Bob-O-Meter FAIL
By Shaun Kenney | Wednesday, September 21st, 2011 | PolicyGovernor Bob McDonnell promises to get citizen input on redistricting.
McDonnell creates a blue-ribbon commission for just this purpose.
Politifact’s “Bob-o-meter” considers it a broken promise:
So McDonnell pledged to create a commission that would “ensure bipartisan citizen involvement in the state”s legislative and redistricting process.” And he indeed appointed a panel. But largely because the governor was indifferent to it’s recommendations, the group never influenced the nitty-gritty of the redistricting process. The real map drawing remained solely in the hands of politicians
And McDonnell turned his promise into a Compromise.
That’s crap — on it’s face, 110% politically-minded editorialized horse crap.
Keep a promise… and the MSM will still skewer you alive (if you’re a Republican). Lovely… and is there any small wonder why no one trusts these guys as the conscience of Virginia anymore when it’s not just opinion anymore — but now deliberate distortion to fit a narrative?
Bob-o-meter FAILS.
Tags:
Contribute for Conservatism!
Share this post
About the author
Shaun Kenney is the Chairman of the Fluvanna County Board of Supervisors, former Communications Director for the Republican Party of Virginia, and an active blogger since 2002. Shaun lives in Thomas Jefferson's backyard with his wife, six children, and a modest attempt at a farm in Kents Store, Virginia.
Comments
24 Responses to "Bob-O-Meter FAIL"
In all due respect, your characterization of the article is absurd, and it is beneath your normal accurate and insightful posts to write such obvious drivel. Politifact got his tepid support just right, and every citizen of Virginia, democrats, republicans, independents alike are still left with an electoral system that encourages anomie and partisanship; it does not need to be that way. McDonnell raised our hopes that he would support change; in the end, he simply withdrew from the fray. If you are looking for leadership, look elsewhere.
McDonnell did exactly as he promised… consideration doesn’t mean carte blance acceptance. Only the most inanely partisan would seek to call this a “compromise” a promise half-kept.
Blue ribbon commission? Check. Ergo, promise kept.
Frankly Shaun…”That’s crap — on it’s face, 110% politically-minded editorialized horse crap.” Well said.
You always this partisan?
Yes
Not at all. Having been a loyal reader, I simply have come to expect more from you than demonstrated by this article.
Mike the only reason you are a loyal reader is so you can let all of us know how truly partisan you are at all times. Thanks for the chuckle.
Fred Hudson, 2nd Vice-Chair of the Virginia Democratic Party, discusses gerrymandering on the locally-produced Charlottesville, VA, politics interview program Politics Matters with host Jan Paynter: http://bit.ly/pm-hudson. The current program features Bob Gibson, Executive Director of the University of Virginia’s Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership, discussing journalism and the media.
Shaun, don’t get sucked into the MB vortex to another universe.
Tim J offers excellent advice if your objective is to be transported to a alternate universe. I have to say that I had thought recently that republicans have been at war with reality, given their dismissal of the value of vaccinations, the existence of science, evolution, climate change, thier dismissal of the need for increased revenue, denial of the need for emergency aid, their support of more unnecessary regulations, etc., but clearly, that analysis does not go far enough. The only way an objective observer can understand their hyper partisanship is to realize they are no longer of this universe. Thanks Tim J for putting that into proper perspective.
Mike, without those like you, we would never know that there are others like us.
Tim J – that is, without a doubt, the comment of the year.
As usual, Mike Barrett somehow thinks he is representative of mainstream opinion. No Republicans are ignoring the value of vaccinations – we simply don’t like being forced to accept them. We don’t pretend science doesn’t exist – we simply don’t treat it like religion. We don’t ignore evolution, we simply allow people to come to their own conclusions, even if those conclusions are wrong. We don’t deny climate change, we deny the idea that by radically changing how we live we can somehow stop it. We don’t dismiss the need for increased revenue, we simply understand that there are two ways to increase revenue – raise taxes or grow the economy to create more taxpayers, and we prefer the latter. We support emergency aid, but we want to see it paid for. We don’t believe in unnecessary regulations, but we do think it’s a good idea for women to be safe when they’re undergoing a dangerous medical procedure.
This is reality – there are two sides to every story, and painting one side as stupid or uninformed because they disagree with you is first grade level maturity.
Bob-o-meter article was fair. It correctly gave the governor full credit for immediately implementing the higher speed limits he promised.
It correctly said he compromised his promise on citizens input into the redistricting process.
Since the govenror never advocated for the plans drawn up by his commission, with citizens input, citizens still had effectively no input into redistricting.
That certainly compromises what the governor promised. He gave lip service to this campaign promise in this instance.
…that is nonsense, Steve. What’s worse, you guys know it and so does the media.
To peddle it smacks only of partisan hackery. Citizen input was offered, and the General Assembly went in another direction. No big deal — it’s more than what citizens received during any other decade of redistricting, that’s for sure.
No, Shaun, it’s partisan hackery for you to contend that the public had any more input this year than they ever have. The General Assembly always holds public hearings on redistricting and then totally ignores what the public wants, just like they ignored the governor’s commission, and does what the legislators want to do anyway.
The governor, as the most popular elected figure in the state and as someone who has veto power over the redistricting bill, had it in his power to insist that the General Assembly actually listen to the public.
Which was the essential tone of his campaign promise.
He didn’t do that.
Which isn’t surprising, because McDonnell had never been a proponent of non-partisan redistricting before his flip-flop in the campaign, which was done for political purposes.
Every candidate makes campaign promises they know they can’t fulfill or that they have no intention of fulfilling. This was one of McDonnell’s.
He’s kept a lot of others. To pretend he kept this one is just intellectually dishonest.
All public comment aside, didn’t Gov. Bob and AG also need DOJ approval for the plan? They didn’t want to pick another battle with the Obama administration, especially one they couldn’t win.
Yes, the suspension of reality continues on Bearing Drift. Steve’s diplomatic interpretation certainly rings true, and I suspect if we were not in a hyper political environment, Shaun would admit just that. But now, that is not possible. It’s like the trial balloon that Sean Connaughton floated about needing new revenue for transportation; the far right shot it down hard, and the Governor, while he absolutely knows Sean was correct, had to back away. We have entered the twilight zone where fact is denied and fairy tales reign.
So Shaun, congratulations on your appointment by the Governor to the Governor’s Task Force for Local Government Mandate Review. Perhaps you will provide some form of open suggestion box on Bearing Drift to tap into all the expertise displayed herein. I have provided some input already to Bob Dyer and I trust he will share it with you. Again, congratulations.
BTW, anyone irritated about state mandates to local governments should now take that complaint up with Mr. Kenney, who’s been a appointed to the governor’s panel to fix that problem. Hopefully, it’s work will be treated more seriously by those in state government, the governor included, than the governor’s panel on redistricting was.
So how is Barry’s stock market rally treating everyone?
Twilight zone is when a “green democrat” tells you that the “missing heat” of their human produced CO2 is causing temperatures to skyrocket dogma is now hiding a thousand feet under the ocean. I have a list of 50 IPCC scientists that disagree with the “green democrats”
George Kaiser of Solyndra/Kaiser fame gave $10,000 to First Lady Michelle’s “charity”.
Only in Barrettland does “input” = “do what we want.”
There was citizen input in the process. There was a non-partisan commission. If I ask for my son’s input on where we go to dinner, I’m not telling him he gets to pick.
The reality is there wasn’t bipartisan support for an independent process, so there wasn’t one. McDonnell fulfilled his promise by seeking input and putting forward the commission.
As for the revenue stuff, nothing ever changes with Democrats. They honestly think that all you need to do raise revenue is raise taxes. The real world doesn’t work that way.
This isn’t a video game.
So you would suggest that the role of the Governor is simply to count the numbers? On a matter this critical, should not the Governor lead? Isn’t that what a Governor is supposed to do? Realizing that we, the citizens of this great Commonwealth are simply fodder for the politicians of the majority to manipulate the districts so they will stay in office and get higher retirement benefits, should not we expect the Governor to represent us, and to serve our public interest? Our districts are so gerry mandered that no one actually knows the boundaries, and in fact, we have reduced the role of Delegate to an anonymous representative of special interests, not a delegate for the people of a district.
Mike, why don’t you go visit and have a chat with Phil Hamilton to talk about these weighty matters?
Leave your response
The comments section is for meaningful discussion. Readers are reminded to post comments that are germane to the article and write in a common language that steers clear of personal attacks and/or vulgarities.
Please take a moment to review our comment policy.