I Was Wrong- Neither Scott Taylor nor Randy Forbes is Fit for Congress

Scott Taylor - Randy Forbes

UPDATED 5-4-16: Today Del. Scott Taylor proved that he is no real friend to the LGBT community by endorsing Donald Trump and suggesting to me that he was merely playing some of us in the LGBT community for fools, yours truly included.   Here's part of a press statement released by Taylor today:

I look forward to running with Donald Trump in November's general election. I encourage Second District Republicans to rally around Trump to help win Virginia for the GOP. The thought of a Hillary Clinton presidency should shock and scare every thoughtful American who knows our country is headed in the wrong direction. I will work with Donald Trump to put America first and get our economy growing again.

I retract my previous post:

Disclaimer: Randy Forbes was a law school classmate of mine.  Over the years, he has become less and less mainstream and hardly resembles the person I once knew. His main agenda in Congress has been far right wing and some of his pro-Christian extremist positions have subjected the Hampton Roads area to ridicule. 

The upcoming primary that will determine the for the Republican candidate for Virginia's 2nd District this November is an opportunity to send homophobic, theocracy loving, do nothing Congressman Randy Forbes into political retirement. Other than backing extreme Christian right efforts in Congress and enjoying the perks of being a member of Congress, Forbes has little to show for his years in Congress. 

Most ridiculous of all, when the Virginia 4th District which Forbes has represented since 2001 was reconfigured after federal courts found it and the 3rd District to have been illegally gerrymandered, Forbes opted not to run for reelection in the 4th District - fearing he would lose now that the district wasn't hand tailored to guarantee him  victory - to run in the Virginia 2nd District where the incumbent, Scott Rigell, is retiring.  What is shocking is that Forbes doesn't live in the 2nd District, has few ties to it, and is only ostensible renting an apartment to put some fig leaf over the fact that he doesn't live in or care about the 2nd District.  For Forbes, it's all about hanging onto the perks and salary of a member of Congress.

As the Virginian Pilot reports, Forbes has a huge amount of money compared to his challengers for the GOP nomination - his chief opponent is Del. Scott Taylor - and basically hopes to buy himself the 2nd District seat which leans Republican in elections.  In contrast to Forbes, Scott Taylor is forward thinking, supportive of equality for all - including the LGBT community - and wants to move the country forward rather than return it to the 1950's as Forbes continually seeks to do.  The 2nd District needs a representative that will represent all residents of the 2nd District rather than only right wing extremists  - Right Wing Watch has often reported on the batshit crazy bills and resolutions favored by Forbes.

I urge readers who live in the 2nd District to make sure they are registered and to vote in the GOP primary later this year and to vote against Forbes - and preferably for Taylor who has even been a sponsor of HR Pride.  Here are details from the Pilot on how Forbes hopes to buy the 2nd District for himself:

Even with the heavy spending, Forbes still had $875,406 cash on hand April 1 because he entered the race with a large campaign fund in place before he decided to leave the 4th. By comparison, Scott had $53,087 on hand April 1 and Cardwell, $9,519.

The winner of the GOP primary will compete in November against Democrat Shaun Brown of Hampton who entered the race near the end of the FEC reporting period. No financial information was available Friday.

If the 2nd District is to be represented by a Republican, it should be Taylor or someone who grasps that it is now the 21st century, not 1950, and who will not focus their efforts on blocking progress and granting special rights and privileges to right wing Christians at the expense of other citizens.

Daily Press Slams Randy Forbes; Forbes to Disingenuously Rent Apartment in Virginia Beach

4th District Congressman Randy Forbes who seeks to be a carpetbagger in Virginia Beach

My former law school classmate Randy Forbes continues to show the extent to which some elected officials will go to put their personal interests ahead the interests and well being of their constituents. Two stories looks at Forbes' self-centered agenda.  First, WAVY- looks at Forbes' plan to rent an apartment  in Virginia Beach in lieu of purchasing a home in the 2nd Congressional District (can we say cheap?) so that he can claim with at least a somewhat straight face that he lives in the District even though 100% of his past ties are in Chesapeake/.the 4th District.   The second piece is an editorial from the Daily Press which basically rips Forbes a new one.  Here are highlights from the WAVY TV piece:

10 On Your Side has confirmed Congressman Randy Forbes (R) 4th District is now in the process of renting an apartment in Virginia Beach.

His Campaign office told WAVY Forbes and his wife “have put down a security deposit and look forward to spending a great deal of time there.”

Forbes’ Communiction Director Hailey Sadler did not say where the apartment is.  Three sources confirm Forbes is getting an apartment at the Mayflower Apartments on 34th Street. Mayflower would neither confirm nor deny the Forbes application to rent an apartment.

Hailey Sadler also says, “Randy and Shirley intend to retain their generational home nine miles outside of Virginia Beach.”

That house is located in Chesapeake in Forbes current district.

Congressman Forbes is switching districts from the 4th where he lives in his Chesapeake home to the 2nd which represents mostly Virginia Beach.

He is running against Delegate Scott Taylor/(R) 85th. Taylor responded to our story “His first political plan of abandoning his people for a better district while living in Chesapeake has failed. Now he wants to try to deceive everyone by renting an apartment? Everyone knows Randy Forbes lives in a big house in Chesapeake, not a small apartment in Virginia Beach.”

It is unsure whether Forbes can and will move his voting precinct to Virginia Beach.

Del. Taylor has repeatedly said, “How can you vote for Randy Forbes who can’t even vote for himself?”

While I generally shun Republicans, it should be noted that Forbes's opponent for the GOP nomination, Del. Scott Taylor, is one of the few Republicans in the Virginia General Assembly who is NOT a homophobe.  Meanwhile. an editorial in the Daily Press slammed Forbes for his shameless opportunism and desire to stay in offence at the cost of the best interests of his constituents.  Here are excerpts:

Instead of a district that resembles a squashed salamander and purports to say bits and pieces of Newport News, Norfolk and Richmond connected by strips of mud along the James River shore make up a community, we will get something different from redistricting.

It's a basic question when lawyers look into something: Who gains?

Lawyers, being lawyers, have to ask it in Latin — they say "Cui bono" — but the point can't be obscured by a dead language. And the point was clear as Fourth grade English when the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments about the court-ordered redrawing of the 3rd Congressional District last week.

Who benefits if the Supreme Court eventually throws out the redistricting?

Members of Congress. The one name that kept coming up in last week's arguments before the Supreme Court was Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Chesapeake.

The lawyer for the Virginia members of Congress who challenged the lower court's redistricting argued several times that redrawing the map injured Rep. Forbes.

"Every time your district is changed and you believe it hurts you, you have a right to go to court and say what?" Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked at one point.

"He suffered injury-in-fact to what?" asked Justice Anthony Kennedy, referring to Rep. Forbes.

"To his ability to be re-elected," the delegation's lawyer said.  Huh?

So members of Congress are special. Their rights to that $174,000-a-year gig, and to districts carefully crafted to ensure re-election, are different than yours. Your right, that is, to a vote that matters to our Capitol Hill solons, most of whom romped home to re-election in 2014 with a 20-percentage-point margin from their carefully gerrymandered districts.

Here's the dirty little secret about congressional redistricting in Virginia: The General Assembly enacts it, but it does so with the wishes of members of Congress uppermost in its mind.

And now there's this: Risking an election loss is an injury — an injury! — to our professional politicians.  Nonsense.

The real injury lies in an environment where politicians don't risk losing elections.  The injured parties here are Virginia voters. We're injured when elected officials no longer have to listen to us because they are so secure in their seats.

Ouch!  But the truth is that the editorial is 100% on point.  Forbes has no right to be assured of re-election.  For years he has had a handcrafted safe seat which has allowed him to be re-elected while doing little or nothing for his constituents and pandering to the most lunatic fringes of the Christofascists in the GOP base.  It is far past time that Forbes be forced to participate in a competitive nomination and election process.  If the voters don't want the theocratic crap that he is peddling, then he deserves to be defeated and forced from office.  

Liz Cheney Quits Wyoming Senate Race

Perhaps realizing that she was going to go down in a humiliating defeat, Liz Chaney - who I consider to be one nasty bitch - has abruptly pulled out of the Wyoming GOP senatorial primary race.  Chaney, who seems to be the female version of her evil father, cited undefined family health issues as a motivation.  Time will tell if this is truly the case or whether she finally figured out that she was viewed as a carpetbagger and was not wanted by Wyoming Republicans.  Here are excerpts from a New York Times story:

Liz Cheney announced early Monday morning that she is withdrawing from the Wyoming Republican Senate primary, bringing an abrupt end to her unsteady challenge to the incumbent, Michael B. Enzi.

“Serious health issues have recently arisen in our family, and under the circumstances, I have decided to discontinue my campaign,” Ms. Cheney said in a statement. “My children and their futures were the motivation for our campaign and their health and well-being will always be my overriding priority.”

Since Ms. Cheney, 47, the former vice president’s elder daughter, declared her candidacy in July against Mr. Enzi — a well-liked, three-term Senate veteran —she not only never found traction but also wound up causing deep rifts among longtime friends and even within her own family. 

Her task was always going to be difficult. Unlike some of the other sitting Republican senators who have been challenged in primaries in recent years, Mr. Enzi has a solidly conservative voting record and did not present the sort of vulnerabilities Ms. Cheney could exploit. But Ms. Cheney never was able to focus much on her opponent, spending much of her five-month candidacy fending off distractions to her campaign. 

Having relocated from suburban Washington to the Jackson Hole area in 2012, she faced relentless questions about her residency and why she would move to the state her father once represented in Congress and almost immediately begin running for office against an incumbent. Longtime friends of the Cheney family in Wyoming, including former Senator Alan K. Simpson, fretted publicly about such a divisive primary. His open expressions of concern prompted a private rebuke from Liz Cheney’s mother, Lynne, who told him to “shut up,” according to Mr. Simpson. 

The perception of Liz Cheney as a carpetbagger was compounded when it was revealed this summer in the Wyoming news media that she had sought a fishing license — a rite of passage in the state — by claiming on her application to be a 10-year resident.

Further, in an interview with The New York Times, Mary Cheney revealed that she had not spoken to her sister in months and that they would not be spending the holidays together. That prompted Dick and Lynne Cheney to issue a statement, which seemed to take Liz’s side in the dispute, affirming that their elder daughter was in fact opposed to same-sex marriage. 

Liz Cheney, thanks to some help from her father, had raised $1 million for her campaign in the first months of her candidacy, allowing her to air a pair of introductory television ads that emphasized her family’s deep roots in Wyoming. A “super PAC” supporting Ms. Cheney was also set up and began to raise money. 

Ms. Cheney’s sudden withdrawal, first reported Sunday by CNN, was indeed dramatic — as much of the short-lived campaign had been. But not for reasons she or her parents would have liked. A campaign meant to carry on the Cheney banner of pugnacious conservatism, especially on national security, offered a vivid reminder about the limitations of transferring political power. 

Good riddance and, if the country is lucky, she will fade into the political wilderness.