WCRC September meeting

Just a few comments on the Wicomico County Republican Club meeting I was at last night.

Now, I've been in a Republican club for the better part of 10 years; in fact, it was just about this time in 1995 that I joined the Toledo Metro Young Republican Club. The pet peeve I have about this group that I didn't have with others is that the meeting's supposed to start at 7:00 - but doesn't until 7:30 at the earliest. I understand there's a social aspect but come on, I like to get my other stuff done too (like work on this blog.) I had trouble when I ran the TMAYRC with latecomers, but more trouble with no-shows.

Anyway, aside from that, it went well. Our club has a pretty good bank balance that's 15% higher than this time last year (because the Crab Feast went really well.) The attendance was very good, better than 30 people there.

Our speaker was Dr. John Bartkovich. He's quite passionate to say the least, which is good. One thing that he's stressing is getting new voters. To paraphrase, it's using the strategy that worked in Ohio to make Maryland a red state. You know, it was in 1984, it can be again.

But we did go through a list prepared by the Maryland state GOP and decided that some of the strategies outlined wouldn't work so well here, at least this far in advance. However, one thing we can do is be out in the community, and we'll put effort there. I'm going to take my turn at our booth at the mall in a couple weeks. (It's a Chamber of Commerce function, the name escapes me.)

Also, there's a couple events I'm likely going to. Senator Stoltzfus has a "Picnic in the Park" a week from Saturday that I'm going to get a ticket for. I applaud his stance on the "Fair Share" fiasco and also think that the investigation into Governor Ehrlich's hiring and firing practice is a partisan witch hunt just to embarass him. And, he answers his e-mails.

Honestly, as gerrymandered as the districts are here, I'm not even sure he's my state senator, but he seems like a good conservative politician, so I encourage the support.

It was noted that it's a busy week ahead, as Congressman Gilchrest is here Monday for two townhall meetings, Lt. Gov. Steele is here on Wednesday for two events, and an announcement by Brian Kilgore next Friday. Might have to wander over there. Plus the Stoltzfus picnic.

So my homework assignment is to register a voter and tell them how I did it. I may have to cozy up to the newbies in the complex to do it.

Well, the next meeting is October 24, 7:00. Guess I'll not worry so much about being prompt, as such I can get my workout in.

Liberals are funny sometimes...

A couple funny things happened on my way to this forum.

As usual, I take a look at a couple left websites. On my Favorites list...What the enemy is up to (MD Dems) and Fired Up! Maryland (news from the dark side.)

The enemy: Take a look at this gem. First of all, "dumping" millions of dollars in stock he likely paid millions for? I get it! Selling stock from a blind trust and making profit is bad, but making many times your money on the cattle futures market is ok.

Besides, the D's should be really happy Frist made that profit since there is a capital gains tax on it. Guess they'd rather see him lose money, since he's a nasty mean rich Republican. Yeah, make him live like the little guy! Wonder how Jon Corzine likes that deal? Didn't he make his money from the stock market?

News from the dark side: And then there's this on a Washington Post article. Now, obviously I've not met Roy Temple (FU! Maryland is his blog) but he's really scraping the bottom of the barrel these days. Pity that the state's actually being run well despite the best efforts of the D's in the General Assembly to pass asinine laws and screw it up.

Not only did I happen to comment on the article by showing him another one on the corruption in Montgomery County (read: Doug Duncan) but today there was another article in the online Sun (of all places,) "More Maryland Surpluses Forecast". I don't agree with the spending priorities spoken of by William Donald Schaefer, but I'm glad that the state has some cushion. So give it back!

And I guess even old Peter Angelos had something to say the other day. From the Washington Times:

With Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley on the verge of announcing he will run for governor, the Baltimore Orioles ran a full-page color advertisement in the Baltimore Sun yesterday with a large photograph of Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., a Republican, wearing an Orioles jacket.

An orange headline above a photograph read: "Thank you! Governor Ehrlich."

Democrats questioned the reasons for the advertisement and the tribute to Mr. Ehrlich that the Orioles have planned before today's game with the New York Yankees.

"It's a thinly disguised campaign ad," said Derek Walker, spokesman for the Maryland Democratic Party. "It certainly amounts to a significant in-kind contribution to the governor's campaign."

But Bill Stetka, spokesman for the Orioles, said the purpose is to thank Mr. Ehrlich for standing behind the Orioles "when no one else would, with regard to putting a team in Washington and the impact it would have on Baltimore and the ball club."

"It's strictly to thank the governor for taking a stand when no one else would, including the mayor of Baltimore city," he said.

Mr. Stetka said Orioles majority owner Peter Angelos will host a pre-game reception for the governor today. He said Mr. Ehrlich also will be honored in a pre-game ceremonies and will take batting practice and throw out the first ball, the Associated Press reports.

(I didn't link it since it was 1/3 of an article of other unrelated items.)

But politics makes strange bedfellows as the D's will be more than happy to cash the frequent Angelos contribution checks - as long as it's Doug Duncan who wins the Democratic primary.

Hat tips and hot tips

Well, maybe it's not such a hot tip. But I did see an article in the Daily Times today regarding the 2006 County Executive race. It's going to be interesting next year since that's a new office.

Instead of a body of seven elected officials representing various areas on Wicomico County, now one person, most likely from Salisbury or a close suburb, will make all the decisions, including budget submission. Obviously, both parties want their person in charge, and having the county executive be from the majority party (even if the County Council is split 4-3 in their favor) would give that party a hammerlock on county government.

So it's a bit surprising that no one has stepped forward to say officially, "I'm running." Perhaps the acrimony currently gripping the County Council over the Rewastico Road horse park fiasco has made potential candidates hesitate to take the slings and arrows certain to come from the opposition party.

Now the hat tips. This is from TheGoldwater's blog, the article today entitled, "A Warning to Elected Republicans":

If you think that you can run and win in 2006 by endorsing the "moderate" position of abandoning the tax cuts, restricting funding to operations in Iraq, abandoning our efforts to remove the death tax from our national burden, and increasing fees on the citizens of the United States-- thing (sic) again.

Conservatives will burn you-- in effigy, in the polls, in the voting booth, on the Sunday morning news shows-- wherever, whenever, and however we can. Now is not the time to go wobbly in furthering the Reagan Revolution. We need more tax cuts, more budget cuts, and more restraints on spending.

I would add that we also need to keep getting judges who realize that the be-all and end-all of American law is the United States Constitution.

Not the UN Charter.

Not a court in Great Britain, Nigeria, Japan, India, Canada, or anywhere else except here.

Not in the judge's gray matter that says life is unfair for the woman, minority, gay/lesbian, illegal immigrant, terrorist, or whoever is not a WASP male and he/she has to do something from the bench to fix it.

Now that we have that straight...

Hat tip number two goes to Duvafiles for today, for pointing out articles in Fortune Magazine regarding the contributions for Katrina relief made by Home Depot and lefty whipping boy Wal-Mart. Plus I liked the comments there about the differences between Democrats, Republicans, and southern Democrats.

As always, the private sector goes about doing its business in ways a bloated bureaucracy that looks out for the best ways to cover its ass cannot.

It goes in with my comments yesterday about divesting unneeded federal land. A large part and benefit of capitalism is that land eventually gravitates to its highest and best use. For all the complaints about urban sprawl and running out of room, I challenge you to take a drive around the lower Eastern Shore. I drove out Route 349 to Waterside and back along Route 352 and Pemberton Drive. There's a LOT of empty scrub land there that's not even farmed.

So the lot of the Eastern Shore is a mix of agriculture and tourism - agriculture being raising chickens and poultry in areas where the soil's not good for grain farming. Where I'm from in Ohio, the opposite occurs - miles and miles of cornfields and soybean plots. The land determines its best use. Places where water is plentiful underground and not at the surface become housing plots. Locations where water is plentiful at the surface become great grounds for fishing and hunting.

But tying into this and paramount above all else is the right to private property. Not the right to damage and destroy others' property values from misuse of your property, but also the freedom to keep your property until such time as you decide to dispose of it; or, for a PUBLIC good (not just additional tax revenue,) be fairly compensated for waiving your right to it.

So I close right back at my comment about judges. We need a judge that will take into account, "nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation." It's called the Fifth Amendment, and that, to me, is the ultimate stare decisis, not Kelo v. New London. And I can only count on a conservative to appoint a judge who sees things that way.

Don't pork chops sound good?

Hurricane Katrina is going to cost the taxpayers over $100 billion when it's all said and done. Hurricane Rita didn't strike in as populated of an area as it hit the mostly rural Arklatex region, so damage will be minimized. Also the death toll should be far less, which is also good. In that case, we lucked out in that Rita didn't run right up the waterway from Galveston to Houston.

But regardless, I was encouraged to see some thought given to not simply printing more money. A group of Congressman led by Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) has a very viable solution called "Operation Offset." Basically, it comes down to repealing or slowing the implementation of new spending programs. The recommendations in Title I alone would save $70 billion in 2006, $193 billion by 2010, and $526 billion by 2015. It's money that WOULD NOT come from the pockets of you and I.

And if you dig deeper into the report, you'll see where even more cuts can be made, cuts that add up in total to almost $1 trillion (even some military spending cuts.) Some of it is the kind of stuff the "Contract With America" was based on but the Gingrich-era Republicans lost their stomach for after the 1995 budget battle and government shutdown. Amazingly, we all survived it, huh?

The problem is that there's only 100 or so Congressmen ( a group called the Republican Study Committee) behind this. There's too many squishy moderates who don't want to see their favorite pork project go away. Our own Congressman, Wayne Gilchrest, is a Republican who is not a member of the RSC. He's also got a lot of highway bill projects that he brought home listed on his website. Here's a few samples of piggish stuff IMHO:

The Crisfield Ferry project would receive $800,000, to be used for the planning, design, and possible acquisition of land for the purposes of a ferry terminal.

If you're going to link up the Eastern Shore with the rest of the state, I think it would be far better to build a bridge in the Dorchester County area. A ferry can only serve a limited number of vehicles and is subject to weather conditions to a far larger degree than a bridge.

The bill also includes funding for several scenic trails in the 1st District. In Centreville, $305,600 was earmarked for design and engineering of the Queen Anne’s County Cross Island Trail, which will be a bicycle and pedestrian trail on a converted rail line.

In Chestertown, $240,000 was set aside for planning the Chestertown Trail, which will be a bike and pedestrian trail linking Wilmer Park to Worton.

In Anne Arundel County, the bill includes $1.2 million for the Broadneck Trail, a component of the American Discovery Trail. This funding would pay for part of the construction of the 3 ¼ mile segment from Sandy Point State Park to Green Holly Drive and College Parkway.

It also includes $800,000 to construct the South Shore Trail from Annapolis to Odenton and another $800,000 to build the trail from Maryland Route 3 at Millersville Road to I-97 at Woorbury.

Wouldn't all of these projects more properly fall under the purview of the state government? I know, it's "only" $3,345,600, but that's money out of our pockets to satisfy a very small portion of the population that actually uses these trails. Now figure all 435 Congressmen have a similar list and you can see where the dollars add up.

(Meanwhile, Rep. Gilchrest is attempting to raise the price of your automobile by supporting a stricter CAFE standard for cars, from 25 MPG to 33 MPG over 10 years. This is more government interference in the free market, trying to force people into less safe smaller cars.)

You know, I didn't want to make this into a Gilchrest bashing post, but doesn't it seem that he's become a RINO with all the pork, the support for CAFE standards, and favoring a repeal of "don't ask don't tell"? I may just have to go to his "town meeting" on October 3rd in Hebron, 6 p.m., at the Rockawalkin Community Hall, 6772 Rockawalkin Road. (Is Rockawalkin a cool name or what?)

I'll go and take notes and I'm betting a blog post is in the offing - once I call my daughter and wish her a happy birthday that night!

So it may be a couple busy Monday nights in a row for me as I have a WCRC meeting this coming Monday night as well. But that's quite all right since I don't really follow Monday Night Football until baseball season is over anyway.

Support our troops!

The sign says it all. Hopefully there's a lot of folks in D.C. to have it out with the whiner Cindy Sheehan and and her far-left Communist-sponsored posse.

Just wish people would understand that we're not doing the War on Terror because we like seeing young men and women die. We're not doing it to get more oil or make Halliburton rich or because the neo-cons think that we can prop up Israel by doing so.

We're doing it because we'd rather kill a lot of bad people over there in Iraq and Afghanistan than let them kill us over here (remember 9/11?) The Wahabbists (hopefully I spelled that right) aren't going to stop until they're sent en masse to see their 72 virgins.

Granted, we can do more on our own borders to stop their infiltration but that's a matter that can be solved if the government would quit covering their ass and let private groups like the Minutemen do some of the work of patrolling the border. It worked in Arizona.

But when it comes to killing people and breaking things, it's a job for the military. And they do that job well, with remarkably few civilian casualties. I'd posit that the ratio of enemy combatants to civilians killed by our military is inverse of that proportion of slaughter incurred when the terrorists strike. A homicide bomb might kill one or two of our soldiers but take along 50 to 100 innocent bystanders.

There's only one way that we can deal with fanatics who aren't afraid of death, and that's hasten their journey to it on our terms rather than on theirs. It's the way we're doing it in Iraq, and it is a shame when good people like Spc. Casey Sheehan have to die because of it.

But it's more of a shame when his mother besmirches the good name of all his fallen comrades to pursue what would be a hollow and short-lived truce with the enemy, for the only peace that will occur in this war will take place when one side or the other is vanquished. And I'm strongly of the opinion that our side must prevail or the world becomes plunged in a new Dark Age.

Joy in Mudhenville!, part 2

On Thursday night, there was finally joy in Mudhenville. After a 38 year drought that saw all 13 other franchises in the league win at least one Governors’ Cup, the Toledo team at last got its opportunity to sip from it. It’s a story that parallels the Boston Red Sox of 2004 in a lot of respects. They broke the "curse of the Bambino", and the Mud Hens broke the "karma of Terry Felton." But more on that later.

I was born in 1964, which was the last year without baseball in Toledo. After having a series of American Association franchises from the late 19th century into the 1950's, Toledo was left high and dry baseballwise after the 1955 season, when that version of the Toledo Mud Hens (also known in that era as the Toledo "Sox" or "Glass Sox") relocated to Wichita. It was truly the end of an era, as even the Mud Hens stadium, Swayne Field, would be leveled to build a shopping center, the first large-scale shopping outside the immediate area of downtown Toledo. (Part of the old outfield wall remains behind what is still called the Swayne Field shopping center.)

But eventually the call was heard for Toledo to get a baseball team back. And, through the efforts of a county commissioner, Ned Skeldon, Lucas County (which Toledo is the seat of) assisted in forming a corporation that bought the former Richmond franchise in the International League. A stadium was needed and what originally was a horse racing track at the Lucas County Fairgrounds in suburban Maumee was renovated in time for the April 1965 debut of the rechristened Toledo Mud Hens.

It was a halcyon time for the city of Toledo. The city was rapidly growing as they annexed many of the former suburban areas of central Lucas County, reaching an all-time high of over 380,000 residents by 1970. Jobs were plentiful as the auto industry was booming in the era of powerful muscle cars. It was a time where prosperous middle-class factory workers could afford the family entertainment of a ballgame, and tens of thousands took advantage of watching the team out at the Rec Center, as the stadium became known. Surrounding the stadium was a host of ballfields (a few of which I played on as a 10-year-old) and a swimming pool complex, as well as the actual fairgrounds. It was a parklike setting for the team, which settled into its suburban home well.

In 1967, this team became affiliated with the nearby Detroit Tigers. That affiliation paid immediate dividends as a pitching staff featuring future big leaguers like Jim Rooker, Mike Marshall, John Hiller, Dick Drago, and Pat Dobson helped lead Toledo to the IL pennant. Many of the same players remained in 1968 as the parent Tigers were also loaded enough to win the AL flag. The 1968 version of the Mud Hens won the regular season but were surprised in the playoffs.

That would be the end of the brief playoff era for Toledo. Eventually the affiliation with the Tigers went sour because of discord between the Mud Hens management and Detroit’s. After a six year relationship with the Tigers ended, Toledo became an affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies in 1974.

Meanwhile, Toledo was starting to show signs of becoming a member of the "Rust Belt." The auto industry that lined the pockets of its workers with extra spending money became more stingy as cheaper cars imported from Japan slowly began to gain market share. One by one, some of Toledo’s largest employers closed up shop. DeVilbiss, Champion Spark Plug, Toledo Scale, and others bolted the city, leaving behind shuttered factories in deteriorating urban neighborhoods.

As the Seventies dragged on, the fortunes of both Toledo and the Mud Hens ebbed. The Phillies tenure as parent team was brief, as the Cleveland Indians followed them in two years later. The Tribe proved to be short-termers as well, as they abandoned the Mud Hens as well after two forgettable seasons. In all, the Mud Hens failed to reach the upper division of the International League for 11 straight seasons beginning with the 1969 campaign and following through to 1979.

It’s not that there weren’t bright spots. One was getting a guy who would make Cal Ripken, Jr. envious. Starting in 1975, Jim Weber has been the Mud Hen radio broadcaster in every aired game. That would be over 3,800 - the number only being fewer than the 4,200 or so games the Mud Hens have actually played by the simple fact that radio broadcasts were only part-time in his early days. It wasn’t until 1983 that all games were broadcast.

And the city of Toledo would get one of its most famous boosters, a guy who indirectly helped the Mud Hens get on the map. Weekly on the TV series M*A*S*H, Jamie Farr’s character of Klinger reminded people of his old hometown of Toledo, Ohio. And someplace along the line, he appeared on the show in a vintage Mud Hens jersey. America did eventually find out that the Mud Hens were real and not made up by a Hollywood scriptwriter. Since then, the Mud Hens have always been one of the better souvenir sellers in the minor leagues, and Jamie Farr became the namesake of an annual LPGA golf tournament held just outside Toledo.

That was also the time I made it to my first Mud Hen games. Back when I played Little League at the age of 11 and 12, my team would make a pilgrimage to see the Mud Hens. Two things stick out from those games. In 1976, the Mud Hens had a player named Jim Norris, which just so happened to be the name of our assistant coach. I found that to be pretty cool. The 1977 game was one where I actually got a program and had it autographed by a couple players. That game also had a home run by a Mud Hen named Dave Hilton. I liked him because on his baseball card he was pictured wearing glasses like I did (and still do.) Still think of the guy as "Home Run" Hilton because of that game.

Better times were ahead for the Mud Hens and the city. A new affiliation with the Minnesota Twins brought better players in, players that enabled the Mud Hens to break a long postseason dry spell in 1980. The team made it through the first round of the IL playoffs before succumbing to instate rival Columbus in the final. Again in 1984 Toledo would see playoff baseball, as well as a short Mud Hen tenure by future Hall of Famer Kirby Puckett, who played in Toledo for about half the season before being called up to the Twins and never looking back. But the 1984 Hens were swept out of the playoffs. That would be the playoff memory for some time.

This brings me to the karma of Terry Felton. Felton was the #2 draft choice of the Twins in 1976, and rapidly ascended through their minor league system until he got to Toledo. As it turned out, he became the team’s modern-era leader in victories with 33, a record that stood until 2004. It’s not that Felton never made it to the Show...but when he did make it, he lost. And lost. And kept losing. His 0-13 record in 1983 closed the books on what was a 0-16 big league career for the Twins.

But what he did on a frustrating night in 1980 changed the feel of the Rec Center. After being pulled from a rough start, Felton took a spare bat and proceeded to smash his steel locker to an unrecognizable mass of metal about 3 feet high. That locker became replaced by a wooden locker that became a poetry board of sorts.

By this time, the Rec Center, and by extension, the Mud Hens, was becoming known as "the morgue," a place where careers came to die. It was a stadium that had seen better days as a racetrack. There was time and effort put into a renovation in 1988 that helped matters along for awhile, but still the park was annually thought of as the worst in the International League. (As part of the 1988 renovation, the stadium was renamed for Ned Skeldon to honor his efforts at returning baseball to Toledo.)

The city of Toledo was also trying to find its way in a post-manufacturing world. While Jeeps and GM transmissions were still being cranked out, the remainder of the manufacturing jobs and population continued fleeing the city. The population of Toledo fell over 10% in a 20 year period, although the bulk of that loss simply spread out to the rapidly growing suburbs. One ballyhooed idea was the Portside Festival Marketplace, a retail and entertainment center fronting the Maumee River. Opened with great fanfare in 1984, it barely survived its first winter and closed for good by 1990. The building did eventually become a tourist attraction with the opening years later of COSI, a hands-on science museum. But Portside was an embarrassing flop and a punch in the gut to Toledo’s pride.

Meanwhile, I was off in Oxford, Ohio, at college. Since my playing days were long over by then (I played through my sophomore year in high school, although most of the time I was a benchwarmer) I was simply a fan and made it to a lot of Miami University baseball games. So I lost touch with my hometown team for a few years. But once I graduated I had more time on my hands, and my dad’s company had season passes to the games. Naturally I became a big fan again, attending about 25 games in my first year back from school. They just gave me the season passes by the end.

This was right before the 1988 renovation, but even that didn’t do a lot for the amenities of the ballpark. The only thing that was good for the fans (but the players hated) was a separation between the dugouts and clubhouse. To get from one to the other, a player had to run a gauntlet of 20 to 30 yards between the field and the clubhouse. (And some guys literally did run it.) It was just a prime place to get autographs. Around that time I also got back into collecting baseball cards, so I took advantage of the concourse to get quite a few cards signed. In this timeframe, starting with the 1987 season, the Mud Hens once again became the Detroit Tigers AAA affiliate, which continues to this day.

While it was a good marketing tool to have the future Tigers in Toledo, the results on the field continued to suffer. In the space of time that the Tigers kept their AAA team elsewhere, that was when the great Tiger players of the 1980's - guys like Lou Whitaker, Alan Trammell, Jack Morris, Lance Parrish, and Kirk Gibson - played in the Tigers system. These guys were replaced in the Detroit minor leagues by the likes of Billy Bean, Scott Livingstone, and Steve Searcy. None of these guys became household names.

But things were slowly changing in the International League. Starting with Richmond in 1985, teams began to build new stadiums or franchises moved to locations with new parks. Even some of the older parks had serious renovations to a much larger degree than Toledo’s.

It was in the early 1990's that rumors began to spread of the Hens’ eventual demise because of the poor facilities at Skeldon Stadium. While the county continued to make a profit from the club, attendance was stagnant if not slowly sinking. The rumblings were generally of the county selling the Mud Hens franchise to a private owner who would move the club. Other talk had the Mud Hens remaining in their location, but the International League and Midwest League would switch franchises...the Toledo team becoming a class A Tiger affiliate while West Michigan became a AAA team.

But the city wasn’t in a position of strength economically. The recession of the early 1990's hit the city hard, including a young man working in the architectural field. I lost my job the very day that my wife and I were slated to move into our house. While I did get my job back eventually, the city of Toledo suffered through a long period of job losses. Complaints about the state of the Mud Hens continued to mount from the league and the local newspaper, who wanted to end the Tigers affiliation as they saw the success of Cleveland’s farm system.

By 1998, Lucas County decided to act in an attempt to quell the rumors and save the Mud Hens. They proposed a temporary 35 month sales tax increase to pay for a new downtown stadium as well as a new water park at the Recreation Center site that would be vacated by the team. The issue went to the voters in November of that year and, led by resistance from Maumee residents bitter about losing their ballpark, the ballot issue was soundly defeated. I didn’t vote for it myself. It wasn’t that I was enamored with Skeldon Stadium, but I thought the water park was a waste of money.

After the voters rejected the measure, the future looked bleak for the Mud Hens. Enter Ray Kest, the Lucas County treasurer. He proposed a different method of funding that did not need nearly as much taxpayer money, as things like stadium naming rights and commemorative bricks would defray the cost, as well as leveraged money from the State of Ohio. The final piece of the financing puzzle would be completed the next year when it was announced Fifth Third Bank had bought the new stadium naming rights.

This would begin a new and exciting era for the Mud Hens and the city of Toledo. After over 40 years without baseball being played in the city, construction of the new Fifth Third Field ensured that Toledo baseball would be played inside the city starting in 2002.

I attended the final game at Skeldon Stadium on September 3, 2001. The Mud Hens, as usual, lost the game to the Columbus Clippers 12-11. Over the winter the anticipation began to build in earnest as Fifth Third Field was evolving into the newest IL ballpark. Additionally, a long-moribund part of downtown slowly began to come back to life as a few eateries and nightspots began opening around the stadium area in anticipation.

So I was among the thousands jammed into Fifth Third Field April 9, 2002 to watch Toledo make its return downtown. Despite an opening 1-4 roadtrip, spirits were high as the Hens took on the Norfolk Tides. They won that game 7-5, swept the four game series, and continued to win. Part of the reason was solid players who were acquired as six-year free agents, attracted by the chance to play in a brand spanking new ballpark. The other part of the equation was good pitching by guys like Mike Maroth and Andy Van Hekken, both of whom ended the season in Detroit.

It looked in late August, though, like the Mud Hens had run out of gas. With 12 games to go, they trailed division leader Louisville by 2 ½ games. But a 10-2 late season surge that included 5-1 marks against Louisville and archrival Columbus enabled Toledo to pass Louisville and net their first ever West Division title, and first playoff berth in 18 years.

Sadly, the Mud Hens disappointed two straight sellout crowds (yes, I went to the playoff opener) by dropping the games to the Durham Bulls. They would lose the third game in front of a half-empty stadium in Durham to be swept out of the playoffs. The playoff losing streak would roll on.

But the signs of life in downtown also continued. It was a minor improvement, but an improvement nonetheless. Trouble was, the effort that was put together to build Fifth Third Field couldn’t or wouldn’t be duplicated for other places in need of facelifts or all-out renovation like the old Steam Plant or SeaGate Centre. Plans for each were made but never followed through as marketing failed. While some of the Mud Hen fans remained downtown to sample the nightlife, most went back to the suburbs. I was a person who did that as I bolted Toledo for the suburbs in 2002.

Toledo did get one honor from the 2002 season, as Fifth Third Field was selected by Newsweek as the best new ballpark in the country. Compared to old Skeldon Stadium, it was a baseball paradise with great sightlines and the Toledo skyline as a backdrop.

But the Mud Hens simply continued to lose in 2003 and 2004, they just did it in front of larger crowds at Fifth Third. 2003's version of the Mud Hens started out with promise, but half the team ended up playing in Detroit by season’s close for the hapless Tigers. The 2004 season ended with a thud, as the loss that day put them in last place in the entire league. It was a season that stood out for a memorable August collapse, as the first place Mud Hens who were confident enough to start selling playoff tickets at the end of July absolutely butchered the month of August, a 5-24 house of horrors.

I was at the final game of the 2004 season on Labor Day, a gorgeous sunny afternoon. I recall thinking it was a long way until April of 2005, but I was looking forward to coming back.

But at last the Toledo economy, stagnant for most of the last 20 years as politicians came and went without solving the city’s problems, took its toll on me. The Friday after Labor Day, I was asked to come into my supervisor’s office and informed that it would be my last day. There was no more work for me to do.

So the 2005 version of the Mud Hens started without me being there. Being far away, I really didn’t notice how well they were doing. They did win the two games I managed to attend, one of them Memorial Day weekend in Toledo against Columbus, the other in Norfolk in July. By that time I had seen the Mud Hens were leading their division and having an awesome year.

The skeptic in me, while hoping they’d continue to win, kept waiting for the collapse that was sure to occur, right? Well, the 2005 Mud Hens didn’t collapse. They got stronger as the season wore on and on a magical Saturday night in front of their fans, they clinched a playoff berth. Two nights later I watched online as they won the division title and had their second champagne celebration in three days.

So step one was complete. They would face Norfolk in the first round of the Governors’ Cup playoffs. And in Game 4, they played a seesaw battle as I watched from afar. That night my skeptical side saw Gookie Dawkins blow a sure out, the error allowing Norfolk to take the lead. Then the fan in me saw the horrendous ending, the phantom tag at second ending what should have been a tied game.

Game 5 was nerve-wracking, although the Hens got an early lead. I’d seen too many games like that to be comfortable. But they ousted Norfolk 5-3 and got their date to face the surprising Indianapolis Indians, who won 3 straight at Buffalo to advance after losing the first 2 games at home.

We know how that series came out. Game 3 was a case of chasing away the bad karma, the black cloud that had enveloped a star-crossed team for those many years. Each hit pounded on the hex like Terry Felton’s blows to his locker, smashing it to oblivion. Each home run took away the thoughts of a thousand blowout losses that Jim Weber still had to broadcast and keep interesting, allowing him to watch a team he had devoted over half his life to finally grab the elusive brass ring. The Hens celebration erased my disgust of watching everyone else get yet another win over the league’s doormat. For the first time in my adult life, I could say that my hometown team was a champion.

Whether this success will translate to a transformation to the city it calls home is yet to be seen. While championships feel great, the city goes about its business as usual day after day. It’s good to see that we will be the reigning IL champions when the AAA All-Star Game makes its first appearance in Toledo next July, but what will the visitors and television viewers think of the city where it’s played?

Toledo can be a championship city in more ways than just sports. But it needs two things it seems to lack: a cohesive plan to take advantage of the natural asset of its location, and leadership to put together a plan and implement it. It is a city where 90% of the time the "we’ve always done it this way" method of thinking rules its actions.

The Mud Hens had "always done it this way" for 38 years. Once they got a plan to take advantage of their natural asset (a great ballpark to play in) and leadership to implement it (in this case superb team chemistry), they cast away an entire mindset of losing and placed themselves into consideration as possibly the best Mud Hen team of all time.

I was born in Toledo. It was a bit sad, but I made the choice to leave because the city didn’t meet my needs. And it’s pretty likely I won’t return except to visit on occasion. But I still care about my old hometown enough to root for its team. And I care enough about a lot of the people I left behind to hope that someone will think about how the Mud Hens escaped their resignation to losing and apply that to what could be a great city, one that is worthy of hosting a great team.

Joy in Mudhenville!

We did it! After 38 long seasons, the Toledo Mud Hens are champions of the International League and can sip from the Governors Cup.

My God, I have so much to say - I just want to scream out in ecstasy! Expect a long post soon, perhaps this weekend when I have time to write it all.

More interesting stuff

Tonight I'm still going through the potpourri of news items and finding a few interesting tidbits here and there.

I've been interested in the AFL-CIO split since the friction started earlier this year. The renegade "Change To Win Coalition" took a fourth scalp from the beleaguered AFL-CIO this week when UNITE HERE, an umbrella of unions in the apparel and hospitality industries, decided to formally leave the AFL-CIO. The tally now stands at 8 million for the AFL-CIO, with the yet unnamed labor insurgency now up to 5 million workers; split between the Teamsters, SEIU (service employees), UFCW (grocery/retail workers), UNITE HERE, and a few smaller unions. This labor movement will adopt a name on September 27, when they meet in St. Louis for their first convention.

To me, the interesting thing is whether these unions will cut back on political spending and actually spend more money on their stated goal of organizing workers. The rift in the labor movement started for that reason, as the CTWC unions complained about the amount of political contributions made by the AFL-CIO at the expense of attempting to grow their unions. With the percentage of unionized labor at a historic low, these CTWC unions know that their spigot of coerced union dues is being shut off by a lack of workers to pay those dues. I'm sure many workers in the unions are paying dues to support politicians they do not agree with. In the 2004 election, Bush held his own in union households despite the heavy public support by the unionistas for John Kerry. In the privacy of the voting booth, Bush garnered a lot of closet union votes.

Speaking of elections, I found a Democrat I could vote for (but probably won't have to.) William Donald Schaefer is hinting at running again for his state comptroller post. The outspoken octogenarian may only have a primary opponent, though. It's hinted that the GOP may not even run anyone against him.

If anything, I have to give the guy credit for having a pair and not being politically correct. He ranted about a McDonald's worker's poor command of English, irritating immigant advocates. He's also been known to aggressively question why state contract bids weren't lower. Hey, I'm for that.

But the best one was his questioning when the state's Minority Business Enterprise program would end. And it's because there's a fair and valid question.

At what point do we say, ok, the field is now level? I've been advocating the sunsetting of set-asides and similar programs for a long time. Affirmative action has become a crutch of quotas for the chosen few. I don't doubt that it was a useful tool in getting minorities into the mainstream of business 30 years ago, but now it's time for the free market to resume and give all, regardless of race and gender, an equal chance at success. It's only in Orwell novels that some should be more equal than others.

This race issue provides me a nice segue into my final chapter for tonight. My old hometown's mayoral primary was on Tuesday. Now, if there was EVER a match between Tweedledum and Tweedledee, this is it. (Note to readers: this may be the ONE time I agree with this columnist.)

In the blue corner: The current mayor, "Sleepy" Jack Ford, who finished second in the primary. He's best known for sleeping on the job in the Ohio Legislature when he was a member of the Ohio House. He's also been asleep at the wheel in Toledo for the last four years as growth and progress has stagnated. (Obviously, since I'm sitting here thanks to a lack of business in the northwest Ohio area for architects.) However, Ford, who is black, got enough of "his people" to turn out to guarantee him a spot in the November election. Higher than normal turnout in the black wards is credited for his second place finish over a charging Keith Wilkowski, a onetime county commissioner and fellow Democrat.

In the purple corner: This corner was red when it was convenient to him 3 decades ago in his bids for Congress, but now the nominally independent former two-term mayor Carty Finkbeiner is in the November mayoral election. He's on his third political comeback now after being term-limited out of office in 2001. Carty (no last name necessary in Toledo, he's a household name) is best known for one thing: he's the guy who seriously suggested moving deaf people out to the airport. Yes, the Trivial Pursuit question's answer is Carty Finkbeiner.

I have met this man on several occasions and he's come across to me as phony as a $3 bill. People, I voted for a guy barely to the right of communist to keep Carty out of the mayor's office in 1993.

The sad thing about the Toledo election is that the GOP candidate, city councilman Rob Ludeman, finished a dismal fourth with only about 12% of the vote. A lot of his GOP votes went to Carty, which shows what's wrong with the city of Toledo in a nutshell. Ludeman didn't win any wards in his council district - all went to Carty.

So I'm glad I don't live in Toledo anymore. There's very few races I don't cast a vote on, but this would be one of them. Come to think of it, I did vote in 2004. When I was downsized out of my job, I voted with my feet and came here. It's not surprising that I've had a lot of company in the last two decades as these choices show what the Democrat machine has done to an otherwise-fine city.

Grist for the mill

A few odds and ends that I've found in my news wanderings:

Only in the mind of a union thug is it all right to pay workers $6 an hour and send them out for a day shift in 104 degree weather without much of a hint of shade. To top it off, they're picketing a place where the starting salary is 25% or more higher than the $6 per hour (no benefits) that these workers are making.

But this is happening in Las Vegas, where the local UFCW union is sending day laborers to picket one of the new Wal-Mart "Neighborhood Markets." (Hat tip goes to Suitably Flip for this one.)

It's not a new tactic. Being from one of the top 5 union markets per capita I've seen my share of picketers, mostly Teamsters or UAW since Toledo is heavily a manufacturing center (think of Jeeps.) But most of the labor unrest there in the last decade has come from the UFCW as various grocery chains have moved into town and some other non-union retailers expanded into the grocery business.

The first dust-up was when Michigan-based Meijer, a "superstore" that featured both general merchandise and groceries, moved into the area in the early 1990's. The local UFCW union struck them in the late 1990's when Meijer's management wouldn't raise wages quickly enough to "catch up" to the other more established chains. They also had a showdown with Kroger a couple years later where a strike was narrowly averted.

But the fangs came out when Giant Eagle moved to town. This chain expanded westward from Cleveland and remained non-union. Oddly enough, I think their northeast Ohio stores are unionized but the stores in the Toledo area have remained non-union. And almost every nice weekend I would drive by Giant Eagle to see the picketers out imploring shoppers not to patronize the non-union store. Of course, I drove by them and shopped there anyway...a nice store with decent prices on their loss leaders and good service. But I found it funny when I'd drive by and see their "workers" sitting around, or, the best one who I saw sleeping in his truck with the sign hanging out the window. Wish I could make $8 an hour for sleeping.

The picketers at Giant Eagle disappeared though when Wal-Mart came to town. Apparently UFCW Local 911 had bigger fish to fry. There were pickets, radio ads (even during Rush), newspaper ads...they pulled out all the stops. Even the city of Toledo bent over backwards for the union. Wal-Mart stores were approved for the city of Toledo proper IF they didn't carry groceries.

So union thuggery is nothing new to Wal-Mart. But back to these workers baking in the hot Las Vegas sun. As I stated, the union pays these people $6 an hour, with two 15-minute breaks allowed in their 5 hour shift - potty breaks at the service station washroom across the street. The union transports them back and forth, except on weekends, where these folks have to find their own way to work.

All this because the UFCW claims that Wal-Mart shortchanges their workers, who make more than the picketers do and can get health insurance through the company for as little as $141 a month for a basic family policy (or $35 a month for individuals.) Obviously picketing is now a job that the Vegas unionistas turn up their nose at - must be too hot to sleep in the truck.

Reading an item from TheGoldwater tonight (props to him for digging this up) regarding Charity Hospital in NOLA. It's a hospital that stayed open as long as it could during the crisis but ran out of generator power only a few hours after the lights went out. Sadly, this proved too much for many patients who died as a result.

His take is sort of a Jim Crow-revisited tale with an almost conspiritorical tone. Charity Hospital is in one of the poorest areas of New Orleans. With decrepit facilities and not a lot of money coming in, this sad situation was pretty much foreseeable.

But I wanted to use this story as a parable of another sort. Along the same vein, many of the hospitals in southern California have shuttered their ERs or closed entirely because of an influx of people who they have to treat by federal mandate but who cannot pay. I do not have a problem with the treatment mandate, although it could be handled more properly at state levels (an argument for another time) - but this is what happens when business and government clash.

In a nutshell, services that Charity Hospital provided were becoming more and more costly, but the payments they received for doing them became less and less. So Charity had to scrimp someplace - in their case, they gambled that their facilities would hold together just enough to pass muster with JCAHO and other hospital regulators. Which they did.

But much like what would happen if you plugged a leaking dike with chewing gum, at some point things are going to break and it won't be pretty. In this case, it was tragic and needlessly so.

There's a big problem with the system as it is. The trouble is that the health care market is way out of whack. Part of that is the redundancy that is built in so doctors aren't accused of malpractice. So each prodding, poking, and test is a "out" in case the doctor is off on his diagnosis. But these cost money. Of course, "you" don't pay for it, the insurer does. And that's great until the premiums and co-pays go up. To turn a phrase, health care insurers ain't in it for their health. They need to make money, otherwise they go out of business!

Then we have the people who extract big money from the Medicare program. If you watch TV for any length of time, you'll likely see a commercial aimed at the older folk for mobility chairs. They seem to be the latest rage in getting Medicare to pay for a big-ticket item that may or may not be necessary. But hey, it's not money out of "their" pocket - until the government has to raise the Medicare premiums. Then it's hissy fit time at the AARP!

It's time for a look at reforming the system. Eventually we have to ease the government out of it. Newt Gingrich was right - Medicare should eventually "wither on the vine," replaced by a fairer privatized system that benefits the patient but doesn't spoil them with extras unless the patient is willing to pay extra.

Finally tonight, I was perusing the FU! Maryland site and they were posting about the MSTA teachers' union complaining about the Steele Report on Maryland's schools. (Note: I didn't read the report, it's 57 pages long.) The gist of the MSTA's complaints were almost all money based - pensions and starting salary. Meanwhile, they were also up in arms about any sort of accountability. No teacher testing for them!

Makes you wonder why homeschooling continues to grow, huh?

Lest we forget...

Wish I had seen this late Saturday night when I was typing, but better late than never. (hat tip: Flip at...Suitably Flip. Thanks dude!)

Four years ago

This is the remainder of what I started writing about earlier, that post will appear below this one.

Oddly enough, with Katrina's aftermath, we're not thinking about what this date signifies. In some ways that's good because life does need to get back to normal. But we shouldn't forget either. In about 6 hours, we'll be four years removed from that terrible hour.

When I first heard about 9/11, I was at work in Toledo when my boss called from his home. He was about to take his kids to school when he called and told me something about a plane hitting the WTC. I just assumed it was a small plane at first and an accident, but then word started spreading about what was going on and we all became glued to our radios.

That was a scary day. I know we had a regular staff meeting that day and we were supposed to finish up a presentation for a new synagogue that night. But that presentation wouldn't occur as it became apparent things wouldn't be normal for awhile. And I feel sorry for poor Rob Brunk. 9/11 happened to be his first day at work for us. Rob's a nice guy who I worked with at a firm before Hobbs + Black (my former employer) so I was glad to see him come aboard. But not on a day like that.

One of the people I feel the most for now that time has passed is my stepdaughter. By then, she was living with her mom in Elyria, Ohio, where they moved after our divorce. But the events of 9/11 put a damper on what was supposed to be a fun senior year for her.

I recall going to a scheduled marching band event the Saturday afterward. Her band, being the host, was the last band to perform. But instead of a rousing sendoff number, her band simply left the field to a single drum cadence. Obviously it reflected the solemnity of the moment, but I felt cheated for her. Being in the class of 2002, she's always going to have that stain on the memory of her senior year of high school.

To this day, we still occasionally get the healing wound torn open. The latest controversy surrounds the Flight 93 Memorial in Pennsylvania. It gives architects a bad name in my opinion. And architects are an interesting lot. While the "name" architects you see in the trade mags and in academia (and who run the AIA) seem to be flaming liberals, almost all of them I've worked with have been moderate to right-wing. The gentleman in question earlier (my old boss) who called about the WTC disaster was probably the most leftist and even he agreed with me on some things.

But I'm glad that we're starting to again view this day as somewhat normal. It'll never be quite like the way 9/11/01 started out (a glorious late summer day in both NYC and Toledo) but sometime the pain will wear off and be replaced by a legacy - a legacy of freedom for many of the world's most oppressed people that came out of that horrible day's events.

Totally unrelated edit: As of this post, I've had to turn word verification on for comments. I hadn't posted my last post 10 minutes and I had two comment spammers, neither of which was germaine to the subject. So my friends at places like WriteWingBlog and the league:revisited will have to type one more word. I apologize for the inconvenience but I'm the only one allowed to mess up my blog with "inappropriate" comments!

Championing the private sector

Since I can't sleep (stuffy nose) I'm perusing some of my background websites that I check occasionally. And I found this article about what the private sector is doing to help out Katrina victims.

As always, leave it to the market to adapt its know-how to the situation. I have a related anecdote to share. As I was doing my shopping in Wal-Mart last Sunday, there was a sign back in their water section that stated their brand of bottled water would be temporarily unavailable because it had been diverted to the Katrina-hit areas (but they had some other brands available.) So somebody at Wal-Mart cleaned out a bunch of stores of various supplies and shipped them south.

Speaking of hurricanes, I'm watching Ophelia with some interest as Delmarva is within the "cone" of its possible path. If there's a silver lining to this, if it went over us, Ophelia's projected path would swing it over a great deal of land mass first and likely weaken it to tropical depression strength or less. But I'm thinking it may be best to place my car in the other parking lot midweek, otherwise it may be sitting in a foot or two of water.

This is where I'll end my first post. As I was writing part two, I decided that the subject was such it deserved its own entry.

I have to laugh!

Generally I just link to posts, but this press release by the Maryland Democrats is too funny to simply link to. This will be fun to pick on!

DELAY VISIT TO MARYLAND HIGHLIGHTS EHRLICH/STEELE TIES TO PRESIDENT BUSH AND THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN AGENDA

Let's see...strong economy, lower taxes, support for our military. Sounds like a good agenda to me - what's wrong with that?

Embattled House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is coming to Carroll County, Maryland tonight, raising money for local Republicans and further highlighting the deep connections between the Ehrlich/Steele administration and the Bush administration and DeLay’s allies in Congress.

All right, DeLay is "embattled" because he has a friend who did no good. Show me the criminal charge against Tom DeLay (that's not part of a partisan witchhunt.) Democrats hate DeLay because he's very effective.

“It’s alarming how far Maryland Republicans will go to raise money for Bob Ehrlich and Michael Steele,” said Maryland Democratic Party Chair Terry Lierman. “The George Bush/Tom DeLay agenda -- mismanaging the war in Iraq, privatizing Social Security, making health care and the cost of living more expensive, and destroying the environment – has no place in the state of Maryland.”

Again, trying to tie that name in. Point by point:

Mismanaging the war in Iraq? We're losing 2-3 troops per day - too many for my liking, but the last two "wars" the Democrats managed were the loss in Viet Nam (with double-digit troop loss per day) and the 15,000 foot war (that's where the bombs dropped from) Clinton had in Serbia.

Privatizing Social Security? All for it. At least us younger folk can get a return on investment. And if that's good enough for government employees, it should be good enough for us.

Making health care and the cost of living more expensive? Only due to the inefficiencies of government interference in free markets and the ever-expanding mandates, mainly pushed by Democrats.

Destroying the environment? The Democrats' answer to that is placing more and more land off-limits to development (which also adds to the cost of living.) Notice that the areas in the world that are the worst environmental disasters are areas where socialism/communism have held sway for generations.

These things only have no place in the state of Maryland because the obstructionist Democrats crave political power more than letting our state truly be the "Free State."

Lierman added that DeLay’s appearance is not surprising, considering that Governor Ehrlich “was DeLay’s understudy in Congress and has brought the same mean spirited, partisan tone to Annapolis.”

I know, it sucks when Democrats actually have to think of and sell ideas to the opposition instead of just doing what they feel in a state with one-party rule. It takes two to tango and have a "partisan tone."

DeLay spent the summer fighting off serious ethics charges, many stemming from his ties to indicted Republican super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who DeLay has called “one of my closest and dearest friends.” Abramoff has also been a major financial backer of Governor Robert Ehrlich.

Notice that's "indicted" lobbyist. President Clinton was indicted as well. And he was campaigning for Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in the 2002 election. I'm not defending Abramoff, but crooks infest both parties.

DeLay’s recent behavior has been deplorable. One week after the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, DeLay pointed fingers at local officials for the poor disaster response, then canceled House hearings on Katrina. At the same time, DeLay praised Republican Governors Haley Barbour (MS) and Bob Riley (AL) while criticizing Louisiana’s Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco.

As he should. The job Blanco did has been worse than horrible, mismanagement all the way by state and local government. While I concede the damage in New Orleans is of a different and more persistent nature (flooding) than the damage in Mississippi and Alabama (mostly due to storm surge and hurricane winds), steps taken by the Alabama and Mississippi governors have put their states on a course toward normalcy much faster than Louisiana's. Instead of waiting on FEMA to bail out their states and blaming President Bush for all ills, Alabamans and Mississippians rolled up their sleeves and got to work.

And doesn't the House have better things to do than hold hearings on Katrina? We know what will happen anyway: the Democrats will finagle a hearing room, invite a few carefully chosen victims of the storm, pat themselves on the back, and make FEMA (and by extension, Bush) the scapegoat.

“This much is clear: Maryland Democrats put Maryland first – Bob Ehrlich and Michael Steele put George Bush and the national Republicans first,” said Lierman.

Don't let them fool you. Maryland Democrats put political power over our lives first. All the GOP is doing is trying to slow down the rate of progress.

Also, a hat tip to a Free State blogger I've recently been introduced to for an interesting idea that has merit. TheGoldwater had the thought of putting an oil terminal/refinery in Crisfield. On the surface, it does have its good points: hundreds of good paying jobs for Somerset County and it's close to a major gasoline market in the Northeast. I know the environmentalists and NIMBYs would pitch a bitch, but it shows thought about a private-sector answer rather than just another government "solution" like Hawaii has proposed.

Speaking of gas prices and government solutions, the Sun made Governor Ehrlich sound clueless again. Seems to be their job. But it was hidden in the article that stations in the Baltimore-Washington corridor use a special blend of gasoline unique to that area. Maybe it explains why prices there are above the national average while prices here on the Maryland part of the Eastern Shore are right about or slightly below that mark.

Once again, a government "solution" via forced mandate comes back to bite Joe Q. Public in the ass and empty his wallet at the same time.

Wrong-way Miller

Was looking at this article in the Sun today. I know prices at the pump were as high as I've ever seen over the Labor Day weekend (over $3 is new to me.)

But Mike Miller's idea is just plain wrong. All a price cap would do is create a shortage of gasoline. Why should oil companies lose money sending gasoline someplace they won't make a profit? I can imagine how bad it'll be for Hawaii since everything is shipped there. But it's the price you pay for not living near a supply of gasoline. About the only thing cheap there is pineapple.

Luckily Maryland is a small state so it's not much more than a gallon or two of gas to get someplace with a supply of gasoline should this hare-brained Miller scheme pan out. If my choice is to pay 15 cents more in Delaware or have no gas supply, guess what I do?

What irks me is that in this time of high prices that hurt consumers, Governor Ehrlich has flatly denied an opportunity for relief by saying no to suspending Maryland's 23.5 cent per gallon state gasoline tax, citing its contribution to maintaining highways.

Now I will agree that Maryland has a pretty good set of highways, save in the immediate Baltimore area (I-695 is pretty dreadful.) However, we were told that the state has a surplus of about $1 billion. According to the state, it collected roughly $750 million in gas taxes last year. So a 90 day suspension in the gas tax (to allow time for the market to stabilize) should cost the state about $190 million - an amount easily replaced by our surplus!

Generally I think Governor Ehrlich does a good job, but in this case he's thinking too much like a government employee. He needs to remember that the people do not serve government, the government is supposed to serve the people. In times where people have to do without because of circumstances not of their making, it behooves government to do the same.

But it never seems that government does without. It's always that tax cuts will "cost" government. Well, maybe if you in the bureaucracy took a look at what you really spend the money on, you'll notice that it's something that the private sector does a better job at more cheaply.

As regular readers know, I'm from Toledo, Ohio. It's a city that has collected a "temporary" 3/4% income tax since 1982. (It was $383 out of my last full year's wages there, really bad since I didn't live in the city by then.) This levy, by law, must go to the voters every 4-5 years. And every 4-5 years the city of Toledo threatens to cut police, fire, and garbage collection if it doesn't pass. This is because the "temporary" tax has now become 1/3 of the city's revenue.

Anyway, I seem to recall a study was done that showed it would be cheaper for the city to privatize garbage collection. Of course, the AFSCME union screamed bloody murder about what they termed a flawed study. So, of course, garbage collection is still unionized and now the threat is semi-weekly collection.

In this day and age, it never seems to be in government's interest to figure out ways to shrink itself. Rather than let the more efficient private sector do things and collect money, big government simply can't do without. It's illustrated by Governor Ehrlich's shortsighted refusal to suspend the gas tax in Maryland. Rather than give a little bit of freedom to the Free State, the governor tightens the screws on all our residents.

Cleaning up the blog

Just a few little odds and ends before I go to bed:

Flip over at Suitably Flip has a timely post regarding something you knew was going to happen: scams tied to Katrina. He did a bit of digging into the subject, and there's some shady folks out there looking to cash in. So far I've put in about $25 to the kitty...

• At our office, I gave $20 to the office collection. When my boss matches all of ours, it should come out well over $500. Not bad for 18 people.
• Last night's Shorebird playoff game had $1 of each ticket go to relief. That would be over $2200 since that was the paid attendance. Added to that is another $1700 when they passed the hat during the 7th inning stretch. That's more impressive since probably 1/3 to 1/2 the crowd had left (we were up 12-3 at the time.)
• Also, during my weekend trip to Atlantic City, a group of firefighters were "filling the boot" for Katrina relief. I'm sure they did well.

And that doesn't count my $200 of so slice of the $60 billion and counting in promised aid from the federal government. (Reading the story, I see President Bush waived the prevailing wage law on these related government contracts. Good for him!)

Earlier I was looking for some info on my old hometown's mayoral race when I came across this gem. While some of the provisions make sense, it's quite interesting that this comes up while the Republicans are in charge in Columbus. Where was this in 1980 when the rural area I grew up in after age 11 became part of the Congressional district mostly populated by the city of Toledo? I just think it's funny that 92% of the money to fund the petition drive (and apparently some of the petitioners) are from outside Ohio. Think the Democrats are worried about Secretary of State Ken Blackwell (a black conservative)? Part of the petition is to strip that office of election duty.

I must say, one thing I don't like about Maryland is that the off-year elections are held in the spring. I like fall elections, probably just because it's what I'm used to. When I was a volunteer in the trenches for those many years living in Toledo, Election Day was like my Super Bowl.

On Election Day, I would get up at 4 a.m. for "dawn patrol", when we went out and plastered all the polling places with campaign signs. I'd have 5-7 places to go and a trunk full of signs to plant. Then at 6:30 I would go vote in my precinct and for several years in a row, I was the campaign worker for my precinct. So I would spend most of the next 13 hours trying to get those last-minute decisions for my candidate.

Then 7:30 p.m. would roll around and I'd run home for a quick shower and then to wherever the party was having it's post-election party. Unfortunately, a lot of the time it was more like a wake, but we had our occasional victories.

And, if you're wondering, I took a personal day off work to do this. No UAW contract mandating Election Day off for me. So I used to have good back-and-forth with the union thugs who spent a couple hours at my polling place.

I guess I'll have to get my fix next November (2006) as Maryland cranks up some major races.

Speaking of Maryland, this is not a good sign for public education.

I got my coupon-laden blue junk mail envelope a few days back, and among the stuff in it was something for UMES (for the non-natives, that's University of Maryland Eastern Shore.) To quote Dave Barry, I swear I'm not making this up - it was the "Arts & Entertainment CALENDER OF EVENTS." So, No! UMES is not my "Education Destination."

Katrina's legacy

There's a lot of bloggers who are commenting on all the finger-pointing going on between the local authorities in Louisiana and the federal government. Go to any news-oriented website and one can get their fill of infighting.

But, my question is: what if it happens here?

I did a quick Mapquest check and the distance between Covington, Louisiana (which is roughly as far west as New Orleans but on the north side of Lake Ponchatrain) and Mobile, Alabama is 138 miles. So figure Katrina did a number on about 120 miles of Gulf Coast when you account for twists and turns in Interstates 10 and 12.

Now imagine a Category 5 hurricane blasting into the Eastern Shore someplace. If the eye struck right at the Maryland/Virginia line, Ocean City and most likely my home in Salisbury would be devastated and the damage may well extend north to Cape May, NJ. A strike farther south may wipe out a vast swath of the narrow Virginia Eastern Shore and just push it right into Chesapeake Bay.

I'm sure that there are disaster plans in place for most of the counties and states. But how much of that deals with terrorism, and can that plan be reworked in some manner to one for a natural disaster like Katrina was? I've seen the signs leading out of Ocean City that say "Evacuation Route" but is it really possible to evacuate tens of thousands of residents and tourists, many of whom aren't really familiar with the area save the route that brought them in (U.S. 50)?

It is fortunate that we don't have some problems unique to New Orleans itself - our land does rise gradually from the ocean so a storm surge would eventually drain away. But there needs to be an action plan in place and it needs to be followed. Red state or blue is only sitting on one side of a line or the other here. I drive down into Virginia or up into Delaware and it looks the same except the state route signs are round. We're all residents of the Eastern Shore and it makes us unique in that way.

So a good idea may be for the governments of the three Eastern Shore states to get together in a low-key manner and just hash out some rules of engagement if a Katrina-style hurricane does strike. Hopefully we've elected leaders and not self-serving wannabes if that all comes down.

And for goodness sakes, be prepared (!) either to evacuate or ride the storm out. Whichever choice you make, think long and hard about it, and be ready to do either at short notice. Being from the Midwest, I have no desire to ride a Category 5 out so I'll head northwest (but keep some essentials around just in case I can't.) I live pretty simply so it's easy for me - others need to think things through.

Labor Day quote

Back from a couple days away. While I was gone, Delmarva won twice and Lexington lost last night, so the second half SAL North title is ours! Bring on Hagerstown for the "Battle of Maryland!"

This is the quote of the day, taken from a person who stayed in New Orleans and has somehow gotten back online to blog.

Anyway, I'm sure there's been human error in this catastrophe. How could there not be? But what I'm saying is that I've come to expect poor decision making and a total lack of initiative from government. They can't even balance a budget, at the federal, state, or local levels. I could balance my checkbook and spend within my means when I was a teenager. But I'm not gonna point fingers and get into the blame game. If you want me to blame something besides the storm herself, I blame the nature of government in the first place. It's too big, it's too slow, it's too inefficient, it's too bloated, and it's too intiative-stifling to be effective in normal circumstances, much less in a disaster. It's a systemic issue, more than an issue of individual people in government.

[Hat tip to Duvafiles. The Transchoptankia Gazette (named after our local Choptank River) is one of my daily reads, he's a local resident.]

I'm going to say something quickly about the passing of Chief Justice Rehnquist. Obviously I didn't know the guy, but he did a lot to stem the tide of judicial activism by his rulings. Unfortunately, by and large his was a minority view. The timing is unfortunate in that now the left-wing fringe has a solid working majority on the court (Souter, Ginsberg, Stevens, and Breyer) - so expect the obstructionist Democrats to try and slow the confirmation process as much as they can. Not sure I agree with elevating Roberts to Chief Justice right away but I can see President Bush's logic. His other choice was probably Justice Thomas and it's possible he may not have wanted the job. (Justice Scalia, at 69, is probably too old now.)

But it'll be interesting to see now that Rehnquist is no longer among us, whether the death watch starts on John Paul Stevens, who's the oldest of the justices at 85. I know every time Rehnquist had a cold it was big news - now let's see how the media treats that coming story.

Delmarva Shorebird update

As of last night, the Shorebirds lost again to West Virginia while Lexington beat Lake County. So the Shorebird lead is now down to 2 games over the Legends.

According to Patrick Heavner, who works for the SAL, if the teams are tied after the regular season there would be a one-game playoff to determine the winner. Based on an earlier coin flip, that game would be at Lexington. Both teams finish the season on the road, but Delmarva is at a further disadvantage since their last series is at Lakewood (a long 11 hour trip) while Lexington closes at Hagerstown (about 7 hours.)

Further, if Delmarva does win the one-game playoff, they then face a second 11 hour or so trip back to Salisbury to face Hagerstown before hitting the road again to finish up the series there after an off day. I actually drove this stretch (Lexington to Salisbury) coming back from my vacation; it's a long, tiring trip.

So the Shorebirds need to go into New Jersey and kick some ass to save themselves a lot of trouble. If they go 3-1 in Lakewood, Lexington could sweep and still miss out.

Let's go Shorebirds! I want to see 3 more home games this season.

Open letter to the league: reassembled

I started this as a comment response, but felt it was too good to bury in a comments section.

Here's the original comment, from the league: reassembled. This is regarding my post, "Bet you thought I forgot...":

At one point you rant against individual rights (you would rather have the impersonal corporation that is WalMart keep a few extra bucks than allow individual families the adequate health care they deserve; you would sacrifice the liberty of individuals to enter into civil marriage for some mis-informed concept of "One man, one woman") but then end the post by implying that you support "the power of the individual." It seems to us you are more than willing to disregard the power, rights and liberties of the individual for the gain of corporations and the anti-gay movement.

Let me counter both arguments:

You say that "the impersonal corporation that is Wal-Mart" is keeping families from getting health care. However, the dirty little secret is there are thousands and thousands of Wal-Mart employees who do have health care coverage through them.

But more importantly, it is not the mission of Wal-Mart to provide health care for their employees. Like it or not, and I know that lefties don't like it, Wal-Mart is in business for one purpose and one purpose only: make a profit for their shareholders. (Full disclosure: I'm not one of them.) In fact, 99.9% of businesses are in it for the profit, and the other 0.1% won't be in business much longer if they keep that poor attitude up.

And nobody is coercing the workers who continue to apply to Wal-Mart for work to do so. With all the negative publicity surrounding Wal-Mart that's mostly stirred up by the unionistas, it's likely that people applying to work there are aware that they're not going to get gold-plated benefits. Also, many of the company's workers are the "working spouses" or retirees who are already covered under another company's health plan or Medicare.

It's one thing that an individual can consider when choosing to work for Wal-Mart. With thousands of jobs out there, one does not have to work there, I choose not to. I applied myself and got a college degree and professional registration so I could choose from among better paying jobs. I do shop at Wal-Mart because they have good grocery prices, but that doesn't mean I stay completely away from a union store like Giant. I just don't shop at Giant as much, since they made the choice to put themselves at a competitive disadvantage by having a union shop.

Of course, what bugs me is Giant trying to strongarm the legislature into artificially leveling the playing field (so to speak) by taxing Wal-Mart. Basically that's what "Fair Share" amounted to. However, I also do not like Wal-Mart (or any other private entity) when they convince local governments to use eminent domain power to steal land from a rightful owner to build a store.

Now, as for my views on marriage: believe me, I know all about ceding liberty there! That's probably why I'm single again.

But seriously, again this is a choice made. While I've benefitted in some ways from liberalized divorce laws, it doesn't mean I was in the right for doing so. Western civilization has benefitted for two thousand years with the morality of one man, one woman. It's only within the last 40 years or so that other "arrangements" have been made more commonplace, and it coincides with a general decline in morality.

If I were a gay man, and I had a partner I was in love with, I would have a choice to make. Now it's easier than ever to be accepted as a couple. But I also know that the relationship would only progress to a certain level because we could not be "married." Maybe it would be a sad reality, but that's the way it is. And in the end it's the way it should be for society's sake.

Assume we cross the line in the sand, as Massachusetts has. Do we now allow a man and boy to be married? If it's all right for two men to be married, why have an arbitrary age limit? Age is only a number. Hey, it works in some Islamic societies, they marry boys and girls off before puberty in some cases.

I don't have the most logical argument against gay marriage; philosophically it does run against the grain of my libertarian streak. But there does have to be a set of rules of some sort, lest morality dissolve into anarchy. It's a concern when behavior becomes the basis for civil rights. This paper does a nice job of presenting the argument of gays comparing their civil rights struggle to blacks in the 1960's.

My final argument is this. Actually, it's not so much an argument as a question.

We all know what sort of chaos the area around New Orleans has descended into since the floods of Katrina. I read Michelle Malkin's blog as a quick news gauge - and the news is now rapes, robberies, shootings, and the like are rampant. Basically, it is truly the strong surviving there. Those that are armed are bullying those who are not, and there's no compunction about breaking into a store and looting the contents. Yes, it can be argued that some simply need the food and water in the store to survive. But nobody needs a TV or electronics when the power is out.

I seem to recall reading that about 40 years ago, New Orleans was in a somewhat similar situation. What I'd like to know, and it'll probably take someone who's an oldtimer familiar with the area to answer this, is whether there was the looting or lawlessness in that flood that there is today?

My theory is that this sort of mob rule did not happen, but with the decline in morals over the last couple generations, we have now seen in New Orleans what happens when people are totally free to do as they wish - when the guardrails are taken down, as it were. It's not a pretty sight.

So yes, I do believe in individual liberty, but I also believe that there is a moral code that needs to be followed to enhance this liberty.