It’s euphemistically referred to as “blown cellulose,” but it’s really just shredded newspaper. If we look closely, we can read some words on it. The amount of newspaper used to insulate our house is as much as we’d go through in twenty years. (If, y’know, we read printed newspapers.) It’s a great insulator, but it uses a stunningly small amount of energy to create, when compared to fiberglass and other forms of insulation commonly used in contemporary houses. It’s sprayed with borate, so insects don’t want it, it’s fireproof, and it won’t mold. (Because it’s packed more tightly, preventing the flow of air within walls, it’s actually more fire resistant than fiberglass.) For you energy geeks out there, it’s an R value of 4.0, compared to fiberglass batts’ 3.2.

It’s a small thing, but it’s one of dozens of such touches that I really like about our new house. The drywall went up this week so, with any luck, we’ll never see our newspaper insulation again.

Anyhow, just to stick a thumb in the eye of Senate Democrats, this evening I put together an HTML version of the same data, making it easier for folks to access and for search engines to index. It took me—no kidding—about twenty minutes. (For example, here’s my senator’s 2009 voting record.) As always, every scrap of legislative data on Richmond Sunlight comes directly from the legislature’s website, so I don’t have access to any special fairy dust that the Senate doesn’t have. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t care who’s in charge of the legislature, transparency is essential. Any Democrats who thinks I’m going to go easy on them had best think again.

Laurence Verga, one of the seven Republicans hoping to unseat U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello, D-Ivy, has clarified recent remarks that he said have been “mischaracterized as racist.”

[...]

On Tuesday, Verga released a statement with an unedited transcript of his remarks at the debate. The transcript, he said, shows he meant that Obama’s foreign policy is “political correctness run awry” because it is too soft on terrorism.
[...]

In Verga’s statement clarifying the remarks, he said the full transcript of his comments show he meant that political correctness has damaged the nation’s ability to fight “global war against jihad.”

To consider the veracity of his defense, let’s look at the text of his remarks, in the context in which he’s saying that they need to be placed:

The biggest threat to our country right now is ourselves. Not the people in this room, but the people that voted the current administration in are the biggest threats. And what that is, is political correctness run awry. We are in a war. There is a global jihad against the United States of America. This jihad wants to take away our freedom. They don’t like our freedom, they don’t like our religion, they don’t like anything about us. And what we need to do is stand up, forget the political correctness and fight this war. To win this war. And make sure that Americans on our soil and internationally are secure.

He goes on a little longer, about Israel and Iran.

Reading this over, one sees Verga’s trouble. He’s making two separate statements. The first is about politics:

The biggest threat to our country right now is ourselves. Not the people in this room, but the people that voted the current administration in are the biggest threats. And what that is, is political correctness run awry.

And the second is about war:

We are in a war. There is a global jihad against the United States of America. This jihad wants to take away our freedom. They don’t like our freedom, they don’t like our religion, they don’t like anything about us. And what we need to do is stand up, forget the political correctness and fight this war. And make sure that Americans on our soil and internationally are secure.

These are two barely related thoughts. The first is the patently stupid assertion that a majority of Americans hate America, led by the president, and that electing him is “political correctness run awry.” The second is the usual pap that terrorists hate us because they “don’t like our freedom,” that we have to “stand up” and “fight this war.”

Now, we’re fighting precisely as many wars as when George Bush was president, Guantanamo is open for business, the Patriot Act remains the law of the land, etc. Unless he’s advocating that we invade a third country, I can’t understand what he’s promoting here.

Verga’s difficulty here is that he’s claiming that his prior statement encompassed—beforehand—the seemingly unrelated one that he made a minute later. By way of comparison, imagine that he said this:

You can tell that President Obama is on the side of terrorists because of his race. We are in a war. There is a global jihad against the United States of America. This jihad wants to take away our freedom. They don’t like our freedom, they don’t like our religion, they don’t like anything about us. And what we need to do is stand up, forget the political races and fight this war. And make sure that Americans on our soil and internationally are secure.

Imagine that Verga said that, and then said “golly, I didn’t mean the president’s race, I was talking about political races, as I mentioned a minute later.” Yeah. Bullshit.

We’re left with two possibilities here. The first is that Laurence Verga was attacking President Obama along racial lines. The second is that Laurence Verga is perhaps the most incompetent public speaker that has ever graced a stage in the Fifth District, who made a gaffe of stunning proportions. I don’t know the man, I don’t know his character (other than that he’s publicly accused me of being the biggest threat to America’s national security), and so I figure it’s theoretically possible that he’s just accidentally said something enormously stupid. I think the evidence supports pretty strongly that he’s racist, but not being psychic, I can’t know his heart.

Best case, Verga (along with Jim McKelvey) merely accused half of the district’s voters of being America’s worst enemies. Worse case, he did that and he’s racist. Either way, with Bradley Rees out of the race, Verga’s now my man for the nomination. Whether racist or incompetent, this is definitely the guy I’d like to have as the face of Fifth District Republicans.

This doesn’t add new information, but it does prevent anybody from claiming that his remarks are being taken out of context, as I understand his supporters are claiming. This is an excerpt from the Lynchburg Tea Party’s video of the entire debate, provided by member Kurt Feigel. See it in a larger context still, if you’re interested.