Below is a video message from Congressman Ted Deutch, a resident of West Boca. At West Boca News we dislike the partisan propaganda tone Deutch uses here, particularly his abuse of words like “reckless” and “shutdown”.
A temporary delay of 17% of spending is not a shutdown. The true recklessness is the bipartisan explosion of spending, deficits and debt. We are unaware of any other candidate for this gerrymandered seat in 2014, but if one arises (whether in a primary or from another party), we will cover such a candidacy.
Category: Opinion
Cocaine Bust in Sandalfoot Area
The Sheriff reports that three people were arrested on Leeward Place (just south of SW Sandalfoot Blvd west of 441). Pictures of Deanna Pittillo, Jared Wilson, and Denice Martin, from the Sheriff, are above. All are accused of drug offenses involving cocaine or possibly another substance.
Per the court clerk’s website, Pittillo has a lengthy history:
We didn’t find any history for the other two. We did find another arrest of someone at the exact same address, Jason Matthew Burns, who was charged with a cocaine offense back in April.
While some might be tempted to connect this to Sandalfoot’s “Scandalfoot” reputation, remember that there have been criminal matters all over Boca Raton, including in the fancy neighborhoods.
As for the opinion of West Boca News, we note that nearly 100 years of drug prohibition has utterly failed. Someday we hope our state and our country will learn the lessons of Prohibition.
Deutch Votes for Amash Amendment
National establishment figures like John Boehner (R), Nancy Pelosi (D), Steny Hoyer (D) and Eric Cantor (R), along with local insiders like Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D), Lois Frankel (D), and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R) voted against it (for spying on us). Those voting for the amendment (against spying on us) included many GOP rebels such as Amash and Walter Jones, along with progressive Democrats like Keith Ellison and Raul Grijalva, co-chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
For more on the Amash Amendment and the “inside baseball” of congressional politics, see this article on Politico, and the Amash Fact Sheet.
February 5th – Boca Tea Party @ Embassy Suites
The Boca Raton Chapter of the Palm Beach County Tea Party is having its next event at the Embassy Suites in 661 NW 53rd Street, which is just north of Yamato and just west of I-95. This is a minor but unwelcome change from the past for us West Bocans, as most recent events had been held in West Boca at the Boca Greens Clubhouse.
The upcoming event is on February 5th and features Mark Meckler. He is best known as a co-founder of Tea Party Patriots, one of a number of groups that seemed to present themselves as national leaders of the Tea Party movement (which really has no national leaders).
Meckler left that group and is now involved with Citizens for Self-Governance, which purports to go beyond the left-right paradigm. This could be a great event, to get a feel for whether this gentleman is genuine himself and has real thoughts about how America can move forward. Or perhaps whether he’s just another in a long line of shameless political figures who stand for nothing. Only one way to find out – show up and ask questions!
As usual, it starts at 5:30 pm with a $15 buffet dinner. The speaker will probably start around 7 pm. Since Mark Meckler is a minor national figure, this should be a better than usual event.
2012 Ballot Questions for Palm Beach County
We just covered the Florida Constitutional Amendments. For Palm Beach County voters there are two additional ballot questions:
Question 1 authorizes slot machines “within licensed pari-mutuel facilities.” What it doesn’t say is that there is only one such facility – the Palm Beach Kennel Club. So this is a special deal for one business in the county.
This is almost a tough one for me. I’m personally opposed to gambling and think it’s not good for society. And I really don’t like that this looks like a special deal for one insider.
However, I don’t think government should regulate gambling at all. This reduces government interference in the economy. Even though it’s only a slight reduction and it smacks of cronyism, I’m voting yes. Barely.
Question 2 lets the County Commission create special property tax breaks “to new businesses and expansions of existing businesses that are expected to create new full-time jobs” in the county. That looks even more like cronyism, and any tax break going to the favored mean the rest of us pay more.
I’m voting no.