In just a month, major safety repairs start on the I-90 floating bridge. Drivers will face congested freeway lanes and ramps to and from Mercer Island.
The state Department of Transportation will completely close the I-90 express lanes between Mercer Island and Seattle from May 4-23 and completely close the westbound mainline lanes to Seattle from July 5-28.
Crews must replace the massive steel expansion joints that allow the bridge to flex with the changing temperatures, wind, water levels and traffic. The aging joints are continuing to crack and deteriorate, requiring constant maintenance. The new joints will be safer and more reliable.
Which ramps will be closed on Mercer Island? In May, construction crews will close both of the westbound ramps to the I-90 express lanes: Island Crest Way and 77th Avenue Southeast. As a result, additional congestion is expected on weekdays on the westbound mainline lanes from 7-10 a.m. and from 4-7 p.m.
Good news for Mercer Island drivers heading eastbound: The express lanes will be open for people going to Bellevue and points east.
Long delays are expected in July when all westbound traffic shifts to the I-90 express lanes. Mercer Island residents can start planning their commute options now, and warn any potential out-of-town visitors about the upcoming construction so they don’t have to sit in traffic during their vacation.
To avoid gridlock in July, solo drivers can travel before 6 a.m., or join a vanpool or carpool during construction. Bicycle commuting also is an option. As part of the project, WSDOT is building temporary bridges to keep the I-90 trail open to bicyclists and pedestrians.
The work is unavoidably noisy. Crews use noise shields and quieter backup alarms, and the noisiest equipment will only be used during the day. Fliers will be sent to homes that will be most affected by the noise.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Monday, March 23, 2009
Cap-and-Trade Could Cost Washington State as Many as 18,292 Net Jobs, $5.7 Billion in Personal Income
Economic research institute finds deficiencies in Western Climate Initiative’s analysis of impacts from recommendations
Specific proposals that several Western states would implement to comply with a proposed cap-and-trade carbon emissions control pact would destroy jobs and erode income, according to a report co-released by a national economics institute and the Washington Policy Center.
In a thorough review of the claims made by the Western Climate Initiative (WCI), the Beacon Hill Institute (BHI) at Suffolk University identified several flaws made by the seven state consortium, calling into question so-called cost savings ranging between $11.4 billion and $23.5 billion. These flaws render WCI’s projections useless in determining the WCI’s cost to state economies.
The authors of the report write, “Using the Western Climate Initiative’s own projections of increases in fuel costs, BHI finds that the policies will decrease employment, investment, personal income and disposable income. While WCI claims the ‘design is also intended to mitigate economic impacts, including impacts on consumers, income, and employment,’ they fail to quantify the impacts.”
Seven states are full participants in WCI: Arizona, California, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. Beacon Hill Institute found that WCI’s policy recommendations “would have substantial negative effects” on the economies of its member states. The WCI has recommended three different cap-and-trade scenarios that consider “narrow” and “broad” market coverage and the use of offsets. Under a scenario in which 25 percent of greenhouse gas emission permits would be auctioned off to emitters in a cap-and-trade scheme, BHI, using their STAMP® (State Tax Analysis Modeling Program) model, determined that the seven states:
· Would lose between 35,177 to 165,397 private sector jobs, while the permit revenue would allow the states to hire up to 19,710 state employees
· Would put investment by firms at serious risk by slowing investment in the region by $1.6 billion to $4.5 billion
· Would diminish total personal income, which would fall by $10.2 billion to $47.71 billion per year
The proposals’ negative economic effects stem from the price and tax increases the states would impose on the energy and transportation sectors. Because a cap on carbon emissions is effectively a tax on energy production that is passed to industry, businesses and consumers, the effect is likely to drive commerce and jobs to other states or countries.
“The cap-and-trade program would increase input costs for producers located within WCI states, placing them at a competitive disadvantage to those outside the areas,” BHI noted. “The pressure would be especially acute for producers that utilize large amounts of energy in the production process, such as manufacturers.”
Beacon Hill found that none of the seven WCI states would escape economic harm should cap-and-trade be imposed. Washington State could lose:
· 18,292 net jobs
· $5.71 billion in personal income
· $302.54 in per capita disposable income
If Washington were to adopt the WCI cap-and-trade proposal based on an auction of 25 percent of emission allowances. The environmental community in Washington have advocated for 100 percent auction of emission allowances.
“Past studies claiming to show cap-and-trade creates new ‘green’ jobs have ignored the costs of those policies,” said Todd Myers, environmental director at the Washington Policy Center in Seattle. “This study shows that increasing taxes and regulations will likely kill jobs and prosperity at a time when we can least afford it.”
The complete study is available online here.
Specific proposals that several Western states would implement to comply with a proposed cap-and-trade carbon emissions control pact would destroy jobs and erode income, according to a report co-released by a national economics institute and the Washington Policy Center.
In a thorough review of the claims made by the Western Climate Initiative (WCI), the Beacon Hill Institute (BHI) at Suffolk University identified several flaws made by the seven state consortium, calling into question so-called cost savings ranging between $11.4 billion and $23.5 billion. These flaws render WCI’s projections useless in determining the WCI’s cost to state economies.
The authors of the report write, “Using the Western Climate Initiative’s own projections of increases in fuel costs, BHI finds that the policies will decrease employment, investment, personal income and disposable income. While WCI claims the ‘design is also intended to mitigate economic impacts, including impacts on consumers, income, and employment,’ they fail to quantify the impacts.”
Seven states are full participants in WCI: Arizona, California, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. Beacon Hill Institute found that WCI’s policy recommendations “would have substantial negative effects” on the economies of its member states. The WCI has recommended three different cap-and-trade scenarios that consider “narrow” and “broad” market coverage and the use of offsets. Under a scenario in which 25 percent of greenhouse gas emission permits would be auctioned off to emitters in a cap-and-trade scheme, BHI, using their STAMP® (State Tax Analysis Modeling Program) model, determined that the seven states:
· Would lose between 35,177 to 165,397 private sector jobs, while the permit revenue would allow the states to hire up to 19,710 state employees
· Would put investment by firms at serious risk by slowing investment in the region by $1.6 billion to $4.5 billion
· Would diminish total personal income, which would fall by $10.2 billion to $47.71 billion per year
The proposals’ negative economic effects stem from the price and tax increases the states would impose on the energy and transportation sectors. Because a cap on carbon emissions is effectively a tax on energy production that is passed to industry, businesses and consumers, the effect is likely to drive commerce and jobs to other states or countries.
“The cap-and-trade program would increase input costs for producers located within WCI states, placing them at a competitive disadvantage to those outside the areas,” BHI noted. “The pressure would be especially acute for producers that utilize large amounts of energy in the production process, such as manufacturers.”
Beacon Hill found that none of the seven WCI states would escape economic harm should cap-and-trade be imposed. Washington State could lose:
· 18,292 net jobs
· $5.71 billion in personal income
· $302.54 in per capita disposable income
If Washington were to adopt the WCI cap-and-trade proposal based on an auction of 25 percent of emission allowances. The environmental community in Washington have advocated for 100 percent auction of emission allowances.
“Past studies claiming to show cap-and-trade creates new ‘green’ jobs have ignored the costs of those policies,” said Todd Myers, environmental director at the Washington Policy Center in Seattle. “This study shows that increasing taxes and regulations will likely kill jobs and prosperity at a time when we can least afford it.”
The complete study is available online here.
Friday, March 13, 2009
Economic Stimulus Starts with Private Sector Job Growth
by Carl Gipson
Director, Washington Policy Center, Center for Small Business
Suddenly everything old is new again. This saying usually applies to the fashion industry, but today we are digging up old economic theories, dusting them off, and re-applying them.
Today, as in the 1930s and 1970s, government spending is passed off as economic stimulus. Proponents for increased public sector spending tout empty bromides like "the multiplier effect" or "investing in the future." They back these up by asserting that not to move forward would result in economic collapse.
Now that the federal stimulus package is in place, and analysts are finally reading what Congress approved (even if Congress didn't read it before voting), state policymakers are kicking around their own versions of "economic stimulus."
The state legislature has already passed, and the Governor signed, legislation that increases unemployment insurance benefits by $45 for the rest of the year (in addition to increasing the weekly minimum: a twofer). Lawmakers are drawing down part of our $4 billion unemployment insurance trust fund to pay for this.
Even though this approach does not directly and immediately result in a tax increase to employers (since employers are the ones who pay the UI premiums) this is a bit of a gamble. The reason we have a substantial return is because employers have been over-taxed. If this recession lasts too long, UI premiums may have to increase. Such an event would make it even more difficult to hire workers.
There is a risk in increasing government spending--via deficit spending--in order to build new public buildings and calling it economic stimulus.
Any true Keynesian would recognize that the famous economist was no fan of deficit spending as we understand it today. He did advocate for public spending to offset recessions but he posited that investments need to be made without deficits. Or, if deficits could not be avoided, each investment should be able to repay its cost over the long run, such as tolling a new bridge to pay back construction costs. It is arguable whether any of the proposed public projects will ever pay for themselves.
Proponents of big government will claim that "investments" must be made in areas such as green technology and green jobs. But what business is it of government to invest in these areas? We all saw the folly of mandating biofuels. It contributed to higher worldwide food prices, farmers planting on marginal land and encouraged a system that negated the promised environmental benefits.
Does the fact that we are in bad economic times mean that we must let the government throw money into an untested, unverified and highly speculative industry? What happens if these efforts fail, as biofuels did? Taxpayers will be stuck holding the bag yet again.
What happens to green areas that the private sector was already investing in? Why should the private sector continue to fund any green initiatives when there's a chance the government will step in with funds, but then it doesn't? This could decimate some good projects that would have actually helped the environment and created new jobs.
One area where Keynes was right is that it is difficult for governments to get the timing right for any type of public works project. Policymaking lags behind any recessionary cycle and temporary public works spending has little effect on actually growing the economy. Our economy is too large and too complex to be stimulated by a few construction projects or "targeted investments."
Public works projects are often big, expensive, and slow to begin and even slower to conclude. And when finally finished the state has a bridge, or a building, or a school, and it might look nice and shiny, but there is also the new debt piled on top of the debt government had already incurred in the past.
Policymakers should instead focus on ways to grow the private sector. Tax cuts are already off the table in our state this session but policymakers should make running a profitable business easier by reforming our burdensome regulatory system. Government spending should be cut down to core levels, so Washington businesses contemplating relocation or expansion will be confident their taxes won't skyrocket.
Returning to the old ways of big government spending will not help the thousands of recently laid off Washington employees get back to work. Policymakers need to invest in ideas that result in private sector job growth. This will lead to the higher levels of production and consumption that will help end the recession.
Director, Washington Policy Center, Center for Small Business
Suddenly everything old is new again. This saying usually applies to the fashion industry, but today we are digging up old economic theories, dusting them off, and re-applying them.
Today, as in the 1930s and 1970s, government spending is passed off as economic stimulus. Proponents for increased public sector spending tout empty bromides like "the multiplier effect" or "investing in the future." They back these up by asserting that not to move forward would result in economic collapse.
Now that the federal stimulus package is in place, and analysts are finally reading what Congress approved (even if Congress didn't read it before voting), state policymakers are kicking around their own versions of "economic stimulus."
The state legislature has already passed, and the Governor signed, legislation that increases unemployment insurance benefits by $45 for the rest of the year (in addition to increasing the weekly minimum: a twofer). Lawmakers are drawing down part of our $4 billion unemployment insurance trust fund to pay for this.
Even though this approach does not directly and immediately result in a tax increase to employers (since employers are the ones who pay the UI premiums) this is a bit of a gamble. The reason we have a substantial return is because employers have been over-taxed. If this recession lasts too long, UI premiums may have to increase. Such an event would make it even more difficult to hire workers.
There is a risk in increasing government spending--via deficit spending--in order to build new public buildings and calling it economic stimulus.
Any true Keynesian would recognize that the famous economist was no fan of deficit spending as we understand it today. He did advocate for public spending to offset recessions but he posited that investments need to be made without deficits. Or, if deficits could not be avoided, each investment should be able to repay its cost over the long run, such as tolling a new bridge to pay back construction costs. It is arguable whether any of the proposed public projects will ever pay for themselves.
Proponents of big government will claim that "investments" must be made in areas such as green technology and green jobs. But what business is it of government to invest in these areas? We all saw the folly of mandating biofuels. It contributed to higher worldwide food prices, farmers planting on marginal land and encouraged a system that negated the promised environmental benefits.
Does the fact that we are in bad economic times mean that we must let the government throw money into an untested, unverified and highly speculative industry? What happens if these efforts fail, as biofuels did? Taxpayers will be stuck holding the bag yet again.
What happens to green areas that the private sector was already investing in? Why should the private sector continue to fund any green initiatives when there's a chance the government will step in with funds, but then it doesn't? This could decimate some good projects that would have actually helped the environment and created new jobs.
One area where Keynes was right is that it is difficult for governments to get the timing right for any type of public works project. Policymaking lags behind any recessionary cycle and temporary public works spending has little effect on actually growing the economy. Our economy is too large and too complex to be stimulated by a few construction projects or "targeted investments."
Public works projects are often big, expensive, and slow to begin and even slower to conclude. And when finally finished the state has a bridge, or a building, or a school, and it might look nice and shiny, but there is also the new debt piled on top of the debt government had already incurred in the past.
Policymakers should instead focus on ways to grow the private sector. Tax cuts are already off the table in our state this session but policymakers should make running a profitable business easier by reforming our burdensome regulatory system. Government spending should be cut down to core levels, so Washington businesses contemplating relocation or expansion will be confident their taxes won't skyrocket.
Returning to the old ways of big government spending will not help the thousands of recently laid off Washington employees get back to work. Policymakers need to invest in ideas that result in private sector job growth. This will lead to the higher levels of production and consumption that will help end the recession.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Dave Reichert: My Thoughts on the Stimulus
As he took the oath of office one month ago, President Barack Obama addressed the economic crisis by asking all of us to be prepared to make hard choices and "prepare for a new age." He called on Congress to "spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day, because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government."
We are in very tough times and everyone recognizes that, even Members of Congress. People are hurting; the government must act, but that act must help address the economic crisis we are facing, not make it worse. Everyone recognizes swift action is needed, but not at the expense of the average American family.
Quite simply, the "stimulus" bill didn't do what it was supposed to -- to help hurting families and small businesses. I opposed this bill because the $789 billion measure was rushed to the floor without thorough consideration, without clear evidence that it would create new jobs, and without regard for many of the proposals discussed in meetings with the President.
Specifically, I am most concerned that this bill is:
Spending too much on programs that won’t create jobs.
Failing to provide significant tax relief for the lowest income families.
Failing to provide relief for small businesses.
Failing to open new markets to trade or help US companies export more goods to create more jobs.
Spending $20B on health IT without requiring certification that systems to manage health records will be able to communicate with each other – which is the very purpose of health IT.
Including language that could lead to the government getting directly involved in Medicare and Medicaid patients’ health care and reduce their choice of care to suit their needs.
I will support legislation that will:
Target spending on infrastructure and other programs that can put people to work now.
Cut marginal tax rates for the lowest income earners, reducing the 10% tax bracket to 5% and the 15% bracket to 10%, giving more targeted and lasting relief.
Lower the tax burden on small businesses in Washington State to make critical investments and employ more workers.
Enact trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea to bolster production of goods and services in Washington State.
Ensure that health IT systems are interoperable before spending billions on them. (Reichert offered an amendment to accomplish this in the Ways & Means Committee)
Support policies that ensure that patients and their doctors have control over their health care needs and services.
I will continue to stand with low and middle-income American families. I will continue to fight for a true economic stimulus bill. One that protects American jobs, promotes American jobs, and creates new American jobs. We cannot spend our way into recovery and prosperity. We cannot continue to borrow endless sums of money to bail out our economy. We need real solutions that create long-lasting jobs.
Hurting families and small businesses need tax relief now. More than 540,000 small businesses in Washington account for 95 percent of the state's jobs, and we must support them to fuel job creation. In addition, directing money to infrastructure upgrades and public transit eases the stress on local budgets, improves the flow of commerce, alleviates congestion and creates jobs. With one in three jobs in our state tied to trade, we must promote global trade, opening new markets that enable American companies to produce and export more goods.
Those who have lost their jobs need hope, stability and security. Taxpayers deserve a comprehensive, accountable strategy to stimulate our economy, not more wasteful Washington, D.C., spending that neglects their best interests. While many of the programs in the bill are valuable, they don't belong in an emergency stimulus package.
Our best hope is in the spirit of America -- in those people working each day to provide for their families. I came to Congress to get things done, to make sure government doesn't get in the way and to allow the innovative people of this country to solve problems. This nation has seen tougher times, and persevered. And we will persevere, for the sake of our future, our children and our grandchildren.
We are in very tough times and everyone recognizes that, even Members of Congress. People are hurting; the government must act, but that act must help address the economic crisis we are facing, not make it worse. Everyone recognizes swift action is needed, but not at the expense of the average American family.
Quite simply, the "stimulus" bill didn't do what it was supposed to -- to help hurting families and small businesses. I opposed this bill because the $789 billion measure was rushed to the floor without thorough consideration, without clear evidence that it would create new jobs, and without regard for many of the proposals discussed in meetings with the President.
Specifically, I am most concerned that this bill is:
Spending too much on programs that won’t create jobs.
Failing to provide significant tax relief for the lowest income families.
Failing to provide relief for small businesses.
Failing to open new markets to trade or help US companies export more goods to create more jobs.
Spending $20B on health IT without requiring certification that systems to manage health records will be able to communicate with each other – which is the very purpose of health IT.
Including language that could lead to the government getting directly involved in Medicare and Medicaid patients’ health care and reduce their choice of care to suit their needs.
I will support legislation that will:
Target spending on infrastructure and other programs that can put people to work now.
Cut marginal tax rates for the lowest income earners, reducing the 10% tax bracket to 5% and the 15% bracket to 10%, giving more targeted and lasting relief.
Lower the tax burden on small businesses in Washington State to make critical investments and employ more workers.
Enact trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea to bolster production of goods and services in Washington State.
Ensure that health IT systems are interoperable before spending billions on them. (Reichert offered an amendment to accomplish this in the Ways & Means Committee)
Support policies that ensure that patients and their doctors have control over their health care needs and services.
I will continue to stand with low and middle-income American families. I will continue to fight for a true economic stimulus bill. One that protects American jobs, promotes American jobs, and creates new American jobs. We cannot spend our way into recovery and prosperity. We cannot continue to borrow endless sums of money to bail out our economy. We need real solutions that create long-lasting jobs.
Hurting families and small businesses need tax relief now. More than 540,000 small businesses in Washington account for 95 percent of the state's jobs, and we must support them to fuel job creation. In addition, directing money to infrastructure upgrades and public transit eases the stress on local budgets, improves the flow of commerce, alleviates congestion and creates jobs. With one in three jobs in our state tied to trade, we must promote global trade, opening new markets that enable American companies to produce and export more goods.
Those who have lost their jobs need hope, stability and security. Taxpayers deserve a comprehensive, accountable strategy to stimulate our economy, not more wasteful Washington, D.C., spending that neglects their best interests. While many of the programs in the bill are valuable, they don't belong in an emergency stimulus package.
Our best hope is in the spirit of America -- in those people working each day to provide for their families. I came to Congress to get things done, to make sure government doesn't get in the way and to allow the innovative people of this country to solve problems. This nation has seen tougher times, and persevered. And we will persevere, for the sake of our future, our children and our grandchildren.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Washington State Attorney General Rob McKenna's Must Read - February 2009
With a critical legislative cut-off date approaching in a few days, I want to update you on the status of our 2009 Legislative Requests aimed at protecting the state’s most vulnerable citizens and assisting financially strapped homeowners.
This Wednesday, February 25, is the deadline for bills to move out of policy committees. Bills not voted out by the end of the day will not move further in this legislative session.
We’re very pleased that our Domestic Violence bill (SB5208), which requires stiffer penalties for our state’s worst domestic violence abusers, has passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and has been referred to the Ways and Means Committee.
Our Vulnerable Adults bill (SB5639), which strengthens protections for those unable to protect themselves from physical abuse or financial exploitation, received a public hearing in the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee on February 17. We’re hopeful it will be scheduled for a committee vote before Wednesday’s cut-off.
Our Consumer Protection package has received broad bipartisan support. Bills which help protect consumers from mortgage foreclosure fraud and update the state’s new-car Lemon Law, as well as our request to prohibit Internet tobacco sales, are all either in the Rules Committee or have made it to the floor vote calendar.
The Prizes and Promotions bill, which brings our state’s laws into the Internet age by making sure that Internet promotions are held to the same standard as direct mail, received a hearing in both the House and the Senate. The Senate version of the bill is scheduled to be voted out of the Senate Labor, Commerce, and Consumer Protection Committee on Monday morning.
On the criminal justice front, our request for updates to the Sexually Violent Predator civil commitment statute received a hearing in the Senate, but has not yet been scheduled for an executive vote. And our bill regarding a study for a digital forensics crime lab in Washington is now on the floor calendar.
At this point, we’re very focused on HB 1247/SB 5183 which creates a class C felony crime of viewing depictions of child pornography and protects non-commissioned law enforcement personnel from prosecution when viewing depictions during investigations. We introduced both the provisions of this bill as two bills last session. The bills received broad support. They were combined into one, passed the House unanimously and then passed out of committee to the Senate floor. Unfortunately, they did not receive a vote there because of time constraints. The AGO’s Director of Governmental Affairs, Hunter Goodman, has been working non-stop with legislators and committee staff to move this bill, which is so important to the protection of children, out of committee before Wednesday.
As I said at the start of the session, citizen involvement in our legislative process is more important than ever to the future of our state. Legislators are making important decisions this session about the state budget, education, health care and transportation.
You can find your legislator, share your opinions with lawmakers or just keep track of legislation by visiting the Legislature’s Web site at www.leg.wa.gov. Please feel free to share this information with friends and family, and encourage each of them to visit the Legislature’s Web site to find out what’s happening now, and contact their lawmakers to ensure their voices are heard while critical decisions are being made on the issues most important to each of them and their loved ones.
As always, you can continue tracking our progress on our website throughout the 2009 Session.
And now, you can also “twitter” about us online! The AGO recently launched a twitter site which, in case you haven’t heard, is a social networking service that allows its users to communicate through the exchange of very brief, text-based messages. While “twitter” certainly isn’t for everyone, it gives us yet another medium to share information and connect with the public on emerging AGO issues, so if you’re interested, take a look!
Sincerely,
Rob McKenna
Attorney General
This Wednesday, February 25, is the deadline for bills to move out of policy committees. Bills not voted out by the end of the day will not move further in this legislative session.
We’re very pleased that our Domestic Violence bill (SB5208), which requires stiffer penalties for our state’s worst domestic violence abusers, has passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and has been referred to the Ways and Means Committee.
Our Vulnerable Adults bill (SB5639), which strengthens protections for those unable to protect themselves from physical abuse or financial exploitation, received a public hearing in the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee on February 17. We’re hopeful it will be scheduled for a committee vote before Wednesday’s cut-off.
Our Consumer Protection package has received broad bipartisan support. Bills which help protect consumers from mortgage foreclosure fraud and update the state’s new-car Lemon Law, as well as our request to prohibit Internet tobacco sales, are all either in the Rules Committee or have made it to the floor vote calendar.
The Prizes and Promotions bill, which brings our state’s laws into the Internet age by making sure that Internet promotions are held to the same standard as direct mail, received a hearing in both the House and the Senate. The Senate version of the bill is scheduled to be voted out of the Senate Labor, Commerce, and Consumer Protection Committee on Monday morning.
On the criminal justice front, our request for updates to the Sexually Violent Predator civil commitment statute received a hearing in the Senate, but has not yet been scheduled for an executive vote. And our bill regarding a study for a digital forensics crime lab in Washington is now on the floor calendar.
At this point, we’re very focused on HB 1247/SB 5183 which creates a class C felony crime of viewing depictions of child pornography and protects non-commissioned law enforcement personnel from prosecution when viewing depictions during investigations. We introduced both the provisions of this bill as two bills last session. The bills received broad support. They were combined into one, passed the House unanimously and then passed out of committee to the Senate floor. Unfortunately, they did not receive a vote there because of time constraints. The AGO’s Director of Governmental Affairs, Hunter Goodman, has been working non-stop with legislators and committee staff to move this bill, which is so important to the protection of children, out of committee before Wednesday.
As I said at the start of the session, citizen involvement in our legislative process is more important than ever to the future of our state. Legislators are making important decisions this session about the state budget, education, health care and transportation.
You can find your legislator, share your opinions with lawmakers or just keep track of legislation by visiting the Legislature’s Web site at www.leg.wa.gov. Please feel free to share this information with friends and family, and encourage each of them to visit the Legislature’s Web site to find out what’s happening now, and contact their lawmakers to ensure their voices are heard while critical decisions are being made on the issues most important to each of them and their loved ones.
As always, you can continue tracking our progress on our website throughout the 2009 Session.
And now, you can also “twitter” about us online! The AGO recently launched a twitter site which, in case you haven’t heard, is a social networking service that allows its users to communicate through the exchange of very brief, text-based messages. While “twitter” certainly isn’t for everyone, it gives us yet another medium to share information and connect with the public on emerging AGO issues, so if you’re interested, take a look!
Sincerely,
Rob McKenna
Attorney General
Friday, February 13, 2009
An Economic Stimulus Package Must Focus on Long-Term Growth, Not Short-Term Jobs
by Mathew Manweller, Prof. of Political Science, Central Washington University
As the United States struggles through a recession, political leaders are hoping a "stimulus package" will save us. There is nothing wrong with the government trying to stabilize or even energize the economy. It is the reason we craft fiscal and monetary polices. The problem with most stimulus packages is that they usually don't work.
Stimulus packages have the potential to succeed, but for several reasons, rarely do.
Unfortunately for elected officials, the Federal Reserve was created as an insulated and therefore independent agency. The President and Congress can pressure the Fed, but they can't make the Fed do anything. In addition, even if the Fed does take action, elected officials can't take any credit for the subsequent results. Politicians like to show the American people they are "doing something" and they can't do that in the realm of monetary policy. As a result, fiscal stimulus packages tend to win out over monetary ones.
Most stimulus packages rely on public works projects. It is common to hear presidents and congress promising an economic package that will build new roads, bridges and infrastructure. It sounds good, except it doesn't work. For starters, infrastructure projects are temporary. Once the bridge, road, or tunnel is completed, the stimulus is gone. Then what? We are still the same country with the same problems and the same economic environment. The only way to keep the stimulus rolling is to build another bridge, road or tunnel. Eventually, we find ourselves paying people to move piles of dirt back and forth. Such projects spread paper dollars around, but do nothing to improve the standard of living or add to a nation's wealth.
Our prosperity is a function of production, not the number of dollar bills. America is a wealthy nation because we produce a lot of stuff, not because we have a lot of dollars. For example, the nation of Ethiopia could pay all of its citizens millions of Birrs to dig tunnels throughout the country. Afterwards, each citizen would have a lot of paper money, but Ethiopia would still be a very poor country (with lots of tunnels).
Public works projects also create inflation. When the government builds stuff, they don't build consumer products. They build roads, bridges, tanks and dams. How many of you have purchased any of these things in your life? Public works projects inject billions of dollars into the economy but do not inject a single consumer good. As a result, we end up with more money in the economy but not more goods to buy. When you have the same amount of goods but more dollars, you end up with higher inflation.
Stimulus checks or tax rebates are a popular form of economic stimulus, and they are equally ineffective. Stimulus checks alter short-term behavior, sometimes. Most people in hard times will simply save the rebate. Others will spend it on a consumer product. To pull a nation out of a recession, however, one needs to alter long-term behavior. Good economic stimulus promotes long-term investment in capital, the building of new plants, investment in new technology and hiring new workers. None of that is accomplished with a rebate check. Entrepreneurs don't launch a new endeavor because every citizen has a $600 check. Investment should be based on the long-term horizon, not a one-month bump in consumer spending.
That doesn't mean all stimulus packages must fail. Governments can promote economic recovery if they craft policies that incentivize long-term investment in both jobs and consumer goods and services. The key is capital creation. When you dig a hole in the ground and call it a tunnel, the only labor needed after the job is done is for occasional maintenance. When you build a new car factory, you need thousands of workers to keep that factory running. The tunnel is a short-term project that creates temporary jobs and long-term inflation. A new factory creates new products, long-term jobs and reduces inflation. But governments don't build car factories. What government can do is make it easier for entrepreneurs to do so.
The best policies governments can adopt to encourage capital creation are long-term structural changes to our economy. These include permanent decreases in marginal income tax rates, corporate tax rates and the capital gains tax rate. By creating a hospitable, stable and predictable economic environment, entrepreneurs know what the long-term business climate will be and invest accordingly.
Rebate checks are feel-good elixirs, and public works projects just mask the symptoms. If we want a sustained economic recovery like we saw in the 1980s and 1990s, we will need to be patient, avoid economic gimmicks, and understand that wealth comes from production, not more dollars.
As the United States struggles through a recession, political leaders are hoping a "stimulus package" will save us. There is nothing wrong with the government trying to stabilize or even energize the economy. It is the reason we craft fiscal and monetary polices. The problem with most stimulus packages is that they usually don't work.
Stimulus packages have the potential to succeed, but for several reasons, rarely do.
Unfortunately for elected officials, the Federal Reserve was created as an insulated and therefore independent agency. The President and Congress can pressure the Fed, but they can't make the Fed do anything. In addition, even if the Fed does take action, elected officials can't take any credit for the subsequent results. Politicians like to show the American people they are "doing something" and they can't do that in the realm of monetary policy. As a result, fiscal stimulus packages tend to win out over monetary ones.
Most stimulus packages rely on public works projects. It is common to hear presidents and congress promising an economic package that will build new roads, bridges and infrastructure. It sounds good, except it doesn't work. For starters, infrastructure projects are temporary. Once the bridge, road, or tunnel is completed, the stimulus is gone. Then what? We are still the same country with the same problems and the same economic environment. The only way to keep the stimulus rolling is to build another bridge, road or tunnel. Eventually, we find ourselves paying people to move piles of dirt back and forth. Such projects spread paper dollars around, but do nothing to improve the standard of living or add to a nation's wealth.
Our prosperity is a function of production, not the number of dollar bills. America is a wealthy nation because we produce a lot of stuff, not because we have a lot of dollars. For example, the nation of Ethiopia could pay all of its citizens millions of Birrs to dig tunnels throughout the country. Afterwards, each citizen would have a lot of paper money, but Ethiopia would still be a very poor country (with lots of tunnels).
Public works projects also create inflation. When the government builds stuff, they don't build consumer products. They build roads, bridges, tanks and dams. How many of you have purchased any of these things in your life? Public works projects inject billions of dollars into the economy but do not inject a single consumer good. As a result, we end up with more money in the economy but not more goods to buy. When you have the same amount of goods but more dollars, you end up with higher inflation.
Stimulus checks or tax rebates are a popular form of economic stimulus, and they are equally ineffective. Stimulus checks alter short-term behavior, sometimes. Most people in hard times will simply save the rebate. Others will spend it on a consumer product. To pull a nation out of a recession, however, one needs to alter long-term behavior. Good economic stimulus promotes long-term investment in capital, the building of new plants, investment in new technology and hiring new workers. None of that is accomplished with a rebate check. Entrepreneurs don't launch a new endeavor because every citizen has a $600 check. Investment should be based on the long-term horizon, not a one-month bump in consumer spending.
That doesn't mean all stimulus packages must fail. Governments can promote economic recovery if they craft policies that incentivize long-term investment in both jobs and consumer goods and services. The key is capital creation. When you dig a hole in the ground and call it a tunnel, the only labor needed after the job is done is for occasional maintenance. When you build a new car factory, you need thousands of workers to keep that factory running. The tunnel is a short-term project that creates temporary jobs and long-term inflation. A new factory creates new products, long-term jobs and reduces inflation. But governments don't build car factories. What government can do is make it easier for entrepreneurs to do so.
The best policies governments can adopt to encourage capital creation are long-term structural changes to our economy. These include permanent decreases in marginal income tax rates, corporate tax rates and the capital gains tax rate. By creating a hospitable, stable and predictable economic environment, entrepreneurs know what the long-term business climate will be and invest accordingly.
Rebate checks are feel-good elixirs, and public works projects just mask the symptoms. If we want a sustained economic recovery like we saw in the 1980s and 1990s, we will need to be patient, avoid economic gimmicks, and understand that wealth comes from production, not more dollars.
Friday, February 06, 2009
What is Not Wrong with U.S. Health Care
by Roger Stark, MD
Barack Obama says he wants to make reforming health care one of his administration’s top priorities. Change in health care is certainly needed. There is a danger, though, that the new president will be unduly influenced by political advocates peddling the same tired myths that have dogged the health care debate since the Clinton years. These myths are founded on selective data, doubtful sources and faulty science. For anyone with an open mind and a passion for accuracy, they are easily dispelled.
First, we hear a lot about how terrible the infant mortality rate is in the United States, supposedly the worst in the civilized world. Is this true? Not really. U.S. health officials count all live births, while many other countries only count full-term births or infants who live at least 28 days. Obviously, premature infants, who are counted in the U.S. but not in other countries, have a much higher risk of mortality.
Second, we are told people in the U.S. don’t live as long as people in other countries. However, deaths from homicide and accidents distort the picture. When the data is adjusted for these categories, life expectancy in the U.S. is as high as in other countries. Homicide and violent trauma certainly reflect a country’s social problems, but they tell us little about its health care system.
Third, we are told that each year in the U.S. there are nearly 100,000 unnecessary hospital deaths. A panel of doctors reviewed the hospital data and found the great majority of these deaths occur at the end of the patient’s natural life, when the outcome would have been the same regardless of what hospital staff did or did not do. In other countries, these older, desperately ill people often are not even sent to a hospital, dying at home instead, and are not included in national medical statistics.
A comparable, population-adjusted study in Canada found 200,000 “unnecessary” hospital deaths, even though political activists regularly push Canadian-style health care as the model for the U.S.
Fourth, we hear many people have to declare bankruptcy because of medical bills. It turns out advocates count any bankruptcy case involving even a single medical bill, whether or not health costs had anything to do with the person’s financial problems.
People ages 55 to 65, who have more personal control over their health coverage, are less likely to declare bankruptcy, while people over 65, who are on government-run Medicare, have seen a doubling of their bankruptcy rate. Tax-funded health care has not reduced bankruptcies for elderly Americans.
Fifth, we are told 45 million Americans are uninsured. Who are the uninsured? Is cost really the reason they do not have coverage? It turns out political advocates count anyone who was without health coverage at any time during a calendar year. Half of those counted as uninsured were in transition to a new job, and one-third could sign up for a government program (like Medicare, Medicaid or state-subsidized care) but choose not to.
Only about eight million people, less than 5% of Americans, are chronically uninsured. This is a serious problem, but hardly a reason to revolutionize health coverage for 95% of the population.
Sixth, we are told the U.S. ranks a dismal 37th in health care worldwide. The figure comes from the U.N.’s World Health Organization. Three of the five criteria used to rate nations were biased in a favor of nationalized, single-payer systems, and U.N. officials admit they have an 80% uncertainty level in their data. Amazingly, none of the five criteria included actual health outcomes, such as cancer or heart attack survival rates. The U.S. tops all countries in favorable health outcomes.
Besides, any health study that ranks Greece (#14) and Morocco (#29) ahead of the U.S. clearly has methodological problems.
The national debate about how to improve health care needs honest research honestly presented, not skewed data or false comparisons with other countries. The six myths about U.S. health care only serve to shift our focus away from the real problem - overregulation and artificially high costs. Only when public policy reconnects patients with their own health care dollars, and when decisions about care are made by doctors talking with patients, not by government program managers, will our nation be in a position to control costs and extend coverage to the chronically uninsured.
Dr. Roger Stark is a health care policy analyst at Washington Policy Center, a non-partisan independent policy research organization in Seattle and Olympia. For more information contact WPC at 206-937-9691 or washingtonpolicy.org.
Barack Obama says he wants to make reforming health care one of his administration’s top priorities. Change in health care is certainly needed. There is a danger, though, that the new president will be unduly influenced by political advocates peddling the same tired myths that have dogged the health care debate since the Clinton years. These myths are founded on selective data, doubtful sources and faulty science. For anyone with an open mind and a passion for accuracy, they are easily dispelled.
First, we hear a lot about how terrible the infant mortality rate is in the United States, supposedly the worst in the civilized world. Is this true? Not really. U.S. health officials count all live births, while many other countries only count full-term births or infants who live at least 28 days. Obviously, premature infants, who are counted in the U.S. but not in other countries, have a much higher risk of mortality.
Second, we are told people in the U.S. don’t live as long as people in other countries. However, deaths from homicide and accidents distort the picture. When the data is adjusted for these categories, life expectancy in the U.S. is as high as in other countries. Homicide and violent trauma certainly reflect a country’s social problems, but they tell us little about its health care system.
Third, we are told that each year in the U.S. there are nearly 100,000 unnecessary hospital deaths. A panel of doctors reviewed the hospital data and found the great majority of these deaths occur at the end of the patient’s natural life, when the outcome would have been the same regardless of what hospital staff did or did not do. In other countries, these older, desperately ill people often are not even sent to a hospital, dying at home instead, and are not included in national medical statistics.
A comparable, population-adjusted study in Canada found 200,000 “unnecessary” hospital deaths, even though political activists regularly push Canadian-style health care as the model for the U.S.
Fourth, we hear many people have to declare bankruptcy because of medical bills. It turns out advocates count any bankruptcy case involving even a single medical bill, whether or not health costs had anything to do with the person’s financial problems.
People ages 55 to 65, who have more personal control over their health coverage, are less likely to declare bankruptcy, while people over 65, who are on government-run Medicare, have seen a doubling of their bankruptcy rate. Tax-funded health care has not reduced bankruptcies for elderly Americans.
Fifth, we are told 45 million Americans are uninsured. Who are the uninsured? Is cost really the reason they do not have coverage? It turns out political advocates count anyone who was without health coverage at any time during a calendar year. Half of those counted as uninsured were in transition to a new job, and one-third could sign up for a government program (like Medicare, Medicaid or state-subsidized care) but choose not to.
Only about eight million people, less than 5% of Americans, are chronically uninsured. This is a serious problem, but hardly a reason to revolutionize health coverage for 95% of the population.
Sixth, we are told the U.S. ranks a dismal 37th in health care worldwide. The figure comes from the U.N.’s World Health Organization. Three of the five criteria used to rate nations were biased in a favor of nationalized, single-payer systems, and U.N. officials admit they have an 80% uncertainty level in their data. Amazingly, none of the five criteria included actual health outcomes, such as cancer or heart attack survival rates. The U.S. tops all countries in favorable health outcomes.
Besides, any health study that ranks Greece (#14) and Morocco (#29) ahead of the U.S. clearly has methodological problems.
The national debate about how to improve health care needs honest research honestly presented, not skewed data or false comparisons with other countries. The six myths about U.S. health care only serve to shift our focus away from the real problem - overregulation and artificially high costs. Only when public policy reconnects patients with their own health care dollars, and when decisions about care are made by doctors talking with patients, not by government program managers, will our nation be in a position to control costs and extend coverage to the chronically uninsured.
Dr. Roger Stark is a health care policy analyst at Washington Policy Center, a non-partisan independent policy research organization in Seattle and Olympia. For more information contact WPC at 206-937-9691 or washingtonpolicy.org.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Why Government Spending Does Not Stimulate Economic Growth
by Brian M. Riedl
Senior Fellow, The Heritage Foundation
In a throwback to the 1930s and 1970s, some lawmakers are betting that America’s economic ills can be cured by an extraordinary expansion of government. This tired approach has already failed repeatedly in the past year, in which Congress and the President:
· Increased total federal spending by 11 percent to nearly $3 trillion
· Enacted $333 billion in “emergency” spending
· Enacted $105 billion in tax rebates
· Pushed the budget deficit to $455 billion in the name of “stimulus”
Every one of these policies failed to increase economic growth. Now, in addition to passing a $700 billion financial sector rescue package, federal lawmakers have decided to double down on these failed spending policies by proposing a $300 billion economic stimulus bill.
Even though the last $455 billion in Keynesian deficit spending failed to help the economy, lawmakers seem to have convinced themselves that the next $300 billion will succeed. This is not the first time government expansions have failed to produce economic growth. Massive spending hikes in the 1930s, 1960s, and 1970s all failed to increase economic growth rates. Yet in the 1980s and 1990s - when the federal government shrank by one-fifth as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) - the U.S. economy enjoyed its greatest expansion to date.
Cross-national comparisons yield the same result. The U.S. government spends significantly less than the 15 pre-2004 European Union nations, and yet enjoys 40 percent larger per capita GDP, 50 percent faster economic growth rates, and a substantially lower unemployment rate.
When conventional economic wisdom repeatedly fails, it becomes necessary to revisit that conventional wisdom. Government spending fails to stimulate economic growth because every dollar Congress “injects” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed out of the economy. Thus, government spending “stimulus” merely redistributes existing income, doing nothing to increase productivity or employment, and therefore nothing to create additional income. Even worse, many government expenditures weaken the private sector by directing resources toward less productive uses and thus impede income growth.
The Myth of Spending as “Stimulus”
Spending-stimulus advocates claim that government can “inject” new money into the economy, increasing demand and therefore production. This raises the obvious question: Where does the government acquire the money it pumps into the economy? Congress does not have a vault of money waiting to be distributed: Therefore, every dollar Congress “injects” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed out of the economy. No new spending power is created. It is merely redistributed from one group of people to another.
Spending-stimulus advocates typically respond that redistributing money from “savers” to “spenders” will lead to additional spending. That assumes that savers store their savings in their mattresses or elsewhere outside the economy. In reality, nearly all Americans either invest their savings by purchasing financial assets such as stocks and bonds (which finances business investment), or by purchasing non-financial assets such as real estate and collectibles, or they deposit it in banks (which quickly lend it to others to spend). The money is used regardless of whether people spend or save.
Government cannot create new purchasing power out of thin air. If Congress funds new spending with taxes, it is simply redistributing existing income. If Congress instead borrows the money from domestic investors, those investors will have that much less to invest or to spend in the private economy. If Congress borrows the money from foreigners, the balance of payments will adjust by equally reducing net exports, leaving GDP unchanged. Every dollar Congress spends must first come from somewhere else.
This does not mean that government spending has no economic impact at all. Government spending often alters the composition of total demand, such as increasing consumption at the expense of investment.
More importantly, government spending can alter future economic growth. Economic growth results from producing more goods and services (not from redistributing existing income), and that requires productivity growth and growth in the labor supply. A government’s impact on economic growth is, therefore, determined by its policies’ effect on labor productivity and labor supply.
Productivity growth requires increasing the amount of capital, either material or human, relative to the amount of labor employed. Productivity growth is facilitated by smoothly functioning markets indicating accurate price signals to which buyers and sellers, firms and workers can respond in flexible markets. Only in the rare instances where the private sector fails to provide these inputs in adequate amounts is government spending necessary.
For instance, government spending on education, job training, physical infrastructure, and research and development can increase long-term productivity rates - but only if government spending does not crowd out similar private spending, and only if government spends the money more competently than businesses, nonprofit organizations, and private citizens.
More specifically, government must secure a higher long-term return on its investment than taxpayers’ (or investors lending the government) requirements with the same funds. Historically, governments have rarely outperformed the private sector in generating productivity growth. In fact, most government spending has historically reduced productivity and long-term economic growth.
The Myth that Highway Spending Creates New Jobs
Nowhere is the government spending stimulus myth more widespread than in highway spending. Congress is already rumbling to push billions in highway spending in the next stimulus package. Over the years, lawmakers have repeatedly supported their errant claim that highway spending is an immediate economic tonic by citing a Department of Transportation (DOT) study.
This study supposedly states that every $1 billion spent on highways adds 47,576 new jobs to the economy. The problem: The DOT study made no such claim. It stated that spending $1 billion on highways would require 47,576 workers (or more precisely, it would require 26,524 workers, who then spend their income elsewhere, supporting an additional 21,052 workers).
But before the government can spend $1 billion hiring road builders and purchasing asphalt, it must first tax or borrow $1 billion from other sectors of the economy - which would then lose a similar number of jobs. In other words, highway spending merely transfers jobs and income from one part of the economy to another.
As The Heritage Foundation’s Ronald Utt has explained, “The only way that $1 billion of new highway spending can create 47,576 new jobs is if the $1 billion appears out of nowhere as if it were manna from heaven.” The DOT report implicitly acknowledged this point by referring to the transportation jobs as “employment benefits” within the transportation sector, rather than as new jobs for the total economy.
An April 2008 DOT update to its previous study reduced the employment figure to 34,779 jobs supported by each $1 billion spent on highways, and explicitly stated that the figure “refers to jobs supported by highway investments, not jobs created.”
Similarly, a Congressional Research Service study calculated similar numbers as the DOT study, but cautioned:
“To the extent that financing new highways by reducing expenditures on other programs or by deficit finance and its impact on private consumption and investment, the net impact on the economy of highway construction in terms of both output and employment could be nullified or even negative.” [Highway Construction: Its Impact on the Economy, David J. Cantor, Congressional Research Service, Report for Congress, No. 93-21E, January 6, 1993]
Not surprisingly, highway spending has a poor track record of stimulating the economy. The Emergency Jobs Appropriations Act of 1983 appropriated billions of dollars in highway spending (among other programs) in hopes of pushing the double-digit unemployment rate downward. Years later, an audit by the General Accounting Office (GAO, now the Government Accountability Office) found that highway spending generally failed to create a significant number of new jobs. [Funds Spent Slowly, Few Jobs Created, GAO/HRD-87-1, December 1986.]
The bottom line is that there is no reason to expect additional highway spending this year to boost short-term economic growth or create new jobs. As stated above, resulting improvements in the nation’s infrastructure may increase future productivity and growth - once they are completed and in use. This is not the same as suggesting that the act of spending money on additional highway workers and asphalt is itself an immediate stimulant.
Even the hope of future productivity increases rest on the assumptions that politicians will allocate money to necessary highway projects (rather than pork), and that those future productivity benefits will outweigh the lost productivity from raising future tax rates to finance the project.
State Bailouts Merely Shift Money around
Congress is reportedly considering using stimulus funding to bail out states dealing with their own budget shortfalls. This makes little sense as a matter of macroeconomic policy. State spending does not suddenly become simulative because it is funded by Washington instead of state governments. Either way, any spending “injected” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed from the economy. It does not matter which level of government is doing the taxing, borrowing, or spending.
Furthermore, sending federal aid to states would not save taxpayers a dime because state taxpayers are also federal taxpayers. Increasing federal borrowing to keep state taxes from rising is like running up a Visa card balance to keep the Mastercard balance from rising. The overall costs do not change, only the address receiving the payment.
Governors typically respond that a federal bailout is preferable because it could be funded with deficits rather than new taxes - currently not an option for the 49 states, like Washington state, with balanced-budget requirements. But it is disingenuous for a state to require a balanced budget, and then demand that Washington bail it out of the consequences of its own overspending.
Congress already sends $467 billion to state and local government every year - up 29% after inflation since 2000. This is well beyond what is needed to reimburse states for federal mandates. In fact, since 1996, Washington has imposed less than $25 million per state in new unfunded mandates. (No Child Left Behind is neither unfunded nor mandated.)
State health, education, and transportation programs remain heavily subsidized by Washington. Commonsense says states should build up adequate rainy-day funds during booms to cushion the inevitable recessions. Instead, states keep responding to temporary revenue surges with new permanent spending programs.
All booms eventually end, and free-spending states left themselves utterly unprepared for the 2002–2003 economic slowdown. Yet instead of sufficiently paring back their bloated budgets, the states demanded and received a $30 billion bailout from Washington in 2003. When government bails out irresponsible behavior, it only encourages more irresponsibility. And that is just what happened: After the 2003 bailout, states went right back to spending - with annual budget hikes averaging 7.2 percent over the next four years. Washington state increased permanent spending by a whopping 34% in four years.
Thus, another recession has brought another round of state bailout calls. How will states learn to budget responsibly if they know they can keep returning to the federal ATM?
The biggest losers from a federal bailout are the taxpayers who live in fiscally responsible states. They played by the rules and resisted extravagant new spending programs - and will be “rewarded” with higher taxes to bail out neighboring states that went on a spending spree they could not afford.
That is simply unfair. And it encourages responsible states to be less responsible next time - better to be the bailout recipient than the bailout payer. Congress should resist a bailout and instead instruct state governments to set priorities, make trade-offs and reduce their own unnecessary spending.
A Better Way
Government spending has an abysmal track record of stimulating the economy. However, these repeated failures have not stopped lawmakers from proposing and enacting a seemingly endless string of “stimulus” bills. Rather than redistributing money, lawmakers should focus on improving long-term productivity. This means reducing marginal tax rates to encourage working, saving, and investing. It also means promoting free trade, cutting unnecessary red tape and streamlining wasteful spending that all weaken the private sector’s ability to generate income and create wealth.
Finally, it means strengthening education - not just throwing money at it. Addressing long-term growth and productivity is more challenging than waving the magic wand of short-term “stimulus” spending - but a more productive economy will be better prepared to handle future economic downturns.
Senior Fellow, The Heritage Foundation
In a throwback to the 1930s and 1970s, some lawmakers are betting that America’s economic ills can be cured by an extraordinary expansion of government. This tired approach has already failed repeatedly in the past year, in which Congress and the President:
· Increased total federal spending by 11 percent to nearly $3 trillion
· Enacted $333 billion in “emergency” spending
· Enacted $105 billion in tax rebates
· Pushed the budget deficit to $455 billion in the name of “stimulus”
Every one of these policies failed to increase economic growth. Now, in addition to passing a $700 billion financial sector rescue package, federal lawmakers have decided to double down on these failed spending policies by proposing a $300 billion economic stimulus bill.
Even though the last $455 billion in Keynesian deficit spending failed to help the economy, lawmakers seem to have convinced themselves that the next $300 billion will succeed. This is not the first time government expansions have failed to produce economic growth. Massive spending hikes in the 1930s, 1960s, and 1970s all failed to increase economic growth rates. Yet in the 1980s and 1990s - when the federal government shrank by one-fifth as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) - the U.S. economy enjoyed its greatest expansion to date.
Cross-national comparisons yield the same result. The U.S. government spends significantly less than the 15 pre-2004 European Union nations, and yet enjoys 40 percent larger per capita GDP, 50 percent faster economic growth rates, and a substantially lower unemployment rate.
When conventional economic wisdom repeatedly fails, it becomes necessary to revisit that conventional wisdom. Government spending fails to stimulate economic growth because every dollar Congress “injects” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed out of the economy. Thus, government spending “stimulus” merely redistributes existing income, doing nothing to increase productivity or employment, and therefore nothing to create additional income. Even worse, many government expenditures weaken the private sector by directing resources toward less productive uses and thus impede income growth.
The Myth of Spending as “Stimulus”
Spending-stimulus advocates claim that government can “inject” new money into the economy, increasing demand and therefore production. This raises the obvious question: Where does the government acquire the money it pumps into the economy? Congress does not have a vault of money waiting to be distributed: Therefore, every dollar Congress “injects” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed out of the economy. No new spending power is created. It is merely redistributed from one group of people to another.
Spending-stimulus advocates typically respond that redistributing money from “savers” to “spenders” will lead to additional spending. That assumes that savers store their savings in their mattresses or elsewhere outside the economy. In reality, nearly all Americans either invest their savings by purchasing financial assets such as stocks and bonds (which finances business investment), or by purchasing non-financial assets such as real estate and collectibles, or they deposit it in banks (which quickly lend it to others to spend). The money is used regardless of whether people spend or save.
Government cannot create new purchasing power out of thin air. If Congress funds new spending with taxes, it is simply redistributing existing income. If Congress instead borrows the money from domestic investors, those investors will have that much less to invest or to spend in the private economy. If Congress borrows the money from foreigners, the balance of payments will adjust by equally reducing net exports, leaving GDP unchanged. Every dollar Congress spends must first come from somewhere else.
This does not mean that government spending has no economic impact at all. Government spending often alters the composition of total demand, such as increasing consumption at the expense of investment.
More importantly, government spending can alter future economic growth. Economic growth results from producing more goods and services (not from redistributing existing income), and that requires productivity growth and growth in the labor supply. A government’s impact on economic growth is, therefore, determined by its policies’ effect on labor productivity and labor supply.
Productivity growth requires increasing the amount of capital, either material or human, relative to the amount of labor employed. Productivity growth is facilitated by smoothly functioning markets indicating accurate price signals to which buyers and sellers, firms and workers can respond in flexible markets. Only in the rare instances where the private sector fails to provide these inputs in adequate amounts is government spending necessary.
For instance, government spending on education, job training, physical infrastructure, and research and development can increase long-term productivity rates - but only if government spending does not crowd out similar private spending, and only if government spends the money more competently than businesses, nonprofit organizations, and private citizens.
More specifically, government must secure a higher long-term return on its investment than taxpayers’ (or investors lending the government) requirements with the same funds. Historically, governments have rarely outperformed the private sector in generating productivity growth. In fact, most government spending has historically reduced productivity and long-term economic growth.
The Myth that Highway Spending Creates New Jobs
Nowhere is the government spending stimulus myth more widespread than in highway spending. Congress is already rumbling to push billions in highway spending in the next stimulus package. Over the years, lawmakers have repeatedly supported their errant claim that highway spending is an immediate economic tonic by citing a Department of Transportation (DOT) study.
This study supposedly states that every $1 billion spent on highways adds 47,576 new jobs to the economy. The problem: The DOT study made no such claim. It stated that spending $1 billion on highways would require 47,576 workers (or more precisely, it would require 26,524 workers, who then spend their income elsewhere, supporting an additional 21,052 workers).
But before the government can spend $1 billion hiring road builders and purchasing asphalt, it must first tax or borrow $1 billion from other sectors of the economy - which would then lose a similar number of jobs. In other words, highway spending merely transfers jobs and income from one part of the economy to another.
As The Heritage Foundation’s Ronald Utt has explained, “The only way that $1 billion of new highway spending can create 47,576 new jobs is if the $1 billion appears out of nowhere as if it were manna from heaven.” The DOT report implicitly acknowledged this point by referring to the transportation jobs as “employment benefits” within the transportation sector, rather than as new jobs for the total economy.
An April 2008 DOT update to its previous study reduced the employment figure to 34,779 jobs supported by each $1 billion spent on highways, and explicitly stated that the figure “refers to jobs supported by highway investments, not jobs created.”
Similarly, a Congressional Research Service study calculated similar numbers as the DOT study, but cautioned:
“To the extent that financing new highways by reducing expenditures on other programs or by deficit finance and its impact on private consumption and investment, the net impact on the economy of highway construction in terms of both output and employment could be nullified or even negative.” [Highway Construction: Its Impact on the Economy, David J. Cantor, Congressional Research Service, Report for Congress, No. 93-21E, January 6, 1993]
Not surprisingly, highway spending has a poor track record of stimulating the economy. The Emergency Jobs Appropriations Act of 1983 appropriated billions of dollars in highway spending (among other programs) in hopes of pushing the double-digit unemployment rate downward. Years later, an audit by the General Accounting Office (GAO, now the Government Accountability Office) found that highway spending generally failed to create a significant number of new jobs. [Funds Spent Slowly, Few Jobs Created, GAO/HRD-87-1, December 1986.]
The bottom line is that there is no reason to expect additional highway spending this year to boost short-term economic growth or create new jobs. As stated above, resulting improvements in the nation’s infrastructure may increase future productivity and growth - once they are completed and in use. This is not the same as suggesting that the act of spending money on additional highway workers and asphalt is itself an immediate stimulant.
Even the hope of future productivity increases rest on the assumptions that politicians will allocate money to necessary highway projects (rather than pork), and that those future productivity benefits will outweigh the lost productivity from raising future tax rates to finance the project.
State Bailouts Merely Shift Money around
Congress is reportedly considering using stimulus funding to bail out states dealing with their own budget shortfalls. This makes little sense as a matter of macroeconomic policy. State spending does not suddenly become simulative because it is funded by Washington instead of state governments. Either way, any spending “injected” into the economy must first be taxed or borrowed from the economy. It does not matter which level of government is doing the taxing, borrowing, or spending.
Furthermore, sending federal aid to states would not save taxpayers a dime because state taxpayers are also federal taxpayers. Increasing federal borrowing to keep state taxes from rising is like running up a Visa card balance to keep the Mastercard balance from rising. The overall costs do not change, only the address receiving the payment.
Governors typically respond that a federal bailout is preferable because it could be funded with deficits rather than new taxes - currently not an option for the 49 states, like Washington state, with balanced-budget requirements. But it is disingenuous for a state to require a balanced budget, and then demand that Washington bail it out of the consequences of its own overspending.
Congress already sends $467 billion to state and local government every year - up 29% after inflation since 2000. This is well beyond what is needed to reimburse states for federal mandates. In fact, since 1996, Washington has imposed less than $25 million per state in new unfunded mandates. (No Child Left Behind is neither unfunded nor mandated.)
State health, education, and transportation programs remain heavily subsidized by Washington. Commonsense says states should build up adequate rainy-day funds during booms to cushion the inevitable recessions. Instead, states keep responding to temporary revenue surges with new permanent spending programs.
All booms eventually end, and free-spending states left themselves utterly unprepared for the 2002–2003 economic slowdown. Yet instead of sufficiently paring back their bloated budgets, the states demanded and received a $30 billion bailout from Washington in 2003. When government bails out irresponsible behavior, it only encourages more irresponsibility. And that is just what happened: After the 2003 bailout, states went right back to spending - with annual budget hikes averaging 7.2 percent over the next four years. Washington state increased permanent spending by a whopping 34% in four years.
Thus, another recession has brought another round of state bailout calls. How will states learn to budget responsibly if they know they can keep returning to the federal ATM?
The biggest losers from a federal bailout are the taxpayers who live in fiscally responsible states. They played by the rules and resisted extravagant new spending programs - and will be “rewarded” with higher taxes to bail out neighboring states that went on a spending spree they could not afford.
That is simply unfair. And it encourages responsible states to be less responsible next time - better to be the bailout recipient than the bailout payer. Congress should resist a bailout and instead instruct state governments to set priorities, make trade-offs and reduce their own unnecessary spending.
A Better Way
Government spending has an abysmal track record of stimulating the economy. However, these repeated failures have not stopped lawmakers from proposing and enacting a seemingly endless string of “stimulus” bills. Rather than redistributing money, lawmakers should focus on improving long-term productivity. This means reducing marginal tax rates to encourage working, saving, and investing. It also means promoting free trade, cutting unnecessary red tape and streamlining wasteful spending that all weaken the private sector’s ability to generate income and create wealth.
Finally, it means strengthening education - not just throwing money at it. Addressing long-term growth and productivity is more challenging than waving the magic wand of short-term “stimulus” spending - but a more productive economy will be better prepared to handle future economic downturns.
Monday, January 26, 2009
To Stimulate the Economy, Stop Trying to Limit Driving and Start Reducing Congestion
by Michael Ennis, Director-Center for Transportation, Washington Policy Center
I'm often asked how other states compare to Washington on transportation policy. This is a reasonable question, because across our state, traffic congestion is growing worse and is expected to double over the next twenty years. Congestion chokes the economy, robs valuable time from our families and lowers our overall quality of life.
But how do we compare to other states?
My response always mentions Texas because of its early adoption of Public/Private Partnerships and tolling, and its continued spending on infrastructure.
Washington can learn a lot from how the Lone Star State is tackling congestion, increasing personal mobility and, as a result, stimulating economic development.
Good transportation policy incorporates five important principles. Policymakers should implement performance measures like traffic congestion relief or economic development. They should respect people’s freedom of mobility, spend transportation dollars based on market demand, improve freight mobility and utilize Public/Private Partnerships.
I was pleasantly surprised to learn recently that the goals of policymakers in Texas are remarkably similar.
According to the state's 2009-2013 Strategic Plan, the Texas Department of Transportation’s (TXDOT) goals include (in this order) to Reduce congestion, Enhance safety, Expand economic opportunity, Improve air quality and Preservation.
Believe it or not, traffic congestion relief is not a policy priority in our state. This means there is no obligation or relationship between spending and reducing congestion.
Not only is congestion relief the top priority in Texas, TXDOT backs up its priorities with specific performance measures that hold the department accountable and ultimately strengthens the relationship with spending.
The TXDOT also uses four strategies to accomplish its stated policy goals: They "use all available financial tools to build transportation projects." They "empower local and regional leaders to solve local and regional transportation problems" and "harness market-based principles to maximize competition, reduce costs, and guide investments." The state also "facilitates consumer-driven decisions that respond to market forces."
Washington policymakers, on the other hand, try to manipulate the market by forcing the public to shift from the roadway to other modes. This demand-side strategy is plainly visible in Washington's new policy to reduce pollution by restricting how much people can drive. State leaders want to reduce how much motorists drive from an average of 31 miles per day, to 22 miles per day, despite technological advances in lowing emissions and improving fuel efficiency. In fact, the transportation sector is the only sector with CO2 emissions in Washington that is actually declining. Never have policymakers been more explicit in their desire to unnecessarily force people away from driving.
Instead of spending money on infrastructure and services that proportionally support market demand, state leaders in Washington try to shift people from one travel mode to another. This strategy inevitably leads to greater traffic congestion, because government will always fail to control the market in this way. Despite years of higher spending on expanding public transport services, its overall mode share has remained flat for the last three decades, while traffic congestion has risen sharply. The current and proposed trends in transportation spending continue this failed strategy.
Washington policymakers would achieve economically better results if they abandoned social engineering and instead responded to market demand. The economy, motorists, taxpayers, the freight industry, ports and ultimately the general public, will benefit and thank them.
I'm often asked how other states compare to Washington on transportation policy. This is a reasonable question, because across our state, traffic congestion is growing worse and is expected to double over the next twenty years. Congestion chokes the economy, robs valuable time from our families and lowers our overall quality of life.
But how do we compare to other states?
My response always mentions Texas because of its early adoption of Public/Private Partnerships and tolling, and its continued spending on infrastructure.
Washington can learn a lot from how the Lone Star State is tackling congestion, increasing personal mobility and, as a result, stimulating economic development.
Good transportation policy incorporates five important principles. Policymakers should implement performance measures like traffic congestion relief or economic development. They should respect people’s freedom of mobility, spend transportation dollars based on market demand, improve freight mobility and utilize Public/Private Partnerships.
I was pleasantly surprised to learn recently that the goals of policymakers in Texas are remarkably similar.
According to the state's 2009-2013 Strategic Plan, the Texas Department of Transportation’s (TXDOT) goals include (in this order) to Reduce congestion, Enhance safety, Expand economic opportunity, Improve air quality and Preservation.
Believe it or not, traffic congestion relief is not a policy priority in our state. This means there is no obligation or relationship between spending and reducing congestion.
Not only is congestion relief the top priority in Texas, TXDOT backs up its priorities with specific performance measures that hold the department accountable and ultimately strengthens the relationship with spending.
The TXDOT also uses four strategies to accomplish its stated policy goals: They "use all available financial tools to build transportation projects." They "empower local and regional leaders to solve local and regional transportation problems" and "harness market-based principles to maximize competition, reduce costs, and guide investments." The state also "facilitates consumer-driven decisions that respond to market forces."
Washington policymakers, on the other hand, try to manipulate the market by forcing the public to shift from the roadway to other modes. This demand-side strategy is plainly visible in Washington's new policy to reduce pollution by restricting how much people can drive. State leaders want to reduce how much motorists drive from an average of 31 miles per day, to 22 miles per day, despite technological advances in lowing emissions and improving fuel efficiency. In fact, the transportation sector is the only sector with CO2 emissions in Washington that is actually declining. Never have policymakers been more explicit in their desire to unnecessarily force people away from driving.
Instead of spending money on infrastructure and services that proportionally support market demand, state leaders in Washington try to shift people from one travel mode to another. This strategy inevitably leads to greater traffic congestion, because government will always fail to control the market in this way. Despite years of higher spending on expanding public transport services, its overall mode share has remained flat for the last three decades, while traffic congestion has risen sharply. The current and proposed trends in transportation spending continue this failed strategy.
Washington policymakers would achieve economically better results if they abandoned social engineering and instead responded to market demand. The economy, motorists, taxpayers, the freight industry, ports and ultimately the general public, will benefit and thank them.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Study: Dams Not to Blame for Salmon Collapse
By SeaFood Business
River dams aren't the main barriers for young Pacific salmon migrating to the ocean, a breakthrough tracking study suggests.
David Welch of Kintama Research in Nanaimo, British Columbia, reports in the journal PLoS Biology that the Columbia River's young salmon and steelhead have as good or a better chance of survival as those in Canada's Fraser River, which is dam-free. The Columbia River has several hydropower dams on its system.
The finding comes as environmental groups campaign to have four Snake River dams removed.
Welch's team used tiny sound-emitting tags on salmon and steelhead released in 2006 from the headwaters of both the Columbia and Fraser rivers, tracking the fish during the smolt stage, when the juvenile fish begin their migration to the Pacific Ocean. Salmon reach maturity in the sea, then later swim back upstream to their hatching site to spawn.
Dramatic declines in the Columbia system have been blamed in part on eight hydropower dams on the Snake River.
"This doesn't mean that dams are good for salmon, but it's a very different result than what the science community would have expected," says Welch. "We'd have expected to see the survival a lot lower [in the Columbia], but we're actually seeing it's somewhat higher."
The researchers say that while 25 to 65 percent of migrating smolts make it successfully through the Snake-Columbia's entire hydropower system, only a fraction - as little as 0.5 percent some years - return as adults.
The findings are based on technology developed by the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking (POST) project, which is headed by the Vancouver Aquarium.
"For the first time we've tracked a critter the size of a hot dog, 1,553 miles (2,500 kilometers) from the Rocky Mountains up to southeast Alaska," Jim Bolger, executive director of POST, told National Geographic News. "One of the other surprises is how quickly they made it - these are the Michael Phelps of small fishes."
River dams aren't the main barriers for young Pacific salmon migrating to the ocean, a breakthrough tracking study suggests.
David Welch of Kintama Research in Nanaimo, British Columbia, reports in the journal PLoS Biology that the Columbia River's young salmon and steelhead have as good or a better chance of survival as those in Canada's Fraser River, which is dam-free. The Columbia River has several hydropower dams on its system.
The finding comes as environmental groups campaign to have four Snake River dams removed.
Welch's team used tiny sound-emitting tags on salmon and steelhead released in 2006 from the headwaters of both the Columbia and Fraser rivers, tracking the fish during the smolt stage, when the juvenile fish begin their migration to the Pacific Ocean. Salmon reach maturity in the sea, then later swim back upstream to their hatching site to spawn.
Dramatic declines in the Columbia system have been blamed in part on eight hydropower dams on the Snake River.
"This doesn't mean that dams are good for salmon, but it's a very different result than what the science community would have expected," says Welch. "We'd have expected to see the survival a lot lower [in the Columbia], but we're actually seeing it's somewhat higher."
The researchers say that while 25 to 65 percent of migrating smolts make it successfully through the Snake-Columbia's entire hydropower system, only a fraction - as little as 0.5 percent some years - return as adults.
The findings are based on technology developed by the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking (POST) project, which is headed by the Vancouver Aquarium.
"For the first time we've tracked a critter the size of a hot dog, 1,553 miles (2,500 kilometers) from the Rocky Mountains up to southeast Alaska," Jim Bolger, executive director of POST, told National Geographic News. "One of the other surprises is how quickly they made it - these are the Michael Phelps of small fishes."
Friday, October 24, 2008
Mercer Island Public Workshop on Pedestrain and Bicycle Facilities Plan
The City of Mercer Island is updating the Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Plan and citizens are invited to comment at an upcoming public workshop. The workshop will be held on October 28, 2008 starting at 7 pm at the Community Center at Mercer View. The Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Plan, originally approved in 1996, guides investments and other actions relating to Mercer Island’s pedestrian and bicycle facilities such as trails, crosswalks, bike lanes, and sidewalks. The majority of the projects and improvements from the 1996 plan have been partially or completely implemented and it’s now time to update the plan.
Please join your neighbors for an informative workshop and an important opportunity to provide input. See you there!
For more information about the Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Plan, please visit www.mercergov.org/PBF . For more information about the public workshop, please contact Joy Johnston, Mercer Island Communications Coordinator at joy.johnston@mercergov.org.
Please join your neighbors for an informative workshop and an important opportunity to provide input. See you there!
For more information about the Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Plan, please visit www.mercergov.org/PBF . For more information about the public workshop, please contact Joy Johnston, Mercer Island Communications Coordinator at joy.johnston@mercergov.org.
Friday, October 17, 2008
What caused Olympia's budget mess? (Hint: it's not lack of money)
by Paul Guppy
Vice President for Research, Washington Policy Center
State finances are in shambles. Olympia leaders have racked up a $3.2 billion deficit and unlike Wall Street, Congress is not going to bail them out. How did we get in this mess? It is not for lack of money. Tax revenues have increased every year, and today the people of Washington send more money to Olympia than ever before.
The cause of the deficit is overspending. Tax revenues are way up--by $2.4 billion according to the latest forecast--but state elected leaders have been spending it even faster. Permanent spending is up 33% in four years, and this does not count new entitlements due to kick in next year.
Some people are pushing to raise the combined sales tax, which already approaches 9% (when the sales tax started it was 2%.) Boosting taxes to get out of the deficit is wrongheaded for three reasons.
First, it is not fair for state leaders to turn to working citizens and businesses that already shoulder a heavy tax burden and make them pay even more to fix Olympia's budget mess.
Second, tax increases depress economic growth, so raising the sales tax would only make a dire situation worse.
Third, it doesn't make sense to reward the very Olympia leaders who created the deficit by letting them ratchet up the state's financial commitments. If we raise taxes lawmakers and the governor would say to themselves, "Wow, we spent all the money people pay in taxes and what happens--they send us more money!"
Some lawmakers want to spend the rainy day fund, but this would only solve a fraction of the deficit and lock in permanent future spending. The legislature would have to come up with the same dollars again and again in every budget indefinitely into the future.
If raising taxes or spending reserves won't solve the deficit then we face painful budget cuts, right? Wrong. Since Olympia lawmakers will have $2.4 billion more to spend next year compared to the current budget, they simply need to become better managers of the money we already send them. Here are a few constructive ideas to get them started.
1. Slow down the rate of spending growth. If Olympia limits the rise in spending to $36 billion in the next budget, up from the current $34 billion, there will be no deficit.
2. Eliminate the new entitlement that will send a check from the state treasury to everyone in the state below a certain income level.
3. Eliminate the $160 million in wasteful budget items identified in the Washington State Piglet Book.
4. Ask state workers to contribute 16% to the cost of their health benefits, as was standard four years ago, instead of the current 12%. They would still get a great deal-- the average in the private sector is 28%.
5. Use the Priorities of Government process to slow down the rise in low-priority spending. Each year state agencies rank their programs by importance: one-third top priority, one-third mid priority and one-third low priority, but lawmakers usually ignore their recommendations.
6. Delay implementation of the new all-day kindergarten entitlement.
7. Delay implementation of the new family leave entitlement.
If lawmakers and the governor set firm priorities within a rising budget--and after all, that is their job--they can solve the deficit without raising taxes. They would not have to cut programs and could direct targeted spending increases to where they are needed most. Of course, if Olympia had not cranked up permanent spending by more than $8.5 billion over the last two budgets, we wouldn't face this problem in the first place.
A final thought: since tax revenues are constantly rising, wouldn't it be a pleasant change if leaders in Olympia, instead of turning to us for more money, would say "thank you" for what we already send them?
Vice President for Research, Washington Policy Center
State finances are in shambles. Olympia leaders have racked up a $3.2 billion deficit and unlike Wall Street, Congress is not going to bail them out. How did we get in this mess? It is not for lack of money. Tax revenues have increased every year, and today the people of Washington send more money to Olympia than ever before.
The cause of the deficit is overspending. Tax revenues are way up--by $2.4 billion according to the latest forecast--but state elected leaders have been spending it even faster. Permanent spending is up 33% in four years, and this does not count new entitlements due to kick in next year.
Some people are pushing to raise the combined sales tax, which already approaches 9% (when the sales tax started it was 2%.) Boosting taxes to get out of the deficit is wrongheaded for three reasons.
First, it is not fair for state leaders to turn to working citizens and businesses that already shoulder a heavy tax burden and make them pay even more to fix Olympia's budget mess.
Second, tax increases depress economic growth, so raising the sales tax would only make a dire situation worse.
Third, it doesn't make sense to reward the very Olympia leaders who created the deficit by letting them ratchet up the state's financial commitments. If we raise taxes lawmakers and the governor would say to themselves, "Wow, we spent all the money people pay in taxes and what happens--they send us more money!"
Some lawmakers want to spend the rainy day fund, but this would only solve a fraction of the deficit and lock in permanent future spending. The legislature would have to come up with the same dollars again and again in every budget indefinitely into the future.
If raising taxes or spending reserves won't solve the deficit then we face painful budget cuts, right? Wrong. Since Olympia lawmakers will have $2.4 billion more to spend next year compared to the current budget, they simply need to become better managers of the money we already send them. Here are a few constructive ideas to get them started.
1. Slow down the rate of spending growth. If Olympia limits the rise in spending to $36 billion in the next budget, up from the current $34 billion, there will be no deficit.
2. Eliminate the new entitlement that will send a check from the state treasury to everyone in the state below a certain income level.
3. Eliminate the $160 million in wasteful budget items identified in the Washington State Piglet Book.
4. Ask state workers to contribute 16% to the cost of their health benefits, as was standard four years ago, instead of the current 12%. They would still get a great deal-- the average in the private sector is 28%.
5. Use the Priorities of Government process to slow down the rise in low-priority spending. Each year state agencies rank their programs by importance: one-third top priority, one-third mid priority and one-third low priority, but lawmakers usually ignore their recommendations.
6. Delay implementation of the new all-day kindergarten entitlement.
7. Delay implementation of the new family leave entitlement.
If lawmakers and the governor set firm priorities within a rising budget--and after all, that is their job--they can solve the deficit without raising taxes. They would not have to cut programs and could direct targeted spending increases to where they are needed most. Of course, if Olympia had not cranked up permanent spending by more than $8.5 billion over the last two budgets, we wouldn't face this problem in the first place.
A final thought: since tax revenues are constantly rising, wouldn't it be a pleasant change if leaders in Olympia, instead of turning to us for more money, would say "thank you" for what we already send them?
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Island Crest Way Project: Seeking Citizens for Panel
The City of Mercer Island is seeking citizens to participate in a public involvement process regarding the Island Crest Way and Merrimount intersection. A panel of approximately 15 citizens plus two Council members will be selected by the Mayor and approved by the City Council to participate in this process. Participants will be expected to attend up to four meetings from November 2008 to February 2009. Their presence would also be valued at a community meeting in early 2009 and relevant city council meetings.
Applications for the citizen panel are due October 8, 2008. Visit www.mercergov.org/IslandCrestWay to download an application or contact Project Manager Anne Tonella-Howe at anne.tonella-howe@mercergov.org or at 206.275.7813 to have an application sent to you.
On September 15, the Mercer Island City Council approved a public involvement process regarding the Island Crest Way and Merrimount intersection. Previously, as part of the Transportation Improvement Plan discussion at the June 2 Council meeting, City Council approved converting Island Crest Way from the current four-lane configuration to a three-lane configuration. Based on the continuing high level of community interest in this project, implementation of any changes to the Island Crest Way corridor will be postponed until additional public outreach is completed.
A panel of approximately 15 citizens plus two Council members will be selected by the Mayor and approved by the City Council to participate in this process which will start in the fall of 2008 and be completed in the spring of 2009. All meetings will be public and non-participants will be welcome to observe. An opportunity for public comment will be provided at each meeting.
Applications for the citizen panel are due October 8, 2008. Visit www.mercergov.org/IslandCrestWay to download an application or contact Project Manager Anne Tonella-Howe at anne.tonella-howe@mercergov.org or at 206.275.7813 to have an application sent to you.
On September 15, the Mercer Island City Council approved a public involvement process regarding the Island Crest Way and Merrimount intersection. Previously, as part of the Transportation Improvement Plan discussion at the June 2 Council meeting, City Council approved converting Island Crest Way from the current four-lane configuration to a three-lane configuration. Based on the continuing high level of community interest in this project, implementation of any changes to the Island Crest Way corridor will be postponed until additional public outreach is completed.
A panel of approximately 15 citizens plus two Council members will be selected by the Mayor and approved by the City Council to participate in this process which will start in the fall of 2008 and be completed in the spring of 2009. All meetings will be public and non-participants will be welcome to observe. An opportunity for public comment will be provided at each meeting.
Monday, September 08, 2008
Sarah Palin's Acceptance Speech at the Republican National Convention
Mr. Chairman, delegates, and fellow citizens: I am honored to be considered for the nomination for Vice President of the United States.
I accept the call to help our nominee for president to serve and defend America.
I accept the challenge of a tough fight in this election... against confident opponents ... at a crucial hour for our country.
And I accept the privilege of serving with a man who has come through much harder missions ... and met far graver challenges ... and knows how tough fights are won - the next president of the United States, John S. McCain.
It was just a year ago when all the experts in Washington counted out our nominee because he refused to hedge his commitment to the security of the country he loves.
With their usual certitude, they told us that all was lost - there was no hope for this candidate who said that he would rather lose an election than see his country lose a war.
But the pollsters and pundits overlooked just one thing when they wrote him off.
They overlooked the caliber of the man himself - the determination, resolve, and sheer guts of Senator John McCain. The voters knew better.
And maybe that's because they realize there is a time for politics and a time for leadership. A time to campaign and a time to put our country first.
Our nominee for president is a true profile in courage, and people like that are hard to come by.
He's a man who wore the uniform of this country for 22 years, and refused to break faith with those troops in Iraq who have now brought victory within sight.
And as the mother of one of those troops, that is exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief. I'm just one of many moms who'll say an extra prayer each night for our sons and daughters going into harm's way.
Our son Track is 19.
And one week from tomorrow - September 11th - he'll deploy to Iraq with the Army infantry in the service of his country.
My nephew Kasey also enlisted, and serves on a carrier in the Persian Gulf.
My family is proud of both of them and of all the fine men and women serving the country in uniform. Track is the eldest of our five children.
In our family, it's two boys and three girls in between - my strong and kind-hearted daughters Bristol, Willow, and Piper.
And in April, my husband Todd and I welcomed our littlest one into the world, a perfectly beautiful baby boy named Trig. From the inside, no family ever seems typical.
That's how it is with us.
Our family has the same ups and downs as any other ... the same challenges and the same joys.
Sometimes even the greatest joys bring challenge.
And children with special needs inspire a special love.
To the families of special-needs children all across this country, I have a message: For years, you sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters.
I pledge to you that if we are elected, you will have a friend and advocate in the White House. Todd is a story all by himself.
He's a lifelong commercial fisherman ... a production operator in the oil fields of Alaska's North Slope ... a proud member of the United Steel Workers' Union ... and world champion snow machine racer.
Throw in his Yup'ik Eskimo ancestry, and it all makes for quite a package.
We met in high school, and two decades and five children later he's still my guy. My Mom and Dad both worked at the elementary school in our small town.
And among the many things I owe them is one simple lesson: that this is America, and every woman can walk through every door of opportunity.
My parents are here tonight, and I am so proud to be the daughter of Chuck and Sally Heath. Long ago, a young farmer and habber-dasher from Missouri followed an unlikely path to the vice presidency.
A writer observed: "We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity." I know just the kind of people that writer had in mind when he praised Harry Truman.
I grew up with those people.
They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America ... who grow our food, run our factories, and fight our wars.
They love their country, in good times and bad, and they're always proud of America. I had the privilege of living most of my life in a small town.
I was just your average hockey mom, and signed up for the PTA because I wanted to make my kids' public education better.
When I ran for city council, I didn't need focus groups and voter profiles because I knew those voters, and knew their families, too.
Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.
And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.
I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a "community organizer," except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening.
We tend to prefer candidates who don't talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.
As for my running mate, you can be certain that wherever he goes, and whoever is listening, John McCain is the same man. I'm not a member of the permanent political establishment.
And I've learned quickly, these past few days, that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.
But here's a little news flash for all those reporters and commentators: I'm not going to Washington to seek their good opinion - I'm going to Washington to serve the people of this country. Americans expect us to go to Washington for the right reasons, and not just to mingle with the right people.
Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests.
The right reason is to challenge the status quo, to serve the common good, and to leave this nation better than we found it.
No one expects us to agree on everything.
But we are expected to govern with integrity, good will, clear convictions, and ... a servant's heart.
I pledge to all Americans that I will carry myself in this spirit as vice president of the United States. This was the spirit that brought me to the governor's office, when I took on the old politics as usual in Juneau ... when I stood up to the special interests, the lobbyists, big oil companies, and the good-ol' boys network.
Sudden and relentless reform never sits well with entrenched interests and power brokers. That's why true reform is so hard to achieve.
But with the support of the citizens of Alaska, we shook things up.
And in short order we put the government of our state back on the side of the people.
I came to office promising major ethics reform, to end the culture of self-dealing. And today, that ethics reform is the law.
While I was at it, I got rid of a few things in the governor's office that I didn't believe our citizens should have to pay for.
That luxury jet was over the top. I put it on eBay.
I also drive myself to work.
And I thought we could muddle through without the governor's personal chef - although I've got to admit that sometimes my kids sure miss her. I came to office promising to control spending - by request if possible and by veto if necessary.
Senator McCain also promises to use the power of veto in defense of the public interest - and as a chief executive, I can assure you it works.
Our state budget is under control.
We have a surplus.
And I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending: nearly half a billion dollars in vetoes.
I suspended the state fuel tax, and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress.
I told the Congress "thanks, but no thanks," for that Bridge to Nowhere.
If our state wanted a bridge, we'd build it ourselves. When oil and gas prices went up dramatically, and filled up the state treasury, I sent a large share of that revenue back where it belonged - directly to the people of Alaska.
And despite fierce opposition from oil company lobbyists, who kind of liked things the way they were, we broke their monopoly on power and resources.
As governor, I insisted on competition and basic fairness to end their control of our state and return it to the people.
I fought to bring about the largest private-sector infrastructure project in North American history.
And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly forty billion dollar natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence.
That pipeline, when the last section is laid and its valves are opened, will lead America one step farther away from dependence on dangerous foreign powers that do not have our interests at heart.
The stakes for our nation could not be higher.
When a hurricane strikes in the Gulf of Mexico, this country should not be so dependent on imported oil that we are forced to draw from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
And families cannot throw away more and more of their paychecks on gas and heating oil.
With Russia wanting to control a vital pipeline in the Caucasus, and to divide and intimidate our European allies by using energy as a weapon, we cannot leave ourselves at the mercy of foreign suppliers.
To confront the threat that Iran might seek to cut off nearly a fifth of world energy supplies ... or that terrorists might strike again at the Abqaiq facility in Saudi Arabia ... or that Venezuela might shut off its oil deliveries ... we Americans need to produce more of our own oil and gas.
And take it from a gal who knows the North Slope of Alaska: we've got lots of both.
Our opponents say, again and again, that drilling will not solve all of America's energy problems - as if we all didn't know that already.
But the fact that drilling won't solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.
Starting in January, in a McCain-Palin administration, we're going to lay more pipelines ... build more new-clear plants ... create jobs with clean coal ... and move forward on solar, wind, geothermal, and other alternative sources.
We need American energy resources, brought to you by American ingenuity, and produced by American workers. I've noticed a pattern with our opponent.
Maybe you have, too.
We've all heard his dramatic speeches before devoted followers.
And there is much to like and admire about our opponent.
But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate.
This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word "victory" except when he's talking about his own campaign. But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed ... when the roar of the crowd fades away ... when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot - what exactly is our opponent's plan? What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he's done turning back the waters and healing the planet? The answer is to make government bigger ... take more of your money ... give you more orders from Washington ... and to reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world. America needs more energy ... our opponent is against producing it.
Victory in Iraq is finally in sight ... he wants to forfeit.
Terrorist states are seeking new-clear weapons without delay ... he wants to meet them without preconditions.
Al Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America ... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights? Government is too big ... he wants to grow it.
Congress spends too much ... he promises more.
Taxes are too high ... he wants to raise them. His tax increases are the fine print in his economic plan, and let me be specific.
The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes ... raise payroll taxes ... raise investment income taxes ... raise the death tax ... raise business taxes ... and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars. My sister Heather and her husband have just built a service station that's now opened for business - like millions of others who run small businesses.
How are they going to be any better off if taxes go up? Or maybe you're trying to keep your job at a plant in Michigan or Ohio ... or create jobs with clean coal from Pennsylvania or West Virginia ... or keep a small farm in the family right here in Minnesota.
How are you going to be better off if our opponent adds a massive tax burden to the American economy? Here's how I look at the choice Americans face in this election.
In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers.
And then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change.
They're the ones whose names appear on laws and landmark reforms, not just on buttons and banners, or on self-designed presidential seals.
Among politicians, there is the idealism of high-flown speechmaking, in which crowds are stirringly summoned to support great things.
And then there is the idealism of those leaders, like John McCain, who actually do great things. They're the ones who are good for more than talk ... the ones we have always been able to count on to serve and defend America. Senator McCain's record of actual achievement and reform helps explain why so many special interests, lobbyists, and comfortable committee chairmen in Congress have fought the prospect of a McCain presidency - from the primary election of 2000 to this very day.
Our nominee doesn't run with the Washington herd.
He's a man who's there to serve his country, and not just his party.
A leader who's not looking for a fight, but is not afraid of one either. Harry Reid, the Majority Leader of the current do-nothing Senate, not long ago summed up his feelings about our nominee.
He said, quote, "I can't stand John McCain." Ladies and gentlemen, perhaps no accolade we hear this week is better proof that we've chosen the right man. Clearly what the Majority Leader was driving at is that he can't stand up to John McCain. That is only one more reason to take the maverick of the Senate and put him in the White House. My fellow citizens, the American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of "personal discovery." This world of threats and dangers is not just a community, and it doesn't just need an organizer.
And though both Senator Obama and Senator Biden have been going on lately about how they are always, quote, "fighting for you," let us face the matter squarely.
There is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you ... in places where winning means survival and defeat means death ... and that man is John McCain. In our day, politicians have readily shared much lesser tales of adversity than the nightmare world in which this man, and others equally brave, served and suffered for their country.
It's a long way from the fear and pain and squalor of a six-by-four cell in Hanoi to the Oval Office.
But if Senator McCain is elected president, that is the journey he will have made.
It's the journey of an upright and honorable man - the kind of fellow whose name you will find on war memorials in small towns across this country, only he was among those who came home.
To the most powerful office on earth, he would bring the compassion that comes from having once been powerless ... the wisdom that comes even to the captives, by the grace of God ... the special confidence of those who have seen evil, and seen how evil is overcome. A fellow prisoner of war, a man named Tom Moe of Lancaster, Ohio, recalls looking through a pin-hole in his cell door as Lieutenant Commander John McCain was led down the hallway, by the guards, day after day.
As the story is told, "When McCain shuffled back from torturous interrogations, he would turn toward Moe's door and flash a grin and thumbs up" - as if to say, "We're going to pull through this." My fellow Americans, that is the kind of man America needs to see us through these next four years.
For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with his words.
For a lifetime, John McCain has inspired with his deeds.
If character is the measure in this election ... and hope the theme ... and change the goal we share, then I ask you to join our cause. Join our cause and help America elect a great man as the next president of the United States.
Thank you all, and may God bless America.
I accept the call to help our nominee for president to serve and defend America.
I accept the challenge of a tough fight in this election... against confident opponents ... at a crucial hour for our country.
And I accept the privilege of serving with a man who has come through much harder missions ... and met far graver challenges ... and knows how tough fights are won - the next president of the United States, John S. McCain.
It was just a year ago when all the experts in Washington counted out our nominee because he refused to hedge his commitment to the security of the country he loves.
With their usual certitude, they told us that all was lost - there was no hope for this candidate who said that he would rather lose an election than see his country lose a war.
But the pollsters and pundits overlooked just one thing when they wrote him off.
They overlooked the caliber of the man himself - the determination, resolve, and sheer guts of Senator John McCain. The voters knew better.
And maybe that's because they realize there is a time for politics and a time for leadership. A time to campaign and a time to put our country first.
Our nominee for president is a true profile in courage, and people like that are hard to come by.
He's a man who wore the uniform of this country for 22 years, and refused to break faith with those troops in Iraq who have now brought victory within sight.
And as the mother of one of those troops, that is exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief. I'm just one of many moms who'll say an extra prayer each night for our sons and daughters going into harm's way.
Our son Track is 19.
And one week from tomorrow - September 11th - he'll deploy to Iraq with the Army infantry in the service of his country.
My nephew Kasey also enlisted, and serves on a carrier in the Persian Gulf.
My family is proud of both of them and of all the fine men and women serving the country in uniform. Track is the eldest of our five children.
In our family, it's two boys and three girls in between - my strong and kind-hearted daughters Bristol, Willow, and Piper.
And in April, my husband Todd and I welcomed our littlest one into the world, a perfectly beautiful baby boy named Trig. From the inside, no family ever seems typical.
That's how it is with us.
Our family has the same ups and downs as any other ... the same challenges and the same joys.
Sometimes even the greatest joys bring challenge.
And children with special needs inspire a special love.
To the families of special-needs children all across this country, I have a message: For years, you sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters.
I pledge to you that if we are elected, you will have a friend and advocate in the White House. Todd is a story all by himself.
He's a lifelong commercial fisherman ... a production operator in the oil fields of Alaska's North Slope ... a proud member of the United Steel Workers' Union ... and world champion snow machine racer.
Throw in his Yup'ik Eskimo ancestry, and it all makes for quite a package.
We met in high school, and two decades and five children later he's still my guy. My Mom and Dad both worked at the elementary school in our small town.
And among the many things I owe them is one simple lesson: that this is America, and every woman can walk through every door of opportunity.
My parents are here tonight, and I am so proud to be the daughter of Chuck and Sally Heath. Long ago, a young farmer and habber-dasher from Missouri followed an unlikely path to the vice presidency.
A writer observed: "We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity." I know just the kind of people that writer had in mind when he praised Harry Truman.
I grew up with those people.
They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America ... who grow our food, run our factories, and fight our wars.
They love their country, in good times and bad, and they're always proud of America. I had the privilege of living most of my life in a small town.
I was just your average hockey mom, and signed up for the PTA because I wanted to make my kids' public education better.
When I ran for city council, I didn't need focus groups and voter profiles because I knew those voters, and knew their families, too.
Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.
And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.
I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a "community organizer," except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening.
We tend to prefer candidates who don't talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.
As for my running mate, you can be certain that wherever he goes, and whoever is listening, John McCain is the same man. I'm not a member of the permanent political establishment.
And I've learned quickly, these past few days, that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.
But here's a little news flash for all those reporters and commentators: I'm not going to Washington to seek their good opinion - I'm going to Washington to serve the people of this country. Americans expect us to go to Washington for the right reasons, and not just to mingle with the right people.
Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests.
The right reason is to challenge the status quo, to serve the common good, and to leave this nation better than we found it.
No one expects us to agree on everything.
But we are expected to govern with integrity, good will, clear convictions, and ... a servant's heart.
I pledge to all Americans that I will carry myself in this spirit as vice president of the United States. This was the spirit that brought me to the governor's office, when I took on the old politics as usual in Juneau ... when I stood up to the special interests, the lobbyists, big oil companies, and the good-ol' boys network.
Sudden and relentless reform never sits well with entrenched interests and power brokers. That's why true reform is so hard to achieve.
But with the support of the citizens of Alaska, we shook things up.
And in short order we put the government of our state back on the side of the people.
I came to office promising major ethics reform, to end the culture of self-dealing. And today, that ethics reform is the law.
While I was at it, I got rid of a few things in the governor's office that I didn't believe our citizens should have to pay for.
That luxury jet was over the top. I put it on eBay.
I also drive myself to work.
And I thought we could muddle through without the governor's personal chef - although I've got to admit that sometimes my kids sure miss her. I came to office promising to control spending - by request if possible and by veto if necessary.
Senator McCain also promises to use the power of veto in defense of the public interest - and as a chief executive, I can assure you it works.
Our state budget is under control.
We have a surplus.
And I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending: nearly half a billion dollars in vetoes.
I suspended the state fuel tax, and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress.
I told the Congress "thanks, but no thanks," for that Bridge to Nowhere.
If our state wanted a bridge, we'd build it ourselves. When oil and gas prices went up dramatically, and filled up the state treasury, I sent a large share of that revenue back where it belonged - directly to the people of Alaska.
And despite fierce opposition from oil company lobbyists, who kind of liked things the way they were, we broke their monopoly on power and resources.
As governor, I insisted on competition and basic fairness to end their control of our state and return it to the people.
I fought to bring about the largest private-sector infrastructure project in North American history.
And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly forty billion dollar natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence.
That pipeline, when the last section is laid and its valves are opened, will lead America one step farther away from dependence on dangerous foreign powers that do not have our interests at heart.
The stakes for our nation could not be higher.
When a hurricane strikes in the Gulf of Mexico, this country should not be so dependent on imported oil that we are forced to draw from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
And families cannot throw away more and more of their paychecks on gas and heating oil.
With Russia wanting to control a vital pipeline in the Caucasus, and to divide and intimidate our European allies by using energy as a weapon, we cannot leave ourselves at the mercy of foreign suppliers.
To confront the threat that Iran might seek to cut off nearly a fifth of world energy supplies ... or that terrorists might strike again at the Abqaiq facility in Saudi Arabia ... or that Venezuela might shut off its oil deliveries ... we Americans need to produce more of our own oil and gas.
And take it from a gal who knows the North Slope of Alaska: we've got lots of both.
Our opponents say, again and again, that drilling will not solve all of America's energy problems - as if we all didn't know that already.
But the fact that drilling won't solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.
Starting in January, in a McCain-Palin administration, we're going to lay more pipelines ... build more new-clear plants ... create jobs with clean coal ... and move forward on solar, wind, geothermal, and other alternative sources.
We need American energy resources, brought to you by American ingenuity, and produced by American workers. I've noticed a pattern with our opponent.
Maybe you have, too.
We've all heard his dramatic speeches before devoted followers.
And there is much to like and admire about our opponent.
But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate.
This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word "victory" except when he's talking about his own campaign. But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed ... when the roar of the crowd fades away ... when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot - what exactly is our opponent's plan? What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he's done turning back the waters and healing the planet? The answer is to make government bigger ... take more of your money ... give you more orders from Washington ... and to reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world. America needs more energy ... our opponent is against producing it.
Victory in Iraq is finally in sight ... he wants to forfeit.
Terrorist states are seeking new-clear weapons without delay ... he wants to meet them without preconditions.
Al Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America ... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights? Government is too big ... he wants to grow it.
Congress spends too much ... he promises more.
Taxes are too high ... he wants to raise them. His tax increases are the fine print in his economic plan, and let me be specific.
The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes ... raise payroll taxes ... raise investment income taxes ... raise the death tax ... raise business taxes ... and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars. My sister Heather and her husband have just built a service station that's now opened for business - like millions of others who run small businesses.
How are they going to be any better off if taxes go up? Or maybe you're trying to keep your job at a plant in Michigan or Ohio ... or create jobs with clean coal from Pennsylvania or West Virginia ... or keep a small farm in the family right here in Minnesota.
How are you going to be better off if our opponent adds a massive tax burden to the American economy? Here's how I look at the choice Americans face in this election.
In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers.
And then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change.
They're the ones whose names appear on laws and landmark reforms, not just on buttons and banners, or on self-designed presidential seals.
Among politicians, there is the idealism of high-flown speechmaking, in which crowds are stirringly summoned to support great things.
And then there is the idealism of those leaders, like John McCain, who actually do great things. They're the ones who are good for more than talk ... the ones we have always been able to count on to serve and defend America. Senator McCain's record of actual achievement and reform helps explain why so many special interests, lobbyists, and comfortable committee chairmen in Congress have fought the prospect of a McCain presidency - from the primary election of 2000 to this very day.
Our nominee doesn't run with the Washington herd.
He's a man who's there to serve his country, and not just his party.
A leader who's not looking for a fight, but is not afraid of one either. Harry Reid, the Majority Leader of the current do-nothing Senate, not long ago summed up his feelings about our nominee.
He said, quote, "I can't stand John McCain." Ladies and gentlemen, perhaps no accolade we hear this week is better proof that we've chosen the right man. Clearly what the Majority Leader was driving at is that he can't stand up to John McCain. That is only one more reason to take the maverick of the Senate and put him in the White House. My fellow citizens, the American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of "personal discovery." This world of threats and dangers is not just a community, and it doesn't just need an organizer.
And though both Senator Obama and Senator Biden have been going on lately about how they are always, quote, "fighting for you," let us face the matter squarely.
There is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you ... in places where winning means survival and defeat means death ... and that man is John McCain. In our day, politicians have readily shared much lesser tales of adversity than the nightmare world in which this man, and others equally brave, served and suffered for their country.
It's a long way from the fear and pain and squalor of a six-by-four cell in Hanoi to the Oval Office.
But if Senator McCain is elected president, that is the journey he will have made.
It's the journey of an upright and honorable man - the kind of fellow whose name you will find on war memorials in small towns across this country, only he was among those who came home.
To the most powerful office on earth, he would bring the compassion that comes from having once been powerless ... the wisdom that comes even to the captives, by the grace of God ... the special confidence of those who have seen evil, and seen how evil is overcome. A fellow prisoner of war, a man named Tom Moe of Lancaster, Ohio, recalls looking through a pin-hole in his cell door as Lieutenant Commander John McCain was led down the hallway, by the guards, day after day.
As the story is told, "When McCain shuffled back from torturous interrogations, he would turn toward Moe's door and flash a grin and thumbs up" - as if to say, "We're going to pull through this." My fellow Americans, that is the kind of man America needs to see us through these next four years.
For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with his words.
For a lifetime, John McCain has inspired with his deeds.
If character is the measure in this election ... and hope the theme ... and change the goal we share, then I ask you to join our cause. Join our cause and help America elect a great man as the next president of the United States.
Thank you all, and may God bless America.
Sunday, September 07, 2008
Rudy Giuliani's Speech to the Republican National Convention
Thank you very much, and good evening. Almost exactly one year ago today, during a presidential debate in Durham, New Hampshire, I said that, if I weren’t running for president, I’d be supporting John McCain.
Well, I’m not running for president, and I do support John McCain.
Every — every four years, we’re told that this presidential election is the most important in our lifetime. This year, with what’s at stake, 2008 is the most important election in our lifetime. And we’d better get it right.
This already has been the longest presidential campaign in history, and sometimes to me it felt even longer.
The American people realize this election represents a turning point. It’s the decision to follow one path or the other. We, the people, the citizens of the United States, get to decide our next president, not the left-wing media, not Hollywood celebrities, not anyone else but the people of America.
That’s right, USA.
Thank you. Thank you.
To those Americans who still feel torn in this election, I’d like to suggest one way to think about this to help make a choice in 2008.
Think about it this way. You’re hiring someone to do a job, an important job, a job that relates to the safety of yourself and your family. Imagine that you have two job applications in your hand with the name and the party affiliations blocked out.
They’re both good and patriotic men with very different life experiences that have led them to this moment of shared history. You’ve got to make this decision, and you’ve got to make it right. And you have to desire — you’ve got to decide, who am I going to hire?
On the one hand, you’ve got a man who’s dedicated his life to the service of the United States. He’s been tested time and again by crisis. He has passed every test.
Even his adversaries acknowledge — Democrats, Republicans, everyone acknowledges that John McCain is a true American hero.
He — he loves America, as we all do, but he has sacrificed for it as few do.
As a young man, he joined the military. And being a “Top Gun” kind of guy, he became a fighter pilot. He was on a mission over Hanoi when his plane was shot down.
He was tortured in a POW camp, but he refused his captors’ offer of early release, because this is a man who believes in serving a cause greater than self-interest, and that cause is the United States of America. America comes first.
He has proved his commitment with his blood. He came home a national hero. He had earned a life of peace and quiet, but he was called to public service again, running for Congress, and then the United States Senate, as a proud foot soldier in the Reagan revolution.
His principled independence never wavered. He stood up to special interests. He fought for fiscal discipline and ethics reform and a strong national defense.
That’s the one choice. That’s the one man.
On the other hand, you have a resume from a gifted man with an Ivy League education. He worked as a community organizer. What? He worked — I said — I said, OK, OK, maybe this is the first problem on the resume.
He worked as a community organizer. He immersed himself in Chicago machine politics.
Then he ran for — then he ran for the state legislature and he got elected. And nearly 130 times, he couldn’t make a decision. He couldn’t figure out whether to vote “yes” or “no.” It was too tough.
He voted — he voted “present.”
I didn’t know about this vote “present” when I was mayor of New York City. Sarah Palin didn’t have this vote “present” when she was mayor or governor. You don’t get “present.” It doesn’t work in an executive job. For president of the United States, it’s not good enough to be present.
You have to make a decision.
A few years later — a few years later, he ran for the U.S. Senate. He spent most of his time as a celebrity senator: no leadership, no legislation to really speak of.
His rise is remarkable in its own right. It’s the kind of thing that can happen only in America.
But he’s never — he’s never run a city. He’s never run a state. He’s never run a business. He’s never run a military unit. He’s never had to lead people in crisis.
He is the least experienced candidate for president of the United States in at least the last 100 years.
Not a personal attack, a statement of fact. Barack Obama has never led anything, nothing, nada.
Nada, nothing.
The choice — the choice in this election comes down to substance over style. John McCain has been tested; Barack Obama has not.
Tough times require strong leadership, and this is no time for on-the-job training.
We agree. We agree with Joe Biden… one time, one time, when he said that, until he flip-flopped and changed his position. And, yes, being president means being able to answer that call at 3:00 in the morning. And that’s the one time we agree with Hillary.
But I bet you never thought Hillary would get applause at this convention. She can be right. Well, no one can look at John McCain and say that he’s not ready to be commander-in-chief. He is. He’s ready.
And we can trust him to deal with anything, anything that nature throws our way, anything that terrorists do to us. This man has been tested over and over again, and we will be safe in his hands, and our children will be safe in his hands, and our country will be safe in the hands of John McCain. No doubt.
I learned as a trial lawyer a long time ago, if you don’t have the facts, you’ve got to change them. So our opponents want to re- frame the debate.
They would have you believe that this election is about change versus more of the same, but that’s really a false choice, because there’s good change and bad change.
Because change is not a destination, just as hope is not a strategy.
John McCain — John McCain will bring about the change that will create jobs and prosperity. Let’s talk briefly about specifics.
John McCain will lower taxes so our economy can grow.
He’ll reduce government to strengthen our dollar. He’ll expand free trade so we can be more competitive. And he will lead us to energy independence so we can be free of foreign oil.
And — and he’ll do it with an all-of-the-above approach, including nuclear power, and, yes, off-shore oil drilling.
Drill, baby, drill?
Drill, baby, drill.
This — this — this is the kind of change — now, you guys are ready to break out. Whoa.
This — this — this and a lot more is the kind of change that will create growth, jobs, and prosperity, not what they want to do, tax us more, increase the size of government, increase tariffs, hurt jobs, send jobs elsewhere.
We need John McCain to save our economy and make sure it grows, but we need it for a more important purpose. There’s one purpose that John McCain understands, Republicans understand, that overrides everything else: John McCain will keep us on offense against terrorism at home and abroad.
For — for four days in Denver, the Democrats were afraid to use the words “Islamic terrorism.”
I imagine they believe it is politically incorrect to say it. I think they believe it will insult someone. Please tell me, who are they insulting if they say “Islamic terrorism”? They are insulting terrorists.
Of great concern to me, during those same four days in Denver, they rarely mentioned the attacks of September 11, 2001. They are in a state of denial about the biggest threat that faces this country. And if you deny it and you don’t deal with it, you can’t face it.
John McCain can face the enemy. He can win, and he can bring victory for this country.
Let’s look at just one example at a lifetime of principled stands that John McCain’s brought about: his support for the troop surge in Iraq. The Democratic Party had given up on Iraq.
And I believe, ladies and gentlemen, when they gave up on Iraq, they had given up on America.
The Democratic leader — the Democratic leader of the Senate said, and I quote, “This war is lost.”
Well, well, if America lost, who won, Al Qaeda, bin Laden?
In the single biggest policy decision of this election, John McCain got it right, and Barack Obama got it wrong.
Senator McCain — Senator — Senator McCain was the candidate most associated with the surge, and it was unpopular. What do you think most other politicians would have done in a situation like this?
They would have acted in their self-interest, and they would have changed their position in order to win an election. How many times have we seen Barack Obama do this?
Obama — Obama promised to take public financing for his campaign, until he broke his promise.
Obama — Obama was against wiretapping before he voted for it.
When speaking to a pro-Israeli group, Obama favored an undivided Jerusalem, like I favor and like John McCain favored. Well, he favored an undivided Jerusalem — don’t get too excited — for one day, until he changed his mind.
Well, I’ll tell you, if I were Joe Biden, I’d want to get that V.P. thing in writing.
Our hero, our candidate, John McCain said, “I’d rather lose an election than a war.” Why? Because that’s John McCain.
When Russia rolled over Georgia, John McCain immediately established a very strong, informed position that let the world know how he’ll respond as president at exactly the right time. Remember his words? Remember what John McCain said? “We are all Georgians.”
Obama’s — talk about judgment. Let’s look at what Obama did. Obama’s first instinct was to create a moral equivalency, suggesting that both sides were equally responsible, the same moral equivalency that he’s displayed in discussing the Palestinian Authority and the state of Israel.
Later — later, after discussing this with his 300 foreign policy advisers, he changed his position, and he suggested the United Nations Security Council could find a solution.
Apparently, none of his 300 foreign policy security advisers told him that Russia has a veto power in the United Nations Security Council.
By the way, this was about three days later. So — so he changed his position again, and he put out a statement exactly like the statement of John McCain’s three days earlier.
I have some advice for Senator Obama: Next time, call John McCain.
He — he knows something about foreign — he knows something about foreign policy. Like Ronald Reagan, John McCain will enlarge our party, open it up to lots of new people.
In choosing Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, John McCain has chosen for the future.
The other guy looked back. John looked forward.
Gov. Palin represents a new generation. She’s already one of the most successful governors in America and the most popular.
And she’s already had more executive experience than the entire Democratic ticket combined.
She’s been a mayor. I love that.
I’m sorry — I’m sorry that Barack Obama feels that her hometown isn’t cosmopolitan enough.
I’m sorry, Barack, that it’s not flashy enough. Maybe they cling to religion there.
Well — well, the first day — as far as I’m concerned, the first day she was mayor, she had more experience as an executive than — than Obama and Biden combined.
Then she became governor. She’s reduced taxes. She’s reduced government spending. She’s encouraged more energy exploration.
She’s been one of the most active governors — she’s been one of the most active governors in the country, and Alaska can be proud of having one of the best governors in the country.
She’s got an 80 percent approval rating. You never get that in New York City, wow.
As U.S. attorney, a former U.S. attorney, I’m very impressed the way she took on corruption in Alaska, including corruption in the Republican Party. This is a woman who has no fear. This is a woman who stands up for what’s right.
She — she — she is shaking up Alaska in a way that hasn’t happened in maybe ever. And with John McCain, with his independent spirit, with his being a maverick, with him and Sarah Palin, can you imagine how they’re going to shake up Washington?
Whew, look out. Look out.
One final point. And how — how dare they question whether Sarah Palin has enough time to spend with her children and be vice president. How dare they do that.
When do they ever ask a man that question? When?
Well, we’re at our best when we are expanding freedom. We’re the party that has expanded freedom from the very beginning, from ending slavery to making certain that people have freedom here and abroad.
We’re the party that believes in giving workers the right to work. We’re the party that believes that parents — parents should choose where their children go to school.
And we’re the party — and we’re the party that unapologetically believes in America’s success, a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom that inspires the world. That’s what our party is dedicated to.
So, my fellow Americans, we get a chance to elect one of our great heroes and a great American. He will be an exceptional president. He will have with him an exceptional woman who has already proven that she can reform and that she can govern.
And now the job is up to us. Let’s get John McCain and Sarah Palin elected, and let’s shake up Washington and move this country forward.
God bless America. Thank you.
Well, I’m not running for president, and I do support John McCain.
Every — every four years, we’re told that this presidential election is the most important in our lifetime. This year, with what’s at stake, 2008 is the most important election in our lifetime. And we’d better get it right.
This already has been the longest presidential campaign in history, and sometimes to me it felt even longer.
The American people realize this election represents a turning point. It’s the decision to follow one path or the other. We, the people, the citizens of the United States, get to decide our next president, not the left-wing media, not Hollywood celebrities, not anyone else but the people of America.
That’s right, USA.
Thank you. Thank you.
To those Americans who still feel torn in this election, I’d like to suggest one way to think about this to help make a choice in 2008.
Think about it this way. You’re hiring someone to do a job, an important job, a job that relates to the safety of yourself and your family. Imagine that you have two job applications in your hand with the name and the party affiliations blocked out.
They’re both good and patriotic men with very different life experiences that have led them to this moment of shared history. You’ve got to make this decision, and you’ve got to make it right. And you have to desire — you’ve got to decide, who am I going to hire?
On the one hand, you’ve got a man who’s dedicated his life to the service of the United States. He’s been tested time and again by crisis. He has passed every test.
Even his adversaries acknowledge — Democrats, Republicans, everyone acknowledges that John McCain is a true American hero.
He — he loves America, as we all do, but he has sacrificed for it as few do.
As a young man, he joined the military. And being a “Top Gun” kind of guy, he became a fighter pilot. He was on a mission over Hanoi when his plane was shot down.
He was tortured in a POW camp, but he refused his captors’ offer of early release, because this is a man who believes in serving a cause greater than self-interest, and that cause is the United States of America. America comes first.
He has proved his commitment with his blood. He came home a national hero. He had earned a life of peace and quiet, but he was called to public service again, running for Congress, and then the United States Senate, as a proud foot soldier in the Reagan revolution.
His principled independence never wavered. He stood up to special interests. He fought for fiscal discipline and ethics reform and a strong national defense.
That’s the one choice. That’s the one man.
On the other hand, you have a resume from a gifted man with an Ivy League education. He worked as a community organizer. What? He worked — I said — I said, OK, OK, maybe this is the first problem on the resume.
He worked as a community organizer. He immersed himself in Chicago machine politics.
Then he ran for — then he ran for the state legislature and he got elected. And nearly 130 times, he couldn’t make a decision. He couldn’t figure out whether to vote “yes” or “no.” It was too tough.
He voted — he voted “present.”
I didn’t know about this vote “present” when I was mayor of New York City. Sarah Palin didn’t have this vote “present” when she was mayor or governor. You don’t get “present.” It doesn’t work in an executive job. For president of the United States, it’s not good enough to be present.
You have to make a decision.
A few years later — a few years later, he ran for the U.S. Senate. He spent most of his time as a celebrity senator: no leadership, no legislation to really speak of.
His rise is remarkable in its own right. It’s the kind of thing that can happen only in America.
But he’s never — he’s never run a city. He’s never run a state. He’s never run a business. He’s never run a military unit. He’s never had to lead people in crisis.
He is the least experienced candidate for president of the United States in at least the last 100 years.
Not a personal attack, a statement of fact. Barack Obama has never led anything, nothing, nada.
Nada, nothing.
The choice — the choice in this election comes down to substance over style. John McCain has been tested; Barack Obama has not.
Tough times require strong leadership, and this is no time for on-the-job training.
We agree. We agree with Joe Biden… one time, one time, when he said that, until he flip-flopped and changed his position. And, yes, being president means being able to answer that call at 3:00 in the morning. And that’s the one time we agree with Hillary.
But I bet you never thought Hillary would get applause at this convention. She can be right. Well, no one can look at John McCain and say that he’s not ready to be commander-in-chief. He is. He’s ready.
And we can trust him to deal with anything, anything that nature throws our way, anything that terrorists do to us. This man has been tested over and over again, and we will be safe in his hands, and our children will be safe in his hands, and our country will be safe in the hands of John McCain. No doubt.
I learned as a trial lawyer a long time ago, if you don’t have the facts, you’ve got to change them. So our opponents want to re- frame the debate.
They would have you believe that this election is about change versus more of the same, but that’s really a false choice, because there’s good change and bad change.
Because change is not a destination, just as hope is not a strategy.
John McCain — John McCain will bring about the change that will create jobs and prosperity. Let’s talk briefly about specifics.
John McCain will lower taxes so our economy can grow.
He’ll reduce government to strengthen our dollar. He’ll expand free trade so we can be more competitive. And he will lead us to energy independence so we can be free of foreign oil.
And — and he’ll do it with an all-of-the-above approach, including nuclear power, and, yes, off-shore oil drilling.
Drill, baby, drill?
Drill, baby, drill.
This — this — this is the kind of change — now, you guys are ready to break out. Whoa.
This — this — this and a lot more is the kind of change that will create growth, jobs, and prosperity, not what they want to do, tax us more, increase the size of government, increase tariffs, hurt jobs, send jobs elsewhere.
We need John McCain to save our economy and make sure it grows, but we need it for a more important purpose. There’s one purpose that John McCain understands, Republicans understand, that overrides everything else: John McCain will keep us on offense against terrorism at home and abroad.
For — for four days in Denver, the Democrats were afraid to use the words “Islamic terrorism.”
I imagine they believe it is politically incorrect to say it. I think they believe it will insult someone. Please tell me, who are they insulting if they say “Islamic terrorism”? They are insulting terrorists.
Of great concern to me, during those same four days in Denver, they rarely mentioned the attacks of September 11, 2001. They are in a state of denial about the biggest threat that faces this country. And if you deny it and you don’t deal with it, you can’t face it.
John McCain can face the enemy. He can win, and he can bring victory for this country.
Let’s look at just one example at a lifetime of principled stands that John McCain’s brought about: his support for the troop surge in Iraq. The Democratic Party had given up on Iraq.
And I believe, ladies and gentlemen, when they gave up on Iraq, they had given up on America.
The Democratic leader — the Democratic leader of the Senate said, and I quote, “This war is lost.”
Well, well, if America lost, who won, Al Qaeda, bin Laden?
In the single biggest policy decision of this election, John McCain got it right, and Barack Obama got it wrong.
Senator McCain — Senator — Senator McCain was the candidate most associated with the surge, and it was unpopular. What do you think most other politicians would have done in a situation like this?
They would have acted in their self-interest, and they would have changed their position in order to win an election. How many times have we seen Barack Obama do this?
Obama — Obama promised to take public financing for his campaign, until he broke his promise.
Obama — Obama was against wiretapping before he voted for it.
When speaking to a pro-Israeli group, Obama favored an undivided Jerusalem, like I favor and like John McCain favored. Well, he favored an undivided Jerusalem — don’t get too excited — for one day, until he changed his mind.
Well, I’ll tell you, if I were Joe Biden, I’d want to get that V.P. thing in writing.
Our hero, our candidate, John McCain said, “I’d rather lose an election than a war.” Why? Because that’s John McCain.
When Russia rolled over Georgia, John McCain immediately established a very strong, informed position that let the world know how he’ll respond as president at exactly the right time. Remember his words? Remember what John McCain said? “We are all Georgians.”
Obama’s — talk about judgment. Let’s look at what Obama did. Obama’s first instinct was to create a moral equivalency, suggesting that both sides were equally responsible, the same moral equivalency that he’s displayed in discussing the Palestinian Authority and the state of Israel.
Later — later, after discussing this with his 300 foreign policy advisers, he changed his position, and he suggested the United Nations Security Council could find a solution.
Apparently, none of his 300 foreign policy security advisers told him that Russia has a veto power in the United Nations Security Council.
By the way, this was about three days later. So — so he changed his position again, and he put out a statement exactly like the statement of John McCain’s three days earlier.
I have some advice for Senator Obama: Next time, call John McCain.
He — he knows something about foreign — he knows something about foreign policy. Like Ronald Reagan, John McCain will enlarge our party, open it up to lots of new people.
In choosing Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, John McCain has chosen for the future.
The other guy looked back. John looked forward.
Gov. Palin represents a new generation. She’s already one of the most successful governors in America and the most popular.
And she’s already had more executive experience than the entire Democratic ticket combined.
She’s been a mayor. I love that.
I’m sorry — I’m sorry that Barack Obama feels that her hometown isn’t cosmopolitan enough.
I’m sorry, Barack, that it’s not flashy enough. Maybe they cling to religion there.
Well — well, the first day — as far as I’m concerned, the first day she was mayor, she had more experience as an executive than — than Obama and Biden combined.
Then she became governor. She’s reduced taxes. She’s reduced government spending. She’s encouraged more energy exploration.
She’s been one of the most active governors — she’s been one of the most active governors in the country, and Alaska can be proud of having one of the best governors in the country.
She’s got an 80 percent approval rating. You never get that in New York City, wow.
As U.S. attorney, a former U.S. attorney, I’m very impressed the way she took on corruption in Alaska, including corruption in the Republican Party. This is a woman who has no fear. This is a woman who stands up for what’s right.
She — she — she is shaking up Alaska in a way that hasn’t happened in maybe ever. And with John McCain, with his independent spirit, with his being a maverick, with him and Sarah Palin, can you imagine how they’re going to shake up Washington?
Whew, look out. Look out.
One final point. And how — how dare they question whether Sarah Palin has enough time to spend with her children and be vice president. How dare they do that.
When do they ever ask a man that question? When?
Well, we’re at our best when we are expanding freedom. We’re the party that has expanded freedom from the very beginning, from ending slavery to making certain that people have freedom here and abroad.
We’re the party that believes in giving workers the right to work. We’re the party that believes that parents — parents should choose where their children go to school.
And we’re the party — and we’re the party that unapologetically believes in America’s success, a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom that inspires the world. That’s what our party is dedicated to.
So, my fellow Americans, we get a chance to elect one of our great heroes and a great American. He will be an exceptional president. He will have with him an exceptional woman who has already proven that she can reform and that she can govern.
And now the job is up to us. Let’s get John McCain and Sarah Palin elected, and let’s shake up Washington and move this country forward.
God bless America. Thank you.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Fred Thompson's Speech at the Republican National Convention
Tonight our thoughts are still with our friends and fellow citizens in the Gulf Coast area, and our thanks go to those who have worked so hard to keep them safe. There can be no more important work than this.
But what we are doing at this convention is also important to our country.
We are going to nominate the next President and Vice President of the United States of America.
We do so while taking a different view of our country than that of the other party.
Listening to them you’d think that we were in the middle of a great depression; that we are down, disrespected and incapable of prevailing against challenges facing us.
We know that we have challenges ... always have, always will.
But we also know that we live in the freest, strongest, most generous and prosperous nation in the history of the world and we are thankful.
Speaking of the vice presidential nominee, what a breath of fresh air Governor Sarah Palin is.
She is from a small town, with small town values, but that’s not good enough for those folks who are attacking her and her family.
Some Washington pundits and media big shots are in a frenzy over the selection of a woman who has actually governed rather than just talked a good game on the Sunday talk shows and hit the Washington cocktail circuit. Well, give me a tough Alaskan Governor who has taken on the political establishment in the largest state in the Union -- and won -- over the beltway business-as-usual crowd any day of the week.
Let’s be clear ... the selection of Governor Palin has the other side and their friends in the media in a state of panic. She is a courageous, successful, reformer, who is not afraid to take on the establishment.
Sound like anyone else we know?
She has run a municipality and she has run a state.
And I can say without fear of contradiction that she is the only nominee in the history of either party who knows how to properly field dress a moose ... with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt.
She and John McCain are not going to care how much the alligators get irritated when they get to Washington, they’re going to drain that swamp.
But tonight, I’d like to talk to you about the remarkable story of John McCain.
It’s a story about character.
John McCain’s character has been tested like no other presidential candidate in the history of this nation.
He comes from a military family whose service to our country goes back to the Revolutionary War.
The tradition continues.
As I speak, John and Cindy McCain have one son who’s just finished his first tour in Iraq.
Another son is putting ”Country First” and is attending the Naval Academy. We have a number of McCains in the audience tonight.
Also here tonight is John’s 96-year-old mother, Roberta. All I’ve got to say is that if Roberta McCain had been the McCain captured by the North Vietnamese, they would have surrendered.
Now, John’s father was a bit of a rebel, too.
In his first two semesters at the Naval Academy, he managed to earn 333 demerits.
Unfortunately, John later saw that as a record to be beaten.
A rebellious mother and a rebellious father - I guess you can see where this is going.
In high school and the Naval Academy, he earned a reputation as a troublemaker.
But as John points out, he wasn’t just a troublemaker. He was the leader of the troublemakers.
Although loaded with demerits like his father, John was principled even in rebellion.
He never violated the honor code.
However, in flight school in Pensacola, he did drive a Corvette and date a girl who worked in a bar as an exotic dancer under the name of Marie, the Flame of Florida.
And the reason I’m telling you these things, is that, apparently, this mixture of rebellion and honor helped John McCain survive the next chapter of his life:
John McCain was preparing to take off from the USS Forrestal for his sixth mission over Vietnam, when a missile from another plane accidentally fired and hit his plane.
The flight deck burst into a fireball of jet fuel.
John’s flight suit caught fire.
He was hit by shrapnel.
It was a scene of horrible human devastation.
Men sacrificed their lives to save others that day. One kid, who John couldn’t identify because he was burned beyond recognition, called out to John to ask if a certain pilot was OK.
John replied that, yes, he was.
The young sailor said, ”Thank God”... and then he died.
These are the kind of men John McCain served with.
These are the men and women John McCain knows and understands and loves.
If you want to know who John McCain is, if you want to know what John McCain values, look to the men and women who wear America’s uniform today.
The fire on the Forrestal burned for two days.
20 planes were destroyed.
134 sailors died.
John himself barely dodged death in the inferno and could’ve returned to the States with his ship.
Instead, he volunteered for combat on another carrier that was undermanned from losing so many pilots.
Stepping up.
Putting his ”Country First.”
Three months later John McCain was a Prisoner of War.
On October 26, 1967, on his 23rd mission over North Vietnam, a surface-to-air missile slammed into John’s A-4 Skyhawk jet, blowing it out of the sky.
When John ejected, part of the plane hit him -- breaking his right knee, his left arm, his right arm in three places.
An angry mob got to him.
A rifle butt broke his shoulder.
A bayonet pierced his ankle and his groin.
They took him to the Hanoi Hilton, where he lapsed in and out of consciousness for days. He was offered medical care for his injuries if he would give up military information in return.
John McCain said ”No”.
After days of neglect, covered in grime, lying in his own waste in a filthy room, a doctor attempted to set John’s right arm without success ... and without anesthesia.
His other broken bones and injuries were not treated. John developed a high fever, dysentery. He weighed barely a hundred pounds.
Expecting him to die, his captors placed him in a cell with two other POWs who also expected him to die.
But with their help, John McCain fought on.
He persevered.
So then they put him in solitary confinement...for over two years.
Isolation ... incredible heat beating on a tin roof. A light bulb in his cell burning 24 hours a day.
Boarded-up cell windows blocking any breath of fresh air.
The oppressive heat causing boils the size of baseballs under his arms.
The outside world limited to what he could see through a crack in a door.
We hear a lot of talk about hope.
John McCain knows about hope. That’s all he had to survive on. For propaganda purposes, his captors offered to let him go home.
John McCain refused.
He refused to leave ahead of men who’d been there longer.
He refused to abandon his conscience and his honor, even for his freedom.
He refused, even though his captors warned him, ”It will be very bad for you.”
They were right.
It was.
The guards cracked ribs, broke teeth off at the gums. They cinched a rope around his arms and painfully drew his shoulders back.
Over four days, every two to three hours, the beatings resumed. During one especially fierce beating, he fell, again breaking his arm.
John was beaten for communicating with other prisoners.
He was beaten for NOT communicating with so-called ”peace delegations.”
He was beaten for not giving information during interrogations.
When his captors wanted the names of other pilots in his squadron, John gave them the names of the offensive line of the Green Bay Packers.
Whenever John was returned to his cell -- walking if he could, dragged if he couldn’t -- as he passed his fellow POWs, he would call out to them.
He’d smile ... and give them a thumbs-up.
For five-and-a-half years this went on.
John McCain’s bones may have been broken but his spirit never was.
Now, being a POW certainly doesn’t qualify anyone to be President.
But it does reveal character.
This is the kind of character that civilizations from the beginning of history have sought in their leaders.
Strength.
Courage.
Humility.
Wisdom.
Duty.
Honor.
It’s pretty clear there are two questions we will never have to ask ourselves, ”Who is this man?” and ”Can we trust this man with the Presidency?”
He has been to Iraq eight times since 2003.
He went seeking truth, not publicity.
When he travels abroad, he prefers quietly speaking to the troops amidst the heat and hardship of their daily lives.
And the same character that marked John McCain’s military career has also marked his political career.
This man, John McCain is not intimidated by what the polls say or by what is politically safe or popular.
At a point when the war in Iraq was going badly and the public lost confidence, John stood up and called for more troops.
And now we are winning.
Ronald Reagan was John McCain’s hero.
And President Reagan admired John tremendously.
But when the President proposed putting U.S. troops in Beirut, John McCain, a freshman Congressman, stood up and cast a vote against his hero because he thought the deployment was a mistake.
My friends ... that is character you can believe in.
For years, members of Congress, Republican and Democrat alike, have gouged the taxpayer with secret earmark spending.
Well, he has never sought an earmark.
I’ve experienced John’s character first hand.
In 1993, when I was thinking of running for the Senate, I went to John for advice. He convinced me I could help make a difference for our country.
I won that election, and with Republican control of Congress, we reformed welfare.
We balanced the budget.
And we began rebuilding our military.
What I remember most about those years is sitting next to John on the Senate floor as he led battle after battle to change the acrimonious, pork barreling, self serving ways of Washington.
The Senate has always had more than its share of smooth talkers.
And big talkers.
It still has.
But while others were talking reform, John McCain led the effort to make reform happen -- always pressing, always moving for what he believed was right and necessary to restore the people’s faith in their government.
Confronting when necessary, reaching across the aisle when possible, John personified why we came to Washington in the first place.
It didn’t always set too well with some of his colleagues.
Some of those fights were losing efforts.
Some were not.
But a man who never quits is never defeated.
Because John McCain stood up our country is better off.
The respect he is given around the world is not because of a teleprompter speech designed to appeal to American critics abroad, but because of decades of clearly demonstrated character and statesmanship.
There has been no time in our nation’s history, since we first pledged allegiance to the American flag, when the character, judgment and leadership of our President was more important.
Terrorists, rogue nations developing nuclear weapons, an increasingly belligerent Russia.
Intensifying competition from China.
Spending at home that threatens to bankrupt future generations. For decades an expanding government ... increasingly wasteful and too often incompetent.
To deal with these challenges the Democrats present a history making nominee for president.
History making in that he is the most liberal, most inexperienced nominee to ever run for President. Apparently they believe that he would match up well with the history making, Democrat controlled Congress. History making because it’s the least accomplished and most unpopular Congress in our nation’s history.
Together, they would take on these urgent challenges with protectionism, higher taxes and an even bigger bureaucracy.
And a Supreme Court that could be lost to liberalism for a generation.
This is not reform.
And it’s certainly not change.
It is basically the same old stuff they’ve been peddling for years. America needs a President who understands the nature of the world we live in.
A President who feels no need to apologize for the United States of America.
We need a President who understands that you don’t make citizens prosperous by making Washington richer, and you don’t lift an economic downturn by imposing one of the largest tax increases in American history.
Now our opponents tell you not to worry about their tax increases.
They tell you they are not going to tax your family.
No, they’re just going to tax ”businesses”! So unless you buy something from a ”business”, like groceries or clothes or gasoline ... or unless you get a paycheck from a big or a small ”business”, don’t worry ... it’s not going to affect you.
They say they are not going to take any water out of your side of the bucket, just the ”other” side of the bucket! That’s their idea of tax reform.
My friends, we need a leader who stands on principle.
We need a President, and Vice President, who will take the federal bureaucracy by the scruff of the neck and give it a good shaking.
And we need a President who doesn’t think that the protection of the unborn or a newly born baby is above his pay grade.
The man who will be that President is John McCain.
In the days ahead at this convention, you will hear much more about what John will do as president -- what he will do on the economy, on energy, on health care, the environment... It is not my role tonight to explain that vision.
My role is to help remind you of the man behind the vision. Because tonight our country is calling to all of us to step up, stand up, and put ”Country First” with John McCain.
Tonight we are being called upon to do what is right for our country.
Tonight we are being called upon to stand up for a strong military ... a mature foreign policy ... a free and growing economy and for the values that bind us together and keep our nation free.
Tonight, we are being called upon to step up and stand up with John just as he has stood up for our country.
Our country is calling.
John McCain cannot raise his arms above his shoulders.
He cannot salute the flag of the country for which he sacrificed so much. Tonight, as we begin this convention week, yes, we stand with him.
And we salute him.
We salute his character and his courage.
His spirit of independence, and his drive for reform.
His vision to bring security and peace in our time, and continued prosperity for America and all her citizens.
For our own good and our children’s, let us celebrate that vision, that belief, that faith so we can keep America the greatest country the world has ever seen.
God bless John McCain and God bless America.
But what we are doing at this convention is also important to our country.
We are going to nominate the next President and Vice President of the United States of America.
We do so while taking a different view of our country than that of the other party.
Listening to them you’d think that we were in the middle of a great depression; that we are down, disrespected and incapable of prevailing against challenges facing us.
We know that we have challenges ... always have, always will.
But we also know that we live in the freest, strongest, most generous and prosperous nation in the history of the world and we are thankful.
Speaking of the vice presidential nominee, what a breath of fresh air Governor Sarah Palin is.
She is from a small town, with small town values, but that’s not good enough for those folks who are attacking her and her family.
Some Washington pundits and media big shots are in a frenzy over the selection of a woman who has actually governed rather than just talked a good game on the Sunday talk shows and hit the Washington cocktail circuit. Well, give me a tough Alaskan Governor who has taken on the political establishment in the largest state in the Union -- and won -- over the beltway business-as-usual crowd any day of the week.
Let’s be clear ... the selection of Governor Palin has the other side and their friends in the media in a state of panic. She is a courageous, successful, reformer, who is not afraid to take on the establishment.
Sound like anyone else we know?
She has run a municipality and she has run a state.
And I can say without fear of contradiction that she is the only nominee in the history of either party who knows how to properly field dress a moose ... with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt.
She and John McCain are not going to care how much the alligators get irritated when they get to Washington, they’re going to drain that swamp.
But tonight, I’d like to talk to you about the remarkable story of John McCain.
It’s a story about character.
John McCain’s character has been tested like no other presidential candidate in the history of this nation.
He comes from a military family whose service to our country goes back to the Revolutionary War.
The tradition continues.
As I speak, John and Cindy McCain have one son who’s just finished his first tour in Iraq.
Another son is putting ”Country First” and is attending the Naval Academy. We have a number of McCains in the audience tonight.
Also here tonight is John’s 96-year-old mother, Roberta. All I’ve got to say is that if Roberta McCain had been the McCain captured by the North Vietnamese, they would have surrendered.
Now, John’s father was a bit of a rebel, too.
In his first two semesters at the Naval Academy, he managed to earn 333 demerits.
Unfortunately, John later saw that as a record to be beaten.
A rebellious mother and a rebellious father - I guess you can see where this is going.
In high school and the Naval Academy, he earned a reputation as a troublemaker.
But as John points out, he wasn’t just a troublemaker. He was the leader of the troublemakers.
Although loaded with demerits like his father, John was principled even in rebellion.
He never violated the honor code.
However, in flight school in Pensacola, he did drive a Corvette and date a girl who worked in a bar as an exotic dancer under the name of Marie, the Flame of Florida.
And the reason I’m telling you these things, is that, apparently, this mixture of rebellion and honor helped John McCain survive the next chapter of his life:
John McCain was preparing to take off from the USS Forrestal for his sixth mission over Vietnam, when a missile from another plane accidentally fired and hit his plane.
The flight deck burst into a fireball of jet fuel.
John’s flight suit caught fire.
He was hit by shrapnel.
It was a scene of horrible human devastation.
Men sacrificed their lives to save others that day. One kid, who John couldn’t identify because he was burned beyond recognition, called out to John to ask if a certain pilot was OK.
John replied that, yes, he was.
The young sailor said, ”Thank God”... and then he died.
These are the kind of men John McCain served with.
These are the men and women John McCain knows and understands and loves.
If you want to know who John McCain is, if you want to know what John McCain values, look to the men and women who wear America’s uniform today.
The fire on the Forrestal burned for two days.
20 planes were destroyed.
134 sailors died.
John himself barely dodged death in the inferno and could’ve returned to the States with his ship.
Instead, he volunteered for combat on another carrier that was undermanned from losing so many pilots.
Stepping up.
Putting his ”Country First.”
Three months later John McCain was a Prisoner of War.
On October 26, 1967, on his 23rd mission over North Vietnam, a surface-to-air missile slammed into John’s A-4 Skyhawk jet, blowing it out of the sky.
When John ejected, part of the plane hit him -- breaking his right knee, his left arm, his right arm in three places.
An angry mob got to him.
A rifle butt broke his shoulder.
A bayonet pierced his ankle and his groin.
They took him to the Hanoi Hilton, where he lapsed in and out of consciousness for days. He was offered medical care for his injuries if he would give up military information in return.
John McCain said ”No”.
After days of neglect, covered in grime, lying in his own waste in a filthy room, a doctor attempted to set John’s right arm without success ... and without anesthesia.
His other broken bones and injuries were not treated. John developed a high fever, dysentery. He weighed barely a hundred pounds.
Expecting him to die, his captors placed him in a cell with two other POWs who also expected him to die.
But with their help, John McCain fought on.
He persevered.
So then they put him in solitary confinement...for over two years.
Isolation ... incredible heat beating on a tin roof. A light bulb in his cell burning 24 hours a day.
Boarded-up cell windows blocking any breath of fresh air.
The oppressive heat causing boils the size of baseballs under his arms.
The outside world limited to what he could see through a crack in a door.
We hear a lot of talk about hope.
John McCain knows about hope. That’s all he had to survive on. For propaganda purposes, his captors offered to let him go home.
John McCain refused.
He refused to leave ahead of men who’d been there longer.
He refused to abandon his conscience and his honor, even for his freedom.
He refused, even though his captors warned him, ”It will be very bad for you.”
They were right.
It was.
The guards cracked ribs, broke teeth off at the gums. They cinched a rope around his arms and painfully drew his shoulders back.
Over four days, every two to three hours, the beatings resumed. During one especially fierce beating, he fell, again breaking his arm.
John was beaten for communicating with other prisoners.
He was beaten for NOT communicating with so-called ”peace delegations.”
He was beaten for not giving information during interrogations.
When his captors wanted the names of other pilots in his squadron, John gave them the names of the offensive line of the Green Bay Packers.
Whenever John was returned to his cell -- walking if he could, dragged if he couldn’t -- as he passed his fellow POWs, he would call out to them.
He’d smile ... and give them a thumbs-up.
For five-and-a-half years this went on.
John McCain’s bones may have been broken but his spirit never was.
Now, being a POW certainly doesn’t qualify anyone to be President.
But it does reveal character.
This is the kind of character that civilizations from the beginning of history have sought in their leaders.
Strength.
Courage.
Humility.
Wisdom.
Duty.
Honor.
It’s pretty clear there are two questions we will never have to ask ourselves, ”Who is this man?” and ”Can we trust this man with the Presidency?”
He has been to Iraq eight times since 2003.
He went seeking truth, not publicity.
When he travels abroad, he prefers quietly speaking to the troops amidst the heat and hardship of their daily lives.
And the same character that marked John McCain’s military career has also marked his political career.
This man, John McCain is not intimidated by what the polls say or by what is politically safe or popular.
At a point when the war in Iraq was going badly and the public lost confidence, John stood up and called for more troops.
And now we are winning.
Ronald Reagan was John McCain’s hero.
And President Reagan admired John tremendously.
But when the President proposed putting U.S. troops in Beirut, John McCain, a freshman Congressman, stood up and cast a vote against his hero because he thought the deployment was a mistake.
My friends ... that is character you can believe in.
For years, members of Congress, Republican and Democrat alike, have gouged the taxpayer with secret earmark spending.
Well, he has never sought an earmark.
I’ve experienced John’s character first hand.
In 1993, when I was thinking of running for the Senate, I went to John for advice. He convinced me I could help make a difference for our country.
I won that election, and with Republican control of Congress, we reformed welfare.
We balanced the budget.
And we began rebuilding our military.
What I remember most about those years is sitting next to John on the Senate floor as he led battle after battle to change the acrimonious, pork barreling, self serving ways of Washington.
The Senate has always had more than its share of smooth talkers.
And big talkers.
It still has.
But while others were talking reform, John McCain led the effort to make reform happen -- always pressing, always moving for what he believed was right and necessary to restore the people’s faith in their government.
Confronting when necessary, reaching across the aisle when possible, John personified why we came to Washington in the first place.
It didn’t always set too well with some of his colleagues.
Some of those fights were losing efforts.
Some were not.
But a man who never quits is never defeated.
Because John McCain stood up our country is better off.
The respect he is given around the world is not because of a teleprompter speech designed to appeal to American critics abroad, but because of decades of clearly demonstrated character and statesmanship.
There has been no time in our nation’s history, since we first pledged allegiance to the American flag, when the character, judgment and leadership of our President was more important.
Terrorists, rogue nations developing nuclear weapons, an increasingly belligerent Russia.
Intensifying competition from China.
Spending at home that threatens to bankrupt future generations. For decades an expanding government ... increasingly wasteful and too often incompetent.
To deal with these challenges the Democrats present a history making nominee for president.
History making in that he is the most liberal, most inexperienced nominee to ever run for President. Apparently they believe that he would match up well with the history making, Democrat controlled Congress. History making because it’s the least accomplished and most unpopular Congress in our nation’s history.
Together, they would take on these urgent challenges with protectionism, higher taxes and an even bigger bureaucracy.
And a Supreme Court that could be lost to liberalism for a generation.
This is not reform.
And it’s certainly not change.
It is basically the same old stuff they’ve been peddling for years. America needs a President who understands the nature of the world we live in.
A President who feels no need to apologize for the United States of America.
We need a President who understands that you don’t make citizens prosperous by making Washington richer, and you don’t lift an economic downturn by imposing one of the largest tax increases in American history.
Now our opponents tell you not to worry about their tax increases.
They tell you they are not going to tax your family.
No, they’re just going to tax ”businesses”! So unless you buy something from a ”business”, like groceries or clothes or gasoline ... or unless you get a paycheck from a big or a small ”business”, don’t worry ... it’s not going to affect you.
They say they are not going to take any water out of your side of the bucket, just the ”other” side of the bucket! That’s their idea of tax reform.
My friends, we need a leader who stands on principle.
We need a President, and Vice President, who will take the federal bureaucracy by the scruff of the neck and give it a good shaking.
And we need a President who doesn’t think that the protection of the unborn or a newly born baby is above his pay grade.
The man who will be that President is John McCain.
In the days ahead at this convention, you will hear much more about what John will do as president -- what he will do on the economy, on energy, on health care, the environment... It is not my role tonight to explain that vision.
My role is to help remind you of the man behind the vision. Because tonight our country is calling to all of us to step up, stand up, and put ”Country First” with John McCain.
Tonight we are being called upon to do what is right for our country.
Tonight we are being called upon to stand up for a strong military ... a mature foreign policy ... a free and growing economy and for the values that bind us together and keep our nation free.
Tonight, we are being called upon to step up and stand up with John just as he has stood up for our country.
Our country is calling.
John McCain cannot raise his arms above his shoulders.
He cannot salute the flag of the country for which he sacrificed so much. Tonight, as we begin this convention week, yes, we stand with him.
And we salute him.
We salute his character and his courage.
His spirit of independence, and his drive for reform.
His vision to bring security and peace in our time, and continued prosperity for America and all her citizens.
For our own good and our children’s, let us celebrate that vision, that belief, that faith so we can keep America the greatest country the world has ever seen.
God bless John McCain and God bless America.
Friday, September 05, 2008
Washington State Taxpayers Need Constitutional Protections
by Jason Mercier, Director, Washington Policy Center - Center for Government Reform
Washington's voters have consistently voiced a desire to restrict the ability of government officials to unduly raise their tax burden. Initiative 601, passed by voters in 1993, required not only a strict spending limit, a two-thirds vote of the legislature to raise taxes, but also voter approval of any tax increase in excess of the state spending limit.
Despite this clear directive by the voters, lawmakers have suspended the two-thirds vote requirement twice (in 2002 and 2005) and Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown filed a lawsuit on March 3, 2008 asking the State Supreme Court to declare the two-thirds vote requirement unconstitutional to make it easier for the legislature to raise taxes.
The State Supreme Court will hear arguments on Senator Brown's lawsuit on September 9, 2008. A final ruling could come in time for next year's legislative session, when lawmakers will try to close a projected $2.7 billion budget deficit, the estimated gap between rising revenues and the even faster increase in state spending. If the Court strikes down I-601, the justices will make it more likely lawmakers will increase taxes in 2009, rather than look for ways to slow down the rate of spending growth.
Ironically, while objecting to the supermajority requirement for tax increases, Senator Brown sponsored Senate rules that require a supermajority vote to amend the budget on the floor.
This rule was used during the 2008 supplemental budget deliberations to block an attempt to remove $250,000 from the Senate budget to buy tickets for girls to attend Seattle Storm basketball games. The vote on the amendment to remove the funding secured a majority, 24-23, but it failed to pass since it did not receive the required 60 percent vote.
The Attorney General is defending the I-601 law against Senator Brown's challenge. The AG points out that in the 15 years since voters adopted I-601, "the Legislature has not chosen to repeal the statute or permanently amend its two-thirds vote provision, although it could have."
Senator Brown says I-601 violates the state Constitution by requiring a two-thirds vote to pass tax increases, when the constitution requires only a 50% majority vote to pass a law. The Attorney General rightly argues that the Constitution only says a bill has to receive a minimum vote of 50% to pass, and that the legislature, or the people, can add to that requirement for some bills if they like. Obviously, the AG says, any bill that receives a two-thirds vote has already satisfied the constitutional requirement of getting 50%.
Regardless of what the Court rules, the long term solution is for state officials to enact meaningful constitutional restrictions on tax and spending increases to help provide a restraint on excessive government spending and future tax increases. Under a statutory law like I-601, it has proven too easy for lawmakers to circumvent and ignore the spending limit.
What the people intended to be a firm but reasonable check on the growth of state spending and tax increases has been reduced almost to zero by the Legislature, as lawmakers seek to accommodate their desire for excessive spending. Today it is a meaningless safeguard that is bypassed regularly by lawmakers intent on boosting spending and taxes.
A model for the reforms that are needed was adopted by the voters last year, when voters amended the constitution to create a budget reserve account, replacing the oft-raided Emergency Reserve Fund that was created by I-601.
Initiative 601 is better than nothing, and the Court should uphold it, but only a constitutional tax and spending limit will help prioritize government spending and provide a legislative climate in which further increases in the government's financial burden are difficult to pass. Under such a restriction, if lawmakers felt they really needed to collect more money from people, tax increase proposals would need a 2/3 vote or could be submitted directly to voters for approval by referendum.
Washington's voters have consistently voiced a desire to restrict the ability of government officials to unduly raise their tax burden. Initiative 601, passed by voters in 1993, required not only a strict spending limit, a two-thirds vote of the legislature to raise taxes, but also voter approval of any tax increase in excess of the state spending limit.
Despite this clear directive by the voters, lawmakers have suspended the two-thirds vote requirement twice (in 2002 and 2005) and Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown filed a lawsuit on March 3, 2008 asking the State Supreme Court to declare the two-thirds vote requirement unconstitutional to make it easier for the legislature to raise taxes.
The State Supreme Court will hear arguments on Senator Brown's lawsuit on September 9, 2008. A final ruling could come in time for next year's legislative session, when lawmakers will try to close a projected $2.7 billion budget deficit, the estimated gap between rising revenues and the even faster increase in state spending. If the Court strikes down I-601, the justices will make it more likely lawmakers will increase taxes in 2009, rather than look for ways to slow down the rate of spending growth.
Ironically, while objecting to the supermajority requirement for tax increases, Senator Brown sponsored Senate rules that require a supermajority vote to amend the budget on the floor.
This rule was used during the 2008 supplemental budget deliberations to block an attempt to remove $250,000 from the Senate budget to buy tickets for girls to attend Seattle Storm basketball games. The vote on the amendment to remove the funding secured a majority, 24-23, but it failed to pass since it did not receive the required 60 percent vote.
The Attorney General is defending the I-601 law against Senator Brown's challenge. The AG points out that in the 15 years since voters adopted I-601, "the Legislature has not chosen to repeal the statute or permanently amend its two-thirds vote provision, although it could have."
Senator Brown says I-601 violates the state Constitution by requiring a two-thirds vote to pass tax increases, when the constitution requires only a 50% majority vote to pass a law. The Attorney General rightly argues that the Constitution only says a bill has to receive a minimum vote of 50% to pass, and that the legislature, or the people, can add to that requirement for some bills if they like. Obviously, the AG says, any bill that receives a two-thirds vote has already satisfied the constitutional requirement of getting 50%.
Regardless of what the Court rules, the long term solution is for state officials to enact meaningful constitutional restrictions on tax and spending increases to help provide a restraint on excessive government spending and future tax increases. Under a statutory law like I-601, it has proven too easy for lawmakers to circumvent and ignore the spending limit.
What the people intended to be a firm but reasonable check on the growth of state spending and tax increases has been reduced almost to zero by the Legislature, as lawmakers seek to accommodate their desire for excessive spending. Today it is a meaningless safeguard that is bypassed regularly by lawmakers intent on boosting spending and taxes.
A model for the reforms that are needed was adopted by the voters last year, when voters amended the constitution to create a budget reserve account, replacing the oft-raided Emergency Reserve Fund that was created by I-601.
Initiative 601 is better than nothing, and the Court should uphold it, but only a constitutional tax and spending limit will help prioritize government spending and provide a legislative climate in which further increases in the government's financial burden are difficult to pass. Under such a restriction, if lawmakers felt they really needed to collect more money from people, tax increase proposals would need a 2/3 vote or could be submitted directly to voters for approval by referendum.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Friday, August 08, 2008
Washington State's August 19, 2008 Primary - State Wide Races
On August 19, 2008, Washington citizens will vote in the state’s first top-two primary election. Below is list of the 9 state-wide offices that will be on the ballot.
For Governor
Dino Rossi (Prefers G.O.P. Party)
Will Baker (Prefers Reform Party)
Christine Gregoire (Prefers Democratic Party)
Duff Badgley (Prefers Green Party)
John W. Aiken, Jr. (Prefers Republican Party)
Christian Pierre Joubert (Prefers Democratic Party)
Christopher A. Tudor (States No Party Preference)
Javier O. Lopez (Prefers Republican Party)
Mohammad Hasan Said (States No Party Preference)
James White (Prefers Independent Party)
For Lt. Governor
Brad Owen (Prefers Democratic Party)
Marcia McCraw (Prefers Republican Party)
Arlene A. Peck (Prefers Constitution Party)
Jim Wiest (Prefers G.O.P. Party)
Randel Bell (Prefers Democratic Party)
For Secretary of State
Sam Reed (Prefers Republican Party)
Mark Greene (Prefers Party Of Commons Party)
Jason Osgood (Prefers Democratic Party)
Marilyn Montgomery (Prefers Constitution Party)
For State Treasurer
Allan Martin (Prefers Republican Party)
Jim McIntire (Prefers Democratic Party)
ChangMook Sohn (Prefers Democratic Party)
For State Auditor
Brian Sonntag (Prefers Democratic Party)
Glenn Freeman (Prefers Constitution Party)
J. Richard (Dick) McEntee (Prefers Republican Party)
For Attorney General
John Ladenburg (Prefers Democratic Party)
Rob McKenna (Prefers Republican Party)
For Commissioner of Public Lands
Peter J. Goldmark (Prefers Democratic Party)
Doug Sutherland (Prefers Republican Party)
For Superintendent of Public Instruction
John Patterson Blair
Don Hansler
Randy Dorn
David Blomstrom
Enid Duncan
Teresa (Terry) Bergeson
For Insurance Commissioner
Mike Kreidler (Prefers Democratic Party)
John R. Adams (Prefers Republican Party)
Curtis Fackler (States No Party Preference)
For Governor
Dino Rossi (Prefers G.O.P. Party)
Will Baker (Prefers Reform Party)
Christine Gregoire (Prefers Democratic Party)
Duff Badgley (Prefers Green Party)
John W. Aiken, Jr. (Prefers Republican Party)
Christian Pierre Joubert (Prefers Democratic Party)
Christopher A. Tudor (States No Party Preference)
Javier O. Lopez (Prefers Republican Party)
Mohammad Hasan Said (States No Party Preference)
James White (Prefers Independent Party)
For Lt. Governor
Brad Owen (Prefers Democratic Party)
Marcia McCraw (Prefers Republican Party)
Arlene A. Peck (Prefers Constitution Party)
Jim Wiest (Prefers G.O.P. Party)
Randel Bell (Prefers Democratic Party)
For Secretary of State
Sam Reed (Prefers Republican Party)
Mark Greene (Prefers Party Of Commons Party)
Jason Osgood (Prefers Democratic Party)
Marilyn Montgomery (Prefers Constitution Party)
For State Treasurer
Allan Martin (Prefers Republican Party)
Jim McIntire (Prefers Democratic Party)
ChangMook Sohn (Prefers Democratic Party)
For State Auditor
Brian Sonntag (Prefers Democratic Party)
Glenn Freeman (Prefers Constitution Party)
J. Richard (Dick) McEntee (Prefers Republican Party)
For Attorney General
John Ladenburg (Prefers Democratic Party)
Rob McKenna (Prefers Republican Party)
For Commissioner of Public Lands
Peter J. Goldmark (Prefers Democratic Party)
Doug Sutherland (Prefers Republican Party)
For Superintendent of Public Instruction
John Patterson Blair
Don Hansler
Randy Dorn
David Blomstrom
Enid Duncan
Teresa (Terry) Bergeson
For Insurance Commissioner
Mike Kreidler (Prefers Democratic Party)
John R. Adams (Prefers Republican Party)
Curtis Fackler (States No Party Preference)
Thursday, July 31, 2008
520 Tolling Committee Adds Open House on Mercer Island - August 13
The 520 Tolling Implementation Committee added a visit to Mercer Island to the series of open houses about how tolls can help pay for a new 520 bridge between Seattle and Bellevue. The Mercer Island open house on August 13, 2008 gives the public a sixth opportunity to provide input and learn about four tolling options being evaluated by the committee. The open houses will include comparisons of forecasts of bridge funding raised by different toll rates and changes in traffic patterns. The open house will be held from 5 pm to 7:30 pm with a formal presentation at 6 pm.
The state Legislature established the 520 Tolling Implementation Committee this year and named as its members: Bob Drewel, Executive Director, Puget Sound Regional Council; Paula Hammond, Secretary, Washington State Department of Transportation; and Dick Ford, Commissioner, Washington State Transportation Commission.
The committee is conferring with local jurisdictions around Lake Washington, evaluating different alternatives, and seeking public input about how tolls can help pay for a new 520 bridge. Members of the public who cannot attend the open houses can learn more about the committee’s work and provide input at www.build520.org. The committee’s final report is due to the governor and the Legislature in January 2009.
The state Legislature established the 520 Tolling Implementation Committee this year and named as its members: Bob Drewel, Executive Director, Puget Sound Regional Council; Paula Hammond, Secretary, Washington State Department of Transportation; and Dick Ford, Commissioner, Washington State Transportation Commission.
The committee is conferring with local jurisdictions around Lake Washington, evaluating different alternatives, and seeking public input about how tolls can help pay for a new 520 bridge. Members of the public who cannot attend the open houses can learn more about the committee’s work and provide input at www.build520.org. The committee’s final report is due to the governor and the Legislature in January 2009.
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