SOUTH BEND MAYORAL RACE

I guess it had to happen, the mayoral campaign in nearby South Bend, IN turned negative thanks to one of the candidates. But, I still say that the apparent value of being mayor of debt-ridden, over-taxed, and deemed a dying city by Newsweek Magazine, South Bend, Indiana is such a lucrative position that it is worth getting down and dirty to win the election. Recognizing that South Bend is only about 100 miles east of Chicago I guess it is not surprising to see Chicago-style political negativity incorporated into the May 3rd multi-candidate race.

Let me note that I am not a resident of South Bend, but I do reside in a bedroom community that is significantly influenced by the inept government in South Bend and St. Joseph County, so the mayoral race impacts me financially.

Last evening while viewing television I saw a negative mayoral campaign commercial aired by Ryan Dvorak, one of three Democrat candidates running against young (age 29) Pete Buttigieg (pronounced Boo-ti-judge), who reportedly has the largest campaign war chest of $250,000. His parents are educators and Buttigieg graduated from Harvard, was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, and his career thus far has been spent in the private sector working for the international consulting firm of McKinsey & Co. He is also an officer in the US Navy Reserve.

When I saw the Dvorak commercial I immediately noted several claims that just did not hold one ounce of honesty pointed at Buttigieg, or even the claims Dvorak made of his own record. He seems almost desperate to attain the mayor’s seat of power, influence and rewards. He should know, because he comes from a long standing South Bend political family.

For the record, Ryan Dvorak is one of the Democrat members of the Indiana House of Representatives who deserted their post when they recently fled to Urbana, Illinois so the State House would not have a quorum. Thirty-seven of the forty Democrat members of the House abandoned their Oath of Office. Of those thirty-seven, were four who represent districts within the local area called “Michiana:” Minority Leader B. Patrick Bauer, Craig Fry, David Niezgodski, and Ryan Dvorak. Both Ryan Dvorak and Craig Fry are running to be mayors of the two largest cities in St. Joseph County, IN, with Fry on the ballot in Mishawaka and Dvorak in South Bend.

I don’t know about you, but I would not support anyone who was AWOL from their elected office such as Dvorak and Fry, because I wouldn’t trust them to flee if/when the going gets tough again.

Bauer and Fry hold lucrative administrative positions at Ivy Tech, a community college, which essentially makes them built-in lobbyists for all education issues. Young Ryan Dvorak is the son of the St. Joseph County Prosecutor, and he is floating bogus claims in his negative campaign commercial boasting that he has experience balancing budgets. He graduated from Notre Dame in 1996, went to work for then local US Congressman Tim Roemer 1996-2001, and has served in the Indiana House since 2002. What budgets? He is but one member of the Indiana House of Representatives and “HE” did not balance ANY budget all by himself.

With the Primary election coming next week it will be interesting to see if we have politics as usual in South Bend. In your Commander’s opinion the three deserters should be tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail. Unfortunately for some reason the voters in South Bend are no different than they are all over the country; they do not consider conflicts of interest and campaign commercials that contain blatant lies to be a problem.

Somehow we survive, but the taxes caused by these complicit conflicted clowns are killing all of us.

COMMANDER GRANGER