Andrew Romano at The Daily Beast has an excellent article on his interview with New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez. He makes the argument that Mitt Romney would be wise to select her as his V.P. running mate, noting that Romney trails President Obama by as many as 56 percentage points among Latinos and by 20 points among women. But then he acknowledges the obvious – after John McCain’s disastrous pick of Sarah Palin in 2008, Romney is not going to take the risk of selecting another female first term Governor of a state not well known to the rest of the country. And Governor Martinez says her answer to a call from Romney would be “Absolutely No”, saying – “I need to finish this job. I have to deliver the results I promised, because as the first Hispanic female governor, I’m going to pave a path of some kind. I want it to be one that little Hispanic girls will want to follow.”

Governor Martinez says there is “no doubt” that Hispanics have been “alienated” during the Republican Presidential Primary campaign with the hard right rhetoric that summed up the Republican approach to solving illegal immigration. Martinez scoffs at the Romney proposal of self deportation: “‘Self-deport?’ What the heck does that mean?” Well Governor, it’s the idea behind recent anti-immigrant laws in Arizona and Alabama: that if you make life miserable enough through harassment and intimidation they’ll just leave on their own. There’s just one little flaw – life in the U.S. with harassment & intimidation still isn’t nearly as miserable as life in Mexico, Guatemala or Honduras. And there’s the little side effect of making life miserable for American Citizens just because their Hispanic heritage makes them resemble someone who might be an illegal. Actually you don’t even need to be Hispanic. I live Cochise County and have gone through the Border Patrol checkpoint on Hwy 191 dozens of times. A white haired 60 year old guy of English & Irish ancestry, I’m always waved through. The one time I was stopped was when I had a friend visiting from Hawaii with me in the car. They demanded his ID and that he declare his citizenship. He’s of Chinese & Hawaiian ancestry, I guess he looked close enough to Hispanic be suspicious.

Martinez, who was a Democrat but changed to Republican several years ago,  has some advice for Mr. Romney- run to the left of Obama by proposing his own comprehensive plan:

“Republicans want to be tough and say, ‘Illegals, you’re gone.’ But the answer is a lot more complex than that.” Martinez envisions an approach “with multiple levels”: increased border security; deportation for criminals; a guest-worker program for people who want “to go freely back and forth across the border to work”; a DREAM Act-style pathway to citizenship, through the military or college, for children brought here illegally by their parents; and a visa (coupled with a “penalty” or a “tagback”) that allows rest of the illegal population to remain in the U.S. while they follow standard naturalization procedures.

Fat chance, Governor. Romney spent alot of time convincing Republican voters that he is “severely conservative” – even the biggest Etch-a-Sketch won’t let him flip-flop to that kind of intelligent approach to illegal immigration. But it is an intelligent approach that Democrats should make the centerpiece of their position on immigration. We absolutely can and must do more to secure the border. It’s an issue of safety and  security, and any reform on immigration is meaningless if we can’t prevent further  illegal immigration. Secondly, it’s way past time for us to implement a guest worker program. It’s an obvious fact that agriculture and some other industries need a lot low paid, low skilled workers, and most Americans won’t do the work. Create a guest worker program that they apply for in their country, allow them live and work legally on the US for a fixed period of 6 months to 1 year, and let them cross the border legally to work. Without thousands of people trying to cross the border illegally to go pick lettuce, the Border Patrol will have a lot of freed up resources to focus on drug smugglers and other dangerous criminals. Many illegals were carried across the border in a parent’s arms or were small children doing only what their parents told them to do. They grew up in America and know little of the country of their parents. We need to give them a chance to earn the American DREAM, and let them prove themselves in college or the military and earn the right to say ” I’m an American”.

And yes, illegal is illegal, and criminal activity should not be rewarded. But there is also a time to be reasonable, practical and fair. There are some pretty wild estimates in the number of people living illegally in the US, I’ll go with the PEW Research estimate of around 11 million. They’re not going to leave on their own, many have lived here for 10, 15 & 20 years and now have many family members here. And there is simply no way in hell we’re ever going to deport 11 million people. Frankly, I have always laughed at that idea.  Have anyone who advocates “send them all home!” ever seriously thought about what would be involved in rounding up 11 million people, placing them in internment camps, and then transporting them to their home country? The last time we tried to round up an ethnic group of people it was only around 120,000. It was called “Executive Order 9066″. It was issued after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, when the US shamefully gave into the hysteria that Americans of Japanese ancestry couldn’t be trusted and needed to removed from general society. It wasn’t pretty, it looked like this:

Does anyone really want to see this magnified a thousand times? And when you try to round up and remove one ethnic group from society, you tend to get some unpleasant side effects. Like this:

No, we will not go there ever again. As Governor Martinez proposes, we need to face reality  and come up with a visa system coupled with a “penalty” that allows rest of the illegal population to remain in the U.S. while they follow standard naturalization procedures.

Susana Martinez is a rarity among today’s Republicans – she’s actually sane, and intelligent. I wish her good luck in convincing Mitt Romney and Republicans to see the light. But I suspect it will take a President Obama and a Democratic Congress that will bring this to pass.

In many ways politics is like the weather – everyone likes to complain about it but no one ever does anything about it. Well, the only way to actually do something about it is to make your voice heard by voting. The deadline to register to vote in the Congressional District 8 Special Election is this Monday, May 14, by midnight. If you are not registered to vote there are many options available for you. The easiest, especially for those reading this blog since that means you are already online, is to register to vote online:

https://servicearizona.com/webapp/evoter/selectLanguage

You can register in either English or Spanish. Important Note: To register to vote online you must have an Arizona Driver License and/or an Arizona non-operating Identification Card issued by the Motor Vehicle Division (MVD) on or after October 1st, 1996. Upon successful completion of the online EZ Voter registration, you will receive a confirmation number. The confirmation number is your receipt the information you entered has been accepted and changed. You may also download a registration form in PDF format, print it out, fill it in and mail it to the the County Recorder’s Office. It must be postmarked by Monday May 14. And to use this form you must have an Arizona Driver License/Identification Card issued after Oct. 1 1996, or a Tribal Identification Number. The addresses for the Pima, Cochise or Santa Cruz Recorder’s offices are listed below.

Finally, you may register in person at your County Recorder’s Office by close of business Monday, May 14:

Pima County Recorder’s Office:

• Mailing Address: P.O. Box 3145, Tucson AZ 85702-3145 Telephone: Voter Information 520 724-4330
• Walk-in Registration: Main Office: 115 N. Church Avenue,  Hours: Mon-Fri 8AM-5PM, Telephone: 520 724-4350, Map
  
• Eastside Office: 6920 E. Broadway Blvd. Suite D, Hours: Mon-Fri 8AM-Noon & 1PM-5PM, Tel.  520 724-4350, Map

Cochise County Recorder’s Office:

• 1415 Melody Lane Bldg. B, Bisbee, Hours Mon-Fri 8-5, Telephone: 520-432-8354
  

Santa Cruz County Recorder’s Office:

• 2150 N Congress Dr. Suite 101 Nogales, Telephone: 520 375-7990

To register to vote in Arizona you must meet these qualification:

• Must be a Citizen of the United States of America
• Must be a resident of Arizona for 29 days
• Must be 18 years of age or more on or before the day of the next regular General Election
• Must not be a convicted felon, unless your civil rights have been restored
• Must not have been adjudicated incompetent (declared mentally incompetent by a court of law)

And when you register to vote in Arizona you must provide ONE of the following forms of identification (if you move to a different county within Arizona you must also provide the identification when updating your voting registration):

• A legible photocopy of a birth certificate that verifies citizenship and supporting legal documentation (i.e. marriage certificate) if the name on the birth certificate is not the same as your current legal name
• A legible photocopy of pertinent pages of a United States passport identifying the applicant
• Presentation to the County Recorder of United States naturalization documents or fill in your Alien Registration Number in box 19 on the front of this form
• The applicant’s Bureau of Indian Affairs Card Number, Tribal Treaty Card Number, or Tribal Enrollment Number in box 16 on the front of the voter registration form
• A legible photocopy of a driver license or non-operating identification from another state within the United States if the license indicates that the applicant has provided satisfactory proof of citizenship
• A legible photocopy of a Tribal Certificate of Indian Blood or Tribal or Bureau of Indian Affairs Affidavit of Birth.

You may also use any of those means of voter registration to update your current registration with change of name, address, party affiliation, and to request to be added to the Permanent Early Voting List (“PEVL”), in which you are automatically mailed early ballots for all elections which you fill out, sign, and return postage free (Business Reply Mail). I signed up for PEVL in 2010 and enjoy it quite a lot. If you wish to request an early ballot for this CD8 Special Election only just call the County Recorder’s office to request one. If voting in person remember that due to the large increase in early voting by mail and decrease in voting in person all counties have decreased the number of precincts and voting locations, so if you plan to vote in person call your Recorder’s office to check on your polling location. You can also check online, as long as you have an Arizona Driver’s License Number.

Important dates for 2012 Elections:

CD8 Special Election:

• May 14, 2012             Last Day to Register to Vote
• May 17, 2012             Early Voting Begins
• June 1, 2012              Last Day to Request an Early Ballot To Be Mailed
• June 8, 2012              Last Day to Vote Early in Person at Recorder’s Office
• June 12 2012             Election Day

Primary Election:

• July 30, 2012             Last Day to Register to Vote
• August 2, 2012          Early Voting Begins
• August 17, 2012        Last Day to Request an Early Ballot To Be Mailed
• August 24, 2012        Last Day to Vote Early in Person at Recorder’s Office
• August 28, 2012        Election Day

General Election:

• October 8, 2012        Last Day to Register to Vote
• October 11, 2012      Early Voting Begins
• October 26, 2012      Last Day to Request an Early Ballot To Be Mailed
• November 2, 2012     Last Day to Vote Early in Person at Recorder’s Office
• November 6, 2012     Election Day

Remember, make your voice heard – VOTE!    

You may be surprised to read someone who blogs under the name “Baja Democrats” freely admit that he once was an enthusiastic supporter of Ronald Reagan and voted for him twice, but it is true. You see, I haven’t changed my moderate, middle of the road views much over the past 32 years – it is the Republican Party that has veered off the middle of the road far right, right into a ditch.

I began life as a moderate Independent, the son of a moderate Pennsylvanian Republican father and a West Virginian Roosevelt Democrat mother. The first time I was old enough to vote I voted for Jimmy Carter over Gerald Ford. I still believe Jimmy Carter was one of the most honest and well intentioned men to occupy the White House. He was just terribly inept. The miserable failure of the Iranian hostage rescue attempt just seemed to highlight the many failures of the Carter Administration, and by June 1980 I’d changed my voter registration to Republican to vote for Reagan in the California Republican primary, and I celebrated well into the night when Reagan decisively defeated Carter. Reagan’s policies were a resounding success – inflation declined from 12.2% to 4.4%, unemployment declined from a post-Depression high of 10.8% to under 6%, with over 16 million new jobs created and GDP growth reaching 3.85%. In 1984 I was living and working overseas but went to the trouble of going to a U.S. Embassy to request an absentee ballot so I could vote for Reagan again. I remember writing my sister, a diehard Democrat, that I was disappointed in the election outcome – I really thought Reagan would carry Minnesota and win all 50 states, she was mad at me for years! In 1988 I happily voted for George H.W. Bush over that idiot Dukakis. 1992 is the only election in which I didn’t vote, I was living & working on the island of Bonaire in the Dutch Caribbean and there was no embassy from which to request an absentee ballot. But I would have voted for Bush in a heartbeat. When the first allegations of womanizing came up in the primary campaign and Slick Willy did his smarmy denials I decided he was one lying, dishonest sonnabitch, and I wasn’t impressed with Hillary’s ‘stand by her man’ routine. I’ve since changed my opinion of Hillary and have a great deal of respect for her. Bill Clinton married very well, Hillary not so well.

But as much as I disliked Slick Willy 1994 brought someone to national prominence that I still loath to this day – Newt Gingrich. What a pompous, self serving, dishonest asshole. His orchestrated federal government shutdown in 1995 finally drove me out of the Republican Party and back to being an Independent. In 1996 I voted for Ralph Nader for President, as my own little way of saying ‘None of the Above’ to Slick Willy and Bob Dull. (misspelling intentional). Finally, the one thing I truly am embarrassed to admit: I voted for George W. Bush in 2000. I literally made up my mind in the voting booth, and as I recall I held my nose when I filled in the oval next to Bush’s name. I didn’t trust Bush’s swagger, but I really disliked Al Bore (another intentional misspelling) and still do. It’s the one vote in my life I would love to go back in time and vote the other way. It took the worst Presidency since Herbert Hoover to finally push me into the arms of the Democrats – I registered as a Democrat for the first time in my life when I moved to Arizona in 2005, and have never looked back.

All we heard from Republicans during the Clinton Administration was “cut spending, reduce the deficit, Balanced Budget Amendment!” Sound familiar? Republicans seem to be concerned about spending and deficits only when a Democrat occupies the White House. Well, back in the 90s it actually made sense – the economy was enjoying one of the strongest and longest peacetime expansions. When times are good you don’t spend like a drunken sailor, you pay down debt and put some cash away for a rainy day. Back then Republicans and Democrats could meet each other halfway and bipartisan majorities in Congress passed spending reduction bills, and G.W. Bush inherited a federal government that was paying down its debt. But it didn’t take long for drunken sailors to come back into vogue. With a Republican in the White House and in charge of Congress they passed and signed the biggest giveaway in U.S. History, the ‘Bush’ Tax Cuts. Senator John McCain, back in the days when he really was a Maverick’ said that the tax cuts “devotes too much of it to the wealthiest Americans“, and that we should be “focused on paying down our debt“. In looking back on the Bush Presidency in a 2007 interview, John McCain noted “I saw no restraint in spending. We presided over the greatest increase in the size of government since the Great Society. Spending went completely out of control“. Indeed, tax cuts nobody needed and few were asking for, coupled with massive spending increases, hundreds of billions of dollars for “regime change” halfway around the world all led to a doubling of the national debt under Bush. And is was completely unnecessary. Except for the minor 2001-2002 recession the economy was growing and didn’t need the massive stimulus from the military and domestic spending. In fact, that much stimulus arguably led to the housing bubble and the near collapse of the financial markets.

Is it short term memory loss that leads today’s Republican Party to scream “Out of control spending!” and “They’re mortgaging our grand-children’s future” and lay it at the feet of President Obama and Democrats, like they’re the ones who invented it? Or is it a double standard? It’s one thing to inject the economy with massive spending when you’re trying to bring the economy back from the brink of the worst recession since the Great Depression, and it’s another thing to do it when the economy is doing just fine. Let’s revisit the policies of that conservative icon, Ronald Reagan. President Reagan, fondly remembered as an anti-tax hero actually raised taxes eleven times over the course of his presidency, all in the name of fiscal responsibility. He muscled through Congress the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 which lowered the top marginal tax bracket from 70% to 50% and the lowest bracket from 14% to 11%. However, as the economy began to emerge from recession he signed the 1982 Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which was the largest peacetime tax increase in American history, a much larger tax increase than Clinton’s 1993 tax increase. During the Reagan Administration, federal receipts grew at an average rate of 8.2%. And it all produced a strong, growing economy that put people back to work. Today’s Republican party not only considers letting the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire – as it was written into law when they were passed – a “tax increase”, they even consider closing tax loopholes to be a “tax increase”. Reagan also signed into law the requirement that even privately owned, for profit hospitals cannot refuse to treat emergency room patients because of their inability to pay. And he also signed into law a bill that granted unconditional amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants. Today’s Republican Party would denounce someone with Ronald Reagan policies as a “tax & spend librul”, a “socialist” determined to take over free enterprise and Healthcare, and an “open borders” anti-American. Oh wait, they already have.

I highly recommend reading the article in today’s Washington Post by Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein: Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem. I also highly recommend sending Richard Carmona to the U.S. Senate and Ron Barber to the House, to bring some common sense back to Congress.

I’ll admit upfront that I’m not a huge fan of The National Journal. But their investigative reporting is very good, and their article on Arizona’s U.S. Senate candidate Jeff Flake reveals the “Mr. Takes on Washington” actually began his career in Washington as a Lobbyist and registered Foreign Agent for a mine in Namibia with ties to Apartheid, Iran, and Resolution Copper. Resolution Copper – the foreign owned company which conned the GOP House into voting for a land swap to trade federally owned land near Superior, AZ with one of the world’s largest copper reserves for commercially worthless land out in the desert 100 miles northwest of Tucson. A land swap Jeff Flake spoke in favor twice on the House floor and which he voted for. A land swap promoted by his old employer.

It all began when Flake served his Mormon missionary work in Namibia in the early 1980s. Namibia back then was governed and controlled by the Apartheid South African regime and Apartheid was fully enforced. Having witnessed  the suppression and exploitation of Namibia’s native population first hand, did Flake return to speak out against this inhumanity and advocate for Namibia’s freedom from South Africa and Apartheid?   No.  He came back to set up shop in Washington, becoming a registered foreign agent for Rossing Uranium, a company which operates a uranium mine in Namibia. It is one of the world’s largest suppliers of the nuclear fuel. Rossing Uranium paid Flake $5,000 and $7,000 per month to “promote it’s image” and open doors. This is what the National Journal has to say about Rossing:

Rossing had a controversial history. The company had operated the Namibian mine since the 1970s. Anti-apartheid and antinuclear protesters had long criticized its operations. And a 1982 report from the United Nations Council for Namibia described “brutal and unsafe conditions” for workers there, and said that whites and blacks were treated differently. “Rossing can guarantee its mine a plentiful supply of cheap labor because it takes advantage of the apartheid system,” the report said.

Gabrielle Hecht, a professor of history at the University of Michigan and the author of the book Being Nuclear: Africans and the Global Uranium Trade, said that the Rossing mine “had a mixed record in 1991,” when Flake worked for the company. “Its occupational health record was being very furiously challenged at that time on an international scale—and he would have known that.”

Rossing Uranium also has some interesting ownership. It is 69% owned by UK based international mining conglomerate Rio Tinto, parent company of Resolution Copper. But Rossing is also 15% owned by a little company called Iranian Foreign Investment Co.. The U.S. Treasury Department lists it as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Tehran regime. From the National Journal:

Jonathan Schanzer, vice president of research for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a conservative think tank, noted that in the 1990s the Iranian regime “was not a friend of the United States; it was an enemy.” He added, “It’s a question of judgment when you represent a company that is owned in part by Iran.”

Flake claims he “didn’t know” about the Iranian ownership and has no comment. Actually, his 1990 federal filing falsely stated that Rossing was not “owned, financed, controlled, or subsidized in part or whole by a foreign government”. The truth was that in addition to the Iranian government’s stake in Rossing, the Namibian government also owned a stake. Is Mr. Flake in a habit of making statements under oath without bothering to check if they are in fact the truth?

Rossing Uranium’s Iranian connection came up last year when Resolution Copper, a subsidiary of Rio Tinto, majority owner of Rossing, pushed for the land swap near Superior. Resolution & Rio Tinto has a simple goal: trading  land far out in the desert in the San Pedro River valley loved by birds but commercially worthless for federally owned land with one of the world’s largest known copper reserves would enable them to mine the copper without paying a penny to to its rightful owners, American citizens and taxpayers. Democrats objected to the swap, pointing out the connection between Rossing, Iran, Rio Tinto and Resolution. Congressman Flake spoke in favor of the swap twice and voted for it, calling it a “great deal”. Actually, it was a sweet deal,  just not for American taxpayers.

Mr. Flake thinks he deserves a raise and promotion to the U.S. Senate. We think he deserves to be fired.

My esteemed colleague Don of Ft. Buckley seems to think that a member of Congress who is not of the party of the majority has little or no chance to get meaningful things done. Well, in this Do Nothing Congress no one of either party has got anything meaningful done. While the special election for the remainder of Gabby Giffords’ elected term is only through the end of this year, it will actually be a very important term. Simply put, the extremes on the right and on the left of this Do Nothing Congress will have to stop playing games, meet in the middle, and get things done.  A compromise on keeping the middle class tax cuts of the Bush tax cuts needs to be reached or they will ALL expire at the end of the year. A budget has to be passed. Last year, to avoid a government shutdown an increase in the deficit limit and outline for a budget was agreed to and passed by a large bipartisan majority. It laid out very clear guidelines for spending levels and the levels of funding for the different governmental agencies and departments. While it passed with a large bipartisan majority, you know who didn’t vote for it? The far right Tea Party Republican freshmen members of Congress, as well as a few members on the far left. This year those same far right Republicans have successfully pressured the GOP leadership to renege on the promises they made last year and pass the Ryan Budget which doubles down on more tax cuts for the wealthy, gut social programs, give more money to Defense than the Pentagon even wants, and does almost nothing about the deficit. Have Republicans in Congress lost their grip on reality???? It ain’t going to happen!

We need for Congress to quit playing games, stop the political brinkmanship, roll up their sleeves and get to work. Voters of southern Arizona have a unique opportunity to send a message to Congress, by sending a moderate to join them in June, a moderate who is ready and willing to work with reasonable, responsible members across the aisle and get things done. That man is Ron Barber, and the difference in approach and attitude between Ron Barber and his opponent Jesse Kelly couldn’t be more stark.

Jesse Kelly has called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” and that he would love to “eliminate it”.  Jesse Kelly thinks all government workers are “leeches”. When asked if he could work with Democrats in Congress Jesse Kelly said “I hope there’s no Democrats left in Congress when I get there.” Sorry Jesse, a totalitarian government isn’t in the cards, and your type of “my way or the highway” is what got us into this gridlock. After spending a trillion dollars and thousands of lives  “rebuilding” Iraq & Afghanistan we need to stop playing policeman for the world and bring those troops and dollars back home and rebuild America. What are Jesse Kelly’s foreign policy views? ” We’ve got to kill all members of radical Islam.”

Southern Arizonans also deserve a person who knows them, and knows the challenges they face. Jesse Kelly grew up in Montana and moved here to work for his father’s construction business. After losing the last election he moved to Texas to work again for his father and returned just after Giffords’ resignation to run for office again. Ron Barber has and owned and operated a family business in Tucson for 22 years with his wife Nancy. His children and grandchildren live here. Ron has pledged to protect the middle class at a time when families have seen their standards of living decline. Barber has made specific pledges to protect Medicare, Social Security and veterans’ benefits, and promised to support members of the military and their families. But here, let him tell you in his own words:

State Senator Frank Antenori, running for the GOP nomination for the CD8 special election and new CD2 general election, has announced he has fired his campaign treasurer Jeffrey Hill, himself former state senator. Antenori spokesman Brett Mecum. says Hill “completely burned them”. Antenori’s campaign missed the April 5 deadline to file a report detailing the campaign’s finances with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), as required by law. All three other GOP candidates met the filing deadline. When Antenori finally filed the report four days late, for good measure he filed twice – one set of records apparently used the wrong form. Then, just to be on the safe side, he filed a third, amended version a day later. Just one little problem:  All three versions have different totals for contributions, expenses and cash on hand!

An article on TheHill.com raises several other discrepancies and possible campaign violations:

A further review of the documents by The Hill showed that Antenori reported no expenditures for rent for his campaign headquarters. County property records show that the shopping center housing his Tucson, Ariz., headquarters is managed by Paul Ash Management Company, but there are no payments to the company. There are also no in-kind contributions for rent, which the campaign would have to report if it were being given free use of office space.

Antenori’s pre-primary filing also appeared to show his campaign in violation of federal campaign law that says that a candidate who is “testing the waters” with an exploratory committee cannot raise or spend more than $5,000. Once they do, they legally become a candidate and are subject to different reporting requirements.

Antenori’s filings show he started off the year with about $9,000 in his campaign account. He didn’t convert his exploratory committee to a full committee until early February.

This is the second major staff shake-up in three months for Antenori. In February, Treasurer and Campaign manager Kenneth Moyes, stepped down.  The only problem is nobody bothered to inform the FEC. Moyes continued to receive inquiries from the FEC requesting details of the campaign’s finances and had to take it upon himself to send the FEC a letter informing them he had nothing to do with the Antenori campaign since February 9.

Frank Antenori is the only Republican with any experience in holding an elective office in the race to replace Gabby Giffords. If he can’t manage a campaign any better than this, manage to use simple math to file accurate reports after three tries, you have to wonder what any of the other three running on the GOP side would do.

Ron Barber – the right choice for southern Arizonans to send to the U.S. Congress.

Former Democratic State Chair Don Bivens announced this morning he is dropping out of the Arizona Senate race, leaving former U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona unopposed in the primary for the Democratic nomination for United States Senator.

In his press release, Bivens stated:

“The continuing head-to-head competition of our Democratic primary is draining resources that we will need as a Party to win the U.S. Senate race in November. While I am confident we would win this primary, the cost and impact on the Party I’ve spent my life fighting for could diminish our chance to achieve the ultimate goal: winning in November.”

Dr. Richard Carmona released the following statement following Bivens’ announcement:

“Don Bivens is a cornerstone of the Arizona Democratic Party and will remain so for years to come. An agent of change for our state, Don knew how great of an opportunity we have to win this seat and knew that it would take a strong and united effort to do so. He and his team ran a strong race that showed a great deal of respect for the nominating process which in turn has improved our party’s chance of success in November.”

“I thank Don, his family and his campaign team for their selfless service to the party and eagerly anticipate working with them to move Arizona forward. He will be an integral player in any winning strategy and I look forward to working with him in the months ahead.”

http://www.carmonaforarizona.com/

Born to a poor Hispanic family in New York City, Dr. Richard Carmona experienced homelessness, hunger and bleak prospects for a future education and economic opportunity.  Rich learned tough early lessons about economic disparities and social injustice – an experience he has never forgotten, and one that has given him an understanding of how culture, health, education and economic status shape our country.

Richard Carmona will be an independent voice in the United States Senate, a voice for ALL Arizonans.

UPDATE: This morning VoteVets.org has also endorsed Richard Carmona for the U.S. Senate:

Veterans Endorse Fellow Vet Carmona for Arizona’s Senate Seat

Phoenix, AZ – The largest group of progressive veterans in America, VoteVets.org PAC, is today endorsing Dr. Richard Carmona, a Vietnam Veteran, for Arizona’s open Senate Seat.

“Rich Carmona has an absolutely incredible story – one of the most American stories I’ve seen in politics,” said Jon Soltz, Iraq War Veteran and Chairman of VoteVets.org PAC.  “He literally pulled himself up by his bootstraps, gave his all in service to this country in war, and came home to continue to serve the people.  He’s a fighter, and exactly the kind of person we need more of in Washington.  He will do Arizona proud.”

In the spirit of bi-partisanship, we offer a campaign web video from Wil Cardon, candidate for the Republican US Senate nomination:

“Jeff Flake has traveled the world at taxpayer expense more than any other Arizona House member.”
- The Arizona Republic

“Jeff Flake, career politician we can’t trust”
- Wil Cardon for Senate Campaign

We couldn’t agree more. Richard Carmona for U.S. Senate.

Republican Tucson Councilman Steve Kozachik – who made a recent guest blog here at Tucson Citizen suggesting everyone – Republican and Democrat – stand aside and let Ron Barber fill the remain term of CD8 – has announced he will supporting Ron Barber in the special election for CD8.

Republican Tucson City Councilman Steve Kozachik is jumping party lines to help Democrat Ron Barber in his special election campaign.

Kozachik is still proposing that all candidates — Republicans and Democrats alike — step aside and let Barber complete the term of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Naturally, that is going over like a lead balloon with the announced Republican candidates. Sam Stone, spokesman for Martha McSally, says this would somehow prevent voters from getting to know Barber and his position on the issues. UA Sportscaster Dave Sitten said “”I won’t stand down now, nor will I stand down when fighting for our community’s values in Washington”. John Lervold called Barber an “anointed one” and called for the voters to decide.

While I admire and respect Kozachik’s independent stance, I feel the voters must make their own decision, between Mr. Barber and Republican candidates. Gabby’s endorsement is just an endorsement, nothing more, nothing less. But we at Baja Democrats wholeheartedly endorse Ron Barber for the remainder of the CD8 term. We also wholeheartedly endorse Matt Heinz for the new CD2 seat.
Ron Barber for CD8, Matt Heinz for CD2 – a winning combination for southern Arizona!

Welcome! I’m starting a new blog here at Tucson Citizen focused and news and events of Southern Arizona Democratic candidates for office, with also limited coverage of statewide Democratic candidates. I’ve been posting as a commenter here as “Cochisecitizen”, my name is David. We welcome constructive comments and opposing opinions, BUT excessive profanity – especially when used to attack someone, threats of violence, or personal attacks will NOT be tolerated and those who resort to those tactics will be banned from any future comments.

Starting off, here are our first endorsement of the 2012 elections:

 U.S. Senate: Richard Carmona

Richard Carmona has a long and distinguished career, and his independent voice will be a welcome addition to the Senate Democratic majority representing Arizona’s diverse culture and priorities. No one wins statewide office in Arizona without winning a majority of Independent voters, and Richard Carmona is uniquely positioned to win the support of Democrats, Independents, and Independent thinking Republicans. His opponent in the Democratic primary, Don Biven, likes to boost that he is the “real Democrat” in the race. Well, Mr. Biven, if your leadership as the State Party Chair during 2010 elections – when Arizona Democrats suffered the worst ass kicking in decades – is any indication of your “leadership”, it is well past time for new voices in the Arizona Democratic Party. We confidently and enthusiastically endorse Richard Carmona for the U.S. Senate.

Arizona Congressional District 1: Wenona Benally Baldenegro

Wenona Benally Baldenegro is the right candidate for Democrats in the new AZ CD01 and the right person to represent the district in congress. Wenona’s roots run deep in the district, born in a rural small town on the Navajo reservation.  The daughter of an elementary teacher, she saw the value of hard work to gain an education, and graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in English Literature at Arizona State’s prestigious Barrett Honor’s College . She then went on to earn earned a juris doctorate degree at Harvard School of Law, and then a master degree in public policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Wenona is on the right side of the issues, and will work hard to protect Social Security. Wenona understands that Medicare and Medicaid saves Arizona trillions of dollars by providing seniors, the disabled, and the disadvantaged with much-needed, affordable quality health care services at a much lower cost. She will fight the exploitation of Native American and federal land by foreign companies who seek only to plunder our natural resources without paying a penny on royalties, conning the public with phony land swaps.

Wenona’s opponent in the Democratic primary is one term Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick, who was deservedly a one term representative. Yes, the 2010 election was a Red tidal wave in Arizona. And yes, voter turnout was less in 2010 than in the Presidential election of 2008. But still Kirkpatrick’s vote total fell by a whopping 44% in 2010 from 2008, while Republican turnout fell by only 10.3%. She enabled Teapublican Paul Gosar to win the election with 11,400 votes less than the losing Republican candidate in 2008. Ann Kirkpatrick was such a lousy Congresswoman that Democrats and Democrat leaning Independents simply didn’t care if she lost.  As with Don Bivens, it is well past time for new voices in the Arizona Democratic Party. Wenona for Arizona!

Bonehead of the Week: Steve Farley 

Finally, we plan to feature a Bonehead of the Week feature. While it will be a non-partisan feature, this week we give it to a well deserving Democrat, State Rep. Farley:

Last week Farley bravely ventured into the CD8/CD2 race by letting us know that should Gabby toss him the bouquet he might take up the challenge. This week he topped that by suggesting – to the laughter of legislative colleagues – that since owners of electric cars pay no gas tax that they be charged by the mile. Really? And how would you implement that? Ask owners if electric vehicles to voluntarily report that? How about checking the mileage during annual emission tests? Oh wait, electric cars don’t emit emissions. But at the heart of the matter is that the gas tax is one of the most regressive taxes there is. Whether it is the single mother putting $5 in the tank of her 12 year old car so she can get to her job at Walmart or the owner of a Hummer filling up for a wild weekend in Vegas, they all pay the same Arizona $.37 cents per gallon gas tax. When the gas tax was first implemented ownership of a car was a luxury, not a necessity, and made some sense that those who used the roads & highways pay for their construction and maintenance with a tax on gasoline. But these days, whether walking, riding a bike, riding in a Sun Trans bus, or riding in a Mercedes we all use the roads There is no need for a special “pay-as-you-go” tax to support them, it should come out of general revenues. And we sure as heck don’t want to discourage the use of electric vehicles, we want to encourage it. Bonehead.

Ok, one last “final”: Don’t argue with Dirty Harry – it is indeed Halftime in America. Hear our engines roar!