NY 23rd Congressional Race and Edward F. Cox

The New York State Republican Party has elected Edward F. Cox, the son-in-law of President Richard M. Nixon, chair of the New York State Republican Party. You will recall that President Nixon, besides having been involved in break-ins and an improved relationship with China (recall the US/China ping-pong match), was Mr. Inflation. He abolished the gold standard and pressured then-Fed chairman Arthur Burns to reduce interest rates to create a stock market bubble to assist his own re-election. Hence, he was as tightly linked to the corrupt New York City economy as is the Democratic Party and its publicity wing, the New York Times. Morally and politically Nixon represents the worst in the Republican Party.

But should the sins of the father-in-law be visited on the son-in-law? Cox has worked as an attorney with Patterson Belknap, a white shoe law firm in Manhattan. The firm is intimately linked to the Wall Street-and-bubble economy, and so the Democrats are very much in his corner. The Democratic publicity wing describes Cox as "centrist", which is a very, very bad sign. When the fringe left describes a Republican as "centrist" the smell of co-optation is in the air.

Mr. Cox assumed his post on September 29 and cannot be held responsible for the Republicans' shooting themselves in the foot in the 23rd Congressional district. The Wall Street Journal reports that Joe Mondello led the charge to nominate a left-wing extremist to run in the 23rd Congressional District. The brilliant and lovely Raquel Okyay has blogged on this depressing race. As an active Republican I cannot support her endorsement for the Conservative Party candidate, though.

Newsrunner publishes a Daily Kos poll that finds that in the Republican 23rd district, the Democrat is ahead because the state Republicans have allowed a left-winger, Dede Scozzaava, run on the Republican ticket. Doug Hoffman, a Conservative Party candidate who represents the mainstream, is getting more than 20% in response to Scozzafava's candidacy. That leaves the Democrat Bill Owens ahead. The Journal reports the same points.

The Journal seems to claim that Joe Mondello and the Republican County chairs are stupid. Perhaps they would rather run a left-wing extremist like Scozzafava than a conservative even if it means losing. Actually, it's not that bad because they thought she would win.

The question for Liberty Republicans in New York is: Can the Republicans recover from the dominance of the extreme left at the state level?

The Republican Liberty Caucus in New York has been discussing the Wall Street Journal editorial which claims about the conservative Republican 23rd district:

"...party bosses have managed to nominate a rare Republican who could lose: Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava, whose liberal record has caused voters to flee to Doug Hoffman, a business executive who is running on the Conservative line. Mr. Hoffman has more than 20% support in the latest poll, which is only a few points behind Ms. Scozzafava, who is only a little behind Democratic lawyer Bill Owens."

The Journal is inaccurate in describing the district as all that conservative. First of all, there are a number of higher education institutions in northern New York and they will slant the vote to the left. Second, the former Congressmen, John McHugh, was a loot-and-spend, big government Republican about whom I blogged in May 2007. McHugh was not only corrupt, but he was so "conservative" that Obama appointed him Secretary of the Army. That's really a sign of conservatism. Their former Congressman was a regular John Locke. After all, he was appointed by Obama.

Third, I lived in northern New York and found the population there to be mostly interested in two things: their next welfare check and how to best clean the buck they just shot. Combine that with widespread drug abuse and a high mental retardation rate due to all the in-breeding and fathers raping their daughters, then you get a sense of the "conservative" population up there. Hence, the Journal overstates northern New York's conservatism. The county chairs may not have been crazy, but they were not people whom I would support in a thousand years. They belong in the Democratic Party, not the Republican.

The question, though, if you care about freedom, is how to get candidates who can help optimize the quest for freedom. Edward F. Cox seems unlikely to be able to do a good job, even if he, as did other Progressive Republican types like George W. Bush, speaks the language of lower taxes and reduced spending. I have concluded that Ivy League types make bad politicians because they have been indoctrinated in the failed ideas of Progressivism. Cox is a graduate of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Government. I very much doubt he knows the first thing about free markets, Locke or the principles on the nation was based. I very much doubt that he will make a difference with respect to Scozzfava or similar kinds of calls.

There is no question that candidates must market themselves to voters and liberal districts need to be regaled with liberal candidates. But I would like to see people who are genuine conservatives who win by pandering to liberal voters on the surface, rather than what the Republicans have now, Republicans who are Progressives at heart who pander to the conservatives in the party and expand government when they are elected, not the least of which were George W. Bush and New York's George Pataki.

Freedom of Information Act Request for Accounting of Olive Budget Surplus

I am sending the following freedom of information act request to the Town of Olive Town Supervisor, Berndt Leifeld. The Democratic Party lied to the American people. It claimed to be the party of the poor and middle class. But when Barack Obama was elected, his first and so far only tangible series of acts was to transfer four trillion dollars to America's super-rich. That is the largest example of corruption in American history. If you combine the corruption associated with Jay Gould, Jim Fiske, John D. Rockefeller, Willy Durant and his insider trading while at General Motors, the corruption on Wall Street in the 1920s that preceded the Great Depression, Enron, Worldcom and the other late 1990s scandals, the S&L crisis of the late 1980s, you combine them, and triple them, they are less than the corruption associated with Barack Obama and the Democratic Party of 2009. Yet, the American media continues to crow about the Mr. Obama's supernatural powers. He is not only the most corrupt president, he is the most corrupt individual in American history.

In our little Town of Olive, we see a microcosm. Corrupt Democrats, who justified the massive wealth transfer to banking interests in the name of "deflation", aim to raise taxes by nearly nine percent. It doesn't bother the Democrats to talk about "deflation" and nine percent tax increases (with utterly no concomitant increases in services) in the same breath. The degree of stupidity and corruption in American politics is nonpareil.

After two trips to the Town of Olive offices I was able to obtain a copy of the September 2009 year-to-date budget variances. The variances indicate that spending has been at approximately 69% of the budget but 75% of the year has passed. That makes it difficult to understand why a nine percent tax increase is necessary.

I reproduce the letter, which I am sending certified mail this morning.


PO Box 130
West Shokan, NY 12494
October 21, 2009

Mr. Berndt Leifeld
Olive Town Supervisor
45 Watson Hollow Road
West Shokan, NY 12494

RE: Freedom of Information Act Request

Dear Mr. Leifeld:

Thank you for providing most of the budget reports I requested upon my second trip to your office. I have a few questions for public consumption.

1. The highway and general fund budgets indicate that the Town has spent 69.01% of the amount budgeted as of September 30, but 75% of the year had passed as of that date. This indicates a budget surplus.

2. Where do budget surpluses get deposited and what are the balances in all of those accounts?

3. When have surplus, unspent monies been used to reduce taxes, and when have they been used to increase special and earmarked accounts?

4. This is a freedom of information act request for copies of all current monthly or quarterly bank account and certificate of deposit (not to exceed 50 pages) statements pertaining to the Town of Olive Highway Fund; the Town of Olive General fund; and special or earmarked funds. These should encompass all town cash, certificate of deposit and other liquid holdings.

5. If (4) does not encompass all town cash holdings I would appreciate an explanation as to what funds have been excluded.

6. This is a freedom of information act request for the accounting reconciliation of cash and fund accounts involving end-of-year transfers from the Town’s general and highway funds to earmarked accounts (not to exceed 25 pages).

Sincerely,


Mitchell Langbert, Ph.D.
Town of Olive Republican Committee

Aristotle: Virtue Proves the Existence of God

"The question might be raised 'Is luck the cause of this very thing--desiring what one should or when one should?' Or will luck in that way be the cause of everything? For it will be the cause both of thinking and deliberating; for a man who deliberates has not deliberated already before deliberating and deliberated also about that--there is some starting point. Nor did he think, after thinking already before thinking, and so on to infinity. Intelligence, therefore, is not the starting point of thinking, nor is counsel the starting point of deliberation. So what else is there save luck? Thus everything will be by luck. Or is there some starting-point beyond which there is not other, and this-because it is of such a sort--can have such an effect? But what is being sought is this: What is the starting point of change in the soul? It is now evident: as it is a god that moves in the whole universe, so it is in the soul; for in a sense, the divine element in us moves everything; but the starting-point of reason is not reason but something superior. What then could be superior to knowledge and intelligence but a god? For virtue is an instrument of intelligence."

Aristotle, Eudemian Ethics, Book VIII.

Town of Olive: Nine Percent Tax Increase When There's an Eight Percent Surplus?

Berndt Leifeld and the rubber-stamp Olive Town Board refused to publish the Town's budget variances when I proposed that they do so at a recent Town Meeting. One of the Democrats suggested that I get out of town instead. However, after two trips to the Town of Olive office on Watson Hollow Road in West Shokan the Democrats-in-power did provide me with a list of budget variances as of 9-30-09, which I copied into the Google Docs file below. You will notice that there are many variances in the year-to-date budget, including a large positive variance with respect to health insurance.

Nine months into the year, the Town is under budget. The total budgeted spending for the year is as follows.

Olive Highway Budget, 2009: $1,715,202
Olive General Fund Budget, 2009: $2,178,065
Total: $3,893,267

Three fourths or nine months of these budgeted amounts are:

Olive Highway Budget 9-30-09: 3/4 x $1,715,202 = $1,286,402
Olive General Fund Budget 9-30-09: 3/4 x $2,178,065 = $1,633,549
Total: 3,893,267 x 3/4 = $2,919,950

But actual spending as of 9-30-09 is as follows:

Olive Highway Actual Spending 9-30-09: = 1,183,727
Olive General Fund Actual Spending 9-30-09: = 1,485,312
Total = 2,669,039

Note that 2,669,039 / 2,919,950 = 91.4%. That is, the Town is under budget by 8.6%.

Now why, during a supposed "depression" that President Barack Obama and the Democrats used to justify a $4 trillion subsidy to the wealthiest Americans, hedge fund managers, investment bankers, money center commercial banks, George Soros and the like, is it necessary to raise taxes when the Town is under budget?

(Note: You can scroll down or across using the bar at the bottom of the Google Docs chart.)