Ehrlich Radio: We listen so you don't have to.
Last weekend, Bob Ehrlich urged listeners of his talk radio show to attend a TEA Party rally in Annapolis sponsored by Americans for Prosperity and other TEA Party organizations. It’s not the first time MD Republicans have tried to latch on to the TEA Parties. However, it looks like Ehrlich is trying to curry favor with the TEA Partiers before they find out he’s not actually a fiscal conservative and they Scozzafava him. It makes sense that Ehrlich would want to distract everyone from his own spending record. In case folks have forgotten, we thought it would be a good idea to remind them of a few facts about Ehrlich’s spending record while in office.
Ehrlich proposed the largest-ever increase in state spending. Ehrlich’s FY 2007 budget proposal contained the largest-ever increase in state spending. It spent nearly $700 million more than revenues and included nearly 300 more positions than recommended by the Spending Affordability Committee. (Department of Legislative Services, Budget Analysis, January 23, 2006)
Ehrlich exceeded the spending affordability guidelines. Ehrlich’s FY 2005, FY 2006 and FY 2007 budget proposals each exceeded spending limits recommended by the Spending Affordability Committee.
Ehrlich was criticized for reckless spending that didn’t “take into account the possibility that the economy might eventually sour.” A January 2006 Baltimore Sun editorial criticized Ehrlich for his spending increases, arguing they were reckless because they would cause budget pain in future years if the economy declined: “But it’s hard to endorse a management philosophy that doesn’t look beyond 2006 – or take into account the possibility that the economy might eventually sour.”
Something tells me that Ehrlich won’t be joining his listeners at this rally, but if he does, he’d probably be a little worried if the TEA Partiers found out that he’s not really one of them.
Ehrlich Radio: We listen so you don't have to.
Is Bob Ehrlich “going rogue?” After months of stoking attention by publicly waffling over a potential gubernatorial run, the talk show host and self-styled political celebrity disclosed on his radio show Saturday that he may instead challenge popular Senator Barbara Mikulski. No doubt surprising Republicans who have been listening for months to his “Will I or Won’t I” Hamlet act of possibly running again for governor, Ehrlich this past weekend called a U. S. Senate candidacy a possibility, saying it is “something that certainly is an option out there for me.”
In fact, the former governor bashed Mikulski before his wife chimed in that, “It’s gonna be real fun to challenge her.” (Unedited transcript of full exchange at the end of this post).
We don’t know what Ehrlich’s focus groups are telling him as he goes office (or just attention) shopping, but his comments got us thinking: What sort of Senator would Ehrlich make?
We can take some clues from Ehrlich’s last stint in Washington, when then-Congressman Ehrlich was a self-proclaimed right-wing disciple of Tom DeLay, Newt Gingrich and other discredited GOP leaders, voting against education and environmental measures.
And, despite his claims of fiscal conservatism, Ehrlich voted for George W. Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy and voted to increase the national debt limit by hundreds of billions of dollars.
“Will I or Won’t I” Ehrlich also:
- Voted to eliminate the Department of Education
- Opposed minimum wage increases, but voted to increase his own pay
- Received a 15% rating from the League of Conservation Voters and a zero percent rating from the American Wilderness Coalition
- Voted to eliminate grants for more cops on the streets
- Voted with George W. Bush and the Republican Party 90 percent of the time
It’s not the best record on which to run against Barbara Mikulski or anybody for that matter. Maybe that explains why any Ehrlich Senate candidacy would be marked by negative and personal attacks against Senator Mikulski (even though, we’d point out, those didn’t work so well for Mikulski’s previous opponents). Come to think of it, any Ehrlich candidacy for anything is bound to be highly personal and negative.
Transcript below:
Caller: I volunteered for you in Howard County both times when you ran for governor, and volunteering again for you to run for Senate. Because I personally think that the winds of change in this country are such that … the expertise and your insight and experience [unintelligible] back in Washington because I personally think the winds of change are greater in Washington. And my thoughts on that are that, if you were the senator — to challenge Sen. Mikulski, who is in bed with ACORN and other nefarious groups, then her ability to be able to effect legislation in Washington which can bring the hammer down on Maryland, in some respect, because right now being able to effect change in Maryland is very difficult for Sen. Kittleman and Del. O’Donnell and I’m going to hang up and listen.
Ehrlich: Wow. I’ll just say this, thank you for the kind words … We’ve kept all options open, and that’s where we are. And all options are open. Sen. Mikulski’s pretty popular, her voting record is dismal. And we see each other from time to time, and we’re respectful. We disagree on just about everything –
Kendel: Not lately. She’s been in real hiding lately.
Ehrlich: Well we haven’t seen her lately, but we do see her, obviously, from time to time, and we see Sen. Cardin as well. I just wish we had more balance in our representation in the U.S. Senate. You always know where our senators are going to be, always, and I think even my detractors in congress, when I was in congress, sometimes they were surprised. And I think it’s a little disquieting to always know where your senators are going to be, and just about every time they’re wrong. So, in any event, that’s where we are.
…
Caller: I just want to second the motion from the gentleman from Howard County that I would love for you to run for Senate instead of governor. I think that Sen. Mikulski is an old pompous windbag who is out of touch with the people of Maryland. And you bring fresh and enthusiastic ideas, you have good common sense to you, and that you would serve the country and the state better by running for Senate and getting us some help over there in DC. And I think this is the time to do it, with the way the tide is turning. And I will hang up and listen to your response.
Kendel: There you go.
Ehrlich: Thank you, Cathy. That’s my cousin, by the way. No. (Laughs) Cathy, thank you for calling. We do need a new voice, obviously, from the Senate in Maryland, the United States Senate, we deserve better than this, and it’s something that certainly is an option out there for me. It’s a difficult race, obviously Sen. Mikulski is pretty popular. She certainly goes out of her way to try to pound us every election cycle, and she appears — she thinks she has a safe seat, and as Kendel–
Kendel: It’s gonna be real fun to challenge her.
Ehrlich: As Kendel earlier stated, this is an environment without consequences, when politicians — and there are some safe Democratic seats in the legislature, some safe Republican seats, it works both ways, everybody, but the fact of it is, when you have a U.S. Senate seat and you think you’re safe, your voting record gets to be what hers looks like and it’s pretty dismal as far as I’m concerned.
Last weekend, radio talk show host Bob Ehrlich said, “The Republican brand is still in my view tarnished. People have not forgotten that Republicans have screwed up when it comes to spending, scandals and all of that.”
Ehrlich is right without a doubt — period, exclamation mark — and his failed record as governor, including spending abuses and other unforgettable scandals, is why the Republican “brand” in Maryland remains problematic for him and all Republicans who served in his administration.
However, he seems to have forgotten that in Maryland it was HIS spending that earned his party a tarnished brand. As a result, Ehrlich was the only governor to lose in the 2006 general election. To remind him, I sent him a letter last recently outlining a few of those spending habits and the tax increases that supported his spending habit, such as:
• Increasing spending by almost 22% in his last two years in office – exceeding the Spending Affordability guidelines;
• Raiding Program Open Space dollars instead of making difficult decisions to balance the budget;
• Raising more than $3 billion in hidden taxes, tolls and fees on Maryland families;
• Raising taxes on income from manufacturing;
• Raising state property taxes 57%;
• Raising the corporate filing fees by $188 million during his first three years in office; and
• Raised college tuition by over 40% during his term in office.
In contrast to Ehrlich’s term, spending levels in the State of Maryland are lower today than they were during his last year in office.
I rarely agree with anything Ehrlich says but this time he was dead on. I just find it a bit hypocritical. I guess he doesn’t remember his flip flop on slots, which he supported for all four years of his Administration as the centerpiece of his budget program, only to oppose in last year’s referendum, which passed with 59% of support from Maryland’s voters. I don’t listen to Ehrlich’s radio show but maybe I should start because I think I found something we can agree on.
