Tag Archives: Mazie Hirono

Waiting for the Schatz fallout

27 Dec

Neil-Abercrombie3-sizedIt’s been about 24 hours since Governor Neil Abercrombie picked Lt. Governor Brian Schatz to fill the remaining term of Dan Inouye.

We don’t pretend to know Abercrombie’s thinking.

In fact, he is famous for doing exactly opposite of what you would think he would/should do.

Now that we’ve covered our butts, let’s take some guesses (in no particular order) as to why he chose Schatz over Inouye’s desire for Colleen Hanabusa.

1) With Inouye gone, Abercrombie how heads the Democratic Party in Hawaii.
We see this is a statement that there’s a new sheriff in town.

2) It makes a statement that the Inouye/Akaka era is over.

3) Schatz was the former head of the Democratic Party here and also headed up the Hawaii campaign for President Obama.

4) Abercrombie always makes his statement in a sweeping and politically over-the-top way.

5) Abercrombie may think this will increase his re-election chances, but in reality it will only split the Democratic Party.
He’s forgetting (or ignoring) how popular and loved Inouye was in Hawaii.
The Dan Inouye faithful can not be pleased with the Governor ignoring his last wish.

Continue reading →

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The race for Inouye’s seat

21 Dec

Hanabusa-and-HironoIt’s always sad when someone beloved as Dan Inouye dies.

Even Hawaii’s politicians are forced to take a few days off from their self-centeredness.

Time is up, let the scramble begin.

Representative Mazie Hirono (on the right) was supposed to be Hawaii’s first female senator, and the first Asian-American woman and Buddhist.
Lots of firsts.

That probably will not happen.

The death of Dan Inouye has created the possibility of a quick, lame-duck appointment and swearing-in of fellow Democratic Representative Colleen Hanabusa (on the left).

You see, Dan wrote Governor Neil Abercrombie that it was his dying wish that Hanabusa replace him.

So, if the Democratic Party gets the required three names to the Governor quickly, and if Abercrombie picks Hanabusa quickly and appoints her quickly — she could be sworn in before Hirono and the other elected freshmen scheduled to take the oath on January 3rd.

End result – Hanabusa becomes the senior senator from Hawaii and seniority over all those freshmen to follow, including Hirono.

Pecking order is a big thing to a politician, so you can imagine how the infinitely ambitious Hirono might react.

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Hirono is having a bad week

25 Oct

We messed up.

We really should have kept track of how much money each candidate is begging for, email by email, day after day.

It’s sure to be a lot.

But there’s no doubt in our mind that the overall champ is Mazie Hirono.

She often sends out an email pointing out some mysterious group is targeting her and she needs money NOW to fight them off.

Here’s the latest:

Aloha –

It’s worse than we thought.

We just got word that another shadowy right-wing front group — the so-called “Fund for Freedom” that we hadn’t even heard of before — is about to unleash $300,000 in attack ads against me.

With the U.S. Chamber and the Fund for Freedom coming in to try to boost Republican Linda Lingle before Election Day, the GOP clearly views this seat as their ticket to a Senate majority.

Who knows which outside group will follow next.

I need your help to fight back, right now, to keep our campaign competitive in this critical final stretch. We must raise $50,000 by Saturday for our Fight Back Fund, so we can expand our own TV ad buy in response.

Please help.

There you go.
The boogie-man is breathing outside the door and she needs your money to scare him off.

She’s right…who knows what group will follow next?

It’s only limited by her fertile mind.

We appreciate the DELETE button this time of year.

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Local politics goes to hell

24 Oct

UPDATE: This article was written last night.
In this morning’s Star-Advertiser, there’s an article about Kirk Caldwell commenting on the negative ads running now.
“”I’m not going around filing any lawsuits on this issue. I believe the best way to address it, for me, and I’m talking about me, personally, is to grow a thicker skin.”
Hardly a stand against them – so we did not change our comments.

==

So, how do your like the political campaigns so far?
Yes, too many negative ads.

Almost all of them are ranting or raving about some candidate.
You can thank your friends and neighbors.

Politicians run that stuff because it works.
Shame on you for buying into it.

And you can thank the U.S. Supreme Court.
It allowed so-called Super Pacs to exist, take money for negative advertising and don’t have to say who sent them a check.

Not too long ago there was no negative advertising in Hawaii.

It was a reflection of the values of our people:

Don’t talk stink about someone
Support your friends
Family comes first
Be nice and be humble

This year is the worst we can remember in 40 years of hanging around politics.

Continue reading →

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And then the senatorial debate

17 Oct

Quite a difference compared to the Obama-Romney slug-fest a couple of hours earlier.

It was a good old-fashioned wrestling match.

Fun to watch.

Now it’s time for Mazie Hirono and Linda Lingle duking it out in today’s double-header.

Except they were so busy trying to be reasonable they were…dull, boring and passionless.

Neither spoke to the viewing audience.

Each droned on in a monotone mouthing the same old messages.

We wanted to get in the car, drive over to KITV and yell at the top of our lungs, “Wake up dammit!, kick some butt!, show us you care!”

Alas, it didn’t happen.

So we lifted the remote – and changed the station.

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