Trumpy-the-Clown Finds A Billionaire Murderer For His Cabinet-- Meet Wilbur

Exactly one week ago to the day, we warned that Trump was likely to appoint murderous billionaire Wilbur Ross to his cabinet as Commerce Secretary. The Wall Street Journal confirmed yesterday that that's exactly what's happening. Many steel workers and coal miners who hoped for a better deal from Trump and decided to roll the dice on his presidency, will remember Ross as a vicious predator who wrecked their lives in his business endearors. Like Trump, Ross plays fast and loose with the law and when his hopes for not being caught are dashed, he pays wrist-slap fines and moves on with his criminal strategies. Unlike Trumpanzee, though, if he takes the Commerce job, statutes would force him to divest himself of his holdings.

In the early 1990s, Mr. Ross represented bondholders unhappy with Donald Trump’s management of his struggling Taj Mahal casino business, a role in which Mr. Ross later said he interacted with Mr. Trump “quite aggressively in a very bad moment for him, and yet came away from it with great respect” for him. The creditors were angry about a possible missed payment and debated whether to seize control of the casino. Mr. Ross argued that Mr. Trump’s properties were worth more with the man involved and helped negotiate a plan to keep him in charge.

That turned out very well for Trump but very badly for investors, who he eventually took to the cleaners (and referred to as "total killers" when he was questioned about it at a GOP debate), workers, contractors and Atlantic City.



Ross is the same kind of sleaze ball businessman, maybe even worse. As the NYTimes reported yesterday, "After choosing national security hard-liners for some of his earliest appointments, Mr. Trump is now turning to a group of ultrawealthy conservatives to help steer administration policy."

Ross, a vulture investor from Weehawken, New Jersey, is best known for buying distressed, failing companies, screwing everyone involved, but especially employees, as he "restructures," and then sells them on for big profits to himself. He's made around $3 billion doing that-- and destroyed the lives of many thousands of... Trump voters. New York Magazine dubbed his the bottom-feeder king in a 2 decade-old profile. They quote him as saying "Look at all the engineers China is graduating. If China marries its massive labor force to technology, things will be very bleak for this country. In industry after industry, wages are starting to get cut back, fringe benefits are getting cut back—look at the poor airline industry—we’re in danger of exporting our standard of living and importing our unemployment . . . You can’t have much of an economy if people are just flipping hamburgers, trading stocks, and suing each other . . . Are our grandchildren going to dive for coins from cruise ships in the East River?"

Bankruptcy is the Greyhound bus terminal of corporate America—a dimly lit hall peopled by hard-luck losers, duped lenders, congenital screwups, and, occasionally, powerless victims of vast global forces. And most professional investors regard bankrupt industrial firms as toxic piles; they flee before the crud can soil their Allen-Edmonds wingtips. But Chapter 11 allows those with an eye for damaged goods to gain control of assets on the cheap. Why? Busted companies can reject leases, walk away from debt, terminate health-care promises, and punt pension plans onto the federally sponsored Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. Such debt purges can suddenly make crappy business models seem brilliant.

In 2001, when LTV, a bankrupt steel company based in Cleveland, decided to liquidate, Ross was the only bidder. Ross suspected that President Bush, a free trader, would soon enact steel tariffs on foreign steel, the better to appeal to prospective voters in midwestern swing states. So in February 2002, Ross organized International Steel Group and agreed to buy LTV’s remnants for $325 million. A few weeks later, Bush slapped a 30 percent tariff on many types of imported steel—a huge gift. “I had read the International Trade Commission report, and it seemed like it was going to happen,” said Ross. “We talked to everyone in Washington.” (Ross is on the board of News Communications, which publishes The Hill in Washington, D.C.)

With the furnaces rekindled, LTV’s employees returned to the job, but under new work rules and with 401(k)s instead of pensions. A year later, Ross performed the same drill on busted behemoth Bethlehem Steel. Meanwhile, between the tariffs, China’s suddenly insatiable demand for steel, and the U.S. automakers’ zero-percent financing push, American steel was suddenly red hot. The price per ton of rolled steel soared, and in a career-making turnaround, Ross took ISG public in December 2003.

...In August 2003, Ross won an auction for the bankrupt Horizon coal company and has since made it the centerpiece of International Coal Group (sense a theme here?). ICG is now the nation’s fifth-largest coal company. “Coal is the cheapest source of energy for generating electric power,” he says. “We have more BTUs of coal than all the Arabs have of oil.” Again, the timing was impeccable. The spot price of coal has doubled since July 2003.

So long as companies fail-- and the government stands as a pension backer of last resort-- this genteel phoenix will keep on buying damaged goods that the market has given up on.

"You thought Betsy DeVos was bad? Look what I found!"

The press rarely talks about how Ross's arrangements in restructuring ICG (International Coal Group) meant no union, no health care and no pensions. No wonder Trump admires him. Oh, and no mine safety. Ever hear of the Sago Mine disaster? It should be called the Wilbur Ross Sago Mine disaster. The 2006 coal mine explosion killed 12 miners because Ross refused to address the safety problems at the mine (even though there had been a dozen roof collapses the year before and even though the mine had been been given over 200 citations by the Department of Labor for safety violations, including 21 for build-up of toxic gasses. By the way, the mine is in Upshur County, West Virginia, which went overwhelmingly for Trump-- 6,971 to 1,763. I wonder if they're celebtrating Ross' appointment.

Ross' p.r. tried to deny he was the mine's owner but the front companies were eventually unmasked. He also lied to the media and claimed the 12 dead miners had been rescued. What a guy! He had originally refused to buy the mine because it was unionized but once he was granted permission from a corrupt state court to throw out the contact and throw out the union, he grabbed the mine and slashed all the benefits the workers had won for decades-- including safety regulations. His company was cited for dozens of what is called "serious and substantive" safety violations, like "failure to follow the approved roof control and mine ventilation plans and problems concerning emergency escapeways and required pre-shift safety examinations."

In 2006 the Wall Street Journal gave Ross sympathetic coverage for his role-- ultimate responsibility-- in the mining disaster. They were certainly more concerned with his feelings than with the families of the dead miners he had killed.

Investor Wilbur Ross has had a golden touch, making money in unfashionable smokestack industries-- steel mills, auto parts, coal mining-- that have seen better days.

His strategy has been deceptively simple: Buy up often-struggling businesses on the cheap, assemble them into more-efficient operations, then sell them off at a premium.

Now he faces one of his biggest tests following the fatal mining disaster this month at the Sago mine in West Virginia. The mine is owned by the company Mr. Ross created, International Coal Group Inc. The Jan. 2 underground explosion captured the nation's attention for days, amid uncertainty about the fate of 13 men trapped underground by the blast. Ultimately, 12 miners died and a 13th is hospitalized in a coma.

"This is the worst day of my life," said Mr. Ross at the time, when he learned of the deaths. He has also said publicly that he identifies with the miners' grieving families, noting that he lost his own father at age 18. "I don't know what is harder-- trying to get to sleep at night with Sago hanging over me or getting up in the morning to face another day of internal sorrow and external criticism," he said on Friday in a statement responding to questions from a reporter.

Mr. Ross has been in the coal business only four years, but already his company, ICG -- which had a stock offering late last year -- is one of the 10 largest coal companies in the U.S. He is aggressively pushing into a gritty, treacherous industry that poses challenges that simply don't exist in other fields. "Coal mining, by its nature, is extremely dangerous," says Wayne Atwell, a metals and mining analyst with Morgan Stanley in New York. Indeed, on Thursday, a separate accident happened at a mine owned by Massey Energy Co. in West Virginia, where two miners are still missing.

The Sago mine accident is putting Mr. Ross under the type of intense scrutiny and criticism he never faced when buying steel mills. For instance, when Mr. Ross announced that ICG was creating a $2 million Sago Mine Fund for the miners' families, inviting others to donate, some observers quickly began questioning whether that was enough and whether he was contributing his own personal funds to the cause. He says he has been calling through his Rolodex to Wall Street banks and billionaire buddies pledging to match additional contributions dollar-for-dollar with his own money.

"My fervent hope is that we will learn something [from the disaster] that will reduce the risk the next time a miner is underground," he said Friday.

...The accident is likely to prove costly to ICG, which had a stock offering on the New York Stock Exchange two months ago. The firm faces the potential of stiff legal liabilities and government fines arising from the accident. Production at the affected mine will be nonexistent during the lengthy investigation into the cause of the explosion. Washington lawmakers from coal-mining states are also demanding investigations to question coal-mining practices. The disaster also provides an opportunity for the United Mineworkers union to make an effort to organize the company's nonunion workers. The company has made disparaging remarks about the efforts by the union, which could increase its labor costs.

ICG's shares began trading on the New York Stock Exchange Nov. 21, hitting an intraday high of $13.10 before closing at $12.45. But they dropped to less than $9 a share after the accident. They have since rebounded to about $10 a share. Mr. Ross's firm, W.L. Ross & Co., owns 13.7% of the company's shares, valued at about $200 million.

Mr. Ross explains that his firm's fundamental approach is unchanged and his company will continue expanding its coal reserves and mining operations. The Ashland, Ky., company, which is building a new headquarters in Teays Valley, W.Va., could be taking a more long-term approach to the coal business than Mr. Ross took in the steel industry. The company, with 100 headquarters staff and nearly 2,000 total employees, is planning to open and develop new mines in West Virginia in addition to the nearly one-billion tons of coal reserves it currently owns.

"We intend to remain in the coal business for a long, long time and have committed $1 billion in the 2005 to 2010 period for upgrading equipment and expansion of mines," says Mr. Ross. "That program is what will make us the low-cost producer."

What if there actually were a price to pay for the 1%'s crimes of predation against the rest of us?

A bad night at the Upper Big Branch mine -- to folks
like Don Blankenship, just a cost of doing business?

"They're moving up in the food chain. This will cause some sleepless nights for people high up in the corporate ladder."

-- Kentucky miners' lawyer Tony Oppegard, quoted by the NYT's Sabrina Tavernise in "Mine Supreintendent Charged in 2010 Disaster"

by Ken

First off, let me say that I'm not so sure about those "sleepless nights" for the mining bigwigs. But I'm guessing that this development will at least get their attention, and get them thinking about deeper questions than "Who did we pay off, or not pay off enough?"

So no, I don't think we've advanced into a New Era of Accountability. But the charging of a third mine supervisor (the NYT had to correct its report that he was "indicted" to indicate that he was merely "charged") in the wake of the 2010 disaster at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia does raise the possibly alarming -- to the economic elites -- specter of facing paying a price for making your business economic pillage, plunder, and rape. And in this case not just economic.

Howie and I have written a fair amount about the West Virginia disaster
(see, most recently, Howie's December 11 post "India Commits A Big No-No -- Holds Elites Responsible For Something; West Virginia, On The Other Hand...") and the shocking irresponsibility of the mine owner, Massey Energy, and its head cheese, Don Blankenship. So let me make clear that by "paying a price," I don't mean the kinds of fines that predatory corporate execs of Donny's ilk have come to accept as a cost of doing business.

Actually, in the U.S. mining industry, fines don't even appear to be thought of as a cost of doing business, since the companies seem to regard payment of fines as optional. Massey Energy certainly doesn't seem to have taken them seriously. What I guess Don Blankenship and his kind consider a cost of doing business would be little mishaps like the one at Upper Big Branch. You know, a few miners maimed or killed here, a dozen there, a couple of dozen way over there -- hey, it's not as if there's any shortage of would-be miners.

I would say that something like justice has been done when erstwhile Don Blankenship and his top lieutenants begin conducting business meetings from their lockups on Death Row. (For the record, Massey Energy was sold last year to Alpha Natural Resources. I'm going to trust the prosecutors to get liabilities sorted out in time for the start of the trials and executions.)

Oh yes, here's the gist of the story.

Mine Superintendent Charged in 2010 Disaster

By SABRINA TAVERNISE

Federal prosecutors filed charges Wednesday against Gary May, a superintendent of the West Virginia coal mine where an explosion left 29 dead in 2010, continuing an emotional case that has been closely watched by the mining industry and the families of the dead miners.

Mr. May is the third mine supervisor to be charged in the disaster, the worst mining accident in the United States in 40 years. Last year charges were brought against two others -- the mine's security chief and a foreman who had not been at the mine on the day of the explosion.

But Mr. May, one of the mine's two superintendents, is the most senior, and industry observers say the charges against him are an indication that prosecutors are getting closer to the executives who ran the company, Massey Energy, which has since been bought by Alpha Natural Resources.

"They're moving up in the food chain," said Tony Oppegard, a Kentucky lawyer who defends miners. "This will cause some sleepless nights for people high up in the corporate ladder."

The way the charges were filed -- directly to the court by prosecutors from the United States attorney's office, instead of by a grand jury indictment -- indicates that Mr. May is cooperating with prosecutors, a strategy that observers say could eventually lead prosecutors to top executives, including Don L. Blankenship, the former head of Massey, who state investigations concluded had enforced a culture of cutting corners and ignoring risks for the sake of profit.

The charges, filed in federal court in West Virginia, include conspiracy to defraud the United States by impeding a federal agency, a felony that is punishable by up to five years in prison.

The charging document paints a picture of deception with Mr. May at its center, directing workers to falsify record books and speaking to them in code as a way of warning that inspectors were coming.

According to a person close to the investigation, those phrases included "bringing in a load of blocks," and "it's raining outside" or "there's a hailstorm outside." Another warning phrase was "I had a hamburger (or cheeseburger) for dinner last night," the person said.

The conspiracy charges against Mr. May were an unusual strategy, lawyers said. Few violations qualify as federal felonies under existing law, and law enforcement has been hampered by weak misdemeanor penalties. A conspiracy charge allows prosecutors to be more flexible in their strategy, and if it is successful, could give them a tool to reach senior mine officials who have traditionally been insulated from criminal charges because they are rarely involved in actual coal mining.

Mr. May began working at the Upper Big Branch mine, as it was known, in February 2008 as a foreman, according to the charging document. He was promoted to superintendent in 2009 and held that position through April 5, 2010, when the explosion happened.

In a statement e-mailed to reporters, Alpha said that Mr. May became an employee of an Alpha subsidiary after that company acquired Massey Energy last year. It said he had been placed on administrative leave.

At the heart of the charges is an accusation that Mr. May knowingly misled federal inspectors from the Mine Safety and Health Administration when they made regular checks to ensure that the mine was safe, signaling to workers on site, sometimes using code phrases, that inspectors were about to arrive. That allowed them to conceal violations for which they would have otherwise been penalized.

Charges also include making changes in the ventilation system in the mine just before federal inspectors arrived to make it appear that the parts of the mine being examined by inspectors had better air than they actually did. . . .

#

Who Looks Out For Us? Raúl

Just think of this as a continuation from today's 10AM post about figuring out who in politics can be trusted. Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ) is the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. There's nothing about him that would make anyone think he's part of the 1% and there's nothing in his record that indicates he serves the interests of the 1%. Wednesday the House voted on one (Paul Gosar's H.R. 1904) in a series of bills dealing with mining that Raúl has been all worked up about. I noticed he-- as well as Ben Ray Lujan (D-NM) and Ed Markey (D-MA) put forward-- amendments that the GOP defeated before going on to pass the overall bill 235-186, the import of which is to give away federal lands filled with copper ore to a private, foreign-owned copper company, while waiving meaningful compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act. Seven Democrats, including some of the worst corporate whores in the Democratic caucus-- John Barrow (Blue Dog-GA), Joe Donnelly (Blue Dog-IN), Larry Kissell (NC), Jim Matheson (Blue Dog-UT), Mike McIntyre (Blue Dog-NC) and Mike Ross (Blue Dog-AR)-- crossed the aisle to vote with the GOP. Seeing that the Republicans had the voted needed to pass the bill, Raúl's amendment would have required that the remote operations center for the proposed mine be located in the local community, that the company actively recruit and hire local employees, that all ore produced from the mine be processed in the United States and that all equipment used at the mine be made in the U.S. It was defeated 182-240, six Democratic corporate whores crossing the aisle to vote for their corporate masters along with the GOP.

Nancy Pelosi did a good overview of Gosar's bill and how it shortchanges American taxpayers:

·         Provides A Taxpayer Giveaway. This GOP special-interest bill shortchanges U.S. taxpayers-- transferring land currently owned by U.S. taxpayers that is potentially worth billions to Resolution Copper company without requiring royalty payments in return.
 
·         Provides A Giveaway to a Multinational Mining Conglomerate. The Resolution Copper company that receives this windfall from U.S. taxpayers is actually a joint subsidiary of two large, foreign-owned mining corporations-- Australian-owned BHP-Billiton and British-owned Rio Tinto.  
 
·         Instead of Providing Royalties to U.S. Taxpayers, Provides for Highly Unusual Appraisal Procedures. The Resolution Copper company estimates that the value of the copper ore in the land they are acquiring is several billion dollars. And yet the bill does not provide royalty payments to U.S. taxpayers as copper ore is extracted from the land. Instead, the bill requires highly unusual appraisal procedures which fail to guarantee that Resolution Copper will pay a fair price for the copper it stands to receive from the American people.
 
·         Rep. Ed Markey Will Offer An Amendment to Provide Royalties to U.S. Taxpayers. One of the amendments made in order by the rule on the bill is an amendment by Rep. Ed Markey. The Markey amendment would require, as a condition of the land exchange authorized by the bill, that Resolution Copper pay an 8 percent royalty to U.S. taxpayers on all locatable minerals produced in commercial quantities from the federal land the company receives in the exchange.

Yesterday, another Republican giveaway to their "generous" donors at the expense of the country was slowed down by a Bureau of Land Management environmental impact statement recommending a 20-year withdrawal from new mining claims of approximately 1 million acres surrounding the Grand Canyon, something Raúl has been organizing for and working towards all year. The GOP has been eager to let mine owners start mining for uranium almost right to the rim of the Grand Canyon and some of it inside the Kaibab National Forest. Arizona Republicans, John McCain, Jon Kyl, Paul Gosar, Jeff Flake, David Schweikert, Trent Franks and Ben Quayle, all of whom take immense sums from the mining interests, are pushing the bill while the GOP still has control of the House. Grijalva pointed out that his 7 colleagues are "ignoring the public will and pushing a back-door corporate giveaway of our nation’s heritage despite the express public will to defend this land. I have to wonder what the motive is behind trying so hard to open the Grand Canyon for business when every federal expert studying the issue has told us this territory should be preserved... This has never been about corporations on one hand and environmentalists on the other. This has been about disinterested science telling us we need to protect this land for the public good. This finding makes sure the Colorado River won’t be contaminated, the area will maintain its attraction for tourists all over the world, and the Grand Canyon will be preserved for future generations. This is the crown jewel of our National Parks system, not a random geological formation to be stripped for parts and sold to the highest bidder.”

I got to Raúl yesterday just as he was hopping a plane to fly back to Tucson. He was happy about the Bureau of Land Management putting the breaks on the Republican push to open up the Grand Canyon area to mining but he's dealing with the GOP's unending efforts on behalf of their campaign donors to pillage the land. "All this year," he told me, "Republicans have been pushing an open season on some of our most important public and Tribal land. They’re trying to approve uranium mining at the Grand Canyon, copper mining at sacred Apache sites, and stripping public spaces all over the country for spare parts. If they get their way, nothing would be spared. It doesn’t matter if a company like Rio Tinto, facing genocide charges and known to operate a uranium mine with the Iranian government, co-owns a proposed venture in Arizona-- Republicans want it to go through. It doesn’t matter if projects would send their profits overseas, hire out-of-state, non-union labor, and sell their product to China. Republicans are for it.
 
"This is especially awful because companies like Shell Oil are already making fortunes off cheaply leased property and resources that belong to the taxpayers. We’re giving our natural resources and our public trust away for pennies on the dollar, whether it’s rock-bottom leases, low royalty rates or sweetheart tax subsidies. I’ve asked some of the biggest companies to open their books and give working families a look at how much these companies are making off public property, how much they’re returning in royalties, and how much they paid for these goods in the first place. I think everyone’s going to be shocked when we finally get some answers.
 
"This has been a tough year for public land and the environment, and I’ve been doing what I can to stop the worst of it. Republicans are doing whatever companies ask them to do, regardless of the public interest. It hasn’t been an easy run, but we’re committed to making sure some of these giveaways don’t go through and preventing any more pointless giveaways of our public resources.”

Believe me when I tell you that there aren't that many Members of Congress to take on their colleagues and take on the might and power of Big Business and fight for the country the way Raúl Grijalva does. The GOP and their corporate allies spent millions of dollars in his district last year to try to defeat him. They're gearing up to do the same thing next year. Last year Blue America helped him fend off the danger and this year-- though he'll be fighting in a somewhat gerrymandered and redder district-- we hope to do that same thing. Please consider helping him win reelection here. As you can see, he's only one of three incumbents Blue America has endorsed in this cycle.

What If Rand Paul Had Been In Charge In Chile?

Last week Ken tackled humanity's fascination with the rescue of the Chilean mine workers. Americans were far more engrossed-- joyfully so-- in this than they were in the 1973 Kissinger/CIA-directed overthrow and murder of Chilean President Salvador Allende and the installation of brutal fascist dictator Augusto Pinochet, who systematically murdered thousands... while pleasing his American backers by, among other things, privatizing Social Security! Last week, though, we were all Chleans, all rooting for "our team."

Lucky for the miners Don Blankenship wasn't in charge. And lucky for the miners, neither was Kentucky self-certified eye doctor Rand Paul, currently running for the open Kentucky Senate seat, after making it clear to Kentucky miners and their families that all he knows about the lives of miners is what he's gathered from right-wing ideological screeds. He loves repeating them but were they in play in Chile over the last 68 days, there would, no doubt, have been a far less happy ending to the story there.

Yesterday we looked at author Thom Hartmann's explanation of the commons-- something radical right Republicans like the spoiled elitist Rand Paul define as socialism. In his book Threshold-- The Crisis of Western Culture, Hartmann uses the example of how he started his first business. Is it socialistic? Capitalistic? If rightists like Paul manage to seize power in their country, whatever it is, it's over:

The electricity that was delivered to us passed through public streets maintained by the City of East Lansing. My customers drove to us on public streets. Most were students attending a largely publicly financed "land grant" university. My employees were literate because they'd attended public schools that were operated by the government. I could accept and cash checks and know that the bank wouldn't run off with my money because of federal and state banking regulators. My contracts with suppliers were enforced with a government-operated court system, making it possible for me to safely predict that people would keep their word to deliver goods after I'd paid for them. If they failed to do so, there as a government-operated police and jail system that could be used to induce them to behave honestly.

My employees would reliably show up for work because their food supply was safe because of government stands and inspections, and because the air and water were clean enough to breathe without causing asthma attacks or disabling diseases. They didn't demand a pension plan from me because we were all-- they and I-- paying into Social Security. We were able to offer an inexpensive health insurance policy-- as I recall, it cost us around thirty dollars a month per employee-- because at that time Blue Cross/Blue Shield was required by the State of Michigan to be a not-for-profit corporation whose sole purpose was to provide health insurance, and at that time our hospitals were all similarly nonprofits that delivered high-quality, inexpensive care.

Paul's nihilism is mistrusted by sensible Kentucky voters and, in a state where McCain bested Obama 58-41% in 2008 and where Obama is highly unpopular today, progressive Democrat Jack Conway is on the verge on turning a deep red seat blue. Blue America's partners at the Americans For America PAC have come up with a novel way of communicating the danger of a Rand Paul victory to mining communities in Kentucky. Please consider helping them keep this ad on radio stations in eastern Kentucky counties from McCreary to Greenup and Pike to Laurel. We're getting reports that Ashland and Middlesboro voters have taken note and are discussing the ad and, more important, what's behind it:



Blue America has endorsed Attorney General Jack Conway as the best candidate for the Kentucky Senate seat-- and we hope you'll avail yourself of the opportunity to contribute to his campaign at the link that starts this sentence. Today the Herald Leader, which had endorsed Rand Paul over Trey Grayson in the Republican primary, came out for Jack Conway as the better choice for Kentucky.

Since riding the Tea Party wave to victory in the Republican primary as a relatively unvetted candidate, Paul has spent the summer and early fall revealing himself to be quite the ideologue who's long on simplistic slogans but short on understanding the drastic consequences of adhering to those slogans.

What came across as refreshingly candid in the spring proved to be distressingly extremist when Paul was pressed on issues ranging from civil rights and the Americans with Disabilities Act to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

As a senator, his mission would be a chain-saw massacre of federal government that lays waste to farm subsidies, education spending, mine-safety regulations, federal aid in fighting the scourge of drugs and numerous other programs of significant benefit to Kentuckians.

Which brings us to another disappointing post-primary revelation about Paul. As far as Kentucky is concerned, he is a drive-by candidate-- a transplant who, despite living here for the better part of two decades, never stopped to smell the bluegrass and learn about his adopted state's history, culture, problems or needs.

The sole focus of his campaign involves his antipathy for federal government. If he mentions Kentucky at all, it is almost as an afterthought.

So, the stark choice for Kentucky voters is this: a moderate Democrat who understands Kentucky's problems and needs and has a plan for creating jobs versus an ideologue Republican/Tea Partier with no record, no understanding of the state and a chain saw for a plan.

By far, Jack Conway stands as the better prepared candidate to serve the best interests of Kentucky in the U.S. Senate.