Hubbard obviously wants to diffuse some of what is being said about him by those who oppose his candidacy, and bringing humor to your initial ad buy is an effective way to accomplish that.  I will be following this race closer than most as I have just moved into the district and look forward to more from Hubbard and his opponent Rep. David Grimes.

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That story was then picked up by Christina Walsh at The Daily Caller, who said,

Jim Peera, who fought the city for years to keep a property he was rehabilitating himself — the kind of entrepreneurial private redevelopment that should be encouraged, especially in this economy — obtained copies of demolition records that indicate hundreds of homes and properties have been demolished over the past five years in Montgomery.  Some may have posed an immediate threat to public health and safety — but that was certainly not the case with all of them.

Consider Jimmy McCall.  Jimmy was in the process of building from the ground-up a home for his family when he was notified it was slated for demolition.  After one failed attempt to bulldoze the half-completed home, the city came back under this state law and got what they were fighting for: Jimmy’s would-be dream home was demolished, and he was stuck with the bill.

There was also coverage from ABC News.  That led to some additional commentary from Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic’s Daily Dish, who obviously doesn’t understand anything about how municipal elections work in Alabama.

This would seem to be an example where libertarians, already on the scene doing excellent work, might ally themselves with a carefully chosen liberal challenger for mayor, given that the local conservative establishment is insufficiently enamored of property rights and limited government. If Strange doesn’t face or beats back a primary challenge prior to the next election — some local conservatives are upset too — I don’t see how any libertarian voter could fail to root for his ouster in the general election.

Obviously, anyone who does know about our municipal elections work knows that we don’t have primaries, because city leaders are not required to declare a party affiliation and do not run under a party banner.  And this is the first negative press I have seen for Mayor Strange, not any indication of a pattern of behavior that has the city in an  uproar.  How the mayor deals with this issue will say a lot for his future as mayor, but it wouldn’t be smart to assume he will or should be voted out of office.

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(EDITOR’S NOTE: I couldn’t be prouder of my grandfather for distributing the following to his friends and family and believe it is surely worth sharing with you.)

It may be me, it may be the times, it could be any number of reasons  but it concerns me that we are moving away from the original  purpose of America.  Many factions have created an atmosphere of divide and destroy, I will work hard not to let that happen. This is not what my forefathers came to America for and I just had to set down in writing my feelings.
 
What is America?
 
Below are lyrics to a song that was first sung by Frank Sinatra in 1944.  It was sung to kids who were picking on a minority kid and literally kicking the crap out of him. Sinatra tried to tell those who were beating the kid up,  it was wrong and in America, a country of immigrants and minorities, we don’t do it because we are Americans and  we stick together and we are better than that. Our country was founded on the premise that all men are created equal, with religious freedom and we are better than any other people in  the whole world. We are compassionate, charitable and a helping people. We fight better than anyone and we love peace more than anyone. When we fought we only asked for only one thing, a place where we could bury our fallen comrades, never asked for land or treasure, only appreciation.
 
Our founding father pledged  their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to create this country. Do we, the succeeding generations wish to squander our birthright?
 
Somehow, somewhere, some place, we seem to have lost our focus. We are becoming intolerant, nasty, greedy, blaming everything on everyone whether they effected it or not. We must get back to the origination of this country or we will surely lose it.

What is America to Me?
 
What is America to me?
A name, a map, the flag I see,
a certain word, “Democracy.”

What is America to me?
The house I live in, A plot of earth, a street,
The grocer and the butcher and the people that I meet,
The children in the playground, the faces that I see;
All races, all religions, that’s America to me.
 
The place I work in, the worker at my side
The little town or city where my people lived and died
The “howdy” and the handshake the air of feeling free
the right to speak my mind out, that’s America to me.
 
The things I see about me the big things and the small
The little corner newsstand and the house a mile tall;
The wedding and the churchyard, the laughter and the tears,
The dream that’s been a growin’ for over 230 years.
 
The town I live in, the street, the house, the room,
The pavement of the city, or a garden all in bloom,
The church, the school, the club house,
The million lights I see, But especially the people,
That’s America to me.

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The full text of the pledge is here.

When this happened, I was pleasantly surprised that the two men competing to represent me in the Alabama House (we are moving into the 73rd District at the end of the week) would do something so unorthodox. Of course, we knew this wouldn’t stand, not in the political environment today.  The only question was when the pledge would be broken and in what context.  We got our answer last week.  This is how WSFA in Montgomery reported the story,

Now, let’s deal with one of Rep. Grimes’s points first. The language of the pledge is clear that it doesn’t matter who was doing the polling. It states that if either candidate becomes aware of dishonest tactics he will publicly condemn it. So, I don’t believe there is any room for debate on that point.

What we’re left with here is the definition of negative. There’s two problems I have with this situation in that area…first is the representing what was done as a poll. This was not a poll, it was a deliberate attempt to deceive, which would certainly fit under most people’s definition of a “negative campaign tactic”.

My other issue is that the full text of the poll (which WSFA stated was conducted by the Alabama Republican Party) has not been made available, so we can only go on hearsay as to what was said. However, if you accept Rep. Grimes representation, we still have a problem. He says one of the poll questions read, “”How do you feel to know that Joe Hubbard is a lawyer who has sued local businesses and has defended many corrupt Montgomery politicians?” If Rep. Grimes believes this kind of tactic doesn’t violate the clean campaign pledge, than where is the evidence for the veracity of that statement? Mr. Hubbard is certainly an attorney, but have seen nothing to support the rest of that question.

All the pledge required of Rep. Grimes was to issue a public statement repudiating the poll. He chose instead to defend it, which has seemed to me to render the pledge he signed meaningless.

(NOTE: Left in Alabama touched on this story briefly earlier and many readers know that Joe Hubbard is a frequent commenter to this blog.)

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Over 1.4 million acres (about 5.1%) of Alabama land is foreign-owned.  The county-by-county breakdown is interesting as well, the counties with the most foreign-owned acreage are:

Butler County:        161, 522 acres (33% of total acreage)

Baldwin County:    109,969 acres (11% of total)

Monroe County:      99,963 acres  (15% of total)

Conecuh County:  97,853 acres (18% of total)

Almost all of the foreign-owned land is forest land and is primarily owned by Dutch companies, though there are also significant holdings by Canadians.  This report is an interesting piece of the puzzle when we are talking about the right level to tax land in the state, and particularly forestland.  Is there anything surprising to you here?

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Voters and elected officials in Greene and Macon County today filed a class-action suit in federal court against Governor Bob Riley and Task Force commander John Tyson. The complaint alleges that the governor violated the Voting Rights Act by nullifying the votes of the electorates in Greene and Macon counties who approved state constitutional amendments in 2003 authorizing electronic bingo operations in their counties.

The complaint also alleges that the raids carried out by the governor and his Task Force have the purpose of perpetuating Alabama’s historical denial of home rule to Black Belt counties, in violation of the Ku Klux Klan Act and the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the United States Constitution.

The suit is being handled by well-known attorneys James Blacksher, Edward Still (who also happens to be a well-known blogger) and Fred Gray.

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The Center for Responsibility and Ethics compiled the data,

“Sen. Shelby, like Rep. Murtha before him, takes trading earmarks for campaign dollars to a level most members of Congress can only dream about,” said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the organization. “Also like Murtha, Shelby earmarks for the benefit of his former-staffers-turned-lobbyists.”

The records identify five former staffers, in particular, whose clients have received over $250 million:

• Ray Cole – former Shelby state director and campaign manager
• Richard Roberts – former Shelby chief of staff
• Wesley Ryan Welch -former Shelby legislative director
• Phil Rivers – former Shelby chief of staff
• Jennifer Bendall – former Shelby policy advisor

There are several things to keep in mind about this report.  First, one of the clients identified as a big benefactor who employs a former Shelby staffer as a lobbyist is the University of Alabama.  Senator Shelby has made no secret of his advocacy for the University and for the Tuscaloosa area and I have little doubt that support would continue regardless of whether there was a connection with former staffers or not.  And that could very well be true of many of the other connections outlined in the Politico piece.

However, it’s the appearance here that’s the problem.  When you have this many former staffers tied to getting this much money in earmarks, it should raise questions and be cause for reflection by the Senator and his constituents.  The Senator believes there is nothing wrong with earmarks, but his constituents should be thoughtful in determining whether those earmarks are based on merit, as the Senator claims, or based on “who you know” as it seems to appear it is.

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Robert Bentley (R) – 55%

Ron Sparks (D) – 35%

Undecided – 7%

These numbers are not much different from the numbers the same polling firm got just before the Republican run-off (56-37).  There are a couple of things that should be of concern to Ron Sparks.  First, Dr. Bentley is already over the 50% threshhold with “likely voters” in this poll.  Second, the undecided pool is quite small.  He is either going to need to convince people who aren’t currently in the “likely voter” category to vote and expand the pool, or he is going to need to pull people who are currently in the Bentley camp over to his side.  No easy task, but as we have seen in this election season, it has rarely paid off to be the front-runner.

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In case you don’t know the story behind this letter, you can get the refresher course here on what happened “six weeks ago” as Dr. Bentley puts it.  Ms. Albright indicated a similar letters was received by Steven Berry, the former campaign communications director.

Mending fences is never a bad idea during the quiet time following a victory and before things ramp up for the fall.

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How did Robert Bentley win?  By gaining the support of a huge majority of voters who supported Tim James and Roy Moore in the June 1st primary.  There are a number of ways to demonstrate this, but let’s look at Republican strongholds (where crossovers would have had the least influence), look at who won them on June 1st and July 15th, respectively, and how many votes Bentley made up on Byrne between the two elections (the change in the spread):

Republican Strongholds

That seven thousand vote increase for Bentley in Baldwin County, which is very much Byrne’s home turf, was particularly damning.  These numbers clearly demonstrate that even without crossover voting, Bentley was very much in control of this race.  Another definitive piece of evidence comes when you focus on the spread between the two candidates, there are only six counties (out of 67) where Byrne increased his spread between June 1st and July 15th over Bentley.

But is incorrect to say that crossover voting made no difference in the race.  It made a significant difference in the final margin, though not in the outcome.  I approached the question of crossover voting by looking at the Republican/Democratic breakdown of voters in the June 1st primary (when there was a competitive race on both sides) and compared that to the number of voters in the Republican run-off on July 15th.  Here it’s instructive to look at the polar opposites of the counties we discussed above.  Let’s look at the counties that had the highest percentage of  Democratic voters in the gubernatorial primaries held on June 1st:

Democratic Strongholds

Macon, the county Mr. Kilgore pointed to in his analysis, and Choctaw were anomalies here, but overall we can see signs that there was indeed crossover voting, though it didn’t make a great deal of difference in a race ultimately decided by 70,000 votes.

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“First and foremost my duty is to AEA and its members,” Hubbert said in the press release. “We support friends of education regardless of party, and our membership reflects the diversity of party membership in Alabama. AEA is made up of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, and my leadership role in one party has at times clouded that issue.”

Danny at Doc’s Political Parlor asks “Why now?”  It’s a great question.  My hypothesis:  Dr. Hubbert believes Dr. Bentley could be a great ally as governor and he didn’t want the party politics that will be part of the gubernatorial election to cause that relationship to sour.

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(Photo Credit: Dusty Compton/AP)

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9:39pm CST – The Secretary of State reports all indications are that there was very little crossover voting today

9:37pm CST – The Fix (Washington Post) – Robert Bentley Clinches Republican Nod for Governor in Alabama

9:35pm CST – AP: Tea Party Favorite Loses GOP Runoff in Alabama

9:34pm CST – The Secretary of State’s office is reporting turnout was about 17%

9:10pm CST – Sewell will face Don Chamberlain, who will be the Republican nominee in a VERY heavy Democratic congressional district

9:06pm CST – Terri Sewell has defeated Shelia Smoot in the 7th Congressional District primary run-off and will almost certainly be the first African American woman to represent Alabama in Congress

9:05pm CST – Martha Roby will be the GOP candidate in the 2nd Congressional District against Bobby Bright.  She easily defeated Rick Barber.

9:04pm CST – James Anderson has declared victory in the Democratic primary run-off for attorney general

8:52pm CST – The governor’s race has been called for Robert Bentley, he will be the GOP nominee taking on Ron Sparks in November.

7:55pm CST – Almost 3% reporting, Bentley 59% to Byrne 41%

7:48pm CST – Still below 2% reporting – Bentley 60% to Byrne 40%

7:37pm CST – There were some errors in counting the number of precincts in, all over the place…seems we are at 2% and it’s still Bentley 54% and Byrne 46% in the GOP governor’s run-off.

7:32pm CST – AP results are here

7:19pm CST – With 3% in – Bentley 54%, Byrne 46%

7:16pm CST – With 1% reporting – Bentley 69% – Byrne 31%

7:14pm CST – First hard numbers are showing on the WSFA website.

7:13pm CST – Watching for the first results on the new SOS website (among other places)

7:06pm CST – Robert Bentley is telling supporters he expects to announce victory within 90 minutes…overconfidence or knowledge?

7:03pm CST – Kyle Whitmire is also live blogging and tweeting tonight.

7:01pm CST – Polls have closed in Alabama.

6:33pm CST – Once all counties have reported the Alabama GOP will post its results here.

6:15pm CST – Polls will close in 45 minutes and we’ll be looking for results to begin flowing within the hour.

_________________________

Don’t forget to vote in the July 13th primary run-off in Alabama.  Both the Republican and Democratic parties have statewide nominees to select – in the attorney general’s race on the Democratic side and the races for governor, agriculture commissioner and public service commission place 1 on the Republican side.

*** Don’t forget we have been tracking the organization and newspaper endorsements for the run-off election.

*** The Secretary of State has the sample ballots for every county.

*** I’m looking forward to seeing how the new election night return system the Secretary of State’s office will be testing works out.

*** Felicia Sonmez at the Washington Post‘s The Fix has an outsider’s perspective on the state of the Republican governor’s race.

*** The U.S. Justice Department is sending observers to Lee, Barbour and Russell counties for this election.

*** The Alabama Democratic party is expecting a light turnout.

*** Will this be the “final word” from 2nd Congressional District Republican candidate Rick Barber?

*** The AP is reporting light turnout across the state…

*** Danny at Doc’s Political Parlor highlights some down-ballot races to watch.

*** An outstanding analysis of the Republican governor’s run-off by Ed Kilgore at FiveThirtyEight.com

What interests you about the election today?  Post your thoughts in the comments below…

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IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

hen in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

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What questions/ideas do you have for me?

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(EDITOR’S NOTE: The headline and first paragraph have been altered since original publication to more accurately reflect the facts.)

Supporters of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman were ecstatic yesterday with the news that the previous decision of the Court of Appeals was vacated, by order of the U.S. Supreme Court and the case has been remanded back for further consideration.  As Walt at Doc’s Political Parlor points out, there are some who believe the whole matter should be dropped now, but that certainly will not be the case.  The 11th Circuit will take its due diligence in reviewing the case, as it should.

Former Gov. Siegelman sent out the following message last night, which was also posted to a Democratic listserv,

Just a late night note to let you know that the US Supreme Court sent my case back to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to review in light of their earlier decision narrowing the scope of the “Honest Services” statute.

This is very good news!

While we have another fight on our hands in Atlanta with the 11th Circuit, the good news is that we have a chance to convince the 11th Circuit that the time has come to finally do justice in this case.

Forget, if you can Karl Rove’s involvement…forget that I was brought to trial in the middle of my reelection campaign by the wife of my opponent’s campaign manager who is Rove’s best friend, this case is important not just for my freedom but for anyone running for office and any of their contributors!

It is important because there was no crime…something that the New York Times __has repeatedly said and to which 91 former state Attorneys General have agreed…appointing a contributor to a board he wanted to be on may be called lots of things but one thing it’s not…is bribery! Otherwise President Obama and all of his ambassadors should be in federal prison!

So I am encouraged because we have a chance to convince the 11 th Circuit to do justice… finally and completely.

Hope you will join me in this fight.

All my best,

Don

I’m not going to re-hash the entire history of this case here, but Roger Shuler, who has followed this case intensely, but with whom I have often disagreed, both on the facts (for instance, his mistaken statement that the conviction, rather than the decision by the Court of Appeals, was vacated) and on his interpretation, raises an important point,

From a Siegelman standpoint, today’s ruling is filled with irony. That’s because the 11th Circuit already has overturned the honest-services fraud convictions against him–although those convictions stand against Scrushy.

The issues remaining against Siegelman involve bribery and obstruction of justice. So how could last week’s Supreme-Court ruling on honest-services fraud–involving former Enron executive Jeffrey Skilling and former media magnate Conrad Black–help Siegelman?
…

It’s undisputed that the Siegelman jury was instructed on theories involving honest-services fraud. But the U.S. Supreme Court has found that theory now is legally invalid. Yates states that such an instruction, in essence, “muddies the water” of a case and raises issues of constitutional error.

So, the issues involved in Siegelman’s case at the appellate court are far from cut and dry.  The determination, according to Shuler, that will have to be made by the court is whether or not the jury instructions on “honest services” fraud (for which Siegelman’s conviction was already vacated) “muddied the waters” for his other convictions.

What are your thoughts on where Siegelman stands today and what that means for his future?

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