Stan Adelstein: Still can't get the hint.

Sibby had a nice little story this AM that's usually the type of thing I'm right on top of. I think Sibby was focusing more on the abortion angle, but what caught my attention was the headline: Adelstein organizing four Democratic campaigns which he picked up in a story as written by Judy Peres of the Chicago Tribune:

"This is all the candidates are talking about, instead of worrying about education and other pressing problems," said state Sen. Stan Adelstein, a long-time legislator who — like three other moderate Republicans who voted against the ban — was beaten in the June primaries by a conservative Christian.

Adelstein, who co-chairs the Campaign for Healthy Families, is organizing four Democratic Senate campaigns.

"My party needs to get back to focusing on true Republican issues — keeping
government out of people's lives, economic growth, education of gifted children and diversity of lifestyle and faith," said Adelstein, who is Jewish. "The only way to get people like me back in power is to throw the scoundrels out."

Read it all here.

For someone who wants religion out of politics, he seems to be the one who brings it up quite often, and in a manner in which I could only term as bigoted. I don't ever recall his opponent saying a word about his religious beliefs. But he seems to have given himself free reign to say she's unfit for office because of her beliefs. If you inserted a racial epithet in place of "conservative Christian" the way he throws it around, I think you'd get my point.

"His party needs to get back to focusing on true Republican issues?" I can barely contain myself when I read this kind of malarkey coming from Stan the self-proclaimed Republican.

I think the telling thing in his statement is in the issues he thinks are important to his GOP: "keeping government out of people's lives, economic growth, education of gifted children and diversity of lifestyle and faith."

Wait a minute? The education of gifted children?

So what are the rest of the children? A bunch of unwashed beggars fit only to serve him?

You know, there's a reason his money became poison to many legislative campaigns in the past two cycles. His sense of elitist entitlement is anathema to the regular South Dakotans who go to and from work and want what most other people (who aren't Stan) in the country want. They want to have good jobs that allow them to be able to feed their families. They want to be safe in their homes. They want their kids to get a good education (not just the gifted ones) and they want their kids to go to college.

Why would we want to put a legislator like Stan back? At best, he was an ineffective fop. At worst, such as the time he introduced legislation to change the state's dinosaur to one he had just purchased a ridiculously expensive casted model of, he's concerned with little else but his self-interest. Think I'm blowing smoke? Go check his legislative record. It ranks among the worst.

I won't go into what I was told by one legislator about the parts of Rapid City he would and would not accept at redistricting.

I heard a story that he had to pay one candidate at the State GOP Convention to listen to him pontificate, after they intially had no time for him. It's oh-so-telling where his strength lies. The only reason he got elected a couple of times had nothing to do with the quality of his character or ideas. It had to do with the $100,000 plus he had to spend each election. And should that be the yardstick by which we measure candidates? I think not.

It would appear that Stan and his sherry sipping friends care little for making the state better and simply want to concentrate on making it better for themselves. As this entitled fool says, "The only way to get people like me back in power is to throw the scoundrels out...." I'd encourage you to elect those he considers scoundrels, and keep doing so for many years to come.

*update- I should add self-interested backstabber to my collection of Adelstein adjectives. From the Rapid City Weekly news:

“I’m not a Democrat,” Adelstein said. “I did exactly the right thing. I have to stay and get my party back.”

He feels extreme conservatives have taken over the state Republican Party and he is forced to collaborate with some Democrats to keep them from being elected to office. Adelstein said he wants a moderate majority to govern the state.

However, he said if Katus wins, the two allies might find themselves on opposite sides of the ballot in two years.

“I think I will run again,” Adelstein said. “But it wouldn’t be against Tom; it would be for my principles.”

Read it all here. That's right. Stan would be running on his principles. Which appear more and more to be "I'm for me."