. It does get confusing when so much stuff is thrown at the wall at one time. In this case, without Sunpapers reporter Brad Olson, there isn't even a wall.

How about this one: "Vinnie DeMarco and the Maryland Citizen's Health Initiative commend Maryland State Senator Andy Harris for his vote as part the unanimous effort of the Maryland General Assembly and Governor Ehrlich to address the high costs for prescription drugs. It is our fervent hope that the Democrat controlled Congress act to remove the Federal constraints on this effort. We call on Senators Ben Cardin and Barbara Mikulski to take the leadership on this on behalf of the Maryland General Assembly, the former Governor and the citizens of Maryland."

Oops! Please forgive me for my foolishness. Democrat party operatives like DeMarco praising Republican legislative actions is as unlikely as Rush Limbaugh endorsing a Democrat for the Presidency.

Democrats: Nothing to like about our candidates

I read with great interest the Party Line (D) column of the 2/26/08 edition of the Jeffersonian. Once again, it started with a tease that it there would be positive information about the current presidential campaign. Once again, it disappointed by spewing out more than 400 words of rumor, innuendo and attack against two well qualified Republicans and patriots, Senator John McCain, and Senator Andrew Harris, men whose service under arms to the United States is well documented, as is their energetic representation in the Congress and General Assembly, respectively. The only favorable words from the columnist about the Democrat candidates: These are two highly qualified candidates. He goes on to state that only the Democrat candidates care about the best interests of the United States.
In a sister publication, The Northeast Reporter, of the same week (2/28/08), a letter to the editor from Shannon Lowe decried Republican Delegate Joe Boteler III for commenting on Democrat Todd Schuler for his leftist views, and criticizing Governor O'Malley for reversing the action to close the Hickey School in opposition to the majority of the people living in Cub Hill. It further objected to partisan Republicans blaming the Democrats for bad things happening in Maryland. I agree that nasty partisanship degrades the discussion of political issues and has a negative effect on our community. I am not as certain that giving credit where it is due is partisanship. My recollection is that Democrats have dominated the General assembly, and get credit for all of its actions, good and bad, for more than one-hundred years.
I agree with Ms. Shannon that it would be nice to hear from elected officials about how we can unite and face issues, but her party is dedicated to burying the Republican Party for at least ten years. I doubt that the Democrats intend to join the Republicans in that nasty, partisan grave.
It is saddening that the Democrat party in Baltimore County cannot find someone to write positive articles about Democrats. I would like to repeat my plea that the Democrats find a spokesman who can tell us why their candidates are worthwhile of our consideration, and compare and contrast them with Republican Candidates. If that isn't possible, perhaps we could read about what makes voting for Democrats a positive thing.
James Kehl, besides being a member of the Democrat Party Central Committee, is a CPA and the author of a book on tax law. In short, all non-political indications are that he 's a bright guy! I have to wonder what impairs his ability to promote positively his party's candidates.
I hope other readers of community newspapers will join me in calling for raising the political discourse to a civil level that permits honest criticism and discussion that honestly informs.

Gimme your money! I’m running for office!

Elected officials write campaign finance laws. Elected officials have a prime directive - get re-elected. Everything they do that can influence re-election is done in that light.

Elected officials wrote and passed the current Maryland Campaign Finance laws (Maryland Code Annotated, Elections, Title 13 Campaign Finance). The Democrat party has held a huge majority in the General Assembly since time immemorial. Each section of the law was passed with consideration of how it would affect the officials' re-election.

Someone has to be held accountable for campaign finance faux pas, intentional or accidental. It would not do to hold the official accountable for these acts, so the scheme has a treasurer who is. The rules are strict, too. Only the treasurer can accept or disburse funds.

There is a case in Maryland where a member of the House of Delegates was convicted of stealing campaign funds and expense account funds. He appealed and the Court of Appeals overturned his conviction and refused to allow as evidence against him the campaign finance reports that he had signed. Only the treasurer was permitted to sign the documents. Any other signature invalidated the forms and they were not permissible as business document evidence. Without the documents, the state could not prove their case. The delegate, who had resigned upon conviction, ran for re-election in 1994 and won. He has a new campaign finance fund, a new expense account, and a job at IWIF, former home of Tommy Bromwell, current home of former Attorney General J. Joseph Curran.

From news reports on the Oliver case, Councilman Oliver admitted that he wrote checks. Under Maryland Campaign Finance Law, only the treasurer can write checks. The treasurer is responsible for the checkbook. Either the Councilman forged a signature, or the Councilman signed a check without lawful authority, or the treasurer pre-signed checks for the Councilman to write as he wished. All three are very bad things to do.

The only time the candidate is liable is when, if acting as the campaign chairman, the mandated reports are not filed timely. The fines cannot come out of campaign funds.

Public Financing of Political Campaigns - Remember the prime directive for elected officials? Do nothing that would impair reelection. Keep that in mind.

PFPC is an idea that comes to us out of the great progressive era of Teddy Roosevelt. It was debated and discussed ad nauseum in a time when the population was inclined towards progressive ideas. This from the era that gave us great programs for leveling in society so that we did not have to suffer through any more robber barons.

Current promoters, all of them elected officials or progressive organizations, complain of the bad influence of money in political campaigns and want to limit it. They also complain of having to spend hours on the telephone fundraising in order to fund campaigns for re-election. Oh, and there is the pitch that political campaigns have become so expensive that well qualified people are reluctant to get involved in representative politics. They call their proposals Clean Campaign Finance Reform. You have heard the joke about how you can tell when a politician is lying - his lips are moving. The lips are flying!

Let us look at some of their arguments. There is too much money in politics. You have heard huge numbers from the media. The presidential campaigns are generating more money per week than President Bush raised for each of the last two campaigns. If you put together all the money for all the campaigns in the country from January 2001 through December 2004, a presidential election cycle, you wouldn't have enough money to pay for the potato chips purchased by Americans during the same period. It is not so much that there is too much money; it is more like not enough of the money finds its way to the elected official's campaign.

Big donations get big attention from elected officials. If I understand this, they are saying that because they have been in office for years, and some people have given the maximum permissible contribution each cycle, that these elected officials are influenced by this money. They do not need campaign finance reform, by their own admission; they need to be turned out of office. More than Clean Money, we need clean politicians.

Well-qualified people, does this assume that current office holders are generally not well qualified, find political campaigns to be too expensive. PFPC schemes establish limits that diffuse this fear, we are told. There is nothing in the PFPC scheme to remove the real problem in this respect, huge campaign war chests held by officials to warn off challengers. Senator Paul Pinsky, the principal proponent of PFPC, has not had a credible challenger since he challenged and beat an incumbent. Since raising money is always seen as a sign of strength and support, rather than collect big checks, PFPC requires a number of small contributions to demonstrate public support. Who has the tougher job of raising these little amounts, the incumbent with a list of thousands of contributors from prior years, or, on of Senator Pinsky's favorite examples, the janitor in the building occupied by the fortune five-hundred company president? Clean Campaigns? It really is more like underhanded dirty dealing.

PFPC gets more people involved in running for office. This might be true. This was one of the stated goals of the Maryland Commission on Public Financing of Political Campaigns. This is somewhat deceptive. A goal to serve the public interest would be to increase the number of challengers elected to public office, and that has not happened. It is unlikely to happen. For example, consider the case of the janitor challenging the two-term incumbent. The incumbent is worried, for good reason. The incumbent might counter this by encouraging several people to run in the challenger's primary. The incumbent can muster a smear campaign against the threat, to be carried out by the solicited challenger. The smart, campaign savvy incumbent can easily keep the credible challenger distracted while remaining above the fray. When the incumbent's record is called forth for public consideration, he characterizes this as an attack from a desperate candidate involved in a dirty primary campaign. This does not cost anybody any money, except the public, and we already know how incumbents regard the public's dollars. This is but one obvious example. Seasoned political operatives know many, many ways to undercut a good candidate. Another easy way to go is to get an independent to run in the General Election and use public money to siphon off votes from the challenger. Remember Ralph Nader and Ross Perot. Remember the impact they had on the presidential contests. PFPC does not even require them to come up with their own money to run spoiler campaigns. Spoiler campaigns are not run merely to please the incumbent. There will always be a quid pro quo at the end. In the 2008 Presidential campaign, Governor Huckabee is said to have stayed in the race in order to minimize Governor Romney, splitting g the conservative vote and giving Senator McCain an easy walk to the nomination. Huckabee is suspected of angling for a VP spot in exchange. Senator Clinton is being encouraged to drop out of the race so she can be added as VP to Senator Obama's nomination.

Presently, incumbents have name recognition, established fundraising and volunteer organizations, and the power of incumbency, the ability to promote themselves at no expense to them, but often at a dollar cost to their constituents, to aid them with reelection. Public finding, even when shared with their opponents, provides them with money without working for it. This is not corruption because of the sharing aspect of the scheme. It is a scheme that will continue progressives in office. Virtually all of the support for PFPC comes from the political left. In Maryland, the left has promised to bury the right. Does anyone really believe that PFPC will level the playing field? If so, can I interest you in some land just east of Ocean City, Maryland?

Real political corruption does not have anything to do with campaign contributions. It has to do with corrupt people. Minor politicians will be caught with their hand in the campaign cookie jar. Recall the scandal surrounding the expenses for hotel room in Towson for Baltimore Mayoral candidate Keiffer Mitchell. This not unlike the Baltimore County Councilman Oliver situation. Both campaigns saw the money sitting there and decided to use it for things prohibited by law. Real corruption takes big money and that cannot flow through a regulated campaign finance system.

Tommy Bromwell was not caught up in campaign finance problems. No matter how much was in his campaign account, or how much he might have needed money for personal things while serving as a Senator, he didn't skim. It was guaranteed he would be caught. He would go into debt before he would ever consider such a thing and there is no indication that he even considered it. He was corrupted by big money. Instead of getting a big paycheck to do the job at IWIF, he exchanged it for similar money to wield influence in state government. Once he went down that easy money path, he became addicted. That was his downfall. The people in the money chain rolled on him. His friends and loyal supporters aren't mad at him for taking the money and the services in exchange for his power, they are mad at the scummy people who rolled on Tommy and snitched him out. There is no shortage of big corruption for elected officials. I recall that Oliver North faced similar charges over a security fence built at his home at no cost to him. Saying that money is the problem is the equivalent of blaming guns for crimes. Neither political party is without corrupt members. Lord Acton's admonition about power comes to mind.

PFPC does not level the playing field. The results from the four states and New York City that have tried this, and all are very different from Maryland, but for one party domination and progressives in their legislatures. Public funding will be used by candidates without a prayer and by incumbents who are not threatened. The first will tilt at windmills and the second will use the money to self-promote at your expense. And that, my friend, is the key.

Polling on this topic always favors: reducing the influence of money in elections; reducing the time incumbents spend raising money and increasing the time they spend on issues important to you; reducing the influence of big donors on public policy; giving you an equal voice with the special interests; cleaning up elections; removing the financial obstacles to well-qualified people who want to run for office. All of these are runaway winners. There is a runaway loser question on these polls, when it is included: Are you in favor paying higher taxes to fund political campaigns in Maryland?

Under the current laws in Maryland, and excepting the office of Governor, candidates for election solicit money from people they think will support their candidacy. People who contribute can be assumed to support that candidate. There are exceptions to this, for instance an employee who buys a ticket to a fundraiser because the boss really wants them to, but largely, contributors to campaigns are supporters. People would be surprised to find out that the Democrat candidate for the Eighth District Senate seat made financial contributions to their Republican candidate's campaign. People would be more surprised to find out that they had contributed to the campaign of someone for whom they would never vote. Under PFPC that would happen to everyone who paid taxes under threat of going to prison. (All taxes are voluntarily paid under threat of going to prison.) There are plenty of governmental programs funded by tax dollars that significant numbers of people disagree with. That happens in republican government. In at least one state with this plan and insufficient money to fund everyone who chose to run, a court challenge resulted in the government having to allocate funds from other programs in order to fund political campaigns. Are we ready to have schools closed, firehouse shuttered, reductions in the number of police officers, all of the foregoing coming from the left's play book, so that we can finance the political campaigns of anyone who can generate four-hundred five dollar contributions? At the Federal level, the check-off for allocations, not additional taxes, to the public funding of presidential campaigns cannot support the needs of the program. Thankfully, most candidates find traditional funding sources – citizens. If the proponents of PFPC would be honest and tell us that it would be Additional Taxes to Fund Political Campaigns, this would be a non-starter.

Public financing of political campaigns is a bad idea for the public. It will not reform the influence of money in politics. It will not open the doors to the state house to new people. It will continue to aid incumbents, making their already all but guaranteed reelection even more assured, and nothing more.

Check back for campaign finance ideas that will help the public.