Monday, July 12, 2010
What Say Melina Kennedy?
Melina Kennedy has become the de facto Democratic candidate for mayor in 2011, but she is silent on all of the major issues confronting the City. She is saying nothing about the transfer of the water and sewer utilities to Citizens Energy she says because her law firm, Baker & Daniels, is representing the City. When Mayor Ballard announced a $33.5 million new subsidy for the Pacers, we got nothing but silence again from Kennedy. The Simons have contributed millions to Democratic candidates and Kennedy no doubt hopes to tap into that money machine for her mayoral campaign. On any host of issues, Kennedy has been totally silent. Instead, she has been spending her time quietly raising money from the movers and shakers for her campaign. It looks like voters will have no real choice in next year's election. Republicans are likely to renominate the incompetent, self-serving and promise-breaking Ballard as their candidate, while the Democrats are going to nominate someone who has no position on the most important issues confronting the city. I guess she's going to rely on "I'm former Olympic athlete Bob Kennedy's wife, vote for me." The most you can find on her campaign website are feel good lines lacking in any substance. How pathetic.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
13 comments:
It was a real opportunity for a second tier candidate like Jose Evans to get some free press and make some headway against Melina Kennedy. Instead he apparently decided to sit it out. Does Evans think he'll get Simons money if he doesn;t criticize the deal? It won't happen.
Thanks for calling out Kennedy, and I agree with you. Worse than pathetic!!
I forgot Evans was even running. He's been so quiet as well. The only thing he's touting is a council resolution to boycott Arizona because it expects the federal government to enforce the immigration laws. That's a winning issue.
Gary, I believe that issue was tabled at last week's Rules and Public Policy Committee.
AI,
I sense sarcasm on the Arizona comment. I agree that's not a winning political issue, regardless of how one feels about the issue.
Yeah, the Pacers did was put on the tee for Evans to get some free publicity and he passed.
We need a good Libertarian candidate. Any takers?
The mayoral election is 17 months away. There is plenty of time for substantive debate. This is the time when candidates are forming their positions.
WANTED- Mayoral candidates desperately needed for medium-large Midwestern city. Applicants must comply with following qualifications:
1)No association with major law firm.
2)Capable of breathing air.
If I was a Dem candidate for Mayor, I would've pounced on this announcement immediately...hell, the speech would've been written BEFOREHAND with blanks to fill in for the numbers. Just goes to show how truly dismal the Dem field remains.
For the record, I'm not happy about this, but I am VERY happy about the sale of the water utility to Citizens. My elation at the utility sale more than makes up for this foolishness.
Carlos, I'm not sure why you are so excited about Mayor Ballard's backdoor tax increase to fund all of those infrastructure improvements. The transfer of the utilites sans backdoor tax increase is okay. I've had it with all of these tax increasex Ballard and his Republican-controlled council are dealing us. I intend to do all I can as as life-long Republican to defeat all of them. If you don't want to act like a Republican, you sure as hell aren't getting my support.
There are a couple of Democratic councilors supporting Ballard's hidden tax increase for the water company deal. They need to be defeated in slating or in the primary. That may very welll happen.
Gary, you & I will just have to agree to disagree on the utility transfer. The way I see it, we have an asset and the city should try to get as much as possible for it.
Again, if the IURC would allow the utility to discriminate between Marion County and non-Marion County residents (residents to pay MUCH lower rates to compensate them for the sale of the city asset), I might agree with you. You and I both know that that ain't gonna happen. If we were to just hand over the utility, then rates would, of course, be lower...but they'd be lower for Boone and Hamilton County residents too EVEN THOUGH they didn't hand over an asset!
Now you're just buying into Ballard's lies, Carlos. For the last fucking time, we are not selling an asset; we are transferring an asset from one public entity to another. Under Ballard's deal, the latter public entity is required to pay cash it does not have, which means it will have to take out a 30-year loan by issuing bonds. We will wind up paying several times the original cost of those infrastucture improvements with an 8 to 10-year life span in the form of much higher rates over the next 30 years. It is public finance at its worst. You cannot be a fiscal conservative, Carlos, and support this plan.
Post a Comment