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09/16/02  Ron Kirk's a Black Guy -- again!

We have heard this song before, and Jesse Diaz has heard it enough.

Let's go back to when Ron Kirk first ran for Mayor against Darrell Jordan and others.  Until that election, it was expected to see a candidate's picture up on billboards.  It's for name/face recognition.  Even after 2 years in office, John Loza had billboards all over the district with his picture to make sure a couple of people would recognize him.  It is pretty standard in local elections.  

Lorlee Bartos and Pat Cotten managed Darrell Jordan's campaign.  Lorlee always put her clients' pictures up on billboards.  It was more than standard for her.  When Jordan's campaign put his picture up on billboards (with his white hair and white skin), Kirk's campaign screamed racism.  It put Jordan on the defensive and Dallas got to see Victim Ron Kirk.

Early in Kirk's first term, Dallas was getting pretty turned off with our new mayor -- his meanness toward anyone who challenged him.  Donna Blumer, Larry Duncan and Paul Fielding supported Charlotte Mayes for Deputy Mayor Pro Tem instead of Chris Luna.  Kirk wanted a "tri-ethnic" hierarchy at City Hall -- himself as Mayor, White Mayor PreTend Mary Poss as Mayor Pro Tem and Hispanic Chris Luna for Deputy Mayor Pro Tem.   It didn't work out the way Con Jerk wanted, and he punished Blumer and Duncan and Fielding - not Mayes, not Lipscomb.  He took Blumer off the Transportation Committee, right when key community meetings were going on regarding plans for LBJ, which dramatically impacts districts then represented by Fielding and Blumer.

About the same time, Ron Kirk started "bashing" the Dallas Country Club because he was not a member, and they didn't have any other bald, Black guys in their membership -- "people who look like us".  That did not sit well with some of his benefactors among Our Downtown Betters (the ODB), many of whom were members of the DCC.  To transfer the focus from Con Jerk and re-establish Ron Kirk as the ODB's "kind of Black man", Kirk got his good buddy John Wiley Price to picket his house a couple of weekends.

Kirk and Price attend the same church and are very tight.  Price never really explained why he and his hired help were picketing Kirk, but it was an effective stunt.  The ODB were convinced that Kirk was one of them if Price would annoy/terrorize Mrs. Kirk and the Kirk daughters.  Victim Ron Kirk, again.

Several months after the arena election (using the term "election" loosely), Belo (dba The Dallas Morning News) finally got around to reporting news they withheld during and before the arena election -- Kirk's wife held over half a million in stock options in a Hicks owned company while Kirk negotiated the arena deal and campaigned for the Hicks and Perot sales tax.  The town was outraged.  How did Kirk handle it?  Why he was himself outraged that anyone would question his wife's integrity.  Never even responded to his own wrong doing.  Victim Mr. & Mrs. Ron Kirk.

There have been several interesting stories in the past few days about some racist comments Candidate Ron Kirk popped out last week in San Antonio.   They are covered much more thoroughly in papers other than The Dallas Managed News.  

Fort Worth News

Cornyn: Kirk's remark divisive Posted on Sun, Sep. 15, 2002 John Moritz - Star-Telegram Austin Bureau

AUSTIN - Republican senatorial candidate John Cornyn denounced as "divisive and puzzling" his Democratic foe Ron Kirk's remarks that there might be less enthusiasm for war with Iraq if wealthier families were forced to send their children to fight. .  .  .    Speaking before a friendly audience in San Antonio on Friday,  .  .  .  Pointing out that the minorities and people from middle- and lower-income families make up a disproportional segment of the U.S. military, Kirk said, "I wonder how excited they'd be if I get to the United States Senate and I put forth a resolution that says the next time we go to war, the first 500,000 kids have to come from families who earn $1 million or more." . . .      But Cornyn said it was inappropriate for Kirk to seek to pit people of different ethnic and socioeconomic stations against one another.      "Why he would engage in such divisive and puzzling tactics as that just amazes me," Cornyn said.

Excuse me -- are there 500,000 millionaires with sons of military age?  I think the real issue here is why there are so few millionaires in America with all the lotteries and reality TV shows?

What in the world was Con Jerk trying to say with that comment?  Whoever is writing Kirk's stuff should be fired.  If Kirk wrote that bit himself, he is a blithering idiot.  If someone else wrote it and he said it, he is a blithering idiot.

His Large White Shadow in Dallas took better care of him than his current handlers.

Here's another one. 

Cornyn responds to remark; Says Kirk's comment 'divisive' By CLAY ROBISON, Copyright 2002 Houston Chronicle Austin Bureau 9/14/02

AUSTIN -- Republican U.S. senatorial nominee John Cornyn said Saturday .  .  . "I'm mystified why Ron would take a bona fide policy difference and put it in such divisive terms," Cornyn said.     Kirk suggested after addressing a rally in San Antonio on Friday that Cornyn is comfortable with the idea of sending U.S. troops to Iraq because of racial differences between the Republican candidate and those who would be in harm's way.      "Look who would be doing the fighting. They're disproportionately ethnic. They're disproportionately minority," Kirk said.   .   .  .   Kirk said that if the children of Cornyn's wealthy friends and acquaintances were likely to be taking enemy fire, "he would be just as deliberative as the rest of us."  .   .   .  .

Excuse me, again.  Those of us who live in Dallas know that Ron Kirk's friends were among the city's most wealthy.  Don't forget, Ron Kirk spent two weeks a couple of summers ago at the Southern France chateau of Billionaire Paul Allen.  That vacation included some time on Allen's yacht in the Mediterranean.  Con Jerk came right back to Dallas and pushed through a tax abatement for Allen's local company.  Kirk refused to recuse himself from the discussion or vote on that abatement.  The Dallas Managed News has still not reported that little infraction and it has been over 3 years ago.  What's a little graft among billionaires and Ron Kirk who likes hanging out with millionaires and billionaires.  Sure hope Paul Allen doesn't have a son or daughter of military age.  

Oh, but then, we do have a voluntary military these days -- no draft.  The people in the military are there because they want to be -- chose to be.  They are not being paid a six-figure salary by a Downtown law firm to do nothing.  They are paid precious little to be soldiers and fight when and where they are sent -- and they chose that life.  Ron Kirk has nothing in common with any man or woman in the military, regardless of the color of their skin or how much hair they have on their head.  

Our military men and women are patriots. Ron Kirk is a carnival barker.

Here's another one from the San Antonio Express-News: 

Kirk: Race, class affect war views By W. Gardner Selby Express-News Austin Bureau (My San Antonio.com) 9/14/02

U.S. Senate candidate Ron Kirk said Friday he would support President Bush if he decides to take military action in Iraq, but decried that America's wars more often are fought by minorities than by the children of privilege.   .  .  .    Kirk said: "I am ready to stand behind this president to go to war."      But .  .  .   "You go and look at the people who are responsible for all the corporate wrongdoing, you ain't going to find a lot of people who look like us," .  .  .      "If you go to Wall Street and look at the people who have been defrauding our nation and brought our economy to its knees, you ain't going to find a lot of people who look like us.      "You go to the battlefields of Afghanistan, you look in the burial grounds of Arlington National Cemetery ..." His words were drowned out by cheering and applause.  .  .  .   "I wonder how excited they'd be if I get to the United States Senate and I put forth a resolution that says the next time we go to war, the first 500,000 kids have to come from families who earn $1 million or more." .  .  .

If the people attending that rally bought that trip (not the Southern France trip), they are really gullible.  

But then, I'm still laughing over seeing Ron Kirk at a union rally in a white shirt sans tie and jacket.  Never -- never -- never would dapper Con Jerk dress that way in real life.  This business of Con Jerk pretending to connect to the working class or middle America is too far fetched to even be amusing.  You know what they say, to be funny, comedy must have some connection to reality.

Of late, Con Jerk is either misspeaking himself or apologizing for mistakes by his campaign.  

	That never happened when his Large White Shadow was pulling his strings.  But then, she used to be a Republican.  Now, she's just a big bag of wind.

Fort Worth News

Kirk says his campaign erred Jay Root Star-Telegram Austin Bureau Sep. 13, 2002

AUSTIN - U.S. Senate hopeful Ron Kirk distanced himself Thursday from assertions that his Republican opponent, Attorney General John Cornyn, played a role in the use of racist testimony in death penalty cases.        Kirk's campaign made suggestions several days ago that Cornyn's office erred by allowing racist testimony to be used in several murder trials -- testimony suggesting that a person's ethnicity could determine a defendant's "future dangerousness."      In fact, Cornyn went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000 to ask that race-based testimony in a notorious death penalty case be thrown out; Cornyn later identified six other, similar cases. Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, later called Cornyn's move to correct prosecutorial error "courageous."     In an interview Thursday, Kirk said he meant to criticize Cornyn for unrelated death penalty issues. Any perceived attack on Cornyn regarding the racist testimony was "more accidental than intended," he said.      "I'd have to, I mean, label that as an error," Kirk said. "If you are trying to make the inference that we were trying to criticize him on the issue of the role that race played, no that was not our intention. It was certainly not my intent."  .   .  .  Kirk spokesman Robert Gibbs acknowledged that the document was poorly worded and said Cornyn was "correct" in trying to overturn the death sentences.  .  .  .     Saldano's Houston lawyer, Stan Schneider, criticized Kirk  .  .  .   "He should say Cornyn did the right thing in that instance and back him up," Schneider said. "You may want to ask Mr. Kirk why he isn't applauding Mr. Cornyn."

Ron Kirk knows as much about criminal law (or civil law for that matter) as I do about repairing a car.  You drive up to the car fix-it place, you describe the noise the car is making and you leave it there for the mechanic to fix it and over-charge you.  Everything that happens to your car until you pick it up is as mysterious to me as what goes on in a court room would be to Ron Kirk.

Kirk clearly is concerned about his poll numbers.

Cornyn now has the endorsement of every major public safety organization in this state, but you would not know that from reading The Dallas Managed News.  What are they writing about?

	Andy Lindblom: I am curious about the line Mr. Kirk says in this article...    "Look who would be doing the fighting," Mr. Kirk said. "They're disproportionately ethnic; they're disproportionately minority." Is not everyone 'ethnic' in some way?  Or by ethnic, does Mr. Kirk imply 'non-white'. I looked up ethnic on  http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary  and the definitions are:  1 : HEATHEN 2 a : of or relating to large groups of people classed according to common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background <ethnic minorities> <ethnic enclaves> b : being a member of an ethnic group c : of, relating to, or characteristic of ethnics <ethnic neighborhoods> <ethnic foods> Do white people not have a  "common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background", or is that a racist idea? Thank you for this forum, God Bless America Vote early and vote often.
Cornyn says he's puzzled by Kirk's comments on Iraq; Ex-mayor renews charges that AG questions his patriotism  09/15/2002 By GROMER JEFFERS Jr./The Dallas Morning News
Republican Senate candidate John Cornyn said Saturday that he is mystified by "divisive" comments by Democratic opponent Ron Kirk, who suggested a day earlier that class and race were factors in Mr. Cornyn's willingness to strike Iraq regardless of the position taken by the United Nations.   .  .  .    "Look who would be doing the fighting," Mr. Kirk said. "They're disproportionately ethnic; they're disproportionately minority."      "The point is, I would be curious to see if we would go to war without any thought of loss if the first half-million kids to go came from families who made $1 million," Mr. Kirk said.  .  .  .      "If we're going to ask American men and women to fight another war, I want to make sure they have every bit of a chance to be successful in Iraq as they were in Afghanistan," he said after speaking to the DFW Federal Club, a Dallas-area gay and lesbian group.   .  .  .      Neither candidate has served in the military.  .  .  .

There is some mention of Cornyn's CLEAT endorsement in this other DMN article, buried way down toward the bottom:

GOP hopefuls say 'hola'; With eye on Hispanic vote, Perry airs Spanish ad, Cornyn woos Valley   09/14/2002  From Staff and Wire Reports

.  .  .   Senate candidate John Cornyn called on his Democratic rival, Ron Kirk, to a debate in the Rio Grande Valley.      Mr. Kirk later accepted, saying: "The more people who see John Cornyn and me together, the more likely it is that I'll be the next U.S. senator."  .  .  .      Mr. Cornyn said in Austin that he believes the Hispanic vote is up for grabs.      Mr. Cornyn, the state attorney general, said he has campaigned in the Valley several times since January and does not believe Mr. Kirk has "shown up."  .  .  .   "Of course, he's been spending most of his time traveling out of state," Mr. Cornyn said. "I have been spending virtually all my time traveling in state."   .  .  .   Also Friday, Mr. Cornyn picked up the support of the Combined Law Enforcement Association of Texas.    "No endorsement in this race means more to me than this one," Mr. Cornyn said. "It comes from the men and women who put their lives on the line to protect our families. It comes from those who sacrifice in many ways to serve the public."  .  .  .  The Dallas Police Association last week announced its endorsement for Mr. Cornyn. Mr. Gibbs of the Kirk campaign said the candidate understands that law officers have a tough job, and he noted that when Mr. Kirk was Dallas mayor, resources were increased, and crime went down.

As if Ron Kirk had one single thing to do with crime reduction in Dallas.  

Apparently Con Jerk is not thrilled to have the Human Rights Campaign endorsement.  He wants their money and their time -- but wanted to keep their endorsement in the closet.

Kirk, Cornyn differ on issues facing gays;  Rivals split on what federal law should cover 09/14/2002  by GROMER JEFFERS JR., The Dallas Morning News

Texas' major candidates for the Senate are split on legislation that would make violence prompted by victims' sexual orientation a federal crime.     Republican John Cornyn opposes it, and Democrat Ron Kirk supports it.    They also are at odds about whether the federal government should prohibit workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation. Mr. Cornyn opposes such a law, and Mr. Kirk supports it.       On another issue, Mr. Cornyn said he supports the state's century-old sodomy law that bars gay sex. Mr. Kirk's campaign manager said the former Dallas mayor had no opinion on the law, saying he believes that "it's a matter best left up to the state."  .  .  .       The Human Rights Campaign, which says it is the largest gay and lesbian political organization in the country, endorsed Mr. Kirk in June.  .   .   .      Asked about his approach to gay-rights issues, Mr. Cornyn responded in a written statement: "Every human being should be treated with dignity and respect. I oppose discrimination and believe the way to make progress in this area is by changing the hearts and minds of individuals."  .  .  .       Mr. Cornyn is against an anti-hate crimes bill, said his spokesman, Dave Beckwith. "The current law is sufficient," Mr. Beckwith said.  .  .  .   Mr. Cornyn sees no need for a federal ban on workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation.  .   .  .    he supports the state's sodomy law,  .  .  .       Ms. Butler said Mr. Kirk considers it a state issue and did not say whether he favors or opposes it.  .  .  .        On other subjects, the candidates did not make clear all of their views, including: ? Whether gays and lesbians should be allowed to adopt children. Mr. Kirk said it's a decision that should be left up to states. Mr. Cornyn said, "The goal should be for every child to have a father and mother who are married." .  .  . ? Whether same-sex couples should be allowed to set up a domestic partnership registry. Mr. Cornyn said he opposes that; Mr. Kirk's campaign did not provide an answer. Kirk endorsement   As for the gay-rights group's endorsement, the Kirk campaign did not publicize it when it was made this summer, nor did a press aide on Monday mention Mr. Kirk's upcoming speech at the group's luncheon or list it on a tentative weekly schedule he sent to reporters that evening.  .  .  .

As usual, the gay and lesbian community are falling in locked step behind the Democrat slate.  They give their time and money, but Kirk is embarrassed to have their endorsement.  What was the basis of their endorsement?  Look at Kirk's answers.  No one can deny Con Jerk was a powerful mayor.  Kirk was Mayor of Dallas for 6 years, but he did not get the gays their non-discrimination ordinance.  He certainly could have got it done, because Laura Miller did it in 6 weeks.

It is ludicrous for Ron Kirk to pretend he is a man of the people -- people of any color.  He is the worst kind of a snob.  He is only where he is because of the benevolence of his rich buddies.  Kirk is a perpetual suck-up who has acquired quite a nest egg by accommodating his wealthy friends.  Don't forget Kirk is the same man who pushed through a sales tax to steal $125 million out of our limited city resources for two millionaires -- neither one of which look like him.   Kirk is the same man who tried to block Laura Miller's efforts to save 3 public wading pools for some of our city's poorest children -- some of whom just might look like Ron Kirk. 

If you are a Democrat and contemplating voting for Ron Kirk for all sorts of party loyalty reasons, you really need to think about the harm he could do in Washington.  We had a surplus when Ron Kirk became Mayor.  You know where we are now.  Is that what you want for the country?

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