Entries for the 'Maryland Politics' Category

As many of you know, I recently started a new job at the University of Maryland, Baltimore.  As such, I am a contractual state employee and I have the opportunity to participate in certain benefit plans available to state employees.  And so this morning, I found myself in the weekly three-hour new employee orientation. 

And one thing I learned made me go "holy shit!"

Frederick County's new policy of inqiuring on the immigration status of people they arrest is drawing fire from CASA of Maryland, including some seriously trumped up figures of costs.  The truth is always the first casualty in the immigration fight.

Remember how O'Guvnah promised us in his 2006 campaign how the O'Guvnah era in Maryland Politics would usher in a brand new Public Service Commission... one not "so connected" with power utilities that they regulated?  How rate increases would be rolled back?  How electricity would be made affordable again?

Of course, the rest of Maryland now knows what Conservatives were saying all along:  O'Guvnah's gift of gab from kissing the Blarney stone was producing rhetoric his capabilities couldn't match.  (In other words, he was lying his ass off.)

And PEPCO has just given us proof.

Are you familiar with the Peter Principle, the certain people rise to their own level of incompetence?  Well, in Maryland we have the Porcari Principle, where certain politicians rise to an even higher level of incompetence.

It is named after Maryland Secretary of Transportation John D. Porcari, whose fundamental incompetence has been on full display these many months since O'Guvnah kissed the Blarney Stone and suckered the state into electing him Governor.

I am no huge fan of the Baltimore Sun-- AKA the Calvert Street Communist Party Newsletter -- but I do like Greg Kane.  He is one of the best columnists of any Tribune paper.

And today's column is right on:  give me concealed carry, or give me police protection 24-7.

Not as poetic as "give me liberty or give me death", but the point is still valid.

The Calvert Street Commie Times has a great article today on Wells Fargo firing back at the City of Baltimore over the lawsuit that accuses Wells Fargo of illegal loans and foreclosures, thereby denying the city "millions" in revenue.

Wells Fargo fires back,  however, that only 313 foreclosures have occurred during the period.  They also highlight the 19,000 tax lien sales by the city that have the same effect as foreclosure.

Should be a fun battle to watch.

That might be my mantra soon.  I really like Alaska's Governor Sarah Palin. She's a no-nonsense, kick-ass/take names, anti-corruption, anti-earmarking Governor.

And her pledge to challenge the Government's listing of the Polar Bear as "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act is right on.

The simple fact is that there has not been a larger polar bear population in the Arctic in over 100 years.  The simple fact is that by listing the polar bear as "threatened" under the ESA gives the the government the ability to hold nearly ANY contributor to the threat of so-called "climate change" accountable.  The simple fact is that it is an overreaction by an Administration grasping for a legacy beyond a hard, tough, controversial war.

Bravo to Sarah Palin! 

The Red Line is a walking, talking "charlie fox".  The long hoped-for, long-awaited, long-dreamed-for transportation line to link the west side and easte side of the cities is too expensive, according to this article in the Calvert Street Communist Party Newsletter.

As Brian Griffiths has already noted over at Red Maryland, O'Guvnah has pledged to spend $1.1 billion of your hard-earned money on new biotechnology research initiatives in order to make the state of Maryland a "hub" for this kind of work.

But what Brian doesn't get into, is why are we spending even more money when we already have a large and established set of incubators at Maryland's premier research institution -- the University of Maryland, Baltimore?

An article in today's Calvert Street Communist Party Newsletter sheds some serious light on the trend toward the "straight vegetable oil" fuel options.  It turns out that using vegetable oil in your diesel engine is illegal on both the State and Federal levels.