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Who is Gary Locke
Democratic Governor has a lot to answer for
By Jeff Brewer
[email protected]
Who is Gary Locke? Outside lawmakers in Olympia,
Washington and frequenters of ‘progressive’ salons, few Americans are
familiar with this 51-year old Seattle politician. However, though he
resides in virtual political obscurity, Tom Daschle and Nancy Pelosi selected
Washington State’s governor to deliver the Democrat response to President
Bush’s State of the Union address.
According to Democrats, Locke is the quintessential legate for their party.
Educated at Yale with a law degree from Boston University, the governor is a
supporter of the death penalty and a reputed fiscal ‘conservative.’
Locke’s website champions his role in passing welfare reform legislation in
1997 and elsewhere one reads of his ‘great’ interest in ensuring that
Washington schools continue to churn out the best and brightest students.
On its face, the governor seems to be made of pretty innocuous stuff…much like
a certain southern Democrat governor-turned repugnant president.
But behind the slick image is another dyed-in-the-wool, corrupt, liberal
Democrat. In fact, candidate Locke’s 1996 gubernatorial machine fed out
of the same Buddhist trough as Bill Clinton and Al Gore. In the summer of
1996, Locke visited the Len Shen Ching Tze Temple in Remond, Washington to pan
for support and, apparently, donations. He received $13,100 in
contributions, including at least $5,000 in cash, in violation of both federal
and state election laws, prompting the state’s Public Disclosure Commission (PDC)
to investigate Locke’s campaign.
As tax-exempt organizations, Buddhist temples, like churches and synagogues are
forbidden by the IRS from campaigning or raising money for any political
candidate. At the time, Washington State law also forbade individuals from
making contributions on behalf of another person or entity. As the PDC’s
investigation would show, however, the temple chief, Grand Master Lu, enthused
to Locke and others during
the candidate’s visits that he wanted Locke to win the governor’s race; the
temple chief even told Locke his donations were “on behalf of everyone.”
Moreover, as columnist Michelle Malkin wrote in September 1997, “…an
internal Locke campaign memo states, ‘The Funds in question were all received
at the temple…’”
Locke’s connections to shady Clinton/Gore donors don’t end there, though.
Notorious felon Johnny Huang and his wife gave Locke’s camp $1000 and
organized at least six extravagant campaign fundraising parties for Locke around
the country. Even after Huang confessed to various counts of wrongdoing,
Locke refused to return Huang-linked funds.
Consider the abuse that occurred under Locke’s purview at the state’s
Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS). When this agency punished
one of its own for exposing a DSHS vendor, Latino Services of Lacey (WA.), which
was producing fake qualifying papers and using them to process Hispanic clients,
Governor Locke turned a blind eye at allegations of welfare fraud. At the
time, Locke was crisscrossing the state trumpeting his part in revamping the
state’s welfare-to-work program, WorkFirst. Despite evidence that these
illegal aliens were using manufactured
social security numbers to bilk the taxpayers, Locke
sat on his hands.
As a state representative, Locke did nothing for taxpayers either, except for
piling on more taxes. Locke co-authored Washington’s 1993 budget that
included the largest tax increase in the state’s history. Moreover,
facing a $1.6 billion budget shortfall in 2002, largely of his own doing,
Governor Locke tried to tax his way to solvency. Last November, though,
Washington voters rejected the
governor’s pet proposal, Referendum 51. This public transportation ruse
included a 9-cent gasoline tax increase, supposedly to finance $7.7 billion
worth of road and transit projects.
On the social front, family man Locke is as radical as any other left-wing
Democrat. In 2000, the governor directed the Public Employee Benefits
Board (PEBB) to draft a plan for providing benefits to same-sex partners of
state employees. Despite protests from
scores of legislators and concerned citizens, Locke unilaterally expanded the
state’s definition of marriage and extended homosexuals effective parity with
married couples. This move has only exacerbated the state’s insurance
fund shortfall.
Locke also marked the 30th anniversary of Roe v. Wade by echoing feminist
cadences for renewed vigilance in preserving a woman’s right to kill her
unborn baby. Sounding every bit like a tool of the feminist agenda, Locke
told reporters assembled in Olympia to hear the governor and other
‘progressives’ tout the killing of over 40 million babies, “Washington is
a strongly pro-choice state. We have laws in place that assure women’s
reproductive rights. We must work hard to guarantee that this critical
protection remains strong and intact.”
Although a former Eagle Scout and a husband and father, Gary Locke is actively
undermining the values he ostensibly represents. By proposing higher taxes
to close budget shortfalls and undermining traditional family values, the
governor is eroding the very freedoms that enabled his immigrant parents to make
a fresh start in the United States.
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