Yesterday morning the Lee Monument, the last major and most prominent celebration of the Lost Cause, was removed. Virginia and Richmond have now truly embraced the 21st Century.
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Lee Monument Removed
Photo Credit: Bob Brown/Times Dispatch
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Democratic Lawmakers Threaten Spending Bill Over SALT Cap Repeal
Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay Tax that man behind the tree. As Congress works to pass a $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation package a group of “moderate” Democrats are threatening to block the spending bill unless the State and Local Tax (SALT) caps are repealed. Prior to Donald Trump’s 2017 tax law, state and local taxes were fully deductible on federal income tax returns (for itemized filers). The 2017 tax law, passed at the urging of Donald Trump, limited the SALT deduction to $10,000. This cap has long rankled Democrats elected to office in high-tax, high-spending locales such as the New York metropolitan area and San Francisco. Closer to home the cap also impacts people living in Virginia’s high-cost, high-tax areas like Northern Virginia. (more…)
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Former Norfolk Sheriff Convicted of Fraud and Bribery
Former Norfolk Sheriff Bob McCabe by Dick Hall-Sizemore
Here is another name to add to the list of corrupt public officials — former Norfolk Sheriff Bob McCabe.
Earlier this week, a federal jury convicted him of all 11 counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. The charges covered actions committed over a 22-year period. They included accepting gift cards to expensive restaurants, Redskins tickets, free catering for his annual golf tournament, an all-expenses paid trip to Nashville, “loans” that were never repaid, and thousands of dollars in cash to spend during casino trips. He was also charged with providing inside information to select companies seeking contracts with the sheriff’s office.
Testifying in his defense at his trial, McCabe admitted to violating campaign finance laws, but claimed it was not intentional. “I just didn’t pay attention to them like I should have.” He also admitted getting loans and gifts from businessmen who had multi-million dollar contracts with the city’s jail, but insisted, “I’ve never taken a bribe in my life.” The “loans” and gifts were because they were friends, he insisted. (more…)
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Driving While Black Redux
by Dick Hall-SizemoreSome participants on this blog have voiced skepticism regarding the claim that Black drivers are more likely than white drivers to be pulled over by law enforcement. Jim Bacon even went to great lengths to demonstrate that it was difficult to determine the race of a driver in a moving vehicle. These skeptics have called for some data to support the claim, rather than relying on single egregious incidents such as the one that occurred in Windsor last year.
That data is now available and it supports the hypothesis that Black drivers are more likely than white ones to be stopped for traffic infractions.
Using recently available data from the Dept. of State Police, the Richmond Times Dispatch has calculated that “drivers who are Black are 1.6 times more likely to be stopped than white drivers based on their respective populations. And once stopped, Black drivers are 1.6 times more likely to have their car searched than white drivers and 1.3 times as likely to be arrested.” (more…)
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Horse Play
A herd of horses live on Shackleford Banks, a barrier island near Beaufort, N.C., where the Bacon family is vacationing. The horses do not comprise a thundering herd of popular imagination, rather they are dispersed in small groups — “harems” — with a stallion, two or three breeding mares, and their colts. Five or six of these groups reside in the eastern tip we visited, along with a few unaffiliated mares too old to breed and young stallions who have not succeeded in winning the affections of any females. (more…)
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Sunset: Beauford, N.C.
The Bacon family is on vacation this week in Beaufort, N.C. Blogging will be sparse.
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Praxis Circle’s Newest Contributor: Ross Mackenzie, Genuine Journalist!
Praxis Circle is a nonprofit that helps its members build their worldview primarily through courses and thought-provoking interviews of our many contributors. We are delighted to welcome our newest Expert Contributor Ross Mackenzie, former editorial-page editor of The Richmond Times-Dispatch!As the editor of the Editorial Page for almost forty years and as a syndicated columnist, Ross wrote over 22,000 editorials and columns. The Washington Post even once called him “the most feared journalist in Virginia” due to his “fearless” style.
Our interview with Ross is wide-ranging and insightful, moving from his education and the influences on his life and work, through his views on everything from communism to the impact of the 1960’s on the U.S. today, and closing with the revelation of whether he is optimistic or pessimistic about America’s future. For those of you who are worried that America is going over a cliff, Ross offers comfort with his observations about how things really haven’t changed much in certain important ways since the 1980’s.
*** sponsored content *** (more…)
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Jeanine’s Memes
Jeanine’s Sunday memes from The Bull Elephant
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Campaign Finance Reform in Virginia – the New Governor Must Lead
by James C. Sherlock
I consider campaign finance reform the foremost issue facing representative government in Virginia.We are one of only a few states with no campaign donations limits at all. We pay for that in legislation enacted and not enacted because of the preferences of huge donors. And in the stink of legal public corruption.
It also drives way up the cost of running and keeps good people from participating.
The new governor will have to lead. (more…)
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Redistricting is Working – Sen. Barker Threatens to Resign
by James C. SherlockSomething must be going right. Sen. George Barker, D-Alexandria, has threatened to resign. Seems he is unable, at least so far, to pick his voters in the redistricting process.
Virginia’s new bipartisan redistricting commission is working the details with two months to complete its work.
Barker is on that commission. But he lives in Clifton, at the western tip of the current 39th Senate district. Oops.
His current 39th Senate District (pictured above) resembles a golf driver in which he lives in the toe. But his comfortable Democratic margins live in the shaft of the 39th that reaches all the way into Alexandria.
As a matter of fact, the state’s Democrats are packed so thickly in Northern Virginia that geographically compact districts can produce fewer, not more, Democrats in the General Assembly.
So they won’t be geographically compact. But Sen. Barker apparently lives too far from the main Democratic vein to merit an exception. (more…)
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Republican Senator Quits Redistricting Commission
Sen. Steve Newman (R-Lynchburg) Photo Credit: Bob Brown/Times Dispatch by Dick Hall-Sizemore
Sen. Steve Newman (R-Lynchburg) has resigned from the Virginia Redistricting Commission. He was one of two Republican Senators appointed to the Commission.
Newman did not give any reasons for his decision. However, it is difficult to think it was not out of personal pique at the turn the decision process has taken. As I detailed in my last post, the bipartisan co-chairs announced in their August 23 meeting a policy forbidding individual commissioners from communicating with the Commission’s partisan attorneys and map drawers outside of a public meeting or without all the members being aware of the communication and any questions and of the response. This policy largely negates the decisions previously made by the Commission and vigorously pushed by Newman: two sets of partisan attorneys, two sets of map drawers, consideration of political data, and consideration of incumbents’ addresses. Newman was the most outspoken member opposed to the new protocol. The recent revealing by the map drawers of proposed Senate districts for Northern Virginia must have been the last straw. They were developed without taking incumbents’ addresses into consideration. Any attempted tinkering with those boundaries will have to occur in public session, presumably subject to a series of votes. (more…)
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Robert E. Lee and the Race Obsession
by Phil LeighRichmond’s Monument Avenue is the latest consequence of a culture obsessed with imaginary systemic racism. Presently, the only legal systemic racism is fifty years of Affirmative Action, which benefits minority races. According to black Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Shelby Steele, Affirmative Action was the first of a long chain of futile initiatives prompted by white guilt to lift blacks out of poverty. All failed because their true motivation was to provide the ruling white elites the moral authority to continue governing.
Affirmative Action never closed the academic performance gap, and government housing forced black fathers out of the home. Instead of promoting self-reliance in the black community, these policies discouraged it. They were, however, habit forming bribes for black votes. Confederate statue destruction is merely the latest bribe. Although chiefly a symbolic gesture, it is vote and donor magnet for race-hustling politicians and “activists.” Razing Monument Avenue statues will do nothing to lift black self-esteem, but it may deepen the racial divide with those who admire Robert E. Lee’s leadership qualities. (more…)
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UVa, COVID, and Jim Ryan’s $200,000 Bonus
Source: University of Virginia COVID Tracker by James A. Bacon
Like many other University of Virginia alumni, I was taken aback to hear that the Board of Visitors had granted President Jim Ryan a $200,000 bonus for the great job UVa had done in addressing the COVID-19 epidemic.
Rector Whittington Clement put it this way: “When the situation this year became clearer and we had a highly successful handling of COVID-19, we think the University did as well as, if not better, than any institution of higher learning in making the adjustments necessary to COVID-19, we thought that it was appropriate to give him a bonus.”
I don’t want to prejudge whether Team Ryan has done a great job of addressing COVID-19 or not. To be sure, UVa has resumed in-person learning, but it also has instituted a draconian lockdown, including mandated vaccination for students, the unenrollment of those who did not comply, mask wearing required both indoors and outdoors, and mandated isolation and quarantine for those who test positive and/or been exposed. UVa is a laboratory testbed for the individual-liberties-be-damned approach to public health that some would like to see for the entire country. (more…)
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COVID, Vaccinations and Risk
Vaccine doses received Pfizer, Moderna and JJ). Source Virginia Department of Health. by James A. Bacon
A new feature of the Virginia Department of Health’s COVID-19 dashboard compares the rate of infections, hospitalizations and deaths among vaccinated and unvaccinated people. We’ll get to that in just a moment. By way of preface, it’s worth noting that every Virginian who wants the vaccine has it.
The graph above shows the number of vaccines given since December 1. Shots given declined to almost zero in July and early August. As the Delta variant created a new surge in infections, a few hold-outs began getting the jab. At this point in time, about 4.9 million Virginians — about 57% of the population — are described as “fully” vaccinated. That number is not likely to change much, although the classification of “fully” vaccinated could change as vaccinations lose their potency and we are urged to get boosters.
Maybe the numbers that follow will jar some of the hitherto unwilling into thinking differently about the risks they face. The next chart shows the differences in the COVID infection rates broken down by vaccination status: fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated, and unvaccinated. (more…)
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Maybe the Redistricting Commission is Working Out After All
These maps compare the existing state Senate districts in Northern Virginia with one of two draft maps submitted to the Virginia Redistricting Commission. Source: The Virginia Mercury In two recent articles in Bacon’s Rebellion, Dick Hall-Sizemore has thoroughly documented the sausage-making that has gone into the Virginia Redistricting Commission. It’s ugly, and it’s discouraging, and makes you wonder if there is any hope for humanity. But the release of two draft maps shows what the new districts could look like. The maps above, taken from The Virginia Mercury, show a proposed re-write of state senatorial districts in Northern Virginia that was submitted to the Commission.
It is a thing of beauty.
Without knowing the partisan implications — do the new boundaries throw incumbent legislators in the same district, do Republicans or Democrats gain ground or lose it? — who wouldn’t prefer the redrawn districts? Who wouldn’t prefer a system where the citizens pick their representatives over one where the politicians pick their citizens?
— JAB
Update: The Virginia Public Access Project reproduces the Republican and Democratic drafts for both Senate and House districts here.
