T.E.A. Parties

Taxes Enough Already!! We don’t like taxes! Let’s do demonstrations to tell the government our views. There is of course a few small details that the organizers of T.E.A. Parties have overlooked. Lower taxes means we won’t have the where with all to provide all the services we want. A few that come to mind are:

Money to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
Money to pay for the FAA, FCC, FDA, and the many other important functions provided by the government
Unemployment insurance payments to all of those who have been laid off
Public schools
Highway maintenance and construction
Police and fire protection

The list is too long to recite here but there is a myriad of services provided by our government. Some are provided by local agencies and others are provided by the state or federal government.

At the beginning of April the federal government actually lowered withholding on our paychecks and lowered the actual income tax rates.

The complaint about our government ought to be about waste and inefficiency. There are too many bureaucrats that do nothing to but add to the morass of functions that do not provide any worthwhile services. Here in Los Angeles the city says it will have a $500million shortfall in its next fiscal year. The solution will be in the elimination of unnecessary commissions and departments that provide very little to the welfare of most citizens.

President Obama has discussed improving the purchasing functions of the federal government. Defense Secretary Gates has proposed eliminating unnecessary projects. But wait, these actions will result in the loss of jobs.

Everyone complains about the cost of government and “pork barrel” projects until the project is in their community. Suddenly it’s not pork. Oh yes, one other thing. The Boston Tea Party was about taxation without representation. If we don’t like our representatives we can vote them out office.

Solving the California Drought

California is facing a drought says the governor and the mayor of Los Angeles. OK we all understand that we have a serious problem. There has been no discussion about ways to obtain additional water.

Other nations located in arid climates have looked to desalination. There are functioning facilities throughout the middle east and Australia. The most successful of them is the Askilon facility in Israel. The cost of producing drinkable (potable) water is ½ cent per gallon. That is about the same cost as the water provided by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

Happily there is a desalination facility planned in San Diego County. For some unknown reason this project has been ignored by both Los Angeles Mayor Villaragosa and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Poseidon Resources Group of Connecticut is about to build a facility in Carlsbad, California. The “project will provide San Diego County with a locally-controlled, drought-proof supply of high-quality water that meets or exceeds all state and federal drinking water standards.”

What I do not understand is the behavior of government in retaining the available water. There is the issue of water use on government property including the sides of freeways. Further there is the issue of broken fire hydrants that take weeks to repair. The biggest loss of water is in the Los Angeles River (really a giant storm drain system). There is no program in place to catch water from that river to add to our supply.

Until our government takes water conservation seriously the pubic won’t.

California Politicians are Failures

The state legislature has approved a budget that signs off on the idea that incompetence is acceptable. The result of the new budget is that our sales tax and vehicle property tax will be one of the highest in the nation. What makes this situation even more horrifying is that the state will still have to borrow money to balance its budget.

It is obvious that state government needs to be reorganized. It is very inefficient. The ability to legislate the changes needed for reorganization of the bureaucracy ought to be everyone’s criteria for electing all of the legislature and the state wide officers.

The silence from members of the legislature tells me that there is no will now to change anything. Recalls are not the answer. Newly elected people are the way to go. Forget party affiliation.

NO on Los Angeles Measure B

There is a proposition on the March 3, 2009 ballot for some kind of investment that will provide solar generated electric. The issue with the plan is the actual cost. As I understand the plan solar cells will be installed on top of major buildings and be sent into the city’s electrical grid. Two reports on the cost are providing conflicting data. One report says the cost will be $1 billon and a second says the cost will be $3 billon. Too many people oppose this proposal to support it. Included in the opposition is the highly respected city controller, Laura Chick. I really honor her opinion. This situation is so bad that we have not received sample ballots for the upcoming election. Clearly this is a city suffering with major mismanagement.

California Government Incompetence

The California legislature is a failed institution. The LA Daily News says in today’s front page editorial that our Leaders fail to lead in crisis. The legislature has been deteriorating for at least the past 30 years. 1978 was the year that the “People’s Initiative to Limit Property Taxation”, known as Proposition 13, was voted into law. According to Wikipedia 64.8% of the voters gave a Yes vote to the proposal despite the fear mongering of elected officials that government services would be desimated. The legislature’s half hearted alternative to the proposition has not been forgotten. As a young family in our first home we saw our property taxes increase by 50% in one year. The savings and loan holding our mortgage raised our monthly payment into an impound account to pay the taxes by 100%. Of course we voted for that initiative. Our property taxes returned to their previous level the following year.

The power of one third of the legislature to determine the fate of this state’s fiscal condition was a well meaning but ill advised effort to control spending during the Great Depression. California has failed to balance its budget for at least four successive years. The public will feel the effect of this situation starting Monday, February 2, 2009 when public services are drastically reduced.

There really is only one way to change this situation. The state constitution needs to be revised. The Sacramento Bee reports that a Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) state wide survey indicates 54% of “believe that it is a “good idea” to change the two-thirds majority to a 55 percent majority.” I will gladly stand in front of Von’s and CVS to obtain the needed signatures.

You Murder You Die!

If Americans were serious about stopping the killings reported on the 6 o’clock news we would have already put laws into place that tell everyone “we mean business.” Swiftly carrying out the death penalty every single time would deliver the message.

The arguments about the use of the death penalty will never go away. Those who view the penalty as inappropriate for a moral and just society continue to offer the same worn out words that have always been used.

Hugo Adam Bedau in his excellent on-line article The Case Against The Death Penalty sums up all the arguments. “The American Civil Liberties Union holds that the death penalty inherently violates the constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment and the guarantee of due process of law and the equal protection of the laws.” Bedau goes on to question the idea that the death penalty is not a deterrent, that there is an inherent unfairness because the penalty has been applied to Black people more often than White people, inevitability of errors, and offers contention of barbarity and retribution.

The problem with all these arguments is that most of those standing for those views have not been part of the devastated families that have lost family members to violence. It’s a loss of life that cannot ever be forgotten. Gangster killings are the most painful because they result in the loss of totally innocent lives. 4-year-old Roberto Lopez Jr. was shot and killed near his Los Angeles home in what police believe was gang violence. These are not just events that happen in Los Angeles. The husband of U.S. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy of New York was killed in the 1993 Long Island Rail Road shooting massacre. The killer was Colin Ferguson. He was sentenced to 200 years in prison, on February 17, 1995. The death penalty was established in New York State following the massacre.

Clearly I can kill in California without fear of actually being put to death. That is the problem with the death penalty. The process of actually going into a gas chamber takes a life time and many people have died of natural causes while awaiting the actual penalty. ACLU’s web site tells us why the death penalty has failed to deter murder.

My view is if you premeditate a murder the penalty is death. The only exceptions are self defense or the murderer is insane. The determination of appeals should not take 20 years.

Overcoming the Balkanization of America

The Balkanization of America is more the fault of the media and politicians than it is the fault of Americans. The real Balkans is the historical name of the area of southeastern Europe on the east side of the Adriatic Sea. It’s the former Yugoslavia which was really made up of at least five nations of varying cultures. This area includes Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo. The United States still has troops there to keep the peace.

Balkanized places in the world are all about hate and separation. The reason for those hatreds and dislikes are too varied to easily define. My problem is that Americans have allowed this situation to develop in our country over hundreds of years. It’s a sad historical fact. Barack Obama talks about the country not being made up of red states and blue states instead everyone being part of the United States. It’s wonderful rhetoric. How can he make that happen when we are so diverse?

Regional separation exists in our country. It is most pronounced with regard to the South. That separation is the result of slavery and the Civil War. To this day some southerners are still displaying the Confederate flag. I personally was confronted just a few years ago in Spartanburg, South Carolina by a man in the airport who tried to convince me that bigotry and hatred for Blacks was part of their (southerners) past. It was he who wanted this discussion, not me. He gets credit for trying to stop the impression that I hold from both the media and personal experience.

Racial and ethnic divisions are the real challenge for the United States. The level of hate for other races and religions continue almost unabated. The fact that there is even a Wikipedia entry entitled Racism in the United States tells us that many people feel victimized by this situation. As I prepared this article I saw a report of two Latinos that are allleged gang members killing an African-American for racial reasons. The killing took place in my community.

While Los Angeles has many integrated communities it has become common knowledge that hatred between Blacks and Latinos is very prevalent. This article in the Los Angeles Times written on October 17, 2007 supports this undeniable reality. There are just too many of these incidents for all of us to ignore. Searches on the internet or a scan of your local newspaper will tell you that the situation is not unique to the Los Angeles area.

At the same time, a walk through the upscale shopping mall in my community tells me that we are a changing society where I see Asians from all countries, Europeans, Jews, Muslims, and Christians all comfortably mixing. As a white man I am in the minority. As pointed out on Chris Matthews weekend show white Europeans will soon be the minority group in America. Younger people are more accepting of differences. So there is hope.

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Rob Taylor has suggested that the melting pot objective for America is the best solution. It is one I definitely support and believe should be encouraged. Barack Obama, with a White mother and a Black father personifies that objective.