Government Gone Wild!
Here’s a story about a government board whose members endlessly dish out taxpayer money. And want endless years in power to keep doing so.
Recently, members of the Santa Clara water board approved steep salary hikes for two of their staffers, making them the highest-paid for their jobs in all of California. For example, the water district attorney will get an 8-percent hike so that she now pulls down $221,720 a year. Well, not exactly. She also got a $12,000 bonus. Then there’s her monthly car allowance: $750.
Yikes. Guess I’m in the wrong line of work.
Interestingly, the board doled out these huge hikes right after refusing to consider a proposal to let voters consider term-limiting board members. These antics are a strong argument for privatizing the water industry, frankly. Short of that, these guys definitely need to be term-limited.
It’s not exactly a secret in Santa Clara that the town’s water board is lavish with its budget. A spate of critical stories made the rounds of California papers after the board’s latest twirl of the financial spigot. As one reporter notes, the board has been “buffeted by charges of excessive spending.”
But you know, there’s buffeting and there’s buffeting. Trust me, any kind of buffeting that leaves incumbents in place to continue their exploitative fun and games is not enough buffeting.
Oh, forget “buffeting”! I’ll take term limits.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Millionaire entrepreneur Norman Braman, an auto dealer, may not be going as far as I’d like in his campaign against a proposed Miami baseball stadium. But so far as he goes, I’m with him all the way.
My question is — Why should any government entity ever be spending taxpayer money on stadiums? There are tickets and promotions and things that raise mucho dinero for franchises. Top players scoop up millions in salary. If big-time sports are not financially viable operations, what could be? And if sometimes owners lack as much money as they might like to spend on a stadium, why should a taxpayer who never watches a game have to pay for it?
Miami-Dade intends to fork over $347 million of taxpayer money plus a $35 million loan. All with no public hearings, no open discussion. No public vote on whether taxpayer money should be splurged on this. Zero due diligence.
So Mr. Braman is suing to expose the shabby politics surrounding the project.
Braman hopes to compel the city to function more responsibly. The evidence so far shows officials have been lazy at best. In one deposition, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez admitted that he had never even seen a financial statement of the Florida Marlins. He never even requested a financial statement.
That’s strike number one. Let’s hope Braman pitches a perfect game.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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We could use a few million-dollar ideas to help fight juvenile crime.
How about a half-million-dollar idea?
The Justice Department gave $500,000 to the World Golf Foundation. The foundation’s beneficiary program is called “First Tee.” It’s designed to get youngsters interested in that most civilized of sporting passions, golf.
Employees in the Justice Department had rated the program way down on their list. But the administrator of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, J. Robert Flores, awarded the money anyway, ignoring programs that employees had ranked as much more effective.
“We need something really attractive to engage the gangs and the street kids, golf is the hook,” said the questionable administrator in question.
Yeah, right. Remember the midnight basketball leagues, supported as a brainy idea by Bill Clinton? Well, at least lots of inner city kids like basketball. Golf seems something of a stretch.
ABC News interviewed a former Justice Department employee for Nightline. Obviously disgruntled, the ex-employee called the program a “waste.”
It turns out that President Bush is the honorary chairman of First Tee. The clear implication? That’s why this golf gig got money while many obviously more practical programs were left unfunded.
Chalk it up to pork envy. Congress can’t have all the insider payola for itself.
Did somebody just yell “Fore!”? Well, it’s not “for(e) the children.”
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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It takes a network of restaurants to feed the Senate, badly.
In 44 years, the dining hall and mini-chain of cafeterias and coffee shops have been profitable only seven. This year the operation will run in the red to the tune of $2 million.
And come lunchtime, folks working in the Senate regularly run over to the House to eat. One critic says Senate victuals are "so bad that the . . . House 'Taco Salad Wednesday' trumps any type of entree they have to offer."
In the House, though, the cafeterias have been privately run for decades. House staffers never flee to the Senate at lunchtime.
Solution? Privatize the Senate restaurants as well. Senator Dianne Feinstein just pushed through legislation to do that. She doesn't think "taxpayers should be subsidizing something that doesn't need to be." She notes that current restaurant management never even bothers trying to break even, knowing their deficits will be covered.
Feinstein has opponents. Another Democrat, Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, says it's hypocritical for his colleagues to condemn privatization of workers generally, but then "privatize the workers here in the Senate and leave them out on their own."
So, what should we do, Senator? Communize the whole economy so no responsible adult is ever "out on his own"?
Menendez is right about the contradiction, but not about how to resolve it. Amtrak? The post office? Both should be out on their own. Along with Senate food service.
This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.
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Democrats thump their chests. Congress just passed a budget . . . in an election year. For the previous four election cycles, that hasn’t happened.
But, since the budget crossed the $3 trillion mark for the first time ever, let’s choke our huzzahs. The federal government is spending us — and especially our children — into ruin.
The Iraq War is incredibly expensive, but spending for other items has shot up, too. Senator Obama says he’ll withdraw our troops, but doesn’t say he’ll do it in his first term. Budget-wise that doesn’t even matter. Obama has already said he’ll simply spend the money now spent on the war on other federal programs.
It gets worse. Sheila Weinberg, head of the Institute for Truth in Accounting, tells USA Today that “We’re running deficits in the trillions of dollars, not the hundreds of billions we’re being told.”
The official deficit last year was $162 billion. But government accounting is, well, crooked. It ignores huge liabilities like Social Security, Medicare, pensions for government workers, VA benefits. Use proper accounting standards and the deficit comes to a whopping $2.5 trillion.
Our national debt is already $57.3 trillion, when federal entitlements are factored in. With local and state government liabilities, the total is nearly $62 trillion, more than half a million per household.
Still, the Democrats running Congress say they’ll have a budget surplus by 2012. How? Well, through massive tax increases . . . which, speaking to other crowds, they promise won’t happen.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Obesity is a problem. Doctors warn about the ill effects of carrying too much flab. The Washington Post is running a front-page series about overweight children.
Good. Knowledge is power, even when it comes to diet and exercise.
But by the second paragraph of the May 19 story we’re told of an additional problem. It is, and I quote, “inadequate direction and dollars at the federal level.”
My first thought? We’ve finally found it! The one thing the federal government isn’t spending too much money on.
European governments spend more dough than ours hectoring people on health. Britain has restricted food ads aimed at kids. But, frankly, I don’t find European nannyism very appealing. I bet one can lose weight without losing freedom. Or a whole lot of money.
My second thought? Losing weight shouldn’t cost us, well, anything. I know for me, when the pounds start to pile up, no one charges me a nickel to leave the house for an evening jog. Running is absolutely free.
Maybe our federal government should stick to its own outrageous fat problem. Our weight problems pale in comparison to all the bloated, wasteful globs of fatty pork thrown around by politicians.
Why not start the government diet by saving the taxpayers the costly, preachy public education campaign? Besides, what American would even listen to the over-stuffed federal government commanding, “trim down”?
Doctor, trim thyself.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Honest people with income and bills know that it’s possible to cut spending.
We don’t always do it when we should. Sometimes we’re undisciplined. But we suffer costs for that lack of discipline. We suffer them directly—as individuals and as families.
In the world of government expenditure, however, it’s always other people’s money being spent or misspent. And the people willing to pick our pockets don’t suffer any direct costs from squandering the funds.
From this lack of incentive or scruple they derive a theory — that there’s no way to cut government spending. They’d prefer not to, it’s a bother. So it’s mission impossible.
California lawmakers love this theory. Seems tax revenues are declining of late. Something about a weak economy. State Senator Denise Ducheny advises voters that the state’s budget deficit has now climbed to $14 billion. Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez says: “The problem is so severe that we don’t have a choice but to raise taxes.”
Right. No choice but to weaken the economy even further. Make it even harder for people to pay their bills.
We’re hearing similar assertions in response to any tax-cut proposals being made in the presidential campaign. Impossible to shave more than a buck or two from federal spending. So how can we cut taxes? What a quandary.
According to my own theory, it’s easy to cut government spending. Use scissors.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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I’ve discussed the hazards of so-called “Real ID” before. What is it? It’s the regime of beefed-up driver’s licenses the federal government wants to impose, complete with biometrics and all-encompassing national database.
Will there be robust safeguards against snoopy bureaucrats, hackers, etc.? Well, dial up Google.com, plug in “identity theft cases per year” and “lost unencrypted laptop.” Some track record.
The details of a brave new world of national ID take time to master. Fortunately, some stalwarts out there have taken the time and are spreading the word.
One is Mark Lerner. Worried about ID security in the wake of 9/11, he thoroughly acquainted himself with tech industry attempts to beef up ID protocols.
He learned that rampant problems with the new technology were being glossed over, test results fudged, policymakers and populace misled. He blew the whistle. Was ignored. Is still blowing the whistle.
Which is riskier: Easily compromised biometrics or practically impenetrable biometrics? Either way, it seems, there would be many ways to jeopardize our privacy and security under Real ID. Thanks to Lerner and other principled critics, at least a few states are refusing to implement the program. Thank goodness there may still be state legislators not bought off by the feds. Maybe we have a fighting chance to stop it.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Every state in the union has a state bird. My state’s is the cardinal. Very red. Pretty. We have a state seal, a flag, and a flower. You’d think with these that legislators could let the matter of state symbols go at that.
But no. We also have a state insect, of all things. Our Virginia solons chose well on the latter, the tiger swallowtail butterfly. Beautiful. That nicely rounds out our symbols, no?
No. We also have a state fish and a state shell, as well. I kid you not. Think brook trout and oyster. Yum?
Yes, the state symbol act is pretty ridiculous. But until recently, I’d never thought about what all this is really for: the kids.
In Missouri, anyway, it has been the policy for children to suggest what should be the state bird, rock, composer, whatever. And then the legislature, in its slower working days, would consider the proposals.
Hey, it’s a way for kids to get involved in . . . uh, government. Sort of. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
But what can we make of the recent attempt in the Missouri legislature to make Budweiser the “state beer”?
Don’t worry, folks. Kids didn’t suggest it. This is entirely the work of adults in the legislature. I won’t say they’re drunk on power, but I won’t say they’re exactly sober, either.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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If you’ve never seen Hitchcock’s The Birds, you’ve probably seen a few chilling out-takes. People running. Birds swooping. People screaming. Glass shattering.
Could the scenario be even scarier? Well, yes: if, say, it were illegal for the victims to defend themselves.
This is not a movie remake. That’s what the beleaguered citizens of Bartow are currently facing. This is a small town outside of Orlando — a quiet community says the Orlando Sentinel. Well, except for the screaming.
Migrating turkey vultures have turned into quite a nuisance there. They rip shingles off roofs. They chew rubber from car windows. First pecking a little. Then a lot.
And the people? Screams. Of frustration.
They’re not allowed to do much about this. They may blow a shrill whistle to try to scare off the vultures, or tactically position stuffed toys that resemble dead vultures. But the beleaguered residents may not kill or even capture the birds.
The birds are protected by the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Apparently we’ve signed an agreement with the birds which makes it a criminal offense for anybody to ruffle their feathers. Too bad such well-meaning edicts don’t also make it illegal for birds to harass innocent villagers.
Once again we see the tyranny of well-meaning politics, un-tethered by even the tiniest amount of thought about the consequences.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Do we need another czar?
Ask Senator John McCain. In a year he could be president and appointing “czars.”
Scary thought. His McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance law squelched too many freedoms for me to rush into rah-rah mode.
Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, agrees with me, telling CNN’s Anderson Cooper: “McCain- Feingold has really left a bad taste in many people’s mouths, not just conservatives . . .”
But when Cooper asked Perkins what steps McCain could take to win support from conservatives, Perkins said McCain could “announce a family czar in the White House to focus on strengthening America’s families.”
You know, I’ve never liked that term, czar. Russian czars were dictators, the name taken from Caesar, the Roman emperor. We Americans are just generally down on all-powerful tyrants. So, why name our government officials “czars”?
Of course, Perkins’s idea isn’t for this Family Czar to tyrannize the countryside. He simply wants to bolster families.
But, ask yourself, which is more likely to come from some powerful new office in Washington: tyranny or stronger families?
And if you bet McCain would pick a swell person to be Family Czar, how would you like Hillary Clinton’s pick? Or Barack Obama’s? If you’re a Democrat, flip the examples around.
I wouldn’t want my own mother to pick someone for such a position. And she’s super swell.
Let’s make this our slogan: No new czars.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Going to the hospital requires a certain . . . humility, I guess. You get dressed up in flimsy gowns, and if your situation renders you immobile, you no longer remain in charge of what you might normally think of as your bathroom functions.
Dignity is not always easy to maintain.
Now, if I were in the hospital biz, I’d be trying to figure out ways of maintaining and catering to customer — I mean, patient — dignity.
But then, if I were in the hospital biz, it would be as an entrepreneur, not as the head of a government bureau.
Sweden, on the other hand, has what Hillary and Obama other Democrats say they want here: nationalized care.
Now, so does neighboring Norway, and their system is so far in the red, and so chaotic that we should be hearing about it in the news, nightly. But we don’t.
Still, the costs associated with socialized care do leak into the American consciousness. The latest? Sweden’s decision to buy unisex boxer shorts for patients. Come summer, no longer will Swedish patients get to wear underwear designed for their precise anatomy. It saves money, you see.
Yes, they ration underwear!
I remember, years ago, hearing a prominent socialist complaining that, under capitalism, he couldn’t buy his exact size of sock. He had to buy a sock designed for feet sized 10-13.
If he suffers in more socialistic Sweden, he’ll have to place that size sock somewhere else.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Since leaving Congress, Dick Armey has been promoting smaller government as a private citizen. Armey’s organization FreedomWorks recently alerted supporters to a perverse power play in the Georgia state legislature: Payback by House Speaker Glenn Richardson against a conservative caucus called the 216 Group.
It seems Speaker Richardson wanted a political pal of his to become chair of the state transportation board. Members of the 216 Group, which meets in the capitol’s room 216, failed to vote for the speaker’s preference. Perhaps they were more concerned about living up to their motto: “less government, lower taxes, personal responsibility, and liberty and justice for all.”
So, Speaker Richardson retaliated by stripping the uncooperative members of their committee assignments.
Armey says, “Speaker Richardson may feel personally slighted that he couldn’t get a political ally on the DOT board . . . but to hamstring conservative lawmakers in his own party . . . trying to do serious policy-work on behalf of taxpayers is simply unconscionable.”
One victim, Doug Collins, told reporters that he suspected he might be penalized for crossing the speaker, “but I felt the need to vote my conscience and my constituency.”
Georgia citizens upset about Speaker Richardson’s abuse of power should demand that he reinstate demoted members and stop kicking other 216 members off their committees. Richardson’s email address is glenn.richardson@house.ga.gov. The phone number of the Speaker’s office is (404) 656-5020.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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My new favorite comedian is Drew Carey.
Not that Carey is funnier than, say, Don Knotts . . . or explanations of the national debt. I just like what Carey’s doing lately — helping turn local stories about political lunacy into national stories. Carey is working with reason.tv, spinoff of Reason magazine, to host professionally made online videos about threats to freedom.
One of the first, which you can watch at santanflat.com, tells of horrific abuse of power in Queen Creek, Arizona. The victim is Dale Bell, owner of San Tan Flat restaurant. Where something terrible is going on.
Dancing.
Not nude dancing. Just dancing. The county council opposes.
Mr. Bell says: “We are open, we never stopped people from dancing and we never will stop people from dancing.”
Ted Balaker, a ReasonTV producer, notes this is about the right to earn an honest living. “If you’re not harming anyone else and people enjoy dancing, that hardly seems like something that should be against the law and restricted in any way.”
County officials conducted what they called the longest “code compliance hearing” in the county’s history to decide how much the fine should be. Result? They want to fine San Tan $5,000 a day for letting his customers dance.
Remember H.L. Mencken’s definition of Puritanism? “The haunting fear that someone, somewhere may be happy.”
But it ain’t over. Not with lawyers from the Institute for Justice now on board; and not with Drew Cary promoting the story, aided by Reason.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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It’s in the nature of government to want to clamp down on information. You see it clearest in totalitarian systems. And in New York City.
The city’s deputy commissioner of counter-terrorism wants to clamp down the private ownership of devices that measure toxins. You know, like anthrax, asbestos, ragweed.
The mayor is all behind him. They have put forward a bill to license such devices.
Why? According to the Village Voice, after 9/11, lots of people bought toxin detectors. And “a lot of these machines didn’t work right, and when they registered false alarms, the police had to spend millions of dollars chasing bad leads and throwing the public into a state of raw panic.”
Scared now?
But the Village Voice went on to take it back as jest: “OK, none of that has actually happened.” That’s just what the regulators think might happen. The Voice was just having fun with its readers.
The scare scenario is just that, a cooked-up scenario.
At a public meeting it was noted that, soon after the catastrophe of 9/11, when the EPA said the air around Ground Zero was safe, it was privately held detectors that proved the EPA wrong. The commissioner did a little hemming and hawing. But when asked if the city really had to put unlicensed detector users in jail, this bozo said yes.
Remember folks: Fear is the great weapon of totalitarians. We have nothing to fear but fear of fear itself.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Our discussions of government gone wild would be a lot more amusing if we didn’t have to actually live with the consequences. That we do tends to mitigate the uproarious hilarity of the politicians’ effervescent insanity.
Awhile back we might have offered a dismissive chuckle to the Big Brother-ish New York City policy of banning restaurants from using trans fat. Personally, I avoid trans fat, as more and more Americans are doing.
But what business is it of the government?
The state doesn’t pay my food bill or my medical bills. Though, some politicians sure would like to make taxpayers pick up the tab.
Now Mississippi Representatives W.T. Mayhall and John Read, Republicans, and Bobby Shows, a Democrat, have pushed nanny government to new heights. These nabobs have introduced legislation to tell restaurants who they may or may not serve. If passed, House Bill 282 would force restaurants to refuse to sell food to those deemed by the state health department to be obese.
I don’t have to explain that discrimination on the basis of race or gender or creed — or even percentage of body fat — is just plain wrong. Everybody knows this.
Everybody but politicians, it seems. So, here it is in terms even politicians might comprehend: Obesity is unhealthy. But in America we believe in individual freedom. In other words, it’s your life.
Moreover, forced discrimination is the opposite of freedom. And even more deadly than obesity.
And definitely not that funny.
This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.
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Power corrupts. Petty power corrupts . . . pettily?
Some time back I told you about Diane Pharr, whose son's school records — his private school records — were publicized by the school board . . . just out of petty vindictiveness for her wanting to learn more about the board's budget.
Now, in Fairfax County, Virginia, public school officials similarly act out. Hunter Mill School Board member Stuart Gibson was forced by the Virginia Board of Education to publicly apologize. That board sided with a local parent defending her son, whose special education history was released by Gibson during — get this — a political campaign. The boy's father happened to be Gibson's opponent.
We've got to watch out for our rights from local officials just as much as from the big boys.
Vienna, Virginia resident Bruce Bennett was twice forcibly removed from public meetings of the Fairfax County School Board. He had tried to tape the events, you see. The officials said that wasn't allowed.
Funny thing is, Virginia, like many states — and the federal government — requires open meetings. Mr. Bennett was entirely within his rights. But he was ousted anyway, and a school district spokesman gave a lot of hooey defending those forced ejections.
These are all developments occurring not far from where I live. I bet, if you checked into your local politics, you'd find similar trouble.
So, if you want to make a difference, get involved. There's somebody's rights you can defend . . . if only your own.
This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.
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The more we sit in front of visual display monitors, the fatter we get. And kids, who increasingly substitute more and more of their play time outdoors for time indoors with their computers and video games, are especially at risk.
It’s a real problem. But do we need a grand program to solve the problem?
In New Mexico, environmental groups are suggesting busing public school kids to under-visited state parks, forcing them to play in the great outdoors.
And since this costs money, add a “sin tax” to sales of new televisions and video games.
There’s symmetry to the idea, so it almost seems responsible. But it seems something else, too: regimenting kids into play is the kind of thing a popular German enviro-political group instituted in the 1920s and ’30s. It kind of gives me the creeps.
The natural playground for kids is nature — where I spent a huge hunk of my time, as a kid. Kids nowadays suffer from what the professionals call “Nature Deficit Disorder.” Parks provide nature and order in a neat little mix. But a freer mix would work better: letting the kids out again, to play near ponds, in creeks, culverts, and briar patches.
This is something parents should think about.
Meanwhile, a cheaper get-kids-walking program would be to park buses half a block further down from the school door. No new tax or grand scheme necessary.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Do we have the right to say things only when other people can’t hear us?
Such seems to be the principle informing an attempt by the government of St. Louis. The city’s trying to force citizen activist Jim Roos to take down a sign that allegedly violates the city’s zoning laws.
It’s a special sign: painted on the side of an apartment building owned by a “housing ministry” founded by Mr. Roos. The city claims the sign is too big. It’s special in another way, too. It says: “End Eminent Domain Abuse.” Mr. Roos has been fighting such abuse by the city. And now, along with the Institute for Justice, he’s fighting for his freedom of speech.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch says there’s a “tricky” constitutional issue at stake — “fighting clutter versus protecting free speech,” supposedly. As if somebody’s ability to call your communication unsightly might justify tossing out the Constitution and our individual rights.
Meanwhile the city has no problem granting exemptions for signs it has no disagreement with. It allows a gas company with downtown offices to display a sign over 1,000 square feet.
So how do we resolve this “tricky” problem?
Simple: Uphold the right of individuals to exercise their freedom of speech and property rights. End zoning laws that violate these rights. And advise persons who don’t like the sign that they are free to look in other directions entirely. Presto, problem solved.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Last October, two colleagues and I were indicted by Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson. Our crime? Helping a petition drive to limit the growth of government spending.
Supposedly, we three willfully violated an arbitrary residency requirement for signature gatherers.
As I’ve explained at the freepauljacob.com website, we acted in good faith to comply with Oklahoma’s unconstitutional regulation. If the prosecution succeeds — if we do get jailed for ten years — it would be a chilling precedent. And sadly, that’s the point: to intimidate citizens from making any future petitions of government that might inconvenience the political establishment.
That’s why a Steve Forbes editorial asked, “Has North Korea Annexed Oklahoma?” and termed Edmondson’s actions “thuggish.” A Wall Street Journal editorial called the AG’s prosecution “bizarre,” expressing fear it would make citizens “think twice before challenging political elites.”
Several Oklahoma legislators have called the prosecution wrong-headed and politically-motivated.
So, Edmondson has begun — you guessed it — a PR offensive. In an opinion piece for a local paper, he wrote, “The Oklahoma Supreme Court and the multicounty grand jury both independently found these defendants to be in substantial violation of Oklahoma law.”
But wait a second. Neither a court, nor the grand jury, have found us guilty of anything. As an attorney and the highest law enforcement officer in the state, Edmondson must know this.We get our day in court. See you there.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Overkill. That’s becoming the watchword of modern policework.
Take the case of Laura Elkins and John Robbins’s home-repair brouhaha four years ago. The couple had begun work on repairing their roof, raising it a bit in the process. They had gotten the required permits. But a neighbor complained that the repairs weren’t being done according to the historic preservations laws of the section of the District of Columbia, where they lived.
So what did the District government do? Send out a building inspector?
No. The District sent about a dozen police and D.C. Consumer Regulatory Affairs inspectors, who raided the home. With a warrant and all.
The kids were sick and had stayed home from school. And the police ransacked the place, allegedly looking for evidence.
The couple sued, and in mid-December, the court declared in their favor. Judge Rosemary M. Collyer, of the U.S. District for the District of Columbia, ruled that the raid was an “unreasonable search and seizure,” a violation of the family’s constitutional rights to privacy. Another hearing will determine damages.
So why the overkill in the first place? Prior to the raid, the homeowners did everything by the book. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough for one neighbor and a head bureaucrat. Or the police, whose behavior ranged from intrusive to frighteningly creepy.
Luckily, we still live in a country with due process, and boy do we need it.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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It may take big bucks to produce public art. But it doesn’t require vast tax funding.
The chief example of this is the Statue of Liberty, which was a gift from the French, and the restoration of which, some time back, was paid for by private (mostly American) funds.
Even Maya Lin’s controversial design for the Vietnam Memorial Wall was mostly funded by privately collected monies.
Of course, the quality of art isn’t determined by the funding. I have friends who tell me I have just “got to see” the statue called “Portlandia” in Portland, Oregon, even though they’re pretty certain it was a taxpayer-funded project. I keep forgetting to look for it each time I visit the rainy northwest city.
Most modern public art is garbage, of course. And too much public art is paid for not by volunteer donors but by taxpayers. That’s my main criticism: public art should be supported by the public voluntarily, and politicians should stay out of art patronage.
Right now, the city of Phoenix, Arizona, faces a big budget crunch. And yet the city council awarded $2.5 million to a Massachusetts artist to build a very tall public artwork. The proposed look of the project seems science-fictional to me. It may even become an example of good public art.
What’s bad is spending other people’s money, taxpayers’ money. The people of Phoenix who wanted it should have raised the funds themselves.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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In theory, there’s supposed to be a difference between politics and governance. But in actual practice, there’s rarely much difference at all.
Take Democratic House Majority Leader Rep. Bill DeWeese. Of the several scandals he found himself embroiled in throughout 2007, the biggest was “Bonusgate,” in which employees of the state of Pennsylvania got big bonus payments for their time working on political campaigns.
Eighty of the 100 Democratic House staffers who were awarded big state bonuses in 2006 either donated money to or worked on the campaigns of eternal candidate DeWeese or his right-hand man, former Rep. Mike Veon.
After the November 2006 election Veon found himself in the private sector. Lucky, in a way, since only after that did the $1.9 million tab for all these election-year bonuses see light.
Representative DeWeese is in a worse pickle, since he’s still in office, and nearly everyone else in his office is pretty clearly guilty. He says that he was “misled” by his staff, and fired seven aides including his chief of staff.
Emails between top Democratic aides and Pennsylvania state house staffers reveal an interesting rating system. Aides received grades as “OK,” “good,” and “rock stars” for their work. For their work on political campaigns, that is.
Prohibitions on politicking by government workers are age-old. But sometimes those in power who make the laws, don’t follow them too well.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Shouldn’t the law apply to everyone equally?
We can argue about what the law should be, or at what rate to tax, or whether a certain regulation is needed. But once public policy is made, it ought to apply to me if it applies to thee. And vice versa.
No special deals for the “politically well-connected.”
Unfortunately, this very American notion of fair play gets tossed in the trash can with alarming frequency.
It just happened recently in High Point, North Carolina. Two big companies, TransTech Pharma and PharmaCore, are staying in High Point and expanding from 125 employees to 330.
First, congratulations. That means more money in the local economy and more tax dollars. Sort of.
I say “sort of” because city government gave over $3 million dollars in so-called incentives to the companies. The state of North Carolina wrote the companies a grant check for $6.5 million more.
In other words: special deals for the big wheels. At the expense of every other business. Every family.
Councilman Mike Pugh voted no to the incentives. “I know it’s vital to get new industries started and to have them in your city,” he told reporters, “but I don’t believe in extortion. When multimillion dollar companies come to us while small businesses are suffering and say, ‘Give us money or we’ll leave or we won’t come at all,’ well, I think sometimes you just have to call their bluff.”
My goodness, Mike, that’s good old-fashioned American common sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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After reading a New York Times article, I’ll stay off South Africa’s roads. Bizarrely tough driving exams are only one reason.
Test-takers give demerits for not looking in rear mirrors every seven seconds, or for coasting back one inch when stopped at a stop sign. And the drivers’ licensing bureau is so complicated that the words “Byzantine” and “Kafka” come to mind . . . to the horror of Byzantium and Franz.
In a follow-up piece, Ryan Hagen expands upon the lesson: “So South Africa must have the safest roads in the world, right? Well, no. The fatality rate per mile is five times higher than that of the United States, and rising fast.”
Why? Lots of people don’t bother getting a license at all. And the requirements, being about as undemocratic and illiberal as one could fear to find this side of totalitarianism, goad the people into near-open revolt; disrespect for the law being generally increased by its nonsensical rigor.
Lots of government programs similarly over-reach. If you demand too much of people, they will come to expect less of themselves. They’ll simply ignore the rules. Ignore the advice. Go outlaw.
The lesson applies to much of what government does, almost everything. We need minimal reasonable requirements in society, yes: Do no murder; don’t steal. Good ideas. Good rules.
But nitpick on every little element of imagined perfection?
Doomed to fail.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Many of us gave and/or received gift cards during the holidays. What a great innovation. Don’t know exactly what someone wants? Give a gift card for a store they like; they can pick out their own gift.
Customers love ‘em and stores love ‘em. Stores can count on that revenue, and, better yet for retailers, most folks spend in excess of the gift card. And when someone forgets to use the card at all or leaves a balance on it, once the card expires, the store keeps that money.
I just learned that in Maryland there’s a law that gift cards must expire after four years.
Now here comes Maryland Delegate Joseline Peña-Melnyk to do something about this. Like me, you’re probably thinking: “Why do these cards have to expire? Change the law. Leave stores and customers free to choose their own terms of trade.”
But Peña-Melnyk isn’t seeking to change that law. No sir. Instead, she’s seeking to grab the money from expired gift cards. All of it! Every penny.
In defense of her House Bill 30, Peña-Melnyk asks: “Wouldn’t you rather know that if you lost a card, or your card has expired that that money will be put to use for public education?”
Seems only two groups in our society think they should get a cut of every economic transaction: the mob and the politicians. But at least the mob doesn’t try to take 100 percent.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Slicing bread used to be a consumer activity. The consumer may have bought the loaf from the local baker, but the slicing of it was up to him. Sometimes one didn’t even bother taking out the knife . . . you just grabbed off a chunk. Hence the term “breaking bread.”
Pre-sliced bread sold at market is a development of later capitalism. It’s pretty neat, hence the expression “better than sliced bread.”
But here’s something worse than sliced bread: a political controversy. In Britain, the land that gave us the sandwich, the House of Lords has been listening to complaints about bread slice thickness. The Baroness Gardner of Parkes says that bread slices are getting thicker, and insists that thicker slices lead to thicker waists.
The Baroness asked “Why is it that in central London you can hardly find a thinly sliced or medium-sliced loaf of bread to buy, and any sandwich you buy in any supermarket is now made with thick bread?”
Now, I don’t know about you, or about London, but I do know that I have purchased thin-sliced bread recently. And thick-sliced, too.
I notice that it is traditional to slice the tougher, mealier breads thicker than the Wonder Bread varieties. And it is known that the thicker, less processed breads are better for you.
We’re all free to have our own opinion about the proper thickness of bread. But best of all would be to keep politicians, and any leftover royalty, out of the issue of bread thickness. No matter how you slice it.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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On November 14, Liberty Services, an Evansville, Indiana firm was victimized by a break-in. According to founder Bernard von NotHaus, the gang took everything but desks and chairs.
No ordinary burglars did this. It was government agents. Targeting a firm that dared to provide an inflation-proof safeguard against government money. Liberty’s latest offering was a Ron Paul silver dollar.
According to a leaked affidavit, Liberty Services is being investigated for “uttering coins of gold, silver, or other metal,” or “making or possessing likeness of coins.” Mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, conspiracy are the types of charges being bandied about. The affidavit says the company’s goal is to “undermine the United States government’s financial systems by the issuance of a non-governmental competing currency for the purpose of repealing the Federal Reserve and Internal Revenue Code.”
Sounds like thought-crime.
Liberty Services has been in business for years. The first Liberty Dollars were sold in 1998. NotHaus has sought to ensure that his company complies with relevant law. Andrew Williams, a spokesman for the Fed, has told the firm that “no law . . . says goods and services must be paid for with Federal Reserve notes. Parties entering into a transaction can establish any medium of exchange that is agreed upon.”
So why the raid now? What real crime has Liberty Services committed? Aside from inflation-proofing their clients? Maybe in court the government will have to say.
Meanwhile, Mr. NotHaus could use some help. To learn more, visit libertydollar.org.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Why would a dictator seek to rid himself of term limits on his own stay in office?
The question answers itself. Dictators don’t want any formal constraints on their power. Power is something they always want more of.
Down in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez has been illustrating this with ever more brazen usurpations. His latest: An attempted overhaul of the Venezuelan constitution by cobbling together 69 amendments, including one to scrap presidential term limits. All in a single referendum. Yes or No, people.
Over the last nine years of his rule, Chavez never lost an election. He lost this one.
Such power grabs are nothing new. In the ancient Roman Republic, magistrates typically served for only a single year, then stepped down. When the republic died with the rise of men like Sulla, Caesar, and Augustus, that was also the end of term limits. Caesar was assassinated after several years as dictator; his successor, Augustus, ruled as an imperial trinity of tribune, censor, and consul for decades.
Thousands of years later, it’s still not easy keeping politicians from serving for life. The current couple heading up Argentina have found a clever way around their country’s term limits. Robert Mugabe, ruler of Zimbabwe, overturned his country’s term limits, too, so he could dictate for going on 28 years now.
Guys like Augustus and Mugabe and Chavez like to use the trappings of democracy. They’d like voters to play along.
Voters don’t have to.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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This is getting ridiculous.
I mean, more ridiculous than usual. Or maybe not; once “zero tolerance” as an end in itself infects rule-setting, maybe every example is equally silly.
One of the latest examples, anyway, is a ban on hugging over at Mascoutah Middle School in Illinois. A 13-year-old student, Megan Coulter, was caught hugging friends after school. The vice principal, a Randy Blakely, swung into action and punished Megan with after-school detention.
The school defends its anti-hugging policy. Banning all hugs helps prevent unwelcome displays of affection.
“Zero tolerance” policies always focus on some non-essential aspect of a bad thing. Then forbid not only the actual bad thing but also the marginal aspect shared by good things. So to “stop” the bad thing you also outlaw the good thing.Physical and sexual abuse are bad. They involve touching. So you ban touching.
Violence is bad. Children playing cops and robbers innocently simulate violence. So you ban an ancient kid’s game. What schools teach by such rules is that children should not make distinctions. Problem? If that’s true, you can’t really explain anything.
And if you can’t make distinctions, can’t think, can’t cope — you just become afraid. Of everything. Including normal, healthy impulses.
I think I need a hug.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Free bicycle sharing programs — can you think of anything less likely to succeed?
Especially in San Francisco. Those hills! My interest in hopping on a city bike and pedaling up a few blocks is about close to zero.
And yet, San Francisco is reported to be trying to catch up with Europe’s bike sharing programs.
I’ve seen a number of bike programs start up, in small towns, in college towns, on college campuses, wherever mushy thinking is sold. The usual effect? Quickly the bikes get trashed or stolen; the program grinds to an inglorious halt.
And yet, when I read articles in the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, the reporters weren’t chortling. There seems this vague hope that “we can just all get along” and use commonly owned vehicles.
Of course, no one suggests a free car program. Or a free money program. I mean, without attempting to elicit a laugh. But, with a straight face, American bicycle pushers (I mean those who push the usage of bicycles, not the bikes themselves) keep on pluggin’ away at what seems the impossible.
According to reports, such a program works in Paris. But those same reports explain that each bike costs $2000 in integral electronic security systems. It seems that, if you don’t hold people responsible, they’re apt to behave irresponsibly.
Basic human nature. But for some people, understanding the basics of human nature is like pushing a bicycle forever uphill.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Why hold elections if government is going to ignore the results?
New Jersey voters must be wondering. Last month, a bond issue to borrow $450 million for stem cell research went down to what the New York Times called “a stunning defeat.”
Steve Lonegan, mayor of Bogota, New Jersey, led the opposition, saying, “This is the power of ideas versus big government.”
But New Jersey’s big government boys don’t play that way. You see, two weeks before the election, politicians had already broken ground on a new building to house the research. And after the vote, Governor Jon Corzine said they’d move ahead nonetheless. Senate President Richard Codey agreed, saying, “I think by the time it’s built, we will have the dollars by any means possible.”
One way to get the dough? Going into debt against voter wishes and the state’s constitution. Back in 2002, this same Steve Lonegan sued the State of New Jersey for amassing debt not authorized by the voters — voter authorization being clearly required under the state’s constitution. But in that suit, the state’s highest court simply ignored the constitution, allowing politicians to continue piling on unapproved debt.
Back then, Garden State government had $4 billion in voter-approved debt and $11 billion in non-approved debt. Today, state debt approaches $30 billion.
Lonegan says Jersey politicians are “spitting in the face of every voter in New Jersey.” So he’s mobilizing citizens, which means, hopefully, that Jersey pols are really just spitting into the wind.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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What’s the compromise between spending $14 billion and $15 billion?
In Washington, that’s $23 billion.
The recent Water Resources Development bill was originally approved by the Senate at $14 billion, and by the House for a billion dollars more. So negotiators between the two houses cooked up a compromise.
In most parts of the world, a compromise between two figures is somewhere in between. But math isn’t exactly the strong suit of our elected reps, so the compromise surged eight billion dollars or more too high.
Thankfully, the president stamped a veto on it and the pork-infested projects bill went back to Congress. Which voted to overturn the veto.
The bloated pus sac of special projects for the Army Corps of Engineers is now law.
Mark Tapscott, editorial page editor at the Washington Examiner, wrote about this in early November. He pointed out that Republican political support for the bill was strong. “Too many Republicans,” he wrote, “are more interested in protecting their ability to spend tax dollars to advance their own political interests than they are in using their position to do what they were sent to Washington to do.”
Tapscott then wrote that he thinks that the GOP is dead, for all fiscally conservative intents and purposes. So, he says, it’s time to start talking about “the dead elephant in the living room.”
OK, I may be a political activist, but I’m calling this early: I don’t have dead elephant clean-up duty.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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An ill wind blows from the Windy City. Early this year, without fanfare or fair warning, the city government made certain types of paper-based publication illegal.
What was made illegal? Free newspapers or broadsides or fliers that have no religious 0r political content, but are likely to have ads. Anything that might easily become litter.
Yes, in the name of litter prevention the city has outlawed a huge hunk of the Chicago publishing industry. What’s more, the city explicitly outlaws leaving "unsecured bundles" of papers on public or private property. Since this is how much of the alternative press is distributed, the alternative press is not amused by the law.
Though there was surprisingly little talk about the law before it received its 50 to 0 endorsement by City Council, it’s getting quite a bit of talk now. And one alderman has stepped up to the mic to claim credit for it. Setting up litter patrols, community awareness drives, and even ticketing of responsible litterers was apparently not enough. For that one alderman, anyway.
Or the other 49 on the council.
Funny thing is, such measures have been tried elsewhere, and overturned by courts. That’s why political and religious pamphleteering was exempted in the Chicago version. Explicit enumeration of rights in the Constitution saved some freedom.
Just not enough.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Can we give John Edwards a taste of his own medicine?
One of the nostrums the Edwards presidential campaign proposes is a two-year ban on advertising for prescription drugs. Even if a drug makes it through the FDA’s hurdles, Edwards wants to prohibit the drug company from telling you about it for two more years.
Why this assault on First Amendment rights? Edwards says it’s to “prevent television ads from driving consumers to drugs that haven’t been proven safe.” He also says the commercials imply that by taking the drug you’ll be skipping through fields holding the hands of your loved one. You’ll be conned into believing Nirvana is around the corner no matter what potential side effects the voiceover warns you about.
By such reasoning, Edwards could ban all prescription drugs forever. Or all advertising forever. Ever see a TV commercial imply that your love life will improve if you have the right toothpaste or hair coloring?
No drug can be shown perfectly safe regardless of individual circumstances. Edwards doesn’t want persons who need certain drugs and would be willing to try them to even find out about the drugs. Not even if these customers have no realistic alternative. In his view, people can’t be trusted to make their own decisions about things.
Say, if Edwards does win the presidency, can we outlaw him from actually saying anything officially — as president — for a couple years? Maybe even four? What a blessed gift that would be.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Politicians love dynasties. Let’s call it incumbency-squared.
In America, we’ve had either a Bush or a Clinton serving in the nation’s highest office for the last two decades. Should Hillary Clinton win the presidency and serve for two full terms, America would have three decades, 28 years, of presidents from just these two families.
Yes, even here, in a republic, there are reasonable worries about dynastic rule.
At least, though, we have presidential term limits.
But then, so does Argentina. And the new president-elect of Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, is the wife of the current president, Néstor Kirchner. The couple has decided to alternate runs for the position, thereby weaseling around the country’s term limit of two consecutive terms. This way, they can rule for an indefinite period.
The Peronistas of Argentina express excitement. But Argentineans with sense should not.
And plenty of Argentineans do worry, especially the 55 percent who voted for someone else. They blanch at the flash and dazzle in the last campaign, the lack of substance. They even talk about Christina’s hair extensions, make-up, and quick-change wardrobe.
But they should worry most about the principles involved.
Don’t cheer for Cristina, Argentina. Term limits aren’t something to squirm out of. They are to be treated with respect. The benefit is blocking the monopolization of power.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Word of warning: Don’t let any rescue workers onto your property. Especially if the situation requiring emergency intervention could be hazardous to the health of the rescuers.
Seems a one-year-old baby named Joey Cosmillo wandered into the backyard of his central Florida home and fell into the pool. By the time his mom got him out, he wasn’t breathing. Rescue workers managed to resuscitate him. But the child is now brain damaged.
A terrible tragedy for any family. But now, add to that trauma a lawsuit from a police officer who showed up on the scene in response to the 911 call. Sergeant Andrea Eichhorn slipped on a puddle of water in the home that day, and broke her knee.
The sergeant isn’t talking to the press. But her lawyer explains: “It’s a situation where the Cosmillos have caused these problems, brought them on themselves, then tried to play the victim.”
I guess the lesson is, don’t call firefighters if your home is on fire. They might get burnt. Don’t call the police on your cell phone if you’re a hostage in the middle of a bank robbery. They might get shot at. Don’t call anybody who makes a living dealing with dangerous situations if you’re in a dangerous situation and can’t make everything normal before the cavalry arrives.
Of course, most emergency personnel have more common sense and good will than this. But you know, just when you think you’ve heard everything . . .
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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During the early days of our republic, animosity against bad politicians could turn quite extreme. A bucket of tar and a pillow of chicken feathers later, and getting on the bad side of the citizenry could have real consequences.
Well, we don’t use tar and feathers any longer, but we do have the Internet.
In Galveston, Texas, the local school board has upset a lot of citizens, one of whom put up a collaborative watchdog website
One typical article on the site makes fun of Lynne Cleveland, the superintendent, by comparing her statement on a state-mandated review program with other such statements from other district superintendents around the state, each saying pretty much the same thing. The superintendent had cribbed her press release.
Many local contributors to the site direct some pretty cutting remarks against what they call the “Circle of H’Eight,” with an “h-apostrophe” before the number “eight,” for the district’s seven Trustees and the superintendent together.
So what does the H’Eight do? Hire a lawyer! Threaten to sue.
The lawyer claims he’s never seen such personal invective directed towards school officials. Oh, and he demands that the website be taken down.
You do have to dig under a lot of invective to find the website’s points — but they do have them. Does that matter? Free speech means never having to say your sorry to politicians. That’s the law. Galveston officials should just be glad that they escaped tar and feathers.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Americans have become foul-mouthed. Vulgarity, swearing, cursing . . . such talk is everywhere, and it’s getting out of hand.
Now, I’m not perfect, but I do try to keep my own such outbursts to a minimum. Besides, my mother was right: People who use profanity a lot tend to look stupid. When you replace the perfect word with the common vulgarity, you appear intellectually lazy, not bright enough to retrieve from memory and speak with the truly apt nouns and verbs and adjectives.
Yet, there’s a time and place for everything. I can forgive — indeed, almost laud — uses of profanity when the situation merits it.
Case in point: A woman in West Scranton, Pennsylvania, is facing a disorderly conduct charge for swearing at her toilet. She could go to jail for a whopping 90 days for this.
And all she did is curse her stopped-up toilet.
Unfortunately, her bathroom window was open, and her words hit her neighbor’s ears. Rather than offer to help her with her toilet, her neighbor complained, telling her to stop using profanity. She responded with gusto. Little did she know, however, that the man was an off-duty cop. He filed a complaint.
Now I don’t want to defend someone’s use of bad language. But I wonder whether this woman isn’t the victim of one of those low-flush toilets mandated by Congress.
Justice may demand letting her go, and locking up Congress.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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My car just died. It needs a new motor. Unfortunately, that costs more than the car is worth. But I don't really even care.
You see, as bad news goes, that's nothing. I'm much more focused on my felony indictment in Oklahoma – threatened with a ten-year prison term for that oh-so-violent crime of helping others petition their government.
Two years ago, I helped advise Rick Carpenter of Tulsa on a petition drive to cap state government spending. The petition company was experienced in the state. Moreover, the company checked with state officials on the rules for who could circulate a petition, and followed those rules.
But after the fact, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled differently: that even people living in the state for months were not considered residents unless they planned to live in Oklahoma permanently.
Now even longer after the fact, the state’s controversial Attorney General Drew Edmondson has moved to prosecute those of us working on the effort for criminal conspiracy. But we didn’t conspire to break the law, just to understand and follow it.
The goal of this prosecution seems to be to scare, to intimidate, to silence those who seek to use the voter initiative process to pass needed reforms on government. Well, it is scary. But we'll not allow our rights to be bullied away.
Maybe it's time for all Americans — conservative, liberal, populist, libertarian — to "conspire" together to take back our political system from the gutter. Before it's too late.
This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.
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One of the nice things about common sense is that it really is pretty common. Most folks from New York City to Topeka possess their own healthy supply.
On the other hand, one of the bad things about common sense is that it seems to contain some mysterious property that repels politicians from getting anywhere close to it.
In Virginia, where I live, there are important legislative elections this year. For some reason, Virginia holds legislative elections in an off-year, when there is always lower voter turnout. Oh, now I get the reason.
So I’m seeing some TV ads and getting some mail from the candidates. Here’s a mailer from the Democratic Party of Virginia. It reads, “Paul Nichols wants to keep guns out of our schools and bring Northern Virginia common sense to Richmond.”
I wonder his opponent’s slogan: “I demand more school shootings, now!”?
And how different really is “Northern Virginia common sense” from, say “Richmond common sense” or common sense in Timbuktu?
Of course, the mailing also tells us that Mr. Nichols “shares our concerns, our ideals and our preference for common sense solutions.”
But you might be wondering: how will he vote on any of the actual issues that matter in our lives? No telling.
The mailer does tell us, though, that “the only way to fix a problem is to do something about it.”
But doing some "somethings" make things worse. And there's no sense in that.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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I like millionaires as much as the next person, maybe more. And I also believe in equal rights. But as I see it, no one really has a “right” to our tax dollars, least of all the rich.
That’s why I won’t be chanting “Save the Millionaires” at the next rally.
And that’s why this story seems so strange. Congress established a program back in 2000 to give D.C. students up to $10,000 a year to defray the cost of paying out-of-state college tuition. You see, with only one public university in the district, most students end up going elsewhere, paying the higher out-of-state tuition rates. That’s not quite fair, say D.C. officials.
Still, it made sense to me when Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn proposed a new rule allowing only those D.C. families making under a million dollars a year to get the tuition subsidy. After all, if we’re trying to help folks in need, helping folks not at all in need seems a waste. As Coburn’s spokesman put it, “Every dollar that goes to millionaire families is a dollar that’s not available to lower-income families.”
But Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C.’s delegate to Congress, strongly opposes this change, arguing, “If you are Bill Gates, who lives in the state of Washington, your kids can go to the University of Washington at in-state tuition rates. Our kids should have the same opportunities as other Americans.”
It’s just not fair. Millionaires in our nation’s capital won’t get this subsidy.
Thanks to Senator Coburn.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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