In Virginia’s 7th Congressional District, Wayne Powell

Our best bet to get the economy growing at a fast enough pace to create jobs for the unemployed, and create jobs for new graduates from high school and college, is to get a Congress that will vote for employment bills instead of making legislative gridlock.

Virginia’s 7th Congressional District, 2012 – from US Atlas

In Virginia, in the 7th Congressional District, Wayne Powell runs to replace GOP Majority Leader Eric Cantor. You might remember Cantor as the guy who said he would not support disaster relief for Virginia’s 7th after the 2011 earthquake.  Powell is a retired Army Colonel  and Richmond attorney.

On almost every issue, Powell runs circles around  Cantor.  In debates, for example, Powell challenges Cantor to explain his votes to extend perks to Congressmen, while shorting the pay of active duty military and veterans — to no avail, Cantor won’t explain.  What could he say?

Especially, what could Cantor say to a decorated veteran like Powell?

Powell can use your help, and contributions.  Check him out at his campaign website, PowellforVA.com.

No, this isn’t the Welsh former soccer player Wayne Powell.  The Welsh Powell would probably represent Virginia better than Cantor, too, but he’s still managing Leamington FC, last I heard.

More:

• Dem. Wayne Powell talks about race against Eric Cantor (wtvr.com)
• Eric Cantor and Wayne Powell to hold debate (wtvr.com)
• Wayne Powell on how the Internet could help him oust House Maj. Leader Eric Cantor from Congress in #VA07 (current.com)
• Cantor, Powell face off in spirited debate (timesdispatch.com)
• “Self-absorbed, egomaniacal” (salon.com)
• President Obama Campaign Video: “Fighting for People with Disabilities” (uneditedpolitics.com)
• Richmond Times-Dispatch photo gallery of August 23, 2011 earthquake
• Crooks and Liars – “Eric Cantor:  No federal earthquake disaster aid without spending cuts”
• Lively debate between Cantor, and challenger Powell (wtvr.com)

Coda:  Yeah, Powell’s probably more conservative than most Democrats; he’ll still be better than Cantor, for Virginia, and for the nation.

How to tell the textbook approval process is broken: Virginia’s voodoo history

4th graders in Virginia could learn from their history texts that thousands of African Americans formed battalions in the Confederate Army and fought to save the South, during the Civil War — entire battalions under Gen. Stonewall Jackson.

That’s what the book claims, anyway.  It’s fiction.  The author fell victim to a hoax.

Kevin Sieff exposed the book in The Washington Post last week.  Virginia education officials quickly moved to discourage teachers from teaching the erroneous passages.  Some education authorities pulled the books.  The incident exposes problems in the textbook approval processes popular in southern states.

If you had hoped textbook craziness was confined to Texas, you know better now.

More:

• Kevin Levin provided some of the best information and commentary about this incident, at Civil War Memory;  see especially his rundown of the claims in the book, here
• Robert Mackey blogged about it at the Lede, at the New York Times site; some good discussion
• Valerie Strauss noted the “high irony” that the erroneous book was approved, while Joy Hakim’s outstanding series on U.S. history had great difficulty getting approval; Strauss also relates the history of why southern states have state textbook approval processes (hint:  Think, “War of Northern Aggression”)
• The book’s author is not a historian, and conducted research on-line; history experts had not reviewed the book

Virginia county judge tells Cuccinelli to cool his jets

Virginia’s Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a heckler of higher education in his state (and probably all states) and a climate science heretic, must wait to get the information he asks of the University of Virginia and its association with super-researcher Michael Mann, at least until a hearing August 20 on whether Cuccinelli is trying to act bigger than his breeches beyond his constitutional powers.

A report in the Danville Daily Progress and Go.Danville.com explains:

Albemarle County Circuit Judge Cheryl V. Higgins has temporarily stayed a subpoena that demands the University of Virginia produce reams of documents related to the research activities of a former climate change researcher.

Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli issued a civil investigative demand – which carries the legal force of a subpoena – in search of documents relating to Michael Mann, a prominent climate change scientist who worked at UVa from 1999 to 2005.

Cuccinelli, a climate change skeptic, has said he is seeking evidence of possible violations of Virginia’s anti-fraud law in connection with five grants totaling $466,000 that Mann obtained while at UVa.

UVa has challenged Cuccinelli’s CID in court, arguing that it is unprecedented, overly broad, oversteps the attorney general’s authority, and violates the basic tenet of academic freedom.

Higgins’ order allows UVa to hold off on Cuccinelli’s demand until the dispute is resolved in court.

A hearing date has been set for Aug. 20.

Resources, and more:

• Washington Post’s Virginia Politics blog with essentially the same report; on June 16, blog author Rosalind Helderman explained the arguments Cuccinelli’s crew made against the University of Virginia’s claim that the subpoena threatens academic freedom of professors
• According to a report at the Chronicle of Higher Education, Cuccinelli admitted his investigation is not on state fraud for state money, but instead is aimed at the data Dr. Mann gathered and reported; this would be an area of federal jurisdiction since the research was done for federal research agencies, and raises the issue of federal pre-emption, among other thorny issues.
• In an editorial on May 28, the Washington Post lauded the University of Virginia for fighting the subpoena, and stopped short of saying Cuccinelli is engaged in a McCarthy-style witch hunt.  Some things go without saying:

It’s not just that Mr. Cuccinelli has presented no real evidence that Mr. Mann did anything “fraudulent” while conducting his research, applying for his grants or analyzing his data; in fact, Mr. Cuccinelli’s targeting of Mr. Mann appears to be based on little more than a misreading of e-mails the scientist wrote. Multiple scientific review committees have examined Mr. Mann’s work, and all have cleared the scientist of wrongdoing.

• The New York Times reported that 325 Virginia scientists and 575 others signed a petition put together by the Union of Concerned Scientists telling Cuccinelli to back off because his actions threaten science.  It is not clear how many signers are named “Steve,” but rumors are that more Virginia-based Steves signed this petition than any petition from the deniers.
• That letter was published in Science:

We also call for an end to McCarthy-like threats of criminal prosecution against our colleagues based on innuendo and guilt by association, the harassment of scientists by politicians seeking distractions to avoid taking action, and the outright lies being spread about them. Society has two choices: We can ignore the science and hide our heads in the sand and hope we are lucky, or we can act in the public interest to reduce the threat of global climate change quickly and substantively. The good news is that smart and effective actions are possible. But delay must not be an option.

Cuccinelli Witch Project

So, you didn’t think the opposition to global warming was political?  You thought “skeptics” were just out to make a scientific case?

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli - campaign photo

As the Hook explains, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has ordered the University of Virginia to turn over all records they have of research done by Michael Mann while he was at the UVA (he left five years ago for Penn State). (Civil Investigative Demand, here)

It’s a fishing expedition, the very definition of a witch hunt.  Also, as I read the Virginia Fraud Against Taxpayers Act upon which Cuccinelli bases his actions [see comments -- better source here], it’s probably outside the statute of limitations.

Research that Cuccinelli has targeted to investigate  includes work Mann did with the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF).  Cuccinelli probably lacks jurisdiction for much of the stuff he wants, trumped by those federal agencies.

Mann is the guy who put together the chart of all the different threads of research that show warming climate, commonly known as the “hockey stick” after Al Gore’s years of presentations on the chart and the movie, “Inconvenient Truths.”  Mann also is among those scientists in U.S. and England whose private e-mails were exposed in the breach of the e-mail servers at England’s Hadley Climate Research Unit.

Three different investigations have put Mann in the clear so far (Penn State’s .pdf of investigation results; response to Texas U.S. Rep. Joe Barton’s assault) — odd that stolen e-mails would produce doubts about the victims of the theft, but ethical standards in science research are indeed that high.  Caesar’s wife couldn’t be considered for research grants.

Why do I think the statute of limitations may apply?  Look at the law, linked above, the Fraud Against Taxpayers Act:

§ 8.01-216.9. Procedure; statute of limitations.

A subpoena requiring the attendance of a witness at a trial or hearing conducted under this article may be served at any place in the Commonwealth.

A civil action under § 8.01-216.4 or 8.01-216.5 may not be brought (i) more than six years after the date on which the violation is committed or (ii) more than three years after the date when facts material to the right of action are known or reasonably should have been known by the official of the Commonwealth charged with responsibility to act in the circumstances, but in that event no more than ten years after the date on which the violation is committed, whichever occurs last.

In any action brought under § 8.01-216.5, the Commonwealth shall be required to prove all essential elements of the cause of action, including damages, by a preponderance of the evidence.

Research at a major research institution like a big, public university involves many layers of regulation and bureaucratic checking.  Generally the university’s research office will require adherence to the school’s ethical code and all state laws up front, and then the auditors check the money flow and research activities through the project.  There is a final sign off at most schools, which would qualify as “the date when facts material to the right of action are known or reasonably should have been known by the official of the Commonwealth charged with responsibility to act in the circumstances.”

Cuccinelli is sending a clear signal to researchers that they are unwelcome in Virginia if their research doesn’t square with his politics — and his politics are weird. Watch to see what the response of the University is, especially if their delivery of documents doesn’t put this witch hunt to bed.

[Update notice:  The text of the law noting the statute of limitations was updated on May 5, to show application to § 801-216.4 as well as § 801-216.5]

Other sources to check:

• Tim Lambert at Deltoid calls it part of the Republican War on Science
• Eli Rabett has the letter from S. Fred Singer that shows how political this is (and good comments from the Smart People feared by Rev. Mummert)
• Wow!  To his credit, Steve McIntyre shows that a scientist can be a climate “skeptic,” and he condemns Cuccinelli’s actions as “overzealous”
• A Few Things Ill Considered provides a few new details and history
• It’s too far for way more commenters than I would have thought at Anthony Watts’s place;  troubling:  One commenter says the far-right wing astroturf group Competitive Enterprise Institute has sued Gavin Schmidt at Goddard (news to me)
• P. Z. Myers is cold, cool, and correct in his comments
• Ed Brayton had noted earlier that Cuccinelli is “crazier than you think” – remember, this is the guy who told Virginia universities they can’t practice non-discrimination against gays, and he’s single-handedly tried to cover up the breast of liberty on the Virginia Seal (an illegal act under Virginia law, entertainingly, to muck with the seal)
• Chris Mooney hit the claxon to warn of Cuccinelli’s actions
• Results of the ethics review already completed by Penn State University on Mann’s research (constructive notification, Mr. Cuccinelli — pay attention, please)
• Richmond Times-Dispatch analysis of Cuccinelli’s first 100 days in office, with no mention of the current witch hunt (good for comparison)
• Fox News
• Charlottesville Daily Progress
• Update, 5-4-2010: Story in The Washington Post
• Nuts-falling-far-from-the-tree department: Cuccinelli is challenging EPA’s decision to regulate greenhouse gases as pollutants, too.
• Update 5-5-2010: This blog, Virginia Qui Tam, tracks citizen investigations such as those authorized by the Fraud Against Taxpayers Act — slightly off track, perhaps, but perhaps not

Making up stuff on the internet

Here’s the Dilbert cartoon Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli should have viewed before he went fishing: