I spoke to Seth this afternoon about his new plan for the pension funds which was unanimously approved today by the State Investment Commission.

The state’s public pension funds currently hold around $7.6 billion of which about $1.1 billion has been invested in so-called “hedge funds” that were originally intended to provide investors with good returns and security.

However, as numerous reports have shown, hedge fund performance hasn’t matched hedge fund promises, except perhaps for their managers who have become billionaires while handling other people’s money.

Searching for alternatives, the Treasurer’s office conducted months of research and consultation with financial experts. They also ran “thousands of models and projections” to come up with a better way to get better returns on investment without undue risk.

The result was announced by Seth today – a “Back to Basics” plan to move about half of the money the state has invested in hedge funds – around half a billion dollars – into safer, better investments such as low-fee index funds.

This will take place over the next two years.

I asked Seth to talk about the challenges of coming up with such a plan, such as public impatience with the pace of change.

“When you’re moving this much money,” he said, “You have to do it in an orderly fashion.” He said making such changes was “like steering an aircraft carrier – you can’t turn on a dime.”

Then there is the matter of exit fees involved when leaving investment vehicles such as hedge funds. “We wanted to make sure we avoided early redemption fees” which in some cases could be significant.

The other factor requiring a careful, deliberate approach is the need to find solid investment alternatives.

I told Seth that the dream of many people, me included, is to see pension fund money used to create local jobs and businesses. But I acknowledged the fact that pension law doesn’t really allow that to be a major pension fund priority.

Seth pointed out that the first duty of any pension trustee is to secure the best rate of return for beneficiaries with the least risk.

That said, among the alternatives they’ve explored are funds that invest in infrastructure. He noted the infrastructure investment market is very “hot” at the moment so the cost of buying in is high. Of course, the basic rule of investing is “buy low, sell high” not vice versa, so timing is a key issue.

Rhode Island has used its pension funds’ proxy voting rights to join with other public pension funds around the country to support shareholder resolutions against excessive executive pay and other abusive corporate practices. These pension funds control millions of shares so they carry some weight at corporate annual shareholder meetings.

The state pension fund is no longer in crisis as it was six years ago. Since Seth took office two years ago, the fund has run in the black for the two years, earning more than $390 million and beating the fund’s goal.
Rather than give back so much to hedge funds, the “Back to Basics” plan should reduce costs while boosting earnings while taking a cautious, prudent approach to risk.

One of the nice things about owning several properties is that when it comes to politics, you have lots of choices about where you can say you live. I’m not talking about the formal definition of legal residence, but “addresses of convenience.”

Having an address of convenience gives you the choice of where to vote or where to run for office. You can shop around to find the most advantageous choice. Not necessarily a legal choice, but one that is rarely ever challenged.

We have lots of examples, such as Republican Kernan “Kerry” King who ran against Gina Raimondo for general treasurer in 2010 even though he was actually a legal resident of Florida and was even collecting a $50,000 a year homestead property tax exemption on his Sarasota County home. He was claiming his Saunderstown house as his legal residence on his campaign declaration.

In my state Representative District (36), we now have a carpetbagger state Representative, a Tea Party Libertarian named Blake Filippi. Filippi claims he lives in his mother’s house on Block Island even though he has listed his mother’s house in Lincoln as his legal address on dozens of legal documents including his Massachusetts lawyer’s license. He told Bob Plain he is currently living in a Providence apartment.

Addresses of convenience. It’s nice to be able to pick and choose. It’s not just Republicans and Libertarians that do it; Democrats also do it.

Take Doug Gablinske, for example. He made a big splash in Rhode Island politics during his two terms in the RI House representing District 68 in Bristol as one of the most vociferous DINOs (Democrat in name only), leading the attack against public workers.

As a result of the 2010 US Census, Gablinske’s district boundaries were changed. In an e-mail to me he said, “I was carefully gerrymandered out of District 68, with the input of Rep. Morrison into the redistricting process, who was afraid I was going to run against him in 2012.  The gerrymandering is obvious, as the line moved over one street, to redistrict me out.”

His home at 45 Kickemuit Avenue in Bristol is no longer in District 68, but moved instead to District 69. Gablinske and his wife Patricia moved with the times and changed their voter registration to 44 Greylock Road which is Gablinske’s mother’s house, solidly within District 68 where they have cast their ballots in 2014.

In his e-mail to me, Gablinske asserted that his change in registration had “nothing at all to do with that and everything to do with helping to care for my 86 year old mother, which is where she resides and I own the house with my siblings.”

Despite the change in voter registration, Doug Gablinske kept using his address as 45 Kickemuit Avenue on many campaign contributions he made since re-registering at Greylock Road (example).

There are a dozen major political donations by Gablinske listed in the Board of Elections database for 2014. Gablinske’s residence shows up as Kickemuit on five of those major contributions; his business address on Metacom Avenue is listed on the other seven.

Greylock Road is not listed on any of these donor files.

I asked Gablinske about the checks written from his business address (it is illegal for businesses to make direct donations to Rhode Island political candidates). Gablinske said that he keeps three checkbooks, one for each of these three properties and acknowledged that it would be illegal if he made a donation through his appraisal business.

He added: “For the record, at your request, I reside at both 44 Greylock Road and 45 Kickemuit Avenue and my voter address was changed to 44 Greylock Road, on may May 8^th, 2014.  My brother Wayne Gablinske, sold his house on Sandra Court, Bristol on February 27, 2015.  He has now moved into 44 Greylock Road to care for my mother, so I have returned to 45 Kickemuit Avenue and am changing my voter address back to that address, all of which is perfectly legal.”

Even though he checked his voter registration to Greylock Road in his old district, Gablinske did not make a run to regain his lost House seat in 2012 or 2014, apparently content to run his appraisal business and engage in lobbying. Gablinske said in his e-mail to me, “I have no plans to run for public office…in any district!”

After losing the 2010 Democratic primary, Gablinske started to work with Terrance Martiesian’s lobbying firm, filing reports with the Secretary of State since 2011 that he lobbied the General Assembly on behalf of the RI Mortgage Bankers at no charge.

Although, on paper, Gablinske is lobbying for the bankers for free, Martiesian’s lobbying firm is billing the RI Mortgage Bankers Association $50,000. What Gablinske gets out of the arrangement does not appear to be covered in the reports to the Secretary of State.

Gablinske asserts that he gets nothing from Martiesian and lobbies for free for the Mortgage Bankers Association because he sits on their board and co-chairs their legislative committee. As an appraiser, Gablinske obviously does a lot of work with mortgage bankers but, he says, “you are trying to connect dots, that do not connect.”

If Gablinske decides the time is right to try to return to the General Assembly since he’s apparently not getting rich from his peculiar lobbying practice, it would be interesting to see which address he uses.

Either address – Kickemuit or Greylock – could be challenged by some sharp-eyed voter based on all the conflicting public records and even Gablinske’s own statement that he lives in both places. But any such challenge would have to be filed very quickly.

After Rep. Donna Walsh learned about Blake Filippi’s declaration of residence and filed a complaint, she was told by BOE Director Bob Kando that under the Board of Election’s rules, there is only a 24-hour window to file a challenge to a candidate’s declaration of candidacy.

While the bizarre way the Board of Elections rules are written gives candidates the edge to get away with running for a seat in a District but not living there, there is the matter of state law and voting.

Under the Rhode Island General Laws, it is a felony to vote or attempt to vote anywhere “other than in the…representative district, or voting district in which the person has his or her ‘residence’”…. Gablinske will have to make up his mind where he really lives before the next time he votes.

One added irony about Gablinske’s flexible residency is that during his time in the State House, he was an outspoken supporter of Rhode Island’s voter ID law.

Why should parents have to produce proof of immunization before their little darlings are admitted to public school when they have the “freedom of choice” to send them to a school more consistent with their beliefs.

If ever there were two “movements” that are destined for merger, it’s the anti-vaxxers and the school choice mobs.

They are linked by the belief that personal “choice,” even when it is not justified by facts or logic, trumps the public interest. They are also linked by total indifference to the costs and consequences their choices have on everyone else.

Each group claims the moral high ground, flying the banner of “freedom of choice.” Yet what they really want is the privilege of making their choice without consequence or cost to themselves. They expect the rest of us to pick up the tab.

This is especially obvious in the so-called “school choice” issue being debated by some in Rhode Island right now. School choice adherents talk as if they don’t already have a choice when in fact they do. For as long as we have had public schools, we have also had private and religious schools.

When I was a child in the 1950s and 60s, my parents wanted me to go to Catholic school, and I did because they had the right to choose, doing twelve years of hard time under the tutelage of nuns and later, the Brothers of the Sacred Heart.

In those days, the parish school didn’t charge for the lower grades, but long-gone Sacred Heart Academy in Central Falls did charge tuition. Because of my parents’ choice, I ended up putting up my earnings from paper routes, bussing tables at local bingo halls and clerking at the local drugstore into my tuition.

I can’t say whether my parents’ choice was the right one or the wrong one, but I do know they made it. And they made it knowing there were going to be costs and consequences.

It’s no different today. Parents still have the same freedom of choice. They can even choose to home school their kids. But the real question behind “school choice” is not the choice itself, but who pays for it.

Chariho vs. charters

Where I live, the Chariho School District (Charlestown, Richmond and Hopkinton) has been in a long-running battle with the Kingston Hill Academy (KHA), refusing to pay to send Chariho students there because Chariho believes KHA cherry-picks students and sends special needs kids back to Chariho. Reliable sources have told me that this has been a long-standing problem at KHA.

Chariho Superintendent Barry Ricci escalated his battle when he sought new legislation in the General Assembly that would allow school districts to refuse to pay charter schools when those charter schools do not meet or exceed the standard of education provided at Chariho.

This attempt – which Superintendent Ricci told me in a January 6 e-mail he will not repeat – stirred up a firestorm from the “school choice” people, including the conservative Charlestown Citizens Alliance that has controlled Charlestown since 2008.

As amazing as it seems, these charter advocates were able to argue with a straight face that their “right to choose” should be honored with taxpayer money, even if it pays for an inferior education. After all, I suppose, “school choice” includes the right to make terrible choices.

Chariho’s fight with Kingston Hill goes back at least to 2009 when, according to a sworn statement by Superintendent Ricci, KHA’s principal admitted that KHA would not spend the money to hire a physical therapist and thus would not accept handicapped students whose education plan included physical therapy.

Later, Superintendent Ricci noted there is no sworn statement from KHA contradicting Ricci’s assertion. Click here to read the materials Superintendent Ricci submitted to the state.

Ricci got no sympathy or relief from soon-to-be ex-RI Education Commissioner Deborah Gist. In fact, Gist ruled in favor of Kingston Hill three times. Gist appointed her General Counsel David Abbott to the role of “special visitor” to examine the validity of Ricci’s charges against KHA.

Abbott’s report, submitted to Gist on October 27, 2014, went badly for Ricci. Click here to read that report.

Abbott reported no evidence to support the claims Ricci had made of earlier discrimination by KHA against disabled children, noting that even if he did, “none of the three allegations is dispositive,” given the age of the incidents. Abbott reports that he finds KHA to be currently in compliance with the law.

Having lost his fight with Kingston Hill, Superintendent Ricci asked to Chariho School Committee to add $53,745 to the upcoming year’s budget to pay for five more kids to go to Kingston Hill.

Even though Ricci lost his battle with KHA when charter school fan Deborah Gist ruled against him and when he couldn’t come up with parents willing to speak up about KHA discrimination.

But that is hardly a vindication for KHA – the verdict is not exactly one of “not guilty,” but more like “not proven.” Nor is it a vindication of charter schools.

Post-Gist public education

Public education is one of the cornerstones of our civil society. We need the best possible public schools we can create. Charter schools only distract attention and resources away from that critical mission. Casting the issue as “school choice” panders to the selfish few who want the rest of us to pay for their personal preferences.

Even though Gist will be leaving Rhode Island soon to take over as school chief in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the odds are that Gov. Gina Raimondo will appoint a new state education commissioner who is even more enraptured with charter schools.

I say that because Raimondo is married to one of the key corporate “education reform” national players, Andy Moffitt. Her campaign was funded in large part by corporate “reformers.” Her deputy, Lieutenant Governor Dan McKee, has been most famous for his fervent push for “mayoral academy” charter schools. Finally, Raimondo has appointed Stefan Pryor to head the state Commerce Department after Pryor’s disastrous tenure as Connecticut Education head where there were charter school scandals all across the state.

Yes, I’m afraid charter schools are about to undergo a boom in Rhode Island with such as cast of characters running the state.

Public school superintendents have made the point repeatedly that charter schools add an element of unpredictability that make it hard to create budgets, hire staff and maintain the proper infrastructure, and to do that knowing that you must serve all students, including all those who have special needs.

If “school choice” parents as these want a school that offers programs that tickle their fancy, then fine – send your kid there, but with your own money. If you want a school that doesn’t require you to present proof that your kids have had all their shots, then fine – send your kids to “Vaxless Academy” but with your own money, And keep those kids aways from everybody else.

While there was jubilation in the Rhode Island Democratic Party election night party because of the biggest sweep since 1960, that mood was not shared by Democrats in South County.

From Exeter to Westerly, Democrats, and especially progressive Democrats, took an awful beating in General Assembly and Town Council races. Majorities in several South County towns also shifted from blue to red in their votes for state offices.

Since I started living in South County in 2002 and covering local politics at Progressive Charlestown, I had enjoyed watching what seemed to be a steady shift from the region’s historic Swamp Yankee conservatism to more progressive politics. South County sent a high proportion of solid blue Democrats to the State House and voted mostly Blue in state and national races.

But that changed on November 4.

Of the 11 South County communities, only four voted for Gina Raimondo over Allan Fung.

In addition to going GOP for governor, South County lost three terrific progressives – my own state Representative Donna Walsh, Sen. Cathie Cool Rumsey and Rep. Larry Valencia. Each of them faced appallingly unqualified opponents. Donna Walsh lost to a radical “Tenther” who doesn’t even seem to live in the District. Cathie Cool Rumsey lost to Hopkinton’s honorific Town Sheriff who was caught using her uniform to impersonate a police officer.

Larry Valencia lost to a guy whose only previous experience was running as a delegate to the Republican National Convention as a delegate for Ron Paul – and who came in fifth out of five.

In Charlestown, we were totally crushed, losing every single elected office in the town to a group called the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA Party), an off-shoot of the RI Statewide Coalition. If you mixed the Tea Party with the Nature Conservancy and the worst rich people’s homeowners association you can imagine, you’d get something that looks like the CCA.

The CCA Party gets more than 60% of its funding from out of state donors. They provide vacation property owners with the ability to vote with their checkbooks in local elections. The CCA Party has increasingly put Charlestown on a “pay to play” basis where the attention you get from town government is in proportion to the amount you donate to the CCA Party.

But those of us in Charlestown were not alone in our misery. Exeter Democrats also took a terrible beating. Exeter rejected all five state general office winners and provided winning margins for Tea Party Rep. Doreen Costa (R) to be re-elected and for progressive Sen. Cathie Cool Rumsey (D) to be ousted.

It was only 11 months ago that Exeter Democrats rallied to crush a gun lobby-sponsored recall of their Democratic Town Council majority. The “Exeter Four” won a huge victory last December 14 only to see two of the four defeated on November 4, costing them the Town Council majority. The level and sophistication of campaigning in Exeter for the general election bore little resemblance to the way Exeter Democrats won last year’s recall.

Larry Valencia’s home base in Richmond also went very bad. Voters rejected the state slate except for Seth Magaziner and also flipped their Town Council from a Democratic majority to Republican control.

Even in Westerly, a Democratic stronghold, Democrats lost control of the Town Council. So it went in North Kingstown, Narragansett and Hopkinton. When the dust settled, the only solidly Democratic town left in South County is South Kingstown.

South Kingstown was the only municipality not swept up in the red tide. South Kingstown was one of only three South County towns to vote for all five Democratic state office candidates. They also re-elected progressive Democrat Rep. Teresa Tanzi by six points despite a $100,000+ campaign mounted against her by mortgage banker Steve Tetzner.

In another closely watched race, South Kingstown also elected Democrat Kathy Fogarty over her Republican opponent, Lacey McGreevey. Fogarty defeated incumbent Rep. Spencer Dickinson in the primary to get her shot at the seat. She won the general election by 16 points.

On top of all that, South Kingstown voters also elected three Democrats and two independents to their Town Council. One of those independents is RI Sierra Club lobbyist Abel Collins.

So what happened?

Like elsewhere in the country, 2014 voter turn-out in South County was low. It was lower than expected even considering the normal drop-off in non-presidential election years.

In Charlestown, we expected turn-out to drop by 900 from the 2012 count for the presidential race. But the drop-off ended up being more than 1,100. With a total voter registration of just over 6,000, that drop-off had a huge impact on the results.

Challengers to incumbents trumpeted the state GOP’s lead issue – 38 Studios – 24/7. Forget that it was unlamented ex-Governor Donald Carcieri’s (R) idea. However, 38 Studios did not affect the state office races or act as much more than buzzkill in most races. Even Republican Attorney General candidate Dawson Hodgson, who probably banged the 38 Studios drum the loudest, admitted after the election that maybe the issue wasn’t so potent after all.

However, 38 Studios may have had a disproportional effect among our South County Swamp Yankees as it was in just about every one of the many mailers, ads and flyers attacking Democrats.

In many South County races, the conservatives out-spent and out-hustled Democrats. In the House District 36 race, Rep. Donna Walsh’s “Tenther” opponent out-spent her 13-to-1 going into the final month.

But money doesn’t always make the difference, as re-elected Rep. Teresa Tanzi can attest. Tetzner went into the final stretch of the campaign having raised three times as much money than Tanzi, mostly through loans he made to his campaign. Tetzner outspent Tanzi by six to one, but she still won.

By contrast, progressive incumbents Larry Valencia and Cathie Cool Rumsey both out-raised and out-spent their Republican opponents, Justin Price and Elaine Morgan respectively, by wide margins, but still lost.

After reviewing Price’s and Morgan’s campaign finance reports, it looks to me that there was a lot more money in their campaigns than they reported. Morgan, for example, reports having spent only $322 on her campaign up to the last week, but she had campaign signs plastered all over Richmond, Exeter and Hopkinton as well as campaign mailers. She only reported $444 in in-kind donations.

There are still unresolved pieces of the puzzle. At some point, Rep. Donna Walsh will get a hearing in front of the state Board of Elections on her charge that her opponent lied about where he lives and is not really a resident of the 36^th District. There may be charges filed in other campaigns for misreporting, ethics violations or campaign sabotage. There are a few recounts to be done of some races for town office.

But in the end, there is a new political reality in South County.

Perhaps with more time and perspective, we’ll be able to figure out what went wrong, but we now live with the reality that on November 4, South County flipped from blue to red. We have to figure out how to flip it back.

Now he’s an “independent” running for general treasurer. But he began the 2014 campaign season as a Democrat running for governor. He was the first to announce, way back in November 2012 right after the last election. He soon realized that there was no way he would win the nomination for governor against Gina Raimondo and Angel Taveras (and later Clay Pell). So he switched to running for the Democratic nomination for general treasurer. But then he pulled the plug on that, too, when he realized he couldn’t beat Seth Magaziner and Frank Caprio.

That’s when he decided instead to go the independent route, though with the informal endorsement from the RI Republican Party.

But Almonte’s biggest problem and the cause of his vacillations is that he can’t keep his own story straight.

He claimed to be a Democrat, but he has repeatedly mouthed Republican positions such as mimicking Mitt Romney’s attack on the “47% of the public” whom Romney – and Almonte – consider to be deadbeats. He attacked Social Security and Medicare and even giving any consideration at all to raising taxes on the rich. It’s all on videotape that is linked here and here.

Almonte’s TV ads tout his credentials as an auditor, which I found to be pretty bold, given that Almonte – as Rhode Island’s Auditor General – failed to sound the alarm about our impending public pension crisis. The first warning from the Auditor General’s office about our pension problems came in the first audit report issued after Almonte resigned. We count on auditors to find problems like the one our pension funds faced, but Almonte blew it but now wants to claim credit for his experience as auditor.

At a recorded forum about a month ago, Almonte appeared on stage with his opponent Democrat Seth Magaziner. Seth very kindly gave Almonte an opportunity to recant, or at least revise, the remarks Almonte had made against the American middle-class, Medicare, Social Security and public pensions.

At first, it seemed as if Almonte was going to recant, saying that the remarks were actually written for him by the US Comptroller General who asked Ernie to take his place at a workshop and deliver the remarks. In an earlier meeting with the political action committee of one of the state’s labor unions, Almonte said that he was paid to make the remarks, as if that made it better.

In today’s video, you can see Almonte explain where the statement came from and see him say to Magaziner that he felt he couldn’t turn down the Comptroller General. Seth’s very droll answer was “I would have said NO.”

Rather than cut his losses, Almonte decided to ditch his good old boy persona to try to take Seth Magaziner to the wood shed. Almonte began lecturing him as if Seth was a school boy – “Listen to what I’m saying so you don’t get it wrong.” And Seth played right along, feeding him straight lines.

Almonte blew it again. He took the position that he doesn’t trust the government to invest people’s money, despite 80 years of successful administration. Seth said that Almonte’s attacks on Social Security were unwarranted, an “over-reaction,” and that “minor tweaks” (such as raising the current cap on the level of income is subject to Social Security – set too low and placing the burden on low-wage workers).

Almonte said that yes, “minor tweaks” could work – such as raising the retirement age. But fundamentally, he does not trust the government, even though he is running for a place in it. He calls this a “courageous conversations.”

Even though Almonte tried to gloss over his earlier remarks, he just couldn’t help himself but take a full header into the swamp. As much as he tried to pass the blame for the anti-Social Security remarks onto the Comptroller General, he ended up embracing privatizing Social Security. Period.

“I don’t trust the government to make the decisions.” Instead, he offered his “vision” of using a “financial literacy program” to teach the elderly how to cope with a new private system where they have to invest the money themselves “so people don’t have to rely on the government.” If that’s not a full-throated call for privatized Social Security, I don’t know what is.

Here’s the new video (you can also click here to see it):

Was Almonte asleep during 2008 – 2009 when those private retirement accounts – 401(k)s and IRAs – crashed and, in many cases, ended up being used to cover mortgage payments?

Actually, Almonte was asleep, because if you look at the reports he issued for the state’s pension funds for those two years (his last before he resigned to run for state office), you’ll see nary a hint of alarm. Click here and here to see what I’m talking about.

But worse than that, it was Almonte’s job in the years leading up to the market crash and Rhode Island’s subsequent pension crisis to point out that the state was failing to make the promised deposits into state workers’ pension funds even though those state workers consistently paid their fair share.

Where was RI Auditor General Almonte while all this happening? Well, then he was part of the government apparatus that he now doesn’t trust. With his record, and his recorded radical views on pensions, Social Security and the middle-class, he wants us to trust him to be General Treasurer?

In the hotly contested 2014 Democratic primary for Governor on September 9, we have one of the fringe candidates in Todd Giroux. Though he is currently polling at 1.4%, the three principal contenders, Clay Pell, Gina Raimondo and Angel Taveras, are all running within 6 points of each other.

Giroux’s numbers, whatever they turn out to be, will not get him elected, but could hurt the real candidates.

Before you throw your vote away on Todd Giroux, let’s take a closer look at him.

Todd Giroux emerged onto Rhode Island’s political stage two years ago when he challenged incumbent Senator Sheldon Whitehouse in the 2012 Primary. I will never forget Giroux’s speech to the State Convention. It was a 15-minute ramble during which Giroux shared his muddled vision of a future.Then came Giroux’s punchline. He told the Convention delegates – and I swear I am not making this up – he would be willing to drop his primary challenge to Senator Whitehouse in return for the state party giving him the House District 68 seat in the RI House of Representatives held at the time by Richard Morrison of Bristol.

I remember the stunned silence as Convention delegates tried to absorb this blatantly illegal deal offer. No one was willing to nominate Giroux. As it turns out, that was the high-water mark of Giroux’s 2012 campaign because he failed to collect enough signatures on his nomination papers to get on the ballot.

In 2014, he is running for Governor, perhaps because running for Governor takes less signatures than running for US Senate. Giroux did not repeat his 2012 mistake by speaking before the 2014 State Democratic Convention. However, he has been attending most of the debates and, to my surprise, some media outlets are actually treating him as a serious person.

They have even allowed him to repeat campaign centerpiece – his pledge to create a billion dollar fund to provide the capital to expand business in Rhode Island. He plans to take the billion dollars out of the state public workers’ pension funds.

This plan is illegal. You can’t just grab a billion dollars from anybody’s pension fund to finance some hare-brained scheme. Pension laws are crafted to prevent exactly that sort of abuse.

But I have seen no one in the media call Giroux out. Instead, they simply run his campaign pledge as if it was nothing out of the ordinary, when in fact, it is not only illegal but reckless.

Giroux has also been working to build an ultra-right base by showing up at gun rallies, opposing all gun restrictions, including those on automatic weapons.

He calls himself a “Liberty Democrat” and told California-based right-wing GoLocalProv pundit Arthur Schaper:

“I understand the constitution and property rights. There are many politicians negotiating away our freedoms, liberties, and playing politics with our economic conditions. I am working here to defend property rights.”

Giroux’s campaign positions also include a mishmash of populist talking points against Wall Street that almost convinced Schaper that Giroux wasn’t a right-wing “Liberty” type after all, but didn’t seem serious enough to dissuade Schaper from singing his praises in GoLocalProv.

Giroux gives his occupation as contractor, but he’s had his troubles with that, too. His company, LG Painting, was hit with a string of lawsuits, civil judgments and complaints with the RI Contractors Board. He ended up turning in his license in 1999. He went into Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation in 2010.

He has set up a new contracting business, Giroux General Contracting, and has already racked up four charges of negligent work and breach of contract at the RI Contractors’ Board.

Todd Giroux has the Constitutional right to run for public office if he chooses. There is always a market for a “none of the above” candidate. But Giroux is, in my opinion, a dangerous guy who says crazy things like looting public pensions to fund his schemes and asking the Democratic State Convention for a bribe.

The September 9 primary vote for Governor is likely to be very close and the outcome is vitally important for Rhode Island’s future. Don’t throw your vote away by voting for a clown candidate (and perhaps encouraging him to keep running in the future).

Personally, I think Clay Pell is far and away the best choice, but if you can’t decide whether to vote for him, as I wish you would, or for his opponents Angel Taveras or Gina Raimondo, it would be better if you voted for nobody for that position, rather than Todd Giroux.

The clock is ticking down rapidly to the September 9 primary where Democrats will have to choose between Seth Magaziner and Frank Caprio as the Democratic candidate for General Treasurer. Polling shows Seth’s public support has jetted ahead to take a 12 point lead over Frank Caprio in the final days. This is a huge shift from the 18 point lead Caprio held over Magaziner in June – a 30-point swing!

It’s pretty easy to understand why this surge happened. One factor was the decision by the third contender, Ernie Almonte, to run not as a Democrat, but rather as an independent with the Republican Party’s tacit endorsement. That was probably a wise move for Almonte, after video emerged showing him promoting right-wing views on issues like Social Security, Medicare and tax cuts for the rich.

It looks like Magaziner picked up all of Almonte’s supporters and then some. Frank Caprio is stuck with his core constituency of very conservative Democrats and party regulars loyal to his father, Judge Frank Caprio.

David Caprio

It also didn’t help that his brother David, a former Narragansett/South Kingstown state Representative, to be revealed as a player and partner with Rep. Peter Palumbo in a sleazy deal to get the state’s big beach concession contract. In what looks like blatant bid-rigging, David Caprio filed the second best bid behind Rep. Palumbo to run the concessions at state beaches.

Once Palumbo won the bid, he withdrew, so the state awarded the contract to David Caprio. Then, Caprio hires Palumbo to actually perform the contract, but at a loss of $250,000 to the taxpayers. The State Police are investigating and the state Ethics Commission is going after Rep. Palumbo because, as a state legislator, he is forbidden from bidding for, or carrying out, state contracts. David Caprio, for his part, resigned as Democratic State Party Chair. He has apparently not resigned from the RI Judiciary Disciplinary Board where he oversees the conduct of all Rhode Island lawyers, including his father and his brother Frank.

As a Democratic State Committee member over the past several election cycles, I saw David Caprio’s only achievement as state party chair was to grease the wheels and whip the vote to get the state party regulars to endorse his brother Frank.

Other than that, David Caprio was practically invisible. Statements by Republicans, no matter how outrageous, remained unanswered. Former state party chair Ed Pacheco had us spoiled – he never let the GOP get away with attacks without a fast and furious response.

The excuse given for David Caprio’s very rare appearances was that he was too busy doing party fund-raising. At least that was the excuse when party members would ask why they never saw him around. However, the campaign finance reports filed by the state party show that Caprio raised virtually no money. The party’s primary sources of funds were contributions of $3500 from most of the candidates for state office. The party reports show that even with a depleted staff, they were running close to the bone.

This unseemliness was enough to shake the faith of even the most loyal party regulars, questioning where the Caprio family was leading them this time.

No resume, no second chance

Lacking any message other than ‘give me another chance,’ Frank Caprio has rolled out negative TV ads challenging Seth Magaziner’s résumé. Caprio’s attacks twisted the facts beyond recognition, as Magaziner’s former boss made clear, Caprio’s attacks on Seth’s résumé only make you want to take another look at Frank Caprio’s own résumé:

• When Frank Caprio served as General Treasurer from 2006-2010, he failed to take action to prevent the underfunding of public workers’ pension funds.
• As a candidate for Governor in 2010, Caprio pretended he had nothing to do with the pension crisis and instead blamed public workers and ran on the position that he would slash their pension benefits.
• In 2010, Caprio actually had private talks with the Republicans about running for Governor as a Republican but, after beating Patrick Lynch, he went on to run one of the worst Democratic campaigns in Rhode Island history.
• It was so bad that, when hearing that President Obama would not endorse him, he publicly said the President could take his endorsement and “shove it.”
• After coming in third in the 2010 Governor’s race, he dropped his Democratic Party membership and in 2012, rooted for Mitt Romney to defeat President Obama.
• When Caprio decided to run again for his old seat as Treasurer, he first discussed running as a Republican with the GOP State Party chair, just as he did in 2010.
• Finally, he decided to run as a Democrat after his brother David was installed as the new state Party Chair.

Accepting the state party convention’s endorsement, Frank Caprio’s acceptance speech can be easily summed up as ‘I won’t screw up as much as I did last time.’

Seth Magaziner

After all that, you would think that Rhode Island Democrats would support a yellow dog rather than Caprio, provided the yellow dog had an untarnished reputation. Fortunately for RI Democratic voters, they already have an alternative with great qualifications and an unblemished reputation in Seth Magaziner.

Here’s a short list of reasons why Seth is the clear choice:

• Life-long Democrat
• Backed by state and national democrats such as Bill Clinton, Deval Patrick, Patrick Kennedy, Liz Roberts, 13 Democratic city and town committees, RI Progressive Democrats, organized labor, RI-NOW and a host of others.
• Activist investor who has proven he can beat the market while also standing up to big-banks to lower fees and fight predatory financial practices like systemic foreclosure.
• Only candidate in the race who testified at the state and federal level about the dangers of predatory financial services such as payday lending and pawn shop check cashing.
• In addition, Seth has published a detailed plan  to make the Treasurer’s office an economic engine, including launching an RI green bank and (this is one of my favorites) investing more of the Treasury’s dollars locally.

And if you want to read more about Seth and what he plans to do on behalf of the people of Rhode Island, click here.

Recently, I angered some people by declaring in RI Future and Progressive Charlestown that, among the three contenders for the Democratic Party’s endorsement for General Treasurer, only one – Seth Magaziner – was really and truly a Democrat.

I declared the other two – Frank Caprio and Ernie Almonte – to be impostors who, at best, deserved to be called DINOs (“Democrats in Name Only).

I noted that both men failed the state by taking no effective action to stop the state public pension crisis before it reached the critical point. Both men – Caprio as General Treasurer and Almonte as Auditor General – not only could have acted, but had the duty to do so.

I also catalogued the words and deeds of Caprio and Almonte that betrayed core Democratic principles and, in some instances, were dishonorable.

More than a few people criticized me for being too harsh. But, as events have shown, I was right.

On June 22, for no good reason, the Democratic State Convention party regulars voted overwhelmingly to follow instructions and endorse Frank Caprio.

The Convention majority seemed ready to overlook his terrible 2010 campaign, capped by Caprio telling President Barack Obama to “take his endorsement and shove it.”

As his tweet shows, Caprio remained angry at the President two years later, and seemed to want President Obama to lose his 2012 bid for re-election. I wonder if Caprio voted for Romney instead of the President.

There was willingness to ignore Caprio’s 2012 disaffiliation from the party and long delay in deciding to run for redemption as a Democrat. Those delegates seemed ready to ignore just about everything other than the orders they received from the Party leadership.

Caprio himself admitted during his acceptance speech at the convention that he did indeed screw up royally in the 2010 election and promised not to let the Party down again. It was all about him and his quest for validation. All very nice if being a bad campaigner was Caprio’s only offense.

But, as the days went by, we learned that not only did Caprio actively consider running as a Republican in 2010 before finally deciding to run as a conservative Democrat, but that he did it again in 2014!

He actually met with Republican Party leadership to discuss running on the Republican ticket in 2014 as well. Only later, months after declaring his intention to run, he re-affiliated as a Democrat and publicly said he was running as a Democrat. This was after his brother David became the pick to become new state Democratic Chair, providing Frank Caprio with a path of least resistance and the inside track to the perception of institutional forgiveness.

What kind of Democrat does this? And what kind of Democrats can ignore all these facts and back a guy like Frank Caprio for such an important job as general treasurer.

Ernie Almonte, erstwhile Democratic contender for general treasurer, isn’t any better than Caprio.

I called out Almonte for his failure to sound the alarm on the state pension system when he was Auditor General and I noted the terrible things Almonte said in 2012 right after he declared his intention to run for Governor in 2014. He was caught on video parroting Mitt Romney’s anti-working people screed and calling for broad cuts in Social Security and Medicare while preserving tax breaks for the rich.

It turns out that Ernie Almonte was also being approached by the Republican Party to run on their ticket for General Treasurer in 2014 while he was campaigning for the Party’s endorsement.

GOP State Chair Mark Smiley said the party even went so far as to hold a slot for Almonte right up until the declaration deadline for candidates. He said that the Republicans were a much better fit for Almonte. This may be the first time Smiley and I are agreed on a political question.

When declaration day came, Almonte filed his declaration as neither a Republican nor a Democrat and will instead run as an independent.

There is no candidate officially representing the GOP, but I think either Caprio or Almonte still fits that bill. Indeed, Almonte attended the GOP state committee meeting and, while not formally endorsed, Chairman Mark Smiley has said that Almonte is their candidate in the race and has the backing of GOP party leadership.

Almonte has already won the approval of famed Tea Party Republican Representative Doreen Costa.

If Caprio does manage to convince Democrat voters in the September primary to pick him over the true Democrat Seth Magaziner, that would set up a November battle between him and “independent” Republican-except-in-name Ernie Almonte that could look alarmingly like 2010.

Actually, a Caprio-Almonte battle in November could be even worse because then we would have two candidates who are all about ambition and their own reinvented identities, devoid of real ideas or principles, but all about denying their pasts and painting themselves as “nice guys” who understand and care about working families, all evidence to the contrary.

But there’s an alternative, and that’s Seth Magaziner.

Here’s a short list of reasons why Seth is the clear choice:

• Life-long Democrat
• Backing of state and national democrats such as Bill Clinton, Deval Patrick, Patrick Kennedy, Liz Roberts, TEN democratic city and town committees, the majority of labor unions to endorse thus far, RI-NOW…
• Activist investor who has proven he can beat the market while also standing up to big-banks to lower fees and fight predatory financial practices like systemic foreclosure.
• Only candidate in the race to have testified at the state and federal level about the dangers of predatory financial services such as payday lending and pawn shop check cashing.

There’s plenty of time between now and primary day in September for Democrats to come to their senses.

The Rhode Island Democratic State Convention will take place on Sunday, June 22. My wife Cathy and I are both State Committee members so both of us will be there and voting for the candidates our town committee, the Charlestown Democrats, have endorsed.

For General Treasurer, we like Seth Magaziner because he has a record of success as an investor and fresh ideas for how to get Rhode Island’s economy growing again. Plus, we think he’s a helluva guy. South County residents can find that out for themselves this Saturday when he comes to the Charlestown Gallery for a fund-raiser party being hosted by friends and supporters. Please bring your checkbook.

As if all of Seth’s positive qualities weren’t enough, Cathy and I would still be voting for him at the State Convention because he is, in our opinion, the only actual Democrat among the three candidates running for the state party endorsement.

His two opponents are former General Treasurer and failed candidate for Governor Frank Caprio and former RI Auditor General Ernie Almonte. Neither Caprio nor Almonte are real Democrats, and I don’t simply mean they aren’t our particular brand of Democrat, which is the progressive variety. Nor are they qualified to be General Treasurer.

Frank Caprio

Frank Caprio, you may recall, ran for Governor in 2010 and came in third because he ran one of the most awful campaigns in Rhode Island history. His biggest headlines came when he told the President of the United States to take his endorsement and “shove it.” Right after his crushing defeat, Caprio actually disaffiliated from the Democratic Party.

Frank Caprio’s term as General Treasurer (2006-2010) was blissful on the surface despite the national economic crash that wrecked the Rhode Island economy and trashed its public pension funds. He kept reassuring us there was no cause for alarm and that he was juggling the state’s portfolio to keep our pension funds solvent. What he failed to do was insist, as was his job, that the General Assembly keep its promises to deposit money in the pension funds as they were required to do.

Caprio only discovered that the pension funds were in trouble as he was leaving office and gearing up for his run for Governor. He then took a sharp turn to the right and used public workers as the scapegoats. He even openly shopped himself to the Republican Party in 2009 before deciding to run for Governor as a Democrat

Though he easily won the party endorsement and primary, the Caprio campaign came off the rails. Caprio couldn’t figure out whether he needed to go further to the right to counter the Republican John Robitaille and Moderate Party Ken Block, or try to tack left to counter then-independent Lincoln Chafee who had gathered support from most of the traditional Democratic base.

For all practical purposes, the end came for Caprio’s campaign when he got into a fight with President Obama over Obama’s reluctance to endorse him over his long-time friend Lincoln Chafee. Caprio actually told the President to “take his endorsement and shove it.

In 2012, apparently after stewing about his defeat for two years, Caprio disaffiliated from the Democratic Party, changing his voter registration to “unaffiliated.” In May 2013, after either deciding or being talked into it, Caprio announced his bid to run for another term as General Treasurer. However, it took until October for Caprio to say he would be doing so as a Democrat.

However, I would like to actual see his current voter registration card, just to be sure.

Since declaring for his old job, Caprio has been spinning some revisionist history about what a great job he did last time and is trying to find the right non-specific ways to address the on-going issues of public worker pensions and the 38 Studios deal, issues he failed to address in 2010.

Caprio did such a lousy job as General Treasurer that current Treasurer Gina Raimondo noted on her website that Caprio left more 900 victims owed compensation from the state’s Crime Victim’s Compensation Fund hanging.

He’s also trying to paint himself as a regular guy and now spins a yarn about how he grew up in modest circumstances on the outskirts of Federal Hill, twisting his actual history as a son of privilege and wealth due to his famous father Judge Caprio. In this video when asked about income inequality Caprio says, “When it comes to opportunity and equality, my feeling and my experience is that in our society there are no limitations and there is no reason for anybody to feel as though they are being held back.”

As a state committee member, I’ve been getting swamped with letters and e-mails from Caprio, but frankly, after reading all his stuff, I don’t know what he stands for, other than wanting a chance to redeem himself through a return to the Treasurer’s office. To that, I say “shove it.”

Ernie Almonte

The other fake Democrat running for General Treasurer is former Rhode Island Auditor Ernie Almonte. He was the first to declare his candidacy, deciding in 2012 to run for Governor but later changed his mind and switched to General Treasurer when he realized he would get crushed in the primary if he ran for Governor. I doubt he’ll do any better for General Treasurer. He’s one of the nicest people in the race, a pleasure to talk to. He prides himself on his honesty and integrity.

It’s too bad he has made such a big deal about that because there’s ample evidence that he’s lying. The worst evidence of Almonte’s deception is this video of him speaking at a seminar to other accountants in October 2012.

It occured near the end of the Romney challenge to President Obama and Romney’s campaign was floundering because of his gaffes, such as claiming that half of all Americans pay no taxes. Romney’s famous 47% claim was a lie because even if people are too poor to pay federal income tax, they still pay Social Security, Medicare, excise taxes and state and local taxes. Romney’s false claim contributed to his resounding defeat in the 2012 election.

In the video, Ernie Almonte spins out almost exactly the same line as Mitt Romney and doesn’t stop there. He calls for drastic cuts to Medicare and Social Security to cut budget deficits and poo-poos even the thought of raising taxes on the wealthy.

At the time of this videoed presentation, Almonte was a declared candidate for Rhode Island Governor. As a Democrat. Yet, he sounds like Mitt Romney with a Rhode Island accent.

This isn’t the only problem with Almonte. As long-time state Auditor General, it was his job to watch the books and count the money to make sure it was all there. One of his most important functions was monitoring the health of the public pension funds.

I read his audit reports for 2007 through 2010 when he resigned. In not one of these reports does Almonte sound the alarm about the state of public pension funds. He blandly notes the market losses the funds took during the recession but said it could have been worse. The first time the Auditor General sounded the alarm was in the first audit report issued after he left.

I asked Almonte to explain this and he told me that, well, he did testify to say there were problems when he went before some General Assembly committees. Period.

When Almonte met with Charlestown Democrats, he also flunked another key test. He was asked if he had any experience investing large sums of other people’s money, which is one of the main things the General Treasurer must do. He paused for a long time and had no answer other than to say he sat on a couple of boards of groups that had money.

There are other primary races to watch, especially the Governor’s race. But there is special significance to the General Treasurer’s race where only one candidate, Seth Magaziner, is a real Democrat we can trust to do right by the people of Rhode Island.

Earlier this month, the good people at the Mystic Aquarium Animal Rescue Team did the unusual, releasing three seals – two harps and one gray seal – at the same time at Blue Shutters Beach in Charlestown. 

The three seals, Pluto, Pandora and Curie, plopped out of their carriers and waddled down to the water to begin their normal lives in the wild.

The Mystic folks warn people to be careful when they find an injured marine mammal and to contact local police or the Mystic Center first on their 24-hour hotline, 860-527-5955, extension 107.

Rescued marine mammals come to Mystic from all over New England to be treated for illnesses or injuries before they are set free from one of Charlestown’s beaches.

They also run educational programs and also try to inform the public on the right thing to do when encountering a stranded or injuries marine mammal. If you read on, you’ll see how one guy who would like to be Rhode Island’s next governor obviously didn’t get the memo.

What not to do if you see an injured seal

Giroux is a construction contractor not a veterinarian.

Of course, he took the obligatory photo for his Facebook page, perhaps thinking this will somehow boost his chances with the voters.

Giroux is not the sharpest pencil in the pencil box.

Neighbors called the police who went to Giroux’s house to tell him to put the seal back, and contacted DEM.

By the time DEM arrived, the seal was gone. They did not find a body. DEM told WPRO that the feds are investigating since Giroux’s action was a violation of federal law.

Giroux is one of several candidates running for state office this year who have no business doing so. I regret to say that Giroux is running as a Democrat, although he is picking up some right-wing Republican support.

In this age of shrinking news coverage of real news, Giroux has been treated as if he’s a real candidate with real ideas, rather than a crank. I’ll be writing more about Giroux soon to back up my assessment of his qualifications. There’s a lot more wrong with him than just acting like an idiot with that injured seal.

This article originally ran in Progressive Charlestown, where you can see even more pictures of the seals Mystic Aquarium released in Charlestown.