Not Larry Sabato

Did You Hear The Joke About The Hispanic Cab Driver?

Perhaps celebrating the return of George Allen to Virginia politics, Ken Cuccinelli gets into the game with a joke about his "hispanic cab driver".

Tommy Norment in Hot Water

With another ethics scandal hitting him.

Albo or Hitler? Part One

Which one said this?

“In a perfect world, I would like to be able to kick out every single person who’s an illegal alien..."

(Sorry for breaking Godwin's Law.)

Weenie(s) of the Week

The winner for the week of January 22nd-28th is the Giles County School Board.

The Board voted this week to spend tax dollars to go to court to preserve displays of "The Ten Commandments" in public schools. 

I've got nothing against The Ten Commandments.  But Giles County is an area that is heavily subsidized in state funding formulas- especially for education.  The money being spent for legal fees to keep a religious display on the walls is being paid for from the tax dollars that Virginia is sending to Giles to fund their public schools.  I don't want to pay for this shit.  If Giles wants to do this, they ought to have a special local tax to pay for these lawyers that is assessed when the final bills come in and is kept separate from the state money they are being sent.

Any school board willing to allocate dollars meant for kids and instead send it to lawyers to try and defend something already decided in court deserves to be thrown out on the street.  In the meantime, here's some well deserved public ridicule for the Board- Drema McMahon, J.B. Buckland, J. Lewis Webb Jr., Joseph Gollehon and Ronald Whitehead.

As the Supreme Court already ruled:  “Posting of religious texts on the wall serves no educational purpose... If the posted copies of the Ten Commandments are to have any effect at all, it will be to induce the school children to read, meditate upon, perhaps to venerate and obey, the Commandments. However desirable this might be as a matter of private devotion, it is not a permissible state objective under the Establishment Clause.”

George Allen Comes To Arlington?

I don't know for sure, but it does seem to fit a pattern.

(I was going to post this myself but when I went to Google to find a link back to the old "deer head" stories about Allen I saw Wonkette already beat me to it.  Sigh.)

As Chris Peace's Immigration Bill Comes Before A Virginia House Subcommittee...

Arizona is dealing with the results of allowing this kind of bigotry and hate to take over the political discourse.

UPDATE:  The lynch mob rolls on to the full committee with Dave Albo of Fairfax County casting a "yea" vote that was decisive (tie votes fail) for this disgrace of legislation. 

RPV Fails Again

Yesterday the Republican Party of Virginia issued a press release and video surrounding the "controversy" when Senate Democrats decided to kill some right wing bills in subcommittee this week and not allow a full committee vote.

Following that press release, right wing bloggers began piling on and on and on and on and on. 

First of all, there was no "rule breaking" as RPV alleged.  In fact- guess where the rule that was used to not hear these bills came from?

Got your guess ready?

It was the Republicans!  GOP Senate Leader Tommy Norment stood up and requested... no he implored Senate Democrats to add this rule to allow the Senate to kill bills in subcommittee to speed up the legislative process.

Check out this video of Norment on the floor requesting this rule change.  RPV, you are pathetic.  Every blogger who called for Senator Janet Howell to resign owes her an apology.

 

 

Petition To The Washington Post

On what might be the top (non-partisan) moral issue of our time.

Good For Janet Howell

Is it possible that Democrats in the Senate finally figured out after three (wasted) years in the majority that if they didn't start showing some serious fight against the Cuccinelli/McDonnell/Bolling Republicans that no one would turn out for them this year?  I'm not sure.  But it looks that way.  Better late than never.  Good for Janet.

Brian Moran Gets Caught In ANOTHER Lie

Thanks to Politifact Virginia for catching him.

It's also worth noting Moran is the first Virginia Democrat caught in a "pants on fire" lie from Politifact Virginia since it was started a few months ago.