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The Daily Courier: Judge, Jury, and Executioner of Jim Raffenburg?

The March 22nd front page story in the Daily Courier featuring Commissioner Raffenburg was disgusting. Raffenburg is not seeking re-election, so why publish this contrived article now?

Why? Because the Daily Courier is the mouthpiece for the courthouse good ol� boys who Raffenburg calls the �secret Cabal� of elitists. Raffenburg is despised because he calls press conferences to blow the whistle, and turns the spotlight on their hidden agendas and their attempts to tax the people of Josephine County into poverty.

They are clearly collaborating to try to destroy Commissioner Raffenburg�s reputation and nullify his political influence with the people of Josephine County. This appears to be an attempt to make sure anyone who protects the public purse like Raffenburg won�t run for public office or the Courier will release its Dobermans to destroy their character and community standing.

Since Raffenburg is not running for re-election why go through all the expense and effort of this investigation now?

Because they want to make sure their people are in place and their agenda is carried out after the election.

What is their agenda?

* Increase property taxes
* Increase fees for permits and other services
* Eliminate our Home Rule Charter
* Install an un-elected County Manager form of government
* Code enforcers who will be hired and paid with your fine money. Their job will be to drive around the county looking for violations, which will force you to pay the fine or go to court to prove your innocence.
* Shorten the time in which the county can seize and sell your property from two years to 30 days after foreclosure for late taxes.
(Why? Because they see hard times coming in the economy and are desperate to find new funding sources to maintain their positions and power.)

What is missing from their agenda? Accountability and cost controls for county government. These public officials don�t want to conserve public funds as good stewards should. These are the people Raffenburg has and will continue to expose.

In the last election the Daily Courier endorsed, and has since nurtured, Dave Toler. Now to secure their second vote on the Board of Commissioners, they need another Toler. That person is Harry Mackin, who has already articulated Toler�s philosophies of support for higher taxes and bigger government.

Apparently this Cabal, of which the Daily Courier�s newsroom is the mouthpiece, is so afraid of Commissioner Raffenburg�s influence and forthcoming endorsement in the upcoming election, they are trying to destroy his credibility. What this Cabal has done with this smear article is to declare war on the people of this county who believe in accountable and transparent self-government.

If Jesus came down from heaven, took off His halo, called Himself John Smith and managed to get elected, He would condemn the courthouse corruption as He did with the money changers. Guaranteed, the Daily Courier and the Cabal would do the same to Him as they are doing to Raffenburg.

It appears that the Daily Courier believes they can fool most of the people most of the time, because they think people are gullible and will believe everything they read. An example of how the voters have been kept in the dark and manipulated, relates to a 1999 efficiency audit of county government, initiated by Commissioner�s Frank Iverson, Jim Brock and Harold Haugen. The conclusion of this auditor was that the Board was the problem. The Board�s response? Fire the auditor and bury this report to keep it out of public view.

This is the same bureaucratic mind-set and reality that Jim Raffenburg has faced since he took office on January 3, 2005. The fault of the Board of Commissioners, as determined by this audit, was that they had failed to address the problems within the county bureaucracy that still fester to this day.

That is what Jim Raffenburg tried to fix. This is why they hate him. The county bureaucracy does NOT want �change.� What they want is your entire tax dollar without any complaints or accountability.

Shame on the Daily Courier, Dennis Roller, and Stacey Stumbo. And, shame on any of us who continue to support this Cabal.

Just like Jim Raffenburg had to pay for an expensive ad in the Daily Courier to respond to their smear of his name in the 2004 campaign, NewsWithViews.com has had to pay $1,765.00 for this ad just to defend the principles of open government, that are under attack by this newspaper, which is the glue that holds this �Cabal of Corruption� together.

Obviously, the Daily Courier is not accustomed to dealing with anyone brave enough to stand up to them.

Instead of prejudging Commissioner Raffenburg based upon the Daily Courier�s lies and innuendoes go to NewsWithViews.com and read Commissioner Raffenburg�s March 2008 Commentary at: http://www.newswithviews.com/Raffenburg/jim7.htm where he addresses these issues.

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