Save Water, Money, and Energy

Benefits of Water Efficiency

If one out of every 100 American homes retrofitted with water-efficient fixtures, we could save about 100 million kWh of electricity per year—avoiding 80,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. That is equivalent to removing nearly 15,000 automobiles from the road for one year!

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What is Truth?

Support Our Youth in their Quest for Truth

Video Captures Secret Bailout Negotiations

Republicans follow Democrat Lead on Open Vote

Today

Assembly GOP Has No Need to Fear Openness

In 2006, the Republican-dominated chamber, in a drive to make its committees more efficient, changed the rules to allow subcommittees to kill legislation on unrecorded votes. Prior to 2006, subcommittees didn’t record votes on recommendations to the full panels but they also couldn’t kill legislation outright.

The minority Democrats in the House cried foul and tried to change the rules in 2007 and 2008, failing both times. News organizations across the state also joined the discussion, with the editorial pages of several of the state’s large dailies calling for recorded subcommittee votes as being in the best interests of all Virginians.

Both years, the GOP caucus refused to move to recorded subcommittee votes on motions to kill a bill.

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From Last Year's General Assembly

“We call on Speaker Bill Howell and House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith to join leaders in their own caucus like Delegate Terry Kilgore in support of open government and giving the people of Virginia the right to know how we vote,” House Minority Leader Ward Armstrong said.

“It’s time for us to ensure accountability in state government by making sure every vote is public,” said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Brian Moran. “Virginia is the birthplace of Democracy and Jefferson’s House deserves better than voting behind closed doors.”

“Hundreds of bills were dispensed without a recorded vote last session,” Delegate Ken Plum, who introduced the resolution last session to require recorded votes in subcommittee. “Every vote should be recorded and open to the people of Virginia. It shouldn’t matter whether it happens in a subcommittee or on the floor of the House of Delegates.”

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Now This Year...

Republican activists push for rule change on vote records

Republican activists are pushing party leaders to abolish a rule that allows members of the House of Delegates to defeat bills without leaving any record of how they voted.

Under House rules, when legislators take action on bills in subcommittees, no votes are recorded. The practice has been used by both Democratic and Republican lawmakers over the years to kill bills without a leaving a voting trail.

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Finks Announces McAuliffe Visit

On Saturday December 13th Terry McAuliffe will be in Harrisonburg .
Terry is past Democratic National Chairman and was Hillary Clinton's campaign manger during the 2008 primary campaign.
Terry is testing the waters about a run for Governor of Virginia in 2009.
If you would like to meet him he will be at Clementine Cafe on South Main at 3:00 pm this Saturday. Clementine Cafe is located across from the old Leggett store on the opposite side of the parking lot beside Dave's Taverna.

Alan Finks
Chair
Harrisonburg Democratic Committee

Obama Enjoys Good Ratings

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Approval Index shows that 43% of the nation’s voters now Strongly Approve of the way Barack Obama is handling the role of President-elect while just 16% Strongly Disapprove. That’s the fifth straight day that Obama has earned a +27 rating in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Approval Index. His highest rating to data has been a +28, reached last week.

Among those who view the economy as the most important issue, 55% give Obama their Strong Approval while 7% Strongly Disapprove (Approval Index rating: +48). As for those who consider nation security most important, 24% Strongly Approve and 28% Strongly Disapprove (Approval Index rating: -4).

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Virginia Politics 2009 -- Governor's Race

Sen. Deeds discusses budget shortfalls

Democratic gubernatorial candidate against education cuts, VDOT audit
By Garren Shipley -- Daily Staff Writer

Speaking in an interview Friday, Deeds said major budget shortfalls are the time to take serious looks at the way Richmond does business.

"We have to think about some of the functions of government," he said. "Perhaps we shouldn't even be performing some functions."

But while some Republican legislators are talking quietly about cuts to education in the face of the $3 billion shortfall, Deeds says that's a bad idea.

"At the end of the day, you don't want to make cuts that are going to erode people's confidence in the future," he said. "The kind of cuts that I think that would do that are cuts to K-12 education."

"We've been going on the cheap on higher education for the past umpteen years," he said. "We have to be prepared to meet the challenges of tomorrow. I don't think we can do that if we say, 'Oh no the sky is falling, we've got to cut education this year.'"

Legislators also have to make some major improvements to the state's road system, Deeds said. Better roads will bring better economic times.

He rejected Republican calls for a "performance audit" of the Virginia Department of Transportation.

GOP legislators say a top-to-bottom review of how the agency accomplishes its role could save the state some money and lead to better roads.

"That's just a cop out. VDOT is continually audited. VDOT right now has fewer employees than they had in 1958," Deeds said.

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Horserace 2009 by the numbers

Virginia voters don't go to the polls until November, but four candidates are already off and running in the race to replace Democratic Gov. Timothy M. Kaine.

As of now, it's anybody's race, according to a poll released Monday by Rasmussen Reports. Hypothetical matchups between the only Republican candidate — Attorney General Bob McDonnell — and the three Democrats show many voters undecided.

McDonnell, R: 39 percent
State Sen. Creigh Deeds, D: 39 percent
Other: 4 percent
Not Sure: 18 percent

McDonnell, R: 37 percent
Del. Brian Moran, D: 41 percent
Other: 5 percent
Not Sure: 16 percent

McDonnell, R: 41 percent
Terry McAuliffe, D: 36 percent
Other: 5 percent
Not Sure: 17 percent

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