Virginia Governorship

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam Must Resign, And Gives America An African American Successor, Justin Fairfax

Ronald 47 Comments

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam has been exposed as having participated in the posting of a photogragh in his medical school yearbook in 1984, in which he is posing with another student, one wearing black face, and the other in a Ku Klux Klan robe and mask, leading to demands for his resignation.

This whole situation is sad, as Northam was elected Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia in November 2017, after serving as Lieutenant Governor, being in the state legislature, having had a medical career, and given eight years to the Army Medical Corp.

Northam was seen as a moderate left Governor, and seemed to be a decent man who would serve the one term allowed Virginia Governors, with no ability to be reelected, due to constitutional bars for a second consecutive term.

But the situation requires immediate resignation, as Northam has lost the confidence of the Virginia voters, and cannot use the excuse of “a youthful indiscretion”, since he was 25 years old at the time of the yearbook photo in 1984.

Certainly, Northam has worked to promote racial reconciliation after the despicable Charlottesville riot in 2017, while he was running for the Governorship, and himself, attended a desegregated high school where the majority of students were African Americans.

No one is saying he is an open racist now, and yet we have an open racist in President Donald Trump, who said both sides in Charlottesville contained decent people, an outrage in trying to call Ku Klux Klan white supremacists as having equality with those protesting racial inequities.

Truthfully, while Ralph Northam needs to resign, Donald Trump, for his long and consistent racism, nativism, misogyny, and praise of white supremacists should also resign, but we cannot be that lucky, unfortunately.

When Republicans are accused of inappropriate behavior, they always manage to move past it and stay in office, while Democrats are always in a position to be forced out, as with Al Franken on the accusations, never fully investigated, of sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct with women.

The only good result of Northam’s eventual resignation is that Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfax, an African American, who graduated Duke University and Columbia University Law School, and is seen as the future of the Democratic Party, as he will turn age 40 on February 17, would succeed Northam as Governor. He would be the second African American governor of the state, after Douglas Wilder, and the fourth African American governor in modern times.

He worked in several Democratic Presidential campaigns, and was a “body man” for Vice Presidential nominee John Edwards in the Presidential campaign of 2004. He also worked for the Senate Judiciary Committee and as a law clerk for a federal judge, and also as a prosecutor.

While Virginia only allows one term for Governor, a succession by Fairfax would not eliminate the possibility of an elected term in 2021, so Fairfax could be Governor of Virginia for nearly seven years. That would make him an historic figure, and give him the opportunity to become a national fiture, and potentially a future Democratic contender for the Presidency in 2024 or 2028.

Only one former Governor, Mills Godwin, was able to serve two nonconsecutive terms as Governor of Virginia, as a Democrat from 1966-1970 and as a Republican from 1974-1978.

Democratic Victories In Virginia, New Jersey, And Elsewhere Sign Of Repudiation Of Trump, And Beginning Of Impeachment Move

Ronald 84 Comments

Yesterday was a glorious day for Democrats across the board.

Ralph Northam won the Virginia Governorship, and the Democrats also won the Lieutenant Governorship and State Attorney Generalship, as as well as switch the control of the House Of Delegates in a massive defeat for Republicans. The Lieutenant Governor is Justin Fairfax, first African American in that position in Virginia history.

A transgender woman in Virginia defeated a rabid homophobe for a seat in the House of Delegates. And the boyfriend of a woman murdered on live television in 2015, ran on the gun issue and won a seat in the House of Delegates in her memory. Two Latinas were also elected to the House of Delegates, as well as a Vietnamese Asian American woman for the first time in Virginia.

New Jersey saw the repudiation of Chris Christie’s lieutenant governor, by Democrat Phil Murphy. And an African American woman was elected Lieutenant Governor.

Maine expanded Medicaid over the objections of right wing bully Republican Governor Paul Le Page.

New Hampshire saw Manchester’s Mayoralty fall to the Democratic nominee.

Minneapolis, Minnesota City Council saw the election of a transgender African American woman.

St. Paul, Minnesota and Helena, Montana elected African Americans to the Mayoralty of both cities, a first for both .

Charlotte, North Carolina Mayoralty went to an African American woman.

Two small cities in Georgia elected an African American woman Mayor, and two African American men won that office, one in a city in Georgia, and one in South Carolina.

Hoboken, New Jersey elected a man of the Sikh religion as its Mayor.

A woman was elected Nassau County, New York (on Long Island) County Executive for the first time, and a rare case of a Democrat winning that position.

The State Senate in Washington State went to a Democratic majority, making the entire Pacific Coast “Blue”, in California, Oregon and Hawaii, along with Washington State.

City Mayors, all Democrats, were reelected in New York City, Boston, and Detroit and a lesbian Mayor elected in Seattle, among other places.

Growing numbers of incumbent Republicans are deciding not to run for reelection, creating more open seats and making likelihood of Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives in 2018 much more likely.

Suburban areas across the nation are growing more Democratic on paper, after massive victories all over the nation.

Northern Virginia has become more powerful in numbers and percentage, overcoming southern and western sections of Virginia, making Virginia clearly a Blue State in the future.

With many Republicans now planning to retire, expect more criticism of Donald Trump, and a growing shift toward impeachment of Trump, since retiring politicians have an independence not seen otherwise, so just as John McCain. Jeff Flake. and Bob Corker have come out against Trump, more can be expected in both houses of Congress.

And for many Republicans who remain, they may prefer Mike Pence in the White House when they are running for reelection, and since Trump shows no loyalties to the party which gave him their nomination, why should they feel an obligation to support him through thick and thin?

Virginia Gubernatorial Race Going Democratic: Great Sign For 2014 And Beyond!

Ronald 5 Comments

The lead of Democratic gubernatorial nominee Terry McAuliffe, a close friend and fund raiser for the Clintons, over Republican Attorney General and gubernatorial nominee Ken Cuccinelli in Virginia, is a great sign for the future of the Democratic Party.

Cuccinelli is a truly nightmare nominee, with his extremist right wing views, and his decision to invite Ted Cruz and Rand Paul into the state to campaign for him, signs of true desperation on his part, and a sign of why the GOP is losing its hold in Virginia.

Cuccinelli’s Lieutenant Governor nominee, preacher E W Jackson, is even more of a right wing lunatic than Cuccinelli, and it is clear that young people, minorities, college educated people, women, and those who believe in socially moderate views are not willing to tolerate such narrow minded and bigoted nominees as Cuccinelli and Jackson.

It has often been said that how Virginia goes in the odd year elections affects Congressional elections the next year, and that has often rang true.

So the Virginia election results, now seen as a massive victory for the Democrats, is a good sign that the state is turning more blue, particularly because of northern Virginia federal government workers, but also because the Republican Party has been unduly influenced by its Tea Party lunatics in that state, as well as nationally, and has led to the highest rate of disapproval for the GOP nationally in its entire history, 63 percent!

Why Chris Christie Will NEVER Be President Of The United States!

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New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has indicated he will run for reelection in 2013, an off year when only the New York City Mayoralty and Virginia Governorship compete for attention.

But with a new NYC Mayor and a new Virginia Governor to be selected, identity unknown, Chris Christie will be focused on more than usual, because he is a potential Presidential candidate for the Republican Party in 2016. He already leads Marco Rubio, Condoleezza Rice, Jeb Bush, and Paul Ryan, respectively, in a public opinion poll on 2016.

There are those who think Chris Christie might be the next President of the United States, but this author and blogger will explain now why Christie is NOT going to be the next President, for many reasons, in no special order. So here goes!

Chris Christie could very well be defeated for reelection by the charismatic Newark, New Jersey Mayor Cory Booker. It should be a competitive race.

Even if Christie wins a second term, he will not become President because:

1, He is much too outspoken, controversial, opinionated, to become our President. He rubs many people wrong, comes across as a bully to many, is crude and rude, and would wear thin in a Presidential campaign, with plenty of documentary evidence already available as to his unpleasant, annoying personality!

2. If he were nominated, he would not even be guaranteed to win his home state of New Jersey, which tends Democratic in Presidential elections.

3. He would be unlikely to win any Northeastern or New England state, except maybe New Hampshire.

4. He would not be able to compete in the Pacific Coast states or Hawaii.

5. He would have a rough time carrying Virginia or Florida, which Barack Obama won twice.

6. He would have a difficult time winning the upper Midwest or Illinois, but with some chance of winning Ohio and Iowa.

7. He would be unlikely to win Hispanics and Latinos in Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada, and would likely lose those states.

8. Christie might win New Hampshire and Ohio, and Iowa, potentially, but that would give him only 28 more electoral votes than Mitt Romney, a total of only 234.

9. Christie’s handling of the Hurricane Sandy situation helped him at that point, but will be forgotten by 2016, and will hurt him among mainstream conservatives, angry that he cooperated with President Obama, and took attention off Mitt Romney.

10.Christie is unacceptable on “social issues’ for his party base, issues such as abortion rights, gun control and acceptance of gay rights, although opposing instituting gay marriage in in New Jersey.

11. Christie has no background or experience in foreign policy, and imagine his personality on the international scene, where with his big mouth, he could cause grief in diplomacy big time! A gruff bully, which Christie is, is not fit to be President of the United States, although it may please the anti foreign tendencies of his party, who think the world is inferior to American “exceptionalism”!

12. This final point is not said in jest or ridicule, or designed as an insult, but to believe that we are going to elect a President as large as William Howard Taft in modern times is to believe in miracles, as Christie is a terrible model for health and physical fitness, and that will be to his detriment, right or wrong, in a Presidential campaign!

So forget about Christie’s own delusions of grandeur, as he is NOT going to be President of the United States in 2017!