Rum, Romanism and Rebellion

- First up…health care expertise from Jon Kyl:

- Shaun McClusky addressed a meeting of NAWBO. He was asked if, under proposition 200, the city council could change the fire response provisions should standards change. He said they could. Of course, they can’t since 200 is a charter amendment that can’t be changed by council fiat. You know, the Republican argument that the council are all incompetent idiots would be more credible if weren’t supporting a candidate that continues to show a lack of knowledge of the basics of Tucson government.

- The Tea Party folks continue to shop around the story that anti-200 activists who attended the event at the tax-payer financed Tucson Electric Park had some secret plan to “rush the stage” when Andrew Napolitano spoke. “DowntownHipster” (probably Tea Party organizer Robert Meyer, who refers to himself as such) posted news of this “secret plan” to the Weekly’s comment section. There are a bunch of reasons that this is an idiotic charge, most of all because it would have been a poor way for the anti-200 folks to make their case. Think about this for a second: these guys were trying to get support from the crowd, but they wanted to disrupt the event? Does that make any sense? I mean, that sort of tactic would be downright teabaggerish.

- From the Glass Houses and Motes in Your Neighbor’s Eye Department: Sal DiCiccio thought he could get all sorts of traction by alleging that Dana Kennedy was supported by out of state donors. The score: Kennedy has raised $5,600 out of state, while DiCiccio has raised $24,000. Oops.

By the way, DiCiccio has spent over $15,000 dollars on his website. What the heck is up with that?

- Democrats hit Steve Kozachik last week for statements Kozachik has made saying that the city should not finance a downtown convention center hotel. Wow. Has he talked to his fellow party members in the legislature who have all but mandated that Rio Nuevo funds must go to convention center improvements? Improvements that would be useless without the new hotel? Hey, this might be an example of Kozachik applying his expertise managing projects for the U of A athletic department. He’ll just get Richard Jefferson to write a check, right?

- Oh, I suppose we should give a “flower” now that the Star has put Rhonda Bodfield, an excellent reporter with actual campaign experience too, on the political beat full time. What galls me, and here is the “thorn,” is that we went weeks with little or no political coverage on the verge of a city election.
In that time, the Star made a big deal about a new wine column. Obviously, much more important than who is running our community.