AZ Politics

I recently paid a visit to Sen. Bill Frist’s VOLPAC blog because he announced the ill-advised re-authorization of the PATRIOT Act in the Senate. You can certainly make up your own minds as to whether the permanent re-authorization of PATRIOT was a good idea (I happen to strongly disfavor re-authorization of any provision of that act that does not sunset), but I have to wonder how the CD 8 candidates would vote for the bill in its present form as it heads to the House, if they could vote on it?

We don’t have to wonder much about how one candidate, Dwight Leister, would vote. It seems pretty clear from his comment on Frist’s blog that he supports the re-authorization:

"As a Democratic Candidate for Congress in Arizona’s 8th District I
support the "Features" that the Patriot Act gives to Law Enforcement
agencies in Southeastern Arizona as we fight the War on terror by
Securing our Borders and enabling our Border Sheriffs to have access to
Federal Funds."

Dwight D. Leister:Chair

www.committee-to-elect.org

T.Mae Leister: First Vice Treasurer

www.dwightleister4congress2006.com

I am somewhat familiar with the PATRIOT Act, and I am not aware of any portions that are of use in enforcing our immigration laws, nor am I aware of any funding coming our way from passage of the PATRIOT Act. Perhaps Mr. Leister could enlighten us as to what those "features" are? I am also curious as to whether there are any "features" of this bill that Mr. Leister does not support?

As he apparently reads this blog at times, I would invite him to clarify his position in a comment, or by contacting me directly, if he prefers. I can’t imagine that the unqualified sobriquet "Supporter of the USA PATRIOT Act" is the best foot to put forward with CD 8’s Democratic primary voters. But what do I know? He’s the candidate for Congress.

Mr. Leister responds on the flip…

Drinking Liberally will be at The Shanty on 4th Ave. Thursday evening begining at 6pm. This week we are having Steve Farley, former candidate for Tucson City Council and transportation activist, to speak about the regional transportation initiatives. So come on down if you want to get educated about transportation, slap Steve on the back … Read more

I just completed an interview with Francine Schacter, who is running for the Democratic nomination for CD 8. I have to write up the interview and transcribe my notes and recording. I will have the full interview up shortly. I invite any representatives or staff from the Latas, Giffords, Rodriguez, or Leister campaigns to contact … Read more

I recently added a link to the Arizona Daily Star’s forums to my right sidebar. I think that such a place could be a useful for community discussion of important public issues, and some candidates for public office are posting there regularly. I chose to recieve daily updates of new forum postings, and one of the posts which caught my attention was one by CD 8 Democratic candidate Dwight Leister.

I certainly agree with his underlying premise – that money is corrupting our political values – but I suspect that Dwight may be taking the give and take of politics rather too personally. Certainly, he needs to focus on things like grammar when addressing the public in an open forum. I haven’t met him personally, so I am not going to form any firm opinion of him based only on a forum posting, and I urge you not to do so either. But I will say that Mr. Leister needs to be concerned to present an air professionalism that does credit to what I am sure is an earnest and informed desire to serve the public welfare.

Oh, and if you are going to call Gabby Giffords a political whore who is frolicking on a bed of special interest money, just come out and say it Dwight; it serves no one to thinly veil one’s imprecations under a barely plausible veneer of deniability. After the jump, Dwight’s post without editing:

Despite the ideological trope that capitalism is somehow the natural
state of human economies, and that any government regulation risks
causing the ‘invisible hand’ of the market to bitch-slap us all, the
truth is that capitalism depends entirely upon a very complex body of
law and social norms. Without the proper legal incentives to channel
self-interest into benefiting society, Wall Street begins to behave
like La Costa Nostra with better tailoring.

In the aftermath of the massive corporate failures that have
characterized the past several years, it is easy to overlook that those
failures where not due mainly to criminals doing illegal things, but to
ethical people doing business as usual. Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Global
Crossing and other now infamous business failures were only the
rottenest apples in a bad barrel; not aberrations, but an extreme
example of what we have allowed to become quite representative examples
of the massive and widespread failure of corporate governance.