My letter to the editor of the Richmond Register granted me space in the newspaper to talk to voters about digging deep to elect a true citizen statesman.
You can view it here
Challenging Andy Barr
Showing posts with label KY. Show all posts
Showing posts with label KY. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 8, 2017
Thursday, December 8, 2016
My Corrupt Hometown
I moved out of my hometown of Irvine Kentucky about 3 months ago. I've moved about 20 miles to the West in Richmond Kentucky. Today from Kentucky state auditor Mike Harmon released a report pertaining to details of possible fraud inadequate leadership and other correct Behavior out of the city hall of my hometown of Irvine.
https://twitter.com/KyAuditorHarmon/status/806883388900700160
Having spent the majority of my adult life living in Estill County where Irvine is the county seat, it is no surprise to me that this has finally been exposed and it is my hope that people go to jail over this because we are not a rich City taxpayers have been violated and people must pay the price. just a reminder of what I gave a speech of pertaining to this exact thing.
https://twitter.com/KyAuditorHarmon/status/806883388900700160
Having spent the majority of my adult life living in Estill County where Irvine is the county seat, it is no surprise to me that this has finally been exposed and it is my hope that people go to jail over this because we are not a rich City taxpayers have been violated and people must pay the price. just a reminder of what I gave a speech of pertaining to this exact thing.
Sunday, October 16, 2016
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Tuesday, August 9, 2016
Meeting KY-6 District US House Rep Andy Barr
Tonight I met for the first time, My US House Representative Andy Barr. However, to properly tell this story, I must go back in time. I was excited in 2012 when someone I’ve never heard of named Andy Barr beat career politician and Nancy Pelosi momma boy Ben Chandler. It wasn’t even a close victory.
Little by little as time passed and I dug into the voting record of Andy Barr, I became discouraged because he had cast votes for legislation and spending bills that I felt violated my beliefs in limited government and fiscal conservativism. I felt that he had went against the tea party constitutional principles he had ran on. I felt compelled to even research all of the bills voted on by the US House in 2013 to compare his votes to KY-4 district Congressman Thomas Massie. What I found was that Barr had voted the same as Massie 77% of the time. For a long time after that, I had let the 23% compel me to post negative comments about him on social media like Twitter and Facebook. I never heard anything from Barr, no response of any kind. I chalked it up to another sell out congressman that really doesn’t care about their constituents. I even made an effort to gather support to challenge him for his seat.
Fast forward to tonight, as people were mingling with fellow conservatives and meeting with other elected republicans such as Kentucky Lt. Governor Hampton, and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul at a fundraiser for Republican for State House 81st district C. Wesley Morgan. I caught up to Congressman Barr and asked to take a selfie with him. After accepting, he immediately stated that he recognized me and my name from all the tweets regarding votes such as the “Cromnibus” or the Continuing Resolution Omnibus spending bill. He understood completely the frustrations I had with him and we spoke at length about why he voted the way he did. After meeting Congressman Barr, I can confidently say that I will still disagree with him on things, but tonight he earned my vote in November.
Little by little as time passed and I dug into the voting record of Andy Barr, I became discouraged because he had cast votes for legislation and spending bills that I felt violated my beliefs in limited government and fiscal conservativism. I felt that he had went against the tea party constitutional principles he had ran on. I felt compelled to even research all of the bills voted on by the US House in 2013 to compare his votes to KY-4 district Congressman Thomas Massie. What I found was that Barr had voted the same as Massie 77% of the time. For a long time after that, I had let the 23% compel me to post negative comments about him on social media like Twitter and Facebook. I never heard anything from Barr, no response of any kind. I chalked it up to another sell out congressman that really doesn’t care about their constituents. I even made an effort to gather support to challenge him for his seat.
Fast forward to tonight, as people were mingling with fellow conservatives and meeting with other elected republicans such as Kentucky Lt. Governor Hampton, and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul at a fundraiser for Republican for State House 81st district C. Wesley Morgan. I caught up to Congressman Barr and asked to take a selfie with him. After accepting, he immediately stated that he recognized me and my name from all the tweets regarding votes such as the “Cromnibus” or the Continuing Resolution Omnibus spending bill. He understood completely the frustrations I had with him and we spoke at length about why he voted the way he did. After meeting Congressman Barr, I can confidently say that I will still disagree with him on things, but tonight he earned my vote in November.
Congressman Andy Barr and I
Sunday, July 31, 2016
Friday, July 29, 2016
Thursday, July 28, 2016
Saturday, March 5, 2016
The Lone #RandPaul Vote
Yesterday I participated with both of my parents in Kentucky's first Republican Presidential Caucus. We had to go to Jackson County about 30 miles away from where we live in Estill County to participate. While it was an inconvenience, it was exciting. It would turn out that Donald Trump would win the Kentucky Caucus. However, one big thing caught my eye! On an interactive map from WKYT.com I was able to find out that I had cast the only vote for sitting Senator Rand Paul in the entire county. Out of hundreds that participated, I was the only one to cast a vote for the most principled defender of our US Constitution on the ballot. Yes Dr. Paul had suspended his presidential campaign in the 24 hours following the Iowa Caucus, but he was the only individual on that ballot deserving of my vote. I have always believed that standing on your principles meant doing so in successes, in failures, and when you are all alone. I was truly all alone in voting for Senator Rand Paul.
Showing Rand Paul in Estill County with One Lone Vote
Showing my GOP Kentucky Caucus Ballot
I am not ashamed of my vote, nor am I going to feel anything but proud of my lone stance. I have believed in Senator Rand Paul before he was ever elected. He was the very first politician I ever came across that was genuine, REAL. He was the first person that didnt promise me things or tell me things I wanted to hear for the sake of a vote. He was the reason I came to be a strong supporter of the US Constitution and strive for Liberty and Freedom. He was the reason I evolved from just being a regular Republican. I stand with Rand Paul. I will always stand with Rand Paul. Even when Im Alone, and I just proved it.
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Did #RandPaul's Hometown #GOP Party Just Try To Torpedo His Campaign?
This goes beyond ridiculousness in politics today. Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, a Republican, running for office has just been attacked by Scott Lasley who heads the Warren County Kentucky GOP. Warren County is where Senator Paul resides today in Bowling Green, Kentucky. The attack? Its over 200,000 dollars that was meant to be transferred from Senator Paul to the Kentucky GOP to pay for making the GOP in the state a caucus state in 2016 versus a primary state. This is being setup so that Senator Paul can still run for office of the Presidency and the Senate in Kentucky..Current State law prohibits candidates from appearing more than once on the same ballot. In an article in the Lexington Herald Leader link listed below
http://www.kentucky.com/2015/08/18/3994360_despite-telling-republicans-otherwise.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&rh=1
Written by Sam Youngman, Scott Lasley states "seems to be creating some confusion" in reference to the Rand Paul mailer that had gone out to voters. Lasley also stated "As of last Friday, it was my understanding that the money had not yet been transferred."
This causes me to take to twitter over the last couple of days to ask Scott Lasley and the Warren County GOP if they are purposely trying to torpedo Rand's campaign? The Kentucky GOP knew that any money that was to come from Senator Paul was contingent on the party passing caucus rules so that he could run for both offices in Kentucky. As of this blog posting...They had not. It should be noted that neither Lasley nor the Warren County GOP have responded to my multiple requests for explanations on twitter.
MORE TO COME!
http://www.kentucky.com/2015/08/18/3994360_despite-telling-republicans-otherwise.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&rh=1
Written by Sam Youngman, Scott Lasley states "seems to be creating some confusion" in reference to the Rand Paul mailer that had gone out to voters. Lasley also stated "As of last Friday, it was my understanding that the money had not yet been transferred."
This causes me to take to twitter over the last couple of days to ask Scott Lasley and the Warren County GOP if they are purposely trying to torpedo Rand's campaign? The Kentucky GOP knew that any money that was to come from Senator Paul was contingent on the party passing caucus rules so that he could run for both offices in Kentucky. As of this blog posting...They had not. It should be noted that neither Lasley nor the Warren County GOP have responded to my multiple requests for explanations on twitter.
MORE TO COME!
Friday, May 15, 2015
2015 #KentuckyGovernor Blog Exclusive
On May 19th, Kentuckians will go to the polls to vote and one of those will be to determine who will be the Democratic and Republican party nominee for Governor. As I always encourage people to be well informed on the issues and the candidates, I wanted to put together a series of questions that were likely to not be part of any arranged debate or you would hear on TV/Radio. I extended invitations on social media to the four GOP Candidates of Matt Bevin, Hal Heiner, James Comer and Will T. Scott. What ended up happening was Drew Curtis an Independent party candidate saw my attempts and decided that he would offer to participate too, Very appreciative, I went ahead and sent him the same questions that I would have asked the others. As this week wore on, Hal Heiner's staff responded to me to send them the questions. Then Matt Bevin's staff contacted me to say they would like to participate as well. Will T Scott and James Comer never replied to my repeated requests. The deadline for participation in this blog post was 7pm EDT Today. As of writing this post, only Independent candidate Drew Curtis successfully submitted replies to the questions asked. This is disappointing because I wanted the readers especially those in Kentucky to see comparisons of responses in order to better distinguish differences between candidates. If Matt Bevin or Hal Heiner end up submitting responses they will be included in a later post. Without further ado, I will list each question along with Curtis' response.
1. The Second Amendment to the US Constitution is very clear that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Question is where do you stand on individual states having laws on the books that infringe on the individual's right to keep and bear arms?
I'm big on separating "Issues" from solutions so let me take this one apart - the real problem is gun violence not guns. I am not aware of any workable US-based solutions to gun violence that involve infringing on individual's right to keep and bear arms.
This would effectively make me a second amendment advocate if we were just talking vanilla "issues". I'm explaining my thought process here because I want people to know I don't have stances, I've actually thought about these things.
A more effective way to prevent gun violence would be to deal with the root causes - starting with mental illness. Laws against guns have no impact on mental illness. I am not in favor of overly broad or ineffective laws.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? I'm expecting no bills impacting gun ownership will escape the Senate. I'm not sure anyone even tried to file one in 2015? I would love for them to work on mental illness as an issue.
2. There are laws in the KRS that promote inequality as far as ballot access is concerned. For certain offices, Democrats and Republicans need only 2 votes to gain access to the ballot, all others need 5000 signatures to gain access to the ballot. What would you do as Governor to promote a remedy for this?
As the only candidate impacted by this, here is a bit of good news - initially I thought that having to get 5,000 signatures would be a burden, but it turns out it's actually been a useful way to engage people early in the process. It's not great, mind you, but it's not as bad as I thought.
I'd probably reduce it down to 1,000 signatures if anything, then require even party candidates to obtain them.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? I'm pretty sure neither party has any interest in allowing candidates to get elected without party help. So this is likely moot as well (although I wouldn't mind some discussion around it)
3. The state of Kentucky saw during the last US Senate Race that KET a publically funded Television Network decide who got to participate in the debate hosted based on THEIR view of who was most popular. What would you do to encourage Frankfort to pass laws forcing ALL Media outlets and ALL publically funded institutions hosting political debates to welcome ALL appearing on the ballot to participate?
I've been thinking a lot about this and I honestly don't know what a better set of guidelines would look like. Personally I'd start by talking to KET about why and how they produced their current list of rules to understand what they're trying to accomplish.
At any rate, Kentucky Sports Radio's debate was by far and away the best debate.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? As I said before, I'm pretty sure neither party has any interest in allowing candidates to get elected without party help. They enjoy their two-party debate duopoly and there's no way they're willing to give it up.
4. Where do you stand on when a human life begins?
Age 22 right after college?
I hit Google to see if there was any consensus - there isn't. Additionally, I think that question continues to get more complicated as medical advancements continue, and I know that different religious and spiritual traditions also have varied answers on this topic. I don't think people will ever all agree. I certainly don't know the answer.
I therefore fall back on supporting individual rights, and think that people should make private medical decisions based on their own conscience and the medical advice of their doctors. That's also my answer on medical marijuana by the way. It's also Bevin's answer on medical marijuana I believe.
Abortions are like guns - no one wants a lot of them around but once in awhile you need one.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? Nothing - the House kills all bills relating to this issue in committee.
5. In 2011, Democrats in Wisconsin literally fled the state in order to avoid voting on legislation that they knew that they could not defeat that would weaken the power of Labor Unions in that state. What would you as Governor do to protect the citizens of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from such political maneuvers that leaves citizens from having proper representation in Frankfort?
As Governor you must act within the law, and from a practical standpoint there is an item in the KY state constitution that prevents anyone from impeding the movement of a legislator during session. I only found out about this when a legislator used it to get out of a DUI this year. So we can't prevent what happened in Wisconsin from happening here. It's stupid but constitutional.
I would hope this specific example would take care of itself in the following election cycle - if voters have a problem with that kind of extreme behavior by legislators they can vote those individuals out of office. I would.
As for stopping other potential political maneuvers, I'd have to see what those look like first. That's not a dodge by the way, I don't think we can predict anything rising to that level.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? No idea - I'll have to handle this on a case by case basis.
6. The first amendment guaranties all individuals the right to their religion. Do you believe that an individual that owns and operates their own business loses that right as part of being in business for themselves?
DREW CURTIS CHOSE TO ANSWER BOTH 6 AND 7 WITH ONE RESPONSE
7. Where do you stand on legislation such as Smoking Bans? Should private business owners not have the ability to decide for themselves if they want to allow smoking just as individual customers have the ability to decide if they want to enter an establishment that allows smoking? Also do you believe that e-cigarettes/vaping should be a part of such legislation since the end product is not smoke rather than vapor as harmless as steam from something out of the microwave.
This is actually the same question - when should the government impose its will on a large group of people for the betterment of society? My answer is I'd rather avoid this whenever possible - but any discussions should involve all stakeholders up front.
The real question is -how- should we construct law? People ask me if I'm in favor of a Religious Freedom Act - my response is which one? Compare Indiana's to Utah's - they both do the same thing, but in Utah it started when the LDS church engaged the LGBT community and came up with wording amicable to all parties. Indiana's version had a loophole you could drive a truck through - namely "belief" being the requisite reason to do -anything- (which is impossible to prove) and requiring the state to provide a reason for having vested interest to stop you from doing it. Which among other things legalizes Sharia law and the Church of Cannabis, two things I guarantee the law's originators were not in favor of. Indiana wrote a law that sucked and had far-ranging unintended consequences baked in.
I'm a big believer in defaults - so on the question of smoking, I believe that a smoking ban should default to -on- with an opt-out for businesses that wish to allow smoking (I'm thinking cigar bars in particular). And I'd recommend the legislature start looking around for what other states have tried to see if there are any solutions there.
On the issue of religious beliefs of businesses - seems to me legally you could make a case that a sole-proprietorship might be able to have beliefs because legally the business and the owner are the same entity. Which is dangerous from a personal legal liability standpoint but people are welcome to do whatever they want there.
However corporations of any other structure can not and do not have legal beliefs.
What am I likely to see hit my desk?
Smoking - doesn't ever seem to pass each year, offhand I don't recall which side of the legislature kills it. If I ever got one, I'd have to decide based on the specific wording. Maybe adding opt-outs would make it more likely to pass whichever chamber keeps killing it?
Relgious Freedom - same answer. Because an exact copy of Utah's would have the best chance of surviving scrutiny, I'd advise the legislators to check it out. An exact copy of Indiana's would be vetoed instantly.
I would again like to thank Drew Curtis for his responses to these questions. I also appreciate Matt Bevin and Hal Heiner for at least getting back with me even though they did not meet the deadline set to be included in this post. Please Kentuckians do not go to the polls without being educated on the candidates available to you. You can find out more about Drew Curtis at his website www.DrewCurtis.com
1. The Second Amendment to the US Constitution is very clear that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Question is where do you stand on individual states having laws on the books that infringe on the individual's right to keep and bear arms?
I'm big on separating "Issues" from solutions so let me take this one apart - the real problem is gun violence not guns. I am not aware of any workable US-based solutions to gun violence that involve infringing on individual's right to keep and bear arms.
This would effectively make me a second amendment advocate if we were just talking vanilla "issues". I'm explaining my thought process here because I want people to know I don't have stances, I've actually thought about these things.
A more effective way to prevent gun violence would be to deal with the root causes - starting with mental illness. Laws against guns have no impact on mental illness. I am not in favor of overly broad or ineffective laws.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? I'm expecting no bills impacting gun ownership will escape the Senate. I'm not sure anyone even tried to file one in 2015? I would love for them to work on mental illness as an issue.
2. There are laws in the KRS that promote inequality as far as ballot access is concerned. For certain offices, Democrats and Republicans need only 2 votes to gain access to the ballot, all others need 5000 signatures to gain access to the ballot. What would you do as Governor to promote a remedy for this?
As the only candidate impacted by this, here is a bit of good news - initially I thought that having to get 5,000 signatures would be a burden, but it turns out it's actually been a useful way to engage people early in the process. It's not great, mind you, but it's not as bad as I thought.
I'd probably reduce it down to 1,000 signatures if anything, then require even party candidates to obtain them.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? I'm pretty sure neither party has any interest in allowing candidates to get elected without party help. So this is likely moot as well (although I wouldn't mind some discussion around it)
3. The state of Kentucky saw during the last US Senate Race that KET a publically funded Television Network decide who got to participate in the debate hosted based on THEIR view of who was most popular. What would you do to encourage Frankfort to pass laws forcing ALL Media outlets and ALL publically funded institutions hosting political debates to welcome ALL appearing on the ballot to participate?
I've been thinking a lot about this and I honestly don't know what a better set of guidelines would look like. Personally I'd start by talking to KET about why and how they produced their current list of rules to understand what they're trying to accomplish.
At any rate, Kentucky Sports Radio's debate was by far and away the best debate.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? As I said before, I'm pretty sure neither party has any interest in allowing candidates to get elected without party help. They enjoy their two-party debate duopoly and there's no way they're willing to give it up.
4. Where do you stand on when a human life begins?
Age 22 right after college?
I hit Google to see if there was any consensus - there isn't. Additionally, I think that question continues to get more complicated as medical advancements continue, and I know that different religious and spiritual traditions also have varied answers on this topic. I don't think people will ever all agree. I certainly don't know the answer.
I therefore fall back on supporting individual rights, and think that people should make private medical decisions based on their own conscience and the medical advice of their doctors. That's also my answer on medical marijuana by the way. It's also Bevin's answer on medical marijuana I believe.
Abortions are like guns - no one wants a lot of them around but once in awhile you need one.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? Nothing - the House kills all bills relating to this issue in committee.
5. In 2011, Democrats in Wisconsin literally fled the state in order to avoid voting on legislation that they knew that they could not defeat that would weaken the power of Labor Unions in that state. What would you as Governor do to protect the citizens of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from such political maneuvers that leaves citizens from having proper representation in Frankfort?
As Governor you must act within the law, and from a practical standpoint there is an item in the KY state constitution that prevents anyone from impeding the movement of a legislator during session. I only found out about this when a legislator used it to get out of a DUI this year. So we can't prevent what happened in Wisconsin from happening here. It's stupid but constitutional.
I would hope this specific example would take care of itself in the following election cycle - if voters have a problem with that kind of extreme behavior by legislators they can vote those individuals out of office. I would.
As for stopping other potential political maneuvers, I'd have to see what those look like first. That's not a dodge by the way, I don't think we can predict anything rising to that level.
What am I likely to see hit my desk from the legislature? No idea - I'll have to handle this on a case by case basis.
6. The first amendment guaranties all individuals the right to their religion. Do you believe that an individual that owns and operates their own business loses that right as part of being in business for themselves?
DREW CURTIS CHOSE TO ANSWER BOTH 6 AND 7 WITH ONE RESPONSE
7. Where do you stand on legislation such as Smoking Bans? Should private business owners not have the ability to decide for themselves if they want to allow smoking just as individual customers have the ability to decide if they want to enter an establishment that allows smoking? Also do you believe that e-cigarettes/vaping should be a part of such legislation since the end product is not smoke rather than vapor as harmless as steam from something out of the microwave.
This is actually the same question - when should the government impose its will on a large group of people for the betterment of society? My answer is I'd rather avoid this whenever possible - but any discussions should involve all stakeholders up front.
The real question is -how- should we construct law? People ask me if I'm in favor of a Religious Freedom Act - my response is which one? Compare Indiana's to Utah's - they both do the same thing, but in Utah it started when the LDS church engaged the LGBT community and came up with wording amicable to all parties. Indiana's version had a loophole you could drive a truck through - namely "belief" being the requisite reason to do -anything- (which is impossible to prove) and requiring the state to provide a reason for having vested interest to stop you from doing it. Which among other things legalizes Sharia law and the Church of Cannabis, two things I guarantee the law's originators were not in favor of. Indiana wrote a law that sucked and had far-ranging unintended consequences baked in.
I'm a big believer in defaults - so on the question of smoking, I believe that a smoking ban should default to -on- with an opt-out for businesses that wish to allow smoking (I'm thinking cigar bars in particular). And I'd recommend the legislature start looking around for what other states have tried to see if there are any solutions there.
On the issue of religious beliefs of businesses - seems to me legally you could make a case that a sole-proprietorship might be able to have beliefs because legally the business and the owner are the same entity. Which is dangerous from a personal legal liability standpoint but people are welcome to do whatever they want there.
However corporations of any other structure can not and do not have legal beliefs.
What am I likely to see hit my desk?
Smoking - doesn't ever seem to pass each year, offhand I don't recall which side of the legislature kills it. If I ever got one, I'd have to decide based on the specific wording. Maybe adding opt-outs would make it more likely to pass whichever chamber keeps killing it?
Relgious Freedom - same answer. Because an exact copy of Utah's would have the best chance of surviving scrutiny, I'd advise the legislators to check it out. An exact copy of Indiana's would be vetoed instantly.
I would again like to thank Drew Curtis for his responses to these questions. I also appreciate Matt Bevin and Hal Heiner for at least getting back with me even though they did not meet the deadline set to be included in this post. Please Kentuckians do not go to the polls without being educated on the candidates available to you. You can find out more about Drew Curtis at his website www.DrewCurtis.com
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Saturday, January 17, 2015
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