Near the top of my wish this for next month’s General Assembly session is a law explicitly authorizing citizens to videotape, photograph, and record audio of police officers in the line of duty. In the current issue of Reason, Radley Balko makes a powerful case for why this is important. In theory, this is the …
Category Archives: Politics
Richmond Sunlight’s JSON API.
I’ve just released v1.0 of the Richmond Sunlight API. It’s JSON-based, simple, and straightforward. This turns Richmond Sunlight into a web-based service that allows any application or website to get data about the General Assembly automatically and basically seamlessly. The most exciting bit, I think, is the Photosynthesis API. Now any individual or organization can …
McDonnell is attacking public broadcasting (again).
Gov. McDonnell is again proposing cutting all funding for public broadcasting, though this time he wants to eliminate all funding—$2M/year—that the state spends on this public/private partnership. State funding provides about 15% of the budget for most public broadcasters, with that state contribution serving as the kernel from which the stations raise money. Clearly this …
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The unstructured structure of the Code of Virginia.
The structure of § 1-401 of the Code of Virginia is broken down into five sections: A, B, C, D, and E. The structure of § 1-402 is broken down into nine sections: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Why two entirely different schemas? I have no idea. I’m starting to …
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Gilmore’s Secretary of Finance has been convicted of defrauding the state.
To those of us who are familiar with Jim Gilmore’s budgeting practices as governor, it comes as no great surprise to learn that his secretary of finance has been sentenced to ten years in prison for defrauding the state of $4 million, as Rosalind Helderman reports in the Post. In 2001, serving on the Tobacco …
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JLARC: McDonnell’s ABC privatization proposal is full of holes.
JLARC has published the results of their audit of Gov. McDonnell’s ABC privatization proposal. It’s harsh. Really harsh. If this plan had any chance of being revived, it seems to me that this must have killed it. Their overall conclusion is that McDonnell vastly overstated the amount of money that his plan would generate, through …
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How will we keep an eye on redistricting?
I’m really worried about how redistricting is going to happen. It strikes me as enormously likely that House Republicans and Senate Democrats will go into their respective huddles, and emerge with new district lines that will be voted on immediately. I fully anticipate that the first time that we see these lines will be when …
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Redistricting considerations.
After getting sucked into Dave’s Redistricting App for a couple of hours, I’m left wondering about all of the factors that ought to be taken into account when creating districts. In particular, congressional districts, due to their size, but I suppose I’m wondering all around, too. What I’ve come up with so far are: Human …
Bachmann can’t name anything she’d cut from government.
This interview with Rep. Michele Bachmann demonstrates everything that’s wrong with Republicans’ current political rhetoric about reducing the size of government: The good news is that Republicans are talking about cutting spending, rather than just cutting taxes. The former is too often ignored. The bad news is that there really doesn’t seem to be any …
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Hurt has filed a $1M lawsuit over a campaign ad.
In what strikes me as terrible, terrible timing, Robert Hurt has filed a lawsuit against the League of Conservation Voters, the Sierra Club, and two C’ville TV stations. He actually filed the suit two weeks ago, but nobody noticed, so it’s becoming public now, on the eve of the election. Here’s the advertisement that’s prompted …
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