Post Primary Comments on the 10th Congressional District

Recap of the 10th Congressional District Primary by a voter from the 13th District

(You poor saps in 10 – how do you live with it?)

It ‘s going to be interesting to see what happens in the 10th District election on November 4. While Kucinich took 53% of the vote, in reality he only took 47% of the vote because the Independents didn’t vote for candidates and if you consider their vote, Kucinich could be in really big trouble – as in he could lose his seat. This is the first time that he’s below 60% and clearly he was nervous enough about losing his job to quit his other ego gig.

Now if the Republicans put some gumption, dough and ground troops into their candidate – even though he’s a really weak candidate and knows so very little about public policy and the issues, he knows even less about trade, tax, health care, and foreign policy.

Clearly the voters don’t seem to mind stupidity – they’ve enjoyed it for the past 11 years. And they have certainly demonstrated that they have very low expectations of their elected officials.

The beauty of this primary election outcome was that the developers got exactly what they deserved – the devil they know! And they wasted more than a half a million bucks in their brilliant discovery….too bad they didn’t have the wisdom to back a qualified candidate who lived in the 10th District and could actually for themselves. You gotta love the developers who were more like pimps and bullies…and their candidate was their trollop – and their other trollop, the mayor, at their very clear instructions on “how high to jump” endorsed their trollop boy. No wonder the city is going down hill faster than the speed of light. Seems everyone has forgotten “for the greater good” and they have all memorized “self interest” -- what we now have is a lot of self-interest elected officials and civil servants living off the taxpayers. Wonder why our population is moving out – I don’t.

Susan Goldberg, 6 months into her tenure as the Editor of the PD hit the nail on the head at her City Club debut on December 7 when she said that Brent Larkin was a “real curmudgeon.” After nearly 40 years on the job, it’s pretty sad that a newcomer to Cleveland figured out what so many of us in this one paper town have known for over a decade….”Larkin should have taken the buyout last year!” Early in his career he was a thoughtful writer who put out issues, but then he must have partied too hearty…and his writing skills have diminished to cynical, nasty, miserable and downright off the mark more often than not. Actually, you have to wonder if he has an intern as a ghostwriter. Larkin, whenever he decides it’s time to retire, will not leave on top – what a pathetic way to exit a life long career.

I say this because if anyone listened to the 10th District Congressional City Club Debate on February 19 at the Crown Plaza, all agreed that O’Grady and Palmer were put in by Kucinich to split the vote. O’Grady was a pathetic giveaway when he got to the podium and started trashing Simpleton. Then he continually quoted Friedman to let everyone know that he’s ready only one book in the past decade. Never once talked about issues. Poor Palmer couldn’t verbalize a complete thought and, as a result, couldn’t make a complete sentence. She gave the most embarrassing performance of the five, but she was pretty certain that she would win the race hands down! She did have a very experienced campaign staff of one and a team of 12 volunteers on a really good night. She mortgaged her house to buy an old blue bus that ate up a lot of expensive gas. Her poor husband suffered through the experience with hunched over shoulders and a constant grim reaper look of enormous pain on his face at every single campaign stop along the way.

Barbara Anne Ferris proved to be the most knowledgeable candidate in the race, fluent on the issues with a clear understanding of how the congressional process worked. All four of her opponents combined could not hold up to the depth of her foreign affairs expertise combined with her work on public policy and economic development. I actually enjoyed and looked forward to her responses because she is the only one who made any sense. She won the debate hands down. Even the high school kids in the audience said so! But it took poor old Mr. Larkin a couple of days to process that after he was given a few stern lectures by well-known political commentators who actually told him who won the debate. And Ferris presented herself in a manner that would make the voters proud to have her represent them. Too bad that money got in the way of good, sound decision making.

So as the campaign season continues, the buffoon continues to rant and rave and accomplish nothing in the process. And the poor people of the 10th District get what they deserve – absolutely nothing. Hopefully, there will be a big surprise in November and the incumbent will be shopping his resume on November 5!

I’m so glad I live in the other district……