Real Importance Of Special Session Lawsuit Was Possible Conspiracy

A Capital letter writer missed the boat in his disappointment with the Republican-led lawsuit to invalidate key results of the special session. I have not had any interactions with letter writers recently, so to remind everyone, the original text is published in bold, with my insightful and accurate commentary printed in plain text.

The Maryland Republican Party is, sadly, becoming indistinguishable from its liberal counterparts. Republicans have now resorted to filing lawsuits to invalidate the $1.3 billion tax incrase imposed on Marylanders by the secretive special sessions of the Democrat-controlled General Assembly.

So far, bold challenger, you have 1 point for and 1 against. You immediately dig yourself into a hole by taking a dig at the MD GOP, but the intellectual athleticism you display by emphasizing the Democrat roots of the special session's sleazy secrecy has vaulted you back to ground level. You almost earned another point for using 3 consectutive words that began with "S", but I just used 4 in a row, so back off.

Since liberals can't get any of their socialist agenda enacted into law, they look to the courts. Be it prayer in our schools, any mention of Christmas in the public square, abortion "rights" or privacy, liberals look to our willing judicial system to read the tea leaves that our Founding Fathers missed when crafting the Constitution.

Excellent! 4 more points for you. So the score is you: 5, me: 1 (I took the point against you and added it to my score). Extra credit for using quotation marks to make a non-verbal argument.

It's disappointing that Maryland Republicans have pulled out the liberal lawsuit playbook to deal with the massive tax redistribution plan of Gov. Martin O'Malley, House Speaker Michael E. Busch, D-Annapolis, and Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., D-Calvert.

Be careful here, friend. You detailed examples of liberals using the courts to do things, rather than to revoke things that have already been done. Also, what is the fascination with using middle intials, and "Jr." for that matter? Does The Capital's editorial staff edit this into the letters? Just say "Mike Busch", "Mike Miller", etc. We don't need the whole bio.

Instead, Republicans should have remained silent and let the tax increases devastate every man, woman, child and small business throughout Maryland. then they should beat Mr. O'Malley, Mr. Busch, Mr. Miller and their Annapolis accomplices over the head with their tax-grab boondoggle every day until the next election.

To me, and I suspect to many people, it sounds like the writer is asking us to give up--to bend over and take what we are given, forking over more than a thousand dollars per year above what we otherwise would have. Sadly, it was clear that this was the will of the legislature, so in the sense that we should not hope to reverse the statuatory process via the legal process, the writer is right.

However, the main point of the lawsuit is more far-reaching. I fully support the lawsuit because I want to know the extent of the involvement of the Democrat leadership. They should know Constitutional requirements, but even if they didn't, they must not knowingly defraud those requirements. That is what the lawsuit is about, at least to me. Did Busch or Miller knowingly falsify documents to meet Constitutional requirements? If so, they should be impeached. If not, we should do what the writer suggests: remember on Election Day how the Democrats gave us the business.

I wrote about how Maryland's structural deficit "problem" mirrors what has been happening in Michigan. The Maryland legislature did not disappoint, enacting tax increases that will not make a difference, given this state's spending fetish.

I recently took Mrs. Politics to Detroit, and upon arrival, we immediately renamed our vacation "The Trip To Michigan" because Detroit is the worst city ever. The best part about Detroit is looking at Canada. But we ate dinner HERE, which was nice, and we stayed outside of Detroit one night, which was also nice.

Michigan recently approved an additional $1.6 billion of new taxes. Michigan voters are so fed up that they will attempt to recall 10 politicians who voted for their latest tax increase.

The difference is: we don't have recalls in Maryland!!

If Maryland Republicans insist on using the courts, maybe they should push for a constitutional amendment allowing for recalls.

Oh.

That might slow down the liberals.
TOM PRENDKI, Annapolis

Final Score: You--5. Me--25,454. I get unlimited points; you were never going to win.

Monahan Testimony

A transcript of the deposition of House of Delegates Clerk Mary Monahan can be seen HERE.

House Clerk Monahan Deposed; Testimony To Be Released Today

From WBAL:

The chief clerk of the House of Delegates was questioned for about fourhours
during a deposition Wednesday relating to a legal case brought byRepublicans who
are seeking to overturn laws passed in Maryland's specialsession.

The deposition was taken in Annapolis after more than a week of
legalwrangling over whether Mary Monahan should be required to answer questions
inthe case.

Mary Monahan, of course, is the clerk who records the proceedings for the House of Delegates, and therefore can verify the authenticity and timeliness of the notification from the Senate of their adjournment.

A spokesman for House Speaker Michael Busch fails to look beyond partisanship:

(Alex) Hughes called the Republican lawsuit "highly partisan."

"Unfortunately this is an attempt to drag non-partisan staff into apartisan
lawsuit, because the plaintiffs (the Republicans) did not like theoutcome of the
special session," Hughes said.

At some point in time, defending the Constitution has become an improper, partisan Republican tactic. Let's stop and think for a minute--when this deposition is made publicly available, it is possible that elected officials at the highest levels conspired to defraud the citizens in a manner that violated express provisions in the Constitution. What else will they be willing to do? It sounds to me like they should be impeached, were such a conspiracy to have taken place.

This is not partisan politics. Even if you wanted to debate the $1.whatever billion in new taxes as a partisan matter, knowingly breaking the law pervades all classifications.

Special Session Lawsuit Update

The state attorney general's office has once again successfully blocked the deposition of Mary Monohan, the clerk of the House of Delegates that can prove or disprove claims of forgery related to the Senate's adjournment during the special session. Previously scheduled for 4 p.m. yesterday, the deposition may not happen until Wednesday or Thursdsay, if at all.

The statements of Raquel Guillory, a spokesman for the Attorney General's Office, paint a conflicting picture. In the WTOP article, the position of the AG seems to be that the deposition will never happen:

A spokeswoman for Attorney General's office said Monahan's testimony
is not germane to the legislative process.

"We believe that the deposition is unnecessary, one, because of
legislative privilege and, two, anything that she has to offer is irrelevant" to
the results of the special session, She said.

However, if you read the WJLA story, you would think that they just need a bit more time:

Raquel Guillory, a spokeswoman for the attorney general, says the deposition has
been put off until at least Wednesday or Thursday.

So, which one is it? Is the deposition unnecessary, or is it necessary on Wednesday or Thursday?

Let me answer the question for you: it's freeking necessary. The fact that the AG can thwart the testimony of the person who can put this whole issue to rest is a testimonial to the climate of government secrecy that has been continually documented. Let's think logically--if Busch and Miller did things by the book, they would be in the papers every day clamoring for this lady to testify to clear their name.

What is clear is that the AG is buying more time to mount their legal roadblock to the Republican action:

The attorney general's office also plans to file a motion Monday to
challenge a Republican effort to block the tax increases from going into effect
this week, including an increase in the state sales tax from 5 percent to 6
percent.

Also this week, the tobacco tax is set to increase from $1 to $2, the
vehicle titling tax will jump from 5 percent to 6 percent, and the certificate
of title fee will increase from $23 to $50.

Guillory said Sunday that a court stay on the new taxes would "cause undue
hardship in the state."

I'm no lawyer, but I would guess that the new taxes are more difficult to repeal now that they are in effect, and increasingly so as time goes on.

It's a good thing the Constitution is on our side.

Special Session Lawsuit

A lot of the other blogs on the right side of this page do a better job than I do covering current events, so I sometimes skip some 'reporting' posts, especially if I am a couple of days late or if the news is about the state or county, which is usually covered very quickly by people a lot more knowledgeable than myself.

I had planned on watching football tonight, while sipping a mug of hot tea and enjoying a nice fire in my fireplace. However, when I lit the wood, my house started filling with smoke--and not because the flue was closed, because I don't have a flue. With my master plan ruined, I had to revert to plan B: here I stand before you, lonely and desolate, with my laptop humming and the Patriots game on a low-def television in the background. Confident that my information will be useful, I shall proceed.

The content of today's musings is a factual update on a constitutional challenge to the recent special session. The problem is as follows. According the Maryland Constitution, one chamber of the legislature cannot stand in recess while the other is convened, without having a vote to specifically allow an extended recess, and a message to the convened chamber informing them of what's going on.

The Senate adjourned on November 9. House records show that the Speaker received notification that day that the Senate would be adjourned until Nov. 15, which would have been fine. However, the timestamp on that notification document was dated Nov. 14! Furthermore, Senate records show that they only planned to adjourn until Nov. 13!

These discrepancies brought about understandable allegations of forgery, that were first reported here. The possibility of forgery is important because (1) it would mean that somebody is getting impeached and (2) if the proper notification was not given, the special session was unconstitutional and the $1.5 billion in new taxes would be nullified.

Republican lawyer types, particularly Michael D. Smigiel Sr. of Cecil County, raised their concerns on the floor, but were scoffed at. So, after the session ended, Del. Smigel (along with 4 other lawmakers and 1 private citizen) filed a lawsuit challenging the Constitutionality of the Senate's recess.

Key to the case is the testimony of the House of Delegates Chief Clerk Mary Monahan, because she would know when the notifications were given, if they were given on time, and if there was any fudging of dates or anything else. Her deposition, scheduled for this past Wednesday, was halted so that the Court of Special Appeals could consider objections raised by the Attorney General. Fortunately, the Court told the Attorney General to shut his mouth, and the deposition is back on for Monday.

I would certainly love for the taxes to be nullified, but the bigger issue is the possible corruption of our elected officials. At every level of government, elected officials show their willingness to obey the law is a discretionary phenomenon--they follow the laws only when it is convenient for them. It would be nice if this perversion of ethics was dealt a punitive blow.

I hope they find a lot out on Monday, because the new taxes are set to take affect on Tuesday!