Byrne responds to Davis on PACT

By Jennifer J. Foster

That didn’t take long.

Bradley Byrne’s campaign has responded to Artur Davis’s charge on PACT:

The campaign for Republican gubernatorial candidate Bradley Byrne issued the following in response to Congressman Artur Davis’ untrue allegations regarding Byrne’s comments earlier this week on a local radio program and his position on the validity of the Pre-Paid Affordable College Tuition contracts many families across the state have entered into with the state.

In a patently false news release earlier today, Davis claimed Byrne said Alabama has no legal obligation to uphold the PACT contracts, and further suggested that as governor Byrne would deny the legal standing of the contracts.

To set the record straight, following is the complete quote by Bradley Byrne to which Davis is referring.

“...a lot of good people around this state invested some pretty hard earned money in that program based upon that assurance from them.  Now, I am not telling you there is a legal obligation on behalf of the state to fix this problem.  There’s not.  But there is a moral obligation, and in my judgment, and the way I look at things, a moral obligation is actually a lot more important than a legal obligation.  So, I think the state does have a moral obligation to fix this problem.“

Bradley Byrne, Dale Jackson Radio Show, 12/30/09

In direct response to Davis’ misrepresentative accusations, Byrne campaign spokesperson Marty Sullivan said:

“Bradley Byrne’s position in regards to PACT has been well reported. He has always maintained that regardless of what a court of law might hold in regards to the state’s legal obligation to PACT contracts, Alabama has a higher, moral obligation to uphold the terms of the agreements. As governor, Bradley will live by that principle, he will uphold the contracts, and he will do the right thing for those families who trusted that their hard-earned dollars would be there when they needed them.

“Now that the record has been set straight, on the strength of Bradley’s own words in their entirety, I’d like to wish Artur Davis and his campaign staff a Happy New Year and encourage them to resolve for 2010 to focus on honest debate of the issues and to give up the undignified practice of knowingly misleading Alabamians by taking the statements of those they oppose out of context.“

The Byrne camp felt that Bradley’s comments were taken out of context—context they feel changes the complexion of what he said. I don’t believe it does—and we’ll have more on that later—but, hey, more power to them.

But since it’s the New Year, I would like to encourage the Byrne campaign to resolve for 2010 to give up the undignified practice of delivering smarmy shots at the end of their press releases. It’s so unbecoming.

Thanks in no small part to Byrne’s statement on the Dale Jackson Show, there is a lot more to come on PACT. A lot more.

Davis hits Byrne on PACT

By Jennifer J. Foster

The PACT issue, which has been simmering for months now, is heating up. Artur Davis’s camp distributed this news release this morning:

Congressman Artur Davis issued the following statement today regarding recent comments made by gubernatorial candidate and former PACT Board member Bradley Byrne about the legal standing of PACT contracts.  While guest hosting the Dale Jackson Show on Wednesday morning, Byrne said, “I’m not telling you there’s a legal obligation on behalf of the state to fix this problem.  There’s not.”

“Bradley Byrne is wrong about the legal standing of PACT and that’s not just a technicality.  It means that a Byrne administration would be prepared to fight in court against the interests of 48,000 Alabama families who are simply asking the state to keep its word.  As these families can testify, the unmistakable language of the PACT contract ‘guarantees’ that the contributions to PACT would be honored; that is also how the program was marketed for the last two decades to hard-working Alabama families who were trying to ensure their children a college education.

Denying the promises made by PACT is no way to rebuild confidence in state government. It shatters trust as much as the PACT Board’s decision this week to alter the terms of current PACT contracts in a way that will put more debt on the shoulders of thousands of Alabama families.  As a two year member of the PACT board, Mr. Byrne should have met with enough PACT families to understand their anguish.  Unfortunately, his comments yesterday have only made the problem worse.  PACT is a legal as well as a moral obligation and as Governor, I will make the State of Alabama keep its word.”

Wow.

That’s GOVERNOR, to you

By Jennifer J. Foster

From The New York Times:

As Gov. David A. Paterson attempts to raise his stature in preparation for his election run next year, some of his close supporters are saying that people should stop calling him by his first name, saying it diminishes him and fails to reflect the prestige of the office he holds.

“People should call him Governor,” said Assemblyman Keith L. T. Wright, chairman of the Manhattan Democratic Party, who is one of Mr. Paterson’s closest supporters. “I’ve only known the man 40 years, and I call him Governor. I think other people should, too.”

Once upon a time, long ago and far away, when I worked for a certain state representative in Florida, people would address him by his title, “Representative”—which is considerably more meager a position than governor of New York.

“It’s just Bill,“ he would insist. And all but a few of the lifelong lobbyists, who referred to people by their titles out of habit, obliged.

It put people at ease. It put them on par with him, as they should be. In his first two-year term as their elected representative, he understood something that David Paterson, for all his years in public service, still doesn’t get: In America, you don’t demand respect from people you are supposed to serve. You earn it by doing your job.

Yes, there is an argument to be made for the gravity of the office and so forth. But I’m just going to go out on a limb and say this: The more David Paterson and his supporters insist on people calling him “governor,“ the less those people will want to do so.

And then it won’t be long until they won’t have a need to anymore.

And that state rep who insisted on being called by his first name? He’s now one of a handful of the most powerful people in Florida.

I’d say it worked out for him.

You can’t fix stupid, part 2

By Jennifer J. Foster

As I told you recently, you can’t fix stupid.

Here’s the latest example, from CNN:

Part of an explosive device that failed to take down a plane last week was sewn into the underwear of the Nigerian man accused of igniting it, a law enforcement official told CNN Monday.

This is also, I believe, some evidence of Darwin’s theory of natural selection.

Sewing EXPLOSIVES in your UNDERWEAR???

YOU!! OUT OF THE GENE POOL!!

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula accepted responsibility for the attempt on the plane, saying in a statement that “there was a technical problem that resulted in a non-complete explosion.“

There was a problem? With a genius like this?

I never would have seen that coming.

The rise of the independent thinker

By Jennifer J. Foster

... or, perhaps, the consequences of the big-tent theory.

CNN had this piece from Julian E. Zelizer about the “four new kings of the hill in Washington”: U.S. senators Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson.

You know Lieberman—though, given the reputation he’s forged for himself over the past six years, it’s hard to remember him as the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee.

The other three have made their names through their roles in the health care debate that has pervaded everything that has gone on in D.C. this year.

I don’t agree necessarily with Zelizer’s first reason for the group’s strength—that “Democrats have never been as ideologically disciplined as the Republicans, and they have been less successful containing party differences.“

I don’t recall the national Democratic Party opening its arms to people who believe in the sanctity of life, and its treatment of the Second Amendment has been, at times, downright hostile.

But I do agree with this:

The second factor behind the new kings of the hill has to do with the sharpening of the partisan divide on Capitol Hill. The impact of growing party polarization since the 1970s has meant that winning votes from the other party is extraordinarily difficult. Except for rare moments, neither party can count on winning significant blocks of votes from the other side of the aisle.

You can read the rest of what Zelizer has to say, but I think the upshot of his article—and what our federal legislators have confirmed for us this year—is that it’s time for the United States to move beyond the two-party system.

This means ballot access—reasonable ballot access—for minor party candidates and independent candidates.

It’s time for Americans to have choices, real choices, beyond the elephants and the jackasses of politics.