Joe Arpaio on Keeping Warm in Stir; Plus, A.J. LaFaro's "Crazytown" Ticket Wins County GOP Leadership

It's Joe's county, and we just live in it...

Also LaFaro has an atrocious record as a fundraiser, and is by all accounts, one angry old honky. So it's all good as far as I'm concerned.

LaFaro maintained that he had not read my column, but rather had heard it being discussed on a local radio show, though he couldn't remember which one.

I related my view that often life is more interesting when you disagree with folks. If everyone agreed, things could get really boring, really fast.

Crikey, imagine if Lisa Gray had become chair and she'd made the county GOP more of a big tent for tuskers, drawing in Indies and Latinos, and raising more moolah in the process?

But that's like one or two blog posts, whereas I think LaFaro's crazytown ticket will be good for a plethora of screeds to come.

I returned to my original question about whether gays are welcome in the county GOP.

"I have no comment on your question at this point in time," LaFaro replied.

I wished him well and ambled off. Interestingly, it may have been the Ron Paul supporters who put LaFaro over the top. They showed up en masse, and were being courted heavily by both teams right up until the vote.

Shawn Dow, a longtime Ron Paul-backer and an ardent (and successful) foe of photo enforcement cameras on our streets and highways, noted the growing number of Paul supporters who're becoming PCs. Though the RP-ers don't yet have the numbers to impose their will on local Rs

"We're half the room, but only one-third of the vote," he claimed, observing that many of the ordinary Rs came armed with proxy votes.

But he still thinks the Paul-ites were the deciding factor in LaFaro's win.

"Whichever side pandered the best to the Ron Paul people was what's going to win," he said. "Team LaFaro pandered the best."

Disgraced, recalled state Senate President Russell Pearce was present. I didn't spot him, though he was supposedly responsible for all but one of the wackadoodle resolutions passed by the assembled.

In these, the county Rs rejected any proposed DREAM Act, declared sovereignty for Arizona under the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, called for the repeal of the 17th Amendment, which mandates the direct election of U.S. Senators by the people, and denounced any yet-to-be passed laws granting "amnesty" to illegal aliens.

Don't know which one Pearce didn't author. Maybe the one about teaching "basic U.S. history" in Arizona colleges and universities?

Folks told me that disbarred ex-Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas had been in the house, but I missed him. However, Sheriff Joe Arpaio was present, as were quite a few of his deputies.

When I caught up with Arpaio, I complimented the ancient autocrat by telling him he didn't look a day over 79. (He's actually 80.)