COMMISSIONER MELVIN HUNT’S DESPERATE HUNT FOR VOTES

When at a meeting in Cleveland, Melvin Hunt referred to three commissioners, Fitzgerald, Lee Groce and Todd Fontenot, as “members of the evil empire” and two members, which included himself and Norman Brown, as “two of the good guys,” everyone in the room should have pulled their breeches up knowing he was filling the room up with verbal manure.

Commissioner Hunt has long been the voting partner of former Commissioner Lee Groce. That is a fact and not debatable among those whom have attended court the last two decades. But Hunt faces re-election, while Groce faces a possible prison sentence. Even though Groce is reported to have cut a deal with the feds, Hunt still feels a need to try and cut a deal with voters. His deal evidently is that in the post Groce and Fitzgerald era, he will distance himself by re-writing history and therefore save the Cleveland area some of the embarrassment they may feel by having a commissioner who has slipped by five Grand Juries by the hair on his chinny chin chin.

But Hunt goes much further than asking his community to ignore the fact that he and Groce scratched each other’s back and cut deals to get what they wanted. He hopes to use his speaking opportunity in Cleveland to launch a new image. He spun himself last week as someone who hoped that the cuts in county spending would have be more than the recent budget. He ties himself to the one proven conservative on the court, County Judge Craig McNair. But Hunt has been one of the biggest proponents of spending money we don’t have for many many years. He has used the commissioner’s ability to create bonded indebtedness time and time again through the years.

Commissioner Hunt has been in a unique position in the last ten years to have stopped the runaway spending, but he has done just the opposite. He has declared in public for years that the roads in his precinct are the best in the county, but instead of using his strong position to stand against unnecessary spending, Hunt has used bartered to allow others money for their roads if his budget was increased also.

Hunt has been the epitome of a tax and spend Democat, but he obviously has noticed taxpayers are voting his kind out of office. So he is re-casting himself as something other than what he has been. He has even twice set a date to switch political parties and act like he is a Republican. The same party he has spent a lifetime denigrating. He is even trying to tie himself to Commissioner Norman Brown even though Brown’s conversion to the Republican party has not been accepted by many Republican activists because of similar patterns of wheeling and dealing and ignoring the best interest of taxpayers.

Commissioner Hunt is desperate to find votes in a community that has rejected his old worn out type of politician. Hunt could have been more careful with taxpayer dollars over the years and he wasn’t. Hunt could have joined the Republican party when he saw which direction Barack Obama was taking this country. But Hunt continues to resist any change in actions and continues to hope political deception will keep him in office. He can call his old buddies part of an “evil empire” but anyone that keeps up with commissioners’ court knows his name is called when they are calling roll in that empire.

Liberty County Sheriff's Captain found passed out.

(10/11/2011, Liberty County, Texas)  This morning Liberty County Sheriff's Captain Rex Evans was found face down passed out.

Liberty Dispatch readers will remember the wrongful and unmerciful recent attacks by Allen Youngblood and his associated commentors on i-dineout - "directly against Evans" and the whole Liberty County Sheriff's Department.  It is unknown yet what role the continual scurrilous attacks by Youngblood and company may have played in the circumstances leading up to Captain Evan's health issues.

Captain Evans is the public information officer for the Liberty County Sheriff's office and also a detective.

Liberty Dispatch hopes Captain Evans gets well soon along with the many readers of Liberty Dispatch who have voiced they will be praying for Captain Evans.

Contributor, Ray Akins

REPUBLICAN PRIMARY ENDORSEMENTS

Before the old Liberty County Republican Party Chairman even leaves town, the new one’s plea for keeping everything “positive” among Republicans may be tested. But I hope not.

Over the last few months it has become more and more obvious that some of the most outspoken activists in Liberty county will differ on who they want to win between two potential primary opponents in two different races. My hope is that the group known as The Outsiders who now count former Republican candidate Eddie Shauberger among them, will promote their choice for sheriff and for district attorney in a positive race with no negative campaigning. I am urging Shauberger and The Outsiders to join me in following County Chairman Ken Coleman’s directive and just lay out to the public their view of why they plan to vote the way they plan to vote. I hope they can express why they believe Henry Patterson deserves to serve four more years and why attorney James Farmer should serve the next four years as district attorney while people like me do the same thing on behalf of our choice for these positions.

As for me, I solicited both of the leading candidates for sheriff to run for office years ago and hope they will both discourage negative campaigning as our primary is conducted. Years ago I was the county chairman when Bobby Rader decided he wanted to run for JP and that despite a streak of over 100 years of Democrats holding the position he was running for, Bobby wanted to run as a Republican. Around that same time, I was invited to try and persuade Henry Patterson to run as a Republican for county sheriff. That position had not had a Republican win in over 100 years either and I liked Henry and wanted to help a small handful of people talk him into running in our party. Of course as many of you remember, we were unsuccessful and Henry ran the first time as a Democrat Unfortunately Henry was defeated in the Democrat’s primary by one of the Republican party’s most notorious foes, Greg Arthur. Thankfully, Henry changed his mind four years later and ran as a Republican and beat Arthur. Though I am supporting his primary opponent, I must say that anyone who knows Henry Patterson knows he is a true Republican. Both men are fine family oriented church-going Christians and surely would like a primary race like Chairman Coleman envisions.

Though I like both men and have friends that will support both men, I have come to the conclusion Bobby Rader would be the best man for the job the next four years. I appreciate both men’s contribution to the local Republican Party and wish them both well. Of course I am just any one person and am not sure anyone will really care who I support, but in the tradition of Liberty Dispatch and with the freedom I now have because I do not hold any position in the party, I hereby endorse Bobby Rader for sheriff.

In the primary for district attorney it again is my hope to promote the idea of being “positive” in our primary as I differ from Shauberger and The Outsiders and choose to back Assistant County Attorney Karen McNair rather than James Farmer they have said they will be promoting. I have met James Farmer and in my two brief conversations he seems to be a very capable and very charming person. Over the summer I have been very pleased to get to know Karen McNair and find out who the person that has been working so hard the last few years to help build a stronger local Republican party. The truth is I was very suspicious of Karen before I got to know her, and I have really enjoyed finding out she is a good ole common sense conservative Republican just like her parents and that she is the kind of person who is motivated to do whatever she feels like is best for our community. Again this is just one man’s opinion, but at this time... I will be urging Republicans to choose her as our candidate for the general election.

These endorsements represent the views of Richard Pegues. The former three term Liberty County Republican Party Chairman is one of Liberty Dispatch’s and Liberty County’s most politically knowledgeable contributors .

NO RED-LIGHT CAMERAS!

My name is Byron Schirmbeck. I was the petition organizer for the vote against red light cameras in Baytown. I also recently addressed the Dayton city council as they have placed the question of whether or not Dayton will install red light cameras on the November ballot. Considering the HCRP and Texas GOP have placed a statewide ban on their platform, that the programs are run by corrupt companies and politicians and make the streets less safe from this money grab and citizens have voted out cameras each and everytime this should be something your site should publicize.

Here is the background info http://www.yourhoustonnews.com/cleveland/news/article_72e075a2-a508-528c-a12d-f7117b7fa9db.html

Also, democrat harris county district judge Mike Miller, who is up for re election in 2012 signed an order declaring our election in Baytown void. Any judge that would sign away our votes does not deserve to sit on the bench. Please consider giving these two issues coverage on your site. Please call or email me with any questions. You can see more info at www.saferbaytown.com and www.citizensforsaferstreets.com

Byron Schirmbeck

Proposition 1 passed, the cameras are coming down! Thank you Baytown! www.saferbaytown.com

“Fallacious Rhetoric against the Tea Party & the Demise of Civilized Discourse” By David Pring-Mill September 19, 2011

LD Supports Mr. David Pring-Mills

I.                   Slander against the Tea Party

   At the time of this writing, the current U.S. national debt is $14,699,021,631,213.05[1]. The nonpartisan CBO recently noted, “The $1.3 trillion budget deficit […] for 2011 will be the third-largest shortfall in the past 65 years (exceeded only by the deficits of the preceding two years).”[2] With a startling lack of transparency, trillions of government dollars have been spent to bail out and support the financial institutions that recklessly wreaked havoc upon the U.S. economy.[3] In 2009, President Obama signed a stimulus bill that cost $787 billion.[4] Following that first year in office, the Obama administration has shown no signs of mitigating its urge to spend, and an aspect of Obama’s healthcare plan, the mandatory insurance provision, has been judicially deemed to be unconstitutional. Obama now wants to pass a jobs bill that will cost $447 billion. During his September 8^th address to Congress, he repeatedly demanded “pass this jobs bill” and “you should pass it right away.” This refrain was uttered 17 times. [5] The veracity of these figures is undisputed, and the implication of these figures is clear – under the President’s leadership, our government is spending money that it doesn’t have and justifying this spending with an increasingly dubious, ineffective ideology and macroeconomic theory. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 46.2 million Americans lived in poverty last year – a record high. The bureau noted that this is “the largest number in the 52 years for which poverty estimates have been published.”[6]

   Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, author of The Tea Party Goes to Washington, recently provided a reporter with a concise description of the political movement referred to as the Tea Party. He stated, “What the Tea Party stands for, and what unites everybody in the Tea Party I think, is their concern about the debt, and the concern that we're borrowing so much and printing so much to pay for our debt.”[7] After considering the aforementioned figures and the stated goals of the Tea Party, one would presume that the Tea Party reflects the sensibilities of almost all citizens – and 30% of Americans do support the movement[8], yet to keep that number from growing further, certain leftists seem determined to depict the movement as a mob of fringe lunatics suffering from simmering, unspoken racist motivations. Rather than engage in a substantive economic discussion, these leftists have chosen to try to malign and marginalize the Tea Party. There is cause for concern here – the national debt is approaching fifteen trillion dollars and the people who want to cut spending are routinely labeled as racist and crazy. This has led me to wonder whether I am living in a farfetched political satire that has somehow risen from fictitious origins into reality.