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Shocking -- More Fletcher Fraud Discovered

I think we should get used to this, as we unpeel the Fletcher onion and understand the facts, not the fictions that the Fletcher-Rudolph campaign tried to spin this year as they trailed by 20 points in the polls:

Today:

"Most notably and despite claims last summer that the Medicaid budget was balanced, the truth is otherwise," Beshear said. "We are facing a current year shortfall of $389 million." About a third of that comes from general funds.

June 2007:

Medicaid Is Back In Black, Official Says

The state Medicaid program that was bleeding cash several years ago is now in the black, largely thanks to broad reforms that are beginning to take hold, Health and Family Services Secretary Mark Birdwhistell said today.

After updating a legislative committee on the progress the Medicaid program has made, Birdwhistell told reporters from the Herald-Leader and the Louisville Courier-Journal that the state will make its budget when the 2007 fiscal year ends on Saturday without having to push back some of its costs to the next budget cycle.

“We’re going to pay all the bills,” he said. “I feel very good about where we are.”

What's even more noteworthy about this dishonesty was that Fletcher named his own Chief of Staff, Stan Cave, acting budget director in September and apparently Cave's loyalty to his boss, and desperation to keep his job, trumped providing the public with honest and accurate data about the state's finances.

Crooks.

What Happened To That $700 Million Surplus Fletcher Told Us We Had Earlier This Year?

In case you weren't sure how big of a charlatan former Governor Fletcher (R) and his merry band of crooks really were:

Fletcher during the April 2007 KET Debate:

“Look at what I started off with a projected $1 billion shortfall at least by some accounting, $700 million at least by others. It was said there’d be a $1 billion shortfall, we’ve had over $700 million surplus now.”

And this e-mail from the Fletcher campaign during the Republican gubernatorial primary:

Dear Friend,
You may have recently received an e-mail from Anne Northup attacking Governor Fletcher yet again. It is unfortunate that her entire campaign is based on repeating arguments championed by the Democrats and attempting to use them for her personal ambitions.

As the first Republican Governor in 32 years, Governor Fletcher has begun to turn state government around. After inheriting a $1 billion deficit, we now have an over $700 million surplus.

Today:

Gov. Steve Beshear said today that the state is facing a $434 million budget shortfall this fiscal year and what he called a “budgetary crisis” over the next two years.

Rep. Geoff Davis (R) -- First-Rate Hypocrite

It's so sad that someone in the public trust would so deceive the voters into the type of congressman he would become if elected. What a fraud.

U.S. Rep Geoff Davis (R), December 2007:

U.S. Rep. Geoff Davis ranked among the biggest congressional spenders of tax money to send mailings to constituents last year, which coincided with a tough re-election campaign for the Republican.

Davis, who represents the 4th District in northern Kentucky, sent out 716,803 pieces of mass mailings in 2006. His use of the congressional franking privilege carried an overall cost of $165,316 to taxpayers.

In the 435-member House, Davis was outspent on total mailing costs by four congressmen, all fellow Republicans.

Candidate Geoff Davis (R), August 2002:

At a press conference today, Boone County businessman and Republican candidate for Congress Geoff Davis issued a strongly worded challenge to Congressman Ken Lucas. Lucas has come under fire recently for using the Congressional privilege of taxpayer-funded mail, or franking, to send what amounts to full-color campaign literature.

...At the conference, Mr. Davis showed the clear pattern of increased spending during election years. Mr. Lucas spent $80,828 on franked mail in 2000 on postage alone, then only $21,389 in 2001 according to figures available at the Congressional Office of Budget and Management.

"Ken Lucas has violated the trust of Kentucky's hard working families by this obvious abuse of tax payer dollars," said Geoff Davis, Republican candidate for Congress.  "As Congressman, I will not use the hard-earned money of taxpayers to fund my campaign. I believe that the 4th District's next Congressman should help working families, not abuse their trust. In a time when many families are struggling, this shows how out of touch Mr. Lucas is with the District," remarked Mr. Davis.

Shameless hypocritical fraud.

This isn't the first time Davis has flaunted this pledge. Click here and the media's reaction here.

UPDATE (5:59 PM): Pat Crowley asks:

The mailings coincided with his re-election campaign against Dem Ken Lucas. What say you, conservative voters? Is Davis keeping his constituents informed or abusing the privilege in an election year?

Did God Lie?

Just ran across this gem from the beginning of last year about the conversation that Rev. Pat Robertson -- who recently endorsed Rudy Giuliani's (R) presidential bid -- had with God:

Robertson said, “Bush is going to strengthen in 2006. The fall elections will be inconclusive, but the outcome of the war and the success of the economy will leave Republicans in charge…. And Alito is gonna get confirmed. I believe another liberal judge is going to retire, step down from the Court; we’ll have another opening there. The war in Iraq is going to come to a successful conclusion, and we’ll begin withdrawing troops before the end of the year.”

With the exception of Alito's 58-42 confirmation a few weeks after Robertson's conversation with the Almighty (which most legal observers fully expected), it appears that God lied to Robertson on all other counts.

Is there really any doubt that Robertson is nothing more than a Charlatan?

Fletcher Becomes Patton -- Part 2

In light of Governor Fletcher's (R) latest frenzy in appointing his cronies to boards and commissions in his final day in office (see here and here), I thought it was worth re-posting this item from last week:

--------------------------------------

Recall Governor Fletcher's (R) anger in 2003 when -- in the weeks before leaving office -- then Governor Patton (D) appointed new members to the Kentucky Racing Commission. So furious was Fletcher that he immediately disbanded the commission upon taking office and replaced it with the Kentucky Racing Authority with new members which he appointed.

Listen to how they whined:

Republicans and their incoming governor, Ernie Fletcher, are crying foul. Although Patton has the authority to pack seats with anyone he chooses until Dec. 9, that-doesn't mean he should, they said. Fletcher is urging recent Patton appointees to decline to serve.

"Any additional appointments will be disappointing as Kentuckians overwhelmingly gave us a mandate to bring-real change to state government, and that includes boards and commissions," said Daniel Groves, Fletcher's chief of staff.

[...]

Yesterday, several Senate leaders came out fighting and accused the lame-duck governor of unseemly arrogance.

"I actually admired Paul Patton and even considered him a friend until last week, when he decided to push for keno and make all these appointments, all at the last minute," said Sen. Charlie Borders, R-Russell, the Republican caucus chair.

"It's like he's somehow more important than the commonwealth," Borders said. "It's like his ego is more important than allowing the next administration to start finding its voice."

-------------------------------

Any surprise that Fletcher would morph into Patton in his final hours? So pathetic.

Giuliani's Problem With The Truth -- Live From Kentucky

Last week, The New York Times splashed its front-page with a story that highlighted Rudy Giuliani's (R) repeated exaggerations of his mayoral record during his current presidential campaign.

Here's an excerpt:

Discussing his crime-fighting success as mayor, Mr. Giuliani told a television interviewer that New York was “the only city in America that has reduced crime every single year since 1994.” In New Hampshire this week, he told a public forum that when he became mayor in 1994, New York “had been averaging like 1,800, 1,900 murders for almost 30 years.” When a recent Republican debate turned to the question of fiscal responsibility, he boasted that “under me, spending went down by 7 percent.”

All of these statements are incomplete, exaggerated or just plain wrong. And while, to be sure, all candidates use misleading statistics from time to time, Mr. Giuliani has made statistics a central part of his candidacy as he campaigns on his record.

I raise this because Jefferson Poole has just posted an excellent account of Giuliani's private fundraiser yesterday in Louisville which appears to further highlight Giuliani's very problem with the truth. Jefferson cites how the fundraiser's host threw out a few statistics of Giuliani's accomplishments as he introduced him (bullet-points which most likely were provided in advance by the Giuliani camp, which in my experience is standard practice for these sorts of events):

He also commended Giuliani for bringing the murders down in New York City so drastically, from about 3,000 a year to more like 500, a figure which could be matched by St. Louis, MO.

In that simple sentence, there are three gross misstatements (and I'm going to assume that Jefferson accurately reported what was said).

First, as Times alludes to in its story above, Giuliani seems to be grossly inflating the number of actual murders in New York City during his tenure. Despite the claim of the rate going "from about 3,000 a year to more like 500," in reality it dropped from 1,946 to 661 -- still an impressive drop -- and has continued to drop during Mayor Michael Bloomberg's (I) current tenure:

• 1990: 2,245
• 1991: 2,154
• 1992: 1,995
• 1993: 1,946
• 1994: 1,561 (Giuliani sworn-in on January 1st)
• 1995: 1,177
• 1996: 983
• 1997: 770
• 1998: 633
• 1999: 671
• 2000: 673
• 2001: 661
• 2002: 588 (Bloomberg sworn-in on January 1st)
• 2003: 597
• 2004: 570
• 2005: 539
• 2006: 596

(Side note: While there's no doubt that murders fell considerably during Giuliani's tenure, it's also worth noting that the drop in NYC's murders largely paralleled a national drop. For example, murders fell nationally by 37 percent during the 1994 to 1999 timeframe (from 24,530 to 15,522), suggesting that the Clinton administration policies and a strong economy also played an important role in the decline that New York experienced.)

Finally, while St. Louis was named the second-most dangerous city in America for 2006, its total number of murders last year was 131, not anywhere close to the 500 that was suggested at the Giuliani event. Seems that Giuliani suffers from the same problem with the truth that Anne Northup (R) warned us had afflicted Governor Fletcher (R).

Given Giuliani's solid record on crime while mayor, you'd think he'd stick to the facts and not constantly embellish them.

A Ban On Political Robo-Calls?

Kudos to State Rep. Jimmy Higdon (R) for pushing for a law that would ban political robo-calls. This is a long overdue action and desperately needed, especially after the disgusting use of them by Governor Fletcher's (R) supporters last month.

But if I recall accurately, wasn't it the Kentucky legislature that exempted such calls from the "No Call List" in the first place? And do they have the courage to ban them now and possibly hurt their own re-election chances down the road? Intestinal fortitude has never been their strong suit.

Thoughts?

Fletcher Becomes Patton

Recall Governor Fletcher's (R) anger in 2003 when -- in the weeks before leaving office -- then Governor Patton (D) appointed new members to the Kentucky Racing Commission. So furious was Fletcher that he immediately disbanded the commission upon taking office and replaced it with the Kentucky Racing Authority with new members which he appointed.

Listen to how they whined:

Republicans and their incoming governor, Ernie Fletcher, are crying foul. Although Patton has the authority to pack seats with anyone he chooses until Dec. 9, that-doesn't mean he should, they said. Fletcher is urging recent Patton appointees to decline to serve.

"Any additional appointments will be disappointing as Kentuckians overwhelmingly gave us a mandate to bring-real change to state government, and that includes boards and commissions," said Daniel Groves, Fletcher's chief of staff.

[...]

Yesterday, several Senate leaders came out fighting and accused the lame-duck governor of unseemly arrogance.

"I actually admired Paul Patton and even considered him a friend until last week, when he decided to push for keno and make all these appointments, all at the last minute," said Sen. Charlie Borders, R-Russell, the Republican caucus chair.

"It's like he's somehow more important than the commonwealth," Borders said. "It's like his ego is more important than allowing the next administration to start finding its voice."

So, aside from helping to force the scary Jon Draud (R) down the throats of Kentuckians as the new state school commissioner, we now see Fletcher's cronies quickly trying to hand out the final racing license before he leaves office -- knowing that such a license probably means a gaming license if expanded gaming is enacted:

The Kentucky Horse Racing Authority could decide before the end of the year whether to grant the state's last racetrack license to Sprint Racing Partners' proposed quarter-horse facility near London.

Authority Executive Director Lisa Underwood said one of its committees is scheduling a hearing for Dec. 10, but she doesn't know whether the application will be on the agenda for the Dec. 17 authority meeting.

...The timing of granting a license also could play a role in whether the track would be eligible for a casino, assuming the legislature places a constitutional amendment allowing gaming on the ballot and voters approve it. Bills to govern the awarding of casinos have limited some of them to tracks licensed by a certain date.

Apparently, it's okay if Fletcher does the very thing he criticized Patton for doing. A shameless hypocrite until the end.

I guess Governor Beshear (D) could always disband the Racing Authority if he so chose -- exactly like Fletcher did -- but that's just my two cents.

More Gooch

A reader passed along a little tidbit relating to our on-going discussion on the recent anti-science efforts by State Rep. Jim Gooch (D) that seemed worth posting:

Hey Mark,

Last February I was doing some citizen lobbying in Frankfort.  I was a walking down a hall when I saw Rep. Gooch surrounded by a group of reporters.  I listened in as they were confronting Gooch about his business ties to the coal industry and asking him about potential conflicts of interest. Gooch clearly looked taken aback by all the attention and pointed questions.  Of course he denied it but then he made a not so veiled threat against those who would level such accusations (conflict of interest) against him, saying that people needed to watch what they say or there could be serious repercussions.  A few reporters asked him what he meant and he responded "I think you know what I mean."

I didn't really know much about Gooch until that point and after listening in, I found out all I needed to know about who this character is.

I'm not sure if I'm more frightened by the views Gooch embraces or the arrogance which apparently accompanies them.

The Incompetence And/Or Dishonesty Of COS Stan Cave

In light of yesterday's revelations by Governor Fletcher (R) of the "discovery" of significant and serious budget shortfalls facing various parts of state government -- despite his constant assertions of wonderful economic times while campaigning -- is the "coincidence" of this gubernatorial announcement just two months ago:

Governor Fletcher's Chief of Staff to Serve as Acting Budget Director
Press Release Date: Monday, September 17, 2007   

FRANKFORT, Ky. – Governor Ernie Fletcher has asked his Chief of Staff, Stan Cave, to act as budget director until a permanent director is named.

Cave will continue to serve as the Governor’s Chief of Staff. His salary will remain the same.

“As our cabinets and agencies begin to prepare for the 2008 budget session, it is critical that we have a leader in place to ensure that those preparations run smoothly and efficiently,” said Governor Fletcher. “Stan’s experience in the Kentucky Legislature and his knowledge of all aspects of state government make him a great fit to act as budget director until the position is filled on a permanent basis.”

Why is this relevant? Two reasons.

First, while Cave is the inner-most of Fletcher aides, and was so actively involved in his re-election campaign, isn't it noteworthy that Budget Director/Chief of Staff Cave waited until after the election to advise the public of the real economic news -- not the fictional world they spun on the campaign trail?

But maybe more noteworthy is how nearly impossible it is to conclude that Cave isn't just lying to the media. Here's what he told Mark Hebert yesterday:

Cave says he can't speak for the governor but he doesn't believe Fletcher was aware of the financial problem while the campaign was ongoing.

This means either Budget Director/Chief of Staff Cave didn't bother to tell the governor -- with who he spent every waking hour for the past year -- of the true depths of the state's financial problems until last week, or he's every bit the liar we've come to believe.

Based on Cave's dismal performance over the years, five bucks says he's lying...once again.

Crooks until the bitter end...

Kentucky's Clear Blue Shift

One of the recent signs that have made more predict that U.S. Sen. McConnell (R) is in for a rougher re-election fight than expected is the fact that President Bush's (R) job approval numbers in Kentucky have plummeted to a disastrously low 35% approve and 65% disapprove.

Indeed, those numbers do suggest that the man who has proudly defended and advanced the Bush agenda ought to be very concerned. But a closer look at those numbers tell an even more problematic story for McConnell.

You see, while Bush is becoming less popular in Kentucky, he's also getting less popular in the other 49 states, so simply using Bush's plunging numbers in Kentucky only tell part of the story. But where things are much more instructive is to see where Bush has dropped more than elsewhere over the past few years.

When you do that, you'll notice that in only one state (New Mexico) has Bush's job performance tumbled more than it has in Kentucky -- among those states which SurveyUSA has been testing monthly since May 2005 -- when you compare the differences in President Bush's net rating (approval minus disapproval):

State	Nov 2007	May 2005	Diff
New Mexico	-35 (32/67)	-4 (46/50)	-31
Kentucky	-27 (35/62)	+2 (49/47)	-29
California	-44 (26/70)	-15 (39/54)	-29
New York	-54 (22/76)	-25 (35/60)	-29
Minnesota	-30 (34/64)	-2 (47/49)	-28
Massachusetts	-54 (22/76)	-26 (35/61)	-28
Virginia	-32 (33/65)	-6 (44/50)	-26
Kansas	-21 (38/59)	+4 (49/45)	-25
Washington	-35 (31/66)	-10 (42/52)	-25
Oregon	-36 (31/67)	-13 (42/55)	-23
Alabama	-16 (41/57)	+6 (50/44)	-22
Wisconsin	-33 (32/65)	-12 (42/54)	-21
Missouri	-28 (35/63)	-10 (42/52)	-18
Iowa	-33 (32/65)	-17 (39/56)	-16
Ohio	-29 (34/63)	-20 (38/58)	-9
AVERAGE	-33.8	-9.9	-23.9

That - along with the plummeting of new Kentucky Republican voters over the past two years and this month's landslide defeat of Governor Fletcher (R) -- really paints a picture that a political realignment is happening here in a noticeable way and these dynamics couldn't be happening to McConnell at a worse time.

Does that lead me to believe that Kentucky is becoming a Democratic state again? No, I wouldn't go that far.

But I do believe these trends tell us that Kentucky is much more politically comparable to the Midwest swing states than it is to the South, which is how the state seemed to behave for much of the past decade, until around 2005 when we began to see a subtle but steady change in the political attitudes of Kentucky voters, leading to John Yarmuth's (D) defeat of Anne Northup (R) in the 3rd congressional district and this year's defeat of Fletcher and plunging approval numbers for McConnell.

This is why McConnell should be even more concerned and why the environment is right for a serious challenge of both U.S. Rep. Ron Lewis' (R) and U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield's (R) congressional seat, as well as the take-back of the state Senate.

(Note: While SurveyUSA has conducted monthly Bush approval tracking in the states since May 2005, about a year ago it narrowed its month survey from all 50 states to 15 states, which is why the above chart only lists those states.)

The Lunacy of State Rep. Jon Draud (R) -- Candidate For State School Superintendent

Only in the past few days have I been able to check out some of the public statements that State Rep. Jon Draud (R) -- one of the four current "finalists" for state superintendent public schools -- has said over the years, and I'm more frightened than ever.

Aside from the clear odor of a sense of entitlement that emanated from today's Kentucky Post story -- when Draud whined about Gov.-elect Beshear's (D) preference in re-opening and broadening the search -- Draud has made a few comments that really deserve a little attention.

In May 2006, during the middle of the Fletcher Merit System scandal, Draud made this remarkable comment about the very wrongdoing that cost Fletcher's re-election:

"I don't want to trivialize any of this, but I've said it all along, to the victor goes the spoils," Draud said at the time. "Fletcher won that office, and he deserves to bring in some of his own people. The Democrats did it for years."

(As an aside -- beyond that scary rationalization for Fletcher breaking the law, one might ask why Draud isn't using that same logic as far as Gov.-elect Beshear (D) having some say over who is hired as the next state school superintendent?)

But there's more bits of wisdom from Draud that should concern us.

Back in 1999, Draud penned an op-ed in the Kentucky Post blaming the First Amendment for the problem of violence in schools, further compounded by the lack of God in our public schools, and went as far as to "demand that our judges stop the media industry from brainwashing our society with violence and indecent conduct said we should demand that judges."

Here are some excerpts (thanks to a reader for pointing this out):

Pendulum swings too far in protecting individual rights
Guest column by Jon Draud

I would like to focus on the First Amendment to our Constitution as one of the major reasons for the increased violence in our society and ultimately our schools.

...The major answer to the question, why did these tragedies occur in Columbine, Jonesboro, Paducah and other cities in our country, is that our culture has been changed by the entertainment industry under the protection of the First Amendment.

...Throughout my 36 years of education, I have observed teachers and school officials attempting to discipline students. The wearing of trench coats, army fatigues and other inappropriate behaviors were not permitted when most of us were students. You may ask, why don't teachers and school administrators stop this behavior? Because today students are protected as parents complain that you are violating their child's First Amendment rights of expression...

Furthermore, we have taken God out of our society and our schools. Our major institutions are afraid to teach values, while many parents have completely abdicated their responsibilities. Parents frequently do not teach their children about God and traditional American values, and schools are forbidden to do so by our court system. Our political leaders are often terrible role models for our children who view their inappropriate behavior in office. Then there are the adults who do weird and unacceptable things, write books about them, and reap huge economic benefits. We glorify the villains and minimize the accomplishments of our heroes. Is it any wonder, we have a lost generation of teens who are turning violent?

Yes, it is important that in a free society that free speech for our citizens is protected. However, it is my position that we cannot allow the entertainment industry to destroy our great country. The entertainment business under the auspices of the First Amendment has created a new culture for us - a culture of violence protected by the First Amendment...

Can we save our great Republic? What can we do to put the brakes on this trip to social chaos? We can pass laws to have police officers for schools, require metal detectors and other security measures. We can require our teachers to teach conflict-resolution skills and to develop skills to identify emotionally disturbed young people. We can demand that our judges stop the media industry from brainwashing our society with violence and indecent conduct. We can do it. However, it will take a strong will of our citizens to relieve the destruction of our culture. The question is, ''Do we have the commitment?''

This is the man that might lead Kentucky's public schools? Frightening...

Two Days After Election, DSCC Launches Ad Against McConnell Citing His Praise Of Fletcher

Ouch. This one is going to hurt, courtesy of the DSCC. (Click here for their press release).

No doubt, U.S. Senator McConnell (R) will start tapping his campaign war chest right away to try to stop the bleeding:

By the way, McConnell has a much bigger problem than Fletcher as he moves forward and that is he'll have to defend and promote the Bush Administration all the way through 2008, while Bush doesn't seem to give a rat's ass about how his 2008 agenda will affect the political environment since he doesn't have to help a vice president running for the top spot.

How in the world will McConnell straight face the voters as Bush continues to build towards war in Iran or continues to veto important programs like SCHIP that more than 80% of Americans support -- while McConnell shepards through such idiocy in the Senate?

That will be his Achilles' Heel. Mark my words.

McConnell is not running in a static environment where all he must do is rehabilitate an image based on the past. He'll continue to be under fire for unpopular policies from a president whose job approval rating is down to an unimaginable 24% in at least one poll.

Kentucky Mitch has become Washington Mitch, and based on Bush's own dismal job numbers in Kentucky, McConnell is a very vulnerable man right now, even in his Old Kentucky Home (despite the fact he was born in Alabama). Just remember that Hillary Clinton (D) is currently out-performing McConnell --in Kentucky -- in hypothetical general election match-ups for 2008, and his own job ratings are consistently under 50%.

Not good news for McConnell. Expect him to hit the panic button right away and go on television ASAP.

Another Conservative Program Rejected -- This Time At The Hands Of Conservative Voters

When we look back at this era of politics, one of the narratives I'm certain we'll be discussing is how so many of the core ideas and beliefs of the conservative ideologues of our time were either rejected, proved to be wrong-headed, or simply disastrous experiments.

Be it their desire for pre-emptive war, denial of the effects of global warming, refusal to embrace universal health care, attempts to legislate morality, efforts to rollback regulations on corporate America, attempts to destroy organized labor, etc, we're seeing how wrong they are on so many critical issues.

Case-in-point: yesterday in Utah -- arguably the most conservative state in the country -- voters overwhelmingly repealed the nation's first universal school voucher law that the Utah legislature had enacted last year:

After a multimillion-dollar political campaign that pitted teachers’ unions nationally against school choice advocates, Utah voters yesterday repealed the nation’s first universal voucher law by an overwhelming margin.

With nearly 97 percent of the votes counted, state election results showed that 62 percent of voters rejected the voucher law narrowly enacted earlier this year, in what was Utah’s first “citizens’ veto” referendum in 30 years.

The level of opposition was much greater in the voting public than in the GOP-controlled legislature, which approved the voucher law by a single vote. Had the law been allowed to take effect, it would have provided all public school students with vouchers ranging from $500 to $3,000 a year, depending on family income.

To opponents of vouchers, the rejection was even more impressive coming from voters in a conservative, Republican state. “Taxpayers, no matter their politics, see vouchers as poor public policy,” Anne L. Bryant, the executive director of the Alexandria, Va.-based National School Boards Association, said in a statement.

America is finally coming to its senses and rejecting the disastrous policies enacted and pushed by the Bush Administration and 12 years of Republican Congress. We saw the first sign of it with the 2006 elections and 2008 isn't shaping-up to be any better for them either.

Is this the return of common sense government that provides for the greatest good and not their narrow interests? I'm crossing my fingers.

The Graying Elephant (And The Spry Donkey)

It's remarkable how four years can completely change a political environment.

Following Governor Fletcher's (R) historic 2003 victory, the general narrative was that Republicans represented young, energetic leadership while Democrats were the old, entrenched dinosaurs who hadn't spent time cultivating its young stars and developing a deep bench ready to run for office.

Following the November 2003 election, that narrative was very true. Back then, Democrats occupied just one congressional seat which was held by then 70-year-old Ken Lucas (D). Meanwhile, then 31-year-old Trey Grayson (R) and 34-year-old Richie Farmer (R) had been elected to statewide office, while 50-year-old Ernie Fletcher (R) was about to sworn-in as governor. The state political parties also mimicked this same age disparity.

Things couldn't be more different with the outcome of this year's election.

Now, the average age of the Republican federal delegation is 63 -- the same age as Steve Beshear (D) -- who is the oldest among Democratic leaders. In fact, only Geoff Davis (R) is under 60 (he's 49). While Republicans were able to retain the 35-year-old Grayson and 38-year-old Farmer, their deep, young bench ready to run for office sure isn't what it used to be.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party is more flush with young talent than in memory.

Attorney General-elect Jack Conway (D) is just 38, Lt. Governor-elect Dan Mongiardo (D) and State Treasurer-elect Todd Hollenbach (D) are both 47. U.S. Rep. Ben Chandler (D) just turned 48, Auditor Crit Luallen (D) is only 55, and U.S. Rep John Yarmuth (D) is an amazingly youthful 60.

And that's just the current team of Democratic elected officials.

Outgoing State Treasurer (and current KDP Chairman) Jonathan Miller (D), who's poised to play a prominent role in the Beshear administration, just turned 40. State Party Vice-Chair (and probably its next chair) Jennifer Moore is just 33. KDP Chief of Staff Jeremy Horton is 41 (previously Jeremy led the group Change for Kentucky), KDP political director Vince Gabbert is 31, general counsel Kerry Morgan is 38, and treasurer David Tandy is 35.

Given the state of things not long ago for the party, a very impressive and talented crop of young Democrats are now prominently in office, and an equally impressive group has just stepped onto the stage and are themselves poised to run for statewide, federal and local office in the coming cycle or two.

While the face of Kentucky Republican Party continues to gray, Democrats have to be more excited than ever with the deep bench that been assembled.

UPDATE (6:06 PM): A reader reminded me of another young Dem that should be in this group -- Lt. Colonel Andrew Horne, 44. Thanks for catching that. He is most deserving as well.

Where There's Smoke...

The folks over at Talking Points Memo are trying to track down who was behind yesterday's illegal robo calls. Turns out an 800 number that has purportedly been associated with yesterday's calls has been traced back to a few other old political campaigns in Georgia, one as recently as last month, as well as going back as far as Georgia Gov. Sonny Purdue's (R) 2002 campaign.

Why this is interesting is that three of Governor Fletcher's (R) inner-most political advisers -- campaign manager Marty Ryall, first-rate political hack Brett Hall, and Fletcher media adviser Fred Davis -- all have deep roots in Georgia Republican politics:

• Ryall managed the race of Karen Handel, Republican candidate for Georgia Secretary of State, in 2006 as well as the 1998 re-election campaign of the late U.S. Sen. Paul Coverdell (R-GA);
                 
• Hall worked on Ralph Reed's (R) 2006 campaign for Georgia lieutenant governor and in Governor Sonny Perdue's (R-GA) 2002 gubernatorial campaign;
            
• Fred Davis has done extensive work in Georgia, including both Coverdell's re-election and Perdue's campaign (which may explain the relationships between the three).

How about those coincidences.

Or are they?

UPDATE (5:23 PM): One TPM reader finds an old reference to Matt Towery, a former Georgia state rep. You may also remember him as Newt Gingrich's former chairman who commissioned those bogus early polls showing Fletcher with just a three point lead over Fletcher. He's also someone Hall refers to a good deal on his little blog of horrors. This gets curiouser and curiouser...

The Story Of The 2007 Election

If one think stands out for me during this election cycle, it was the realization that the more Governor Fletcher (R) tried to trot out the tired old fear tactics on social issues, the more Steve Beshear's (D) lead grew.

While Fletcher never got with 15 points of Beshear in any of the independent polls, a quick glance of the poll track will show that when Fletcher confined his attacks on Beshear to his newly-found opposition to expanded gaming, the lead was in the 16-19 range. But when Fletcher decided to go "all in" and shamelessly pander on the social issues, that lead grew to 20-24 points.

Think for a moment of all the issues that Fletcher tried to base his re-election fantasy on:

• expanded-gaming
• Kentucky Central
• immigration
• guns
• abortion
• gay marriage/domestic partner benefits
• Ten Commandments

None of it worked, except maybe to galvanize Democrats and ensure they voted on Election Day and did not take the outcome for granted. 

The one thing Fletcher never talked about was his record. Of course, he too realized that he had little to run on, despite blaming everyone else for his problems. If he had, Fletcher might have kept his loss closer to 10 points than 20 points.

Ultimately, what we learned about Ernie Fletcher was that he was the luckiest man in Kentucky in 2003 when he ran during a Democratic scandal in the state, at a time of national uncertainty, with a then popular president (at least in Kentucky), and he had the McConnell machine determined to elect its first Republican governor in 32 years. But he also suffered from a chronic affliction that can only be described as an enormous political blind-spot.

Once elected, Fletcher proved himself to be a minor leaguer trying to compete in the major leagues and couldn't. He pushed the McConnell crowd out of the inner circle (he was too smart for them), he began to believe his own press releases, and he surrounded himself with political lightweights like Daniel Groves, Stan Cave, Robbie Rudolph and Brett Hall whose collective chief virtue was that their arrogance was eclipsed only by their incompetence. Oh, and he took political advice from Larry Forgy.

And for his death knell, Fletcher failed to realize the lessons of 2006 when the public no longer looked to the Republican Party as the guarantors of moral and ethical behavior and that their "values" no longer were viewed as superior to Democrats'. Nationally, voters now trust Democrats more than Republicans on every single issue tested and the attempts by some remaining behind-the-times Republicans to demagogue on social issues just doesn't work any longer. Apparently, Fletcher didn't the get the memo from his crack team of advisers.

To sum it up, this isn't 2003 any longer. The voters are much smarter than the politicians give them credit for being and this election didn't require very much deep analysis on their part. The fact that Ernie Fletcher spent millions of dollars trying to spin a fable didn't mean the voters were going to buy it. They heard the attacks but they rang hollow this time. The voters realized over the past few years that Fletcher was a hypocritical phony who lost his privilege to lead the people that trusted him to do so in 2003. They also rejected the shameless pandering of candidates like Stan Lee, Linda Greenwell, and Melinda Wheeler.

After Kentucky Democrats had largely lost their way with the public four years ago -- thanks to many factors including Paul Patton, 9/11, the temporary rise of the religious right, and their own arrogance -- the voters went in a different direction. But Democrats re-adjusted, learned from their mistakes, new Democratic leaders emerged and the political climate changed at just the right time.

This time, the voters are ready to reward the party that put forth the better candidates, ran on the better agenda, and for which they now trust more than the other guys on the most important issues of the day.

That's the story of 2007 and why Ernie Fletcher is about to join the unemployment line. This is going to be a very fun evening...

Not So Fast

As we get ready for a victory tonight that may well double the margin Governor Fletcher (R) received in 2003, here's a look back at a few of the comments made by Republicans four years ago this evening:

"We will take this mandate tonight and move this state forward," Fletcher told his victory celebration at a Lexington hotel.

...

Republican U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell: "Thirty-two years of drift, 32 years of incompetence, 32 years of corruption have come to an end tonight."

...

"Most of you have been foot-soldiers in this revolution that started back in 1994 that swept the congressional delegation, swept the state Senate and now we're another step to completing the job with electing a brilliant, outstanding, incredible man of extraordinary integrity in Ernie Fletcher," said McConnell.

...

Fletcher's supporters said his win was about Fletcher's abilities, and not just about the idea of change. Campbell County Republican Chairwoman Barb Haas said Fletcher, a doctor and former fighter pilot with an engineering degree, won on his own merits, not on the misgivings of Democrats.

"We will never have a more qualified governor," said Haas, one of many Northern Kentuckians who attended the Republican victory party in Lexington.

...

Kentucky's last Republican governor, Louie Nunn, said Fletcher's sincerity and life experience won the race for him.

"I cannot think in my lifetime of a governor with the qualifications that he will bring to the job, even me. I think he will be remarkable. And I hope I don't sound giddy tonight," Nunn said.

...

"Western Kentucky has been left out by the Frankfort establishment and they're tired of it," said Scott Jennings, senior political advisor for the Republican Party of Kentucky.

"It was a repudiation of the last 30 years, and I think they said we just aren't going to take it anymore."

If Fletcher claimed a 10-point victory as a "mandate" what does one call a 20-point victory?

I Hope You Took The "Under"

A month ago, I set the over/under line for the number of newspaper endorsements that Governor Fletcher (R) would receive at 1-1/2. At the time, I took the under. Most of those leaving comments thought that was crazy and surely Fletcher -- the incumbent -- would get two or more endorsements.

He got none.

Not one.

Not the Paducah Sun.

Not the Hopkinsville New Era.

Not the Bowling Green Daily News.

Not the Danville Advocate-Messenger.

Not the Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer.

Not the Kentucky Enquirer.

None.

Fletcher likes to offer his phony talking point that his problem with the media is simply with the Courier-Journal and Herald-Leader, yet not one of those who endorsed him in 2003 (nearly all of the above) did so again in 2007.

Not even whack-jobs at the Paducah Sun had the guts to try to fashion an editorial suggesting that our incompetent and corrupt governor deserved another four years.

Amazing.

Sad Or Pathetic?

I'm not sure whether this "accomplishment" parsing on the Fletcher-Rudolph website is mostly sad or pathetic?

Governor Fletcher Has Delivered on His Promises
• More than 100,000 new jobs created between January 2004 and July 2007.

...More jobs - Kentucky has gained over 100,000 jobs between January 2004 and July 2007 (US Census, Current Population Survey, not seasonally adjusted).

Of course, his term began before January 2004 and has spanned (unfortunately) beyond July 2007. So far, only 61,200 new jobs have been created during his full-term.

But what's so shamelessly pathetic about this is that they try to get to 100,000 new jobs by 1) using "not seasonally adjusted" numbers, 2) starting the tally in January 2004, and 3) cutting it off in July 2007.

Why is that important? Well, the point of seasonally-adjusted numbers is to deal with the enormous -- and predictable -- swings in the job market that occurs at standard intervals -- like layoffs of temporary workers right after Christmas. Sure enough, Kentucky employment dropped 45,800 from December 2003 to January 2004. How convenient. (This happens every single year between December and January).

But if you're Three Card Ernie, you try to offer the voters the sleight of hand by making them think you got sworn-in in January 2004 -- not at the beginning of December 2003 -- use unadjusted raw numbers to pick-up a quick gain of 45,800 jobs, and then cut-off your count in July 2007. And then Bam!...100,000 new jobs appear to have been created.

Thankfully, the voters aren't dumb enough to re-elect this guy.

Oh, and by the way, the new job numbers just came out in the past day or so and the number of employed Kentuckians keeps dropping -- down 6,000 since March 2007 alone. Only 60,600 new jobs have really been created during his failed term. But who's counting?

The Fraying Of Governor Fletcher (R) Before Our Eyes

From the Murray State University newspaper on Governor Fletcher's (R) visit to the area:

Later, he blasted the Lexington Herald-Leader and the Louisville Courier-Journal for their support of Beshear. The Courier-Journal's latest Bluegrass poll showed Fletcher trailing by 23 percentage points.

"Harry Truman was one of my favorite presidents," he said. "... And the press had it wrong on him. When we've travelled around and saw the number of folks out, the press has it wrong now."

He said in an interview with the Herald-Leader, the publication opposed him on four 'G's' - God, gun control, gynecology (abortion) and gays. Fletcher maintains traditional conservative values on each.

"Gynecology"? What a true embarrassment Fletcher has become.

One side note, when Harry Truman (D) won the presidency in 1948 political polling hadn't yet been in use. That came around in the 1970s -- decades later. While I'm sure most Democrats appreciate that one of Fletcher's favorite presidents was one of their own, there weren't any polls showing Truman down 23 and 24 points in the final week.

But I'm sure Fletcher won't allow those pesky facts to get in the way of a snappy soundbite.

4 more days.