From The Pilot
By Chris Fitzsimon - Wednesday, July 28, 2010
“We have terrorists running America. … If we allow it, these same folks will inflict more damage on our nation than any suicide bomber could ever hope for.”
Those paranoid delusions are not the work of an anonymous commenter on an obscure right-wing website whose owners are difficult to discover. They are from an article a couple of weeks ago on wakeupamerica.com, a website run by two Republican members of the General Assembly, Sen. Andrew Brock and Rep. Bryan Holloway.
Suggesting that the president is a terrorist more dangerous than a suicide bomber is normally the kind of statement that would prompt calls for apologies or result in other elected officials distancing themselves from the statements and the people who made them.
Not in this case. Wakeupamerica.com has been spewing this kind of venom since Brock and his pals created it.
Past articles have talked about “the movement to take back our country from the radical socialist agenda that Obama and his cronies are subversively implementing,” and they have warned that “the left’s policies, especially those policies aggressively set forward by the Obama administration, target the family and Christian churches for destruction.”
Not only have there been no repercussions for Brock or Holloway, the media have barely reported on their offensive antics.
Another well-known North Carolinian is also playing a prominent role in the far right’s national attack machine: Fred Eshelman, the CEO of Pharmaceutical Product Development Inc. in Wilmington.
The School of Pharmacy at UNC-Chapel Hill was renamed for Eshelman two years ago after he gave more than $30 million to the university. Eshelman was in the news recently for a large gift he made to UNC Wilmington and for ringing the NASDAQ bell on the 25th anniversary of his company.
But Eshelman is more than a prominent businessman and university benefactor. He is the principal funder of a group called RightChange.com that ran ads against Obama in the 2008 election that were so extreme that even a respected conservative group called them “ridiculous” and an “outright, nonsensical lie.”
RightChange ran ads in a congressional race earlier this year that featured an attack of the “50-foot Pelosi” and is now attacking Florida Gov. and Senate candidate Charlie Crist.
Documents filed with the IRS show that RightChange spent just under $300,000 in the second quarter of this year, most of it on consultants. One of them is Tim Pittman, an official in administration of Republican Gov. Jim Martin in the 1980s.
The other board members of RightChange are Republican legislators, Sen. Fletcher Hartsell and Rep. Jeff Barnhart. They have never explained their involvement with the group or how they feel about the offensive ads it runs.
Earlier this year, Eshelman was also one of the founders of yet another right-wing group, Real Jobs NC, whose first website featured more distortions about North Carolina’s taxes. The website was taken down, but you can bet it will be back and it’s likely that ridiculous attack ads will come with it.
Maybe outrageous statements calling the president a terrorist or running blatantly false ads isn’t really news anymore in the current political climate.
But surely the fact that four state legislators and one of the state’s most prominent business leaders are playing increasingly prominent roles in the far right’s national propaganda machine that produces the scurrilous attacks is newsworthy.
Why isn’t anybody asking more questions?
Chris Fitzsimon is executive director of N.C. Policy Watch. Contact him at chris@ncpolicywatch.com.
Moore Progressive
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Better Be Preparing for the Budget Storm
From The Pilot
The one thing everyone agreed on during this year's budget debate is that North Carolina's financial problems will be a lot worse the next time lawmakers put a budget together.
The $1.3 billion temporary tax increase passed in 2009 will expire next June. The $1.4 billion in federal money used to balance this year's budget will be gone, or at best dramatically reduced.
More students will be showing up at universities and community colleges. Medicaid enrollment is almost certain to increase, and the cost of health care continues to rise. Add it all up, and it is a shortfall that the N.C. Budget and Tax Center says could come close to $4 billion.
Filling that hole would be an almost impossible challenge in a normal year, but addressing it after cutting $3 billion in General Fund spending in the last biennium boggles the mind.
More devastating cuts and less new revenue are on the way, no matter how much lawmakers talk about cutting waste and inefficiency in government. The hole is simply too massive.
The easy cuts have been made, and so have many that were not easy and in a lot of cases were inadvisable because of the damage they have inflicted on the fundamental institutions of the state, from the safety net to education at every level.
Most of the talk to date about the $4 billion problem on the not too distant horizon has been cast in political terms, used as a talking point by Republicans to portray Democrats as fiscally irresponsible, though Republicans didn't rush forward with any brilliant ideas about where to find a billion dollars or two to set aside without laying off thousands of teachers or closing hospitals.
That's the way politics works, and this is an especially charged political year. But we need more than soundbites to get ready for what's shaping up as the worst state budget crisis in 75 years. We need political leaders in both parties to start working on solutions now, not two months before the next fiscal year begins.
The most obvious place to start would be an overhaul of the state's antiquated tax system, an effort that has stalled time and time again in the face of heated opposition from well-heeled special interests and demagoguery from groups ready to twist any mention of taxes into crass government-bashing to serve their ideological agenda.
And tax reform is not the only place we need in-depth discussions now to get ready for next year. The state's criminal justice system continues to lock up nonviolent offenders that could be better served for less money in alternative settings, yet alternative programs suffered their own rounds of budget cuts in the last two years.
There's plenty more that lawmakers should consider to get ready for next year's crisis, from an honest look at business incentives to the program that provides tuition grants for North Carolina students at private colleges regardless of the student's family income level.
But they need to get started soon, not wait until the middle of next year's session.
Chris Fitzsimon is executive director of N.C. Policy Watch. Contact him at chris@ncpolicywatch.com.
The one thing everyone agreed on during this year's budget debate is that North Carolina's financial problems will be a lot worse the next time lawmakers put a budget together.
The $1.3 billion temporary tax increase passed in 2009 will expire next June. The $1.4 billion in federal money used to balance this year's budget will be gone, or at best dramatically reduced.
More students will be showing up at universities and community colleges. Medicaid enrollment is almost certain to increase, and the cost of health care continues to rise. Add it all up, and it is a shortfall that the N.C. Budget and Tax Center says could come close to $4 billion.
Filling that hole would be an almost impossible challenge in a normal year, but addressing it after cutting $3 billion in General Fund spending in the last biennium boggles the mind.
More devastating cuts and less new revenue are on the way, no matter how much lawmakers talk about cutting waste and inefficiency in government. The hole is simply too massive.
The easy cuts have been made, and so have many that were not easy and in a lot of cases were inadvisable because of the damage they have inflicted on the fundamental institutions of the state, from the safety net to education at every level.
Most of the talk to date about the $4 billion problem on the not too distant horizon has been cast in political terms, used as a talking point by Republicans to portray Democrats as fiscally irresponsible, though Republicans didn't rush forward with any brilliant ideas about where to find a billion dollars or two to set aside without laying off thousands of teachers or closing hospitals.
That's the way politics works, and this is an especially charged political year. But we need more than soundbites to get ready for what's shaping up as the worst state budget crisis in 75 years. We need political leaders in both parties to start working on solutions now, not two months before the next fiscal year begins.
The most obvious place to start would be an overhaul of the state's antiquated tax system, an effort that has stalled time and time again in the face of heated opposition from well-heeled special interests and demagoguery from groups ready to twist any mention of taxes into crass government-bashing to serve their ideological agenda.
And tax reform is not the only place we need in-depth discussions now to get ready for next year. The state's criminal justice system continues to lock up nonviolent offenders that could be better served for less money in alternative settings, yet alternative programs suffered their own rounds of budget cuts in the last two years.
There's plenty more that lawmakers should consider to get ready for next year's crisis, from an honest look at business incentives to the program that provides tuition grants for North Carolina students at private colleges regardless of the student's family income level.
But they need to get started soon, not wait until the middle of next year's session.
Chris Fitzsimon is executive director of N.C. Policy Watch. Contact him at chris@ncpolicywatch.com.
Nope, Just Kidding: A New Day of Racial Harmony
From The Pilot
By Dusty Rhoades - Sunday, July 25, 2010
It's been, to say the least, an interesting couple of weeks in American race relations.
Things kicked off when the NAACP voted, at its annual convention, on a resolution that "condemns the bigoted -elements within the tea party and asks for them to be repudiated." Note that the statement doesn't call all TPers racist. And as we know, it's not unusual in American politics for one group to ask another to "repudiate" its more fringe elements - so long as those fringe elements are on the so-called "left."
On one occasion, for instance, the late Tim Russert called on Barack Obama to repudiate, of all people, Harry Belafonte, for referring to President George W. Bush as a "terrorist," as if the rantings of an aging calypso star were somehow the responsibility of every black politician.
But, boy howdy, ask the TPers to distance themselves from the people at their rallies who carry signs showing the president as a witch doctor, complete with bone in nose, and just watch their old gray heads explode.
The immediate reaction was to go into their standard attack mode - as always, a variation on the old schoolyard riposte, "I know you are, but what am I?" It was the NAACP, the tea partiers asserted, who were the real racists.
Then the leader of a group called the Tea Party Express, a guy named Mark Williams, published a mock letter from the NAACP to Abraham Lincoln. "We Colored People have taken a vote and decided that we don't cotton to that whole emancipation thing," Williams wrote. "Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house."
Nope, no racism there. Within a few days, Williams was, as requested, repudiated. He and the Tea Party Express were tossed out of the the Tea Party Federation. The NAACP issued a press release commending the federation.
A new day of tolerance and understanding dawned in America. Ha ha! Just kidding.
Enter Andrew Breitbart, the man who gave the world the infamous ACORN "pimp" tapes, in which members of the community organizing group were supposedly caught on tape advising a fake pimp and his prostitute how to set up in business and avoid taxes. The tapes were later discovered by the California attorney general's office to have been "heavily edited." They cut out the fact that, among other things, one ACORN worker had called the cops and that the supposed "pimp" (shown in the intro in full Superfly regalia) had actually been dressed in a suit and tie and claimed he was a law student.
After that, Breitbart was discredited and never again believed or taken seriously by anyone of any significance. Hee hee! Got you again!
Breitbart claimed to have found a tape of a U.S. Department of Agriculture functionary named Shirley Sherrod telling an NAACP group that, in a former job, she hadn't given a white farmer who came to her for help "the full force of what she could do." She'd taken him to a white lawyer ("one of his own kind") and, as the clip ends, left him there.
The NAACP, apparently unaware of what a dishonest propagandist Breitbart is, condemned Sherrod. She lost her job with the USDA. Then the rest of the tape came out. Once again, things were not as Breitbart had presented them. Imagine that.
Sherrod found out that the lawyer she'd referred the farmer to hadn't done much. In fact, the poor guy was about to be foreclosed on. At that time, she went on to say, she realized that "it's really about those who have versus those who don't ... and they could be black; they could be white; they could be Hispanic."
She got to work, she helped save the man's farm, and she and his family remain friends to this day. He and his wife even went on CNN to try to clear Sherrod's name. Instead of a story of racism, it was a story of overcoming it. The NAACP and the White House apologized and USDA head Tom Vilsack offered Sherrod her job back. She's not sure she wants it, and who can blame her?
In the end, everyone learned a valuable lesson. From then on, everyone listened to what other people were actually saying, instead of filtering it through their own prejudices and trying to pick out little out-of-context nuggets to pelt their perceived enemies with.
Ho ho! That's a real knee-slapper, that one is.
Dusty Rhoades lives, writes and practices law in Carthage. Contact him at dustyr@nc.rr.com.
By Dusty Rhoades - Sunday, July 25, 2010
It's been, to say the least, an interesting couple of weeks in American race relations.
Things kicked off when the NAACP voted, at its annual convention, on a resolution that "condemns the bigoted -elements within the tea party and asks for them to be repudiated." Note that the statement doesn't call all TPers racist. And as we know, it's not unusual in American politics for one group to ask another to "repudiate" its more fringe elements - so long as those fringe elements are on the so-called "left."
On one occasion, for instance, the late Tim Russert called on Barack Obama to repudiate, of all people, Harry Belafonte, for referring to President George W. Bush as a "terrorist," as if the rantings of an aging calypso star were somehow the responsibility of every black politician.
But, boy howdy, ask the TPers to distance themselves from the people at their rallies who carry signs showing the president as a witch doctor, complete with bone in nose, and just watch their old gray heads explode.
The immediate reaction was to go into their standard attack mode - as always, a variation on the old schoolyard riposte, "I know you are, but what am I?" It was the NAACP, the tea partiers asserted, who were the real racists.
Then the leader of a group called the Tea Party Express, a guy named Mark Williams, published a mock letter from the NAACP to Abraham Lincoln. "We Colored People have taken a vote and decided that we don't cotton to that whole emancipation thing," Williams wrote. "Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house."
Nope, no racism there. Within a few days, Williams was, as requested, repudiated. He and the Tea Party Express were tossed out of the the Tea Party Federation. The NAACP issued a press release commending the federation.
A new day of tolerance and understanding dawned in America. Ha ha! Just kidding.
Enter Andrew Breitbart, the man who gave the world the infamous ACORN "pimp" tapes, in which members of the community organizing group were supposedly caught on tape advising a fake pimp and his prostitute how to set up in business and avoid taxes. The tapes were later discovered by the California attorney general's office to have been "heavily edited." They cut out the fact that, among other things, one ACORN worker had called the cops and that the supposed "pimp" (shown in the intro in full Superfly regalia) had actually been dressed in a suit and tie and claimed he was a law student.
After that, Breitbart was discredited and never again believed or taken seriously by anyone of any significance. Hee hee! Got you again!
Breitbart claimed to have found a tape of a U.S. Department of Agriculture functionary named Shirley Sherrod telling an NAACP group that, in a former job, she hadn't given a white farmer who came to her for help "the full force of what she could do." She'd taken him to a white lawyer ("one of his own kind") and, as the clip ends, left him there.
The NAACP, apparently unaware of what a dishonest propagandist Breitbart is, condemned Sherrod. She lost her job with the USDA. Then the rest of the tape came out. Once again, things were not as Breitbart had presented them. Imagine that.
Sherrod found out that the lawyer she'd referred the farmer to hadn't done much. In fact, the poor guy was about to be foreclosed on. At that time, she went on to say, she realized that "it's really about those who have versus those who don't ... and they could be black; they could be white; they could be Hispanic."
She got to work, she helped save the man's farm, and she and his family remain friends to this day. He and his wife even went on CNN to try to clear Sherrod's name. Instead of a story of racism, it was a story of overcoming it. The NAACP and the White House apologized and USDA head Tom Vilsack offered Sherrod her job back. She's not sure she wants it, and who can blame her?
In the end, everyone learned a valuable lesson. From then on, everyone listened to what other people were actually saying, instead of filtering it through their own prejudices and trying to pick out little out-of-context nuggets to pelt their perceived enemies with.
Ho ho! That's a real knee-slapper, that one is.
Dusty Rhoades lives, writes and practices law in Carthage. Contact him at dustyr@nc.rr.com.
Look Where Burr's Sympathies Lie
From The Pilot
By Kevin Smith - Sunday, July 25, 2010
Richard Burr has collected 6.3 million reasons to like his chances for re-election this November. Elaine Marshall has - well, Richard Burr. It's left to North Carolinians to decide whether $6.3 million is enough to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.
Project Vote Smart has a page where you can plug in a senator's name and see how he or she is rated by various interest groups. It's a good way to see where a senator's loyalties lie and whether his or her values reflect your values.
For instance, for the years from 2005 to April 2010, Burr received three A's and two B's from the gun owners of America. Compare that with his scores from the National Education Association, which are straight F's. Go down the list of education-related interests and his scores are, with one exception from one group in one year, either F's on a grade scale or below 31 on a percentage basis.
We may reasonably debate what, if any, restrictions are appropriate to Second Amendment rights, but giving Americans the tools to restore and sustain our economic viability should be sacrosanct. In Richard Burr's world, Little Johnny may or may not be able to read, but he can shoot. What does that mean for his prospects?
If our children want to compete for the best jobs, they're likely to have to do so in a globalized economy. It will be the caliber of their minds that matters. In the battles that will most directly determine the quality of their lives and the lives of their progeny, Richard Burr leaves our children out unarmed.
Burr's campaign ran an ad during the primary in which several supporters affirmed that Burr is the right choice for veterans. Here again, ratings from veterans groups over his time as a senator tell a different story. Burr ranks constantly low - all the more so when you consider the number of military bases and retired military in North Carolina. His highest rating from the major veterans groups during his time in the Senate is a C.
Burr is the ranking member of the Veteran's Affairs Committee, but he's no friend to veterans.
Here's another interesting paradox: Burr has an 85 percent rating from the National Right to Life Committee and an 88 percent rating from the Family Research Council, but only a 42 percent rating from the Children's Defense Fund, 0 percent from the American Public Health Association and 25 percent from the American Hospital Association.
What those numbers suggest is a man who is committed to the sanctity of life before birth but who has a vexing disregard for the sanctity life outside of the womb. Who does Burr represent? Does he represent the interests of upper-class, middle-class, working-class and impoverished North Carolinians equally? The numbers give us a clear understanding.
We know he supports business - Business-Industry PAC, 100 percent, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, 100 percent, all as you would expect. We know he's no friend to organized labor - AFL-CIO, 6 percent, American Federation of Government Employees, 8 percent, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, 0 percent, also to be expected.
But what about regular, not necessarily union, middle- and working-class North Carolinians? It turns out that there's an organization called themiddleclass.org. How does it rate our senior senator? For the years 2005-2009, he got straight F's, a 36 percent rating for 2009. He's just as weak on poverty issues as he is on middle-class issues. Burr's interests reflect the interests of those best able to pay for his support.
Richard Burr will use all of the considerable resources at his command to try to persuade a majority of North Carolinians that he's looking out for them. But in the words of Bill Parcells, "You are what your record says you are." Richard Burr's record says he's six years late for his regular tee time. North Carolinians deserve better.
Kevin Smith lives in Aberdeen. Contact him at kevinasmith@gmx.com.
By Kevin Smith - Sunday, July 25, 2010
Richard Burr has collected 6.3 million reasons to like his chances for re-election this November. Elaine Marshall has - well, Richard Burr. It's left to North Carolinians to decide whether $6.3 million is enough to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.
Project Vote Smart has a page where you can plug in a senator's name and see how he or she is rated by various interest groups. It's a good way to see where a senator's loyalties lie and whether his or her values reflect your values.
For instance, for the years from 2005 to April 2010, Burr received three A's and two B's from the gun owners of America. Compare that with his scores from the National Education Association, which are straight F's. Go down the list of education-related interests and his scores are, with one exception from one group in one year, either F's on a grade scale or below 31 on a percentage basis.
We may reasonably debate what, if any, restrictions are appropriate to Second Amendment rights, but giving Americans the tools to restore and sustain our economic viability should be sacrosanct. In Richard Burr's world, Little Johnny may or may not be able to read, but he can shoot. What does that mean for his prospects?
If our children want to compete for the best jobs, they're likely to have to do so in a globalized economy. It will be the caliber of their minds that matters. In the battles that will most directly determine the quality of their lives and the lives of their progeny, Richard Burr leaves our children out unarmed.
Burr's campaign ran an ad during the primary in which several supporters affirmed that Burr is the right choice for veterans. Here again, ratings from veterans groups over his time as a senator tell a different story. Burr ranks constantly low - all the more so when you consider the number of military bases and retired military in North Carolina. His highest rating from the major veterans groups during his time in the Senate is a C.
Burr is the ranking member of the Veteran's Affairs Committee, but he's no friend to veterans.
Here's another interesting paradox: Burr has an 85 percent rating from the National Right to Life Committee and an 88 percent rating from the Family Research Council, but only a 42 percent rating from the Children's Defense Fund, 0 percent from the American Public Health Association and 25 percent from the American Hospital Association.
What those numbers suggest is a man who is committed to the sanctity of life before birth but who has a vexing disregard for the sanctity life outside of the womb. Who does Burr represent? Does he represent the interests of upper-class, middle-class, working-class and impoverished North Carolinians equally? The numbers give us a clear understanding.
We know he supports business - Business-Industry PAC, 100 percent, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, 100 percent, all as you would expect. We know he's no friend to organized labor - AFL-CIO, 6 percent, American Federation of Government Employees, 8 percent, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, 0 percent, also to be expected.
But what about regular, not necessarily union, middle- and working-class North Carolinians? It turns out that there's an organization called themiddleclass.org. How does it rate our senior senator? For the years 2005-2009, he got straight F's, a 36 percent rating for 2009. He's just as weak on poverty issues as he is on middle-class issues. Burr's interests reflect the interests of those best able to pay for his support.
Richard Burr will use all of the considerable resources at his command to try to persuade a majority of North Carolinians that he's looking out for them. But in the words of Bill Parcells, "You are what your record says you are." Richard Burr's record says he's six years late for his regular tee time. North Carolinians deserve better.
Kevin Smith lives in Aberdeen. Contact him at kevinasmith@gmx.com.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
A letter to losers (of jobs)
From The Raleigh News and Observer
Dear Unemployed Person
or Persons:
These are tough times for Americans. They're especially tough times for people like you who have lost your jobs and who still can't find new ones, because of the Obama Recession, which started at approximately 12 noon on Jan. 20, 2009, after eight years of nonstop growth and prosperity under President George W. Bush.
We sympathize with your situation, and we know how hard it must be to be without a job as the bills pile up. (Technically, we don't really know how hard it must be, because we all have jobs - with lots of great benefits, too - but we can certainly imagine how hard it must be. We'd hate to be in your shoes right now.)
Anyway, we sympathize with what you and your loved ones must be going through - although why unemployed people still deserve to have loved ones when they're not doing a single thing to help them is a total mystery to us.
We're writing to set the record straight after weeks of misinformation put out by the Obama administration and their friends in the liberal media. You may have heard that Republicans have been opposed to extending unemployment benefits for the millions of Americans whose benefits have already run out.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The truth is: Republicans haven't been opposed to extending unemployment benefits. We've been opposed to letting the Senate vote on extending unemployment benefits - that's a totally different thing.
You may also have heard that some of us have had some unflattering things to say about unemployment benefits in general, and about how receiving unemployment benefits is a whole lot easier than looking for work and only encourages people to stay unemployed.
We weren't talking about you. You're almost certainly not the kind of person who'd sit on his duff week after week and take advantage of the generosity of hardworking, taxpaying, real Americans.
You know the kind of person we mean.
The other thing you might have heard about us is that we're "hypocrites," because now we oppose extending unemployment benefits, when we used to be in favor of them when George Bush was president.
Or maybe you've heard us called even bigger "hypocrites" because we insisted that any extended unemployment benefits be paid for, rather than adding to the deficit - even though we aren't insisting that extended tax cuts for wealthy Americans be paid for, and even though those particular tax cuts add much more to the deficit than unemployment benefits would.
We have a very simple answer to these charges: Where's Obama's birth certificate?
Besides, those are just numbers - we have the facts on our side. And the No. 1 fact is this: Everyone knows that Republicans stand for fiscal discipline and responsible budgeting. In fact, whenever fiscal discipline has broken down and the budget has gotten out of control, Republicans are the first ones to say who's responsible. (Hint: Not us.)
Mitch McConnell, our Republican Senate leader, put it exactly right the other day when he talked about the dangers of excessive government spending to help people who can't even hold a job. "At what point," he asked, "do we pivot and start being concerned about our children and our grandchildren?"
To Republicans, the answer is perfectly clear: We pivot when there's a Democrat in the White House.
"The president knows that Republicans support extending unemployment insurance..."
House Republican Leader
John Boehner
House Republican Leader
John Boehner
Dear Unemployed Person
or Persons:
These are tough times for Americans. They're especially tough times for people like you who have lost your jobs and who still can't find new ones, because of the Obama Recession, which started at approximately 12 noon on Jan. 20, 2009, after eight years of nonstop growth and prosperity under President George W. Bush.
We sympathize with your situation, and we know how hard it must be to be without a job as the bills pile up. (Technically, we don't really know how hard it must be, because we all have jobs - with lots of great benefits, too - but we can certainly imagine how hard it must be. We'd hate to be in your shoes right now.)
Anyway, we sympathize with what you and your loved ones must be going through - although why unemployed people still deserve to have loved ones when they're not doing a single thing to help them is a total mystery to us.
We're writing to set the record straight after weeks of misinformation put out by the Obama administration and their friends in the liberal media. You may have heard that Republicans have been opposed to extending unemployment benefits for the millions of Americans whose benefits have already run out.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The truth is: Republicans haven't been opposed to extending unemployment benefits. We've been opposed to letting the Senate vote on extending unemployment benefits - that's a totally different thing.
You may also have heard that some of us have had some unflattering things to say about unemployment benefits in general, and about how receiving unemployment benefits is a whole lot easier than looking for work and only encourages people to stay unemployed.
We weren't talking about you. You're almost certainly not the kind of person who'd sit on his duff week after week and take advantage of the generosity of hardworking, taxpaying, real Americans.
You know the kind of person we mean.
The other thing you might have heard about us is that we're "hypocrites," because now we oppose extending unemployment benefits, when we used to be in favor of them when George Bush was president.
Or maybe you've heard us called even bigger "hypocrites" because we insisted that any extended unemployment benefits be paid for, rather than adding to the deficit - even though we aren't insisting that extended tax cuts for wealthy Americans be paid for, and even though those particular tax cuts add much more to the deficit than unemployment benefits would.
We have a very simple answer to these charges: Where's Obama's birth certificate?
Besides, those are just numbers - we have the facts on our side. And the No. 1 fact is this: Everyone knows that Republicans stand for fiscal discipline and responsible budgeting. In fact, whenever fiscal discipline has broken down and the budget has gotten out of control, Republicans are the first ones to say who's responsible. (Hint: Not us.)
Mitch McConnell, our Republican Senate leader, put it exactly right the other day when he talked about the dangers of excessive government spending to help people who can't even hold a job. "At what point," he asked, "do we pivot and start being concerned about our children and our grandchildren?"
To Republicans, the answer is perfectly clear: We pivot when there's a Democrat in the White House.
Rick Horowitz is a syndicated columnist. You can write to him at rickhoro@execpc.com.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Fishermen rebuild oyster reefs with stimulus money
From Raleigh News and Observer
he Associated Press
he Associated Press
WILMINGTON -- Federal stimulus funds have been doled out far and wide. And deep. Like the bottom of a North Carolina sound.
About 70 fishermen are being paid to scatter oyster shells in shallow waters along the state's coast, said Ted Wilgis, education coordinator for the North Carolina Coastal Federation.
That includes a 1-acre area in the Middle Sound off Wrightsville Beach that fishermen James and Steven Galloway hope will keep their family business going for years to come.
About 70 fishermen are being paid to scatter oyster shells in shallow waters along the state's coast, said Ted Wilgis, education coordinator for the North Carolina Coastal Federation.
That includes a 1-acre area in the Middle Sound off Wrightsville Beach that fishermen James and Steven Galloway hope will keep their family business going for years to come.
The site will be closed for four years to allow the oysters to grow before they are harvested.
James Galloway, 56, told The Star-News of Wilmington about 75 percent of his income comes from collecting and selling oysters.
"It helps us in more ways than one," said Steven Galloway, 21. "It's work for now. It's good money. Then in a few years, we'll have more oysters. It's sort of win-win all the way around."
Besides the fishermen, about 65 other jobs for barge operators, lab technicians and tugboat captains are collecting paychecks from the coastal federation's $5 million grant under the stimulus package, Wilgis said.
The project has also paid earlier this summer to create two large oyster reefs covering 48 acres in Pamlico Sound that will not be reopened to fishing.
The work comes as oysters need to find a hard surface to grow on after drifting in ocean currents for the first several weeks of their lives. The stacks of old oyster shells provide the habitat they need.
Oysters also play an important ecological role, said Troy Alphin, a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington's Center for Marine Science.
Oyster reefs shelter fish, crabs and other small marine creatures, which provide food for larger fish. Oysters also filter and improve the coastal waters.
James Galloway, 56, told The Star-News of Wilmington about 75 percent of his income comes from collecting and selling oysters.
"It helps us in more ways than one," said Steven Galloway, 21. "It's work for now. It's good money. Then in a few years, we'll have more oysters. It's sort of win-win all the way around."
Besides the fishermen, about 65 other jobs for barge operators, lab technicians and tugboat captains are collecting paychecks from the coastal federation's $5 million grant under the stimulus package, Wilgis said.
The project has also paid earlier this summer to create two large oyster reefs covering 48 acres in Pamlico Sound that will not be reopened to fishing.
The work comes as oysters need to find a hard surface to grow on after drifting in ocean currents for the first several weeks of their lives. The stacks of old oyster shells provide the habitat they need.
Oysters also play an important ecological role, said Troy Alphin, a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington's Center for Marine Science.
Oyster reefs shelter fish, crabs and other small marine creatures, which provide food for larger fish. Oysters also filter and improve the coastal waters.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Marshall, Burr volley over jobless benefits
Democratic Senate candidate Elaine Marshall on Tuesday accused Republican Sen. Richard Burr of helping block the extension of unemployment benefits for millions of North Carolinians.
Marshall, the secretary of state, held a news conference outside Burr's Winston-Salem office, where she delivered a petition of 15,000 signatures urging Burr to end his opposition.
"For months my opponent has been working against our working families - blocking the extension of unemployment benefits," Marshall said in prepared remarks. "Because of this partisan obstruction, more than 2.5 million Americans have been cut off (from) unemployment benefits they desperately need to survive."
She was accompanied by several unemployed North Carolinians.Marshall, the secretary of state, held a news conference outside Burr's Winston-Salem office, where she delivered a petition of 15,000 signatures urging Burr to end his opposition.
"For months my opponent has been working against our working families - blocking the extension of unemployment benefits," Marshall said in prepared remarks. "Because of this partisan obstruction, more than 2.5 million Americans have been cut off (from) unemployment benefits they desperately need to survive."
Burr's office released a statement saying that he agrees with President Barack Obama's statement last November that benefits must be extended in "a financially responsible way" that does not add to the national debt.
Burr said Republican proposals to pay for extended benefits by making cuts elsewhere in government had been blocked by Democrats four times.
"I think everyone agrees that we should extend unemployment benefits, but one party is using this as a political tool while the other party wants to extend the benefits and pay for them," Burr said.
Meanwhile, the state Democratic Party released a Web video of Burr giving a C-SPAN interview in March in which he said automatically extending unemployment benefits for 12 months would be a "discouragement to individuals out there to actually go out and go through the interview process."
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Marching toward Arizona
From NC Policy Watch
If you want to know what might be in North Carolina's future, take a look at Arizona and not just its much-publicized, offensive and likely unconstitutional immigration law. Look at the rest of that state's government too if you want a preview of what the angry Right and the think tanks that support them could do here if they take over state government in the fall.
Ken Silverstein has a preview in the July issue of Harper's Magazine and it's a sobering read. The hard, angry right runs the Arizona legislature and has for years. That's why the state literally sold its Capitol to raise money and leases it back.
Other state buildings have been sold too, day-long kindergarten for poor children has been abolished, and thousands of people have been slashed from the Medicaid rolls. The state has securitized the lottery, which basically means it's also been sold, and raided a special fund set aside for education.
The state has done all that and still faces a massive budget crisis next year. You can only imagine what that will prompt lawmakers to do. They have cut taxes 15 of the last 17 years despite their budget woes.
And it's not just fiscal policy. Legislators in Arizona have passed legislation demanding to see President Obama's birth certificate if he runs for reelection and they have declared that Arizonans have a constitutional right to hunt.
They have allowed guns to be taken into many previously gun free zones like bars and university campuses supposedly to protect the state from terrorism. The Harper's story quotes one member of the Arizona General Assembly saying that trees were stealing the state's water supply.
There's more in what Silverstein calls a "Grover Norquist lab experiment run amok," but that's not entirely accurate. It's turned out just like Norquist had hoped. He's the anti-government crusader who famously said he wanted to shrink government enough "were we can drown it in a bathtub."
It's also what could happen in North Carolina if you listen to the rhetoric from the tea parties and the politicians who pander to them.
Republican Party Chair Tom Fetzer organized an effort to defeat extremist Congressional candidate and Christ's War blogger Tim D'Annunzio in a primary runoff, but Fetzer based his criticism on D'Annunzio's criminal record. He never denounced D'Annunzio's positions or rhetoric that included a call to dismantle most of the federal government.
Republican candidates routinely appear at rallies alongside people who portray Obama as Hitler and claim he favors genocide.
The think tankers on the Right are there too and it's their philosophical extremism that morphs into policy positions for the candidates they support. It's not hard to imagine a tea party dominated General Assembly abolishing Smart Start and doubling or tripling tuition at UNC.
Raleigh's leading think tank on the Right has long advocated both. They also want to sell state buildings and privatize museums and parks or at least charge admission fees only the wealthy could afford.
Say goodbye to affordable housing programs and health-insurance for kids in working poor families. Public education would almost certainly be dismantled and privatized too, with vouchers and tax credits that also benefit the rich.
Taxes, especially on the wealthy and corporations would be slashed and slashed again, no matter what university had to be closed or what vital human service had be to be abolished. Raising revenue is never an option. That's why they insist on pledges and oaths from candidates never to raise taxes.
It might seem impossible that could happen in North Carolina, a moderate and occasionally progressive state. But if listening to the hard right rhetoric at the tea parties and political rallies doesn't convince you, take a long look at what has happened in Arizona.
And remember that plenty of people there thought it could never happen either.
Tuesday, July 20th, 2010
By Chris FitzsimonIf you want to know what might be in North Carolina's future, take a look at Arizona and not just its much-publicized, offensive and likely unconstitutional immigration law. Look at the rest of that state's government too if you want a preview of what the angry Right and the think tanks that support them could do here if they take over state government in the fall.
Ken Silverstein has a preview in the July issue of Harper's Magazine and it's a sobering read. The hard, angry right runs the Arizona legislature and has for years. That's why the state literally sold its Capitol to raise money and leases it back.
Other state buildings have been sold too, day-long kindergarten for poor children has been abolished, and thousands of people have been slashed from the Medicaid rolls. The state has securitized the lottery, which basically means it's also been sold, and raided a special fund set aside for education.
The state has done all that and still faces a massive budget crisis next year. You can only imagine what that will prompt lawmakers to do. They have cut taxes 15 of the last 17 years despite their budget woes.
And it's not just fiscal policy. Legislators in Arizona have passed legislation demanding to see President Obama's birth certificate if he runs for reelection and they have declared that Arizonans have a constitutional right to hunt.
They have allowed guns to be taken into many previously gun free zones like bars and university campuses supposedly to protect the state from terrorism. The Harper's story quotes one member of the Arizona General Assembly saying that trees were stealing the state's water supply.
There's more in what Silverstein calls a "Grover Norquist lab experiment run amok," but that's not entirely accurate. It's turned out just like Norquist had hoped. He's the anti-government crusader who famously said he wanted to shrink government enough "were we can drown it in a bathtub."
It's also what could happen in North Carolina if you listen to the rhetoric from the tea parties and the politicians who pander to them.
Republican Party Chair Tom Fetzer organized an effort to defeat extremist Congressional candidate and Christ's War blogger Tim D'Annunzio in a primary runoff, but Fetzer based his criticism on D'Annunzio's criminal record. He never denounced D'Annunzio's positions or rhetoric that included a call to dismantle most of the federal government.
Republican candidates routinely appear at rallies alongside people who portray Obama as Hitler and claim he favors genocide.
The think tankers on the Right are there too and it's their philosophical extremism that morphs into policy positions for the candidates they support. It's not hard to imagine a tea party dominated General Assembly abolishing Smart Start and doubling or tripling tuition at UNC.
Raleigh's leading think tank on the Right has long advocated both. They also want to sell state buildings and privatize museums and parks or at least charge admission fees only the wealthy could afford.
Say goodbye to affordable housing programs and health-insurance for kids in working poor families. Public education would almost certainly be dismantled and privatized too, with vouchers and tax credits that also benefit the rich.
Taxes, especially on the wealthy and corporations would be slashed and slashed again, no matter what university had to be closed or what vital human service had be to be abolished. Raising revenue is never an option. That's why they insist on pledges and oaths from candidates never to raise taxes.
It might seem impossible that could happen in North Carolina, a moderate and occasionally progressive state. But if listening to the hard right rhetoric at the tea parties and political rallies doesn't convince you, take a long look at what has happened in Arizona.
And remember that plenty of people there thought it could never happen either.
Senator Hagan steps up on veterans' mental health
From Blue NC
Submitted by scharrison on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 2:38pm
Submitted by scharrison on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 2:38pm
I received this earlier today via e-mail from a Governor's Focus member:
TRICARE is not a facility or a group of practicing clinicians, it's a funding vehicle. And for those who have left active duty service, it soon becomes a health care insurance plan that requires a monthly premium payment, if they want to remain enrolled. It doesn't provide care, it pays for care, and the dollars are appropriated for and administered by the Department of Defense. And it's not some sort of entitlement program dreamed up by soft-hearted politicians, it's an integral part of our nation's defense framework.
I wanted to make that clear upfront, because the bill in question, if passed, will facilitate the needed treatment of thousands of current and former service members. And that's going to cost money. A lot of money. As such, there will be opposition to this increase in spending, both from Congress and the DoD itself. Opposition which should (and probably will) be ashamed to show its face in public.
Now to the "why" this is needed. Within the mental health field in general, and the substance abuse field in particular, the vast majority of counselors and clinicians are not (medical) doctors. This is not to disparage the value of doctors in the system, but to provide demographics. The number of MD's is so limited, the few in the system are often responsible for serving several clinics, making an appearance at each maybe once a week. Meaning, if an individual must see a physician before he/she can even begin the evaluation/treatment process, that appointment could be weeks in coming. And for some, those few weeks could be a lifetime.
Speaking of, now is as good a time as any to talk about suicide rates in the ranks:
Back to the people who can ease that suffering and save those precious lives and families. Those non-MD's; the PA's, nurses, psychologists, licensed counselors, etc., are the eyes, ears, mouths (and yes) hearts of our mental health system. They have the brains and ability to both assess problems and open doors where solutions can be found. Whether it's in- or out-patient treatment relying on government, private, or faith-based resources, these folks are armed with answers. Our troops are in desperate need of those answers, and the extra funding that would require.
U.S. Senator Kay R. Hagan (D-NC) yesterday cosponsored a bipartisan bill to help service members access mental health care services...Here's the core of the problem Kay is trying to fix:
“Our service men and women put their lives on the line for our country, and they now face an unnecessary, administrative hurdle to accessing mental health care,” Hagan said. “As a U.S. Senator from North Carolina and member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I am focused on ensuring our veterans, active duty military and their families can access the services they need. Mental health care for our returning troops is so critical, and I will work with my colleagues to ensure this important bill is signed into law.”
Currently, TRICARE, the health care system for service members, requires them to obtain a physician referral in order to see a licensed mental health counselor. However, this same obstacle is not applied to licensed social workers or certified marriage and family therapists.I'm going to attempt to give you some background on this issue, but if any MH professionals notice any fallacies or points that need clarification, please let us know. Getting it right is critical.
TRICARE is not a facility or a group of practicing clinicians, it's a funding vehicle. And for those who have left active duty service, it soon becomes a health care insurance plan that requires a monthly premium payment, if they want to remain enrolled. It doesn't provide care, it pays for care, and the dollars are appropriated for and administered by the Department of Defense. And it's not some sort of entitlement program dreamed up by soft-hearted politicians, it's an integral part of our nation's defense framework.
I wanted to make that clear upfront, because the bill in question, if passed, will facilitate the needed treatment of thousands of current and former service members. And that's going to cost money. A lot of money. As such, there will be opposition to this increase in spending, both from Congress and the DoD itself. Opposition which should (and probably will) be ashamed to show its face in public.
Now to the "why" this is needed. Within the mental health field in general, and the substance abuse field in particular, the vast majority of counselors and clinicians are not (medical) doctors. This is not to disparage the value of doctors in the system, but to provide demographics. The number of MD's is so limited, the few in the system are often responsible for serving several clinics, making an appearance at each maybe once a week. Meaning, if an individual must see a physician before he/she can even begin the evaluation/treatment process, that appointment could be weeks in coming. And for some, those few weeks could be a lifetime.
Speaking of, now is as good a time as any to talk about suicide rates in the ranks:
June was not only the worst month ever for American combat deaths in Afghanistan. It was the worst month ever for suicides in the Army, CBS National Security Correspondent David Martin reports.We've lost more troops to suicide in the last nine years than have died in combat in Afghanistan. To say we have a mental health crisis is such an understatement that I can find no analogy with which to make a suitable comparison. And the scary part is, even if we withdrew all forces from the theater today, the legacy of that mental health damage will continue to take lives for years.
A total of 32 soldiers, both active duty and reserve, took their own lives in those 30 days. So far this year, 145 soldiers have committed suicide compared with 130 during the first six months of last year, which at the time was the worst on record.
Back to the people who can ease that suffering and save those precious lives and families. Those non-MD's; the PA's, nurses, psychologists, licensed counselors, etc., are the eyes, ears, mouths (and yes) hearts of our mental health system. They have the brains and ability to both assess problems and open doors where solutions can be found. Whether it's in- or out-patient treatment relying on government, private, or faith-based resources, these folks are armed with answers. Our troops are in desperate need of those answers, and the extra funding that would require.
Protesters disrupt school board meeting
- STAFF WRITER
A mid-meeting disruption that verged on a riot has erupted at tonight's Wake County school board meeting with a group of chanting protesters refusing to relinquish the microphone. A string of arrests by armed police has followed.
During what had been a relatively quiet meeting, speaker Carolyn Coleman began a loud complaint to the board about its policies on diversity, then brought more than two dozen protesters forward to join her in chants of "forward ever! backwards never!"
Young protesters David Eisenstandt, a familiar figure among the youth protesters, was one of the first arrested, as police took at least half a dozen into custody.
During what had been a relatively quiet meeting, speaker Carolyn Coleman began a loud complaint to the board about its policies on diversity, then brought more than two dozen protesters forward to join her in chants of "forward ever! backwards never!"
Young protesters David Eisenstandt, a familiar figure among the youth protesters, was one of the first arrested, as police took at least half a dozen into custody.
Board members have retreated into a private meeting after protesters ignored Chairman Ron Margiotta's threats of arrest.
Now remaining protesters are singing the civil rights anthem "We Shall Overcome."
Board member Keith Sutton at one point was in the midst of the fray, apparently trying to prevent excessive or rough handling of demonstrators. Sutton was briefly halted by police, but let go, observers said.
Earlier, Rev. William Barber, head of the state NAACP, and Rev. Nancy Petty, senior pastor at Pullen Memorial Baptist Church, were arrested by Raleigh police as they stepped onto the property of the Wake school board administration building, defying a school district letter barring them from the grounds.
Shortly after leading a downtown march and rally protesting the Wake school board majority's decision to ditch the district's long-standing diversity policy, Barber arrived at school administration headquarters on Wake Forest Road in Raleigh. Stepping out of an SUV around 2:45 p.m., Barber was met at the building entrance by Harold Lassiter, head of security for the school district, and several Raleigh police officers. With Petty by his side, Barber read aloud an open letter to school board chairman Ron Margiotta.
Lassiter asked whether Barber, who along with Petty, Duke University professor Tim Tyson and activist Mary D. Williams were arrested for disrupting a June 15 school board meeting, had prepared written assurances he wouldn't disrupt the afternoon school board meeting taking place inside the building as required by a school board letter banning the four from the property.
"No," Barber said. Officers then arrested Barber and Petty and led them away in plastic wrist restraints and transported to the Wake County jail.
Barber and Petty were charged with second-degree trespassing, said Jim Sughrue, Raleigh police spokesman. A protester was also arrested. Gregory Moss was charged with resisting, delaying or obstructing a law enforcement officer and was also transported to the Wake County jail.
Their arrest triggered shouting and chants from the more than 100 protesters gathered outside the building, many of them carrying signs equating the board majority's diversity decision with de facto resegregation of Wake schools and neighborhoods. More than 20 Raleigh police officers, some on horseback, were stationed around the crowd, backed up by a mobile command center. Paramedics pedaled on bicycles, on the lookout for protesters overcome by the high heat.
Inside the building, the school board started its monthly meeting with Margiotta's pledge not to create schools full of poor or minority children. They faced a packed house of both supporters and opponents.
Chairman Ron Margiotta just gave an opening statement maintaining that that the board would not be distracted by its detractors, presumably including this morning's downtown protesters and the pastors and others arrested minutes ago when trying to attend the meeting, from which they had been barred.
Margiotta heads a coalition determined to end the Wake schools' longstanding emphasis on maintaining balanced schools based on students economic background.
"This board does not intend to create high-poverty or low-performing schools in the new zone assignments.
The board has a full agenda of items, including addressing projected elementary school overcrowding and preparing a job description for a new superintendent.
Earlier today, Wake County school board chair Ron Margiotta proposed generally limiting school board meetings to one per month, instead of the customary two, with one or two work sessions each month.
In addition, Margiotta suggested the elimination of the board's standing committees, saying that having items discussed in committees, at work sessions and at public meetings led to repetition. Some members said the approach would not allow time for adequate consideration of items before they had to be voted on.
"Let's try it and see how it works," Margiotta said, suggesting that the proposal could be tried for three or four months as a test.
Later he added, "The intention was to try to streamline our process."
A resolution calling for the change on a trial basis will be heard at the meeting today.
Items could be introduced through members designated as liaisons in particular areas, or directly to the chair, he said.
Training sessions could be incorporated into some work sessions. State law calls for school boards to meet on the first Tuesday of each month.
Margiotta, who introduced the proposal at a committee of the whole meeting that is in progress, had suggested last month that he would have substantive changes to suggest in the board's meeting structure.
"I don't see how board members could be up to speed on all the items we work on," member Kevin Hill said. "I am beginning to get frustrated with making decisions with 12 minutes to think about it."
Ad hoc committees, like the one formed to search for a new superintendent, would continue to operate, Margiotta said.
Now remaining protesters are singing the civil rights anthem "We Shall Overcome."
Board member Keith Sutton at one point was in the midst of the fray, apparently trying to prevent excessive or rough handling of demonstrators. Sutton was briefly halted by police, but let go, observers said.
Earlier, Rev. William Barber, head of the state NAACP, and Rev. Nancy Petty, senior pastor at Pullen Memorial Baptist Church, were arrested by Raleigh police as they stepped onto the property of the Wake school board administration building, defying a school district letter barring them from the grounds.
Shortly after leading a downtown march and rally protesting the Wake school board majority's decision to ditch the district's long-standing diversity policy, Barber arrived at school administration headquarters on Wake Forest Road in Raleigh. Stepping out of an SUV around 2:45 p.m., Barber was met at the building entrance by Harold Lassiter, head of security for the school district, and several Raleigh police officers. With Petty by his side, Barber read aloud an open letter to school board chairman Ron Margiotta.
Lassiter asked whether Barber, who along with Petty, Duke University professor Tim Tyson and activist Mary D. Williams were arrested for disrupting a June 15 school board meeting, had prepared written assurances he wouldn't disrupt the afternoon school board meeting taking place inside the building as required by a school board letter banning the four from the property.
"No," Barber said. Officers then arrested Barber and Petty and led them away in plastic wrist restraints and transported to the Wake County jail.
Barber and Petty were charged with second-degree trespassing, said Jim Sughrue, Raleigh police spokesman. A protester was also arrested. Gregory Moss was charged with resisting, delaying or obstructing a law enforcement officer and was also transported to the Wake County jail.
Their arrest triggered shouting and chants from the more than 100 protesters gathered outside the building, many of them carrying signs equating the board majority's diversity decision with de facto resegregation of Wake schools and neighborhoods. More than 20 Raleigh police officers, some on horseback, were stationed around the crowd, backed up by a mobile command center. Paramedics pedaled on bicycles, on the lookout for protesters overcome by the high heat.
Inside the building, the school board started its monthly meeting with Margiotta's pledge not to create schools full of poor or minority children. They faced a packed house of both supporters and opponents.
Chairman Ron Margiotta just gave an opening statement maintaining that that the board would not be distracted by its detractors, presumably including this morning's downtown protesters and the pastors and others arrested minutes ago when trying to attend the meeting, from which they had been barred.
Margiotta heads a coalition determined to end the Wake schools' longstanding emphasis on maintaining balanced schools based on students economic background.
"This board does not intend to create high-poverty or low-performing schools in the new zone assignments.
The board has a full agenda of items, including addressing projected elementary school overcrowding and preparing a job description for a new superintendent.
Earlier today, Wake County school board chair Ron Margiotta proposed generally limiting school board meetings to one per month, instead of the customary two, with one or two work sessions each month.
In addition, Margiotta suggested the elimination of the board's standing committees, saying that having items discussed in committees, at work sessions and at public meetings led to repetition. Some members said the approach would not allow time for adequate consideration of items before they had to be voted on.
"Let's try it and see how it works," Margiotta said, suggesting that the proposal could be tried for three or four months as a test.
Later he added, "The intention was to try to streamline our process."
A resolution calling for the change on a trial basis will be heard at the meeting today.
Items could be introduced through members designated as liaisons in particular areas, or directly to the chair, he said.
Training sessions could be incorporated into some work sessions. State law calls for school boards to meet on the first Tuesday of each month.
Margiotta, who introduced the proposal at a committee of the whole meeting that is in progress, had suggested last month that he would have substantive changes to suggest in the board's meeting structure.
"I don't see how board members could be up to speed on all the items we work on," member Kevin Hill said. "I am beginning to get frustrated with making decisions with 12 minutes to think about it."
Ad hoc committees, like the one formed to search for a new superintendent, would continue to operate, Margiotta said.
thomas.goldsmith@newsobserver.com or 919-829-8929
Sunday, July 18, 2010
The World In Which We All Grew Up
From The Pilot
By Dusty Rhoades - Sunday, July 18, 2010
Recently, House Minority Leader John Boehner gave an interview to The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review in which he - surprise! - criticized Congressional Democrats and Congress.
It was a wide-ranging interview covering subjects like the financial reform bill, which Boehner compared to "killing an ant with a nuclear weapon." (I'm sure people adversely affected by the financial meltdown will be glad to know that the crisis was only an "ant" as far as the Republican leadership is concerned.)
As usual, Boehner trotted out one of the catchphrases of the American right: a professed yearning for, as he put it, "the America he grew up in," which he claims is being "snuffed out" by those awful Democrats.
Well, according to Brother John's Wikipedia page, he was born in 1949. So the "America he grew up in" saw the Red Scares, the polio epidemics, the Korean War, McCarthyism, the Berlin Wall and the hydrogen bomb. It also was the era in which the Vietnam War began, although no one really paid much attention at the time. Oh, and let's not forget the overarching and ever-present dread of a nuclear war that would wipe out civilization (fallout shelters, anyone?)
It should also be noted that America wasn't exactly congenial if you were black, brown, gay or disabled, and was pretty doggone restrictive if you were female. If you were an abused child, your plight was more likely than not to be ignored or hushed up.
I joined up with America in 1962. The America I grew up in saw the aforementioned Vietnam War in full bloody flower, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy and Malcolm X, race riots, anti-war riots, the 1968 Chicago "police riot," hippies, Yippies, an exploding drug culture, Nixon, Watergate, Charles Manson, an OPEC embargo which led to a gas crisis, an economic crisis, a hostage crisis, "malaise," a major city going broke, Chrysler going broke (and having to be bailed out), polyester leisure suits, disco, and a limited selection of weak, lousy beer that we only drank because we didn't know that there was anything better.
Oh, and there was still that fear that we were going to start swapping nukes with the Russians and wipe out all life on the planet. Consider this, though: The America Brother John and I grew up in also gave us the vaccine that eradicated polio, the GI Bill, the Marshall Plan, the Interstate highway system, Elvis, Chuck Berry, the Civil Rights Act, the Clean Air Act, the Ford Mustang, moon landings, communications satellites, weather satellites, the transistor, the microchip, the MRI ... the list of advancements, societal and scientific, goes on and on.
And now? There are still environmental dangers like the Gulf oil spill, but on average, the country's air and water are measurably cleaner than they used to be. We are able, if we have the will, to give everyone in the country instant access to more information than our ancestors ever dreamed of.
We still have our differences with the Russians, but we don't live in fear that we're going to blow each other off the face of the Earth. We still fear attack, but it's not a world-ending one. Things are not perfect, but they're certainly better, for children, women, minorities, gays and the disabled. And the beer selection is excellent.
The America I grew up in is like the one John Boehner grew up in, the one my children grew up in, and the one that every American child born while you read this column is going to grow up in. It's a place of fear, violence, chaos and injustice. It's a place of hope, kindness, creativity and progress. It's always, as Dickens put it, the best of times and the worst of times.
What America is always doing, though, is moving forward. That progress may be slow, or it moves in fits and starts. That can be frustrating. But there's no going back, Mr. Boehner. The America we grew up in is gone, and it's not coming back. A new one is being made every day on its foundations, just like every day since the country was founded. You can slow that down, but you can't stop it.
Dusty Rhoades lives, writes and practices law in Carthage. Contact him at dustyr@nc.rr.com.
By Dusty Rhoades - Sunday, July 18, 2010
Recently, House Minority Leader John Boehner gave an interview to The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review in which he - surprise! - criticized Congressional Democrats and Congress.
It was a wide-ranging interview covering subjects like the financial reform bill, which Boehner compared to "killing an ant with a nuclear weapon." (I'm sure people adversely affected by the financial meltdown will be glad to know that the crisis was only an "ant" as far as the Republican leadership is concerned.)
As usual, Boehner trotted out one of the catchphrases of the American right: a professed yearning for, as he put it, "the America he grew up in," which he claims is being "snuffed out" by those awful Democrats.
Well, according to Brother John's Wikipedia page, he was born in 1949. So the "America he grew up in" saw the Red Scares, the polio epidemics, the Korean War, McCarthyism, the Berlin Wall and the hydrogen bomb. It also was the era in which the Vietnam War began, although no one really paid much attention at the time. Oh, and let's not forget the overarching and ever-present dread of a nuclear war that would wipe out civilization (fallout shelters, anyone?)
It should also be noted that America wasn't exactly congenial if you were black, brown, gay or disabled, and was pretty doggone restrictive if you were female. If you were an abused child, your plight was more likely than not to be ignored or hushed up.
I joined up with America in 1962. The America I grew up in saw the aforementioned Vietnam War in full bloody flower, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy and Malcolm X, race riots, anti-war riots, the 1968 Chicago "police riot," hippies, Yippies, an exploding drug culture, Nixon, Watergate, Charles Manson, an OPEC embargo which led to a gas crisis, an economic crisis, a hostage crisis, "malaise," a major city going broke, Chrysler going broke (and having to be bailed out), polyester leisure suits, disco, and a limited selection of weak, lousy beer that we only drank because we didn't know that there was anything better.
Oh, and there was still that fear that we were going to start swapping nukes with the Russians and wipe out all life on the planet. Consider this, though: The America Brother John and I grew up in also gave us the vaccine that eradicated polio, the GI Bill, the Marshall Plan, the Interstate highway system, Elvis, Chuck Berry, the Civil Rights Act, the Clean Air Act, the Ford Mustang, moon landings, communications satellites, weather satellites, the transistor, the microchip, the MRI ... the list of advancements, societal and scientific, goes on and on.
And now? There are still environmental dangers like the Gulf oil spill, but on average, the country's air and water are measurably cleaner than they used to be. We are able, if we have the will, to give everyone in the country instant access to more information than our ancestors ever dreamed of.
We still have our differences with the Russians, but we don't live in fear that we're going to blow each other off the face of the Earth. We still fear attack, but it's not a world-ending one. Things are not perfect, but they're certainly better, for children, women, minorities, gays and the disabled. And the beer selection is excellent.
The America I grew up in is like the one John Boehner grew up in, the one my children grew up in, and the one that every American child born while you read this column is going to grow up in. It's a place of fear, violence, chaos and injustice. It's a place of hope, kindness, creativity and progress. It's always, as Dickens put it, the best of times and the worst of times.
What America is always doing, though, is moving forward. That progress may be slow, or it moves in fits and starts. That can be frustrating. But there's no going back, Mr. Boehner. The America we grew up in is gone, and it's not coming back. A new one is being made every day on its foundations, just like every day since the country was founded. You can slow that down, but you can't stop it.
Dusty Rhoades lives, writes and practices law in Carthage. Contact him at dustyr@nc.rr.com.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
NAACP July 20th March 4 our Children and against resegregation
Submitted by Tara on Mon, 07/12/2010 - 10:28.
The Follies
From NC Policy Watch
By Chris Fitzsimon
Debunking the high-tax rhetoric one more time
It's always interesting to note when a national study or report names North Carolina one of the best places in the country to do business.
The Governor's office sends out a press release, a few media outlets mention it briefly and the next day the anti-government crowd resumes making their ridiculous claims that state tax and regulatory policies make it virtually impossible for companies to operate here.
They almost always include the talking point that North Carolina taxes are the highest in the Southeast (they're not by the way) and that the state is losing jobs to its neighbors because it's so hostile to business and free enterprise.
That was the script again this week as CNBC released its annual ranking of the top states in the country for business. North Carolina was 4th, and made the biggest jump in the rankings from the previous year. The results are worth looking at in a little more detail.
One of the criteria was the cost of doing business, which included taxes, utility costs, workers; compensation insurance, etc. North Carolina ranked 15th in that category, but ahead of southern states like Georgia, Louisiana, Virginia, even Texas, the top-ranked state overall.
The cost of doing business in North Carolina is lower than it is in Texas. That's not something we hear very often during the debate in the General Assembly about taxes or regulation. Or on the campaign trail.
Empty your wallet scratch-off game
The North Carolina Exploitation Lottery unveiled three new games this week, always a reason to celebrate. One of them is an instant scratch-off game appropriately named "Break the Bank."
It does bring to mind a lot of other ideas for instant scratch-off games, "empty your wallet," "waste your savings," "throwaway your kids college education," or "take a chance with grocery money."
The possibilities are endless once you decide to fund education by convincing people to buy lottery tickets.
The UNC PAC is reloading
Here's another interesting note from the campaign finance reports that were filed this week by candidates for state office and political action committees. Citizens for Higher Education, the PAC funded by wealthy supporters of UNC-Chapel Hill has just under $180,000 in the bank and that's after already contributing $58,000 to legislators campaigns this election cycle.
The PAC handed out $479,000 to legislators' campaigns in the 2008 elections, so plenty more cash is likely on the way to campaign coffers from the well-heeled UNCers.
This legislative session, lawmakers finally repealed the provision that let out-of-state athletes pay in-state tuition, which has been a $10 million windfall for the athletic booster clubs that pay for athletic scholarships.
The PAC continues to employ two lobbyists to patrol the legislative halls on its behalf, even though UNC-Chapel Hill has its own lobbyist and the university's interests are also represented by the folks from the university system who work with legislators on a daily basis.
The booster club subsidy is gone for now thank goodness, but it's hard to rest when the fatcats who support it are still throwing their money around.
From the Fringe
There's plenty to choose from for this week's From the Fringe. Angry Locker Jon Ham is still seeing a liberal media conspiracy behind every tree.
Ham was upset that a national story carried in the News & Observer about the NAACP's resolution about the tea party movement incorrectly capitalized the word democratic in a quote by a tea party official.
The N&O reported the statement this way. "There's no room for that kind of vitriolic language in a civilized Democratic society," Shelton said.
Democratic little d is the correct usage.
Sloppy copy editing you might think? Ham is sure there's much more to it, either the reporter intentionally used the capital D, or more likely used it by accident which Ham thinks would be far worse, because it reveals a "deep and unconscious bias."
Maybe he could help crack the code behind the common misuse of the word Capitol, which only refers to a building, not a city.
It all seems to add up to a covert plot to overthrow the government through carefully and diabolically placed grammatical errors. Be on the lookout. You have been warned.
Ham's not the only one on the Right breathlessly hyperbolic this week. The Locker's Asheville ranter uses this headline to criticize a story in the Hendersonville paper about Congressman Health Shuler's position on legislation allowing public employees to collectively bargain.
"Mollycoddled Weasel Words to Bring Down a Nation." Letting firefighters collectively bargain would destroy America? Who knew?
The fear-mongering even finds its way into the Lockers event announcements. One for something called a citizen's constitutional workshop proclaims that "the past 100 years of Progressive Ideology have almost destroyed the US Constitution."
We are hanging by a thread ladies and gentleman. Our nation is at risk. Make sure all your subjects and verbs agree and please, please, don't make any mistakes in Capitalization capitalization.
By Chris Fitzsimon
Debunking the high-tax rhetoric one more time
It's always interesting to note when a national study or report names North Carolina one of the best places in the country to do business.
The Governor's office sends out a press release, a few media outlets mention it briefly and the next day the anti-government crowd resumes making their ridiculous claims that state tax and regulatory policies make it virtually impossible for companies to operate here.
They almost always include the talking point that North Carolina taxes are the highest in the Southeast (they're not by the way) and that the state is losing jobs to its neighbors because it's so hostile to business and free enterprise.
That was the script again this week as CNBC released its annual ranking of the top states in the country for business. North Carolina was 4th, and made the biggest jump in the rankings from the previous year. The results are worth looking at in a little more detail.
One of the criteria was the cost of doing business, which included taxes, utility costs, workers; compensation insurance, etc. North Carolina ranked 15th in that category, but ahead of southern states like Georgia, Louisiana, Virginia, even Texas, the top-ranked state overall.
The cost of doing business in North Carolina is lower than it is in Texas. That's not something we hear very often during the debate in the General Assembly about taxes or regulation. Or on the campaign trail.
Empty your wallet scratch-off game
The North Carolina Exploitation Lottery unveiled three new games this week, always a reason to celebrate. One of them is an instant scratch-off game appropriately named "Break the Bank."
It does bring to mind a lot of other ideas for instant scratch-off games, "empty your wallet," "waste your savings," "throwaway your kids college education," or "take a chance with grocery money."
The possibilities are endless once you decide to fund education by convincing people to buy lottery tickets.
The UNC PAC is reloading
Here's another interesting note from the campaign finance reports that were filed this week by candidates for state office and political action committees. Citizens for Higher Education, the PAC funded by wealthy supporters of UNC-Chapel Hill has just under $180,000 in the bank and that's after already contributing $58,000 to legislators campaigns this election cycle.
The PAC handed out $479,000 to legislators' campaigns in the 2008 elections, so plenty more cash is likely on the way to campaign coffers from the well-heeled UNCers.
This legislative session, lawmakers finally repealed the provision that let out-of-state athletes pay in-state tuition, which has been a $10 million windfall for the athletic booster clubs that pay for athletic scholarships.
The PAC continues to employ two lobbyists to patrol the legislative halls on its behalf, even though UNC-Chapel Hill has its own lobbyist and the university's interests are also represented by the folks from the university system who work with legislators on a daily basis.
The booster club subsidy is gone for now thank goodness, but it's hard to rest when the fatcats who support it are still throwing their money around.
From the Fringe
There's plenty to choose from for this week's From the Fringe. Angry Locker Jon Ham is still seeing a liberal media conspiracy behind every tree.
Ham was upset that a national story carried in the News & Observer about the NAACP's resolution about the tea party movement incorrectly capitalized the word democratic in a quote by a tea party official.
The N&O reported the statement this way. "There's no room for that kind of vitriolic language in a civilized Democratic society," Shelton said.
Democratic little d is the correct usage.
Sloppy copy editing you might think? Ham is sure there's much more to it, either the reporter intentionally used the capital D, or more likely used it by accident which Ham thinks would be far worse, because it reveals a "deep and unconscious bias."
Maybe he could help crack the code behind the common misuse of the word Capitol, which only refers to a building, not a city.
It all seems to add up to a covert plot to overthrow the government through carefully and diabolically placed grammatical errors. Be on the lookout. You have been warned.
Ham's not the only one on the Right breathlessly hyperbolic this week. The Locker's Asheville ranter uses this headline to criticize a story in the Hendersonville paper about Congressman Health Shuler's position on legislation allowing public employees to collectively bargain.
"Mollycoddled Weasel Words to Bring Down a Nation." Letting firefighters collectively bargain would destroy America? Who knew?
The fear-mongering even finds its way into the Lockers event announcements. One for something called a citizen's constitutional workshop proclaims that "the past 100 years of Progressive Ideology have almost destroyed the US Constitution."
We are hanging by a thread ladies and gentleman. Our nation is at risk. Make sure all your subjects and verbs agree and please, please, don't make any mistakes in Capitalization capitalization.
Senator Hagan solidly behind caps on emissions
From Blue NC
Submitted by scharrison on Sat, 07/17/2010 - 10:54am
Submitted by scharrison on Sat, 07/17/2010 - 10:54am
Adding her signature to a letter sent to the leader of the Senate:
“We believe the scale of this challenge dictates the need for a comprehensive solution that includes making polluters pay through a price on greenhouse gas emissions,” wrote Sens. Mark Begich of Alaska, Michael Bennet of Colorado, Roland Burris of Illinois, Al Franken of Minnesota, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Ted Kaufmann of Delaware, Jeff Merkley of Oregon, Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Mark Udall of Colorado, Tom Udall of New Mexico and Mark Warner of Virginia.And I believe you're right.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Report: School Districts’ Perspectives on the Economic Stimulus Package
From NC Policy Watch
Teaching Jobs Saved in 2009-10 But Teacher Layoffs Loom for Next School Year
Friday, July 16th, 2010
By StaffTeaching Jobs Saved in 2009-10 But Teacher Layoffs Loom for Next School Year
While nearly two-thirds of all school districts have used the federal stimulus money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to save or create teaching jobs in the 2009-10 school year, as many as three-quarters of the nation's school districts expect to cut teaching jobs in 2010-11 due to budget decreases, according to a new survey of districts released this week by the Center on Education Policy (CEP).
The report, based on a nationally representative sample of district-level administrators surveyed in the spring of 2010, finds that nearly 95 percent of the nation's school districts have received or been promised funding from the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund (SFSF) authorized by ARRA. However, districts with funding declines are likely to face serious problems in the coming school year because much of the federal stabilization funding they have received has already been spent. An estimated 68 percent of school districts expect their total budgets, excluding ARRA funds, to decrease for school year 2010-11. As a result, 75 percent of districts that received SFSF funds expect to lay off teachers in 2010-11 to address their persistent budget shortfall.
SFSF funds helped to stabilize local budgets in 2009-10, though they were often insufficient to compensate for budget decreases not covered by the federal stimulus money. The report also finds that even with the ARRA funds, about 45 percent of districts with SFSF grants had to cut teaching staff in the 2009-10 school year.
"Unless additional recovery money is provided, the education jobs crisis that had been averted to some extent this year may emerge in full force in the coming school year, creating unprecedented shortages of classroom teachers that could undermine progress in school reform," said Jack Jennings, CEP's president and CEO.
CEP asked districts about actions they were undertaking to implement ARRA's four reform areas. CEP found that districts focused more aggressively on reform goals relating to improving teacher quality, bolstering standards and improving assessments, and participating in state longitudinal data systems than on improving low-performing schools. CEP suggests that this may be because districts have focused heavily on aligning their education reforms with state priorities and because not all districts have low-performing schools.
The majority of school districts have received or have been promised supplemental funding through ARRA for Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). More than half of districts receiving this funding are using the money to save or create jobs, as well as to purchase materials, technology, and equipment.
You can access the full report, at CEP's web site.
Based in Washington, D.C., the Center on Education Policy is a national, independent advocate for public education and for more effective public schools. The Center works to help Americans better understand the role of public education in a democracy and the need to improve the academic quality of public schools.
White House: Stimulus created nearly 1 million jobs in South
This week, President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers released [pdf] their latest quarterly report about jobs flowing from the spring 2009 stimulus bill.
According to the White House figures, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has saved or created just over 3 million jobs -- including nearly 1 million in 13 Southern states.
The estimates -- especially for the number of jobs potentially "saved" thanks to the stimulus bill's impact on the overall economy -- involve modeling that is far from an exact science, although the report does take pains to cite a variety of government and independent sources to confirm its conclusions.
Based on their data, here's a chart with the state-by-state numbers:
The Southern numbers are especially notable given the political battles over the stimulus last year. The government's data show that some of the biggest job gains came in states led by governors who vocally opposed the stimulus bill:
* In Texas, Gov. Rick Perry (R) initially rejected $555 million in stimulus money for unemployment benefits (although later changed his mind) and even suggested Texas might have to secede from the United States. The White House estimated 225,000 jobs were created or saved in Texas, second only to California.
* South Carolina's embattled Gov. Mark Sanford (R) vocally opposed the ARRA and likened accepting stimulus money to "fiscal child abuse." The Obama team says it can take credit for 41,000 jobs in that state.
* In Louisiana, Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) savaged a "stimulus bill that has not stimulated" (although, less than a day after that, he did a photo op celebrating a stimulus-funded project). The government credits the stimulus bill with creating 39,000 jobs in Louisiana.
* Mississippi's Gov. Haley Barbour (R) was a staunch opponent of the stimulus, and suggested on Fox News this year that it's only created government jobs. The Mississippi stimulus impact: 26,000 jobs.
* This week, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) said it's "hard to say" how much impact the stimulus has had in his state, allowing it may be responsible for up to 14,000 of the 72,000 jobs created on his watch this year. The White House estimates 73,000 jobs from the stimulus overall.
Of course, these numbers don't even count a big source of Southern job stimulus this summer: the 2010 Census, which just last month was employing over 100,000 people in 11 Southern states.
Who says the South doesn't need government jobs programs?
According to the White House figures, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has saved or created just over 3 million jobs -- including nearly 1 million in 13 Southern states.
The estimates -- especially for the number of jobs potentially "saved" thanks to the stimulus bill's impact on the overall economy -- involve modeling that is far from an exact science, although the report does take pains to cite a variety of government and independent sources to confirm its conclusions.
Based on their data, here's a chart with the state-by-state numbers:
The Southern numbers are especially notable given the political battles over the stimulus last year. The government's data show that some of the biggest job gains came in states led by governors who vocally opposed the stimulus bill:
* In Texas, Gov. Rick Perry (R) initially rejected $555 million in stimulus money for unemployment benefits (although later changed his mind) and even suggested Texas might have to secede from the United States. The White House estimated 225,000 jobs were created or saved in Texas, second only to California.
* South Carolina's embattled Gov. Mark Sanford (R) vocally opposed the ARRA and likened accepting stimulus money to "fiscal child abuse." The Obama team says it can take credit for 41,000 jobs in that state.
* In Louisiana, Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) savaged a "stimulus bill that has not stimulated" (although, less than a day after that, he did a photo op celebrating a stimulus-funded project). The government credits the stimulus bill with creating 39,000 jobs in Louisiana.
* Mississippi's Gov. Haley Barbour (R) was a staunch opponent of the stimulus, and suggested on Fox News this year that it's only created government jobs. The Mississippi stimulus impact: 26,000 jobs.
* This week, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) said it's "hard to say" how much impact the stimulus has had in his state, allowing it may be responsible for up to 14,000 of the 72,000 jobs created on his watch this year. The White House estimates 73,000 jobs from the stimulus overall.
Of course, these numbers don't even count a big source of Southern job stimulus this summer: the 2010 Census, which just last month was employing over 100,000 people in 11 Southern states.
Who says the South doesn't need government jobs programs?
N.C. unemployment falls for fourth consecutive month
07/16/2010 11:31 AM
Since February, the state has added more than 45,000 jobs.
In June, the number of unemployed workers in the state decreased by more than 20,000 to more than 454,000. Since this time a year ago, that number has decreased by close to 44,000.
County-by-county unemployment rates for June will be released next Friday.
Push builds for Democratic convention in Charlotte
City leaders hire consultants to help Charlotte prepare for visit from party's site selection team.
Charlotte leaders ramped up their push for the 2012 Democratic National Convention on Thursday, bringing on two consultants, launching a website and laying out a vision of "an Olympic village" for up to 35,000 delegates.
"It's a tremendous honor for our community to be among the four cities selected for this process," Mayor Anthony Foxx told reporters. "It would be an even greater honor to win."
Last month, the Democratic National Committee named Charlotte a finalist for the convention along with Cleveland, Minneapolis and St. Louis.
A site selection committee is expected to visit the city later this month. A decision could come by the end of the year.
Foxx said the convention would put Charlotte on an international stage and mean an economic impact of up to $200 million.
Foxx and Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers, who co-chairs the effort, spoke to reporters at the Charlotte Chamber. They stood before a backdrop adorned with a logo for "Charlotte in 2012" and the slogan "Reaching for Tomorrow."
The organizing group has hired Tom McMahon, a former executive director of the DNC, and Karen Finney, a former spokeswoman for the DNC. McMahon led the effort that chose Denver, Colo., to host the 2008 convention.
The Charlotte group has also hired the marketing firm Luquire George Andrews.
Foxx said no public money is going to the organizing effort.
Rogers said his job "is about the money." He offered no details of how much has been raised or spent so far. If Charlotte wins the convention, it would be expected to raise at least $40 million.
Rogers touted the relatively compact center city, where hotels and venues such as Time Warner Cable Arena and the convention center are within walking distance.
"We can make Charlotte an Olympic village for a political convention," he said.
Legislative Session Proved A Busy One
By Scott Mooneyham - Friday, July 16, 2010
Raleigh
Not so long ago, state legislators had years in which they met for eight months while accomplishing very little other than making sure that the state budget was balanced for another year.
This latest even-year short session of the North Carolina General Assembly, in which they met three months, won't be remembered that way.
Legislators bit off big chunks of substantial policy change in 2010. Some weren't completed until the wee hours Saturday morning, as the General Assembly adjourned for the year after a grueling final day in which lawmakers met for more than 20 hours.
The Democrats who control the legislature were motivated by an uncertain political landscape that threatens their majorities in the House and Senate. Sometimes that kind of threat can be a recipe for a do-nothing legislative session.
It had a different effect this year.
Legislators hit the ground running in their budget deliberations. They ultimately approved a $19 billion state spending plan, the total rising to $20.6 billion when accounting for federal stimulus money. The bill's passage marked the first time since 2003 that legislators had a budget in place by the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.
In a second straight year of depressed tax collections, the budget provided no salary increases for state employees. Those workers, though, seemed happy to avoid the furloughs and layoffs seen in other states.
The biggest critics of the spending plan were home health businesses. They were chagrined with a decision to significantly scale back a Medicaid program for in-home care services for the poor.
Legislative Republicans predicted doom because the plan made few provisions for next year, when most or all that extra federal help to the states will be gone.
Besides the budget, state lawmakers passed another round of government ethics reform, made another attempt at banning video poker, approved a batch of tax breaks and incentive measures designed to lure new industry to the state, and decided to require DNA samples of those arrested for some crimes.
They also passed legislation that puts tougher rules on local alcohol boards, broadens how money collected from a service fee on telephone bills can be spent, and subjects those who violate domestic violence orders to tougher criminal penalties.
As always, some major legislation died on the vine. Among the victims: a proposed overhaul of how negligence lawsuits are decided, a $450 million borrowing plan with projects that included new engineering facilities at N.C. State University, a proposal to soften the state's ban on hardened structures along beaches, and a measure to discourage the operation of abusive puppy mills.
For three months, legislators were as busy as the beavers they decided shouldn't be moved from Greensboro (yet another last-day piece of legislation considered).
Now they'll get busy with the business of trying to keep or win power. How the decisions they made over the last three months play into that business is anyone's guess.
Scott Mooneyham writes for Capitol Press Association in Raleigh. Contact him at smooneyh@ncinsider.com.
Raleigh
Not so long ago, state legislators had years in which they met for eight months while accomplishing very little other than making sure that the state budget was balanced for another year.
This latest even-year short session of the North Carolina General Assembly, in which they met three months, won't be remembered that way.
Legislators bit off big chunks of substantial policy change in 2010. Some weren't completed until the wee hours Saturday morning, as the General Assembly adjourned for the year after a grueling final day in which lawmakers met for more than 20 hours.
The Democrats who control the legislature were motivated by an uncertain political landscape that threatens their majorities in the House and Senate. Sometimes that kind of threat can be a recipe for a do-nothing legislative session.
It had a different effect this year.
Legislators hit the ground running in their budget deliberations. They ultimately approved a $19 billion state spending plan, the total rising to $20.6 billion when accounting for federal stimulus money. The bill's passage marked the first time since 2003 that legislators had a budget in place by the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.
In a second straight year of depressed tax collections, the budget provided no salary increases for state employees. Those workers, though, seemed happy to avoid the furloughs and layoffs seen in other states.
The biggest critics of the spending plan were home health businesses. They were chagrined with a decision to significantly scale back a Medicaid program for in-home care services for the poor.
Legislative Republicans predicted doom because the plan made few provisions for next year, when most or all that extra federal help to the states will be gone.
Besides the budget, state lawmakers passed another round of government ethics reform, made another attempt at banning video poker, approved a batch of tax breaks and incentive measures designed to lure new industry to the state, and decided to require DNA samples of those arrested for some crimes.
They also passed legislation that puts tougher rules on local alcohol boards, broadens how money collected from a service fee on telephone bills can be spent, and subjects those who violate domestic violence orders to tougher criminal penalties.
As always, some major legislation died on the vine. Among the victims: a proposed overhaul of how negligence lawsuits are decided, a $450 million borrowing plan with projects that included new engineering facilities at N.C. State University, a proposal to soften the state's ban on hardened structures along beaches, and a measure to discourage the operation of abusive puppy mills.
For three months, legislators were as busy as the beavers they decided shouldn't be moved from Greensboro (yet another last-day piece of legislation considered).
Now they'll get busy with the business of trying to keep or win power. How the decisions they made over the last three months play into that business is anyone's guess.
Scott Mooneyham writes for Capitol Press Association in Raleigh. Contact him at smooneyh@ncinsider.com.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Legislating Under the Influence
Executive Summary
Long before BP’s Deepwater Horizon well began belching oil into the Gulf of Mexico, BP and the rest of the energy industry had turned loose a gusher of cash in Washington, saturating Congress and the federal government’s regulatory apparatus.
In the last decade alone, big energy has pumped more than $2.9 billion into electing and lobbying federal officials and candidates, according to campaign finance and lobbying disclosure reports.
That’s about $5.5 million for each of the 535 seats in the House and Senate.
As energy dollars flow freely in Washington, the development of alternative energy sources proceeds slowly, at best, and the nation’s reliance on energy produced overseas grows deeper. Meanwhile, at the industry’s urging, a 27-year moratorium on oil and gas drilling off the east coast has been allowed to expire and legislation to cap carbon emissions, pushing oil-gulping industries to find new energy sources and use petroleum more efficiently, has stalled in Congress.
And in the Gulf, what President Obama has called “a scandalously close relationship” between oil companies and the agency that regulates them, looms as a likely contributor to an environmental disaster that is poisoning an entire ecosystem and threatening the nation’s seafood and tourist industries.
Data compiled by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics reveal that:
Energy interests, including oil and gas companies, electric utilities, mining companies and waste management firms, have contributed more than $337 million to federal candidates and party organizations since 2000. Only the financial sector – banks, insurance companies and other financial firms, has given more.
Oil and gas companies are the energy industry’s most aggressive donors. They’ve contributed more than $154 million to federal candidates since 2000, about 46 percent of big energy’s total donations. Electric utilities have donated more than $104 million and mining interests just over $30 million.
The energy industry focuses its investments in Congress on lawmakers who can most help the industry’s bottom line. Since 2000, big energy has given nearly $110 million to the campaigns of members of four Congressional panels assigned to oversee it. Industry donations to committee members increased nearly 80 percent between 2000 and 2008, amid growing public support for legislation to put new limits on carbon emissions. Big energy also looks out for Congressional leaders; though it’s still early in the current election cycle, the industry has given nearly $3.1 million to campaign committees and political action committees controlled by House and Senate Democratic and Republican leaders.
The energy industry generally prefers Republicans, but money follows power. In some elections during the past decade its spending on GOP candidates has been three times that on Democrats. Big energy’s support for Republicans soared during the Bush administration, as Vice President Dick Cheney led an energy task force that actively sought industry input. But after Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, their share of the industry’s donations increased dramatically, and so far in 2010 the GOP is doing only slightly better than the Democrats in attracting industry donations.
Employees of and groups tied to BP, the company at the center of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, have donated more than $3 million to congressional election campaigns since 2000. BP also invests heavily in lobbying; the company spent nearly $16 million in 2009 and more than $3.5 million on lobbying during the first quarter of this year.
The Minerals Management Service, the federal government’s supposed watchdog on the industry, has been a longstanding target of energy lobbyists – with devastating results. Since 2006, the number of companies and industry advocacy groups lobbying the agency has more than doubled, according to an analysis by Congressional Quarterly.(1) Industry lobbyists have paid for gifts, ski trips and golf outings for MMS employees, and a 2008 investigation by the Interior Department’s inspector general found that employees at an MMS royalty collection office in Denver engaged in sex and used drugs with energy company representatives.(2)
The energy industry has made a point of adding former MMS executives, along with former Congressional staff members, to its lobbying staffs. While President Obama has ordered federal agencies not to hire anyone involved in lobbying agency officials during the past two years, the “revolving door” from the federal government to the lobbying corps remains open. More than 300 lobbyists now working for oil and gas interests have past connections to federal agencies or Congress. (3)
No sensible person would invest the kind of money the energy industry invests in our government and politics without expecting something in return. And big energy’s investments have helped it secure lax Congressional and regulatory oversight and a host of federal policies that benefit its bottom line.
But as millions of gallons of oil spill into the Gulf of Mexico every day, it’s increasingly clear that the industry’s profits are coming at the nation’s expense. Political leaders who are serious about helping America achieve energy independence need to declare their own political independence, scrapping a system that relies on special interest money to finance their campaigns and replacing it with small donations from working Americans through the Fair Elections Now Act.
Long before BP’s Deepwater Horizon well began belching oil into the Gulf of Mexico, BP and the rest of the energy industry had turned loose a gusher of cash in Washington, saturating Congress and the federal government’s regulatory apparatus.
In the last decade alone, big energy has pumped more than $2.9 billion into electing and lobbying federal officials and candidates, according to campaign finance and lobbying disclosure reports.
That’s about $5.5 million for each of the 535 seats in the House and Senate.
As energy dollars flow freely in Washington, the development of alternative energy sources proceeds slowly, at best, and the nation’s reliance on energy produced overseas grows deeper. Meanwhile, at the industry’s urging, a 27-year moratorium on oil and gas drilling off the east coast has been allowed to expire and legislation to cap carbon emissions, pushing oil-gulping industries to find new energy sources and use petroleum more efficiently, has stalled in Congress.
And in the Gulf, what President Obama has called “a scandalously close relationship” between oil companies and the agency that regulates them, looms as a likely contributor to an environmental disaster that is poisoning an entire ecosystem and threatening the nation’s seafood and tourist industries.
Data compiled by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics reveal that:
Energy interests, including oil and gas companies, electric utilities, mining companies and waste management firms, have contributed more than $337 million to federal candidates and party organizations since 2000. Only the financial sector – banks, insurance companies and other financial firms, has given more.
Oil and gas companies are the energy industry’s most aggressive donors. They’ve contributed more than $154 million to federal candidates since 2000, about 46 percent of big energy’s total donations. Electric utilities have donated more than $104 million and mining interests just over $30 million.
The energy industry focuses its investments in Congress on lawmakers who can most help the industry’s bottom line. Since 2000, big energy has given nearly $110 million to the campaigns of members of four Congressional panels assigned to oversee it. Industry donations to committee members increased nearly 80 percent between 2000 and 2008, amid growing public support for legislation to put new limits on carbon emissions. Big energy also looks out for Congressional leaders; though it’s still early in the current election cycle, the industry has given nearly $3.1 million to campaign committees and political action committees controlled by House and Senate Democratic and Republican leaders.
The energy industry generally prefers Republicans, but money follows power. In some elections during the past decade its spending on GOP candidates has been three times that on Democrats. Big energy’s support for Republicans soared during the Bush administration, as Vice President Dick Cheney led an energy task force that actively sought industry input. But after Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, their share of the industry’s donations increased dramatically, and so far in 2010 the GOP is doing only slightly better than the Democrats in attracting industry donations.
During the first quarter of 2010, the energy industry spent more than $3.2 million on lobbying for each day that Congress was in session. That's more than $244,000 per member through the quarter. Among major industries, only health care interests have spent more. For every $1 spent on political campaigns, the energy industry spends more than $7 on lobbying. Since 2000, energy companies have invested nearly $2.6 billion to lobby Congress and the executive branch. The industry’s annual tab for lobbying increased by 159 percent during the decade, as it won passage during 2005 of an energy bill giving $14.5 billion in tax breaks to energy companies, and during 2008 persuaded Congress and then-President George W. Bush to lift a 27-year embargo on offshore oil and gas exploration in the Atlantic.
Employees of and groups tied to BP, the company at the center of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, have donated more than $3 million to congressional election campaigns since 2000. BP also invests heavily in lobbying; the company spent nearly $16 million in 2009 and more than $3.5 million on lobbying during the first quarter of this year.
The Minerals Management Service, the federal government’s supposed watchdog on the industry, has been a longstanding target of energy lobbyists – with devastating results. Since 2006, the number of companies and industry advocacy groups lobbying the agency has more than doubled, according to an analysis by Congressional Quarterly.(1) Industry lobbyists have paid for gifts, ski trips and golf outings for MMS employees, and a 2008 investigation by the Interior Department’s inspector general found that employees at an MMS royalty collection office in Denver engaged in sex and used drugs with energy company representatives.(2)
The energy industry has made a point of adding former MMS executives, along with former Congressional staff members, to its lobbying staffs. While President Obama has ordered federal agencies not to hire anyone involved in lobbying agency officials during the past two years, the “revolving door” from the federal government to the lobbying corps remains open. More than 300 lobbyists now working for oil and gas interests have past connections to federal agencies or Congress. (3)
No sensible person would invest the kind of money the energy industry invests in our government and politics without expecting something in return. And big energy’s investments have helped it secure lax Congressional and regulatory oversight and a host of federal policies that benefit its bottom line.
But as millions of gallons of oil spill into the Gulf of Mexico every day, it’s increasingly clear that the industry’s profits are coming at the nation’s expense. Political leaders who are serious about helping America achieve energy independence need to declare their own political independence, scrapping a system that relies on special interest money to finance their campaigns and replacing it with small donations from working Americans through the Fair Elections Now Act.
Falling behind, quietly
CHAPEL HILL -- I've been a football player who majored in philosophy, a Texan who believes in civil rights, a leftist intellectual obsessed with Hank Williams and a Tar Heel who prefers beef brisket to pork barbecue. I'm at ease with incongruity.
Still, in recent months, I've observed curiously distinct universes.
First, I'm a student of politics. And there is little doubt that the greatest energy and most potent fervor in our civic lives now comes from an erupted volcano on the right.
Still, in recent months, I've observed curiously distinct universes.
First, I'm a student of politics. And there is little doubt that the greatest energy and most potent fervor in our civic lives now comes from an erupted volcano on the right.
Nationally, tea parties express a visceral and unyielding disdain for government, especially the federal variety. Much of the rhetoric is overtly racist, much is comically ahistorical and for supposed "constitutionalists," much is flatly anti-textual. But drained of its extremes, and of its hates, the tea party movement is a thunderous claim by an assertedly aggrieved, almost exclusively white membership that too much of its money is being taken by the government. Armed or otherwise, they're primed to fight.
Locally, the Wake County school board has launched an analogous war. With the diversity policy interred, economically disadvantaged, mostly black, kids will be more effectively corralled. Suburban schools can be left to their more congenial circumstance. Sure, evidence suggests that the concentration of at-risk kids threatens to compound poverty with diminished opportunity, but we've had enough "social engineering." Our schools are not, apparently, wrought with public mission or obligation. We seek private enclaves. Each to his own. And his own kind.
Both here and across the country, it is a season of reckoning - a backlash of white discontent.
But I also study poverty. And that means one pays attention to race as well. Latinos (23.2 percent) and African- Americans (24.6 percent) are about three times as likely as whites (8.6 percent) to live in poverty. These federal figures are tied to traditional measures of impoverishment - that is, they are based on income - the dollars families bring home each month to secure the essentials of life.
In recent weeks, though, we've seen an array of studies based not on income, but wealth - the resources that households manage to accumulate. Wealth, of course, not only replicates itself, generating additional income. As important, it provides essential buttress against the misfortunes of economic dislocation and duress. It thus offers a necessary and illuminating measure of both opportunity and challenge. Our racial wealth disparities are horrifying.
The Insight Center's 2010 report found that, nationally, black households, on average, generate about 62 cents for each dollar of income secured by white households. But for "every dollar of wealth owned by the typical white family, the typical family of color owns only about 16 cents." The N.C. Assets Alliance, in its newly released "Prosperity Grid," found that our "households of color" own just 14 cents for every dollar owned by whites.
Concurrent with these efforts, Brandeis University concluded a sophisticated study of wealth accumulation by 2,000 black and white families from 1983-2007. Thomas Shapiro, the report's author, concluded that for these households, "the racial wealth gap has more than quadrupled over the course of the past generation." While average white family resources rose from $22,000 to $100,000, black family wealth, beginning much lower, scarcely moved.
The causes of such daunting racial wealth inequity are disputed and complex. Historical patterns of discrimination, debilitation, and ownership-preclusion, extended by inheritance, play huge roles. Real estate red-lining and housing segregation cast long shadows. And sadly, subprime mortgages, predatory loan and payday lending schemes have been directed toward communities of color.
But less obvious turns contribute as well. Our largest housing program, by a ton, is the mortgage deduction. It flows, dominantly and perversely, to those with bigger houses and more money. We subsidize pensions and health care policies that are more generous to those with higher incomes. In recent decades, we dramatically reduced estate and capital gains taxes, changes heavily targeted to the richest among us. We tax, astonishingly, much capital-based income at lower rates than ordinary salary.
It's no mystery there's anger afoot in the land. The surprise is the tea partyers aren't black.
Locally, the Wake County school board has launched an analogous war. With the diversity policy interred, economically disadvantaged, mostly black, kids will be more effectively corralled. Suburban schools can be left to their more congenial circumstance. Sure, evidence suggests that the concentration of at-risk kids threatens to compound poverty with diminished opportunity, but we've had enough "social engineering." Our schools are not, apparently, wrought with public mission or obligation. We seek private enclaves. Each to his own. And his own kind.
Both here and across the country, it is a season of reckoning - a backlash of white discontent.
But I also study poverty. And that means one pays attention to race as well. Latinos (23.2 percent) and African- Americans (24.6 percent) are about three times as likely as whites (8.6 percent) to live in poverty. These federal figures are tied to traditional measures of impoverishment - that is, they are based on income - the dollars families bring home each month to secure the essentials of life.
In recent weeks, though, we've seen an array of studies based not on income, but wealth - the resources that households manage to accumulate. Wealth, of course, not only replicates itself, generating additional income. As important, it provides essential buttress against the misfortunes of economic dislocation and duress. It thus offers a necessary and illuminating measure of both opportunity and challenge. Our racial wealth disparities are horrifying.
The Insight Center's 2010 report found that, nationally, black households, on average, generate about 62 cents for each dollar of income secured by white households. But for "every dollar of wealth owned by the typical white family, the typical family of color owns only about 16 cents." The N.C. Assets Alliance, in its newly released "Prosperity Grid," found that our "households of color" own just 14 cents for every dollar owned by whites.
Concurrent with these efforts, Brandeis University concluded a sophisticated study of wealth accumulation by 2,000 black and white families from 1983-2007. Thomas Shapiro, the report's author, concluded that for these households, "the racial wealth gap has more than quadrupled over the course of the past generation." While average white family resources rose from $22,000 to $100,000, black family wealth, beginning much lower, scarcely moved.
The causes of such daunting racial wealth inequity are disputed and complex. Historical patterns of discrimination, debilitation, and ownership-preclusion, extended by inheritance, play huge roles. Real estate red-lining and housing segregation cast long shadows. And sadly, subprime mortgages, predatory loan and payday lending schemes have been directed toward communities of color.
But less obvious turns contribute as well. Our largest housing program, by a ton, is the mortgage deduction. It flows, dominantly and perversely, to those with bigger houses and more money. We subsidize pensions and health care policies that are more generous to those with higher incomes. In recent decades, we dramatically reduced estate and capital gains taxes, changes heavily targeted to the richest among us. We tax, astonishingly, much capital-based income at lower rates than ordinary salary.
It's no mystery there's anger afoot in the land. The surprise is the tea partyers aren't black.
Gene Nichol, a professor of law at the UNC School of Law, is director of UNC-Chapel Hill's Center on Poverty, Work & Opportunity.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Two good posts from Democracy NC
Wednesday, July 14, 2010:
- Unfortunately, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that the rescue fund provision in Connecticut’s public financing program is unconstitutional, because it chills the “free speech” (read: high-priced speech) of privately financed candidates whose excess spending triggers the release of extra funds to candidates in the public program. The Ninth Circuit took the opposition position in the McComish v. Bennett case in Arizona, ruling that rescue funds enhance speech and don’t stop the privately financed candidate from continuing to raise and spend money. The US Supreme Court put a stay on the provision in Arizona while it considers whether or not to review the McComish decision. The new decision in the Connecticut case makes it even more likely that the Supremes will examine the trigger provision, and most observers expect the court’s anti-voter, pro-corporate majority to strike down the provision. North Carolina’s three programs for some judicial, executive branch and local elections all have trigger provisions and will likely need revision next year when the court makes its decision. Meanwhile, the programs can proceed, despite rants from the rightwing, and the underlying framework of voluntary public financing incentives is not in jeopardy. In a separate opinion, the Second Circuit also upheld Connecticut’s ban on contractors and prospective contractors from contributing to state officials, but the decision is closely linked to a corruption scandal that sent the state’s governor to prison; bans on lobbyists making contributions and contractors raising funds for candidates were struck down as too broad.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010:
- A California news story highlights how wealthy interest groups are willing to invest millions in local elections, often hiding behind pretty names and saturating a small legislative district with attack ads. We’ve seen it with “Farmers for Fairness” in North Carolina, a front group for a handful of multi-millionaire hog producers. The battle between insurance companies and trial attorneys that is played out in virtually every state legislature continues during the campaign season as each side sponsors electioneering activities, allegedly independent of their favored candidate and therefore less regulated. The Supreme Court's Citizens United decision promised to increase such activity by gutting prohibitions against direct corporate spending close to Election Day. Legislation adopted last week by the NC General Assembly (H-748) conforms state law to that court decision, but also expands the disclosure requirements on independent advocacy and electioneering efforts. It began in much weaker form in an effort to win support from anti-regulation conservatives, but fortunately got stronger in many respects under pressure from Democracy North Carolina and others. Given the contentious election ahead, we’ll likely see how well implementation of the new legislation informs the public about which group is investing how much of whose money in what race.
How Confession Is Part of Compassion
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
While I appreciated Angus McLeod’s review of American war casualties in his letter to The Pilot (June 18), I fail to understand how war deaths in the defense of freedom excuse us from facing our mistakes.
Isn’t President Obama’s honesty about our errors in judgment an important part of U.S. diplomacy with other nations? Is it not arrogant to ignore such behavior and expect the world to adjust?
Without honest confession, we are perceived as a powerful bully in spite of the good we have done around the world. Confession is not a sign of weakness; nor does it make us vulnerable and weak.
It communicates a strength that says, “We know we’re compassionate and responsive to the pain of the world, but we also know that we’ve made mistakes and we want to acknowledge them so we don’t repeat the same action.”
I paraphrase what I think McLeod is saying: “Look at what we have done around the world; because we are magnanimous, we don’t have to look at our dark side and confess that we make mistakes.” It’s a little like an abusive husband who says to his wife, “Look at all I do for you; how can you complain when I get a little physical once in a while?” When push comes to shove, domestic violence is not any different than international violence.
Because I believe we are all unique expressions of creative oneness, compassion and confession become ways to care for ourselves as well as others.
Chas Griffin
Seven Lakes
While I appreciated Angus McLeod’s review of American war casualties in his letter to The Pilot (June 18), I fail to understand how war deaths in the defense of freedom excuse us from facing our mistakes.
Isn’t President Obama’s honesty about our errors in judgment an important part of U.S. diplomacy with other nations? Is it not arrogant to ignore such behavior and expect the world to adjust?
Without honest confession, we are perceived as a powerful bully in spite of the good we have done around the world. Confession is not a sign of weakness; nor does it make us vulnerable and weak.
It communicates a strength that says, “We know we’re compassionate and responsive to the pain of the world, but we also know that we’ve made mistakes and we want to acknowledge them so we don’t repeat the same action.”
I paraphrase what I think McLeod is saying: “Look at what we have done around the world; because we are magnanimous, we don’t have to look at our dark side and confess that we make mistakes.” It’s a little like an abusive husband who says to his wife, “Look at all I do for you; how can you complain when I get a little physical once in a while?” When push comes to shove, domestic violence is not any different than international violence.
Because I believe we are all unique expressions of creative oneness, compassion and confession become ways to care for ourselves as well as others.
Chas Griffin
Seven Lakes
‘Puppy Mill Bill’ Got Ganged Up On
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
It was like an unholy alliance indeed that managed to head off the so-called Puppy Mill Bill in Raleigh.
We join letter writer Sharon Shaw (The Pilot, July 10) in wondering what the pork industry and the National Rifle Association have to do with puppies. We, too, deplore the success that lobbyists for those two powerful entities had in preventing a legislative committee from even having an opportunity to consider a very reasonable bill that would have outlawed some of the more horrendous and inhumane things said to go on at some of the state’s puppy factories.
According to a lobbyist for the N.C. Pork Council, who spoke rather too candidly to a reporter from The News & Observer of Raleigh, the pig industry opposed the Puppy Mill Bill for one reason and one reason only: because the legislation had the support of the Humane Society of the United States. In other words, to paraphrase an old Arabic saying, “The friend of my enemy is my enemy.”
After all, you can’t go around allowing a do-gooder organization to succeed today in its attempt to do something to relieve the suffering of cooped-up mama dogs and their babies. Who knows? — that same group may turn around tomorrow and try to get the state to take a closer look at the conditions that sows and their piglets are subjected to on their miserable journey from birth to the meat counter at your local supermarket.
But why in the world did the National Rifle Association ever come to have (you should pardon the expression) a dog in that fight? That’s not altogether clear, just as it never is where the NRA is concerned. Again, there must have been concern about the possibility of an undesirable precedent being set. Start outlawing the mistreatment of pups today and pigs tomorrow, and next thing you know, questions may start to be raised about the shooting of rabbits, squirrels and deer.
That’s unlikely, given America’s proud hunting tradition, but you can’t be too careful — or too paranoid — about such things. The NRA stepped in even though the framers of the legislation made a point of excluding hunting dogs from its purview.
Meanwhile, the operators of puppy mills are free for now to go on producing their “product” under conditions that are sometimes so inhumane as to make pet lovers weep in anguish. Here’s hoping the pork and firearms lobbies are proud of themselves for deep-sixing the attempt to do a little something about it.
It was like an unholy alliance indeed that managed to head off the so-called Puppy Mill Bill in Raleigh.
We join letter writer Sharon Shaw (The Pilot, July 10) in wondering what the pork industry and the National Rifle Association have to do with puppies. We, too, deplore the success that lobbyists for those two powerful entities had in preventing a legislative committee from even having an opportunity to consider a very reasonable bill that would have outlawed some of the more horrendous and inhumane things said to go on at some of the state’s puppy factories.
According to a lobbyist for the N.C. Pork Council, who spoke rather too candidly to a reporter from The News & Observer of Raleigh, the pig industry opposed the Puppy Mill Bill for one reason and one reason only: because the legislation had the support of the Humane Society of the United States. In other words, to paraphrase an old Arabic saying, “The friend of my enemy is my enemy.”
After all, you can’t go around allowing a do-gooder organization to succeed today in its attempt to do something to relieve the suffering of cooped-up mama dogs and their babies. Who knows? — that same group may turn around tomorrow and try to get the state to take a closer look at the conditions that sows and their piglets are subjected to on their miserable journey from birth to the meat counter at your local supermarket.
But why in the world did the National Rifle Association ever come to have (you should pardon the expression) a dog in that fight? That’s not altogether clear, just as it never is where the NRA is concerned. Again, there must have been concern about the possibility of an undesirable precedent being set. Start outlawing the mistreatment of pups today and pigs tomorrow, and next thing you know, questions may start to be raised about the shooting of rabbits, squirrels and deer.
That’s unlikely, given America’s proud hunting tradition, but you can’t be too careful — or too paranoid — about such things. The NRA stepped in even though the framers of the legislation made a point of excluding hunting dogs from its purview.
Meanwhile, the operators of puppy mills are free for now to go on producing their “product” under conditions that are sometimes so inhumane as to make pet lovers weep in anguish. Here’s hoping the pork and firearms lobbies are proud of themselves for deep-sixing the attempt to do a little something about it.
NC county officials back Arizona immigration law
The Associated Press
WILMINGTON, N.C. -- A Republican-controlled county commission in North Carolina is endorsing Arizona's new immigration law.
The Star-News of Wilmington reported Tuesday the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution supporting the law. A resolution is simply the board's opinion and carries no legal authority.
The Arizona law would require state and local police to question and possibly arrest illegal immigrants during the enforcement of other laws such as traffic stops.
The Star-News of Wilmington reported Tuesday the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution supporting the law. A resolution is simply the board's opinion and carries no legal authority.
The Arizona law would require state and local police to question and possibly arrest illegal immigrants during the enforcement of other laws such as traffic stops.
New Hanover may be the first North Carolina county to adopt such a measure. A spokeswoman for the National Association of Counties only said one Missouri county passed a similar resolution and Prince William County, Va., officials passed a local law similar to Arizona's law.
Information from: The StarNews, http://starnewsonline.com
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