Month: July 2012

A close shave for redistricting petition

They only turned in about 10,000 “spare” signatures at the June 30 deadline, but those behind a petition drive to bring the recently-enacted Congressional districts to referendum felt confident they would have just enough signatures to place the matter on the November 6 ballot, and preliminary numbers seem to bear them out.

Out of the 65,722 signatures given to the state Board of Elections, 44,310 – or roughly 2/3 – have been verified by the state. At this point the drive sits at 39,516 validated signatures, which means just 16,220 out of 21,412 of the remaining names need to be acceptable. The history of these recent referendum petitions suggests that only about 10 percent of the signatures have been ruled invalid; if that trend holds the drive will end up in the range of 59,000 valid signatures and would be on the ballot.

(continued at Examiner.com…)

The contribution process

Today promises to be the last of the brutally hot days our region has endured, as temperatures are predicted to retreat into the eighties for the next few days. (If anything, we could use the rain this cold front may bring us.) But for several thousand men and women, 100-degree days are common during the summer because they’re serving in the arid lands of the Middle East.

Now I understand the argument that many make: well, they’re the ones who volunteered to serve so they probably had an idea of what they were getting into. Moreover, when they return they’re going to be the recipient of a host of government goodies, such as a lifetime of medical benefits, assistance in paying for a college education, and preferences in various areas of housing and employment. No doubt many have seen this as an attractive way of life, well worth the risk to life and limb – particularly as the benefits of military service are continually promoted in venues attractive to the younger generation.

Yet when they arrive at the front against Islamic terrorism they find that William Tecumseh Sherman was right: war is hell. Soldiers can do all the training and wargaming that’s demanded of them, but when the objective by the enemy is to inflict real, honest-to-God death and destruction onto people they have no compunction whatsoever about killing (nor about dying for their own cause) by any means possible – including tactics far outside the Geneva Convention – it’s a wonder more don’t crack under all that stress. Seeing good friends blown to bits by an IED doesn’t do wonders for one’s psyche. And yes, I again acknowledge the argument that these sons and daughters of ours volunteered for the gig.

So when they receive something tangible which expresses our support I’m sure it makes their day; an island of hope and comfort among the drudgery and despair.

The cynic in all of us also says that those companies and entities which supply the items placed in the care package are in it for the publicity or the tax writeoff, and that could be true. To be honest, I’m not clear just how Move America Forward (the organization which sponsors the Troopathon and these care packages) acquires the items for the packages they send overseas – my guess is that many of them are donated by suppliers while others are purchased at a nominal to wholesale price. And obviously there’s the cost of postage involved in getting these overseas. I can tell you the price has increased over the years since I think the initial 2008 package (which may not have had the same number of items, so I could be doing an apples-to-oranges comparison) was around $15 apiece. It’s gone up a couple dollars each year since.

Still, I figure it’s the least I can do to thank those who put their lives on the line for us. While many question our purpose in fighting overseas, the fact is that we will be there until our Commander-in-Chief says we come back.

As for the Troopathon itself, it will be broadcast over the internet, presumably at the Troopathon site, starting at 4 p.m. this coming Thursday, July 12. (At this time they have a rebroadcast of last year’s program there.) Over previous years a veritable who’s who of conservative and pro-troop personalities have stopped by, and this year will be no exception.

The difference is, as I detailed a little last week, that I have a fair amount of bragging rights at stake because I am part of a larger blogger team. No question I want to do my part as I have the third-most-read website on the team (behind Hot Air, of course, and The Lonely Conservative) according to Alexa ranking so I should be a key contributor to the cause. I figure if fifty readers can help out that would be an appropriate kickstart. Now I know I have way more than fifty readers on any given day so this is quite doable, I think.

If you support the troops, here’s a way to do so. I did, and I’m just a struggling middle-aged blogger. Just click on the large banner on the right sidebar and enlist yourself in my army of troop supporters!

 

A Shore method of hearing from the Left

You’ll probably recall, as part of my coverage of the recent Delmarva Chicken Festival, that I brought up a new group called Let’s Be Shore. It’s a project of the Maryland Humanities Council, explained the nice lady manning (or would that be womanning?) the tent, and they’re looking to create a dialogue about our way of life.

Well, the other day I received an e-mail from Michelle Baylin, who’s the Communications Manager of the Maryland Humanities Council. It read in part:

I was writing to ask if you would consider additional posts and wanted to let you in on an update:  we are planning our first panel discussion, during the Chesapeake Folk Life Festival on July 28th at 3pm, with some of our video portrait subjects participating.  We’ll also have a Sharing Station tent at the festival as well.

Let’s Be Shore seeks, through the use of the humanities, to bring people with divergent perspectives together for respectful dialogue, offering a platform for residents to express views on the issues of land use, agriculture, the economy, and water quality along Maryland’s Eastern Shore.  Conservative views are an important component to presenting a balance of opinion! (Emphasis in original.)

Well, let’s add up the score: you got at least one additional post and I definitely have conservative views. But I knew nothing about the Chesapeake Folk Life Festival until I looked it up – it’s held in the quaint but picturesque town of St. Michaels. There’s nothing farther down the Shore just yet, so this partial effort at a response will have to suffice for now.

As always, I’m a little suspicious of these attempts at “dialogue” and togetherness because my experience has been that those who gain control of the group tend to also want to control a lot of other activities – case in point, the Wicomico Neighborhood Congress, which eventually devolved into an agenda-based group that seemed to screech most loudly against developing new neighborhoods (which, ironically enough, would be potential new members.) They eagerly climbed aboard the “growth is bad” bandwagon personified by this guy.

On the other hand, the tendency of conservatives to just want to be left alone by big government also means they’re not going to speak out as forcefully and we all know the squeaky wheel gets the grease.

But insofar as the quality of Chesapeake Bay is concerned, of course I’d like it to be clean as well. Yet I’m quite aware that to get it as pristine as it was when the only things which moved around here were a few Indians and plenty of wild game is not very realistic. To think otherwise is a pipe dream only a non-profit or government agency which would like to assure itself a perpetual slice of the taxpayer revenue pie would think up.

More importantly, if we ever got it back to that state the Chesapeake Bay Foundation would have no more reason to exist, so do you think they’ll ever give the Bay an “A” for cleanliness? I doubt it, because they’ll continually move the goalposts and we’ll be lucky if they get it above a “C”. In fact, the stated goal of the CBF is to restore the Bay to its state when first discovered, but there are several million people who would have to be forcibly relocated for that to occur. Not that the CBF seems to mind.

Instead, they advocate policies which will make growth more difficult and expensive in the entire Bay watershed, with a little bit of indoctrination thrown in:

Education will serve as a means to citizen engagement and behavior change…Drawing on the beneficial results of CBF educational efforts, we will engage adults and young people in a campaign to see that good laws and regulations are developed, introduced, passed, and enforced.

So that’s what we on the pro-growth side are up against, and it wouldn’t surprise me to eventually find the CBF’s hand (or money) in this effort at “dialogue.”

Speaking of money, as of last year the Maryland Humanities Council derived the bulk of its income from the National Endowment for the Humanities, with a smaller portion coming from various state departments. It’s worthy to note as well that the National Endowment of the Humanities requested over $154 million of your tax dollars for FY2013. Thus, you and I are paying for this.

The question is whether they’ll actually listen to conservative voices of reason who would like nothing better than securing a cleaner Bay without sacrificing the vast potential this area still has.

Friday night videos – episode 72

There was a little more of a break than I envisioned when I did my last episode at the tail end of last year, but the good news is that FNV is back for the summer!

Since summer is the silly season of politics and I like my bands when I can get them, I’m bringing back this series each Friday night through August. So for the next nine weeks rock out the summer with some new stuff and old classics I’m bringing back.

The first song is a tribute of sorts to a supporter of local music – the ‘Live Lixx at Six’ series on Ocean 98 (WOCM-FM). The background song comes from The Permilla Project, who’s featured at the end of this video.

Another Live Lixx video goes back to the early days when DJ BK and Leslie did the show as a tandem, and features The Aaron Howell Band.

Moving out of the Irie Radio studio, I included this song because the singer’s husband never sees Too Much Fun. It’s an old classic rock chestnut from a group which used to be known as 8 Track Flashback, but it’s good anyway.

Keeping with the female vocal theme – but switching back to original music – this is a band called 14-5 out of Pocomoke. You know, I’m not digging the unkind comments on the video (if you look at the YouTube page) unless they’re willing to go out and try it themselves. I know I can’t carry a tune in a bucket.

Another female vocal, from a group I’ve probably featured more than any other, Semiblind.

To close out, I wanted to give you a brief history of this series. It originally started out as a weekly review of some of the many political videos I was receiving back in 2009, with my first episode put up July 24 of that year. It wasn’t until episode 8 in October that I did music videos, and this was the very first one I selected.

For a long time, the Chrome Donut video was the most-watched video on my channel and it’s still #4 among music videos. This leads me to a good idea – next week I’ll feature the top three as I look back, while adding some new stuff as well.

Until next Friday night, have a great week and rock the summer!

Shocker: capital leaves a high-tax state

I would have argued for a release which wasn’t on a holiday week – a point I made to spokesman Jim Pettit – but on Tuesday Change Maryland released a fascinating study about the migration of capital from Maryland to other states; a study which also looked at the effect on each of Maryland’s 23 counties and Baltimore City.

In the release, Change Maryland Chair Larry Hogan is quoted as saying:

A growing tax base is the ultimate win/win situation in public policy. It eases the pressure to raise revenues, and conversely, a shrinking tax base often leads to a troublesome tax-and-spend downward spiral as actual revenues fail to meet estimates.

Welcome to Maryland, huh? How many gimmicks has the state tried over the last half-decade or so to address a yawning structural deficit? We were told the tax hikes in 2007 would do the trick, but if that wasn’t the case we would be rolling in dough from all the casinos we would build to keep those Free Staters wagering at home instead of traveling to Delaware or West Virginia to play those one-armed bandits. And so on, and so forth – meanwhile, the state continues to increase spending at a rapid clip, daring revenues to try and keep up in a losing race. The Change Maryland group also has a handy list of the 24 tax and fee increases we have endured since Martin O’Malley came into office inheriting a budget surplus in 2007.

So when I received a preview of this study on Monday, the first thing I naturally gravitated to was how it affected my home county of Wicomico, which has had its own budgetary struggles over the last couple years. Those of the liberal persuasion – a number which includes our County Executive, Rick Pollitt – blame a voter-imposed revenue cap for part of the problem, but a larger issue is the rapid decline of property values that, through property taxes, make up a significant portion of county revenues.

Whatever the reason, the Change Maryland numbers show a stark difference between Wicomico and neighboring counties on the lower Eastern Shore. Using the factors of those coming and leaving, our overall income tax base declined 0.77% while each of the three surrounding counties (Dorchester, Somerset, Worcester) increased at 0.47%, 0.16%, and 2.07% respectively. Worcester’s gain was the largest in the state, with Kent County on the Upper Eastern Shore second at 1.55%.

While the Change Maryland analysis focuses on larger counties, Hogan also had encouraging words for the rural parts of the state:

I’m very encouraged by how well we’re doing in the rural and outlying counties. These small economic engines are powering the state forward by attracting new residents.   Clearly where we need to see improvement is in our largest jurisdictions.  Baltimore City is losing its tax base at unacceptable levels and Montgomery County’s stagnant tax base will further tarnish its business reputation as elected officials seek more revenue to make up for budget shortfalls.

Yet there are three exceptions to that rural/urban rule, as Allegany County in the western panhandle lost quite a bit of its tax base as did Caroline County (also on the Eastern Shore.)

I think the problem can easily be addressed for Allegany County by allowing the extraction of natural gas from the Marcellus Shale which lies underneath; meanwhile, Caroline County is such a small number to almost be an anomaly. However, Caroline is a very rural (and landlocked) county lying somewhat off the beaten path and attracting jobs and residents can be difficult in those cases.

On the other hand, the obvious point Change Maryland is making about the lack of encouragement to business growth is most reinforced by the tax base declines in Baltimore City and County along with the close Washington D.C. suburbs of Montgomery and Prince George’s counties. Their tax base may be shrinking, but combined these entities make up about 60% of Maryland’s roughly 5.8 million residents.

So that leaves poor old Wicomico County, which is flailing just like the big boys. But why?

The liberal and Pollitt argument would go something like this: because our budgets were made artificially tight by the revenue cap, we couldn’t “invest” in quality-of-life aspects of government like education and recreation to attract people to live here. But the key attraction to an area to businesses is generally how receptive the location will be for the bottom line – even though Perdue is located in Wicomico County many of its workers choose to live in other areas for various reasons, whether lower property taxes, better housing or schools, or just liking a place to live enough to make the extra commute worth it.

If you look at the actual Wicomico County numbers, it’s interesting to see that the number of filers declined by just 45, out of a total of over 2,000 on each side – it’s not a statistically significant change. But add in the dependents and the number swells to an outflow of 215. It’s a suggestion that families with kids are leaving the area; naturally those on the Left would quickly indict the lack of spending on schools and quality of life as a culprit.

But the income difference is stark enough to suggest that it’s truly a lack of good job opportunities that is costing Wicomico County – there’s about a $5,000 income differential between those leaving and those coming in. In other words, good-paying jobs are being lost and replaced by ones which aren’t as lucrative. It’s one thing that I wish Change Maryland had included, but instead I did the simple math.

The first number in these upcoming series is the income (in thousands) per filer coming into each county and Baltimore City. The second number is the income (in thousands) shown from outgoing filers, with the third plus-or-minus number being the difference between the two:

  • Allegany: 31.48, 37.73, (-6.25)
  • Anne Arundel: 51.74, 53.22, (-1.48)
  • Baltimore City: 37.81, 43.83, (-6.02)
  • Baltimore County: 42.44, 46.28, (-3.84)
  • Calvert: 57.61, 53.71, +3.90
  • Caroline: 35.12, 31.22, +3.90
  • Carroll: 55.14, 47.76, +7.38
  • Cecil: 45.86, 45.53, +0.33
  • Charles: 48.52, 48.89, (-0.37)
  • Dorchester: 34.13, 35.40, (-1.27)
  • Frederick: 53.55, 50.64, +2.91
  • Garrett: 48.45, 32.48, +15.97
  • Harford: 52.17, 48.51, +3.66
  • Howard: 61.39, 59.05, +2.34
  • Kent: 48.79, 36.24, +12.55
  • Montgomery: 58.62, 59.00, (-0.38)
  • Prince George’s: 40.18, 40.85, (-0.67)
  • Queen Anne’s: 58.41, 49.64, +8.77
  • St. Mary’s: 50.51, 49.36, +1.15
  • Somerset: 26.74, 27.00, (-0.26)
  • Talbot: 53.00, 46.96, +6.04
  • Washington: 39.12, 38.59, +0.53
  • Wicomico: 31.44, 36.88, (-5.44)
  • Worcester: 49.67, 34.53, +15.14

Looking at the numbers through this lens, you can see that Wicomico is right there with Baltimore City and Allegany County in bleeding good-paying jobs and attracting what might be considered the working poor. Oddly enough, both Wicomico and Allegany border the two best performers on this particular comparison as both Garrett and Worcester counties are attracting new and much more affluent tax filers.

My theory on this stark differential is that these wealthier newcomers are retirees who wish to live out their years by the beach or up in the mountains, not necessarily those drawn because of good-paying jobs. A combination of retirees and people who wish to live in more rural areas, perceiving a better quality of life there, and don’t mind a long daily commute might explain the success of Eastern Shore counties like Kent, Queen Anne’s, Talbot, and perhaps even Caroline.

And then there’s the group that simply threw up their hands and moved out of the state entirely. The Change Maryland study points out Virginia was a major beneficiary of Maryland’s losses, which makes sense considering those who work in Washington D.C. can just as readily commute from Virginia as they can from Maryland. Dan Bongino – who’s familiar with working in Washington as a former Secret Service agent protecting the President –  has mentioned the fact that many considered him “crazy” for selecting Maryland over Virginia when he moved here from New York (because of the tax burden) on the campaign trail. But “I saw Maryland first and I fell in love with it,” said Dan.

Unfortunately, there are too many other pragmatic thinkers who may love Maryland but are deciding to vote with their feet and depart for greener financial pastures. It will be the job of those like Hogan and Bongino to shake up the state and place it back in a positive direction for job growth by encouraging business investment instead of considering wealthy people cash cows to milk until these producers crumple over from exhaustion.

Shorebird of the Week – July 5, 2012

For the longest time, it appeared Brenden Webb would be one of those guys who had a very good eye at the plate but wouldn’t be good at making contact. In 1,063 professional at-bats (here in the States) Brenden has drawn 181 walks but fanned an amazing 305 times, including 152 strikeouts in 487 plate appearances last season. With that in mind, consider that Webb’s 64 bases on balls is second-best in the entire South Atlantic League but his 81 strikeouts are fourth-most. It is an improvement, though, considering Brenden had the second-most strikeouts in the league (152) last year – the leader had 172 but also had 110 more plate appearances than Brenden did.

But in his second time through the league Brenden has improved his average by around 40 points, and the winter spent playing professionally in Australia couldn’t have hurt. In fact, Webb is enjoying a breakout season considering he’s never hit above .227 in any of his three previous seasons and has also established career highs in doubles (17), home runs (8), RBI (33), and stolen bases (16) in barely a half-season this year. After last night’s game he was batting .255 – improving 17 points since the league’s All-Star break with a 13-for-39 streak.

Strangely enough, Webb is one of the few minor league players who’s played four minor-league seasons without experiencing a mid-season promotion or demotion – but there’s a pretty good chance that streak may come to an end before all is said and done on 2012. While his average could be a little higher, the 22-year-old out of California’s Palomar College has probably exceeded the expectations of a 30th round draft selection and may get a chance with Frederick given the season-long turmoil in the Orioles organization. Brenden’s certainly earned it with his hard work and desire to improve by spending the winter playing in Australia.

P3k

Just for the record:

  • It took me 924 days to get to post number 1,000.
  • From there, it took 736 days for me to reach the 2,000 milestone.
  • But I’ve slowed down just a bit to reach 3,000, because it took me 749 days to write the last thousand posts.

Still, I have made it and I have you, my faithful readers, to thank.

Normally I write about what I’ve done over the previous period of time, but today I’m going to write about my future. This seems the opportune moment to reveal a secret of sorts.

For the last couple years I have been on-again, off-again working on a book manuscript and it’s nearly done. I’m calling it So We May Breathe Free: Solutions From A Common Man (as a working title, although I may change it slightly.)

There was a period of time I actively sought an agent and traditional publisher, but after reading into the subject of actually writing books I found out the timeline for getting this to market would likely be long after the desired timeframe. Simply put I should have started on that road about 18-24 months ago. Obviously I didn’t.

So my idea is now to put this out as an e-book, whether through Kindle, Pubit, Smashwords, or someone similar. That way it’s released at the time I want it to be out in the public hands. Ideally, this would be around the end of July or early August. Aside from going over the final draft and doing about 3-4 pages of additional writing, the text is written.

Of course, I realize the odds of success are as long as the unemployment lines – somewhere I read that the average book sells fewer than 100 copies. I would hope all my readers buy the book so I can at least beat those odds. But I won’t sneeze at selling a million, either!

Yet there are a number of other factors which could lead to the success of the project. I’m not going so far as to do a Kickstarter campaign like my blogging friend Bob McCarty did – although a rattle of the tip jar would help – but I am looking for ideas and suggestions. Probably my biggest need is cover art, since I know the concept I want but don’t think I have the software to do it. If you have e-publishing experience, well, I have some questions for you too!

The other piece of the puzzle I think is necessary is for me to get the word out and market the book. Once I get the book released, I’ll be looking to spread the word through any means possible. If you need a radio guest, I’m your guy. Have some questions you need answered for a blog post? Fire away. I figure every new person I reach is another potential customer and I need a national base for this endeavor.

I’m hoping to have a number of new milestones in place by the time I get to post number 4,000. But one thing which will never change is my appreciation for the support I’ve received from my readers, and hopefully I’ll have a far larger family of them the next time I hit a thousandth post.

An Independence Day message

I don’t normally write a lot on Independence Day, for I know that most people have better things to do than celebrate the holiday reading my space. But it’s not like Christmas Day where I actually leave the site dormant for the day, because I have something to put in the space.

This year I wanted to point out that 2010 U.S. Senate candidate Jim Rutledge wrote a piece he sent to a number of conservatives around the state (I was one of them) and it was something I thought worth the link – in this case I linked to his Facebook page, where you can read what he had to say.

But this was also reposted in a number of locations, and in this case I’m going to steer you to the Right Coast blog that Julie Brewington hosts, with the reason being the comments afterward. There’s no doubt we have freedom of speech in this country and I’d be the first to defend Liberal Elite’s right to say what he/she wants. But I’ve seen this comment thread for three days now and I’ll still be damned to know what the objection to Jim’s subject matter was?

Now we can sit all day and debate some of the concepts and whether our freedom and liberty is put at risk by one party or another – while liberals are great at telling people what to do, the point made that certain conservatives do the same thing in certain areas of life is one well taken.

For example, as I note in a comment made I am pro-life and believe life begins at conception. But I would disagree with a Constitutional amendment to outlaw abortion because I also believe in the sanctity of state’s rights and, while it is acknowledged the right to life is endowed by our Creator as part of our Declaration of Independence, the Constitution is the actual law of the land and it clearly states in the Tenth Amendment that powers not specific to the Federal Government are reserved for the states or the people. (Moreover, the Fourteenth Amendment says that states can’t deprive anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.)

Regardless, the entire concept of independence is more and more a moot question because many in our society have, as Rutledge says, “trade(d) his liberty for his rulers’ promises of health and welfare.” That’s simply part of the human condition, and no matter how noble the American experiment a sizable portion of people will be happy to be what others would consider a slave – just as long as they have a benevolent master. Personally I would lump about 90 percent of Obama supporters into that group, but that’s just me.

So the choice is more and more clear: are we free or are we slaves? No, I’ve not suddenly warped in time back to 1860 but the upcoming election presents a rather stark choice nonetheless. I sure have no desire to celebrate Dependence Day, but too many out there are happy to do so.

Playing from the inside

In May I did an Examiner piece on the Coalition to Reduce Spending, a group which was co-founded by a former Ron Paul campaign operative with the aim to endorse candidates pledging to (of course) reduce spending.

Well, today I found the following in my e-mail box, with the headline “Johnson, Paul Campaign Talent Combine to Help Liberty Candidates Win.”

Struggling libertarian political candidates and advocacy groups now have a chance to succeed in races where the establishment might otherwise prevail.  Seven of the most successful individuals who have variously worked on the Ron Paul, Rand Paul, and Gary Johnson campaigns (among many others) have combined to form Liberty Torch Political Consulting, LLC.  The firm aims to change the outcome of elections around the country and get more freedom-loving candidates elected to office than ever before.

The common name between the two groups is Jonathan Bydlak, who is president of the CRS. I must be on his e-mail list.

Now that’s not to say I have anything against the group; in fact, I’d love to see plenty of pro-liberty candidates win. But it has to be said that this team doesn’t necessarily have a track record of success, unless you consider Gary Johnson’s nomination as the Libertarian candidate a smashing accomplishment. Yes, Ron Paul has been successful in several House elections but he never accounted for a significant part of the presidential vote, nor did Johnson. Only Rand Paul has seen a major electoral success, and that was in Kentucky – not exactly a key swing state. So what would they really bring to the table?

I suppose their apparent focus on winnable local races is a good one, since there are hundreds of local and state seats up for grabs this year. Obviously there’s a significant pro-liberty media presence out there, so local races which aren’t going to be decided mostly on who bombards the airwaves with the most frequent and dirtiest thirty-second commercials will be a natural market for the folks at Liberty Torch. Adding a little national panache to these local races may help tip the scales in a few of them.

While he’s not necessarily the poster boy for pro-liberty followers, the way Scott Brown nationalized a Massachusetts U.S. Senate race seems like a good model to follow – in Maryland, Dan Bongino has taken a few pages from that campaign. Having a broad network in media can help to some extent, as can some creativity and plain talking. But you need to have the boots on the ground, too, and consultants are no substitute for a good candidate. (Notice the two commercials I cited backed candidates who lost their election – one in the primary and one in the general.)

But it’s interesting to see our side playing the same game as the high-powered Beltway politicians play. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, right?

Troopathon 2012 set to go, and I’m a small part

No, I won’t be appearing on the internet broadcast. But last evening, for the first time, I was accepted into the bloggers’ competition for this event. There are several teams of bloggers which attempt to outdo the others and I will be part of a team called the Hot Air Steamers. Besides Hot Air (which will likely get most of the contributions) there are others like Maggie’s Notebook and The Lonely Conservative on the team, or so I am told. I’m sure the Move America Forward group will be putting out team rosters at some point.

So what I have done is set up a link to our team on the sidebar – you can’t very well miss it – and your job (should you choose to accept it) is to contribute by buying a care package for the troops, starting at $24.99. I’m a person of modest means but I will be getting one on Friday when I’m paid. Shoot, if everyone who reads this website in a week got one the Hot Air team would get a significant boost and people there might just say, “what is this monoblogue?” and stop by. It can’t hurt, and it certainly would be a great morale boost for our volunteers in far-flung lands.

(I was just looking at the e-mail which invited me, and the bloggers as an aggregate raised $30,000 in care packages for the troops last year. So my readership note definitely stands – even the small fraction of my readership that 50 packages would account for would be huge at $25 apiece. Seems like a worthy goal.)

Now I understand that a large percentage of my readership is burnt out on war and probably despises the Commander-in-Chief. But it’s always been said on the Left that “oh, we support our troops, we just don’t support their mission.” Well, to them I say put up or shut up. And to those on the right side, it’s a worthy cause to which I’ve donated a few times over the years.

As I said up top, I’m not going to be on the actual broadcast (July 12, 4 p.m. to midnight in the Eastern Time Zone) but if I get the chance I will be watching. They have a number of interesting guests from the conservative world each year and this year they’ll also be remembering Andrew Breitbart as part of the webcast. It would be nice to see them crack the million-dollar barrier again as they did in the inaugural 2008 edition, but I’m sure they’d settle for beating last year’s mark of around $500,000.

And if I can be of assistance, I’m glad to help.

Losing the war on poverty

Many of you know this, but some don’t: one of my tasks when I’m not working on this site is to contribute content to the Patriot Post. On Friday they ran a slightly edited version of something I wrote for them as a featured article. The purpose of today’s post is to expand on these remarks, which I rarely do for these assignments – maybe I should do so more often.

**********

Income Redistribution: Losing the War on Poverty

It costs us nearly $1 trillion a year between federal and state entities, but the vast redistribution of wealth that is government’s preferred solution for equalizing outcomes is doing nothing of the sort. Instead, it’s created two distinct but politically powerful groups: 1.) A permanent underclass comprising a vast group of indentured servants who pay little to nothing in taxes but who get just enough handed to them by the American sugar daddy to stave off rioting in the streets, and 2.) The government employees and contractors who hand out the largess.

Since the so-called “Great Society” was launched under President Lyndon Johnson, the poverty rate has fluctuated in a relatively narrow range between 10 and 15 percent. As a whole, Americans are far wealthier with more material goods than they were at the start of Johnson’s “War on Poverty,” but those at the lower end of the income scale are still deemed to be in need of assistance by those who believe they know best. According to a recent Cato Institute study, government spending on poverty programs now amounts to nearly $20,000 per person. This means that, on the average, a “poor” family of four benefited from almost $80,000 in government spending last year — certainly enough to qualify as a middle-class income if it were earned.

Of course, America’s poor aren’t living in a manner one generally envisions as indicative of a middle-class income. The various forms of welfare that federal and state governments distribute pass through many hands before finally reaching recipients. This creates a long list of those who like the programs and want to see them expanded. And since Barack Obama has turned many millions of Americans into government dependents, making any sort of meaningful cut will be a politically dicey prospect should Mitt Romney win this November.

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I try to keep these under 300 words or so given that I have to share space with many others who also lend their talents to this internet publication. But here I can write as many words as I wish.

What floored me was the vast waste cited in the Cato study. Yes, I realize it’s a libertarian-leaning organization and their method of coming up with this figure was simply adding up all the spending they considered “welfare” and dividing it by the number of people the government says live beneath the poverty line. So they probably fudged the figures to some extent, but I would hazard a guess that when all is added up it can be legitimately be claimed the federal and state governments still spend our median household income of roughly $50,000 per household on those who are poor. But they don’t receive $50,000 worth of benefits, do they?

There have always been people who live in poverty and squalor, although squalor as defined in our country might be a godsend to those living in the most wretched farflung corners of the world. This is why we have so many immigrants (legal and illegal) coming here, as America is still thought of as the land of opportunity. The question has become what opportunities are out there.

Yet those in the generation of our grandfathers who were considered poor were also ones who worked hard. Take as an example the Eastern Shore, which for generations has depended on two key sources of income: agriculture, including the growing and processing of chickens, and seafood, most generally crabs, oysters, and the like. A half-century ago most worked in those industries, with a few of the more affluent and industrious creating a merchant class to service the needs of these workers who needed to buy groceries, clothing, or other basic material goods. I’m guessing you didn’t have a whole lot of slackers and layabouts around here.

Over the last thirty years things have changed. Sure, the local economy still runs on the bounties of the land and the Bay, but now those who became affluent in the large cities come here to either spend their vacation time or to retire. So we have a third key industry many have become dependent on locally, but it’s perhaps the least reliable one because people need disposable income with which to enjoy their leisure. If they don’t have the money, we on the Shore go back to life circa 1962. The problem is that the work ethic which used to permeate the Shore (and most of the rest of America, for that matter) seems to have declined as people became accustomed to a modern lifestyle. It’s been aided by the welfare state.

We all know that if welfare went away tomorrow there would be rioting in the streets. But the question is whether the riots would be led by those who were suddenly left without their monthly checks and food stamps or by those government workers who unexpectedly find themselves without a job. Based on what we saw in Wisconsin my money (what little I have) is on the latter. I know charities would work hard to find a way to fill in the gaps for the truly poor if welfare disappeared, but it seems that, once established, government programs go on forever.

Maybe the problem with poverty is that we consider it a problem to be solved. The most charitable among us have always stopped to help those who cannot help themselves, but once the concept was created that government would step in and make it all better, the number who gave of themselves dwindled. It was now someone else’s mess to take care of, and the idea of poor but too proud to accept government-sponsored relief faded into obscurity. Instead, we now openly advertise for more food stamp recipients like they’re just another consumer commodity. We’ve gone from having to stand in line to get voucher coupons to spend at the store to having just another card to swipe because it reduces the “stigma” of being on the dole.

I believe we as a nation are approaching the crossroads. Either we cut back and restore ourselves to greatness or we follow in the footsteps of long-lost empires like Rome or ancient Greece. It pains me to say this, but in 2012 America it really is no more than bread and circuses. Sadly, it may not be up to us to change that but we have to at least try.

By the way, I have some ideas to address this. Watch this space and the monoblogue Facebook page (which you really should ‘like’) for more on that project.