He does resemble President Reagan a bit.
Posted on 11/16/2006 5:35:30 AM PST by Quilla
In Birmingham they love the governor. And in Mobile and Huntsville, too.
As Republicans coast to coast were burying their many political dead, a Republican governor once given up for dead was enjoying a landslide victory. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley was re-elected last week, beating long-popular Lt. Gov. Lucy Baxley with more than 58% of the vote, including an impressive 20% of the black vote. His victory was not simply the result of Alabama being a Republican state: Democrats won the two next most prominent statewide races, those for lieutenant governor and Supreme Court chief justice. In Alabama as elsewhere, this was a Democratic year--with the notable exception of Mr. Riley, a conservative reformer in cowboy boots, with a cheerful, Reagan-like demeanor.
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
Thus did Mr. Riley run for re-election as a genial, tax-cutting, budget-cutting, crisis-handling, job-creating, education-boosting, utterly scandal-free reformer. Every major newspaper in the state--conservative, moderate and liberal alike--endorsed him for another term. Interesting how that works.
In his victory speech on election night, Bob Riley put himself on the line by urging the people of the state to "demand a higher level of excellence from state government than you have ever demanded before." Judging from the election results, Alabamians think that type of excellence already is housed in their governor's mansion.
Gov. Riley gets it.
Sounds like good news for my neighbor state.
Pence/Riley for 08
"Thus did Mr. Riley run for re-election as a genial, tax-cutting, budget-cutting, crisis-handling, job-creating, education-boosting, utterly scandal-free reformer. Every major newspaper in the state--conservative, moderate and liberal alike--endorsed him for another term. Interesting how that works."
I'm sure the national msm could have dug up something that would have tarnished this excellent Republican candidate, had he been running for the US Senate. Perhaps he cheated on a spelling test in grade school, or wet his pants in kindergarten. That would have been exagerated into major character flaws that disqualified him to serve in the same government as those paragons of virtue, Reid, Kennedy, Pelosi, Murtha, and Jefferson (D-LA).
Wish Arkansas had one.
He does resemble President Reagan a bit.
In November 2005, Riley was linked to the Jack Abramoff scandal when his former Congressional press secretary, Michael Scanlon, pleaded guilty to conspiracy in the matter. It further emerged that, as a Congressman, Riley signed a letter on behalf of the U.S. Family Network, opposing expansion of casino gambling in Alabama. The U.S. Family Network was revealed to be an Abramoff front, funded by the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, which operated competing casinos. Riley has denied knowing the source of this funding.
Personally, I don't think it is a problem, but the MSM is sure to be particularly aggressive on anyone who even remotely reminds them of Reagan. Still, he sounds like soemone who should run nationally. I would definately prefer him to the current batch of frontrunners.
Thanks for posting this. Alabama continues to move forward in many ways.
Gotta love Media Bias --- What they didn't say was that EVERY SINGLE OTHER STATE OFFICE WENT TO REPUBLICANS. Except one - Agriculture Commissioner ROn Sparks was reelected for the 10,000 time.
Every single Supreme Court seat outside of Chief Justice, Attorney General, Sec of State, State Treasurer --- etc etc etc etc all Republicans.
NOw the TWO offices they are touting -- BIg Jim Folson, former Gov/Lt Gov and in one of the biggest Political machines families in the state Barely beat out a political Newcomer Luther Strange for Lt. Gov.
And Sue Bell Cobb, who is a conservative Democrat, won the Supreme Court Chief Justice because her opponent was the person named to replace Roy Moore when he was removed, so she benefitted from a backlash against her opponent.
Good news!!
Alabama has been democratic state as long as I can remember. But an Alabama democrat is more republican than a republican in any northern or western state.
50 years ago, Riley would have been indistinguishable from any other "southern democrat".
That is to say CONSERVATIVE.
Actually he was only elected one other time.. He got his start via the other dim AC making an "assistant" position for him. Ron ran his campaine and thus got cherry picked to be in his commercials etc... (good ole boy network). As far as I know, Ron never had a pair of overalls on, but his political advertisments sure showed him as a good ole farmer. Ron is just a political gamer that plays on people's lack of knowledge in backgrounds.
He used to date this lady up the hill from me, and would ask to borrow tools occasionally. I don't know that he knew which end was up on them and probable never used a tool in his life.
Uggg...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.