Fairfax County Democrats Elect New Chair and Officers
FALLS CHURCH – Members of the Fairfax County Democratic Committee met on January 3rd to select a new Chair and twelve Officers. In the tightly contested Chair’s election for which 72% of FCDC members turned out, Cesar del Aguila of Herndon emerged victorious by just four votes.
“On Tuesday evening FCDC chose new leadership full of energy and representative diversity to keep Northern Virginia moving forward,” said del Aguila. “I’m optimistic that with this new team, we’ll take the largest Democratic committee in Virginia to a new level of effectiveness and influence in 2012 and beyond.”
Members chose twelve Officers, nine of whom are newly elected to those positions. The full Officers list (excluding District Chairs who were elected last month) is as follows:
Vice Chair South: Christopher Ambrose
Vice Chair North: Sue Langley
Vice Chair Central: Carrie Nixon
Vice Chair for Precinct Operations: Tania Hossain
Vice Chair for Technology: Todd Smyth
Vice Chair for Voter Registration and Get Out the Vote Operations: Chrisi West
From the Kaine campaign, it looks like they’re stocking their roster with talented female, diverse, employees. They also appear to be putting a significant emphasis on doing well in the urban/suburban “crescent” from NOVA to Richmond to Hampton Roads, where Democrats traditionally must do well to win in Virginia. Smart moves.
Richmond, VA – Today, Kaine for Virginia announced the campaign will add experienced staff in the Field, Political, Communications and Operations departments, building out the infrastructure needed to convert the early grassroots momentum of 2011 into a winning coalition in 2012. Tim Kaine released the following statement regarding the announcement:
“I’m extraordinarily pleased to welcome so many qualified and dedicated individuals to my campaign team,” said Kaine. “Traveling around Virginia, I have been overwhelmed by enthusiasm for our campaign’s message that Washington can learn lessons from Virginia on how to rebuild our economy, restore fiscal responsibility and rediscover common ground. I am confident this innovative and talented group will help me deliver that message to every corner of the Commonwealth and build a winning coalition of support.”
Please see below for background on new Kaine for Virginia staff:
Ally Coll, Field Director
Ally Coll got her start in field working for Barack Obama in Southwest Iowa during the 2008 presidential primary. She has since worked for Washington Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell. Coll served as the Field Director on Murray’s successful 2010 re-election campaign and has most recently worked as Murray’s Political Director and Cantwell’s State Finance Director.
Tyee Davenport, Political Director
Tyee Davenport has served as Deputy Political Director at the Democratic Party of Virginia (DPVA) since April 2010. Previously, Davenport worked as the Richmond and Hampton Roads Political Director for the Wagner for Lt. Governor campaign. In 2008, she served as Political Outreach Organizer for the DPVA Coordinated Campaign where she assisted Congressman Bobby Scott’s campaign in Virginia’s 3rd Congressional District. Davenport also brings eight years of private sector experience where she worked for a Fortune 500 logistics company.
Sindy Benavides, Northern Virginia Political Director
Sindy Benavides joins the Kaine for VA campaign from the Democratic National Committee where she served as the National Director of Community Outreach. Benavides formerly served in Governor Kaine’s administration as the Director of Board Appointments, the Deputy Director of Constituent Services, and the Latino Liaison.
Brandi Hoffine, Communications Director
Since April 2011, Brandi Hoffine has served as Kaine for VA Press Secretary. Hoffine joined the campaign from the Democratic National Committee where she served as Deputy National Press Secretary. During the 2008 presidential election, Hoffine was a member of the Obama for America and DNC joint rapid response team. Prior to that, she worked in political research.
Lily Adams, Press Secretary
Lily Adams joins the campaign from the office of U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal where she served as Press Secretary. During the 2010 election cycle, Adams was Deputy Press Secretary for Ohio Governor Ted Strickland’s re-election campaign. Adams returns to Virginia where, in 2009, she worked as a member of the Deeds gubernatorial campaign press team.
Nicole Gyorfi Titus, Director of Digital Media
Nicole Gyorfi Titus most recently served as a Director of Business Development for new media firm Blue State Digital. Previously, she worked with direct mail firm O’Brien, McConnell and Pearson as a Director of Client Services managing national grassroots fundraising programs for the DNC, Hillary Clinton for President, Senator Harry Reid and leading advocacy organizations. Titus also worked for EMILY’s List during the 2004 election cycle.
Dawn Hillard, Operations Director
Dawn Hillard has served as Operations Director at the Democratic Party of Virginia since 2009. Prior to that, Hillard worked for Virginia Victory 2005 and Moving Virginia Forward PAC also in the role of Operations Director.
Are you ready for a risky life of hard labor digging up dirty fuels the 1% can sell to make billions in profit? Get excited for the brown jobs revolution!
No, really. An editorial in today’s Wall Street Journal calls for More Brown Jobs. Even though American oil use is declining and what’s being produced isn’t lowering the price of gas or home heating oil here – it’s just being sold overseas.
So get excited! From drilling for oil shale to fracking for methane gas to digging for uranium to building pipelines that bring Canadian tar sands to Chinese oil tankers, corporate polluters are eager to exploit the crushing economic crisis their Wall Street friends created to make unemployed workers think they have to sell out their children’s health to put food on the table now!
What’s that? Worried your community will be turned into an industrial wasteland? That you’ll be able to light your tap water on fire? That soon you too will be saying things like, “Just about anybody I talk to that’s a neighbor – and some of them are getting wealthy – are sick of it”?
Come on – corporate America wouldn’t lie to you! Right?
(Interesting, although personally I think they mainly screwed themselves, through gross incompetence. – promoted by lowkell)
by Paul Goldman
Even given the questionable legal and constitutional aspects of how the Virginia Republican Party reviewed the petition filings of their GOP presidential hopefuls, all of them might have made the ballot but for a little known change in Virginia law. This statutory change, passed in 2010 by the General Assembly, altered a crucial part of the petition gathering process, making it harder for candidates to get the 10,000 valid signatures required for listing on the March 2012 GOP presidential primary ballot.
It is a change that only a handful of people in Virginia, or nationally, would appreciate in terms of its real-world effect on the presidential primary process here in the Commonwealth. The change, while legal and properly pre-cleared with the Justice Department under the Voting Right Acts, has had an unintended, but self-evidentially devastating impact on two of the four leading candidates for the GOP nomination.
How so, you ask? For the 2008 GOP presidential primary, state law said candidates had until 60 days before the primary to submit the required 10,000 signatures. But for the upcoming GOP primary, our petition gathering law has been changed; the new language, added in 2010, now says these petitions must be submitted to the State Board of Elections 75 days prior to the primary date.
This loss of 15 days of petition gathering at such a key point in the process – the nomination fight is heating up – cost Santorum, Gingrich, and Perry many thousands of signatures each in my experience.
Moreover, the State Board of Elections kept the starting date for signature gathering the same in 2012 as it had been in 2008 — July 1 of the previous year. So in effect, the GOP candidate in this cycle lost not only 15 days of overall petition gathering, but those key 15 days when their petition drive would likely be the most productive.
When you add the overall nature of Virginia’s restrictive rules, the use of questionable review standards and procedures by the state parties as permitted by their loose interpretation of state law, the lack of any oversight by the State Board of Election as prohibited by state law, and now the loss of several key weeks of petition gathering, it is no wonder our system is about to disenfranchise so many Virginians in terms of their ability to exercise the right to vote for the candidate of their choice.
In terms of practical politics, it would seem the loss of those 15 days, in little known legislation failing to take into account the real-world impact on Virginia’s presidential nomination process, might make us the laughing stock of America come this March if the GOP is having a real contest, and if Virginia only has Mitt Romney and Ron Paul on the ballot.
The Obama administration plans to use its executive authority to install Richard Cordray as head of a federal consumer watchdog agency in a defiant move after the Senate rejected the nomination last month, a White House official confirmed Wednesday.
President Obama is scheduled to announce the decision during an appearance in Cordray’s home state of Ohio, where he served as attorney general until losing his reelection bid in November 2010. The president will portay his decision as an escalation of the White House’s “we can’t wait” campaign to take action that does not require congressional approval.
Of course, Republican’ts will scream that this is evil/unconstitutional/dictatorial/blah/blah/blah, even though they’re the ones who – as usual – have been completely obstructionist, obstinate, uncooperative, juvenile, anti-democratic (small “d”), you name it. The fact is, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created by an act of Congress, it needs someone to head it up, and there’s absolutely no excuse for Republican’ts to keep blocking superbly qualified presidential appointments from so doing. And no, the gimmicky bull**** of keeping the Congress in “pro forma” session doesn’t count. With that, commence Republican’t whining in 5…4…3…2…1…blastoff.
P.S. If you want to express your support for Richard Cordray, and also help Elizabeth Warren build her mailing list, click on the image above. Again, thanks to President Obama, and go Elizabeth Warren! 🙂
Is it possible to have a caucus that no one wins? The results from Iowa sure look like it:
Mitt Romney has been campaigning for president for six years. He’s spent millions of dollars of his own campaign money and has been backed by tens of millions in spending by shadowy outside groups (thanks, Supreme Court’s awful, activist Citizens United ruling). Romney only managed 24.6% – 0.6% less than in 2008.
Extremist social conservatives certainly didn’t support Perry (10% & clumsily indicated he’d drop out), Bachmann (5% & possibly dropping out this morning) or Cain (1% & already out). But even with supporters of controlling theocratic government consolidated behind him, Rick Santorum couldn’t win.
Despite an alleged ability to draw independent & liberal crossover votes and what his supporters claimed was an infusion of people traveling to Iowa, Ron Paul still finished third.
It’s hard to see a path to victory for anyone but Mitt Romney – phony, lying, corporations-are-people Mitt Romney. The real question at this point: Will Republicans set aside their dislike of Romney & unite in their hatred of President Obama behind him anyway? Be so dispirited by Romney that down-ballot Congressional races swing to Democrats? Turn to a third party candidate like Paul? What do you think?
Here are a few Virginia (and, for today, Iowa caucuses) news headlines, political and otherwise, for Wednesday, January 4. Also, for everyone who lives in Arlington, make sure you come tonight at 7 pm to check out the ACDC candidates forum for County Board (at GMU Law School, Founders Hall, 7-9 pm). Also, check out the utterly insufferable, phony Willard M. Romney quoting verses of patriotic songs (while his sons, none of whom serve or have served in the military, stand smugly behind him). This is the best Republican’ts can do? Welcome to a second term, President Obama! 🙂
The Iowa Republican freak show/caucuses have begun. I know, don’t get too excited or anything. 🙂 Also, for what it’s worth, CNN’s entrance poll has it roughly as follows heading into the caucuses (numbers calculated from sub-category percentages provided, but they don’t just give you the totals for whatever idiotic reason):
1. Paul 24.0%
1a. Romney 23.5%
3. Santorum 18.5%
4. Gingrich 13.0%
5. Perry 10.5%
6. Bachmann 7.5%
If this is how things end up tonight, it will be a good night for Willard “Mitt” Romney, and not such a great night for Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, and Michele Bachmann. As for Rick Santorum, if this is the actual finish, it will be a pretty good night for him based on where he was a week or two ago, but not based on where he’d been trending the past few days. He must have thought he could win this thing, but let’s wait until the actual results, not just a CNN “entrance poll” of questionable accuracy and validity.
By the way, the Obama campaign has an impressive social media effort going on tonight, with a wrap-around banner ad on the Des Moines Register website (which should get huge traffic this evening), as well as the video you can see above. Nice job, Obama campaign!
We’ll start getting results soon from a variety of source (e.g., see Google Politics and Elections, AP, CBS, etc.). In the meantime, please feel free to use this as an open thread about the Iowa caucuses and/or the 2012 presidential race in general.
UPDATE Wednesday morning: With 1,766 precincts (99.5%) reporting, it’s Romney 25% (30,015), Santorum 25% (30,007), Paul 21% (26,219), Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 5%, and Huntsman 1%. For Romney, that’s an almost identical percentage and numerical total to the 2008 Iowa caucuses, essentially demonstrating zero progress since then in rallying Republicans to his side (despite his increasingly shrill, almost crazed, anti-Obama language, not to mention his continued retreat from reality-based policies). Heckuva job, Willard, you’re made an absolute fool of yourself yet STILL not made inroads with the right wingnuts who don’t trust you but who make up a good portion of the Teapublican’t base!
UPDATE 11:00 pm: Bottom line, it looks like a tossup between Santorum and Romney, which is good news for Willard. Paul underperformed a bit, and the other candidates – especially Bachmann and Perry (neither have any excuses whatsoever, as they both were heavily invested in Iowa) are way behind, probably no “ticket” out of Iowa (although their zombie corpses could continue onwards for a bit longer). Definite winner tonight: Barack Obama, who will end up facing one of these freakazoid/losers, with no apparent sign of Republican enthusiasm in terms of voter turnout. Works for me! 🙂
UPDATE 10:37 pm: With 954 precincts (54%) reporting, it’s Santorum 24% (14,606 votes), Romney 24% (14,205 votes), Paul 22% (13,145). Forget the other candidates, they’re toast.
UPDATE 10:21 pm: With 878 precincts (about half) reporting, it’s Santorum 24%, Romney 24%, Paul 22%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%. Seems to me that Perry and Bachmann are certainly toast, Gingrich possibly as well.
UPDATE 10:14 pm: According to Nate Silver, “A linear projection would estimate the total number of votes at 114,429, slightly behind the 119,118 who voted in 2008…So far, reporters who observed that there did not seem to be huge waves of enthusiasm at the events held around Iowa look to be vindicated.”
UPDATE 10:03 pm: With 808 precincts reporting, it’s Santorum 24%, Romney 24%, Paul 22%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 9:40 pm: With 548 precincts reporting, it’s Romney 23%, Santorum 23%, Paul 23%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 9:29 pm: With 433 precincts reporting, it’s Santorum 23%, Romney 23%, Paul 23%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 11%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 9:20 pm: With 323 precincts reporting, it’s Paul 24%, Santorum 23%, Romney 23%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 9:10 pm: With 270 precincts reporting, it’s Paul 24%, Romney 23%, Santorum 23%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 9:05 pm: With 190 precincts reporting, it’s Paul 24%, Santorum 23%, Romney 23%, Gingrich 13%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%.
UPDATE 8:55 pm: With 111 of 1,774 precincts reporting, it’s Santorum and Paul at 24% each, Romney at 22%, Gingrich at 14%, Perry at 9%, Bachmann at 6%.
Longtime Del. Bob Marshall is considering entering the race for Virginia’s open U.S. Senate seat and has gone so far as to seek legal advice from the attorney general on how to collect signatures for a statewide run.
Marshall, a Prince William Republican who narrowly missed the party’s nomination for the job in 2008, told The Washington Examiner on Tuesday that he still has people asking him to throw his hat in the ring but he didn’t have a timetable for making a decision.
“Bottom line, am I serious about this prospect? Yes. Definitely,” he said. “But I’ve still got to get all these ducks in line before I set the trip wire.”
To put it mildly, this would be entertainingly HIlarious. It also would be a great benefit to Virginia voters, who could see just how crazy the Teapublican’ts really ard. So…Sideshow Bob? Please let us know if you need any help with those “ducks.” Heck, it might be worth having a reunion of Jim Webb’s “ragtag army” for that reason alone! LOL
UPDATE: Aaron Blake tweets, “Marshall nearly beat former GOV Jim Gilmore at the GOP convention in 2008, but VA GOP holding a primary this time, so that hurts his chances.”
As Virginia is preparing for budget battles at both the state and local levels, one of the big issues that will be discussed is teacher salaries. That’s because for localities like Fairfax County, there have been pay freezes in effect for the last several years (though they did get a one percent cost-of-living increase last year). Most of the teachers I know could definitely use a little more money, but haven’t complained too much about the pay freeze because they’re simply thankful to have a job in this economy. Plus, nobody goes into teaching to get wealthy.
With that being said, Northern Virginia is a very expensive place to live. It therefore shouldn’t be too surprising that a recent survey by the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers found that salary impacts job satisfaction for many local teachers.
Seventy-six percent of teachers said they agreed “very much” or “somewhat” that “teacher satisfaction is primarily dependent on salary” in a survey conducted by the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers, one of two district teachers’ unions.
That was significantly different from teachers’ responses to a similar survey last year, when nearly 70 percent said the relationship between happiness and pay was “weak” despite a two-year freeze on raises and cost-of-living adjustments.
Considering the results of this survey, teachers will probably be pleased to hear that a lot of school board members have made teacher pay a big issue and Superintendent Jack Dale is expected to request a pay increase in his 2013 budget proposal. They shouldn’t get too excited, however, because I still expect a pay increase could face a lot of opposition.
In Fairfax County, simply giving school employees a one percent cost of living increase would cost about $16 million. If you allow teachers to also get their traditional pay increase (which is usually associated with how long they’ve been teaching and what type of degree they have), it would likely cost another $40 million. While these numbers are big, I personally think it’s an investment that must be made in order to make sure we keep high quality teachers in the schools. They are, after all, one of the primary reasons that Fairfax has one of the top school systems in the country.
Unfortunately, a lot of leaders in the Republican Party have made it clear they think we shouldn’t pay teachers a decent wage. In places like Wisconsin and Ohio we’ve even seen the GOP trying to cast teachers as the evil opponents of sound fiscal policy — even after they made plenty of sacrifices in the way of salary. And right here in Virginia, we’ve already seen Gov. Bob McDonnell propose significant cuts to a program that help school districts in Northern Virginia offer public school employees a competitive salary — a move that could greatly hinder efforts to remove the pay freeze in Fairfax. At the same time, he wants to increase the state’s investment in charter schools (which ultimately means less funding for public schools).
As a proud alumna of Fairfax County Public Schools, I certainly hope Jack Dale is successful in securing more funding for teacher pay. Despite the difficult economic times we’re facing, teacher pay is an investment the public could get behind because it’s one that sees both fiscal and moral rewards for the community. When you look at the national movement against paying school employees what they deserve (a movement Gov. McDonnell and his allies appear to have joined in), however, I don’t see any sort of pay increase happening without a fight.
From the Kaine campaign, it looks like they’re stocking their roster with talented female, diverse, employees. They also appear to be putting a significant emphasis on doing well in the urban/suburban “crescent” from NOVA to Richmond to Hampton Roads, where Democrats traditionally must do well to win in Virginia. Smart moves.
by Paul Goldman
Oh pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease 
