Friday, 1 February 2008

Coincidence?

The name of the game is patronage. Why do we play? To gain political dominance. It seems to be a game that Beshear's administration has taking a shining to. Beshear in another act of apparent patronage appointed John Paul Chappel to fill the vacancy on the 27th Disctict Court.

Beshear picked John Paul Chappell, 37, over two others to fill the open 27th District Court judgeship in Laurel and Knox counties, a position vacated by recently elected Kentucky Court of Appeals Judge Michael Caperton.

Chappell also filed on Dec. 12, 2007, to run in the 2008 election for that post along with four other contenders. Then, on Jan. 19, Chappell wrote a $200 check to Democrat Scott Alexander, who is running against Republican Rep. Brandon Smith in the Feb. 5 state Senate election....

...Chappell also gave $800 to Beshear and Daniel Mongiardo's campaign last fall...

...The other two candidates nominated to fill out the 27th District judgeship -- David Randall Azbill of London and Gilbert Edward Holland of Barbourville -- didn't contribute money in last year's governor's race or in the 30th District Senate race.

Of course the fact that Chappell gave money to Beshear and his hand picked candidate in the 30th District had nothing to do with his appointment.

"We were unaware of that because we don't check peoples' contributions," Viki Glass said.

Maybe it is coincidence that Beshear appointed the only person who gave money to his campaign. Maybe Chappell is very deserving of the appointment. Maybe I am crazy. But as an outsider, it just seems like another in a long line of "amazing coincidences" that pop up while watching this administration. At some point incidents like this one stop being coinidence and start being a means of doing business. With Beshear's history, I am leaning towards the latter.

Posted by brians at 6:51 PM in Kentucky Politics
Responses (0)

Beshear Uses State Airplanes for Campaign Stops

Unfortunately for the Beshear team, the past election season wasn't that long ago. Most of us still remember many of his campaign promises. Take for instance his denial of using state air craft for political or personal events.

Last May, Beshear and every other candidate in the Democratic primary for governor answered "no" when asked in a televised debate if they would "use the state aircraft to attend political, personal or campaign events."

During that same debate, Beshear blasted former Gov. Ernie Fletcher for using state airplanes to attend campaign fund-raisers and rallies.

"That's not right," Beshear said then. "It shouldn't be going on and we need some definite rules on how to do that."

Well it turns out that in the last week , Gov Beshear has used a state airplane twice to attend political rallies in Eastern and Western Kentucky. So much for campaign promises! Or is it a broken promise? Beshear's spokeswoman would lead us to believe otherwise.

On Thursday, Beshear spokeswoman Vicki Glass said the governor's "no" actually meant "he would not use the state airplane for political-only trips" .... "There were events in those areas that he needed to attend to," Glass said. "It made sense to work in the political angle while he was there."

The excuse is hilarious. Ms. Glass must think we are all complete idiots. He never added "for political-only trips" in his answers last year. In fact his answer to the question was emphatically no. He would not use it for political events of any kind. I don't remember him ever saying "except for" in any of his statements.

It is even funnier when Senate Minority Leader Ed Worley comes to Behsear's defense.

"It's quite astounding to me that a new governor would get criticized when we just witnessed the outgoing governor do it for a full year and gave those big checks away to the tune of a billion dollars," Worley said.

Wow, there is some serious re-writing of history. Wasn't the point of last years election was that Beshear would change how things were done in Frankfort. Not do exactly what Fletcher did? In fact, I would argue that Fletcher's trips were less egregious than Beshears. He just planned campaign trips where he already had business trips scheduled. He didn't create magical business trips to areas where special elections were being held.

Senate President David Williams, R-Burkesville, said it seems more than coincidental that Beshear has been in the 30th Senate District for state business while a heated campaign is under way.

It is amazing that the Beshear just happened to have business in these two special election districts. These events just add even more proof that Beshear never intended to change Frankfort. He just wanted to take us back to the dark days of Democratic hegemony in Frankfort.

Posted by brians at 5:31 PM in Kentucky Politics
Responses (0)