Justin already referred to the position paper sent out by the Dennis Michaud campaign. The linchpin to many of Michaud’s positions seems to be not so much what he’d do differently than Governor Carcieri, but that it is his belief that he will be better able to bring people together. He really puts a premium on “collaboration.” The truth is, I agree with many of Michaud’s goals and can appreciate his desire to bring people together. However, I think it is either naivete or a large dollop of hubris for him to believe that somehow he would manage to succeed where so many others have failed. Let me give some examples.
For instance, in stating his position on education, Michaud suggests
Collaborating with educators, organized labor, the executive branch and legislative assembly to improve education
For more specifics, follow the above link to the actual document. In short, this plan doesn’t much differ from some of the things the Governor has tried. Thus, we are left to believe that, somehow, Michaud will be able to convince educators, labor leaders and legislators to support the establishment of more charter schools (again, read the document), something they have vehemently opposed in the past. How is he going to get them on board?
Michaud also addresses labor issues by saying he wants to
establish a collaborative dialogue with organized labor…
I’m sure, as history has shown, that organized labor will be very open to reducing their benefits just because Prof. Michaud asked them to.
On health care:
I will implement a collaborative approach with health care professionals, insurance professionals, organized labor, business, and General Assembly to come up with new innovative solutions…
Michaud also wants to be bipartisan when it comes to tax policy by
Creating a bipartisan commission that incorporates members of the business community, the general assembly, the executive branch, organized labor, academia/economists and civic groups to address state taxation policies…
In Prof. Michaud’s world, collaboration and the formation of bipartisan commissions automatically leads to the solutions he seeks. It’s really that simple. We all know that Governor Carcieri never attempted to sit down and deal openly and honestly with some of these same people, right?
Of course, the belief that through collaboration and dialogue all things can be solved is a common conceit held by most of those found in faculty lounges across the country. They are wise and informed on many and sundry theoretical problems and are also able to formulate brilliant and theoretical solutions to the world’s problems.
However, the world of hardball RI politics is not theoretical and the players have some very real motivations and desires. They don’t always mean or do what they say. Any given solution thought up by Prof. Michaud will be viewed by some entity (unions, Democrats) as a threat to its power or well-being. What then?
What if in the course of your dialogue you discover that one or more of the entities won’t budge? Do you push them and risk a break down in your collaboration and risk being accused of being undiplomatic? Do you try to outlast them and hope they come around, which risks a perpetually inconclusive “outcome?” Do you keep talking for its own sake? Do you give them almost all they want and claim victory over their token concessions on one or two points?
Missing in this list is the course so often taken by Governor Carcieri: taking the issues directly to the people and working with those who will work with him honestly and above the board. This also means calling attention to the intransigence of those with whom he has tried and failed to deal. This is the only path to real reform: bring bold solutions to the table and call attention to those blocking reform. Of course, to Prof. Michaud, that’s just being “mean.”
Arnold Kling has a few questions regarding whether or not “you” are conservative. Here they are:
1. Do you believe that bringing children into the world is a very serious responsibility for the parents?
2. Do you believe that the flaws and imperfections of human beings are reflected in government?
3. Do you believe that it is better to try to accumulate wealth for retirement or to rely on a pension?
4. Do you believe that your health is your responsibility?
5. Do you believe that education is more important than public schools?
6. Do you believe that the world would be better off if more countries were like America, or not?
Follow the link for Kling’s answers to each question. However, here’s Kling’s central thesis, which gives you a hint at the sort of answers he has to each question:
What is distinctive about liberals is their belief that they are the only people who can exercise freedom with responsibility. They believe that a paternalistic government can make better decisions for those who not in the elite.
Kling doesn’t just take the liberal, “elitist” mindset to task, either. The paternalistic attitude as exhibited by the Bush administration in such matters as No Child Left Behind or Medicare Drug program also fosters government growth. We need look no further than the fraud, waste and abuse that ocurred under the mantle of Hurricane Katrina “aid” for further proof.
The short answer to the question, “Are you conservative?” is dictated by whether or not you believe in an expansive or conservative use of government to “solve” people’s problems.
Attaching a typo-rife position paper, Megan Boben — apparently the press secretary for Republican candidate for governor Dennis Michaud — emailed me to point out Charles Bakst’s “great job accurately representing Michaud’s positions.” I’m sure more time with that piece would reveal a wealth of interesting quirks, but this one jumps out at me:
VOTER INITIATIVE: “It’s bad.” The Assembly should thrash out issues instead of voters being able to force them onto the ballot. Wealthy people or corporate interests “could literally highjack the voters.”
This position is mostly noteworthy when contrasted with the following “Current News” from Michaud’s campaign Web site:
Dennis is extremely excited that the state legislature has decided to allow the citizens of Rhode Island to vote on the Casino issue. If the people decide that they want a casino to help secure the future of Rhode Island, as Governor, Candidate Michaud looks forward to helping the project come to fruition.
I suppose one is meant to conclude (wink, wink) that Michaud is, specifically, “extremely excited” that the wealthy people and corporate interests who back the casino will have their opportunity to “literally highjack the voters.” Of course, between the lines of the following from the Bakst column, one gets the sense that it may be the GOP primary that is hijacked first:
LOBBYING: Lt. Gov. Charlie Fogarty, Democratic candidate for governor, proposes that lobbyists have to report every contact — you know, meetings, phone calls, e-mails — they have with legislators and other top government decision-makers. “It sounds like a good idea to me,” says Michaud.
Touting the good ideas of a potential general election opponent from another party is, to say the least, a suspicious political slip — especially when presented in conjunction with an ostensible position paper that makes repeated and nakedly political accusations against a primary opponent. I was going to joke that Michaud’s campaign slogan of “we can do better” would best be directed at his campaign staff, but I suppose it all depends on what, exactly, his campaign is trying to do.
[Open full post]Two different versions of eminent domain have been passed by the Rhode Island legislature, one by the Senate, one by the House. Sadly, neither bill clearly limits the power claimed by the state government to seize private homes and give them away to new owners who promise to increase the tax-value of the seized property.
The House passed eminent domain legislation (H6739A) officially introduced by Representative Charlene Lima. (The version of the bill passed by the House bears no resemblance to the bill introduced by Representative Lima this past January. This is not a bad thing in and of itself; her original bill was not very good either). Here’s the full text of H6739A as passed…
(a) Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, no public corporation, municipality, quasi-state agency, state agency, or any political subdivision thereof, shall exercise their power of eminent domain to acquire private property for the purpose of conferring a private benefit or use for a particular private entity.There are at least two problems with the House bill (beyond the part (b) exception, which basically says that the government reserves the right to seize homes in areas determined to be blighted). The first problem with H6739A is its ambiguity as to whether it even addresses the core controversy surrounding eminent domain for economic development. If a tax-revenue increase is the expressed reason for the taking of a private home, does this mean the purpose of the taking goes sufficiently beyond “conferring a private benefit” to a point where H6739A does not apply? Why wasn’t the clearer language proposed in other bills prohibiting the use of eminent domain for “transfer to a person, nongovernmental entity, public-private partnership, corporation or other business entity” approved instead?
(b) Nothing in this chapter shall abrogate or diminish the provisions of Chapters 31 and 32 of Title 45.
The second problem with H6739A was pointed out by Representative Nick Gorham on the House floor; the meaning of “use for a particular private entity” is not well defined. Suppose eminent domain seizures are proposed that would give seized property to a shopping mall developer. Since a shopping mall will be used by more than a “particular” private entity — multiple shop owners as well as private citizens would “use” the facility — does H6739A apply or not?
I am not sure of the answers to these questions. They would have to be decided in court, which means that H6739A keeps us right where we are at the present moment, where the right combination of lawyers and city councils and economic redevelopment authorities can throw someone of out their home raise by making arguments about increased tax revenues to a sympathetic panel of judges.
The Senate bill (S2155A), much longer and more precise, looks nothing like the House bill. However, S2155A also fails to protect Rhode Island citizens from the possibility of losing their homes to economic development seizures. The clause supposedly limiting the power of the state to use eminent domain for economic development begins as follows…
No entity subject to the provisions of the chapter shall exercise eminent powers to acquire any property for economic development purposes unless it has explicit authority to do so and unless it conforms to the provisions of this section.Red flag right away. The “unless” clause pre-supposes that the government intends to continue asserting its right to use eminent domain for economic development.
The biggest problem with S2155A, however, is not what is there, but what is not. The original version of S2155 contained strong, clear and explicit protection for homeowners…
The entity shall not take by eminent domain property for economic development purposes that is significantly residential and is not in substantial violation of applicable state laws and regulations and/or municipal ordinances and codes, regulations governing land use or occupancy at the time of the proposal of the development plan for development, but may acquire such property in accordance with the development plan for a negotiated, mutually agreed on price.This existence of this strong “shall not” clause in the original bill led me to label the original incarnation of S2155 as one of the “good” eminent domain reform bills. Unfortunately, the Senate was sure to strip the unambiguous protection for “significantly residential” property out of the bill before passing it.
Now, all S2155A says is that the government has to have a written plan before throwing someone out of their home in the name of economic development and that the government must give an owner being evicted some time to sell the home first. This may be the most offensive part of the new “improved” S2155A; how much will someone be able to get for a home on the open market once it’s under the cloud of being seized by the state?
With ample opportunity to protect the interests of the people, the Rhode Island legislature chose to protect the government’s broad power to seize your home instead. To see the better eminent domain reforms the legislature decided not to implement, check out the text of Senate bill S2408 and House bill H7151. [Open full post]
PROEM:
I wrote the following piece for publication in the closing months of 2004. As these things happen, it was never published, but never actually rejected. In the intervening months, I’ve periodically looked for it online — as if I’d posted it somewhere — so it seemed prudent to go ahead and do so now.
Whether or not “moral values” were the decisive factor in this year’s election, pervasive acceptance that they are the opposition’s domain seems to have stung some liberals deeply. The Democrats have long been marketed as the party for good deeds done by proxy. As University of Connecticut professor emeritus William D’Antonio phrased it, in his Boston Globe defense of “Massachusetts liberals,” “The money they have invested in their future is known more popularly as taxes.”
The moral heft that some public-dime philanthropists attribute to taxation has granted the flow of federal funds a central place in the dark fantasies into which such people have recently retreated in their wounded vanity. They are discovering the great flaw of a strategy that makes a social-investment advisor out of a republican democracy.
The blue states, those that voted for John Kerry, contribute more to the federal coffers, but that money disproportionately ends up in the red states, those that voted for George Bush. As long as the priorities of the former group defined the national agenda, however, this relationship hasn’t attracted much attention. Perhaps those liberals who noticed it thought the political leverage garnered through dependency was part of their investment.
But with the decisive reelection of a hated regime, coastal Democrats fear that the “segment of the country that pays for the federal government is now being governed by the people who don’t pay for the federal government.” The partisan who decried that state of affaires on The McLaughlin Group, Lawrence O’Donnell, believes that its continuation will generate “a serious discussion of secession over the next 20 years.”
Unfortunately for the budding rebels of the coasts, some of the evidence doesn’t quite fit their complaint. For example, it’s true that dense populations tend to vote in the Democrats’ favor; hence the idea that the blue/red gap means that the tax dollars of wealthy urbanites are being funneled to rustic fundamentalists. On the local county level, however, population correlates with federal expenditures. Consequently, expenditures also correlate with party affiliation. In fact, the distribution of those dollars appears to be the better predictor of Democrats’ success.
Consider New Jersey, to which the Tax Foundation attributes the “‘blessing’ of being the [top] state that gives far more than it receives.” Using 2003 data, the average Kerry county in New Jersey has 181% the population of the average Bush county, but it receives 211% the federal largesse, according to the Census Bureau. In a state that receives back only 57¢ per federal tax dollar collected, each resident of Kerry territory accounts for $5,917 in federal expenditures, while each resident of Bush country accounts for $5,086.
Suspicions of a similar situation in Illinois led the aptly named blogger Sensible Mom to hypothesize that red counties “are contributing more to and demanding less of the federal government than the blue counties.” And as it turns out, in her state, Kerry-voting counties include 53% of citizens but claim 60% of distributed federal dollars. That disparate distribution of the 73¢ that the state gets back per tax dollar translates into $6,011 for each blue county resident, compared with $4,526 for each red county resident.
Even in Mississippi, where Kerry counties are home to only 32% of the population, they claim 39% of federal expenditures. Per person, the blue sections of this red state take $8,082 from the national tax pool, while the red sections take only $6,675. As for New Mexico, which is opposite New Jersey on the Tax Foundation’s list, the $1.99 that the feds return for each tax dollar accumulates to $9,517 per Kerry county citizen and $8,773 per Bush county citizen. In this case, the difference would be much greater if it weren’t for almost $2 billion in non-defense procurement dollars pouring into Los Alamos county, which President Bush won with 52% of the vote.
The dramatic skew in Los Alamos raises an intriguing question: who actually gets the money? Lawrence O’Donnell claimed that “ninety percent of the red states are welfare client states of the federal government.” But the Los Alamos National Laboratory and its $2.2 billion budget (FY04) are managed by the University of California, the public higher education system of the nearest blue state.
Alternately, consider the locally focused federal charity of Section 8 housing. The nation’s two richest states, Connecticut and New Jersey, receive $126 and $106 per capita for Section 8, respectively. The nation’s two poorest states, Mississippi and Arkansas, receive $54 and $53 per capita. For the navy blue states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the numbers are $178 and $200. Obviously, housing is more expensive in the coastal states, but again: who gets the money? The needy may manage to put roofs over their heads — in homes that don’t necessarily vary qualitatively no matter the area’s political color. However, the cash goes into the bank accounts and investment portfolios of landlords and property owners.
Number-crunching aside, blue-state conservatives have reason to suspect that the tides of money aren’t their liberal neighbors’ most significant concern. Just as there are blue hands out for federal dollars in red states, there are voters in the blue states who aren’t interested in outsourcing good deeds and the provision of hope to politicians and bureaucrats. His second time on the presidential ballot, W. increased his percentage of votes in 48 states, after all. In fact, Karl Rove has noted that the Bush vote in Rhode Island increased at more than twice the national rate.
Potential secessionists might be surprised how many loyalists are in their midst. (Indeed, the more they rant, the more there will be.) Beneath the confusion of liberals’ clamorous dominance on their home turf, it might actually be the case that the people who really pay for the federal government are at last being governed by sympathizers from that distant land in which “moral values” are not merely a catch phrase to be spun.
ADDENDUM:
Reader AuH2ORepublican corrected me regarding the number of states in which Bush increased his vote (see comments section). Honestly, I don’t recall my source for that statistic, but I’ve modified the text.
The very first thing Rhode Island Congressman Patrick Kennedy talks about in the biographical section of his official Congressional website is his work on the House Appropriations Committee…
Patrick J. Kennedy is serving his sixth term in Congress as the representative from the First District of Rhode Island.I hope that Congressman Kennedy considers the national interest in his work on the Appropriations Committee, something that his Appropriations Committee colleague Jim Moran of Virginia apparently believes to be largely unnecessary. This is how Congressman Moran, in the Arlington Sun-Gazette, talks about his plans for the future if the Democrats retake a majority in the House…
Kennedy was appointed to the House Appropriations Committee in December 1998, but requested a leave of absence in order to fulfill a two-year term as the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. With the term completed, Kennedy now sits on the powerful panel which has authority over all of the federal government’s discretionary spending. As part of his Appropriations duties, Kennedy sits on the Subcommittees on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and on Commerce, Justice, State, and Judiciary.
Moran, D-8th, told those attending the Arlington County Democratic Committee’s annual Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner on June 9 that while he in theory might oppose the fiscal irresponsibility of “earmarks” – funneling money to projects in a member of Congress’s district – he understands the value they have to constituents.Is Congressman Moran speaking only for himself here, or expressing the philosophy shared by all Congressional Democrats? I’ve contacted Congressman Kennedy’s office to try to find out.
“When I become chairman [of a House appropriations subcommittee], I’m going to earmark the sh** out of it,” Moran buoyantly told a crowd of 450 attending the event.
Remember Congressman Moran when Democrats make their arguments for why taxes must be rasied. It’s not that more money is needed to address real needs; it’s that Congressional chairmen want to take control of more of your money in order to bolster their power. [Open full post]
Associated Press story here…
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida’s leader in Iraq who led a bloody campaign of suicide bombings and kidnappings, has been killed in an airstrike, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday. It was a long-sought victory in the war in Iraq.Al-Qaida confirms here (h/t Kathryn Jean Lopez) taking the concept of declaring victory, no matter the circumstance, to a whole new level…
Al-Zarqawi and seven aides were killed Wednesday evening in a remote area 30 miles northeast of Baghdad in the volatile province of Diyala, just east of the provincial capital of Baqouba, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. said.
“We want to give you the joyous news of the martyrdom of the mujahed sheik Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” said the statement, signed by “Abu Abdel- Rahman al-Iraqi,” identified as the deputy “emir” or leader of al- Qaida in Iraq.President Bush’s statement here…
“The death of our leaders is life for us. It will only increase our persistence in continuing holy war so that the word of God will be supreme,” it said.
Now Zarqawi has met his end, and this violent man will never murder again. Iraqis can be justly proud of their new government and its early steps to improve their security. And Americans can be enormously proud of the men and women of our armed forces, who worked tirelessly with their Iraqi counterparts to track down this brutal terrorist and put him out of business.AND the Iraqi government has filled the posts of interior minister, defense minister, and national security minister. Details here. [Open full post]
The operation against Zarqawi was conducted with courage and professionalism by the finest military in the world. Coalition and Iraqi forces persevered through years of near misses and false leads, and they never gave up. Last night their persistence and determination were rewarded. On behalf of all Americans, I congratulate our troops on this remarkable achievement.
About three decades ago, the state of Hawaii decided it could ignore the 15th Amendment to the US Constitution…
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.To administer programs intended to benefit “native” Hawaiians, a 1978 constitutional convention in Hawaii created a public body called the “Office of Hawaiian Affairs” (OHA). The OHA was to be managed by a nine member board of trustees chosen by statewide elections. Not all citizens of Hawaii, however, were eligible to vote for trustees. Anyone not a “descendant of the aboriginal peoples inhabiting the Hawaiian Islands” was barred from voting in an OHA election (and from running for an OHA seat).
In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court held that denying citizens the right to vote because of their racial ancestry violated the 15th Amendment (Rice v. Cayetano [2000]). Cribbing Martin Luther King, the Court issued a reminder that people should be judged on their character and not their race…
The ancestral inquiry mandated by the State implicates the same grave concerns as a classification specifying a particular race by name. One of the principal reasons race is treated as a forbidden classification is that it demeans the dignity and worth of a person to be judged by ancestry instead of by his or her own merit and essential qualities. An inquiry into ancestral lines is not consistent with respect based on the unique personality each of us possesses, a respect the Constitution itself secures in its concern for persons and citizens.Now, through his sponsorship of the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act, Senator Daniel Akaka of Hawaii is spearheading a move to circumvent the 15th Amendment and set up racially exclusive governance in Hawaii by recognizing native Hawaiians as an Indian tribe. Amazingly, in what is purportedly the twenty-first century, the first action mandated by Senator Akaka’s Reorganization Act is the creation of a government commission charged with classifying and registering American citizens according to race…
The Commission shall–Maybe after the racial registry is created, the commission can follow-up by handing out badges to non-Hawaiians, so people won’t get confused about who’s who.
(A) prepare and maintain a roll of the adult members of the Native Hawaiian community who elect to participate in the reorganization of the Native Hawaiian governing entity; and
(B) certify that each of the adult members of the Native Hawaiian community proposed for inclusion on the roll meets the definition of Native Hawaiian in section 3(10).
This bill is being considered by the Senate this week. Let’s hope our Senators have the wisdom to vote against establishing racial registration and racially exclusive government within the borders of the United States of America. [Open full post]
This posting is Part XVII in a series of postings about economic thoughts.
The study of economics is important because economic truths directly influence outcomes in our society. People of good will want our society to be a just one. What constitutes a just society? That question is far too broad for any single posting. Nonetheless, Michael Novak offers a compelling explanation in response to a question frequently asked these days – What does “social justice” mean?
[Open full post]The trouble with “social justice” begins with the very meaning of the term. [Nobel Laureate Friedrich] Hayek points out that whole books and treatises have been written about social justice without ever offering a definition of it…The vagueness seems indispensable. The minute one begins to define social justice, one runs into embarrassing intellectual difficulties. It becomes, most often, a term of art whose operational meaning is, “We need a law against that.” In other words, it becomes an instrument of ideological intimidation, for the purpose of gaining the power of legal coercion.
This posting is Part XVI in a series of postings about economic thoughts.
Robert Nisbet once said: “Only Hayek has rivaled Bertrand de Jouvenel in demonstrating why redistributionism in the democracies inexorably results in the atrophy of personal responsibility and the hypertrophy of bureaucracy and the centralized state instead of in relief to the hapless minorities it is pledged to serve.” So what are some of the ethical issues that arise out of redistributionist public policies?
In the Introduction to Bertrand de Jouvenel’s book, The Ethics of Redistribution, John Gray writes:
[Open full post]Bertrand de Jouvenel’s study in the ethics of redistribution is distinctive, in the first instance, because it focuses precisely on the morality of redistribution and not on its side effects on incentives…[it] embodies a fundamental challenge to the values expressed in redistributionist thought…[he] is concerned with the impact on individual liberty and on cultural life of redistribution rather than with its effects on productivity…
