kirkwalsh.com

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The New York Times had a big story over the weekend about young Evangelicals in St. Louis not being pre-programmed robots for the Republican party. I have no idea what placement it had in the paper, but it was the 10th most e-mailed story yesterday online (I can imagine readers of the Times shock and dismay that some Midwestern Christians may be *gasp* Democrats).

It’s a long line of stories that seem to be the reversal of the long line of stories about the power of the Religious Right of the last decade. Now that the Democrats are ascendant, the media has to come up with a meme that will fit with their worldview.

Ms. Banerjee, who appears to be the religious correspondent from the Times given her other stories, does an okay job but why do we need these stories? Is it really that surprising that someone can be Christian, live in the Midwest, and be a Democrat? I realize we’re not as smrt as those that happen to live near an ocean (must be the salty air or something) but we can think for ourselves. It should be no more surprising than finding someone that is Jewish, lives in New York, and is a Republican. Where are the stories on that? I mean if we are going to play stereotypes they can go both ways.

I would prefer the story have focused on some of the quotes rather than the fact that they happen to not be Republican. I agree with a lot of what was said by the Baptists in the article (you won’t find me saying that a lot) that we need to be out in the world rather than retreating from it as a lot of the older generation would prefer. They mention that any political agenda should be about more than abortion and gay marriage, but why not expound on that?

I’m not a huge fan of media bias (and it cracks me up to no end that Hillary’s supporters are claiming that the reason she lost is because of liberal bias) so I’m going to blame the tone of the story more on the editors lack of knowledge than an overall bias. Just to clear the air, yes, there are people in the flyover that aren’t GOP-programmed killing machines.

As the Presidential race heats up, we’ll see more articles from places that NYT reporters hoped that they would never be sent (”Send me to Baghdad, just not St. Louis!”). I hope that they all don’t take the condescending tone of this piece, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

Dear Mr. President:

I know that you are unlikely to listen to me as I’ve never voted for you, routinely called your adventure in Iraq a travesty, and referred to your Administration as a bad joke on the American people. But I believe that for the good of the nation, we can agree on one thing. Don’t let George Ryan out of prison.

The former Governor of Illinois was convicted of using his office as an ATM machine and filing fraudulent tax returns to cover it up. He received trips, money, and campaign contributions from state contract holders. He, without remorse, steered contracts to friends and associates. He was among the most corrupt officials Illinois has ever had, and when you consider that 4 of the last 7 Illinois Governors have served prison time that’s really saying something (and Blago will likely make it 5 of 8).

But most importantly, you cannot let the deaths of the Willis children go unpunished. The Willis family was simply driving down the highway when a piece of metal flew off of a truck and into their van. The van exploded trapping their six children inside. All six children were killed in the accident. The truck driver should never have been on the road. He bribed an official in the Secretary of State’s office to get his license. Governor Ryan was Secretary of State at the time and it was later learned that there was a statewide system of bribes for driver’s licenses and that the bribe money was going into Governor Ryan’s Gubernatorial campaign fund. It simply defies logic that he would not have known about the systematic rot. Given what we know of his term as Governor, it seems prescient.

As far as I (and many other Illinoisans) are considered, Ryan deserves to spend the rest of his time in prison. Commuting his sentence, as his lawyer former Illinois Governor Jim Thompson suggests, would show that you can do whatever you please as long as you have friends in high places to bail you out. I’ve criticized your Administration for doing the same thing several times and I hope that in the last months of your Presidency you consider the message that sends to historians about your Administration.

I have no sympathy for George Ryan, as this letter suggests. Governor Thompson claims that it is punishment enough for him to lose face and that he shouldn’t have to do prison time. For the sake of the Willis family and all the others that were hurt as a result of Governor Ryan’s actions, I plead with you to let Mr. Ryan face his punishment. Send a message that Governors and public officials should not be for sale. Talking tough about crime and punishment is one thing, actually letting justice rule is another.

Please Mr. President, let Governor Ryan serve his time.

Sincerely,

Kirk Walsh, Registered Voter

Here in Missouri, we’re being bombarded with a campaign for the “Yes for Schools First!” initiative. It’s a great thing for all Missourians, I mean just look at the benefits.

• The Schools First Initiative, a measure proposed for the November 2008 state ballot, will provide new revenues for Missouri schools – without increasing our property taxes or state income taxes.
• Provides over $100 million per year in new revenues to schools by updating the state’s casino regulations and increasing the gaming tax casinos pay to 21%.
• Ensures that these casino tax revenues are used to increase funding for schools – and cannot be used to replace or supplant other education funds.
• Allows Missouri casinos to compete on a level playing field by eliminating outdated chip limit and patron tracking card regulations that do not exist in any other state.
• Limits the number of casinos in Missouri to those already built or under construction.
• Provides additional funding for veterans’ services and other public services from the $2 per visitor excursion fee paid by casinos.

But, there’s a huge elephant in the room that the website ignores. Who is paying for the initiative? Missouri’s casinos. Why? Look at the third “benefit” listed above. This initiative would lift Missouri’s current law that allows a gambler to “only” lose $500 every 2 hours. Oh, and it would limit the number of casinos in Missouri to those already built, which would guarantee no more competition for the casinos.

The gaming industry has been pushing for years to remove the loss limits. They have run into strong resistance from anti-gambling members of the legislature from Southern Missouri and they are hoping that they can bypass these members by going directly to the people of Missouri.

But, let’s do the math here. So, the casinos pay 20% of the gross receipts in taxes. That means that for every five dollars that you lose in a casino four goes to the casino and one goes to the State. Okay, this initiative is promising $130 million to the State in increased tax revenue. If the casinos get four dollars for every dollar the State receives, that means an additional $520 million in revenue for the casinos  ($130 * 4) on top of making sure that there will be no further competition in-state from other casinos.

I could go on and on, but really you get the point (though the FAQs are rather amusing from a cynical political perspective). It’s not that I am opposed to gambling or that I believe that the $500 loss limits should be kept. I think it’s wholly unfair and misleading for the casinos to be fronting a group that claims that the initiative will be nothing but roses and candy for everyone in Missouri with nary a mention of the benefits that the casinos receive.

Just yesterday I posted about Bombardier’s attempt at getting Missouri to pay them more than twice the cost of a new factory in Kansas City and I mentioned Edward Jones’ tax breaks. I look in the St. Louis Business Journal and once again, EJ comes hat-in-hand looking for more tax abatements.

This time, it’s $17.8 million for a project that has already started in Des Peres, a suburb of St. Louis. That’s right, we’re not even bothering with the whole “I’ll move, I swear I will” song and dance this time. This project was approved and has been started, but the County Executive (Charlie Dooley) says that we should give them a break anyway. Just ’cause.

Look, I dislike corporate incentives (and I think I’ve made that clear) but this is ridiculous. They’re going to do the project anyway! This is free money given to a highly profitable company for no reason other than we feel like it. Why do I care? Because everyone not named Edward Jones, including myself, pays higher taxes when one person gets special breaks.

Instead of doing this, St. Louis County should be using the money to lower everyone’s property taxes and promoting the fact that property taxes are much lower than in neighboring cities (*cough* Chicago *cough*). I’m not for making evil businesses pay higher taxes just ’cause either (and I’ve made that clear), but to simply give them $17.8 million of taxpayer money because they are nice guys seems a little over the top to me.

Okay, so the real score is probably Lobbyists 7,565,545,312,212 Good Tax Policy 1, but in this case the Missouri Senate did the right thing.

See, Bombardier is thinking about building a plant in Kansas City adjacent to the airport. But first, they want to milk the State of Missouri for all it’s got before committing to do so. The Missouri House passed the proposal but a Senate Committee decided that it was too rich even for them and voted it down.

The subsidies would be up to $40 million per year for 22 years. That’s $880 million for Bombardier from the State of Missouri. The plant itself would only cost $375 million, so the company is making over 2:1 on their money with little risk as the enabling legislation only says that a “reasonable” repayment plan be in place before the credits are issued. If Bombardier doesn’t meet the required payroll for the given year they will simply forfeit the credits for that year, not be required to pay back any of the credit previously earned (hey, for Missouri that’s a step in the right direction).

I loathe incentives such as these. Most of them go to taxpayers for doing what they would have done anyway without the subsidies. Of course, Bombardier has to certify that another city or country is in the running and they would only locate in Missouri if they get the credits *wink, wink*.

The legislation is here if you want to read it (why would you?). I don’t expect it to be down long, though. The Missouri Lege is known for handing out incentives like hotcakes (Edward Jones, you hear that?) and the lobbyists will be hard at work in the last 12 days to swing the two GOP Senators back to the yes column.

Ahhhh, April 15th. The day when tax people party (there ain’t no party like a tax party!) and politicians hoist ever dumber tax ideas on an unsuspecting public. Today’s contestant is John McCain. Let’s see what Senator McCain would do if he were Supreme Overlord:

• Extend the Bush Tax Cuts (which he didn’t support until running for President)
• Suspend the Federal Gasoline Tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day
• Double the tax exemption for each child from $3,500 to $7,000
• Create a third individual taxing system by allowing people to elect a flat tax (all the rage in GOP circles these days)

Oh, he has other economic ideas as well.

• Stop adding to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve so oil prices will come down (maybe he should check out the Strategic Helium Reserve sometime and how it’s basically been propping up the helium market).
• Strengthen states’ ability to be the lender of last resort for student loans (rather than the Federal government?)
• Suspend all discretionary spending increases other than the military for one year (you mean like the Student Loan program?)

Pandering, pandering, pandering. I’ve said before I’m all for a simpler tax system. Adding a third tier of individual taxing systems and increasing preferences for one group of people ain’t it. The gasoline tax helps to pay for infrastructure, which is already crumbling. How will we pay for it (and it’s discretionary spending, John)?

On the economic side, discretionary spending isn’t the problem. It makes you look like you’re attacking the problem, but it’s nowhere near the problem. Just about two years to the day I posted about the Federal budget and what percent relates to what. Senator McCain wants to freeze non-military (and veteran) discretionary spending? Here’s a reprint of that chart:

Assuming that all of the miscellaneous falls into the category, we’re looking at less than a quarter of the budget. If we want to get serious about the Federal deficits (which politicians aren’t but want you to believe they are) they’ll have to attack the 75% of the budget that’s the new third rail of politics. If you can’t cut defense, Medicaid, or Social Security and want to cut taxes you don’t have a lot of choices. But you can appoint a commission to study it and report back to make it look like you’re serious when everybody knows the report will be DOA because it will involve hard choices that no one will make.

Maybe I’m just cranky today, but I’m sick and tired of stupid, pandering tax ideas. Senator McCain’s hardly the only one. The ideas on the Democratic side are just as stupid and pandering. The more special giveaways that you give to politically desirable sub-groups, the more everyone pays. I’d love it if we made the dependant exemption one million dollars, but all the tax would be paid by those that don’t have children. The same thing happens on a smaller scale with all these tax giveaways, we just never see the sleight of hand that takes away what they are “giving” us. We all need to fight for a simpler, fairer system that just makes sense. And that means giving up some of our preferences for a lower rate.

Oh, and telling politicians not to put out more stupid, pandering tax ideas on April 15th.

We received word over the weekend that Charlton Heston died in his home after a long battle with a disease similar to Alzheimer’s. The first thing I thought of was his legacy and how it would be different for each generation.

For those of a certain age, they will remember Mr. Heston as the grandiose figure that won Oscars and played Moses and Ben Hur with such authority. For my generation, however, Mr. Heston’s legacy is likely to be far less romantic.

See, most of Mr. Heston’s classic roles were well before my generation was born. While I’m not opposed to watching movies made before I was born, there are a great many of the “classics” that me and those in my generation have not seen. I can’t sit still long enough to watch all three and a half hours of “The Ten Commandments” (which is why I’ve never seen the Lord of the Rings movies either) and “Planet of the Apes” has been mocked so many times that it is hard for a contemporary audience to watch it with a straight face.

No, see, Mr. Heston’s legacy for my generation is more likely to be as the gun nut that held a pro-firearms rally in Denver just days after the Columbine shootings. While I don’t blame guns for the Columbine shooting, holding a rally in support of gun ownership after a couple of kids shot up their school was not the best idea and for a lot of people in my generation that is what they will remember. We remember seeing the images on tv (I watched the live footage of the high school on CNN in real time) and seeing Mr. Heston in Denver capitalizing on the tragedy made a lot of us uncomfortable. [ed: while I realize some of this is in Bowling for Columbine, I ignore 90% of what Michael Moore does and am not relying on that but relying on my personal memory].

Whether or not it’s fair that this will be the first memory that comes to pass for a lot of my generation is up for debate. I’m not advocating that this should be his legacy, I just thought it was interesting how different the same person can look to people of different generations. Mr. Heston did a lot of wonderful things in his life, and even his political life was a lot less one-sided than simply being President of the NRA, but it’s often the last public images that people remember.

God speed, Mr. Heston. You will be missed.

I was about to give the Clinton campaign credit for not piling on in the whole “Should Obama dump his pastor” kerfuffle. Then Hillary’s team lets her put an easily fact-checked lie into her stump speech and she then decides it’s time to wade in because she was “just responding to a question”.

Uh huh. Because pols never, ever avoid a question they don’t want to answer. I’m sure it has nothing to do with a deflection strategy on the whole Bosnia issue. I want to give her the benefit of the doubt and say she misremembered the first time, that happens. But then her team let it into a stump speech and didn’t bother to factcheck the story. That’s the real problem here. Why would they put that into the stump speech without knowing whether it was true? You would think that the Clinton campaign people would have this whole running for President thing down but they prove time and time again that they simply have no clue.

As far as the whole pastor thing, I don’t much care. I disagree with a lot of what my minister says as well. I wouldn’t want you to hold me to his politics anymore than I would hold you to yours. It’s not as silly as the whole Geraldine Ferraro incident (who should know about being used to make a point) but anything passes as news in this 24 hours a day news cycle where gotcha politics rules.

Oh well, only seven more months until the 2012 election cycle starts…

Kevin,

I’ll put it in terms you’ll definitely understand. The Protestants have a bit of marketing problem. The Catholics offer copious amounts of booze and a good time. Protestants offer marching through Catholic neighborhoods and getting shot at. I think we definitely have the advantage on that one.

Not that I partake and I am truly annoyed at those that portray themselves as part Irish today, but I can see where the issue lies for your side.

If only you’d move back to your own country, we wouldn’t have an issue

I’ve avoided talking about the Spitzer fiasco in New York because in a lot of ways I think it’s silly. Yes, we all love watching holier-than-thou politicians being hoisted on their own petard, but really it’s a family issue masquerading as a political circus.

Though, I have to give credit to Virgin Mobile Canada for this ad that will be in Canadian newspapers this weekend (hmm… I wonder why they aren’t running them for Virgin US?). It’s timely and actually pretty funny. I doubt they’ll get many conversions but at least they’ll have a lot of free promotion as the news media picks up the story.