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Sunday, March 22, 2015
First Woman, Black, Appointed to
Command Maryland National Guard
By Elena Baurkot, Capital News Service
WASHINGTON - When things go wrong in
people's lives, they often hear the clichéd
advice to "look for a sign." But for Maj. Gen.
Linda L. Singh, it was not a sign but a booth
in a mall that was the key to solving her
problems.
After leaving her home in Frederick County at
the age of 16 as a result of a dispute with her
parents, she was sleeping from place to place
without a real home and started working at a mall where she came
across a military recruiting booth, Singh said.
Previously, Singh had hoped to study electrical engineering at the
University of Maryland. Instead she joined the Army National
Guard in 1981.
"The military was one of those choices where I felt like it was an
option that was going to give me a chance to do something bigger
than what I was doing, I felt like that was my outlet. I had no idea
that it was going to lead to where it is today, but I am thankful for
it," Singh said in a recent interview.
On Feb. 28, she assumed command of the Maryland National
Guard, appointed by Gov. Larry Hogan as the state's 29th adjutant
general. She is the first woman and African-American to serve in
that position.
Singh lived with her grandparents until the age of 9 in a maledominated household, so entering a career field where men made up
the large majority was not an issue for her.
She attributes her strength as a person to the family members she
interacted with when she was younger, including her grandparents,
whom she described as "very strong and very value-based
individuals."
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Singh also credited her parents, whom she moved in with at age 9,
for her strong will.
"I'd have to say that my whole life stands for someone that is very
strong-willed," Singh said.
She demonstrated that early on in her career by working as a single
parent and struggling to make it to drills for 2 1/2 to three years. At
one point, she had no car and sometimes she had no babysitter, but
she persevered.
Singh, 50, has spent most of her life in Maryland. She was born in
Montgomery County, grew up in Frederick County and lives in
Prince George's County.
She graduated from Columbia Union College with a bachelor's
degree in business administration and received master's degrees and
certificates from several other institutions.
She has two daughters and a husband of more than 22 years, all of
whom she describes as very supportive of her.
In her civilian life she has been serving as the director of operations
at Accenture, a company that provides management consulting,
technology and outsourcing services.
Singh began her military career as an enlisted personnel specialist in
the Maryland National Guard. Commissioned as an officer in 1991,
she has been deployed twice overseas, once to Kosovo in 2006 and
once to Afghanistan in 2011, where she received the Bronze Star for
her service.
While the Bronze Star is one of many citations she has received,
Singh said this medal means a lot to her because it was a rugged
deployment where she worked seven-day weeks and 12 to 15-hour
days.
"I put a lot on the line, my own personal self on the line, to be able
to go and do that deployment as many of us do, and I felt like if I
wasn't right there doing it with my counterparts and my folks, then
who am I to be able to stand up and lead them at the end of the
day," Singh said.
This article was originally published in the Herald-Mail Media on
March 9, 2015.
THURSDAY MAR 26 7:00pm
*** DISTRICT 15 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ Potomac
Library on March 26, 2015 7:00
pm
THURSDAY MAR 26 7:00pm
MoCoYR - Monthly
Meeting/Happy Hour @ Mi
Rancho, Rockville on March 26,
2015 7:00 pm
THURSDAY MAR 26 7:00pm
*** DISTRICT 19 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ Red, Hot &
Blue Restaurant, Shady Grove on
March 26, 2015 7:00 pm
TUESDAY MAR 31 7:00pm ***
DISTRICT 14 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ ReMax
Buffington Room, Olney on
March 31, 2015 7:00 pm
THURSDAY APR 2 6:30pm
******* FIRST THURSDAY
APRIL ******* w/ Christopher
Summers of MPPI @ Ted's 355
Diner, Rockville on April 2, 2015
6:30 pm
THURSDAY APR 9 7:00pm ***
DISTRICT 18 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ Savannah's,
Kensington on April 9, 2015 7:00
pm
WEDNESDAY APR 15 6:00pm
*** DISTRICT 20 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ Mi Rancho,
Silver Spring on April 15, 2015
6:00 pm
THURSDAY APR 16 7:00pm
*** DISTRICT 39 - MONTHLY
MEETING *** @ The Grille at
Flower Hill on April 16, 2015
7:00 pm
FRIDAY APRIL 17 7pm
Maryland State GOP Spring 2015
Convention - Hospitality Suites@
Princess Royale Hotel, Ocean
City on April 17, 2015 7:00 pm
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SATURDAY APRIL 18 9am
Maryland State GOP Spring 2015
Convention @ Princess Royale
Hotel, Ocean City on April 18,
2015 9:00 am
Full Calendar
MoCo Councilman Hans
Riemer's Political Hoax:
Reinstating the Military
Draft
Usually when political operatives engage in dirty tricks, they take
great pains to avoid having their fingerprints attached. They are, at
least a little embarrassed, at being caught red handed circulating
some lie or hoax in order to advance their candidate or party.
Montgomery County Councilman (and potential Congressional
District 8 Democratic candidate) Hans Riemer shows no such
reluctance. In his own bio, he takes personal credit for a media
campaign promoting the notion that the military draft would be
reinstated:
"In the 2004 election, Hans served as political director for Rock the
Vote, as the group registered nearly a million young voters and
broke new ground in online political engagement.....and guided the
organization's strategy, including the controversial media
campaign on the military draft that rocked the 2004 presidential
election."[1]
"Controversial" apparently is Hans' euphemism for a complete
fabrication. There was never a chance of the draft being reinstated
At the time, the fact-checking website "Urban Legends" debunked
the draft email campaign with the following comments:
"Most knowledgeable observers put the chances of Congress
reinstating the military draft in the near future at near zero. As
noted in the Selective Service statement above, both President Bush
and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld have repeatedly insisted there is
no need for a draft at this time, and although there are indeed two
bills before Congress calling for a revival of some form of
compulsory military service, both were introduced by Democrats
with neither the interest nor the support of the current
administration. The bills have languished in committee for more a
year without so much as a single debate or discussion. No one
expects anything to come of them, certainly not by 2005."[2]
Republicans Serving
Montgomery County
A sampling of the Republican
officeholders in Montgomery
County.
Garrett Park Town Council
Philip M. Schulp
Laytonsville Town Council
Charles A. Bradsher
James A. Ruspi
Village of Martin's Additions
Tiffany Ann Cissna
MCGOP Central
Committee
Chairman
Michael Higgs
[email protected]
1st Vice Chair
Katja Bullock
[email protected]
2nd Vice Chair
Dwight Patel
[email protected]
Treasurer
Mark Uncapher
[email protected]
Secretary
Joseph Gillin
[email protected]
General Counsel &
Parliamentarian
Vince DeCain
[email protected]
Organization Chair
Greg Decker
[email protected]
Communications Chair
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The website Snopes reached an identical conclusion: "Claim: The
U.S. military will be reinstating the draft by Spring 2005.
Status: False"[3]
At that time, the legislation on the draft came from Rep. Charles
Rangel (D-NY) and it was actually a proposal to create a national
service requirement, either for the military or for domestic service.
[4] His bill never attracted a single Republican co-sponsor, or any
activity in the then-Republican controlled Congress.
In spite of this, Hans Riemer can be seen on archived C-SPAN
footage at a June 8, 2005 "Rock the Vote" fundraiser honoring
former President Clinton, making the following claims:
"...and that is why we tackled issue of a potential military draft. This
one issue, with this one issue, young people showed their political
power. We saw it, we gave it a megaphone, Congress saw it, and
they voted against it, the President - the Presidential candidates
saw it and they were against reinstating the draft, and this is not
over, but we know where young people stand." [5]
Consider the incredible brazenness of the scene that C-SPAN
captures. Hans Riemer is caught on stage with the former President
of the United States, not just claiming to have won a Congressional
vote that never actually occurred, but also suggesting he caused
President Bush to reverse a position on the reinstating a military
draft, and also that of other (presumably all Democratic)
Presidential candidates. Not a shred of evidence suggests any of
them ever entertained supporting a draft.
President Reagan once popularized the English translation of a
Russian proverb, "Trust, but Verify." When considering the claims
of political operatives such as Hans Riemer, the better advice seems
to be "Verify, before ever Trusting."
[1] http://hansriemer.com/hans/
[2] http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_draft.htm
[3] http://www.snopes.com/politics/military/draft.asp
[4] http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:h.r.163:
[5] http://www.c-span.org/video/?187098-1/rock-vote-awards
Comedy Hour in Annapolis
By Nick Peang-Meth
Humorist Will Rogers once said, "I don't make
jokes. I just watch the government and report
Kat O'Connor
[email protected]
District 14 Members
Sam Fenati
[email protected]
Rick Hansen
[email protected]
Anne Koutsoutis
[email protected]
Joe Gillin
[email protected]
Kat O'Connor
[email protected]
District 15 Members
Dan Cuda
[email protected]
Ed Edmundson
[email protected]
Nathan Hauser
[email protected]
Dick Jurgena
[email protected]
Bill Richbourg
[email protected]
District 16 Members
Marcus Alzona
[email protected]
Larry Lesser
[email protected]
Ann Guthrie Hingston
[email protected]
Bob Carter
[email protected]
Allyson McMahon
[email protected]
District 17 Members
Michael Higgs
[email protected]
Deborah Lambert
[email protected]
Liga Michailovs
[email protected]
David Roseman
[email protected]
Adol Owen-Williams
[email protected]
District 18 Members
Katja Bullock
[email protected]
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the facts." All too often it seems he could have
said that after watching our Maryland General
Assembly in action, since it appears that the
legislative proceedings are more of a cruel
joke than serious business.
There has been perhaps no greater comedy hour this session than
during the proceedings on Gov. Hogan's budget. The House of
Delegates just approved a revised version of the budget by a vote of
129-10. In the end, they left the majority of Gov. Hogan's proposal
intact. But most of the changes they did make were extremely
irresponsible.
Ever since they got their hands on the budget, the General
Assembly, led by Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Maggie
McIntosh, has worked tirelessly to reverse the modest cuts that Gov.
Hogan made in order to balance the budget and eliminate the
structural deficit he inherited.
The cuts that Gov. Hogan made were mild and unremarkable. State
employees were not going to get their negotiated pay raises, nor
would education spending increase at the level initially anticipated.
But the Democrats in Annapolis were not about to sit idly by while
their core constituencies were forced to tighten their belts a notch.
So, they did what has been the practice for decades in Annapolis take the money from somewhere else. In this case, Maryland's
fragile pension system was the target. McIntosh's committee halved
the $150 million investment that Hogan made - a figure that was
already slashed by the legislature last year.
In February, while Maryland retained its AAA bond rating from all
three New York rating houses, there was one major caveat: all three
expressed deep concern over the underfunded pension system.
According to the Maryland Reporter, Moody's said that "failure to
adhere to plans to address low pension funded ratios could make the
rating go down."
The Washington Post Editorial Board has been particularly vocal
about this issue, writing in a March 19th editorial: "The day of
reckoning for Maryland's pension fund will come... [Democrats]
have simply deferred the pain."
The decision to cut contributions to the pension fund has been
standard operating procedure for some time now. Transportation
and environmental trust funds have been drained in similar attempts
to stave off even the most modest cuts to programs that Democrats
in Annapolis hold dear.
This is a practice that is short sighted and stupid. Just as Maryland's
highways, roads and bridges have fallen into further disrepair under
this practice, the pension fund that thousands of state employees
Vincent F. DeCain
[email protected]
Q.T. McCord
[email protected]
John Midlen
[email protected]
Jean Alexandra Tuttle
[email protected]
District 19 Members
Don Irvine
[email protected]
Frederick Seelman
[email protected]
Sheldon Sacks
[email protected]
Martha Schaerr
[email protected]
Jeff Brown
[email protected]
District 20 Members
Deanna Stewart
[email protected]
Corey Golladay
[email protected]
Jennifer Pasenelli
[email protected]
VACANT
VACANT
District 39 Members
Gregory Decker
[email protected]
Candice Clough
[email protected]
Al Phillips
[email protected]
Alirio Martinez, Jr.
[email protected]
Nancy McMahan Farrar
[email protected]
At Large Members
Tommy Rodriguez
[email protected]
Gus Alzona
[email protected]
Patricia Fenati
[email protected]
Dwight Patel
[email protected]
Michael Belan
[email protected]
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rely on for stable retirements will someday no longer be able to
meet the commitments made to state retirees.
McIntosh explained at the beginning of the budget process that "We
are really going to try to have a budget that comes out that does not
tear the safety net apart." This too is preposterous. Gov. Hogan's
cuts were modest, and the most controversial were the ones made to
state employee salaries and increases in education funding. They
didn't deal with the safety net. In fact, Hogan's cuts to state
employee salaries probably prevented him from having to furlough
any workers.
But Hogan's solution was just too sane, so McIntosh decided to
bleed our underfunded pension system some more instead.
Will Rogers has been dead for 80 years now, but his comments still
ring true today. It appears that the budget process in Annapolis is
just one more cruel joke.
Wootton HS Lincoln Club a Model for
Success
By Nick Peang-Meth
This winter, the Montgomery County Republican Central
Committee establishe$ a number of new committees with the
purpose of expanding the party's outreach. I sit on one of them, the
Youth Outreach Committee. This committee is responsible for
or' anizing high school Republican clubs in Montgomery County. In
this, there is great opportunity.
For evidence of this, one need not look any further than Rockville's
Thomas Wootton High School. There, Lincoln Club President Jon
Glaser has done extraordinary work spreading the conservative
message and encouraging political activism amongst his high school
colleagues.
Under his leadership, the club has engaged in a number of important
and otherwise overlooked activities that reflect the values of the
next generation of conservative leaders. For example, his club
created a 9/11 memorial to help fellow students remember those
lives lost on that fateful day. The club has also undertaken a
"Patriotism Project" that brought changes to the way the Pledge of
Allegiance was administered in the mornings, and ensured every
classroom had an American flag. To combat misconceptions that
Republicans are "anti-environment" he had his club adopt a road
near the high school.
Tanzi Strafford
[email protected]
Lorraine Kuchmy
[email protected]
Mark Uncapher
[email protected]
MCGOP District Chairs
District Chairman for LD-14
Sharon Begosh
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-15
David Drake
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-16
Ann Guthrie Hingston
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-17
Kathy Ganley
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-18
Joan Pleiman
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-19
Martha Schaerr,
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-20
Deanna Stewart
[email protected]
District Chairman for LD-39
Nancy Farrar
[email protected]
The kind of work the Lincoln Club does far outpaces the school's
rival Young Democrats club, which was started only a few months
ago, and boast far more members. More important, it highlights a
great opportunity for the Republican Party.
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If so much can be done by just one high school club, imagine the
impact that could be had if every one of Montgomery County's 25
high schools had Republican Clubs that active.
The Youth Outreach Committee is striving to achieve that goal.
***
The Youth Outreach Committee is hosting its first meeting on April
18th at the MCGOP Headquarters 15833 Crabbs Branch Way at
1pm. Anyone interested in getting involved or helping out is
encouraged to attend, and to contact someone on the Youth
Outreach Committee.
Montgomery County Republican Party
Tel.: (301) 417-9256
by authority Mark Uncapher, Treasurer
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