Adelstein's Politics of Destruction

The Rapid City Weekly News has an enlightening article about the Rapid City mayoral election last night:

Former state Sen. Stan Adelstein was at the courthouse Tuesday night, examining numbers, working his cell phone and chatting with people. Adelstein said “hard data” obtained through polling showed the need to go after Kooiker.

“Poor Alan, he wasn’t comfortable with what we had to do,” he said. “But we had to do it.”

Hanks stopped on his way into the courthouse to greet Adelstein. “I want to give this guy a big hug,” he said.

Adelstein said state Sen. Bill Napoli, a major Kooiker supporter whom he has feuded with for years, is the next target of his moderate coalition of Republicans and Democrats. “Now it’s Napoli’s turn to go down,” Adelstein said.

Observation #1: If "poor Alan" was so uncomfortable with Adelstein's dirty politics, why is he giving "big hug[s]" to him?

Observation #2: If the polling showed they "needed to go after Kooiker," they could have done so on a legitimate number of issues, such as qualifications, experience, Kooiker's votes on city issues, etc. Instead, they chose to ridicule Kooiker as an ideological extremist and religious nut...for a position which has little or no ideological overtones or opportunities. It appears ideology is inescapable for Adelstein and his cronies, and lowdown personal politics is the modus operandi.

Observation #3: Yet again we see from the "mainstream" media that there is no such thing as liberals, only "moderates" as Adelstein's coalition of liberal Republicans and Democrats is referred to.

Observation #4: Adelstein's swipe at Bill Napoli goes to prove Observation #2, in that it's all about destruction for Adelstein. He can't even peacefully enjoy the victory of one of his friends, without plotting the political destruction of his next target. How sad it must be to live to destroy.

Something else I noticed from this article. Remember the stink when Pennington County Auditor Julie Pearson moved a voting precinct from Open Bible Christian Center at the last minute, even though their political issue signs were outside the buffer zone specified by the law? And Bill Napoli, who represents the district in which this happened, protested this and got in a feud with Pearson over it?

Maybe I'm wrong, but I would have thought a county auditor should be nonpartisan, especially given their political and electoral responsibilities. Yet look at this screen clip from the RC Weekly News article:



I would have thought professionalism if nothing else would have prevented such an action and display by an official who shouldn't be showing favoritism. Since this was a city election, perhaps she didn't have any official involvement in the Rapid City election, even though Rapid City is in Pennington County. I don't know. Even if she had no official involvement in the election, it gives the impression that she as an official might be endorsing one candidate over another.

But given that Hanks is Adelstein's man, and Napoli is Adelstein's target, and Pearson pulled the rug out from under Napoli's constituents in the last election, the whole collection of dots makes me wonder.

HT to the ever vigilant South Dakota War College.