Tag: idiocy

Anti-Semitic Pixels Go Unchallenged

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In the last few weeks, there has been what at least one person – seemingly ignorant of the word’s definition  – considers to be a scandal. Known to many as “one of the many lawyers who works around Buffalo” and commonly referred to as, “isn’t that guy retired”, one nominally “Democratic” activist pointed out that a horrible crime had been perpetrated – the chief executive of Erie County used the county seal on his campaign website.

Not waiting for Republicans to point out any alleged impropriety, he bravely preserved democracy and the American way by ensuring that only one Democratic politician was called out. Never mind that the seal appears on the websites of other county politicians,  this was the America-saving result: 

Thanks be to God that this grievous insult to the taxpayers of Erie County has been rectified. The entire internet has been sanitized, and you can no longer infer that there was some official imprimatur from county government over Poloncarz’s website. No word yet on whether any alleged “Democratic” “Activists” will demand similar cleansing of other political websites, lest our civilization fall. 

But why was the most glaring insult overlooked? 

If you look very closely at the “Poloncarz for Erie County” header image shown above, it is made up of tiny pixels. One of the pixels in that image is a known, admitted anti-Semite.  In spite of that fact, no one has demanded its removal, or that Poloncarz further scrub his website. County Comptroller Stefan  Mychajliw has not yet sounded the alarm – reasonably or otherwise – over this grave injustice. 

Right there. That particular pixel is clearly not only anti-Semitic, but an outspoken nazi. How is it that all of these great legal minds, all of these brave Democratic activists were so lazy and blind as to not demand that pixel’s immediate removal from a campaign website? If you go to Poloncarz’s website and attempt to give money, are you giving money to support white supremacy or euthanasia? 

These are important and heady times for self-hating Democrats. There aren’t just offensive pixels, but rude cursors, Stalinist background images, and fascist metatags – none of which have been exposed or called out by the likes of the Niagara Falls Reporter and the people who take it seriously.

“Short as life is, we make it still shorter by the careless waste of time.” – Victor Hugo.

Erie County 2013: Ds, Rs, Is, Cs, Blanks, and EmoDems

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Who’s who, what’s what, and what to think about it all. The background is as follows: Jeremy Zellner defeated Frank Max last year in a hotly contested race for chairmanship of the Erie County Democratic Committee – a win that was ultimately challenged in court, where Zellner’s win was upheld. Since then, Max – more often than not aligned with former chairman Steve Pigeon and his small but vocal team of Republicans nominally Democratic contrarians has been cultivating alliances with Republicans and Conservatives, and at times creating chaos for its own sake. 

The Republican committee is run ably by Nick Langworthy, who has a lot of big-ticket names and hard-fought races under his belt. More importantly, the outnumbered Republicans have aligned themselves in most races with both the Erie County Conservative Party, run by Ralph Lorigo, and the New York State Independence Party, which does not let any local IP organization decide on endorsements. Having three lines, including two cleverly named minor fusion parties, is the only way Republicans can win races countywide, and in certain parts of the county. 

But the most dangerous person for Democrats in western New York is Stefan Mychajliw. The eye-chart name, the boyish good looks and charm, for years you let him into your homes via the teevee, where he donned a red coat and asked “tough questions” because he was on your side. He has parlayed that nightly visit into elected office, where he is relentlessly “reasonably sounding the alarm” on county spending, waste, fraud, and abuse. He knows full well that he has wide and deep appeal to voters, no matter what party affiliation. The comptroller gig is just part of a longer-term goal to attain executive office – Mayor or County Executive – and people know him and like him, regardless of how he’s doing his job. 

COUNTYWIDE

Erie County Comptroller (Stefan Mychajliw, incumbent)

Democratic Regionalism and downsizing activist Kevin Gaughan has taken the place of Lynn Szalkowski, who dropped out of the race shortly after petitioning ended. Gaughan will compete on the Democratic and Working Families lines. Mychajliw will have the Conservative line, but he is being challenged on the Independence Party line by Anthony Dorazio, Jr. 

The venom directed by the chaotic Frank Max EmoDems against Zellner’s recruitment of Szalkowski should be of particular concern. Szalkowski was, on paper, the dream candidate; she is an attractive, youthful female with an ethnic name from the suburbs, whose CPA made her remarkably more qualified for the position than the incumbent. It’s not her fault she dropped out of the race – by all accounts, she is smart, bright, and knew what she was getting into, but personal stresses got in the way of an effective campaign and she had to drop out. It’s frankly none of anybody’s business what those stresses were, but there was a great deal of hatred spewn at her and at Zellner when she departed the race – and it was done by people who are either named “Mychajliw” or so close to his campaign that Zellner could have recruited Jesus Christ, CPA and they still would have backed Stef. “Disingenuous” isn’t strong enough for their wailing. 

But more importantly, Szalkowski is exactly the sort of person any political party should want to attract to public office. Smart people who enter politics know they’re in for a tough go, but she was unfairly and viciously attacked. Suggesting that the party perpetrated some sort of petition fraud is laughable. They really wanted her.

Now, we have Kevin Gaughan – a person who, unlike Mychajliw, has a genuine record of accomplishing the unthinkable – shrinking of the size of government in western New York. A lawyer, Gaughan has devoted years to make the region and city run smarter and more efficiently. Would Gaughan run his office by press release, and send auditors to trick custodians into unlocking rooms to grab DSS records from a secure subbasement location in the Rath Building to score political points? Doubtful. 

Dorazio is a local IP member who is sick of the downstate people selecting Republicans (almost exclusively) to run on that line. 

Erie County Sheriff (Tim Howard, incumbent)

Richard Dobson is a former deputy, and is backed by the Max/Pigeon EmoDems faction. Bert Dunn is scion to the Bert’s Bikes empire, formerly the Dunn Tire empire, and is a current Sheriff’s Deputy. It’s been alleged that the EmoDems have teamed up with incumbent Tim Howard to use Dobson as a pawn. Dobson is similar in almost every way to the last two Democrats who challenged Howard and lost.

By contrast, Dunn is young, he’s currently on the force, knows the issues that exist on the force as it stands now, and is a centrist Democrat who has crossover appeal. Republican Tim Howard, who is running for his third term as county sheriff, has endured a string of high-profile embarrassments and scandals from the Department of Justice review of the holding centers, the Ralph “Bucky” Phillips escape from a county jail, the botched search for Joan Diver, etc. Howard will have the Conservative and Independence line, and Dunn will have the Working Families Line. 

COUNTY LEGISLATURE

Certain races will be closely watched because it takes one seat to flip the Democratic majority into a Republican one. That one seat doesn’t necessarily mean a Republican pickup, by the way – there are at least four nominal “Democrats” vying for a seat, any one or all of whom would gladly strike a deal to share power with the Republicans, just like under Barbara Miller-Williams period of dysfunction and collaboration. 

District 1 (Timothy Hogues, incumbent)

Hogues will have the Working Families line, but he is being challenged on the Democratic line by… 

…wait for it…

…Barbara Miller-Williams. No joke. No one has the Republican or Conservative nod. Miller-Williams has backing from people close to City Hall, and the chaotic Max/Pigeon EmoDems. Hogues defeated Miller-Williams last time around because she used her position to align herself with Chris Collins and the Republicans on the legislature, effecting a Republican coup of that body. The result was devastating for her constituents, as Collins defunded clinics and other resources on which the community depended. Hogues is chairman of the public safety committee and has helped to restore all the Collins cuts to libraries, rodent control, and a soon to open clinic on Broadway. Hogues is a rising star in the party and someone to watch. 

District 2 (Betty Jean Grant, incumbent)

Democrat Grant came extremely close to upsetting Democratic State Senator Tim Kennedy during last year’s primary, mostly thanks to an aggressive write-in campaign. It shows that Grant has a very strong and motivated base of support. Joyce Wilson Nixon is challenging Grant for the Democratic line in September. Betty Jean will have the Working Families line.  No one has the Republican or Conservative nod. Nixon’s husband works in City Hall, and she runs the National Inner Cities Youth Opportunities nonprofit, which receives public money to help at-risk youth. 

District 3 (Lynn Marinelli, incumbent)

Attorney Jennifer Stergion is running on the Republican and Conservative lines, while Marinelli has the Democratic and Working Families lines. The two will square off in September in an Independence Party primary. Marinelli is one of the hardest working people in county government, and is an effective, likeable, relentless candidate. 

District 4 (Kevin Hardwick, incumbent)

Hardwick will run on the Republican, Conservative, and Independence Party lines. A Democrat named Bill Conrad is running on the Democratic and Working Families lines. Conrad is a relative unknown outside of Kenmore and Tonawanda, but he is a teacher at Ken West, an unenrolled voter, and is very active in extracurricular sports in the town. He is very smart and will need to work extremely hard to unseat the well-known and popular Canisius professor. 

District 5 (Tom Loughran, incumbent)

Loughran has staked out a bit of a reputation for independence during his legislative tenure, and will be challenged in November by Republican Amherst Highway Superintendent Bob Anderson. Anderson and Loughran both submitted petitions for the Independence Party line. Anderson will have the Republican line, while Loughran has the Democratic line. Someone submitted “opportunity to ballot” petitions for the Working Families line, and a Christopher Fellows is challenging Loughran in a primary for the Conservative line.  Loughran will have to run hard, as it is a tough district, but his independent streak and no-nonsense demeanor should do well for him. 

District 6 (Ed Rath, incumbent)

Rath will have the Republican, Conservative, and Independence nods while Clarence resident Alan Getter submitted Democratic petitions. Getter is unenrolled and needs a Wilson-Pakula to run on the (D) line. A Clarence resident, Getter is a CPA and small business owner who is active in the community. Ed Rath is Ed Rath. 

The Frank Max Faction MascotDistrict 7 (Tom Mazur, incumbent)

Mazur is not seeking re-election, and he has endorsed Democrat Lynn Dearmyer to replace him. Dearmyer primaried Mazur in 2009 and lost. Former Cheektowaga town councilman Rick Zydel is challenging Dearmyer for the Democratic nod.

Zydel has the backing of the Max/Pigeon chaos faction. In fact, Zydel announced that he would run a primary campaign against the incumbent Mazur, the legislative majority leader. Obviously, that’s not going to go over well at Democratic HQ. So, when Mazur decided not to run – mere days before petitioning was to begin – HQ wasn’t inclined to call an endorsement meeting, and an open primary ensued. Zellner says, “not one committeeman” has called him to “express outrage at this.” Incidentally, as to Zydel’s alleged popularity in Cheektowaga, he most recently lost re-election to the town council to (of all things) a Republican. 

Pat Burke, a South Buffalo native who recently ran for a seat on the common council – and lost  – is also running as a Democrat, leaving a 3-way primary in September.  Elias Farah, who appears to be a tea party type, is running on the Republican and Independence lines. Zydel has the Conservative nod, and also submitted petitions for the Working Families line.  

District 8 (Terry McCracken, incumbent)

McCracken is not seeking re-election. Democrat Wes Moore is backed by the Frank Max / Steve Pigeon Democratic faction. Ted Morton is running on the Republican line. Wynnie Fisher is a teacher who is also running as a Democrat, and Morton has the Conservative line.  As in the case of Zydel, Moore announced before McCracken decided he was out. Moore never contacted Democratic Headquarters or Jeremy Zellner directly, except to send an email to a generic “info@” email address asking when his endorsement meeting would be held. None was held. It should be noted that WGRZ 2-Sides cohost Kristy Mazurek is Moore’s and Zydel’s campaign manager. Query why Mychajliw would have felt the need to abandon the show when he ran for public office, yet the Democrat on the show feels no similar ethical obligation to do so, going so far as to attempt to ridicule an opponent on Facebook who wasn’t interested in going on the show. 

Like Zydel, Miller-Williams – and to a lesser degree Nixon – are potential candidates to flip the legislature to one that is friendly to the Republican minority, resulting in a de facto Republican majority. Anyone who remembers the Barbara Miller-Williams legislature knows what that would look like. The only difference now is that Chris Collins is nowhere to be seen. 

District 9 (Lynne Dixon, incumbent)

Former WGRZ journalist Dixon is a member of the Independence Party who caucuses with the Republicans in the legislature. She is being challenged by Democrat Mike Schraft, who also has the Working Families line. Dixon has the Conservative line, and is being challenged by Brian Burke for the Independence Party nomination. Schraft is a military guy with a background at the State Department, specifically dealing with development and budget issues in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Washington. Burke is related to Pat Burke, as seen above in the 7th District Race. 

District 10 (Joe Lorigo, incumbent)

Lorigo is a member of the Conservative Party, led locally by his father, who caucuses with the Republicans in the legislature. Lauren M. Gray is a young law school graduate awaiting her bar exam results, has the Working Families line, and is challenging Lorigo for the Independence nod. Democratic Headquarters is proud to have five female candidates, three of whom have never before run for office. Lorigo is seen as vulnerable and a possible (D) pickup, due to the fact that he doesn’t enjoy a wide base of support and has done little. 

District 11 (John Mills, incumbent)

Mills is running unopposed. Can you believe that? 

Questions/comments & hate mail: buffalopundit[at]gmail.com

Follow along on Twitter. 

Obama, Satan, and Spelling

6 comments

Ha ha! A tee vee show about a 2,000 year-old work of fiction hired a Moroccan actor to play a fictional bad guy, and he looks sort of like President Obama! Let’s talk about this! This is important business! Can you imagine? The devil looks like Obama! Well, more accurately – the guy the producers hired to play the “devil” resembles President Obama.

This must be important because even WBEN is talking about it! And the comments from people who are apparently not at all embarrassed to use their own names are predictably ignorant and hateful. Also, spelling. 

 

Get me out of here. 

The Committee to Save Matt Ricchiazzi

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Matt Ricchiazzi. Will he ever learn that the path to electoral success and/or a hack job is paved with hard work, loyalty, and not behaving like a lunatic? 

He started out so promising – fresh face, self-identified bisexual Republican running for Mayor, offering up big ideas. Then he aligned himself with tea party people like conspiratorial truther Allen Coniglio. He alternately endorsed, then didn’t endorse, then endorsed again, Carl Paladino. He ran his sister for city council. He ran for school board but didn’t make the ballot. He ran for state senate, but was ineligible. 

I obtained a series of emails he sent in 2010, where he lectured western New York’s gay activists about what they were doing wrong, with little positive feedback. For example: 

On a serious note, as long as the gay community is bound to the hip of the Democrat Party WE WILL NEVER, EVER ACHIEVE MARRIAGE EQUALITY. Never. If you think any different, then you’re delusional and stupid. We have ABSOLUTELY NO POLITICAL LEVERAGE AS LONG AS DEMOCRATS THINK THAT GAYS DON’T VOTE REPUBLICAN. They have nothing to fear if they offend, betray, or insult us.

Further, the Democrats are making too much money off of the gay marriage issue, and they have no monetary interest in giving that up. They recieve donations, volunteers, etc because of this ban, and if we had marriage equality there would be no carrot left to keep the gay community on the Democrat band wagon.

As long as gays demonize ALL REPUBLICANS as being homophobic and racist, why are they going to go out of their way to be nice to people that propagate hate against them, because that’s what you’re doing. Especially considering that those pro-gay Republicans would incur political vulnerabilities within that their party that the other half of the Democrat Party is sure to exploit, it would make no sense for them to do that.

That must be why he’s developing and distributing homophobic political lit. 

Date: Sunday, August 29, 2010, 1:22 PM

Camile,

I’m hardly self-loathing. What do I care if I can’t get married to my partner, if he has to move out of state to find work?

I’m voting for Carl because he’s an awesome guy and he understands how the real economy works. Now, I realize that many of you work for the government or off of government contracts, so you’re not concerned with the real (private sector) economy. But for those of us who don’t want to content ourselves sucking on the government tit, we can’t afford to care about frivolous BS, like the word “marriage.”

Now, if you want to get all hysterical about nothing more than a word, then feel free to go waste all your time and energy being hysterical. But I’m far more worried about the economy and my generation’s economic opportunity and the debt burden with which the current generation of leadership is crushing us, than I am with semantics.

For that reason, Carl is far more in touch with the issues and needs that concern my generation

And, Carl has already said that he would not veto a marriage bill that passes the State Legislature. He would sign it into law, even though he personally does not support it, because that’s how he feels a democracy should work.

Paladino for the people!

-Matt

Over the last week or so, he has invented out of whole cloth a non-existent Republican “committee” (consisting of one member), which was ostensibly holding a lit design contest. Five pieces of fake lit were sent out to an undisclosed roster of politicos and press, all of which viciously attacked either Mark Grisanti or members of his staff.  It culminated on September 10th with this: 

It’s not persuasive, it’s not pithy, it’s not funny, it’s not anything except an opportunity for Ricchiazzi to inflame homophobia.  Now recall that all of this stems from the Grisanti camp’s refusal to give Ricchiazzi a job. 

Think about how pathetic this is: a kid who’s gay or bisexual is so  upset over not getting a job that he’s spent the better part of the last year spreading lies about Grisanti’s behavior during that bar fight in the Falls, he’s developing idiotic political literature attacking Grisanti and his aides, and he develops the homoerotic piece of literature shown above for the sole purpose of getting conservative-minded opponents of same-sex marriage angry. He is so self-loathing, so opportunistic that he chooses to inflame anti-homosexual passions. 

The guy Ricchiazzi is supposedly trying to help – Kevin Stocker – told Channel 4 that he finds the ad offensive. Ricchiazzi emailed Channel 4’s Lou Raguse to say that he “saw” the lit and that his “committee” thought it was brilliant. 

And that’s not all. Ricchiazzi’s efforts in this instance are so clumsy that it’s gotten tons of attention as the “most anti-gay” piece of literature never sent. HuffPo, BuzzFeed, Politico have all covered this piece of lit. But the best information comes from BuzzFeed’s Chris Geidner, via Twitter: 

The pornographers who produced the images from which Ricchiazzi obtained the images for the mailer shown above posted this: 

While everyone at CorbinFisher is flattered the self-described “Committee to Save the Erie County Republican Party” would select two of our company’s images to represent all-things-gay, the persons/person considering the unauthorized use of our images, in violation of registered copyrights, should be aware we take the protection of our intellectual property seriously.

Whichever group or individual took a break from furiously manipulating themselves to the collection of CorbinFisher gay erotic images they apparently maintain on their computer should be aware use of the images without our prior written consent is a violation of our copyrights.

Certainly, having all heard of occasions in which self-professed family values advocates have vehemently opposed same-sex marriage rights while at the same time adopting “wide stances” in airport restrooms, employing male prostitutes as European vacation luggage carriers or mile-high methamphetamine-smoking partners, and shamelessly pursuing sexual favors from pages in the halls of Congress, it doesn’t quite surprise us those behind the “Committee to Save the Erie County Republican Party” would readily have access to a number of our sexually explicit, gay-oriented images.  Nonetheless, we’d politely ask they discontinue attempts to insert our copyrighted images in to their distributed political material, and instead stick to secretly pleasuring themselves and battling their internal struggles with guilt and shame over the sexual orientation they are unable to come to terms with, like so many other outspoken opponents of gay rights are so good at doing.

So, Ricchiazzi can’t get hired, he can’t properly get a YouTube hit piece up, he can’t get traction for his fairy tales about the Falls bar fight, the Senecas want nothing to do with him, Stocker has disavowed any involvement with him, he’s alienated and angered the gay community, and he’s burned just about every bridge he’s ever tenuously built. What a waste. 

 

Dino the Disgrace

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I don’t live in Lancaster, so I don’t really care very much whether its rude, glibertarian supervisor, Dino Fudoli, fails or succeeds. However, Wednesday’s Buffalo News published a profile of Fudoli which revealed that some are turned off by his aggressive, obnoxious behavior, and that he’s occasionally willing to take unpopular stands. BFD. 

But it also featured this quote: 

“Sometimes I feel like I’m on an island, that nobody else is looking out for the taxpayers but me. People need to start waking up and realizing that the government’s not their friend, the government’s their enemy,”

I added the emphasis there, because it took me aback. I had to re-read that second sentence several times. Here’s a sitting supervisor – the government executive for a municipal entity – informing his constituents that he’s their enemy – after all, he is the chief executive of that government. That their neighbors are their enemy. 

What does government do? It provides us with the foundation for a civilized society. Because our government(s) are representative democracies, the government is us. The people who work as clerks and highway workers and teachers crossing guards and cops and firefighters and librarians and assessors and plow drivers and garbagemen – you know, these guys (NSFW):

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3mw49mk_x0]

These people do hard work, and they’re not monsters or the enemy or Hitler or Tojo or mad King George. They’re your neighbors. They’re your family and friends. They’re also part of “government”. Do you think they’re your “enemy“? 

I can’t think of a more fundamentally stupid notion than for an American elected official to promote the notion that government is the people’s enemy. Even if you disagree with a person or a policy or how money is being spent – do you think Boehner or Pelosi or Obama or Romney are your enemy? Do you think that your town supervisor or your county legislator are your enemy? Do you operate under the mindset that, if the town of Lancaster thinks that it really needs another cop, and the entire town board votes to hire a new cop – these people are all your enemy, and here’s Dino Fudoli to protect you from the tyranny of the extra cop? 

Fudoli is promoting not just a ridiculous, tea-partyist, idiotic idea of town government as someone’s “enemy”, but brewing up a recipe for anger, aggression, violence, and harm. It’s much, much easier for some lunatic to commit a physical assault of some sort on a government official if he’s been told by some simpleton that this official is the “enemy”. You go to war with enemies. Anyone with an ounce of decency should condemn this fundamentally un-American, un-democratic view of what our system of government is, especially on the local level.

Accused former drug dealer and undemocratic Collins apparatchik Dino Fudoli is a disgrace to his office, to Lancaster, and to WNY. 

Ironic Criminal is Ironic

22 comments

Remember this guy? He was all over Channel 4 and the Shredd & Ragan show: Shredd & Ragan show about a month ago, expounding on how black people were ruining the old First Ward, etc.  How minorities should stay on their own side of town and not “wreck” South Buffalo neighborhoods.  

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR8NBOn1WY0]

Turns out, the proud South Buffalo racist guy is William Shanahan, and he’s not only in jail, he’s a convicted felon. 

“Scheme to defraud” in the 1st degree involves a systematic, ongoing effort to defraud or obtain property under false pretenses from 10 or more people, or fewer depending on the value of the property and the age of the victim. This is a class E felony. 

Robbery in the 3rd degree involves “forcible stealing” through the use or threat of physical force on a person to take his belongings. According to the New York State Penal Law, this is a class D felony.  

Irony is a guy who complains about “the minorities” and their crime ruining neighborhoods, yet is a convict himself. 

Invented People

10 comments

At the Republican debate where multimillionaire candidate Mitt Romney bet slow candidate Rick Perry $10,000 as to whether Romney was a member of the Obama revolutionary socialized medicine cadre or not, book hawker and corrupt former Congressman Newt Gingrich averred that Palestinians were (a) all terrorists; and (b) an “invented” people.

Setting aside the tea party pandering about all Muslims being terrorists, I’m more fascinated by the “invented people” crack. Members of, say, the Navajo or Seneca Nation might very well ask what the hell Gingrich thinks “Americans” are.