Kevin Earl Dayhoff Art One-half Banana Stems

Kevin Earl Dayhoff Art One-half Banana Stems - www.kevindayhoff.com Address: PO Box 124, Westminster MD 21158 410-259-6403 kevindayhoff@gmail.com Runner, writer, artist, fire & police chaplain Mindless ramblings of a runner, journalist & artist: Travel, art, artists, authors, books, newspapers, media, writers and writing, journalists and journalism, reporters and reporting, technology, music, culture, opera... National & International politics www.kevindayhoff.net For community: www.kevindayhoff.org For art, technology, writing, & travel: www.kevindayhoff.com

Friday, April 28, 2006

20060426 MD Delegate Bennett Bozman passes away


Veteran MD Delegate Bennett Bozman, dead at age 69

The Associated Press and Delmarva Daily Times is reporting this evening that veteran Maryland Eastern Shore, Maryland Delegate Bennett Bozman, D., Dist. 38B, Wicomico & Worcester Counties has passed away.

Del. Bozman died en route to Johns Hopkins… The Berlin, Maryland resident passed away from bacterial meningitis “while being transported from Atlantic General Hospital in Berlin to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore.”

The photograph of Delegate Bozman, is from The Daily Times’ Web-site.

Ms. Canfora elaborated, “Bozman, 69, a democrat who served District 38 covering Worcester and Wicomico counties, was a retired pharmacist and long-time politician. He is survived by his wife, two children and three grandchildren… See continuing coverage in Friday's The Daily Times.”

To find delegate Bozman’s Maryland House of Delegates brief bio, go: here.

He was an early riser, who often started his days at 5 AM and it was not uncommon for him to work through until midnight. He was known for using a series of cloth bags in order to keep his various categories of paperwork in order, eschewing the standard Annapolis briefcase.

For lunch, he was known for eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Not quite what one would think of when the ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee and deputy majority whip has a power lunch.

The Associated Press article says, “Bozman, a Democrat, joined the House of Delegates in January 1991. He had served as deputy majority whip since 1995. He was a member of the Ways and Means Committee, Joint Committee on Federal Relations and the Joint Audit Committee.

“Bozman was born in Norfolk, Va., in 1936. He attended Washington High School, in Princess Anne, Md. He graduated from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy. He served in U.S. Coast Guard from 1961 to 1969.”

In my Tentacle column of February 24, 2006, “Kelly’s Dream Deferred,” I wrote:

“As a newly minted elected municipal official in the late 1990s, I have fond memories of those folks who were friendly and helpful as I tried to unravel the byzantine rituals of the Maryland General Assembly. Perhaps, first among equals in that helpful group was Delegate Kelly... Most members of the Frederick and Carroll County delegations were very supportive... Several of the other names that quickly come to mind when I think of friendly folks who went out of their way to lend a hand were: Del. Brian R. Moe (D., Anne Arundel/PG); Del. Bennett Bozman (D., Wicomico/Worcester); Del. Norman H. Conway (D., Wicomico/Worcester); Sen. Donald F. Munson (R., Washington); then-Del. Charles McClenahan (R., Somerset, Wicomico & Worchester); and Judge Paul G. Goetzke, then Annapolis city attorney.”

My wife, Caroline and I have a number of very good memories of Delegate Bozman. One of my many favorites is when we visited Crisfield, Maryland in September 2000. (See: "20060426 Sept. 2000 Tawes Card Crisfield Museum Presentation.” on www.kevindayhoff.com.

On September 2, 2000, my Caroline and I traveled to Crisfield, Maryland and attended the 53rd annual Crisfield Crab Derby Labor Day Weekend. After lunch, Caroline and I presented the Governor J. Millard Tawes Historical Museum with a framed "1938 J. Millard Tawes for Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland Campaign Card"

Delegate Bennett Bozman was very helpful in arranging for Caroline and I being able to make that donation to the museum.

I certainly did not agree about everything with Delegate Bozman. But he worked tirelessly for his constituency and he had a deep all abiding respect for his responsibilities as a Maryland elected official. With Bennett, there was always something positive to discuss and I always enjoyed his company. He always greeted me with a smile and friendly conversation. He will be missed.

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

####

20060426 Sept. 2000 Tawes Card Crisfield Museum Presentation.

1938 J. Millard Tawes campaign card donated to the Tawes Museum

On September 2, 2000, my wife, Caroline and I traveled to Crisfield, Maryland and attended the 53rd annual Crisfield Crab Derby Labor Day Weekend. After lunch, Caroline and I presented the Governor J. Millard Tawes Historical Museum with a framed "1938 J. Millard Tawes for Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland Campaign Card"

If memory serves me correctly, the folks at the Tawes Museum had none in their collection and were not aware of the existence of a "1938 J. Millard Tawes for Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland Campaign Card."

At the time, attempts to donate another Tawes 1938 campaign card in our possession, to the Maryland State Archives were unsuccessful. Perhaps we should try again?

Delegate Bennett Bozman was very helpful in arranging for Caroline and I being able to make that donation to the museum.

The text of my remarks that afternoon explains things:

It is a pleasure to be in Crisfield today. I'd like to extend my greetings to Mayor Richard Scott, Vice-President Councilwoman Catherine Brown, Councilwoman Carolyn Evans, and Councilman Danny Thompson.

I am Westminster City Councilman Kevin Dayhoff and this is my wife Caroline Babylon.

Westminster is a small town in Carroll County - not unlike Crisfield and not unlike Somerset County. Both are rooted in the traditional values that have made this country great.

It is quite an honor to be here today for the 53rd National Hard Crab Derby and Fair to make this gift to the Governor J. Millard Tawes Historical Museum.

I want to particularly thank your Delegate Bennett Bozman (D) for his tireless efforts in helping bring this: 1938 J. Millard Tawes - Democratic Candidate for Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland - card back to Governor Tawes' hometown- which spawned his brilliant career of leadership in Maryland.

Indeed, your entire great Delegation to Annapolis was instrumental in bringing this 1938 Tawes campaign card home. We all owe a great debt of thanks to Delegate Norman Conway (D), Delegate Charlie McClenahan (R) Senator Lowell Stoltzfus (R) in addition to Delegate Bennett Bozman (D) for their support in this effort.

On August 13, 1938, the Westminster Riding Club was having it's Fourth Annual Horse and Pony Show. Our Aunt Eleanor Babylon was a founder of the Westminster Riding Club and was the Secretary for the Horse Show.

The Babylon Family has a rich and long history in community leadership. Our great-grandfather served as President of the Westminster City Council in the 1890s and my father-in-law - Caroline's father - served as President of the Westminster City Council for 25 years.

In 1938, Aunt Eleanor Babylon took it upon herself to correspond with a number of officials and leaders throughout the state - soliciting sponsorships for the Horse and Pony Show.

I'm not exactly sure how it is that Aunt Eleanor came upon the idea of writing to Mr. Tawes, but Margaret Lee Tawes graduated from Western Maryland College in Westminster, in 1932. Aunt Eleanor Babylon also attended Western Maryland College in that time frame, which causes one to speculate that they knew each other and were friends. This may have given Aunt Eleanor the idea to contact J. Millard Tawes, who at the time was running his first statewide election campaign.

Mr. Tawes responded with two gracious letters in which he contributed $10.00 towards the Horse and Pony Show. I find this significant and foretelling, as $10 was a good deal of money in the depression in 1938, and Carroll County is quite far away. It speaks directly to the early signs of Governor Tawes' great statewide leadership. One of his letters included this campaign card, which we found in Aunt Eleanor's personal papers several years after her death.

As students of history, Caroline and I immediately understood the value of the card. Our evaluation was heightened by our keen interest in Maryland's Eastern Shore. My brother, in search of the traditional values we grew up with in Carroll County as children, moved to Talbot County - on the water - in 1983. As children, my family traditionally spent its August vacation on the Nanticoke River.

As many of you are quite aware, the Tawes 1938 election campaign for Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland was a pivotal event in Governor Tawes' distinguished career. Earlier, in 1930, at age 36, Governor Tawes had begun his political career when he was elected Clerk of the Circuit Court in Somerset County by narrowly defeating his republican opponent, Harry T. Phoebus by 72 votes. It is interesting that Mr. Phoebus later served Somerset County and the lower Eastern Shore honorably as a State Senator.

Governor Tawes won the 1938 campaign for Comptroller of the State of Maryland by defeating his opponent, William G. Jack by nearly 140,000 votes.

Without further ado, on behalf of myself, my wife Caroline, and the Babylon Family – on behalf of your delegation to Annapolis: Senator Stoltzfus, Delegate Conway, Delegate McClenahan and Delegate Bozman, I present to the Governor J. Millard Tawes Historical Museum, this framed 1938 J. Millard Tawes for Comptroller of the Treasury Maryland Campaign Card.

That day, there was a parade through town. As Caroline and I were talking with Delegate Bozman and Delegate Norman Conway (D), Delegate Charlie McClenahan (R), all representatives of the then-District 38, Somerset, Wicomico & Worcester Counties; the conversation turned to who was going to drive the new pick-up truck in which the three elected officials were going to ride in the parade.

Delegate Bozman turned to me and said, “well Kevin’ll drive.” And that was that. Caroline and I, who, as best as we could remember, had never been to Crisfield before, drove the three elected officials through town in the parade.

Later, Delegates Bozman, Conway and McClanahan, Caroline and I took a trip in Delegate McClanahan’s boat over to the Bayside Inn, in Ewell, on Smith Island.

We had the “Two crab cakes plus all you can eat lunch buffet.” It was $12.95 and delicious.

We later returned home after a wonderful day in Crisfield with memories that will last a lifetime and Delegate Bennett Bozman was instrumental in the occasion.

We have since returned to the lower eastern shore on several occasions. Most recently, on February 25, 2006, Caroline and I made a presentation for the Mar-Va Theater Annual Chicken Dinner meeting on “The economic benefits of the arts in a community.”

Each and every time we have visited the lower eastern shore, we have been greeted with the same hospitality and graciousness.

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

####

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

20060426 Lunch at Illiano Family J&P Pizza, Taylorsville MD


Lunch at Illiano Family J&P Pizza in Taylorsville MD

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Lunch today was at the Illiano Family’s (www.illianopizza.com) latest restaurant. It is located in Taylorsville, at the intersection of Rte 27 and Rte 26 in southern Carroll County Maryland.

The drawing, “Clem’s Firewood” is the view of the intersection from my table.

They have excellent food, but today I just wanted to eat and run, so I had the Greek salad. My server was Katie P. She used to work at Baugher’s in Westminster, another one of my favorite restaurants.

My Mom’s side of my family is from the Taylorsville – Mt. Airy part of southern Carroll County – the “Wright” family. (And the Warfield, Gilliss, Farver and Haines families…)

The family church, since 1879, is there in Taylorsville, the Taylorsville United Methodist Church. I do not know where the family church was before then. I stopped by and visited my grandfather, William Earl Wright and some other family members, after lunch.

Why not stop by the next time you are in the area? They have excellent food, the restaurant is locally owned and Frank Illiano is a strong supporter of the local community. The money you spend stays in the community.

Frank Illiano, his Family and the History of New York J&P Pizza

The history of New York J&P Pizza, below, is taken off their website, http://www.illianopizza.com/history.php, on April 26, 2006:

Growing up in a small Italian town with his six brothers and five sisters, young Francesco Illiano had two great passions – soccer and restaurants.

At just eight years of age he was spending his afternoons as a right defender, taking the ball away from the opposing team’s best striker, and his evenings washing dishes in the midst of a bustling bistro kitchen.

Shortly after his 12th birthday, and already developing the skills of an expert pizza chef, he left home to live with an older sister and work full time in a traditional Italian family restaurant.

Then, in his early twenties, following a spell in the Merchant Marine traveling the waterways of the Mediterranean and Northern Africa, he arrived in the United States to work at a friend’s restaurant.

In 1983 he took ownership of a small Westminster, Maryland pizzeria and sub shop known as “New York J&P Pizza” – and the first chapter of this great American success story had been written.

Today, Frank Illiano remains just as passionate about his restaurants – with New York J&P Pizza now one of central Maryland’s most successful family restaurant chains – and is never happier than when coaching a soccer team with his young son Gennaro playing right defender.

The original Westminster restaurant is gone but five New York J & P Pizza locations in Carroll, Frederick and Montgomery counties continue the tradition of authentic Italian cooking in a true family atmosphere.

Frank, his wife Miia and their two older children Amber and Randy are all involved in running New York J & P Pizza’s Mt Airy location. The Hampstead restaurant, which opened on 5th December 1983, is run by Frank’s older brother Augusto; Younger brother Tony runs the Spring Ridge location; Miia’s mother Tina is in charge in Damascus and her cousin Leho in Finksburg.

In the spring of 2005, a sixth J & P Pizza was added to the fold – with the addition of the Taylorsville location. In a remarkably quick turn-around, Frank and his team were able to transform an existing restaurant into the newest J&P Pizza – with the great food and great atmosphere that J&P patrons have come to expect. The Taylorsville location – situated on the busy corner of Routes 26 & 27 – also features a Crown gas station with breakfast hours for coffee, sandwiches and doughnuts.

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

####

20060425 Introducing Hot Air


Introducing Hot Air

Read Michelle Malkin’s Introducing Hot Air

Hot Air can be found here: http://hotair.com/

3…2…1…

http://hotair.com/archives/the-blog/2006/04/24/321/

April 24, 2006 4:15 AM by Michelle

We’re live! Welcome to Hot Air, the world’s first, full-service conservative Internet broadcast network. Tune out Katie Couric and tune …

Conservative Internet Broadcast Network Debuts

http://www.emediawire.com/releases/2006/4/emw376471.htm

Features daily newscast with Michelle Malkin • Staff blogs w/the hottest vidclips & headlines • Affiliates across the globe • Right-leaning movies, podcasts & animation

Washington, DC (PRWEB) April 24, 2006 -- Hot Air (http://www.hotair.com/), the world’s first conservative Internet broadcast network, launches today. Founder and CEO Michelle Malkin leads a multi-talented, tech-savvy staff on the cutting edge of the Internet video/TV convergence.

Hot Air’s ground-breaking, irreverent daily video newscast, “Vent with Michelle Malkin,” tackles media sacred cows and left-wing shibboleths -- harnessing the best blog reporting and analysis across the Internet. Today’s inaugural newscast skewers U.S. high-tech titans kowtowing to China’s tyrants.

This is not your father’s nightly news.

Hot Air exposes new viewers of all political stripes to the world of videoblogging, animation, and podcasting. The network has signed on independent affiliates from Paris to Washington, D.C. Advertisers have lined up; Hot Air has already sold pre-roll video ads through the first week.

The next great information revolution is here. Tune in at http://www.hotair.com/.

To schedule an interview with Michelle Malkin, e-mail hotairnetwork @ gmail.com

# # #

Monday, April 24, 2006

20060421 Support Your Local Michelle Malkin


Support Your Local Michelle Malkin

April 24, 2006

For the Who, What, Why, When, Where and How on this image… start your reading with: 'A PERSONAL NOTE' from Michelle Malkin.

It appears that the image credit belongs to: Frank J. at IMAO in a post dated

April 18, 2006, at 09:58 AM, “Support Your Local Malkin!”

And for even more background, this is Ms. Malkin’s post on April 19, 2006:

I AM NOT AFRAID OF YOU

By Michelle Malkin · April 19, 2006 08:53 PM

You know who you all are.

And if you think I'm going to stop blogging/writing/making a living because you've plastered my family's private home address, phone numbers, and photos and maps of my neighborhood all over the Internet to further your manufactured outrage and pathetic coddling of a bunch of lying, anti-troops punks at UC Santa Cruz...

...you better think again.

***

Oh, and here's just a reminder of the kind of poor, "peaceful," innocent "children" at Santa Cruz engaged in throwing rocks, slashing tires, and running military recruiters off their campus:

Click here.

And here.

That's what this is all about--not me. Them.

***

Previous:

The moonbats strike back
More thuggery at Santa Cruz
Cut off tax money for UC Santa Cruz!
Seditious Santa Cruz vs. America
UC Santa Cruz hates our troops

For some context and balance – this is what her critics are saying. Decide for yourselves…

Michelle Malkin knows better than publishing a private person's information

By King Bastard | 4/19/2006 3:06 PM | 37 words

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She published the information of a deleted press release which contained private citizens' phone numbers.

Michelle Malkin's home address:

(Ok, maybe we're not that mean)

Click here for Her Bastard of the Blogs card.

Download "Bastard of the Blogs" cards: David Winer, Michelle Malkin, Wil Wheaton, Daily Kos, Robert Scoble | Who's Next?

1 Comments | Add Comment

Hypocrisy, publicly available information and Michelle Malkin

http://www.thosebastards.com/trackback/2312/

By King Bastard | 4/20/2006 7:09 AM | 341 words


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For a short period last night, we had her personal address on this site. After a second thought, we took it down. I think it was up for about an hour, which with our site traffic roughly translates to about three readers, give or take 20 readers.

We were wrong in doing so.

However...

It's not like we had to search long on the web to find this publically available information -- it took a bit of searching, but it was easy to find. Most people's personal information is pretty easy to find on the web. This is page that is still up on the web.

So in justifying the post, we're going to use the same reason Michelle Malkin uses:

I linked to that still has the SAW contact information publicly available to anyone...

She's gone all moonbat, saying she's not going to be intimidated. Of course, when she posts other people's information, she calls it justified and feels good about herself. When we do, she thinks we're intimidating her.

(I'd tell you where the page is at, but then that kind of defeats the purpose of not calling it out).

There are hordes of information. We make a big stink about Google CEO Eric Schmidt objecting to his personal information showing up on the web, even though it was Google's own search engine that made it possible (and his company profits off of the indexing of such information).

Regarding how this all started, Michelle Malkin went to a cached page, took a screenshot, and posted the image on her site because didn't like the politics of the people. Michelle's it's not your place to justify the disclosing of this information because you deemed that they were terrorizing people. That's an issue for the Santa Cruz police department to deal with, not your own brand of vigilante justice.

How vindictive. How un-professional. How Malkinesque.

If you're so bent of out of shape over the posting of personal information, why did you post their information, Michelle? How do you sleep at night knowing you're such a hypocrite and terrible person?

Download "Bastard of the Blogs" cards: David Winer, Michelle Malkin, Wil Wheaton, Daily Kos, Robert Scoble | Who's Next?


Thursday, April 20, 2006

20060419 Dems Smear Politics in Maryland


Dems Smear Politics in Maryland

April 19, 2006

Although it has received only perfunctory coverage locally, it appears that our state continues to grab national attention for what happens when a single “state-sanctioned” majority party runs a state government and ignores the citizens it is supposed to be serving. It’s a storyline that sounds like the fodder for a paperback novel about intrigue in a developing nation.

Read what Gregory Kane said here, and what the New York Post and the New York Sun have recently said…

What is capturing nationwide attention is a March 27 confidential report prepared for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee by a top National Democratic Party strategist - Cornell Belcher - and paid for by the Democratic National Party.

The March 27, 2006 report reflects what many have understood to be the Democratic response to Lt. Governor Steele for quite some time – smear him before he starts being a perfect suitor for Maryland voters in this fall’s election and inspires a full fledged revolt in the Democratic forty-year strangle-hold on African-American voters and Maryland politics. (From my April 19, 2006 Tentacle column, “Guess Who’s Coming to the Election.”)

Republican Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele is a front-runner to replace the retiring longstanding liberal democrat, U.S. Senator Paul Sarbanes, in this fall’s Maryland election.

Conservatives from both parties have historically governed Maryland. However, in response to the warning signs of the mid 1990s, the Democratic Party incomprehensibly took a precipitous turn to the left, leaving many party members behind shaking their heads and counting on voter inertia to sustain them.

Voter inertia is no longer working as voters want vision, new ideas and approaches and all they are getting from the majority party is partisan politics.

Like the incoming tide lapping upon the fragile wall protecting a castle in the sand, what started as a trickle is continuing to become a major breach as liberal Democrats in the state increasingly whisper that the times are a changing.

Consider the following statistics cited in the March 27 Democratic National Committee report. According to the Washington Post - Black voters most likely to consider backing the GOP Senate candidate:

Voters ages 18-29: 60%;

Men under 45: 55%;

Baltimore residents: 53%;

Voters with a high school degree or less: 51%;

Women under 45: 51%;

Weekly churchgoers: 50%;

Men 60 and over: 45%;

Women 60 and over: 36%;

Prince George's voters: 35%;

Voters earning more than $75,000: 30%.

The warning signs have been appearing for years, yet the Kool-Aid drinkers are still in denial. In 1994, a Democrat was narrowly elected Governor; the party faithful said it was a fluke.

Many political scientists actually credit the hard right wing of the Republican Party for the Democratic victory for not fully supporting the candidacy of Ellen Sauerbrey.

A mistake not repeated in 2002, when Republican Robert L. Ehrlich was elected governor of the State of Maryland. The first Republican governor in Maryland in almost four decades.

As voter discontent is starting to become obvious over the temper tantrum thrown by the Democratic leadership in the single party controlled 2006 session of the Maryland General Assembly, many thinking Democrats are starting to see the handwriting on the wall.

Snubbing and attempts to discredit good people voicing discontent or outright defecting from the Democratic Party is becoming a major department in the organization of the Maryland Democratic party apparatus.

While the Democratically controlled Maryland General Assembly plays the blame game and “let’s change the rules,” other African-American leaders are finding their voice and stating the obvious.

In July 2003, then-Denton Mayor Victoria Goldsborough said, “This party is moving and shaking, and I just want to be in it.”

With that parting comment, Ms. Goldsborough, an outspoken Eastern Shore African-American joined with Easton Mayor Robert Willey and changed to the Republican Party.

Both had been taken for granted by the Democratic Party and coupled with their differences of opinion with an increasingly liberal agenda, petty annoyances compounded into major friction and they bolted.

In February 2005, Annapolis Alderman George O. Kelley Sr. defected. A life-long Democrat, Alderman Kelly, a former police office and minister of an influential African-American church in Annapolis cited core values, public safety policy and fiscal responsibility differences with the Democratic Party.

Granted, several local elected officials here and there does make for a flood of defections. But coupled with the information that more first time voters are registering Republican and increased numbers of citizens are switching party affiliations; it all leads up to not just a qualitative shift but a quantitative sea change that is sure to continue to be reflected at the polls.

Former Prince George's County executive Wayne K. Curry, a 1972 Western Maryland College (now McDaniel College - in Westminster, MD) graduate, was quoted: “There hasn't been this kind of revelation of the diversity of thinking among African-Americans, and Steele's campaign has brought that into focus…”

As the majority party in Annapolis continues to react badly to the growing threat of republicans, we saw many votes in the 2006 legislative session cast, not according to the merits of the legislation, but on mean-spirited partisan politics.

Memo to the Maryland Democratic Party: a leader like Lt. Governor Steele is not an anomaly as you would like for the electorate to believe. He is simply a sign of things to come.

At present, we may not even know the name of the next “Michael Steele,” but their will be many more as Republicans continue to be relevant and Democrats continue to give African-Americans lip-service or otherwise simply take this vital Maryland constituency for granted.

Republicans are often their own persons, as has been evident in recent well-publicized disagreements between the President George W. Bush’s administration and the national Republican leadership.

Political scientists note that it is a sign of the growing relevancy and strength of the Grand Old Party that it is tolerant of leadership disagreement in pursuit of service to the citizens they serve. This also serves to attract additional folks to the Republican Party as the mantra of the Maryland Democratic Party is: “their way or the highway.”

Picturing the Lt. Governor with President Bush is inside baseball and in the end, is meaningless to the average voter at the polls. (Although, I for one would love to have a picture of the Lt. Governor and Condoleezza Rice for my office. It will not affect how I vote but it would brighten my day.)

In a recent interview with Steele campaign spokeswoman, Melissa Sellers, she summed it best when she said: “Michael Steele is committed to uniting Marylanders behind his vision of opportunity and empowerment. This stands in clear contrast to his opponents’ documented strategy of divisive race-based attack politics.”

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

####

Monday, April 17, 2006

20060417 Maryland Dems Smear Steele At Their Peril

“Maryland Dems Smear Steele At Their Peril”

The Web site, Real Clear Politics is carrying an insight post, today, by Gregory Kane on Maryland Democrats once again playing the “race-card.”

“If Maryland Democrats were smart, they'd listen to Wayne K. Curry.

That is, if they were smart. But they aren't, so they probably won't.

Curry is the former county executive of Prince George's County, Md., one of the richest counties in the state, if not the country. Curry is also black and a Democrat.

Two weeks ago, Curry warned his fellow party members not to demonize Maryland's Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele.”

Read the rest of the post:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/04/md_democrats_attack_steele_at.html

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

20060407 Schaefer defends schools takeover

Schaefer defends schools takeover at Carroll meeting

Baltimore Examiner Carroll County Edition

Matthew Santoni, The Examiner

Apr 7, 2006 7:00 AM (4 days ago)

“Carroll County - Comptroller William Donald Schaefer defended the state’s takeover of 11 Baltimore City schools and fended off calls for more state funding of Carroll County schools Wednesday night at a meeting of the South Carroll County Democrats…

“The former Baltimore mayor and Maryland governor praised state Superintendent of Schools Nancy Grasmick as the “top-notch person in the country,” and chastised members of the state legislature who call the takeover politically motivated..."

Read the rest of the article here.

####

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Gordon Parks - An American Cultural Icon passes Away at 93


Gordon Parks - An American Cultural Icon passes Away at 93
April 5, 2006 By Kevin Dayhoff

A tribute to the life of a man, in which love, dignity and hard work overcome hatred and bigotry.

Last month on March 7, a cultural icon and one of America’s greatest artists, Gordon Parks, passed away at the too-young age of 93, in Manhattan.

Born in abject poverty, Gordon Roger Alexander Buchanan Parks came into this world on November 12, 1912 in Fort Scott, Kansas, to a tenant farming family.

He was the youngest of 15 children. By age sixteen, at the dawn of the Great Depression in 1928, his mother died and he ended up homeless in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Kenny Irby wrote a poignant March 15, 2006 retrospective on “Poynter on Line” - “Gordon Parks: From Country Boy to Renaissance Man, A True Photographic Idol, IN MEMORIAM: 1912-2006.” In his essay, Mr. Irby called to our attention:

“Delores Johnson -- formerly with The Kansas City Star, now, with The Virginian-Pilot -- photographed Parks in April 2004, at what is believed to be his last extended photo session.

“Parks was the first black photographer to penetrate through racial barriers at Life magazine and many other agencies. During his photo session with Johnson, he recalled how some whites would not allow him to photograph them, how he was often turned away because of the color of his skin”.

There are many fascinating aspects of the Gordon Parks story, which spans many “revolutions” in the history of American public policy, scope and approach of government and social progress.

But, for an artist as prolific and accomplished as Mr. Parks, many folks are not aware of his name, although most are aware of his work.

Mr. Parks credits his mother with having a profound influence upon his life. Isn’t it so with many of us? She taught him that he could do anything to which he set his mind to do.

Mr. Irby reveals, “In one of (Mr. Parks’) autobiographies, "A Choice of Weapons," he says his mother "placed love, dignity and hard work over hatred, she always told me that I could do whatever little white boys did and that I had better do it better."”

Indeed, it was by his work ethic and his enormous talent that he escaped the chains of poverty or simply becoming another sad statistic of the Great Depression.

It is reported that he was famous for being a workaholic and a taskmaster well into old age.

In an excellent 2,700-word memoriam in the New York Times, Andy Grundberg wrote that Mr. Parks was a “photographer, filmmaker, writer and composer who used his prodigious, largely self-taught talents to chronicle the African-American experience.

“But as an “iconoclast, Mr. Parks fashioned a career that resisted categorization.”

For most of the 1930s, he supported himself by playing piano in a brothel, basketball and working as a busboy. It was in 1938, while working on the Chicago to Seattle train as a waiter, Mr. Parks noticed a discarded magazine with photographs from the Farm Security Administration, and became interested in photography.

In 1937, he purchased a “Voightlander Brilliant” camera, for $12.50 at a pawnshop in Seattle. He began free-lancing as a fashion photographer at local department stores in St. Paul, Minnesota.

It was here that he happened to take a photo of the heavyweight boxer, Joe Lewis’ wife, Marva Lewis. Impressed with the photo, she encouraged him to move to Chicago, where he gained attention doing a photo-documentary series of the poorer black areas of town.

In 1941, he had an exhibition of these photographs that earned him a fellowship from the Julius Rosenwald Foundation. The fellowship paid him $200.00 per month so that he could find photography assignments. That year, he joined the photographic documentation project of the New Deal’s Farm Security Administration, in Washington, D.C., as an intern.

At the age of thirty, Mr. Parks found himself working with photographers such as Marion Post Wolcott, John Vachon, Jack Delano, John Collier, Dorothea Lange and Russell Lee, under the direction of Roy Emerson Stryker.

The photograph for which he may be the most famous was “American Gothic,” which he took while he was with the FSA, in 1942. Mr. Grundberg, describes it best in his New York Times article: “it shows a black cleaning woman named Ella Watson standing stiffly in front of an American flag, a mop in one hand and a broom in the other. Mr. Parks wanted the picture to speak to the existence of racial bigotry and inequality in the nation's capital. He was in an angry mood when he asked the woman to pose, having earlier been refused service at a clothing store, a movie theater and a restaurant.”

Landon Nordeman, in a May 1, 1997 paper written on Walker Evans and documentary photography, gives us an idea of the extraordinary fortunate consequence of the FSA photographic documentation project for generations of historians; in 1944, 270,000 negatives and 77,000 prints by FSA photographers was deposited with the Library of Congress in Washington.

The Farm Security Administration was discontinued in 1943, as the nation’s attention continued to focus on World War II. Mr. Parks transferred to the Office of War Information.

Numerous accounts recall, “One of his assignments was photographing the training of the first unit of black fighter pilots, the 332nd Fighter Group. Prohibited from accompanying them to Europe and documenting their participation in the war effort, Parks left in disgust…” (www.gale.com)

He resigned in 1944 and moved to Harlem in New York City and began free-lancing for Vogue magazine.

According to a biographical sketch by Sharisse Foster, “… He then shoots for the Standard Oil Photography project in New Jersey. It is here that he produces some of his most inspiring work including "Dinner Time at Mr. Hercules Brown's Home” (1944), and "Grease Plant Worker” (1946). In these images he depicts the industrial workers in small cities.”

After several years with Vogue, he was able to attract the eye of Life magazine. In 1948, he took a job as a photojournalist with Life that until 1972, took him all over the world, photographing everything from fashion in Paris to the slums of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to celebrity portraiture.

In 1963, he wrote an autobiographical novel, “The Learning Tree,” in which chronicled much of his childhood in Kansas. In 1969, he adapted “The Learning Tree” into a screenplay, wrote the musical score and directed the movie, by the same name.

It wasn’t until the late 1960s, that the baby boomer generation started to take notice of his work, mostly documenting the Black Panther movement and the struggle for civil rights.

But it was when he burst into the world of commercial Hollywood in 1971, with what many refer to now as “blaxploitation films,” that he gained the attention of the emerging pop culture of the children of the 60s.

Yes, this is the gentleman who in 1971 directed "Shaft," starring Richard Roundtree as the cool, black leather jacket-clad private detective.

The movie was released on July 2, 1971. I saw it in Greensboro (or Burlington – as one gets older the mind is the first to go) NC, where I witnessed much of the audience get up and leave the theatre not too long after the movie began…

Remember the music score was by Isaac Hayes? Wikipedia confirmed some old notes that the “movie was adapted by Ernest Tidyman and John D. F. Black from Tidyman's 1971 novel of the same name…. It won an Academy Award for Best Music, Song for Isaac Hayes for "Theme from Shaft". It was nominated for Best Music, Original Dramatic Score…. In 2000, the United States Library of Congress deemed the original film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.”

Mr. Parks followed this up with "Shaft's Big Score!" in 1972. What is little known is that originally, “Shaft” was written as a straightforward detective movie with a white detective.

However, with the huge success of movie, “Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song,” a few months earlier, it was quickly realized that the money was in the neophyte genre of blaxploitation movies and the film was quickly adapted.

Many of the younger readers became aware of this genre of movies when Samuel L. Jackson starred in a remake of the movie in 2000.

Mr. Parks continued to write books, do films for television, pursuing photography and even composing music right up until his death.

Seldom do contemporary artists exhibit talent in so many different ways. His legacy is that of overcoming obstacles with hard work, focus, perseverance and determination.

He was an artist with a profound social conscious, who never lost track of his responsibility to the public, from which he earned a living.

He set the standards high and served as an example for many of us, that life is not about excuses. It is about taking personal responsibility for our lives, rolling up our sleeves and just going it.

Mr. Parks life is a tribute that love, dignity and hard work will always overcome hatred. One wonders what he could have accomplished if he didn’t have overcome the barriers of hatred and bigotry. Wouldn’t it better if we lived in a world, in which love, dignity and hard work could utilize the springboard of an enlightened society where color, race, religion or ethnic background didn’t matter.

Dr. Martin Luther King said, in his famous August 28, 1963, “I have a Dream” speech, “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

In 1959, in “The Measures of Man,” Dr. King shared with us, “Man is man because he is free to operate within the framework of his destiny. He is free to deliberate, to make decisions, and to choose between alternatives. He is distinguished from animals by his freedom to do evil or to do good and to walk the high road of beauty or tread the low road of ugly degeneracy.”

History has fortunately judged Gordon Parks by the content of his character and his choice “to walk the high road of beauty.” We have been fortunate enough to benefit from the content of his character and the beauty he left behind.

Gordon Parks is an inspiration for all of us, whether we are artists or community leaders or whatever role we wish to play in making our planet a better world.

Gordon Parks will be missed. May he rest in peace. God Bless.

Author’s note: On March 29, 2006, I wrote a tribute to Gordon Parks in The Tentacle. This memoriam expands upon much of that column, but takes advantage of not having a word limit.

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.
He may reached at kevindayhoff AT gmail.com or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net

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20060405 Gordon Parks
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20060405 Omnibus Rolling Blackout Acts of 2006

20060405 Omnibus Rolling Blackout Acts of 2006

April 5, 2006 By Kevin Dayhoff

In my Tentacle columns of April 4th, 2006 and April 5th, 2006, I referred to the “recent surge of Maryland General Assembly legislative initiatives in response to the end of the Baltimore Gas and Electric Company’s electric rate price freeze … as the “Omnibus Rolling Blackout Acts of 2006.”

Much is left to be accomplished with the time remaining in the tumultuous 421st legislative session of the Maryland General Assembly - now mercifully measured in days.

Although, for many, the 421st legislative session cannot end soon enough.

To borrow some ideas as to how to explain the bizarre 2006 session, I am reminded of a series called the “Carnival of the Clueless,” written by a freelance writer, Rick Moran.

If Mr. Moran were to be aware of the Merryland General Assembly’s operatic 2006 session deliberations and decisions, he would have a field day.

Special segments would feature the “vote early and vote often” initiative; Wal-Mart; “let’s change any law that happens to not suit us at the moment” and now, “how to cause a problem and then blame anyone else but ourselves.” A bonus feature would highlight, “how to bankrupt a public utility and encourage it to take their jobs, headquarters and business to Florida.”

My April 5th, 2006 Tentacle column explained:

“Members of the Maryland General Assembly’s leadership deserve a lifetime achievement award for ducking their responsibilities, scapegoating and obfuscating the truth in their response to the rate caps coming off Baltimore Gas and Electric as a result of the 1999 electric deregulation legislation.

“The legislative proposals, the “Omnibus Rolling Blackout Acts of 2006,” that have arrived at the governor’s desk, do nothing to address the problem of consumers facing a huge increase in their electric bills after July 1.”

It would appear that every year, the Maryland General Assembly (MGA) needs to prove to any investor owned company that anything that can possible be regulated (read, most anything that moves) in the State of Maryland is not a good investment.

One wonders that unless the MGA wants to spread its span of control across state lines and start regulating electric generation costs across the country, at some point in time, where is Maryland going to get its electricity and at what cost.

As businesses, jobs and stockholder capital continues to flee Maryland, where is the money going to come from to provide jobs for Marylanders, increase tax base – and with respect to the current cost of electricity for consumers, the power plants necessary to bring the cost of electricity down.

Forget about analogies of this august body’s cluebat populism being an opera, the machinations over the ramifications of Maryland’s California-style electric deregulation have become the stuff of an epic poem written by Franz Kafka.

If the Maryland General Assembly has its way, the sad sorry saga of how it managed to cause a problem, for which it now portrays itself as heroically punishing the victim of its folly, will be recited for the rest of millennium around the glow of candlelight.

The problem has been unfolding for almost seven years. However, just a month or so ago, as the impending reality of the rate caps coming off finally descended on the MGA; the first response by the Maryland Democratic Party was to air commercials - for battery powered radios - all across our great state that it was all Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich’s fault.

Huh? In 1999, Governor Ehrlich was not a member of the MGA.

In anticipation of this rolling black out coming our way, the Maryland General Assembly’s response has been to hold inside-baseball hearings on mythological allegations involving Governor Ehrlich’s personnel practices – at a cost of $600,000.00 and counting.

Perhaps if one tenth of the efforts to play partisan politics had been spent on addressing the issues, instead of synthetically inventing problems and making up Maryland law as they went, we wouldn’t find ourselves lighting candles to fight off the impending darkness.

In January - while the MGA was playing let’s stick it to Governor Ehrlich and Wal-Mart -the Governor was already hard a work, in anticipation of the challenges foreseen with the rate caps coming off this coming July.

In February, the governor wrote the PSC asking for a plan to protect consumers from an abrupt rise in electric rates. The PSC developed a plan that quickly got lost in the high weeds of manipulative partisan gotcha politics.

In an article, “BGE: Cap on rates may force bankruptcy,” in the Baltimore Business Journal (BBJ) on February 17, it is reflected that the Governor “wrote a letter to the Maryland Public Service Commission asking the state regulatory agency to develop a plan to give BGE customers relief from sudden price increases expected next summer.”

The Governor was reported to have written, "Unfortunately, wholesale electric supply market prices are at historic highs just as BGE's rate freeze is about to expire.”

Meanwhile WBAL reports on March 24, that Public Service Commission (PSC) chairman Kenneth Schisler “is dismissing claims by some lawmakers that they were blindsided by BGE's plans to raise rates precipitously when price caps come off in July. WBAL News has obtained records that show numerous conferences and meetings between PSC agents and lawmakers over the course of several months last year. At least 20 briefings or meetings are documented by the PSC.”

Instead of pursuing win-win solutions that will provide electric rate relief of consumers, all the while, maintaining the financial stability of the utility companies, most the of the hot air coming from the Maryland General Assembly has been political spin, in an attempt to re-write history.

In 1999, the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, consumer activists and environmental advocates did not embrace Senate Bill 300, the “Electric Utility Industry Restructuring Act.”

Then-Gov. Paris N. Glendening was skeptical to the point that he threatened a veto. In the end, it passed by such a bi-partisan majority that it was veto proof.

Writing for The Tentacle on March 17, Delegate Richard Weldon (R., Frederick and Washington Cos.) identified the main protagonists of the legislation accurately and succinctly: “Speaker Michael Busch (D., Anne Arundel) was then the chairman of the Economic Matters Committee. The bill was co-sponsored by the two most powerful members of the Maryland Senate, President Mike Miller (D., PG) and Sen. Thomas Bromwell (D., Baltimore Co.). Senator Bromwell chaired the Finance Committee, the committee that deals with utility regulation in the Senate.”

To make matters worse, in 2000 the MGA required Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE) to divest itself of its power plants and forced the utility to sell electricity on the national open market – where, incidentally, it could sell it for higher prices as the price of power plant fuels continued to skyrocket. Read Jay Hancock’s March 12 article in the Baltimore Sun: “Maryland, Michigan take diverging paths in deregulation.”

In an article, “BGE: Cap on rates may force bankruptcy,” in the Baltimore Business Journal (BBJ) on February 17, Wayne Harbaugh, Baltimore Gas and Electric’s (BGE) manager for pricing and regulatory services was quoted: “Our residential customers have been enjoying six years of price freeze service as electricity prices have been ramping up elsewhere in the country….”

In the same Baltimore Business Journal article, Kenneth W. DeFontes Jr., president of BGE, shed some light on the issues by saying “that much like a gas station owner shouldn't be blamed for higher fuel costs, high power prices are out of BGE's control.”

Isn’t it odd, that it has been inadequately reported that the PSC followed the 1999 deregulation law in overseeing the 72 percent rate increase by following regulations that “were (subsequently) approved by the Democratic-appointed members of the PSC and the Democratic-appointed People’s Counsel…,” according to Barry Rascovar writing in the Gazette on March 31.

Isn’t it odd, that in the March 18 front page story by the Baltimore Sun, detailing an in-depth review of PSC chairman Shisler’s emails, that the Sun was not able to “discover” that the chairman had been working on the impact of the rate caps coming off and keeping lawmakers informed.

For context, one wonders why the political writers of the Sun has never looked in depth to the money trail, emails and correspondence between liberal lawmakers and Giant Food or the unions that essentially wrote the Wal-Mart legislation.

At this time, after sine die next Monday, April 10, the leadership of the Maryland Democratic Party will all stop by the local hardware store and buy an electric generator.

Once they are home, they will develop even more misinformation by the glow of candlelight and the political writers for the Baltimore Sun to repeat as fact.

The political writers at the largest newspaper in Maryland are doing what they can to be the Web site for this sordid political blame game. This is a gross disservice to citizens they serve, who ultimately will have to pay for partisan politics trumping substantive leadership.

Apparently, it is just a rumor that the Maryland Democratic Party will soon be rolling out a new line of candles for this summer’s campaigning.

Forget the candles, it has been reported that rolled-up old newspapers burn brightly and provide a good source of populist artificial heat. It’ll get ya through the night, but in the morning it will back to cold reality.

In the end, all hopes that the MGA will provide a win-win solution the impending rise to the cost of electricity have resulted in a blown fuse. The governor must veto the current legislation on the table that will ultimately bankrupt the electric utilities and provide no relief to electric ratepayers.

Writing in The Gazette on March 31, Blair Lee nailed it: “But instead of working together, the incumbents are playing a risky game of political ‘‘chicken” with one eye on the clock and the other on the precipice.”

Playing chicken with an increased cost of electricity is not viable for either party in the context of the higher gas prices, mortgage costs, heating oil and property taxes - and growing voter intolerance to all the inside baseball childish bickering.

As the lights go dark on the Merryland General Assembly, the lighters held high in the air are not in honor of Bob Dylan, but rather by members of the leadership of the Maryland General Assembly trying to find their way out of a dark building.

Once again, we’re depending on Maryland Governor Robert L. Ehrlich to come through for the citizens of Maryland.

Electric Deregulation

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff AT carr.org

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