From the Archives: Fifth District congressional candidate Jeffrey Clark endorses idea of liquor sale privatization

Fifth District congressional candidate Jeffrey Clark endorses idea of liquor sale privatization
August 13, 2010 7:07 PM MST

Just prior to his debate with incumbent Representative Tom Perriello (D-Ivy) at Charlottesville’s Senior Center on August 11, independent congressional candidate Jeffrey Clark gave his opinion on a current statewide issue.

When asked by the Charlottesville Libertarian Examiner what he thinks of Governor Bob McDonnell’s proposals to privatize the state’s monopoly on wholesale and retail sales of distilled spirits, Clark readily replied, “I like it.” It is, he said, “a win for everybody.”

‘A great model’
Pointing out that in “many places” elsewhere in the United States, liquor is sold through private outlets, Clark asked, “If it’s working effectively in other areas of the country and it’s a great model, why not move in that direction here as well?”

Clark explained that he doesn’t see “any reason that would prevent us from” privatizing ABC sales.

“We can get away from the bureaucracy,” he added, noting that “small businesses like restaurants and things like that would welcome the idea of the privatization of the ABC stores.”

Drawing on his own business experience, Clark remarked: “Trust me, I’ve been in restaurant-hotel management for a very long time, and I understand the red tape that can go along with that.

End the red tape
“Listen,” he continued, “just trying to get an opportunity to be able to have the privilege of selling alcohol in your business can be a huge issue of red tape and then you’ve got to go deal with this government bureaucracy that is the ABC stores of Virginia.”

McDonnell’s idea is “a way overdue proposal,” Clark said, wondering “why so long here?” when 32 other states have had private systems for decades.

Like the governor, Clark suggested that ABC privatization is part of a broad-based approach to government reform.

“We really need to look at every program, no matter what it is, even if it seems small, even if it seems like” people are dismissing the idea by saying things like “Oh, the ABC stores, it’s just alcohol, no big deal, we’ll leave it” the way it is, Clark argued.

‘Save a dollar, save a billion’
“Any area where we can look, where we can focus on the small things” the state should consider a change. “If it’s saving [just] a dollar, who cares? If we look to save a dollar, we can eventually save a million, two million, a billion.”

By looking for savings and efficiencies, Clark asserted, “we can start to bring these things back into some type of financial control and better serve the people.”

Clark, who lives in Danville in Southside Virginia, where it is believed much of the opposition to McDonnell’s proposals originates, does not see a downside.

“I don’t think anybody believes that somehow the ABC stores won’t be able to serve the public as well if they’re somehow not under government control,” he said.

“As a matter of fact, I think that most independent businesspeople probably act more responsible in their day to day lives than do government bureaucracies.”

Add Jeffrey Clark’s name to the list of supporters of Bob McDonnell’s ABC privatization efforts.

Publisher's note: This article was originally published on Examiner.com on August 13, 2010. The Examiner.com publishing platform was discontinued July 1, 2016, and its web site went dark on or about July 10, 2016.  I am republishing this piece in an effort to preserve it and all my other contributions to Examiner.com since April 6, 2010. It is reposted here without most of the internal links that were in the original.

Tom Perriello and Barack Obama

It's not news -- at least not anymore -- that President Barack Obama attracted a crowd of more than 7,000 people when he came to Charlottesville on Friday to speak at a rally on behalf of incumbent Congressman Tom Perriello (D-Ivy).

The event was carried live on local television stations, from the landing of Air Force One at CHO through following the motorcade down a deserted Route 29 through the speech itself to the lift off of the President's airplane barely two hours later.

The question remains, however, as to why the President came to Charlottesville in the first place.  The appearance was, it seems, the only one at which Mr. Obama offered his campaign support to an individual Member of the House of Representatives.  (In other campaign appearances around the country, the President spoke on behalf of candidates -- some incumbents, some not -- for the U.S. Senate and for governor, but not for House Members.)

Here's my interpretation of the events of these past days, which must have been pretty heady for local Democrats.  People who live in Washington, D.C., can be cynical about presidential motorcade sitings, but such things are rare in Central Virginia.  (In the past 100 years or so, there have been scattered visits by Franklin Roosevelt, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton [as president-elect], and George W. Bush.  Charlottesville is long past the days when three presidents called it home.)

So why did Obama come?  And why did Perriello accept his visit, considering that the Fifth Congressional District is far more conservative than Perriello himself is, or claims to be?

It might not be risky for Perriello to be seen (figuratively) bumping fists with Obama at Charlottesville's downtown pavilion, in a city where Democrats show a routine 4-to-1 advantage in election returns.  But down toward Farmville and Bedford and Danville, associating with the highly unpopular president days before the election is quite risky.  It might make Charlottesville and Albemarle voters more enthusiastic about their candidate -- who they were going to cast a ballot for, anyway -- but it might also incite fence-sitting or complacent conservative voters farther south.

So, my take on all this:  Regardless of whether Perriello wins or loses next Tuesday, the new Democratic establishment is setting him up to be a favored candidate for statewide office in 2013.

Face it, after the Republican sweep of 2009, the Democrats don't have much of a bench of eager potential candidates for governor, lieutenant governor, or attorney general.  Terry McAuliffe may be up for a repeat run for the Democratic nomination for the top spot, but few others seem to want to go through the (political and personal) pain that plagued Creigh Deeds last year.

Democratic powerbrokers see Tom Perriello as a rising star within their party, an opinion shared by many in the party's grass roots.  He voted for Obamacare, cap-and-trade, and the failed stimulus package but kept his distance on the administration's budget, banking "reform," and other controversial issues. He has a great resume:  two degrees from Yale, experience as a humanitarian in combat zones overseas, and at least two years as a Member of Congress.  He's proven himself to be a hard worker and indefatigable campaigner. (It helps that he's unmarried and childless.)

My prediction is that, win or lose on November 2, Tom Perriello will be a candidate for Virginia Attorney General in 2013.  I also predict that the Democratic Party will give him a clear path to the nomination.  (Sorry, Senator McEachin!  You had your chance.)

I can't wait to talk to Ken Cuccinelli to ask him what he thinks of his re-election opponent.

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Snow Blast from the Past

We seem to have dodged a bullet tonight.  Early forecasts predicted that Charlottesville might be facing six to ten inches of snow on top of the 15 or so inches that walloped us last weekend.  A changeover to sleet and freezing drizzle seems to have thrown a blanket over those predictions, and we're likely to wake up in the morning with no more than an inch or two of the wet, white stuff on the ground.  Morning rush hour might be slower, but not disrupted.

Apparently the storm tracked northward, so Northern Virginia and Washington, D.C., will still suffer multi-centimeters of snow in addition to the two feet or so that capital area residents have been trying to dig their way out of since Saturday.

All this snow -- a record seasonal snowfall for Charlottesville -- reminded me of one of the "big ones":  the 1979 Presidents' Day snowstorm that hit Washington while I was a sophomore at Georgetown University.  Records show that National Airport recorded an official total of 18.7 inches the weekend of February 19-20, 1979, but as an article in Tuesday's Washington Post explains, this number probably underestimates what fell on other Washington-area neighborhoods.

Paul Farhi wrote in the Style section:

National Airport became the official NWS reporting station for the District in 1941 and has recorded the most precise and voluminous weather data in the region since then, said Chris Strong, a Weather Service meteorologist. The city had its own official station in Georgetown dating back to the Civil War, but that was closed as the Weather Service moved to serve the meteorological needs of the growing aviation industry, he said. Dozens of weather "spotters" provide readings from around the city, but none as frequently as the office at National Airport.

What's more, the lower snowfall totals recorded there aren't really surprising, given the airport's location along the Potomac, Strong said. The river and sea-level location moderate the direction and influence of winds in the area.

Bob Ryan, WRC-TV's chief meteorologist, points out, too, that the construction of Crystal City immediately to the airport's west further affected wind patterns, making the airport's microclimate somewhat more benign than elsewhere.

In all, "precipitation levels can vary quite wildly" over a relative small area, Strong said. In fact, Alexandria -- a short jog south of the airport -- recorded 28.9 inches during the storm.

My memory of that 1979 storm jibes with that explanation. I remember snow much deeper than a foot and a half -- and home movies I took in the storm's aftermath seem to confirm my memories. I dug up -- no pun intended -- this two-minute clip of brief shots in Georgetown, including one really quick flash of Wisconsin Avenue right at the beginning, with most of the pictures taken on the main campus and East Campus of Georgetown University. Alert to Georgetown alumni who were frolicking in the snow over Presidents' Day weekend in 1979: you might see yourself in this video. (That includes you, Roger Theis, Leonard MacKenzie, Joe Banno, and Rick Peete, inter alia.)

Here's the clip, which I posted to YouTube on Monday evening, just before that popular web site went into maintenance mode for several hours:

(The music accompanying the pictures is an instrumental version of Georgetown's alma mater, known in 1979 as "Sons of Georgetown" and now called "Hail, Oh Georgetown," sung to the traditional Welsh anthem, "Men of Harlech.")

Just to bring things up to date, last Sunday, in the bright sunlight that inevitably follows a major snow storm, I took a few photos on the grounds of another renowned institution, the University of Virginia. Here's a sample; the rest can be found on Facebook.

 

  

  

  

Thinking back on that video -- made on a Super-8 movie camera with a zoom lens -- those kids you see throwing snowballs at Sugar's are now in their 30s or 40s, probably with kids of their own.  Time flies as fast as the jet stream brings an Arctic blast to the mid-Atlantic region.

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Video from Nathanael Greene Freedom Festival

On Saturday evening, I posted a photograph of five candidates for the GOP congressional nomination in Virginia's Fifth District. All five are campaigning for the privilege of facing incumbent Representative Tom Perriello (R-Ivy) in the general election of November 2010.

I was also able to capture video of four of the five when the spoke to the political activists gathered at the Nathanael Greene Freedom Festival, which took place on the grounds of Ruckersville Elementary School in Greene County. Unfortunately, my videotape ran out just before the fifth candidate, state Senator Robert Hurt, took the stage.

I apologize to Senator Hurt and want to make clear this was not intended as a slight. There were other video cameras present at the event, and they might have captured his speech and posted it to the Internet by now. I am sure I'll have other opportunities to record speeches by Senator Hurt and the other four candidates between now and the convention/primary/unassembled caucus next spring. (The Fifth District Republican Committee has not yet chosen a method of nomination.)

Before the candidates spoke, WINA-AM radio talk-show host Rob Schilling gave a short address. You'll notice how windy it was: papers were blowing everywhere, flags were mostly unfurled, and it often sounds like someone is snorting into the camera's microphone. That's not a snort, it's the wind.

Rob Schilling:

I would like to gently correct Rob for a misquotation. He attributes the line, "A government that is big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have," to Thomas Jefferson. This mistaken attribution is common. It was not said by our third president, however, but rather by the 38th president, Gerald R. Ford. He used a similar line in the early 1960s, when he was a congressman, and repeated it in an address to a joint session of Congress in 1974. I remember hearing it in his 1976 speech accepting the GOP presidential nomination, but have not been able to find a reference that confirms my recollection.

Thomas Jefferson said many marvelous things, but this is not one of them. Gerald Ford said more than "Whip Inflation Now" and "Live from New York, it's Saturday night!"

The first congressional candidate to speak was Feda Morton of Fluvanna County:

The second candidate to speak was Michael McPadden of Albemarle County:

The third candidate, also from Albemarle County, was Ken Boyd:

The fourth candidate (another from Albemarle County) was Laurence Verga:

At this point, my camera hit a wall, to my chagrin. I missed several other speakers who followed, including Delegate Rob Bell (R-58) and business owner Tom Slonaker (Forest Lake Arby's) as well as state Senator Hurt.

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Class of 2010 Photo

Five of the candidates for the Republican nomination in the Fifth Congressional District race to select an opponent to incumbent Representative Tom Perriello (D-Ivy) appeared today at the first annual FreedomFest in Greene County. The event, with multiple sponsorships that included the Jefferson Area Tea Party and the Green County Republican Committee, attracted about 150 to 200 people and featured food, drinks, and a moon bounce for the kids.

For the first time (but probably not the last) the five candidates posed for a photograph (at my suggestion).

From left to right: Ken Boyd, Laurence Verga, Feda Morton, Michael McPadden, Robert Hurt.

Video from the event will be posted later today.

Update: More photos from the Green County FreedomFest can be found on Facebook.

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