The press and, stunningly, the Democrats, are giving Tim Griffin a pass. So far he has been in a cake walk without being boldly challenged by the opposition party on his past criminal activities and the Arkansas media just seems to shrug their shoulders at it. (I suspect Griffin has laid out plenty of shiney objects to distract them with.) But the fact remains that this scumbag did something unforgivable in the way he treated soldiers serving our country overseas.

Again, don’t take my word for it, check the email lists Tim Griffin was so happy to provide us with:

As I keep saying, there is no other side to the story here.  Griffin and the RNC actively worked to disenfranchise registered, legitimate voters serving our country in the military. He’s the one who accidently sent this to the wrong email several years ago, and no matter how much his story changes, no matter what his supporters shriek back, he can’t escape that fact. So far, he’s gotten away with this-the corrupt Bush justice department wouldn’t prosecute on of their own, the Obama justice department is too wrapped up in turning pages and being “bipartisan” to pursue the crimes committed by Bush Administration officials (many of them far worse than anything Griffin did), and so far he’s gotten away with it on the campaign trail without having to answer for his crime against our troops.

So I may end up sounding like a broken record for a bit, and not just for the rest of the campaign. You don’t do shit like this to soldiers shedding their blood on the battlefield and get away with it. And if he wins, I’ll keep it up as long as needed. And if he’s Congressman for life, well, he’s got a few years on me. I’m sure I’ll outlive him.

From the Arkansas Blog:

The religionist bullies of the Family Council have sent a letter to several retail chains (not including Walmart or Kroger) attempting to warn them off installing lottery vending machines. They proclaim that the “tide is turning” on the lottery and they expect the legislature to outlaw the vending machines in 2011. I’m not so sure.

An overwhelming majority approved the lottery. Its popularity has only grown with the millions passed out for college scholarships. I’m no lottery fan. But forget about half-measures. If the lottery is to continue to produce the return expected, the grim reality is that it has to be marketed to the maximum.

The bullies got 1,200 people who said they oppose lottery machines. Big whoop — 648,122 voted for the lottery.

Whatever your view of the lottery, and unlike Max Brantley I’m a supporter though that’s neither here nor there for the purposes of this post, the vote vs. the Family Council petitions is telling. The Family Council could barely find a thousand people in a state of over two million to sign on and they think the tide is turning. Well over 600,000 people statewide approved the lottery. In other words, Bill Halter and the lottery supporters beat the Family Council and beat them bad.

Remember, for years right wing “religious” groups worked with out of state gambling interests to keep Arkansas from getting a state lottery. The state legislators bought their arguments, afraid of offending the church going crowd. But when the lottery got put on the ballot Arkansans, most of whom I would wager are pretty religious (understatement of the year), voted for it overwhelmingly. In other words, the Family Council and Jerry Cox were revealed for what they were-a fringe group way out of touch with the people of Arkansas. And now that they’ve shown that they can’t rally a significant force to take on the lottery they’ve shown that they have no real power or influence anymore.

Next year, we’ll no doubt be in a showdown with Cox and co. in the state legislature over progressive and right wing legislation. This, more than anything, shows that they can be beaten. And if we can beat them in other areas, like the Equal Rights Amendment, then we can break them.

Joyce Elliott joined Fox 16 down in Little Rock to discuss her race for Congress and and issues facing the district. First question out of the gate was something I’ve been wanting to see how Elliott would handle from the start, her past support of the DREAM Act, which allows children of undocumented immigrants who are U.S. citizens themselves to go to college. It’s a potentially thorny issue that I’m sure Griffin has been licking his lips over, but in typical Elliott fashion she handled the issue spectacularly-

Yes, it’s something I still support because here’s the deal that we need to think about in Arkansas. Arkansas ranks at the very bottom of the number of college graduates that any state has in the country and it’s a status that we can’t afford. We need more for our college graduates if we’re ever going to move or per capita income. We need those graduates in this state to make sure that we have the workforce that we need. And even just as importantly we have invested in these kids for twelve years in many cases. They had nothing to say about whether or not they ended up in this country, they’ve been here all this time, they’ve done all the right things, they’ve graduated from high school, we need them-every student should have the right, I think, to say I want to pay my way to college, it’s nothing to do with scholarships which is what you hear most of the time. All the bill requires is that they would be allowed to pay instate tuition rates just as your child or my child might do because it’s in our economic interest to do so.

I knew what Joyce Elliott was made of in 2005 when she stood up for the DREAM Act. As I recall, she needed police protection at the time after the Ku Klux Klan labeled her “a busy little nigress.” But she didn’t back down from doing the right thing and standing up for kids in need that other politicians were happy to turn into a political football.

This issue is not going to be one that Tim Griffin can turn against her so easily. As Elliott explained, the bill helps students who have been here in this country, most of whom are American citizens by birthright (you know, that antiquated idea that if you’re born here you’re entitled to the rights of being an American that Republicans want to get rid of so badly) and all of whom had no say in how they came here, regardless of what we might think of their parents’ actions. It doesn’t provide any scholarships or any other sort of money to go to college-that’s a myth-it just allows them to pay instate rates as anyone living in Arkansas should be able to do. What’s more, the bill was supported by Mike Huckabee, who labeled opponents like Jim Johnson Holt the “Shiite wing of the Republican Party”. In other words, if Griffin wants to bring this up, Elliott can and will punch back successfully, and so will the rest of us. Other Democrats could take a lesson from Elliott in her framing-here’s this potentially devastating issue if misconstrued as it so often is, but rather than adopting the right wing frame Elliott points out that this is something that benefits the state economically.

Even better, Elliott frames the choice between herself and Griffin nicely-she’s been here working for the district and the people in it as a teacher and a public servant. As she pointed out, Griffin simply parachuted in and decided he wanted to run for Congress. That’s a winning argument out on the campaign trail if there ever was one, and it’s nice to see her putting Griffin on the defensive over his status as a carpet bagger.

Enough is enough, it’s time for Alan Simpson to go. Simpson, a former Republican Senator from Wyoming who was appointed to sit on the Blue Dog’s pet project commission to slash Social Security. Simpson has long been an advocate of cutting social security and he stepped in it big time when he compared people on social security to a cow with “310 million tits.” The tits, of course, being all of us, but namely senior citizens, like my grandfather, who would be living in extreme poverty without it.

Simpson apologized, but then went on to say something more disturbing.

“The irony (is) that the veterans who saved this country are now, in a way, not helping us to save the country in this fiscal mess,” said Alan Simpson, co-chair of the White House’s fiscal commission, according to the Associated Press.

Simpson was referring specifically to the disability benefits the Department of Veterans Affairs dispenses to Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange.

According to AP, Simpson declined to comment on whether this issue would be examined by the commission. But as TPM has reported, some members of the commission have sought to prioritize cuts to service members and veteran benefits over other defense spending cuts.

It’s time for Simpson to leave, and every Democrat in the country should be calling for Obama to fire him. I’m not a big fan of Democrats running away from the President, as you probably gathered from the tongue lashing I gave Chad Causey, but I don’t want Obamabots either. If you’re a Democrat who thinks you have to criticize the President, then do so in a constructive manner. No one who claims to support seniors or veterans can say they support the President’s decision to keep Simpson on. For that matter, I don’t think you can support seniors or veterans and support this Blue Dog pet project for slashing away at the most vulnerable in our society. You want to balance the budget? In the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, get rid of Bush’s tax cuts for millionaires, get the economy going again, and if you’ve got to cut spending gut that bloated military industrial complex. Do not hurt the people who have built this country, who have poured their sweat, tears, and blood into it to make it what it is.

The Keet campaign really has been an interesting spectacle to watch.  It started off with Republicans desperately in need of a candidate to run against Beebe so they could keep their future ballot access.  Keet, a washed up former state legislator who had lived and worked in Florida for years, was chosen to hold the spot on the ballot.  At the time the assumption was he’d run a nice, clean, friendly campaign.  After all, that was the signal he was sending at the time.  It didn’t last long though. 

Before long, Keet, without an issue to run against Beebe, was campaigning hard on every national issue he could find, running against President Obama’s health insurance plan, on Arizona’s racial profiling bill, the national deficit, etc.  All of those things, of course, have had absolutely nothing to do with being the Governor of Arkansas.  For awhile though, it looked like it was actually helping him.  There were a few friendly Rasmussen and Republican-internal  polls (that may be redundant) that showed him within ten points of Beebe.  And for a little while it was looking like his campaign had legs.

The last two weeks though have been disastrous for the Keet campaign.  Really, I guess the implosion started before that, at his “Time For Truth” press conference.  Keet basically got to the podium to whack Beebe and ended up telling a whopper of a lie, claiming that saw mill workers were being fined 10,000 dollars for filling out the wrong forms.  Well, the state agency came out and said that didn’t happen-they just ask workers who do that to fill out the form again.  Keet walked away looking like a combination of both a fool and a liar.  In short, he got every reporter in the state out to his little press conference and made a complete ass out of himself.

But in the last two weeks things have really snowballed.  Keet first had to explain why he lied about when he moved back to Arkansas from Florida and if he committed voter fraud in Florida or, alternatively, lied to Max Brantley about when he moved back.  (It seems to be a case of the later.)  If Democrats were absolutely ruthless, they could contest his residency (the way they once wrongly tried to do to Bill Halter) and potentially have him chunked off the ballot and in so doing likely deprived the Republican Party of their future ballot access.  So far, they haven’t done that.  Considering Keet’s implosion though, they may not have to.  Keet now finds himself explaining why he didn’t pay property taxes or restaraunt taxes promptly, why he claimed a homestead tax credit he wasn’t entitled to, and why he didn’t pay property taxes at all on his plane that he housed out in Nevada.  Keet only made matters worse on himself when he seemed to blame his wife for the whole mixup and then ended up with the poor lady standing next to him as he further embarrassed himself to day attacking the reporter who quoted him and then hemming and hawing over the actual charges, claiming he was trying to be “too honest”, which has to be the dumbest thing he has said in the course of this campaign so far.

So yeah, the Jim Keet campaign is tanking in a not so slow motion car accident.  Republicans wanted to manufacture an ethics scandal against Beebe by digging through old campaign reports and campaigning against the ethical lapses of Democrats like Robbie Wills and Dustin McDaniel.  They can’t do that now because their guy has been shown to be a liar and a tax cheat.  Jim Keet wanted to campaign against the new state police plane.  Yeah, watch what happens whenever he lets the word “plane” come out of his mouth now.  And the lies he keeps telling on the campaign trail are starting to pass the point of the prevaricating politician.  Between his 10,000 dollar whopper and his bizarre claim today that Governor Beebe hired a private investigator to follow him around, I’m personally starting to wonder if Keet doesn’t have a serious problem.  I’m not trying to be funny or snipe him for that either.  He really did seem paranoid today and it’s hard to believe that anyone connected with reality would be spinning yarns this long-even a desperate politician.

There are also some interesting rumors floating around in the grape vine.  Some are suggesting that Keet might drop out or somehow be forced from the race by his own party.  I doubt that’s going to happen, but Republicans are quickly finding themselves in a desperate situation here.  Their guy is collapsing, big time, and they’re going to be left with a serious problem at the top of the ticket.  And really, I don’t think it’s going to get any better.  The signs keep suggesting that Keet’s implosion is going to continue.

Remember Jim Keet’s (R-Florida) last press conference where he claimed that sawmill workers were being charged $10,000 by the state for filling out the wrong forms and got revealed to be a unconscionable liar? Well, his press conference today wasn’t quite as funny but still managed to be pathetic.

In the face of revelations that he cheated on his taxes, including on his personal plane, Jim Keet (R-Florida) decided he needed to hold a press conference to address the issue. Except he didn’t address it-he tried to dodge it.

Keet used today’s press conference, not so much to clear up any remaining questions about his personal tax issues, but to say that each of those issues had been resolved and he was ready to talk about other things, which was to be expected. What was unexpected was Keet’s charge that Gov. Beebe’s campaign had hired a private investigator.

“I believe these matters have been a diversion fueled by my opponent, who spent $34,000 on a private investigator, from what is really important in this race,” Keet said.

Keet said the expenditure was discovered by going through the governor’s campaign finance reports. In response, Gov. Beebe’s campaign had this to say by email.

“If Jim Keet wanted to avoid all of the questions with his taxes, he could have paid them in the first place, as Arkansans do. We do not employ any private investigators, but it would seem the records Jim Keet is referring to are all a matter of public record that anyone can look up, not just Sam Spade and Perry Mason.”

Keet challenged Gov. Beebe to a series of four debates, one for each congressional district that he said should be televised. He also gave a laundry list of issues that he said Arkansans would rather hear about including immigration, “Obamacare,” controlling government spending, ethics reform and education.

A private investigator? Seriously? Boy, Keet’s sounding more than a little paranoid. Apparently Beebe is responsible for him not paying the taxes he owed and claiming tax credits he didn’t deserve. Yeah, it’s all Beebe’s fault that Keet’s a tax cheat…And it’s just such a diversion for Arkansans to ask if the man who want’s to be their governor has honesty and integrity isn’t it?

What’s even sadder is that Keet, after apparently telling the ADG that his wife handled these tax problems, essentially blaming her, stood at the press conference standing next to his wife, angry at the reporter for what he himself apparently said!

Wow…just wow….I don’t think there’s ever been a major candidate on the ballot, in my memory at least, that was this pathetic. Way to go Republicans-you scored a real winner here!

Note: Sorry about the lack of a title earlier-the computer screwed up on me somehow.

A friend of mine who happened to be paying attention to KASU last week passed me this:

Last week on a KASU radio program hosted by news director Greg Chance, excerpts of comments made by Republican First Congressional District candidate Rick Crawford were aired. Crawford once again revealed his ignorance of the real world by twice stating that a benefit of the Iraq war was the creation of Kurdistan as a sovereign nation. If true, that would be news to the world, and not welcome news to the governments of Iraq, Turkey, and others. Of course, it is not true, and Rick Crawford was simply demonstrating his ignorance of the real world once again.

The creation of a sovereign Kurdistan hasn’t happened. Were it to happen, the Middle-East would explode. Neither the Iraqi government or Turkey, both being our allies, would take it sitting down. And they wouldn’t take it too well if a U.S. Congressman said something so stupid. International incidents have been started over less. I may not be the biggest Chad Causey fan right now but he’s looking a lot better by comparison to this idiocy. Causey better step it up-like Boozman, there’s no reason why any Democrat should be losing to this clown.

The Iraq War is coming to a close, thank God.  Tonight, President Obama announced that major combat operations in Iraq were ending.  He didn’t do so on the deck of an aircraft carrier positioned so that it looked like he was way out at sea.  He didn’t wear a flight suit.  He didn’t have a big red white and blue banner declaring “Mission Accomplished!”  He simply sat at his desk and delivered the news to the nation.  There’s still a lot to be done, namely the actual draw down, but President Obama promised us that he would begin drawing down combat brigades this year.  There are some that will say it’s not enough.  There will be Republicans who say he shouldn’t do it all.  But the fact of the matter is this-President Obama has kept the most important promise he ever made to the American people.  He was elected to end this war, and he is doing just that.

The Iraq War has been one long, horrible, national nightmare.  We as Americans have now lived through a time when we saw a U.S. President, former President Bush, lie to us about matters of national security.  We have now lived through a decade in which an American President, George W. Bush, made up a reason to go to war with a nation that, whatever it’s flaws, did not attack us and presented no threat to us.  We have seen the day, where an enemy, Osama Bin Laden, attacked us, and our Commander in Chief, George W. Bush, let him get away with it as he turned his attention to Saddam Hussein, manufacturing lies about WMD’s and connections to Al Qaeda that didn’t exist in order to justify it.

That wasn’t all we saw either.  We saw America lose it’s role as a leader on the world stage because of Bush’s blunder.  We saw America, for the first time in history, enshrine a torture policy into law.  We saw a political party, the Republicans, do everything they could to exploit fear and hysteria among Americans so they could snoop through our library books and tap our phones without a warrant.  We saw burning bodies drug through the streets and a man get his head sawed off as he screamed and all for what?  Lies.  That is the nightmare that President Obama is ending.  That is the change he was elected to bring about.  For whatever other faults he may have…for whatever criticisms I might level at him…I will always thank him for this.

The Republican Party owns this war.  Republicans were the ones who sold Americans lie after lie after lie.  They lied about the WMDs.  They lied about Al Qaeda connections that didn’t exist.  Hell, they even used the Iraqi airforce as a scare tactic when Iraq didn’t even have an airforce.  Remember the mushroom cloud?  Remember small pox and anthrax?  They did everything they could to scare the American people into supporting this war, and when it was revealed that they had lied about it all their grand designs of American hegemony and corporate profit fell apart like Iraqi sand sliding through their fingers.  But it was at an enormous cost to all of us.  Republicans like to talk about supporting the troops.  All through Bush’s administration Republicans said that if you didn’t support the war or President Bush you were unpatriotic.  Meanwhile Republicans in Congress and President Bush’s Administration sent soldiers off to war like cows to a slaughter with insufficient forces and armor.  When they came home with broken bodies and wounded minds they left them in the filth that was Walter Reed and ignored the escalating cases of PTSD.  Hell, Tim Griffin, on behalf of the Republican National Committee, even worked to make sure those soldiers fighting for their country overseas couldn’t exercise their right to vote.  That’s how much Republicans support the troops.  And yeah, if they get elected to positions where they can make decisiosn about war or our soldier’s lives, they’ll do exactly the same thing all over again.

Our soldiers have done their jobs admirably.  They deserve all the praise and thanks in the world.  If you know someone who serves, thank them.  Hell, throw your arms around them and hug them.  There are enough wives and husbands, sons and daughters, moms and dads crying over lost loved ones.  It is time to end this war, and President Obama is keeping his promise to do so.  There is more to be done on so many fronts, surely, and a lot of us won’t rest until we see every last soldier come home from Iraq AND Afghanistan.  But we’re on the right path, and it’s thanks to President Obama’s leadership.

Debbie Murphy is giving her district a real choice in November. Consider the two candidates, Debbie and her opponent, David Sanders:

Running for the Republicans is David Sanders. What’s he done with his career? He worked for Governor Mike Huckabee. He had his gig doing right wing newspaper columns. He was on the radio for a bit. And what did he do with that platform? For the most part he was just another cog in the right wing noise machine, attacking things like the Governor’s Commission on Global Warming which put forth recommendations would have helped the state protect its farms, businesses, citizens, and natural resources by tackling the threat of climate change. But he also worked hard to advance himself. My personal favorite example on that front was when he happily talked up failed AR-Sen candidate Stanley Reed while quietly preparing to run Reed’s campaign. So, Mr. Sanders lack of journalistic integrity and forthcoming aside, what we basically have here is a man dedicated to the interests of the right wing and to his own career advancement. What, if anything, has he given back to his community? What has he done for the people in it? Apparently nothing. Sanders comes straight out of the political culture that focuses less on community issues and solving real world problems and more on the advancement of one’s self and the protection of private corporate interests.

Debbie Murphy is different. Her resume is polished by a list of community activities and frankly I don’t see how she found the time or the energy to do it all. She’s been on the school board, worked with the humane society, the Baptist Health Foundation, Lyon’s Board of Church Advocates, and the Governor’s Task Force on Gifted and Talented Education. She’s gone above and beyond the call to give back to her community, and that kind of energy would serve her district far better than Sanders’ rigid ideology and experience as a beneficiary of wingnut welfare.

It’s really a simple choice-a lady who has given of herself again and again on behalf of her community or a guy who sat on his butt writing crappy columns for the right wing noise machine.

Representative Barbara Nix is one of my favorite members of the state legislature.  Why?  Because she gets results for one.  But as a pleasant bonus, she is showing her constituents and people around the state what progressive representation can do for them.  Republicans have done a great job painting progressives as east or west coast freaks that can’t relate to ordinary Arkansans, and conservative Democrats have never once chastised them and even join in with them from time to time.  And what do those conservative Democrats accomplish for their constituents in their tenure?  Nothing, unless you’re a big bank, a developer, a health insurance company, or Wal-Mart.  Seriously, point to one major accomplishment of any right wing Democrat in this state.  For that matter, point to the accomplishment of any Republican.

Barbara Nix is showing that progressives are different.  And not only is she getting results, she’s doing work that benefits people that have always been encouraged to think that progressives don’t represent their interests.  Nix has consistently advocated for the interests of working people, saying when she first ran that she was doing so to “give a voice to the common people, the everyday working people.” Conservative Democrats and Republicans always say that but again and again their policy prescriptions benefit the wealthy and big business.  Nix though is showing working people that she cares about them and that progressive policies benefit them.  Take her bill that she wrote to guarantee the safe transport of railroad workers, blue collar people who conservatives target on the social issues but then leave high and dry when it comes to representing their needs and interests.  Barbara Nix stood up for them and delivered, and there are a lot of working families who will benefit from her efforts.

And remember, according to the narrative established by the right wing, progressives are supposed to be soft on crime. That’s not true, and the members of the Benton Fraternal Order of Police showed that much when they endorsed Representative Nix in her bid for public office. And they aren’t the only ones who have seen the hard work that Nix has put into making her community safe. Mothers Against Drunk Driving recognized her as one of several “Community Champions” last year for her efforts to combat drunk driving.

This is why we need progressives at every level of government, from city councils on up through state legislatures and statewide offices to Congress and the Presidency. Imagine if every member of the state legislature was as productive, concerned, and forward thinking as Nix. Can you picture what kind of a state Arkansas could be?

It’s like Governor Beebe said a little while back. Democrats that get results will weather a tough year. I suspect Nix will be one of them. And progressives like her who get results will do themselves, and the rest of us, a world of good. Remember, Nix is weathering the storm in Saline County, which seems to be ground zero for Arkansas teabagger craziness. (Remember how the U.N. wanted to destroy America by building the Fairplex in Benton?) If she wins reelection, and she seems to be running strong, then it’s a sign that progressives can run and win everywhere in this state and that other Democrats have every reason to be as courageous and productive as she is.

Why are Democrats polling so poorly this year? I have a hunch that it’s overplayed (more on that tomorrow) but there’s no doubt that things are tough. So what caused it? This:

According to the Commerce Department this morning, the country’s gross domestic product this spring grew at an anemic 1.6 percent. But that’s just the latest in a series of indications that the economy isn’t really improving. Forget mosques and immigration and health care reform — they may split the country and bedevil Democrats politically, but it’s the economy that’s really to blame for all of it. The good news is, there are steps the government can take to improve the situation. The bad news is they’re not gonna. And that’s why Democrats are suffering.

“It’s very difficult to envisage any significant policy response to current economic problems in the near term,” said Mark Zandi, one of the nation’s top economists, earlier this week.

That means economic indicators won’t be improving. Unemployment is stuck at 9.5 percent and threatening to climb. Jobless claims are inching higher over time (there were 473,000 this week) and new home sales tanked in July, down 12.4 percent. It may not be a double-dip recession, but as Paul Krugman notes, “this isn’t a recovery, in any sense that matters.”

That means pain for Americans, and potentially big losses for the Democrats in November.

But help isn’t on the way. Congress could pass legislation extending COBRA subsidies, food stamps, or major incentives for small business to hire. But the Democrats long ago gave up on passing significant stimulus, their hands tied by Republicans and squeamish, vulnerable members of their own party. And without any further action to pump money into the sputtering economic engine, Americans will be left to simply wait for the economy to improve on its own — which won’t happen very quickly.

Democrats came into office not because we were so great but because the Republican Party was so bad. We had a huge mandate and a mess that required and still requires bold action. And rather than being left, right, or center, most Americans simply want to see results, and with our majorities in Congress we should have seen results. But the Blue Dogs and company derailed all that. By obstructing from within the party, they aided the Republicans and have paralyzed the whole economic situation and have hurt the party’s chances in what started off looking like a cycle where Dems could even make gains.

I’m all for a big tent. I want to see a diverse party-men and women, white, black, brown, etc., people of every faith and people who don’t give a flip about religion, old and young, rural and urban, heterosexuals and every member of the LGBT community all in the same party. What I don’t want in the party are the people who are cutting our throats when they’re supposed to be part of the team. I don’t want people who are in the party of the common man, the party that’s supposed to give a voice to the voiceless, sabotaging our agenda for the sake of the wealthy and big corporations. That’s why the Blue Dogs and company have to go.

I don’t make many predictions. I ain’t Mrs. Cleo. I don’t think though that this year will be as big a disaster for Democrats as many are thinking or as the polls are suggesting. Whatever happens though, the best action Democrats can take is to cut the Blue Dogs and their ilk loose. At this point, it’s not only a matter of our party’s survival, it’s a matter of what’s good for the nation. The Blue Dogs have become a cancer on the country and are hurting it with almost every act. For that reason, it’s time to get rid of them altogether.

Boy, Jim Keet’s ethical issues keep getting better and better.

Keet’s bigger problem is the song-and-dance he’s run through to justify failure to pay property taxes the last few years (as many as five) on a $135,000 Beechcraft airplane. The plane is owned by a Nevada corporation based in Clark County (Las Vegas). Keet has given the D-G an alibi about easier registration in Nevada, uncertainty about whether assessment is required in some Nevada counties, a bookkeeper’s bad advice and other verbal noise to cover his tax avoidance. But there are obvious problems in the story. The plane WAS assessed in Pulaski County. Then Keet got it taken off the books in 2005 by telling the Pulaski assessor he’d moved to Florida. But the plane is not assessed in Florida. Where does Nevada come in to begin with? And why was it not assessed in Arkansas until the D-G caught Keet? Keet certainly knew about taxes in Arkansas through 2005.

So, now that Republicans officially have a tax cheat running for Governor, do you think they’ll call him out? After all, they went to so much trouble trying to make up an ethics complaint against Beebe, you’d think that they really cared about ethics. But here they have a scandal plagued candidate, just like they do in the Secretary of State race and both House races. Any Republican want to do what’s right and call these goons out? Anyone? Come on, there’s got to be one Republican out there that’s not a liar or a hypocrite…

Damn those crickets are loud…

For the most part, the traditional media in Arkansas sucks, from the news you can get on tv down to the local papers. That’s not to say there aren’t a few bright spots. And it’s not to say it’s a local phenomenon. Nationally, traditional media outlits tend to be so scared of being labeled liberal that they parrot right wing talking points without question and go out of their way to present a fictitious balance. Instead of trying to determine what the truth is they look for balance. Example-candidate A eats babies but he says that since candidate B doesn’t have children he must have eaten them too…You decide! And then there’s the right wing media-Fox, the Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal, Clear Channel, etc.-that the big money wing of the Republican party has invested so heavily in over the last thirty years or so to create a propaganda arm of the GOP. Here in Arkansas, the local version of that would be the Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

I say that because Congressman Vic Snyder made a little bit of a splash with his letter to the editor. In it, Snyder basically seized on another one of the media’s failings, having plenty of time to report on nonsense, in this case reporting on the fact that one of Snyder’s staff members is pretty, while avoiding reporting on serious matters, like Tim Griffin’s corruption.

In his letter, Snyder points out that the ADG ignored CREW’s naming of Tim Griffin as one of their crooked candidates. And he’s right. I’m not an avid reader of the Dem Gazette, but my extended family members are and they keep me pretty well informed of what they’re writing, and the ADG hasn’t said a word about Tim Griffin’s ethical and legal issues to my knowledge. No major media outlit, except for the progressive Arkansas Times of course, has. For the most part, it’s not a matter of bias, at least not ideological. It’s more because they think all of that stuff happened way back in 2007 and is old news that everyone’s already heard. The fact of the matter is though that all of Griffin’s skeletons didn’t get the attention they deserved back then by Arkansas media anymore than they are now when AR-02 voters are on the verge of electing a crook to office. But with the ADG it’s a little different. They’ve always been the state’s Republican rag, even if they do look out for a number of conservative Democrats. Remember, it’s not so much about protecting the party with them as it is about standing up for the status quo and the big corporations they’re bound at the hip with financially. (That’s not a knock on ADG reporters, many of whom do great work.) Beyond that, with the election of Barack Obama, the conservative editorial writers, especially Paul Greenberg, have gone off the deep end.

So yeah, Griffin’s their guy. They’ve always hated Vic Snyder and have tried to tear him down at every point. In her stellar career in the state legislature they’ve tried to do the same to Joyce Elliott. (I remember at one point they were actually blasting her for hating Jesus or something when she’s a practicing Christian.) So Griffin, to Paul Greenberg and co., is the golden egg that popped out of the goose’s behind. That these are the same people who are always cramming a sermon down on our throats in every Sunday paper but are still willing to carry an unconvicted felon’s water is pretty telling. So is the fact that all through the Iraq War debate the editorial writers of the ADG did their best to label critics of the war and Democrats as being unpatriotic when we opposed it or criticized Bush but are yet to say a word about Tim Griffin’s criminal activities that hurt active duty soldiers in that war. And yeah, it’s also pretty telling that they’re (rightly) criticizing Robbie Wills for his unethical activity while turning a blind eye to the fact that Griffin committed a felony.

There is no doubt that Griffin did this. He himself was incompetent enough to let his own emails get out with the list of poor and active duty minority voters he was targeting. The video is there of him giving two separate explanations of all that went on. And yeah, CREW (which contrary to one Republican blogger’s assertions goes after liberals too) nailed him for good reason. Democrats need to nail Griffin on this because the state media isn’t doing it’s job, which is to inform the public. Tim Griffin got away with his crimes because the corrupt Bush Administration wasn’t going to go after their toady and because they Obama Administration wanted to cast itself as post partisan. Since the state’s leading newspaper is making it clear they don’t give a rat’s ass about the truth, it falls on Democrats, activists, and bloggers to push the issue into the public consciousness.

Okay, I was reluctant to do this story because female candidates tend to get all kinds of flack for their hairstyles and appearances.  But still, this from Beth Anne Rankin is just…well…weird.

Take a look-

Before:

After:

Look like a certain Alaskan nit-wit you can think of?  It’s almost scary.  Okay…forget the almost part.

Yeah, I’m still on Causey’s case about his stupid comment regarding the President, and I’ll stay on it right up to November 2nd if I have to. That’s right-I’ll do a post on this every single day until he deals with this. Why? Because, I want Causey not only to win but to be the best possible candidate and Congressman that he can. The strategy he’s employing now makes him neither.

I’ve heard from several people that Chad was simply doing what he has to do to win. But here’s the flaw in that argument-that tired old strategy or running away from the Democratic President/the national party and running as a conservative Democrat DOESN’T WORK ANYMORE. Here’s why: To those of us in the party who are strong progressives or are committed to the party, it tells us that you’re using us and that we can’t trust you. To those who are more conservative or whatever, they’re just going to see that “D” after your name and say you’re trying to fool them. It creates a trust issue, and the whole exercise is so damaging, especially in the days of 24/7 media and blogs where little comments like this are easily captured and exploited, that it’s not worth engaging in. If Causey thinks that’s the best way to win, then he’s being stupid. If someone told him that was how he had to do it, then they gave him bad advice.

There’s a better way. The Blue Dogs and their conservatism/obstructionism is what has hurt the Democrats so bad in a cycle where they could have made gains in the beginning. Instead of running to the discredited right, make a populist, progressive argument. People are angry right now because nothing is getting done to turn the economy around (thanks again to Republicans and Blue Dogs) and because it’s increasingly obvious that big corporations and the wealthy own the government. Channel that anger and talk about people’s economic needs. Become a champion for the people. And when something will help them, make a case for it. In other words, be a leader.

That’s what I want to see Chad Causey be. A leader rather than a ‘fraidy cat…someone who will represent the people of this district and not the big corporate interests like Blanche Lincoln, Mike Ross, and yes, Marion Berry. As I’ve said, I will not lift a finger to help someone who is Wooldridge-lite or Crawford-lite after all the hard work we’ve been putting in against both of those two clowns. And I, for one, won’t keep my mouth shut either because I’m tired of seeing progressives who work their hearts out for Democrats be taken advantage of by them, especially when there’s a better path to victory.

So yeah, if Chad wants the continued help of the people who rallied behind him to beat Tim Wooldridge in the primary, he needs to take his foot out of his mouth and deal with this. He also needs to do something to get the base excited because it’s that enthusiasm gap that’s killing the Democrats right now. None of this is to say that Chad’s a bad guy or that we want Rick Crawford to win. On the contrary, he’s a good guy with a lot of potential who needs to step up his game so that we don’t end up dealing with Congressman Crawford next year.