Rumors have it that a robo-call phone poll was conducted on September 15, 2011 that resulted in 356 voters responding to questions regarding how they felt about the upcoming September 20 Special Election….and Legend-in-His-Own-Mind Candidate Robert Lamutt is not in first place.

The poll was conducted by Insider Advantage/Rosetta Stone Communications and results are due to be published in an upcoming MDJ article.

One simple question was asked: “If the election for State Representative were to be held today for whom would you vote?“ (PV Note: Kudos to the grammarian who worded this question correctly by using the “for whom would you vote” rather than the stock “who would you vote for?”)

This is a PDF to the poll’s results, including cross-tabs.

Now…when you look at this, you see that of the poll participants, 19.8% favor newbie political candidate John Carson to establishment-favored, ex-politician Robert Lamutt’s 17.3%. (ouch!!!)

While you may think a 2.5% difference is nothing, if Lamutt was in the lead, he’d be crowing at the TOP of his lungs all over the district about how great and wonderful he is and blah-blah-blah.

Who the heck is Carson? As PV said above, a newbie. To Lamutt, likely a “nobody.” BUT…this lead shows that of the people in the district who do remember Robert Lamutt’s previous service as a state senator that they ain’t all that impressed with him….and, more importantly, with 35% of the poll not having an opinion on any of the candidates, this leaves a total of 47.7% of the people who are aware of the 5 candidates by name in this race and they are not planning on voting for Lamutt.

One new development since PV issued our Alert a week ago was that the AJC published an article about Lamutt’s staggering lien debt of $138K owed to the federal and Georgia state government that he (or his LLC, etc. legal entities he controls)…and Lamutt had answers for the federal debt issue: “I could have gone bankrupt and walked away from everything and everybody…”

PV Chuckles: REALLY? Lamutt thinks he could have filed bankruptcy and told the feds to kiss their money goodbye? REALLY? For someone supposedly so astute about financial matters, Robert Lamutt is demonstrating a clear line of ignorance.

If you file bankruptcy (whether personal or for a business entity), those federal tax liens stay attached to you even after your bankruptcy. In fact, there are several forms of debt you never get excused from paying-back when you file for bankruptcy: child support, student loans, and federal tax liens.

So, the audacity of Mr. Lamutt’s claim that “Hey, I coulda filed bankruptcy and absolved my debt obligation of $136,000 to the IRS but I didn’t because I wanted to be a good citizen” is 100% bunk. It’s bull.

Now, there are those who look at his answers and think “Yeah, maybe you know, this economic environment, blah-blah-blah…“….but, here are a few facts:

1) In 2004, well before the 2008 recession, he was in debt to the IRS for about $25,350 from his Lamutt for Congress campaign. Eventually, he paid that off.

2) Lamutt explains in this recent AJC article that the state tax liens have been “resolved.” Well, according to the Cobb Superior Court Clerk’s records as of 9/16/2011 at 1:22 AM, they have not been “resolved.”

There is no receipt of any of these state tax liens being “satisfied” and closed-out by the state. Perhaps we should assume the folks at Labor Commissioner Mark Butler’s office are just slackers at getting the “paperwork” done, eh?

PV Summarizes: Hey…look, money problems suck. PV sincerely hopes that Lamutt gets clear of these liens.

But, Lamutt took $6,000 of money out of one of these operating entities that he owns/manages/is-directly-responsible-for and loaned his campaign for this race this money (HD 43 – Lamutt Campaign Disclosure).

So, if one has $6,000 to extract from an operating entity that owes a federal tax lien, one should wonder how responsible that person is?

Unless, you voters in the HD 43 think it’s okay for a candidate for public office to imagine he’s at a roulette wheel and the $6000 is a bet he is placing with the payoff to be a) winning, and b) winning so he can rise to a position where he can make ALL kinds of backroom deals for votes, and deal in influence games…?

If you do think spending this $6000 (and, who knows how much more he’ll put in in an effort to win?) shows Lamutt is a responsible enough person to represent you in HD 43, then PV feels sorry for you folks.

Rumors have it that one of the candidates in the upcoming Special Election for HD 43 has a wee bit of a problem he needs some help on: According to the Cobb County Superior Court Clerk’s records, Robert Lamutt has a current outstanding lien balance owed to the Georgia Department of Labor of $2,563.12…and, his current balance owed to the IRS is a whopping $136,105.87. Adding these two numbers together and one gets approximately $138,700 in debt owed to government entities.

The term “current balance” is used to distinguish these current outstanding balances from the nearly 8-year history of liens from state and federal levels of government against Lamutt-related entities. In the past 8 years, Lamutt (including the current balances) has actually had a total of $168,713.54 liened against him and/or his various interests (including his “Lamutt for Congress” entity in 2004).

Of this total, Lamutt has only satisfied $29,607.67 worth of them, leaving the $138.7K in outstanding liens* mentioned above.

This lien situation does create, at minimum, the following questions in any voter’s mind in this Special Election:

1) How responsible would it be for me to help elect a person to represent me (“me” being the me who is a voter in HD 43) who has an 8-year history of racking-up over $150,000 in liens that governments (i.e., governments who always look to raise my taxes when they are short on funds) are owed?

2) If it comes to a backroom deal that screws my best interests while helping my representative pay off his debts, am I willing to have my interests sacrificed for his?

3) Don’t we have enough problems already in this state and country that I shouldn’t help get someone elected who clearly cannot manage their own affairs properly and legally?

*Links to Lien Documentation Below

1 Zipped File of All Individual Liens

Lien History-2-Page Summary PDF

PV Note To No One In Particular: Gee, wouldn’t it be swell if there was an addendum made to the Georgia Transparency & Disclosure Act that, in addition to the normal basically tell-us-nothing-about-a-candidate’s financial disclosures that you made it a requirement that they disclose ALL debts like IRS liens, Georgia Unemployment Insurance liens, county property tax liens, etc. on any and all related legal entities to the candidate?

Because not having those disclosed puts the people of the district at risk of being represented by someone who cannot manage their own personal finances…why should they be allowed to run for election without disclosing serious debts like liens from a government entity against them? Or, do you folks just like to leave the door wide open to encourage opportunities for graft, backroom deals, prostitution, what-have-you (e.g. Yellow Jackets sleeping with Dawgs), etc. for elected officials in Georgia to take advantage of?
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Don’t Believe the Hype. Meet the Real Rick Perry
Republican Liberty Caucus of Texas Sends Warning to Republicans Nationwide About Perry’s Tax and Spend Record

Excerpted from RLCT’s website: “AUSTIN, TX – Texas Governor Rick Perry may be the flavor of the day for a lot of Republicans, but Texas Republicans who are familiar with his record are a lot less enthusiastic about his presidential run. “Perry has a unique talent for finding new ways to raise taxes and loves to use taxpayer money to subsidize his business cronies,” says Secretary Dave Nalle of the Republican Liberty Caucus of Texas. “His supposed belief in limited government and states rights conveniently disappears whenever it conflicts with the demands of the special interests and corporate cronies who he serves.”

The whole story as to why Rick Perry would suck as President

Lots of activity in the politics and government of Cobb County, Georgia, and PV hopes to be able to engage where we see a need for our input.

In the meantime, we encourage you to checkout Cobb County freelance writer Craig Kootsillas‘ reporter’s notebook, which focuses on news and analysis of political happenings for the Cobb County region: Cobb Homeowners

J. Randolph Evans
Column No. 1077 (7/15/11)

The federal debt is over $14 TRILLION. How big is it?

$14 TRILLION.

To just count to $14 trillion, like 1, 2, 3, and so on, would take 448,000 years.

$14 TRILLION.

That is over $46,000 for every person in the United States (which is as much as the average person working actually makes in an entire year –
$46,326); for a family of four, it is $186,648 (which is over 2 times what the average family makes – $67,348).

$14 TRILLION.

If one dollar bills are laid end to end, $14 trillion would extend from the earth to the moon and back again 2,800 times or if just stacked, almost one million miles.

$14 TRILLION.

To pay it back in one year would require $38,356,164,383 (that is $38 BILLION+) per day; of course, that is not going to happen. To pay it back in 10 years would take $3,835,616,438 ($3 BILLION+) per day; that is not even going to happen.

$14 TRILLION.

That is $35 for every tree on the Earth (400 billion trees) – rather have the trees.

$14 TRILLION.

That is almost $36 for every star in the Milky Way – rather have the stars.

$14 TRILLION.

That is over $2,000 for every person on the planet (6.93 billion people.)

$14 TRILLION.

Bill Gates would have to pay his entire fortune ($54 billion) to the federal government and earn it again 259 times to pay it off.

$14 TRILLION.

It would take virtually the entire Gross Domestic Product (the value of everything produced in a year) of the United States ($14.119 trillion in 2009, which is estimated to be around $15 trillion in 2011) to pay it off.

$14 TRILLION.

In order to borrow that much money, a person would have to start borrowing $1 million per day, every day, for the next 38,356 years.

$14 TRILLION.

That is $1,806,451 for each wage earner in the United States (there are approximately 7,750,000 wage earners). At an annual average wage of $43,326, it would take 100% of their pay for over 41 years to pay their $1,806,451.

Get it? Biggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg problem!

So, has the United States borrowed enough?

Well, the folks in Washington, D.C. want to borrow more. Consider this: just the interest on this debt is now over $3.5 trillion or over $11,000 per person, and that number keeps growing.

So, the final countdown begins toward the day – August 2, 2011 – when the United States government reaches its debt limit. What happens if the Congress does not increase the debt limit? Then the government cannot borrow more money. So what is the problem with that?

Well, without more borrowed money (beyond the over $14 TRILLION it has already borrowed), the government will not have enough money to pay all of its bills. This does not mean the government will have no money. It still gets what it collects in taxes.

In fact, in August, the federal government will collect approximately $172 billion. The problem is that the federal government’s bills for August (money it has already spent) will be approximately $307 billion.

Imagine if your checkbook for August had only $172 in it when you are faced with $307 in bills to pay. Unfortunately, it is a problem millions of Americans face every day. They just solve it in a very different way.

A good start would be an austerity budget, with a diet of rice and beans for the foreseeable future. Every expense would be reviewed to see where costs could be cut or eliminated, and things not needed would be sold to help make ends meet.

Here is what the federal government faces in August expenditures. Salaries for active-duty military personnel are approximately $3 billion. Military support is approximately $32 billion. Social Security and Medicare payments total approximately $100 billion. Interest on the debt is approximately $30 billion. Unemployment benefits are approximately $13 billion. Just these items add up to $178 billion, i.e., more than the government’s total revenue for the month.

Then, there is everything else like courts, parks, etc. Get the picture?

Too much debt; not enough income – not a pretty picture. Now really, would anyone actually loan more money to this group without some serious changes to how they are doing business? Of course not. That is at the core of the debate raging in Washington, D.C. It is a real debate with real consequences.

Here is how Albert Einstein defined ‘insanity’: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

$14 TRILLION – INSANITY. Here is another idea – the debt limit can only be increased in the future by the American people. Borrow more money? It is time to try something different.

Beyond all the cites in the Sixth District Court of Appeals’ decision on the healthcare law, I find this one little sentence at the bottom of Page 23 of the decision to be…kinda…nonsense in the fullest sense of the word. Under Section C, 2nd sentence:

“However, the text of the Commerce Clause does not acknowledge a constitutional distinction between activity and inactivity, and neither does the Supreme Court.”

What is the definition of “commerce?” Commerce is the activity of the buying and selling of goods and services. Nothing more, nothing less.

SO…if you have no activity (i.e., “inactivity”), you have no commerce. So, if an individual is not buying a health insurance policy, he/she is not participating in a commerce-related act. Therefore, the “Commerce Clause” cannot be used to compel someone to engage in an economic activity when they are not choosing to engage in it now.

Apparently, the judges missed the actual concept of what “Commerce” means. It means “activity,” not inactivity. NOW, this court is stating Congress can regulate anything you’re NOT doing. Geez. What idiotic logic. And, with that logic, the Constitution is clearly no longer needed.

Here’s the danger in this illogical reach into the realm of non-commerce: It does not matter what that “something” is that someone is not engaging in. It can be a health insurance policy as it is in this case…but, if it is argued down the road that everyone who doesn’t own a gun now is required to buy a gun or get fined, then this court will have a very difficult time saying “No, Congress cannot require people who don’t have a gun to buy a gun” when they’ve decided Congress does have the power to require someone to buy a health insurance policy (or face a fine/penalty) when they’ve personally opted to not buy an insurance policy.

Rumors have it that over yonder at the newfangled Dawg Engineering (sic) School of Athens, Georgia, they are going to be asking the Board of Regents to approve of two brand spanking new engineering degrees: a UGA Master of Science in Engineering (sic), and a UGA Doctor of Philosophy in Engineering (sic).

Now, of the multitude of “Gee, that’s interesting…” reactions some of you may have about this news, the most interesting observation PV has about this bit of news is these requested degree additions are not the result of some long-range, detailed plan of implementation. They are, instead, the result of very poor planning and complete ignorance, it seems, of what the reality is in the marketplace for hiring engineering professors.

From a publicly-available memo about an “email vote” from members of the Executive Committee of the UGA University Council that took place on June 9, 2011, we have the following statement: “…in attempting to hire new faculty for these [engineering] programs, there has been some difficulty in that the best faculty wish to serve at institutions with Ph.D. programs. UGA planned to add Ph.D.’s in these new engineering fields soon, so the process has been requested to be expedited.”

PV Ponders The Implications: So…the UGA Dawg Engineering (sic) administrative folks have found it challenging to recruit and hire good, qualified professors to come to Athens to teach undergraduate engineering (sic) courses, eh?

Because, just like the UGA grads in the Georgia Legislature who have a problem thinking much further down the road than their “lunch date” with the hot lobbyist (male or female), the always-only-thinking-as-far-as-his-navel-for-foresight-UGA-President-Michael Adams apparently just figured he could say to the world “Hey! We done got ourselves an Injuneering Skule here in Athens. Y’all come here and we’ll give you an injuneering degree,” and qualified instructors would just fall all over themselves to get a job at an institution that just basically offered a 4-year undergraduate degree in engineering (sic) and no research opportunities as there would be in any (real) school that offered graduate degrees in engineering?

And, upon PV’s reading of the two baffle-the-Board-of-Regents-with-Bullshit documents (which, granted, with at least 9 of the regents being UGA grads, that isn’t all that difficult to snow them with seemingly high-falutin’ language relating to engineering education concepts) that describe these two new degree programs, we discover that in order to get into either the UGA Master’s or UGA Doctorate in Engineering (sic) program(s), a student does NOT have to possess an undergraduate degree in engineering. One can merely possess a science or a mathematics undergraduate degree to get accepted into the UGA engineering (sic) graduate degree programs.

Wow. Awesome. Thanks for dumbing-down even more the concept of a quality engineering education from this state with not requiring undergraduate degrees in engineering as a prerequisite for getting into the UGA graduate program for engineering (sic).

All this new program crap means is that down the road, UGA will come running to the legislature for more money to support their lower-quality engineering (sic) curriculum because NO ONE is going to be rushing to get into the school when they discover that the major corporations who go to career fairs every single season at Georgia Tech will not be wasting their time visiting UGA to recruit Dawg Engineers (sic).

PV Offers This Bit of Advice To Anyone Contemplating Attending UGA Engineering (sic) Skule: If you want to be an engineer, and you cannot get into Georgia Tech, go to Auburn for your engineering education. The women are just as good-looking as those that go to UGA, but you’ll get a much better…real engineering education than you could ever possibly get with the yahoo-run Dawg Engineering (sic) Skule.

“Harold Bost, who heads the county’s Issues Tea Party, is organizing opposition to the penny tax across the metro area.

“Whenever there is this much money out there for politicians and bureaucrats to play with, I don’t trust them a bit,” Bost said. “We don’t want any part of it.”

http://www.ajc.com/news/fayette/fierce-opposition-in-fayette-954543.html

For the 2012 RATS vote, the misinformation war has begun…and, to no surprise to anyone, the misinformation comes from the “pro” side.

What is “RATS?” RATS stands for Regional Atlanta Transportation SPLOST. It’s that 1% sales tax addition to 10 metro-Atlanta counties’ existing total sales tax. (If this “RATS” concept sounds familiar, a few months ago I dubbed this T-SPLOST as “RATS”…easier to remember, and more accurate as to the political storm of misinformation that will ensue from the pro-RATS side.)

The vote is going to be on the ballot sometime in 2012, and, according to one blog I read, “July or August of 2012.” The actual date has not been set yet by the Secretary of State. The commonsense ballot date should be during the 2012 General Primary, which is usually held in July of a normal Georgia election year.

It would be “commonsense” because then the 10 counties’ election boards would not have to set-up for a special election, potentially costing anywhere between $340,000 (as Cobb County’s recent March SPLOST cost) and $455,000 per county in extra taxpayer dollars to finance any such vote in each county.

Note: The “$455,000” is an extrapolation of what a special election date would cost in Fulton County based on Cobb’s dollar amount for their SPLOST. Cobb County’s 2010 Census population was estimated at 688,078. Dividing this into Cobb’s published dollar figure of $340,000 for their recent SPLOST, you come up with an average cost per person of $0.494. Fulton County’s 2010 population estimate is 920,581, so this means a potential cost of $455,000 to Fulton County residents.

To the “misinformation war”, I direct your attention to an article published in today’s AJC on this ballot election, titled “Too Big to Fail” article.

In this article, about halfway down the page, state economist Kenneth Heaghney quotes a dollar figure that this additional 1% sales tax would only add to the “typical family’s budget” a total of $216 per year.

I’m not sure what the phase “typical family’s budget” means. And, it is crucial that that definition is defined because to not do so would be to deliberately mislead the voters.

Let’s look at the Cobb County SPLOST passed this past March 15. Over the next 4 years, the county is hoping for $492,000,000 in sales taxes to be collected. Taking the population of Cobb used above of 688,078, this means an average of $715 per person over 4 years. Dividing again by 4 leads us to an average of $178.76 per Cobb resident per year.

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From Jim Galloway’s Political Insider column:

When newly re-elected state GOP chairman Sue Everhart arrived home from an out-of-town trip on Wednesday, she found a sizeable bouquet of flowers on her porch.

Everhart confirmed delivery Friday afternoon. “I will not deny it. I tried to call him and thank him,” she said. But if he truly, truly liked her, the former governor would vote Republican, Everhart said.

SPECIAL MEMORANDUM

RE: Why the Governor is working so hard to elect Tricia Pridemore Chairman

Dear Convention Delegates & Alternates,

Are you curious as to why Governor Nathan Deal and others who support Tricia Pridemore are so strongly supportive of her…a woman Nathan Deal barely knew for about 6 months before he threw his whole weight behind?

Well…since a lot of you are the proverbial “newbies”, we’ll let you in on a little secret we political veterans know, and it’s three little words: Follow. The. Money.

What does this mean? Well, in the case of why the Governor supports Tricia so much, and why other elected officials do as well, all you gotta do is follow the money that went from Tricia Pridemore’s bank account into Nathan Deal’s campaign coffers, as well as the campaign coffers of many other of her supporters.

Here’s a link to all of Tricia’s contributions (as well as those from her husband, Michael Pridemore) to state candidates: How much were the Pridemores responsible for in direct giving to Deal? Looks like…all told, including both cash and contributions in-kind, a total of $10,499.33. Hardly chump change.

This explains a little about why Governor Deal is so much in favor of Tricia Pridemore. She bought his support. But, this isn’t the whole story.

The rest of the story is Governor Deal’s and his always-present Chief of Staff Chris Riley always make sure that somehow, public tax money from others, or contributions from others, always makes its way to a Deal/Riley-related/controlled business entity. There is documented proof of this via the following stories on the Web:

1) As Chief of Staff of Congressman Deal, Chris Riley authorized payments direct from the congressional office’s account (i.e., federal tax money) to his wife’s company: Ex-Rep. Nathan Deal Paid $245.000 to Aide’s Wife

Now, Riley’s logic-defying answers are: 1) “no profit was ever made” and 2) his claim in that story that he “never received income from Chattahoochee Logistics.”

These answers should initiate the following process in any business person’s mind: “Wow! So, if we don’t make a profit, we don’t have to report that we received income? Really? Where’s that IRS Rule?”…..AND….”Okay…but, aren’t they married? Don’t they live in the same house? Wouldn’t the money that flowed through Chattahoochee Logistics find its way into a joint-checking account between a husband and wife?”

Answers: No. No, not really. Nowhere. Yes. Probably. Probably Yes.

2) As a candidate for Governor, Deal directs $135,000 of campaign contributions to his own pocket via a company he is a part owner of: Deal’s aircraft expenditures raise ethics questions

Golly…let’s put aside the “ethics law” questions and just look at the sheer instance of money being directed from a campaign into a candidate’s pocket?

Here’s a better question: Does ANY other Republican statewide candidate engage in this type of activity? How about any Republican Congressman? How about any US Senator in our state? Does Senator Isakson or Senator Chambliss direct campaign money to any private enterprise they have any control over, either direct or indirect? Do they? How about Congressman Gingrey? How about Congressman Westmoreland?

We’d really like to know if they do…and if it is the proverbial “norm?” If it is, hey, awesome. Really. We’ll no longer regard this as something to be shocked about in politics.

Would YOU do it? Would YOU consider it a proper thing to engage in…to be able to use your own campaign funds to enrich your own business…yes, even if you don’t “make a profit” from doing so…?

So…here’s the point with this State Chairman’s race: What if the reason why the Governor was so gung-ho for Tricia Pridemore had more to do with getting his own “choice” in as the State GOP chair so Nathan Deal and Chris Riley and all their other financial-related entities could get direct access to the coffers of the State Republican Party via their own controlled-candidate?

You see…based on those two articles, there is already a documented record of Deal and Riley thinking nothing of using other people’s money for their own business interests. Tricia Pridemore certainly doesn’t know any different. She is ready to do ANYTHING the Governor will want her to do…and that includes writing checks to whomever he asks her to write checks to. How could she refuse anything he requested?

Follow The Money, Ladies & Gentlemen, to figure out why the Governor supports Tricia…follow the evidence, and the bigger picture becomes quite clearer as to what is truly going on here.

This state’s Republican Party is not a kingdom in which we must all bow-down and kiss the rings of our elected leaders. Those of you who go around chanting “The Governor told me to vote this way so I will blindly do exactly what he wants” are setting yourselves up to be a devoted slave to the Governor from here on out, never acquring the ability to think for yourself in politics.

As we recall, that is not the definition of a “conservative.”

Rumor has it that though Sue Everhart‘s name was printed on the program of last week’s “Celebrate Georgia/Governor’s Ball” event, Sue was, in fact, not sent an invitation.

This is what PV knows: We know Sue was NOT sent an invitation because she told us that she never received the invite. Had she been invited, she would have attended as that is one of the chief roles of being chairman of the party: You go to events when you are invited and there is no pre-existing conflict at the same time.

Since we did not attend the May 2 event, we do not know what was printed in the program, but Sue has heard from at least one person that her name was printed in the program for the night. This is the “rumor” part of this post.

The fact part of this post is that Tricia Pridemore is clearly an immature, classless woman to have taken Sue’s name off the invitation list even though had the event not gotten snowed-out on January 10th, Sue would have attended that inaugural.

Tricia Pridemore has about as much class as a tree frog. It doesn’t matter how much money someone has…they can neither buy class nor borrow it. You either have it or you don’t. And, Pridemore clearly is nothing but low-class to not invite the Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party to this type of event.