Tilting at windmills
Sometimes we feel we're fighting an uphill battle to spread the truth in the face of the lies put forth by Kentucky Democrats and their co-conspirators in the media.
Every time we turn around, there's another whopper that needs to be corrected.
The latest comes from Al Cross, who as a native of Clinton County and as a member of an influential Republican family in that community, should really know better.
Cross' latest offering in the Courier-Journal contains this little doozy:
"But most Republican voters seemed to conclude (inaccurately, we reiterate) that Fletcher did no worse than his Democratic predecessors..."
The truth, Mr. Cross, is that what may have happened in the Fletcher administration regarding personnel decisions pales in comparison to what Democrats have done for years. Your reiteration is wrong. Being from Albany, where Republicans are still in the majority but Democrats controlled state jobs, you should know that.
In fact, the best evidence of this occurred right next door to your home county in Wayne County, also a staunchly Republican County:
I know because my mother, Fern Baker, was Wayne County Democratic Chairperson for 9 years during the Wilkinson and Patton administrations before she succumbed to cancer Aug. 12, 2002. She was a member of the prestigious Ford Society. In all those years, I know of no one in Wayne County in all those years who was hired for a state job based on qualifications, NOT ONE, but always on political afiliation.
Pretty damning stuff, huh? To have the son of the local county Democrat chair make this kind of statement?
Things were so bad before Fletcher took office that even after he was inaugurated, many mid-level managers with hiring power were heeding the recommendations of their local Democrat party officials and elected officials instead of the recommendations that came from Fletcher administration officials.
It's pretty bad when even in a Republican administration, Democrats are controlling the hiring process, isn't it? That's one reason the Personnel initiative was started; to take control of hiring away from Democrat officials and Democrat state employees who owed their jobs to patronage and were just biding their time until the next Democrat administration. And that's exactly what was happening. The entrenched Democrat bureaucrats were hoping that if they continued to curry favor with the Democrat power brokers during the Fletcher administration, their loyalty would be rewarded the next time the Democrats took power.
We once heard it said that even though Cross comes from a Republican family, when he took the Frankfort bureau chief job at the Courier-Journal, he registered as an independent to avoid any charges of conflict of interest. Even then, detractors would call him "that Clinton County Republican." We've also heard it said that many Republicans thought it appeared that he bent over backwards to be critical of the GOP so as to dispel any notions that he was partial to his family's party.
It must have worked. Even though Cross is gone from the C-J and now only writes a semi-monthly column, he's still despised in many Republican quarters.
With columns like his most recent, it's easy to see why.
posted by K-Pac II @ 11:21 AM
9 comments
9 Comments:
Al Cross is right
KY Pac:
Bottom line: we need to reorganize government and do away with this sort of patronage. There's no valid reason that the private sector can't maintain our road systems or many other functions of government-- with the obvious exception of police.
The truth is that all administrations have done this. I don't know if the others did it to this extent or that extent, but that's misleading anyway. The truth is that Paul Patton owed a lot to Brer Jones people and Brer owed to Wally's folks and so on, downt the line. Governor Fletcher didn't accumulate all that baggage and wasn't beholden to the previous pols hires or their patrons.
But if we can begin to outsource government, we won't have this problem and we'll be able to spend more on the areas we need: growing the economy and education.
Cyberhillbilly....
You are very right about outsourcing and privatizing government functions.
But....
Go over to your nearest state highway department district office (yours is Jackson, isn't it, or maybe it's Flemingsburg or Pikeville, we aren't sure) and suggest that to the managers who have been working there since Isaac Shelby was governor (or at least Wendell Ford) and see how far you get. Those people will throw a fit.
In truth, Kentucky is already privatizing a lot of the stuff the state forces used to do, such as mowing, patching, striping and guardrail installations. And the old-line Democrats in Transportation are fighting it tooth and toenail.
K-Pac 2 (we're too sorry to sign in to Blogger this afternoon....)
KY Pac:
I agree that it will be incredibly politically challenging. I'm glad to hear it's being done. Perhaps you could send me some info re that to johnathangay@hotmail.com
Bloggers exit to urge the parties in one direction or another... getting things done, that's a different game altogether. But hopefully the Governor can continue to move that ball slowly forward as Bush did, oh so slowly and so little, with social security reform.
CHb
I'm voting for Beshear...period.
Who the hell is we? Are you two people or just one crazy guy?
We've said before -- this blog is a collaboration between a number of people -- all conservative Republicans and Fletcher supporters. We agree on Fletcher but disagree on other issues, so we only try to publish the consensus views here.
Plus, newspapers use what's called "the editorial 'we'" to put forth their viewpoints -- "We endorse Joe Blow for dogcatcher in this year's election" -- so it's also applicable in that sense.
Looks like you guys are starting to talk to yourselves. It seems no one else is interested in your pathetic opinions...
Smartrepub, looks like the majority of the Republicans who voted last Tuesday share at least some of our opinions. And you're here reading.
It appears nobody else in this state is going to tell the truth about the Fletcher administration and what really happened, and give the whole story about the personnel investigation. The mainstream press isn't, and it appears even our friends at some of the other conservative/Republican blogs and sites aren't.
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