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We are entering the final two months of the 2010 election cycle and we spend more time beating each other up rather than working together. I understand that a lot of people are concerned about the process in replacing Kenya Marshall in the Jefferson County 17th place vacancy. However, we have our nominee in Elisabeth French regardless of how flawed the process was and we need to unite behind her now.
Such diaries like Denial at Bessemer Opinions are only further driving apart the party.
There have also been calls for Nikki Still supporters to ramp up a write-in campaign, but Still herself so far is not enthused about it. However, letter after letter in the paper and voter after voter in person tell me that write-in is exactly what they are going to do. Many feel like a vote for French is a vote for the race based system that has infected the Democratic Party.
So we will write in our vote for Nikki Still.
Some progressives have demonstrated their unwillingness to address the problem as found on Progressive Electorate. (Emphasis mine)
Left in Alabama has video from yesterday's SDEC Meeting in which
Elisabeth French was appointed to replace Kenya Marshall on the Democratic
ballot. A number of folks I've talked to are disappointed that the nomination
did not go to Nikki Still - the 2nd place finish in the July 13th Runoff. I'm
confident Liz French will competent just as I thought Nikki Still would. The issue we should all agree on is the need to rid our State of the parasite called partisan Judicial elections.
Rather than looking inward to solve their own problem, they say focus on the unrelated but also important problem of partisan judicial elections.
We are not ignoring the problem, we have been talking about the need for non partisan judicial elections for a long long time. That is the root of the problem. Taking politics, as much as possible, out of the Judicial selection process. Most other states have done this.
Yes, it is reasonable to argue that the process was flawed. But we've got to move past that with a limited amount of time left in this election cycle.
That being said, I want to direct you to the new Alabama candidates blog Fight for Alabama . The folks at Left in Alabama worked on this project for the entire month of August. Should be a good resource if it is promoted and used.
College football officially kicks off today. Of course there were some games the last two nights. But the big cheese plays today.
Rollllll Tide. We are playing San Jose State today.
Penn State, the team of CasualWednesday, comes to Tuscaloosa next weekend for an epic showdown and renews a major rivalry of the 70's and 80's.
Who is your team? What games are you looking forward to this weekend?
Monday nights showdown between Virginia Tech and Boise State could have National Title implications. If Boise wins they are in prime position for a run at a BCS championship. If VA Tech wins they are in the hunt and all talk ends of Boise not getting their fair shot at the title.
I look forward to watching some of the LSU- North Carolina game tonight. UNC has a number of starters out though due to NCAA violations. For LSU and hot seat Les Miles this is a must win.
Wow so much going on last night. Just some links to whet your appetite until the big Grayson Q and A this evening.
1. Alabama will improve the digital divide in rural areas as the White House is sending $111 million for a broadband initiative.
Good to see a lot of this money headed for the Black Belt and if I'm not mistaken a minority owned business. I've traveled a lot of this part of the state recently and access has been very limited.
The largest of the Alabama grants is $59 million and was awarded to Trillion Communications Corp. in Bessemer. The company, representing the South Central Alabama Broadband Commission, will help deliver fiber-based connectivity to households, businesses and community institutions in the eight counties of Macon, Lowndes, Dallas, Wilcox, Butler, Crenshaw, Conecuh and Escambia, according to the company's application.
2. New York House Democrats seem to be caving into pressure and are in agreement that the Muslim community center should be moved from its planned location. Political analysts are not surprised.
The Democrats who are going to lose in 2010 are from moderate to conservative districts, so these are the Democrats who are trying to be very careful in their handling of this issue," Phillips said. "They don't want to take an unpopular position on anything right now."
We're also big sports fans. Might I add - some of us are college football fanatics.
Here's my preseason Top 5
1. Alabama - Gotta go with my team and the defending BCS National Champions.
Yeah that's the real trophy. I toured the new Athletic Facility at Alabama a couple months ago. We've got a tough October gauntlet and that 2nd game of the season against Casual Wednesday's Nittany Lions will be tough. Always tough to pull off the magical repeat, but Bama has the talent.
2. Ohio State - Favorable schedule and a lot of returning talent after winning the Rose Bowl last year. That second game of the season against Miami at home might be a trap though.
3. Florida - Yeah I know Tebow and his Friar haircut are gone to Denver. But Urban Meyer came back for a reason. Tough game at Bama. But otherwise road schedule is a joke.
4. Texas - Young quarterback. But Texas is solid on Defense. Look for another Red River Shootout against Oklahoma to tell us what to expect the second half of the season in the "Big Twelve".
5. Virginia Tech - a sleeper pick. But I think that Beamer's boys knock off Boise in the first game of the season and set the stage. The toughest games will be in November.
Other teams in the mix - Oregon, Nebraska, Boise State, Iowa, TCU
Who's your pick to win it in 2010? What is your team?
Even for those of us that monitor Alabama politics, it should still come as quite a surprise that the State ranked first in the amount of money spent on Judicial Elections between 2000-2009. It should be a wake-up call for all of us that our partisan system of electing Judges is beyond flawed. We should realize that we are out of control when we spends this much money on Judicial Elections.
Supreme Court candidates in Alabama spent $41 million in that decade, more than twice the amount spent by candidates in the No. 2 state, Pennsylvania, the report, The New Politics of Judicial Elections, said
Citizens believe that the obscene amount of money affects how justice is administered. Perception is important when discussing our faith in the legal system.
Polls show voters believe campaign money buys favorable court rulings, the report said.
"This crisis of confidence in the judiciary is real and growing," Sandra Day O'Connor, former U.S. Supreme Court justice, wrote in a forward to the report.
In light of the Citizens United ruling, we can only expect that the amount of money spent on Judicial elections will rise. Corporations will be allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money on deciding which Justices would be more likely to rule in their favor. This issue should be on the radar of legislators in the 2011 election regardless of whom has control of the Statehouse.
Wake up folks, wake up.
The easy answer is that party politics should be taken out of judicial elections completely. Alabama should absolutely not have partisan elections for Judges. I prefer the Missouri Plan to the current system of partisan Judicial elections
The Missouri Plan, also known as merit selection, was developed in 1913 as a compromise judicial election reform combining the best features of appointment while retaining an electoral feature. In 1940 Missouri became the first state to adopt merit selection, and more states have embraced this reform throughout the century.
That being said, the Alabama State Democratic Executive Committee is meeting today to decide what will happen to the place on the ballot for the Judicial Circuit Place 17 spot. Kenya Lavender Marshall was suspended by the State Bar for allegedly converting client funds for her own use and yesterday was voted to be removed from the ballot by a sub-committee. The entire Executive Committee will likely ratify that decision today.
So many assumed that Judge Nikki Still, the incumbent and runner-up to Marshall would be the obvious choice. But by State Party bylaws, nominations are allowed to be taken from the floor and others have been campaigning the committee.
My sources involved with the State Democratic Executive Committee that Birmingham Attorney Elisabeth French will easily have the needed votes to garner the nomination. Still is "still" campaigning in the hope that she persuades undecided members. Attorney Tamara Harris Johnson has also thrown her name in the hat although she has failed to garner any real traction.
Perhaps as some have suggested in a Left in Alabama diary, French would be a compromise.
The rationale for picking French goes something like this: the voters elected Marshall a black candidate so she should be replaced by French a black candidate.
However, Still may not be appointed for another reason. Although she is a Democrat, Still was appointed by Governor Riley in 2009 to fill the vacancy when Judge Allwin Horn retired. Had she been appointed by a Democrat Governor, her road to victory would have been much easier at the ballot box or with this committee of loyal party members. I think that some party leaders will have a tough time choosing anyone appointed by a Republican Governor. To be fair to Still, she told Governor Riley that she was a lifelong Democrat and would run for reelection as a Democrat.
Is the Alabama Democratic Party aware Left in Alabama has a history of supporting conservatives over liberal democrats and gave Congressman Artur Davis a free pass for his vote against health care reform?
Is the Alabama Democratic Party aware my front page privileges were revoked by the administrators because I said something they didn't like about Terri Sewell and because I wasn't an Artur Davis for Governor supporter? Although they claim I was never banned from posting Left in Alabama my account was disabled for several months. My account was briefly reinstated last month, then I pi$$ed them off again and was subjected to the Dale Jackson treatment.
It's a special rule for Dale (3.00 / 2) And Redeye. Folks who tend to get caught up in arguing for the sake of argument and leave a large volume of low value comments in a short time. Dale agreed to this arrangement. He's on the honor system but we remind him of his total.
As of today I cannot log on to Left in Alabama to post comments. They also have a rating system which allows trusted commenter's to delete post. As a member of the Alabama Democratic Party I have a real problem with any party funds being spent with a blog who treats me in this manner.
Oh please (4.00 / 4) Stand behind your words, why don't you? It may be cute in junior high to mince words and try to avoid responsibility for what you said, but no one really believes you're blameless even then and it certainly doesn't wash when you're an adult.
You painted all moderates with an extremely broad and unflattering brush then pretend you didn't mean to apply that brush to someone who calls herself almoderate? No one here is that gullible.
You have the pissing analogy backwards. This is how it goes, according to LBJ who said it of J. Edgar Hoover: "I would rather have him inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in." It's akin to "keep your friends close and your enemies closer."
I agree that a party divided will not stand. So why do you persist in pounding wedges that serve to split off various segments of the party? It can't just be a party of people who exactly agree with Redeye, because there are not enough people like that to form a majority for anything. Well, I guess it could be a party that small, but members would only be able to moan and complain about never having power and getting pissed on all the time because most people would be outside the tent.
A party like that is nothing to aspire to
Is this what the Alabama Democratic Party stands for? If so count me out.
Forty five years from today President Lyndon Johnson signed the 1965 Voting Rights Act. This weekend celebrations are taking in place in Selma, Alabama where marches as part of the voting rights campaign led to the signing of this act. However, youth are being denied the opportunity as part of a diverse group called Project Dance, to dance on the Edmund Pettus Bridge this weekend.
Today the youth organized a protest/rally at City Hall where they danced then marched across the bridge and again dance the Jai Ho Dance on the other side of the bridge.
"The League of the South was organized more or less as an academic exercise by people who were college professors primarily . . . they wrote series of articles about Southern Independence."
He went on to essentially say the League of the South did not become a radical group until he left the organization.
For your "it's almost 5 o'clock on this Thursday afternoon" reading pleasure.
1. We thought Artur Davis might be a Democrat again based on a quote he made about the Fair Sentencing Act not going far enough as reported by Huff Po yesterday. Actually Ryan Grim wrote the part about might be a Democrat again and deserves credit. Except for the fact that Davis didn't say that exactly. Congressman Danny Davis of Illinois made the statement.
An update to the story was offered
CORRECTION: The original version of this article inaccurately attributed a quote to Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.). The quote, which remains in the piece, has since been attributed to the proper source, Rep. Danny Davis (D-Il.) In addition to seeking clarification, Davis' office released a statement this morning offering the following thoughts on the issue:
My position is that I supported the legislation to reduce the crack powder distinction because the current 100 to 1 ratio in the federal sentencing guidelines cannot be justified. I have held that position since I practiced as a federal prosecutor in the nineties. At the same time, I would oppose efforts to make the new ratio retroactive to past drug defendants largely on the grounds that the federal courts would be swamped with appeals and collateral attacks on sentences.
So in theory, Artur Davis supported the Fair Sentencing Act so I guess he deserves some credit. Well not too much since essentially everyone in Congress except for some dude from Texas voiced approval for its passage. For example, one of the driving forces for the Fair Sentencing Act on the Senate side was Jefferson Beauregard Sessions. Nuff said there.
This masterpiece editorial should be reprinted by every paper in the country. Furthermore, every state should pass this law immediately and we should see it introduced at the Federal level. Fat chance but it's definitely worth dreaming about.
With our logo proposal, when lawmakers get up to speak, colorful patches on their suits will make it clear whom they represent. Your lawmaker, not just your AT&T installer, will wear the familiar blue and white AT&T sphere. AT&T is among the top spenders on lobbying in California - as is the Western States Petroleum Association. The association's curved swoosh will be prominent on lawmakers' suit jackets, along with the logos of their oil company members, including the red letters of ExxonMobil and the cheerful yellow and green sun of BP.
No doubt political leaders will protest. But enough is enough. We might as well make it clear that when lawmakers speak, what we're actually hearing is a word from their sponsors.
Perhaps we won't know the long term health effects caused by the oil spill for many years to come. We are already seeing a number of Alabama residents being treated for a variety of symptoms. According to the Alabama Health Department officials at least 103 people , in Mobile and Baldwin counties, have been treated for direct and indirect exposure.
Forty-seven of the patients complaining of oil-caused symptoms were exposed via inhalation, 25 by contact, three through ingestion, nine patients reported multiple exposures, and 19 were exposed indirectly, according to the Alabama Department of Public Health.
Direct exposures are exposures to oil or oil by-products through contact, inhalation or ingestion, according to public health officials. Indirect exposures occur because of other circumstances associated with the oil spill.
For example, heat exhaustion during cleanup efforts or mental health concerns such as anxiety or depression, would be examples of indirect exposure, said Dr. Thomas Miller, with the Alabama Department of Public Health.
So the costs to our state rise and this does not include all of the unreported cases. This also probably is a very high under-reporting of mental health issues. I'm going to look for articles that give us numbers for Louisiana and Mississippi this evening. If you can find anything please let us know.
So when we have candidates run for office it's certainly fair to explore their voting history. Failing to vote for a lengthy period of time is an indication of how you view your civic responsibility. This is especially troubling that such successful women have neglected this duty.
California Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Meg Whitman admitted last year that her voting record was unacceptable .
Carly Fiorina's spotty voting record has also been a hot topic of discussion as she is challenging Barbara Boxer for U.S. Senate in California as the Republican nominee.
Perry County residents filed a federal lawsuit against the owners of the landfill where coal ash from last year's spill in Kingston, Tenn is being dumped.
Interestingly, the owners of the landfill filed bankruptcy earlier this year claiming that the operators have not paid them.
Good for the residents of Perry County who were not given proper notice before the coal ash was being transported. They also have a right to know what the long term health consequences are from this material being transported and stored in their county.
Despite Terri Sewell touting an internal poll with her up, Shelia Smoot continues to gain the momentum in the race by gaining the support of Congressional leaders James Clyburn and Bennie Thompson. Clyburn is the House Whip and Thompson is the Chairman of Homeland Security.
Smoot in the past couple of weeks has also added the endorsements of the Alabama Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers Local 2143.
