Jeanette Rishell’s Desperate Search For Justification
By Greg L | 20 September 2007 | Jeanette Rishell | 21 Comments
How do you know when you really have the liberals by the short hairs? When they start flailing around trying to justify themselves, and start trying to justify what has been proven false, such as this.
In this flyer by the Jeanette Rishell for Delegate campaign, the claim is that Del. Jackson Miller (R) voted to “increase his own pay.” Is that true or not?
Well, based on this and this, it sure looks like it:
A. Out of this appropriation, the House of Delegates is funded $18,423,119 the first year and $18,422,301 the second year from the general fund. The Senate is funded $9,926,898 the first year and $9,927,389 the second year from the general fund. B. Out of this appropriation shall be paid:
[?]
7. Allowances for expenses of members of the General Assembly, either (a) an amount not exceeding $75 per day for expenses which are vouchered or (b) an amount equaling the maximum daily amount permitted by the Internal Revenue Service.
Tricky, but the pay raise is there, embedded in a provision that ties per diems to the federal rate, which effectively increases them. Verrrry clever.
Or rather, very pathetic on the part of the Razing Kaine nutroots. House Democratic Caucus Chairman Brian Moran, the darling of the left, also voted in favor of this bill, as did every other member of the House of Delegates.
So after hearing from the Jeanette Rishell campaign that this was in relation to a budget item passed by the Manassas City Council, which was proven false, now the Rishell campaign is telling folks that this “pay raise” was actually an adjustment in the per-diem expenses allowed for members of the General Assembly. HB 1650, offered by Delegate Vincent Callahan, was the budget bill, which passed the House and Senate unanimously, was amended by the Governor, re-passed both chambers unanimously and signed into law. Can you imagine the howls of outrage from the left if this kind of ridiculous charge had been leveled against a Democrat?
How completely pathetic. It’s pretty clear that the Rishell campaign mistook an item on the agenda of the Manassas City Council for a pay raise when it wasn’t, got caught, and is now flailing for something it might possibly use to substantiate something that was clearly not truthful in the first place. Instead of owning up to a dumb mistake, they’re determined to try to perpetuate this fallacy with ever more frantic attempts to link Jackson Miller with any legislation at all that had any impact whatsoever on the inadequate compensation that legislators receive for their service. It’s not going to work, especially on this bill, something that didn’t change compensation for legislators, and which was supported by every member of the General Assembly.
This is getting awfully stupid, Ms. Rishell. How about you just fess up and tell the voters that in your zeal to go negative, you got sloppy and started telling people stuff that wasn’t true. Instead of pulling the plug on this stupidity, you allowed this to continue because the DPVA was pressuring you to do so, and you didn’t have the courage to stand up for the moral principles you claim to hold so dear. How about something new and refreshing from you, Ms. Rishell, like the truth? It would be a welcome change.
This monumental gaffe could, and should, pretty much sink Jeanette Rishell’s campaign.
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Per diems are not reportable as income to the IRS. A per diem is not considered “pay” at all. Rather, it is for the reimbursement of living expenses incurred by legislators who are essentially living away from their homes for two months each year. Through their per diems, legislators pay for room and board, as well as meals and any other incidentals arising from their stay in the Mystical City on the James. Legislators’ “pay” has remained the same for over a decade - delegates at just a hair shy of $18,000 per year, senators just north of that.
Seems to me that the old “pay raise” trick is square one for most challengers. If an opponent doesn’t give you anything else to work with, claim he raised his own salary or missed a bunch of meetings.
NJH
In a desperate attempt to drive up a candidate’s negatives that had none in the first place, Rishell flunked campaign 101 and allowed her campaign to blow up very early in the game.
When you attack, especially this far out from the election, you better have your ducks in a row, with everything being legitimate, and backed up by research. What she has effectively done is made darn sure that nobody will believe a single thing coming out of her campaign from now on. It doesn’t matter what his campaign comes up with at this point to draw a distinction, they opened with a huge, obvious lie. Everything else now (no matter what) has absolutely no credibility. There is just no legitimacy here anymore. Now she can just be mocked as a liar who can’t be trusted from now until the election.
There is a silver lining here, not for Rishell but for the DPVA, Kaine’s PAC, and Warner’s PAC. They now have a good excuse to pull all their support and stop funding this losing cause. They can go spend somewhere else in a campaign that actually has a glimmer of hope to win.
I think this is going to get shoved up the southern cavity of the Rishell campaign, and then broken off in said cavity. She’s in quicksand. The more she struggles to get out, the deeper she sinks.
But, I believe that per diem is untaxable, right? And Bob Marshall is notorious for commuting to and from his district in our to pocket the per diem….
Sounds like money in the bank to me.
Per diem is not taxable. That is the point. It is not salary. If Bob Marshall wants to make that trip home every night, good for him. Doesn’t that keep him more connected to the voters he represents?
But this isn’t about Bob Marshall. It’s about Jackson Miller and how his opponent can’t seem to get her facts straight even when they are laid out in front of her.
NJH
Pocket the per diem? That’s laughable. Have you ever worked at the General Assembly? Even as a staffer…that per diem doesn’t come close to covering your expenses and that was before gas was so expensive. I can’t imagine what it costs these guys to drive back to the district…even if it’s just for weekends.
LSM,
Please get yourslef into a 12-step program ASAP. You have lost touch with reality. You do understand that we are talking about $75 per day? I would estimate a round trip from PWC to Richmond to be 180 miles. At the IRS accepted claim for mileage $0.485 per mile = $87.30. Per diem wouldn’t cover this if Marshall was “commuting”. Even if he claims the mileage on his taxes, he’s not required to stay in Richmond. If he’d rather sleep in his own bed, and spend 3 hours on the road every day, that’s his business. $75 dollars a day is small compensation for either being away from home, or spending 3 hours a day on the road.
What’s that smell? I think it’s the stuff the Rishell they tried to smear on Miller, but got stuck to themselves instead.
“spending 3 hours a day on the road”
If I95 is messed up, add another 2 hours to that.
I don’t understand you right-wingers. When you don’t have a decent argument, you spend time vilifying character. If you disagree with a candidate based on the issues, that’s one thing. How refreshing. I think based on my research of the Republican candidates running for office, the overall theme is hate and divisiveness. It is obvious that the right wing wants an All Bob Marshall legislature in Virginia in order to control personal conduct and restrict freedom.
As for Jackson Miller, all of those so-called bills were nothings to make the immigrant haters think he’s doing something productive. What a joke. How many of them were enacted? He’s a one trick pony. A bloody cop, for God’s sake. A bully who wants to use police tactics to make law in Virginia. He has to go!
There’s no need to “vilify” Rishell’s character…she’s managed to do that quite well to herself in her attempts to vilify Jackson Miller. She also managed to energize, and ANGER, her opposition in this heretofore uneventful race…and characters like patryot (just the sort to twist a word like that, just as he typically twists the facts).
Sorry, didn’t finish the portion of the sentence about patryot but, on reflection, I think I’ll let everyone’s imagination finish it in their own way. It’ll give everyone the opportunity to mentally fill in language that Greg would never allow.
partyot,
I understand you left-wingers perfectly. Your candidate is a socialist. She has a past that she is trying to run from. Her work on behalf of the Woodbridge Workers Committee, a marxist organization, as part of Unity in the Community is well documented. Her plan to raise taxes to establish a whole new grade level, as well as tax Northern VA residents for out-of-region transportation projects, along with her support of the illegal alien lobby, caused her to lose last November. So what does she do now? She hides her true agenda on illegal immigration when speaking with voters, and flat-out lies about her opponent. This is Rishell’s version of the moveon.org add trashing General Petreus.
Jackson Miller has spent his entire adult life serving the community, as a commissioned officer in the US Army, a career Police Officer, City Councilman, and as our Delegate.
What’s Rishell done? What sacrifices has she made in service to her community? She’s an admin assistant at a small mortgage company, and raised money for illegal aliens, fought to destroy traditional mariage with her advocation for Gay Marriage. Just an ex-hippie baby-boomer looking for some purpose in life.
She is going to lose, and lose big. Maybe this time, she’ll just fade away.
I and an interesting run in with Jeanette last night. She was conversing my neighborhood, and so I waited until she was passing my house, and we exchanged greetings. I started to ask her a question, but she cut me off and said she did not have time to talk. Hmmm, I thought to myself, she is out walking the pavement presumably to talk with potential voters, yet when she comes across one( I witnessed her knocking on four doors without having any response) she says she does not have time to talk. All the while she was walking away, though the young lady with her seemed to have a bit more fight in her since she wanted to continue to talk with me.
I asked her about the most recent mailing and she said it was all true and that was the information she received. She said Jackson was a failure on the illegal immigration issue since his bills were not passed. I then asked her about what she would about the issues and about once nice neighborhoods that are now not so nice. She said she would work with local Governments, yet did not say how that would work out, and how successful she would be. So, on one hand, she blames Jackson for being a failure because his bills were not passed, but she feels she will be able to do better by working with others. Does she not understand that it might take a few times for some bills to get passed by both the House and the Senate? I guess not, because in her mind if one holds a different opinion, they are wrong, and there is nothing to discuss.
Oh, she was also able to say without laughing that she is a moderate.
She then stormed off, and I said just like the typical liberal who runs off when faced with facts and tough questions. Is this the type of person we need in Richmond? One who does not have time for people who may not share the same opinions? One that gets defensive when the going gets tough?
This is the second time I had Jeanette on the run. Exactly how is she going to work with others in Richmond?
Jeanette, I know either you, or someone from your campaign reads this blog. Why is it just the simple man on the street sends you running the other way? I thought you elitist liberals were smart? Though I guess not smart enough.
I’d rather be a right winger, then a left-wing nut anyday. If she was so good in the first place, she would have won last year. I realize honesty is not a trademark of the left-wing nut crowd, but really Jenette should be above pushing lies, unless of course she realizes that is the only way she can attack Jackson.
Patryot,
You go on and on talking about right wingers vilifying character, and how bad they are for doing it.
Then you start calling Miller a “bloody cop”, “bully”, and a “one trick pony”.
Patryot, I too hate “right wingers who vilify”. I equally hate ultra liberals who are pure hypocrits. That would be you.
I have heard Jackson Miller speak twice this year in public. He went well out of his way to say Rishell was such a “nice lady, just wrong on the issues.”
I wonder if he will continue to say the polite little niceties about her in the future.
Citizenofmanassas, I wonder if her analysis of Miller being a failure on immigration because none of his bills passed the General Assembly in his first year could equate to these past figures being considered “failures”.
Failure #1 - George Washington is a failure because of Valley Forge.
Failure #2 - Winston Churchill is a failure due to Dunkirk.
Failure #3 - J.F.K.’s Presidency was a failure because of the Bay of Pigs.
Failure #4 - Douglas “I shall return” MacArthur is a failure because of the Philippines.
Simply put, most of our greatest leaders are considered such because of failures that they had to overcome. Even so, Miller is not a failure on the immigration issue. In fact he has done remarkably well.
I also have heard this claim from other people that Rishell is saying Miller is a failure because none of his immigration bills passed. Mrs. Rishell, Im sorry but this is such a lame political point. It makes you sound terribly desperate. You can come up with a better arguement.
I have a question for all of you familiar with this race in Prince William. Why does this lady continue to keep the immigration issue a part of the race. It seems like it would be impossible to move to the right of a guy like Miller (who is also a police officer) on immigration?
She seems to be keeping the ball in his court. Can someone up there tell me why she dosent just run on the traditional issues that would be her strength and his weakness like healthcare and education?
She is obviously getting bad advice.
Anonymous, she is probably trying to direct the issue AWAY from herself (it happens to be the #1 issue up here at the moment, particularly in the 50th District) because SHE has a provable history very supportive of the illegal alien agenda. I believe that she is “taking this advice” very willingly…although I’m more inclined to believe that this is the REAL Jeanette Rishell that we’re seeing right now, and she’s not that nice little woman that so many said she was.
BTW Anonymous, those other issues you mentioned (healthcare and education) have become intertwined with the illegal alien issue in this area. So you can see why they’ve currently taken a back seat to the illegal alien invasion.
ManassasCity,
So true. Of course she has never held elected office before, so how would she know what it takes or even how to reach across the aisle to get things done.