A clunker of a deal

After I wrote about the possible loss of jobs in the local auto industry on Wednesday, I wanted to bring up a bill which passed the House on Tuesday which sounds innocent enough but to me sets a dangerous precedent and insults my intelligence on several levels.

Its formal name is the Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save Act but H.R. 2751 is better known as the “Cash for Clunkers Act”. According to this story from The Hill by Jim Snyder and Silla Brush, the bill would allow consumers to collect on a voucher up to $4500 if they trade in a “gas guzzling” car for one which gets more mileage per gallon. Obviously the concept was enticing enough to get both our local Congressmen to vote in its favor.

I’m sure many will ask what is wrong with this concept. However, we see just how the government is handling its running of the American auto industry and how they’re attempting to take away choice from the consumer by adopting stricter CAFE gas mileage standards. Moreover, I’m very leery of regulating behavior on the public dime, since the estimated tab for the program ranges up to $4 billion. To me it’s much like adding a particular tax break for doing whatever action the government wishes one to do.

At the moment the voucher goes toward buying a vehicle which gets as little as 4 more miles per gallon. But as the Hill story notes, the manner of payoff is still negotiable and may be set up to eliminate any chance that a car fitting the classic definition of a “gas guzzler” (e.g. sport-utility vehicle, light-duty truck) qualifies for the taxpayer-funded subsidy.

In an era where we’ve proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that throwing taxpayer money at a problem can make it far worse than it was when it started, this program once again promises to be a never-ending boondoggle that will only siphon money from taxpayers and line the pockets of some large entity. It’s yet another case where a Congress which should have known better to mess with the free market is listening to the wrong set of people with the wrong set of priorities.

Whither the jobs?

A pair of local blogs have a story tonight (unconfirmed by a “real” news source as of yet) that a local GM dealer is among the victims of downsizing by General Motors.

Assuming the rumor is true, this means another possible loss of dozens of jobs from a local business. Yet I don’t hear a lot of wailing or gnashing of teeth from local or state political leadership. Compare that with the pout-whine sequence many governors and affected local officials (including Governor Markell of Delaware) went into when they found out a local General Motors or Chrysler plant was marked for extinction. My recollection is that the GM plant in the Wilmington area employed about 450 people.

Now losing 450 jobs creates a sizable chunk of people thrown onto the unemployment rolls, but at the same time losing a half-dozen automobile dealerships can put a like number out of work. In recent months the Eastern Shore has lost a number of dealerships through consolidation or bankruptcy, yet I didn’t hear Governor O’Malley complain about the large loss of good-paying jobs. Maybe it was because they weren’t UAW members and generally good loyal Democrats?

This is also going to lead me into a related article I’ll put up tomorrow. In the meantime, we all need to ask ourselves when the bloodletting in the job market will finally come to a halt. While the “official” national unemployment rate is hovering just over 9 percent, it’s certainly double-digit in our local area and even “shovel-ready” make-work jobs aren’t going to make enough of a dent to carry that number downward significantly.

It’s more ammunition for a call to make our region more business-friendly. Let’s hope that the elected officials who seem to be receptive to the idea of minimizing the tax bite suffered by residents also get an idea of policies to bring good private-sector jobs our way as well.

D-Day for health care

I have such fun with these “Organizing for America a Socialist Paradise” appeals from Barack Obama’s flunkies. Wonder who’s hosting the local one?

They’re planning a push for so-called health care reform on Saturday, at least according to Obama mouthpiece David Plouffe:

Remember this date: Saturday, June 6th, 2009. We will look back on that day as the moment when the fight for real health care reform began in your neighborhood — perhaps even in your own living room.

It won’t be in my living room, that’s for sure. I write from my office most of the time.

On June 6th, in thousands of homes across the country, we’ll gather to launch our grassroots campaign for health care. We’ll watch a special message from the President. We’ll build the teams and draw up the plans for winning health care reform the same way we won the election: Building support one block, one neighbor, one conversation at a time. And we’ll put those plans into action.

Give me a break. You (well, more specifically liberals and their allies in Congress) have already put these plans into place. We’ve had the camel’s nose under the tent for so long that half the hump is in there as well. To me that’s the problem.

There’s no prior experience required. We’ll send you the details for dialing into the President’s call and provide you everything you need to make your meeting a success.

You know, I wonder who pays to provide you everything you need? Is that taxpayer money or leftover special interest funds? I presume it’s the latter since “Organizing for America a Socialist Paradise” is an arm of the DNC.

After the election, people gathered at over 9,000 meetings across every state to set priorities for health care reform. Our voices were heard. Now the race is on to make sure Congress produces a plan that reflects the President’s call for reduced costs, guaranteed choice, and quality care for all.

I think they have two words reversed in that sentence – the sentence should read, “reduced choice, guaranteed costs”.

Let’s look at this logically. Unless and until someone reduces regulation and makes it easier to provide health care as a free market, private companies who provide funding (through premiums paid) will escape as they can from a market where it becomes more difficult to create a profit for themselves.

Like it or not, there is a phenomenon in health insurance known as “adverse selection” where those who need health insurance the most are the most likely to seek it out. It’s why those in the business try to build as large of a group as possible, particularly if they can get a large number of healthy folks. And while in theory a group of 300 million would spread costs around, the problem is in the perception of “free” health care liberals try to spread to an unwitting public.

To make that happen, we need to build a groundswell of support in every district and every state, and we have no time to lose. All summer we’ll be reaching out to our neighbors, knocking on doors, serving in our communities, and building a grassroots network strong enough to win.

Oh please…come knock on my door. I need a good argument I would win.

These gatherings on June 6th are just the beginning of a battle between those who fought and believe in change and those who would protect a broken status quo. The stakes for our country could not be greater.

Nor can the cost for our country if you succeed. They are correct that the status quo is broken, but it’s still far better than most other places in that we have the greatest technology and have made many of the advances in healthy living possible (along with making possible some lifestyle choices that aren’t so great…but that usually comes from personal choices made).

These kickoffs will be both effective and fun. You’ll meet likeminded supporters in your neighborhood, share stories, enjoy good company and a shared mission, and know that no matter what this effort requires of us, if we work together we’ll be ready to face it and persevere.

Yeah, let’s have a block party. The real job in all of this will be fighting the special interests who have a stake in this so-called “reform” – unions, certain government employees, senior lobbying groups like the AARP, and some business interests.

Here’s the rub. As I mentioned above, those who need health insurance most are the most likely to seek it out while healthy individuals tend to shy away from the investment. In order to make health insurance profitable from a government standpoint, one solution would have to be forcing those who are healthy to bear the cost of those who are sickly. In our current employer-based system this can be done, but it becomes quite expensive for the employer. In the last 15 years, the palette of benefits a company generally offers has come down simply to health insurance and possibly a 401 (k) account. They’ve also passed along more of the costs through higher co-pays and assuming less of the insurance payment, making the employee take a larger deduction out of his or her check.

Eventually I believe the government needs to get out of health care entirely, as in sunsetting Medicare and Medicaid. Much as I’d love to see it happen though, that’s not going to happen in my lifetime – despite the eventual unsustainability of these programs which provide “free” health care and prescription drugs. (Yes, I know there is some cost to the end-user but it’s small in proportion to actual costs so it may as well be free.) Nor do I believe that health insurance needs to be compulsory – advisable, of course, but not required for everyone should they wish to roll the dice in life.

Instead, I hear various proposals being bandied about to cover everyone with health insurance paid for either by employers or the government. But where does that cut costs?

Or, we can simply go to a British- or Canadian-style single-payer system, where those who are seriously ill have to take their chances that they’ll receive life-saving or life-enhancing treatment in a timely manner. Honestly, I think the Obama folks would like to head in this direction but may use the compulsory health insurance idea as a bridge to get there when private companies can no longer compete in the insurance market due to regulations and restrictions on who and what they have to cover.

The other side of the pincer movement toward socialized medicine comes through a proposal to count employer-provided health care benefits as taxable income. While John McCain had this idea as a campaign plank, he combined it with a tax break. Unfortunately, we all know tax breaks aren’t forever in this debt-ridden economy of ours. And once taxpayers scream about needing to “do something” about this unfair situation, the government would be all too happy to step in and save the day.

It all comes back to money. In the case of all providing parties their goal is to at least recoup their costs in providing health care and medical services.

Doctors need to pay for their lengthy term of education and particularly the skyrocketing costs of malpractice insurance and other overhead in operating a practice – including providing benefits themselves. Yet they are squeezed by shrinking reimbursements from insurance companies and government.

Hospitals are saddled with mounting costs in building state-of-the-art facilities and treating patients (many of whom are here illegally) who have no ability to pay but use the emergency room as their physician of choice. While the left likes to claim that 47 million people don’t have health care the reality is that federal law mandates treatment for anyone regardless of ability to pay. In addition, hospitals also have many of the same overhead issues doctors face.

What those who would attend these Obama-sponsored meetings seem to see as the last resort, however, is the one entity which can print money – the federal government.

They’re confused on one thing, though. While health care is a legitimate need, it is NOT a right.

The road to real health care reform starts by attempting to make the best choices for a healthy lifestyle and doing those things which aren’t congruent to that goal in moderation – but not having the choices made for you by an overreaching nanny state.

It continues by being encouraged to contribute to your own health care costs through tax-free medical savings accounts combined with a health insurance plan that gets back to the basics of covering catastrophic losses, but makes you consider whether some non-emergency or cosmetic procedures are worth the price you’d bear.

On the way, we roll through a healthy dose of tort reform, including the adoption of “loser pays”. This should bring down the cost of malpractice insurance; slowly at first but as the need for “defensive medicine” decreases so should the costs involved which would need to be reimbursed in any lawsuit.

As a lot of smart people have learned for generations, though, the road to health care reform ends with a market-based solution. It’s quite amazing what our prosperity hath wrought despite the best efforts of overzealous regulators, hordes of illegal immigrants and freeloaders looking for a scam, and greedy trial lawyers to game the system to their advantage. People still come here from foreign lands across the globe because they know we provide the best health care anywhere.

Let’s not allow that standard to be diminished in the pursuit of so-called equality, because the only equality Obamacare promises is equality in misery.

By the way, the closest host to me here in Salisbury is a man named Brian Bernard (you can find yours here). I hope he reads this and comments, I’d love to hear his side.

Economic rant and theory

I’m going to do something rare for a conservative and portray myself as a victim. As many of you know, one casualty of the economic downturn in the construction and building industry was my previous job. It was one of the hundreds of thousands of jobs lost that particular week back in December, toward the beginning of an job-creation tailspin that roughly coincided with the election of Barack Obama as President.

While I don’t hold Obama’s predecessor completely blameless in all of this, the fact remains that things have gotten markedly worse in the last four months or so. It’s a point brought home to me when I found out today a prospective client of mine wouldn’t be able to complete a planned enrollment because his bottom line was making him lay off over half of his staff.

Needless to say, economic woes were the key issue of the 2008 election. Several times a week we received word of some major institution, in particular banks, laying off thousands of workers because they needed to fix their bottom line quickly. This also occurred in a number of Fortune 500 companies as well.

I’ve noticed lately that we don’t hear as much about these mass layoffs anymore. For example, while the news concentrated on the number of Chrysler dealerships being shut down (to be quickly followed by a similar General Motors casualty list), no one seemed to point out the mass layoff of perhaps 45,000 employees nationwide once these dealers close. Granted, many of these dealerships handle multiple auto lines and may not necessarily close completely (as an example, the Frostrom Chrysler-Jeep dealership in Pocomoke City also handles Subarus) but the hardship of needing to furiously unload cars in an effort to stave off creditors before the Chrysler franchises are pulled will likely spell their doom and take those other brands off the local markets as well.

As it turns out, my prospective client has a used car dealership. His business trouble stems in large part from a lack of trade-ins for new cars because few are buying new, instead deciding to keep their old (but paid-for) clunkers around. Plus credit is a little tight and those who have jobs are saving their money waiting for the other shoe to drop.

So it’s bad enough that Delmarva is losing a sizable number of jobs from these dealerships closing. Here’s where I wonder about another industry many on Delmarva depend on – tourism. Sure, most locals grumble about the traffic heading to the beach on summer weekends, but after enduring a summer of $3-4 per gallon gasoline last year, will the mounting job losses in the economy at large mean another drop in tourism spending this year as those who are laid off cut back on fun things like the family vacation?

As a season ticket holder for the Shorebirds, I’ve been pleasantly surprised that attendance is up but caution that a large part of the increase is from scheduling several early-season “Hit the Books” nights. (It’s a good sign though that there are six HtB nights scheduled as opposed to four last season – more schools are participating.) Certainly the Shorebirds can benefit from an economic downturn as cheap entertainment for a night but as more lose jobs will they feel the pinch as well? The bills have to come first for most of us.

Even local and state government feels the pinch as they need to furlough employees or slash their pay. It seems like everyone is suffering except Uncle Sam.

And speaking of Uncle Sam (or Uncle Barack if you prefer), today he announced new emission and fuel economy standards for the auto industry that’s 2/3 beholden to him for their very survival – that’s two of the Big Three with the exception of Ford Motor Company. While the administration is quoted in this AP story by Tom Krisher that the needed changes will run consumers about $1300 per car, what’s not being said is that the changes will hit automakers in the segments where they make the most money – sport-utility vehicles and trucks. They don’t make nearly as much on economy cars, but that’s what the new standards will encourage, along with people keeping their older SUV’s for a longer period of time when they find the newer, smaller ones won’t handle both people and cargo as effectively.

In short, new vehicle sales are likely to decrease unless and until Fedzilla dreams up new regulations aimed at getting older, non-compliant cars and trucks off the road. If they can regulate what type of gun you can buy and what sorts of food you can eat, chances are we’re not all that far from being told that if you have a car that’s pre-1990 you need to scrap it or maintain it simply as a historic vehicle not intended for everyday usage.

I’m not looking at this as the owner of a large car or SUV; as a matter of fact I drive a small coupe which gets reasonably decent gas mileage. Instead, I see this as choice by fiat (not the Italian car maker, though) where the free market is choked and restrained by the desire of some to control what everyone else can do with their lives. Far from letting a crisis go to waste, the Democrat Socialists are moving quickly to cement a position of power over American society in the mode of Peron or Mussolini.

In the meantime, the pain of losing a job is going to be felt by untold millions more as government dithers on finding a solution where it can be most involved instead of jumping aside and letting the correction take its course. We did this in the 1980’s and there’s no reason to think it wouldn’t work again if tried.

The next job which needs to be lost is a government job. How about starting with Congress in 2010?

Odds and ends no. 19

It’s been a couple months since I went through my “blog ideas” folder and checked out what’s in the grab bag of interesting stuff so tonight seems like a good occasion to look there once again. So let me open up my mailboxes and see what pops out at me…

I haven’t touched on the issue of energy in awhile, in part because our gas prices haven’t gone quite as sky-high as they did this time last year – even with recent price increases we’re only paying about half as much at the pump as we were at this point in 2008. But that doesn’t mean the issue has gone away and I keep in touch with my source in the energy industry. She sent me a primer on rhetoric vs. reality and I may gather more information later this week as I’ve been invited to another blogger conference call on the subject.

Now, let’s look at those who would deign to create law on the subject of energy as well as a thousand and one other aspects of life. How this escaped a full post I don’t know – perhaps it was because our current legislator wasn’t included as part of the survey. Regardless, the National Taxpayers Union last month released its list of big spenders in Congress, and out of the Maryland and Delaware contingent only Roscoe Bartlett had a decent grade (his 72% was a B) while Mike Castle was fortunate to “earn” a D. While there’s certainly room for argument about fiscal friendliness and the weight the NTU assigns to particular votes, in 2008 the trend was not one toward smaller government and I can but imagine what the 2009 report will show.

But even if Congress held the line, what happens if they’re not the ones who hold the purse strings anymore? It’s an argument postulated in a recent op-ed by the Center for Individual Freedom, which asks the question:

(W)hat if the GOP is proven right … the voting public once again demands change … and America discovers that a Congress full of resurgent Republicans is powerless to stop the bleeding?

That scenario is all too plausible given the breathtaking rate at which the legislative branch is losing its power to determine the nation’s economic future to unelected bureaucrats.

This trend began late last year, when the Bush Administration used fears of a nationwide financial meltdown to smooth passage of its Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), promoted as a panacea for the nation’s financial ills.

TARP, unfortunately, did not unfold as advertised.  Even its name proved to be a lie. Rather than buying up the “troubled assets” that were supposedly prolonging the credit crunch, TARP morphed into a plan for injecting liquidity into the nation’s banking system (a move, it should be noted, that has done little to increase lending rates).   Because Congress had practically given the money away at gunpoint, the mandarins at the Treasury Department were free to change the program’s aims at will – despite the fact that they had claimed only weeks before that the original plan was the only thing standing between the nation and economic oblivion. (Emphasis mine.)

Multiply that by the dozens of bureaucratic fiefdoms entrenched in Washington and it’s clear we need a sea change in attitude among Americans, too.

Let’s start with our Congressman. This was the response I received a few weeks ago regarding my concerns with the stimulus package:

Thank you for contacting my office to share your thoughts on the economic stimulus legislation. As your Representative, I am guided by the perspectives of my constituents and our common goals of restoring fiscal responsibility to our nation’s federal government, revitalizing our economy, protecting the Chesapeake Bay and preserving the agricultural heritage of our communities.

Our economy is in crisis and the American people are hurting. Since the current recession began in December 2007 over 3.6 million Americans have lost their jobs. Employment fell in every month of 2008, and over 600,000 jobs were lost in January 2009 alone. In Maryland unemployment has reached a 15 year high. There is a consensus among economists that drastic action is needed to rejuvenate the economy.

In an attempt to address the nation’s worsening financial situation, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, H.R. 1, was introduced in the House of Representatives on January 26, 2009.  This legislation contained $819 billion in infrastructure spending, revenue sharing with the states, middle class tax cuts, business tax cuts, unemployment benefits, and food stamps.

While this initial package contained well-intentioned efforts to strengthen our economy, the bill also contained billions in spending that I was not convinced would go directly to stimulating the economy. Considering the fact that our nation is already over $10 trillion in debt, we cannot afford a fiscally reckless stimulus bill.  Consequently, I voted against the proposal and expressed my belief that Congress could and must do better. As the bill moved to the Senate and then the Conference Committee between the chambers, I worked with like-minded colleagues on both sides of the aisle, particularly members of the Blue Dog Coalition, to remove billions of dollars of spending that was not timely or targeted, including eliminating $200 million for the National Mall, $75 million for smoking cessation activities, and $16 billion in permanent changes to Medicaid. In the end we succeeded in cutting over $60 billion in misguided spending from the legislation while adding significant tax relief for Maryland families. Ultimately, the package included $288 billion of tax cuts for working families, including $70 billion to protect middle-class families from the Alternative Minimum Tax.

Let me be clear, the final version of the stimulus bill was not perfect.  However, given the depths of the financial crisis, we could not afford to let the perfect be the enemy of the necessary. The bipartisan compromise contained critical job-creating infrastructure investments in areas like transportation and broadband development. It included needed aid to states and localities to stave off layoffs and cuts to essential services. Meanwhile, the $288 billion worth of tax relief will help grow our economy by providing over 95% of working families with a tax cut. And, most importantly, it is projected that the package will create or save approximately 8,200 jobs in the 1st District and over 66,000 across the state of Maryland.

The stimulus bill enjoyed the strong support of a diverse range of coalitions, including conservative pro-business organizations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the Association of General Contractors and the National Restaurant Association. The package is projected to create or save over 3.5 million jobs, and even conservative economists like Mark Zandi, an economic advisor for John McCain’s presidential campaign, noted “that the jobless rate will be more than 2 percentage points lower by the end of 2010 than without any fiscal stimulus.”  Although I am under no illusion that the stimulus bill alone can bring us out of the current recession, I believe that it is an essential first step.

Like you, I am concerned about our nation’s fiscal policies.  Consequently, I voted against the release of an additional $350 billion to bailout Wall Street and the $410 billion FY09 Appropriations Omnibus, two costly measures that I did not believe were the most responsible expenditures of taxpayer dollars. My first official act as a Member of Congress was to sign on as an original co-sponsor of legislation to stop the automatic 2010 Member pay raise and I was pleased to later join my colleagues in successfully rejecting the pay increase when it came to a vote before the full House of Representatives.

Please know that I will work to ensure rigorous oversight over the stimulus and I encourage you to do so as well by visiting the www.recovery.gov website, where you can track the bill’s impact.

Please do not hesitate to contact me again in the future regarding issues that concern you.  I believe that continuous communication with the residents of the First District is essential to helping me be an effective advocate for you in Congress. To stay informed, please visit my website at www.house.gov/kratovil.

Thank you again for contacting me and I look forward to hearing from you.

While the jury is still out, Frank’s not as bad as I feared thus far but certainly we can do better in Congress.

Continuing on the subject of legislative business, there are some who feel we Republicans can do better as a party here in Maryland. While the subject didn’t openly come up in our recent convention, there’s a few in the General Assembly who don’t care for party leadership, as evidenced by this letter (h/t Blue Ridge Forum).

They’re the same folks who complain that the party is missing a fundraising opportunity by pricing its VIP gathering with Newt Gingrich too low, at least if you believe this Alan Brody piece in the Gazette newspaper. (Again, h/t to Blue Ridge Forum).

Yeah guys, just keep alienating your grassroots. While it’s true that Gingrich should be a good draw, I don’t think many GOP activists in Maryland have $250 in pocket change lying around to get a chance to meet with Newt Gingrich, let alone twice that much. Honestly, the party brass should be pleased with getting the onetime Speaker to be a speaker as opposed to the little-known person the event featured last year.

Just bring on an establishment candidate next year or try a coup at the Fall Convention and watch the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland contingents walk out – then see how successful 2010 is without us.

Finally, you may recall that the group Our Country Deserves Better did a bus tour last fall to promote the McCain/Palin ticket (well, mostly Sarah Palin). They’re going to do it again, this time as part of the Tea Party movement.

From August 28 to September 12, a host of folks will cross the nation with daily rallies. The Tea Party Express will wrap up in Washington D.C. for a gathering to show support for fiscal conservatism in our nation’s capital. Methinks the tour needs to make a slight detour southward! Delaware and Maryland have liberal big-spenders in Congress too.

So that’s a cleaning of my mailbox. Hope you enjoyed it!

It’s suckcastic!

While my site wasn’t offline, I have to throw some jeers at Comcast for being offline for a good chunk of the afternoon and evening. Frankly, I’m surprised my readership wasn’t affected too badly.

But I had meant to write a much longer post this afternoon and didn’t really have a chance to put it up because I had no idea Comcast was out (my TV worked) and was fiddling around with my computer trying to see what was the matter. So I’m even farther behind the 8-ball posting-wise.

I do want to make some observations about the Chamber of Commerce hullabaloo. Sounds like a case of feed the ego to me. I’ll grant that the gentleman in question has some influence but that comes more from butting into the conversation than actually dictating policy.

Most of you don’t know this but back in October of 2007 I spoke at a luncheon in front of the C of C on a similar topic – in that case it was a subcommittee who asked me to speak on the subject of blogging for business purposes and how to get started in the blogging world. So instead of a full room I spoke to perhaps a dozen or so people. My point is that the Chamber has visited the blogging subject before but on a much smaller scale.

I read the online version of the Daily Times story and the associated commentary regarding the upcoming event. Obviously he’s a lightning rod so if the Chamber is looking for attention and publicity they’ve got it. However, my question is simple: will his appearance generate more light on the subject or simply spread more heat around? Given the cool weather we’ve had for the most part I’d take some heat but I doubt it’s what the Chamber of Commerce wants.

Maybe the best observation comes from an out-of-town blogger. I recommend you read Tim’s post regarding the event on Gunpowder Chronicle and then judge accordingly.

Personally, I don’t know if I’m an invited guest and honestly I have an appointment that morning anyway, so it’s likely I’ll have to pass on the festivities. But certainly a number of views of the event will emerge and they should make for interesting reading. Sometimes personality can go a long way even without a lot of substance to back it up.

A new new Saturn?

Normally I don’t delve into auto news, but the recent closing of the local Saturn dealership made me think of this.

According to a Wall Street Journal report by John D. Stoll and Norihiko Shirouzu, the newest suitor for Saturn could the French automaker Renault. However, the Journal article questions the wisdom of that takeover when Renault already owns a large share of Nissan, a company which competes with Saturn in the small-car market.

In the local case, though, this could restore 30 jobs lost when the dealership pulled the plug on local operations. I was concerned because I used to deal with the dealership when I owned a Saturn, and I never had an issue with them with the exception of their not having a model which appealed to me when I was looking for the one I eventually bought.

So let’s hope that this merger or takeover works out better than the last time Renault became involved with an American carmaker. Before Chrysler took over the former American Motors, Renault was the automaker who paired up with AMC in its final days, bringing us the not-so-memorable Alliance and Le Car. Given the relative success of Nissan, maybe Renault can be just what Saturn needs – we’ll just have to see.

Whither downtown?

This post was inspired by a post on the Views of a Salisbury Grinch website, although I can’t discount an earlier post on the topic over at Delmarva Dealings.

Tomorrow I’ll be in downtown Salisbury attending the Tax Day Tea Party, but it’s fairly rare that I go down there on business which doesn’t involve the political. (One exception will be the upcoming Salisbury Festival, at least to check out the car show and local bands.) I have little use for the available shopping downtown and haven’t had much of a need for legal services since I came to Maryland.

But that’s certainly not to say that downtown Salisbury isn’t important. While the Centre of Salisbury and adjoining shopping along U.S. 13 is rightfully the retail hub of the lower Eastern Shore region this doesn’t mean retail doesn’t have a place in downtown – far from it. Nor should the impact of those eateries and entertainment facilities in and around downtown be discounted either. They have a role to play in downtown Salisbury’s present and future.

However, I think there is a three-pronged approach to making downtown a more vibrant area. Two pieces of the puzzle are pretty simple and won’t take a whole lot of effort; it’s the third piece of the jigsaw which will make for the most difficult fit.

There also needs to be some assumptions made of items which have to occur irrespective of downtown’s fate.

One is that crime needs to be curtailed and the streets made safe regardless of the time of day. In this I don’t advocate for or against any particular style of policing or who actually accomplishes the goal, whether it be the city police department, the Sheriff’s Department, or a combination or merger of the two.

The second assumption is that the effort will not bear fruit overnight and that progress may not be steady. Perhaps it’s best to think of this as something along the lines of a plan for 2020 or 2030, but with interim tangible goals along the way which will account for most changing conditions. (Obviously if a tornado or other natural disaster occurs we have a whole new set of priorities and a much cleaner slate to begin from.)

But there are three parts to bringing downtown back in my view.

The first is pretty simple: what do people want to see downtown?

Some would like to bring back the old retail-oriented downtown, and in some limited fashion this is a workable solution. But the days of a Woolworth’s or similar retail outlets are long gone.

Others would like to have more residents call the area home. There are already opportunities to live and work downtown but not many take advantage of them. For the most part I think it’s partially because of crime and partially because services aren’t all that convenient.

Many see the possibility of a downtown oriented toward arts and entertainment, with galleries, coffeeshops, and bars playing local music dominating the scene. But would SU students and “townies” be able to coexist in the same area or would it become mutually exclusive to one group, shutting out a large segment of the population?

I think the best way to answer the question is simply to ask it. Why not a coordinated effort to poll the public?

This is a place where the old-fashioned media and new media can coexist. We can put a list of possible ideas in the Daily Times, local television and radio websites, and significant area blogs. It would be quite interesting to see the variation by source as well.

With this snapshot of public opinion in place (or even without it, although I think it may help) the city can embark on the second step.

Often design professionals (and others interested in those professions, such as college and high school students) get together and hold a design charrette to kick around ideas for a particular project. What I propose is a series of three weekend-long charrettes, perhaps a month or two apart, with a public presentation and critique after each. In that way there can be a guideline fashioned for development downtown that has both professional design influence and citizen input.

It’s the third leg of the triad which will come the hardest, and that’s investment. Even the best-laid plans won’t come to fruition with no one to back them financially.

At the moment, there are businesses and other investments downtown which are doing well while others are hanging on by a thread. Those which are doing well obviously would like to see additional successful examples but the problem is in those lagging businesses downtown which are economic drags whether because of a poor business plan, a lack of amenities, the sluggish economy, or a combination of all three.

Just as a house in poor shape drags down the value of those surrounding it, vacant storefronts are eyesores which make remaining businesses look the worse for wear and make investors shy away. (For an example, see Salisbury Mall, former). There needs to be incentives in place to encourage investment – not just downtown, though, but all over Salisbury. A chain is only as good as its weakest link.

There’s another aspect of the downtown area which may or may not be a factor in its success, but chances are that it will have an important role to play.

More than many cities, Salisbury’s riverfront seems to be ignored to a great extent. In many downtown areas the body of water is the main attraction, but not Salisbury. Yes, there is a pedestrian path along the river but little of note fronts the river through much of downtown except parking lots. I’ll grant the Wicomico River isn’t much to look at (but is plenty to smell) for much of the year; however, the river is navigable for much of its length downtown.

Yet much of the development in the past occurred a block or two away along Main Street. Perhaps this is a remnant of the Wicomico River’s working past (and present) but should the river have a role in a revitalized downtown, and at what cost?

We know Mayor-elect Ireton promised to clean up the Wicomico River but how will those ideas work with the thought of renovating downtown? And what of infrastructure – turning downtown into a district which has a different function than the Salisbury of today may require a large investment in utility upgrades.

Nor should the needs of outlying areas be ignored by the siren song of a vibrant downtown as a dream which may not be achievable. It’s quite possible that the public doesn’t have the desire, will or intestinal fortitude to save Salisbury’s downtown and it slips into the sands of history like the downtowns of a thousand other small- to medium-sized towns.

We don’t have to suffer that fate, but then again what we have as our downtown may just have the proper functions and layout to suit Salisbury’s needs with a minimum of modification. Perhaps it’s meant to be an area which mostly functions as the legal hub of the area with just a smattering of retail and dining, enough to suit those who work there already. It’s not that anything is wrong with that scenario, but we wouldn’t be hurt by looking into other possibilities.

If they don’t read a 1200 page bill…

In the past I have noted that one of my favorite books is Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. As a small offshoot of the whole Tax Day Tea Party movement there is an effort afoot to send a copy of the volume to members of Congress. This has also made for a new term in the political lexicon, “going Galt.”

By definition, “going Galt” is slowing down the work schedule or the innovation so as not to become one of those affected by President Obama’s “soak the rich” tax scheme. In other words, if I worked 70 hours a week and made $300,000 for my efforts, “going Galt” would be dropping the workload to 60 hours a week in order to make just a little bit less than the point where extra wealth would be seized by the IRS.

The “Going Galt” website interprets the idea this way:

When you see that a majority of your government’s policies and programs are not simply inefficient or ineffective, but are actually wrong in principle and detrimental to your own personal goals, then every dollar taken from you and spent implementing these programs becomes not just an act of theft, but an act of slavery as one is forced to support one’s oppressor. Seen in that light, it is crystal clear why people would choose to reduce their taxes so as to starve the beast and free themselves from its clutches. For these people, “Going Galt” is not an economic decision, but a moral one. They are ultimately fighting for their freedom and should be applauded and supported in their actions. (Emphasis in original.)

It is this view of government as oppressor which is moving from the radical to the commonplace as expressed in the Tea Party movement.

And if that still seems like a fringe element sort of concept, another method of measuring government impact on one’s life has been around for many years and buttresses the point of just how intrusive those bureaucrats are becoming.

While sine die for our Maryland General Assembly occurs tomorrow, a number of revenue enhancements they have adopted over the last many decades means that our state’s Tax Freedom Day doesn’t come along until next Sunday – a date which ranks as 5th latest in the year among the 50 states. (Sarah Palin’s Alaska is the earliest, they were freed way back on March 23. Right behind them is Bobby Jindal’s state of Louisiana which celebrated the milestone on March 28.) As a whole, the average American celebrates today, just two days before the IRS collects its due and 103 days into the calendar year.

However, the Tax Foundation (who determines each state’s tax burden as a percentage of the calendar year) cautions:

Tax Freedom Day, like almost all tax burden measures, ignores the current year’s deficits. If the projected deficit for 2009 were counted as a tax, Tax Freedom Day would arrive on May 29 instead of April 13-the latest date ever for this deficit-inclusive measure. (Emphasis mine.)

Hence the frustration that’s beginning to boil over like a tea kettle, whistling loudly but ignored by those in charge.

It would be an interesting question to ask our legislators and those who determine how our money is spent (all the way from the Salisbury City Council and Wicomico County Council through our General Assembly to Congress on the legislative side and from Rick Pollitt to Martin O’Malley to Barack Obama on the executive roster) just how many of them have actually read Atlas Shrugged – much less understood the concept behind Ayn Rand’s work.

If they’ve read the book, they will hopefully understand that the squalor which builds as conditions deteriorate for the masses isn’t all that far-fetched in a nation where unemployment is rising in most sectors except for government employment. It’s a workforce where most are honest and hard-working but you run more and more into the modern-day Wesley Mouch.

It’s my belief that government – at least as constituted in modern society – cannot solve problems because by doing so the agency or bureau would eliminate the reason for its own existence. Thus, problems tend to be addressed by regulation, which creates another set of problems for a new agency or bureau to work on. Government agencies can easily multiply faster than rabbits, and each gets a larger workforce that depends on taxpayers for their wages and benefits.

By getting into the legislative body, one can set the agenda for perpetual re-election and power by creating as many government jobs as possible while attempting to spread just enough benefits to the voting population to curry favor come time to vote. Is it any wonder that the campaign to win office nearly always spends far more than the office is worth salary-wise?

Yet those we place in charge of representing us cannot be counted on to even read the legislation which spends trillions of dollars of not just my money, but my daughter’s and any children she’s fortunate enough to have. This despite our President’s pledge to give Congress and the public enough time to read what’s he’s about to enact.

So while I feel this effort by the Galtists has its heart in the right place, the only thing that politicians listen to is the votes on Election Day – unfortunately the Tea Parties will long be a thing of the past once that day of reckoning arrives again.

In somewhat unrelated but still relevant electoral news, I found out today as well that one of the local left’s favorite whipping boys (because of their support for Congressional aspirant Andy Harris), the Club For Growth, is losing its president. Outgoing head Pat Toomey announced today that:

With 41 Republican senators, we should be able to use the filibuster to stop (liberal senators) in their tracks. But several of those Republicans support that liberal agenda. One of them is Arlen Specter. I personally believe that it is time for him to go. And that job falls on me. Very soon, I intend to announce my candidacy for the United States Senate in a Republican primary challenge against Arlen Specter.

In other words, a possible rematch of the 2004 campaign looms where Specter and Toomey battled and establishment Republicans (including President Bush) angered many of the grassroots conservatives by publicly backing Specter.

Taking over the Club will be former House member Chris Chocola from Indiana.

What I want to know is: who’s against this?

I had this passed along to me by Nick Loffer and thought it would be worth noting as the time drew closer:

Friends and Fellow Taxpayers of Maryland,

Americans for Prosperity Maryland invites you to our Official Kick Off Press Conference and Rally April 2nd, 1 p.m. at The Lawyers Mall at the State House in Annapolis. Tell the Governor and General Assembly how you feel about our economic situation and policies in place!

Americans for Prosperity is a national organization that promotes limited government and free market principles at all levels.

The Maryland Chapter was formed to educate and advocate these principles through grassroots movements because we all have had enough of the failed policies that hurt Maryland. We will be an effective force for improving the economic and governmental landscape so that all Maryland Taxpayers can be prosperous.

But we still need everyone’s help and voice! Without concerned citizens like you these events could not take place. It is time to make your mark on behalf of everyone in Maryland!

You can help Maryland by showing up to the Press Conference and signing our petition to Gov. O’Malley and the General Assembly urging them not to accept any Federal money with strings attached.

Tim Phillips, the National President of AFP, will be the keynote speaker and an organizational meeting will follow.

AFP has been involved with the Tea Parties that have been organized and have been successful all over the Country. Please support these events to continue the fight for sane economic policies.

We will meet starting at 12:15 at the Navy-Marine Corps Stadium parking lot for free parking and trolley service to the State House.

For questions, comments, or more information please contact State Director Dave Schwartz at dave@afpmaryland.com – (443) 797-5144

Or

Nick Loffer – afpmd@live.com

Let us all make a difference for Maryland and We hope to see you there!

Again, one has to ask who is against prosperity? Until very recent times when Uncle Sam seemed to want to get his mitts into everything, the system we had was working pretty darn well.

I believe in equality of opportunity but there’s no way we can have equality of outcome unless misery is shared equally. Sure, as a kid I wanted to be a pro baseball player but with my lack of talent there no one would pay to watch me play – that is, unless the government decided on affirmative action for skill-challenged players like me and let me in that way. But would I have truly earned it?

Perhaps I use an apples-to-oranges comparison but it’s the job of the market to pick winners and losers, not that of Barack Obama. However, by hook or by crook it appears BHO has usurped the task  – just ask Rick Wagoner about this, or those people unfortunate enough to still be holding Chrysler shares. In either case, prosperity is not forthcoming once the federal government has its way and to me that’s an outcome which should have never happened.

The party’s not over

So I’m not going to turn off my lights tomorrow night for “Earth Hour”.

You may recall I blogged about this last year. Unfortunately, this year’s edition of the Spring Luau was last week but I may just take that hour to do the upcoming “Weekend of local rock volume 22” post in commemoration of that enjoyable use of thousands of watts of amplification from 17 (!) bands.

Needless to say, a number of people have poked fun at this including the fine folks at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. They put out a press release for the “Human Achievement Hour” noting in part that:

The Competitive Enterprise Institute, a leading free-market think tank, plans to recognize “Human Achievement Hour” between 8:30pm and 9:30pm on March 28, 2009. The new one-hour holiday coincides with Earth Hour, a period of time during which governments, individuals, and corporations have agreed to dim or shut off lights in an effort to draw attention to climate change.

(snip)

The new one-hour holiday, unknown prior to this press release, has already received overwhelming support from many of Washington, D.C.’s leading institutions. The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, for example, tells CEI that it does not plan to shut down all of the city’s bus and rail lines for the “Earth Hour.” The Kennedy Center, likewise, has scheduled a performance of the long-running play Sheer Madness, a jazz concert, and a dance performance to coincide with the Human Achievement Hour. Washington, D.C.’s Target store, furthermore, will remain open until 10:00pm on the evening of the 28th. The Smithsonian Institution also plans a film showing that will extend into Human Achievement Hour.

(snip)

Other organizations around the world and the nation have planned events in support of the new holiday. For example, The United State Marine Corps will continue its combat and humanitarian operations around the world during Human Achievement Hour. The New York Times confirms that it intends to put out a paper on March 29th, 2009 (preparation and printing for that issue will take place during Human Achievement Hour). At least 30,000 movies will also be screened in celebration of Human Achievement Hour. Hospital emergency and operating rooms, likewise, will remain open in Washington and in the rest of the country. Nearly all of the nation’s Wal-Mart locations will also be open during Human Achievement Hour.

Those wishing to celebrate Earth Hour, however, do not need to take part in Human Achievement Hour. “Earth Hour is a viable alternative to human achievement hour,” says CEI Senior Fellow Eli Lehrer. “Those who wish to celebrate Earth Hour should sit in the dark, turn off the heat, and breathe as little as possible.”

It goes without saying that, except for CEI itself, the institutions listed above have not actually endorsed “Human Achievement Hour.” (All the quotes and facts, however, are real and may/should be used.)

It goes without saying that this time around I’ll likely be home for that hour so I may have to turn on a few extra lights. This will assure the power grid doesn’t have an abnormal drop in usage and malfunction.

Do you get the idea that I see this Earth Hour as patently ridiculous? This may be one of the ultimate expressions of symbolism over substance. Besides, thanks to global cooling (created by the sun) there may be a number of people who won’t have a choice about whether their house is heated and the lights are on because they’ll either be flooded out (North Dakota/Minnesota), enduring a power outage thanks to a blizzard (Oklahoma/Texas), or not have a habitable home at all (various locations in the Deep South have been hit by tornadoes in the last couple days.)

So if you want to sit in the dark feel free, but I’ll be doing something productive because I know that my contributions to society require me to use at least some energy. We have no need to retreat to a 19th century lifestyle regardless of what the doomsday prophets say.

Salary drive

On Thursday last we found out that our newly-minted Congressman, who’s sworn to uphold the law, isn’t above shaping it to punish those he deems unworthy of the money they’ve legally become entitled to.

With this vote on H.R. 1586 Frank Kratovil (along with 87 Republicans who should be hanging their heads in shame) decided that contractual obligations completed long before the TARP money was given to AIG (who in turn laundered it to dozens of other recipients) – and which comprised less than 1% of the total payout – mean nothing when the federal government takes over a large chunk of the company.

Certainly the bonuses seem excessive and one can argue that the legislation is an incentive not to take the federal bailout money in the first place. Truthfully the federal government should not have bailed out AIG in the first place but unfortunately they already cast that die some time ago.

But Thursday’s vote also signified another step in the continuing attitude change among Congress that they’re just damn well entitled to make decisions for the rest of us when it comes to how a business should be run; never mind that their sole expertise seems to come from accepting campaign contributions from many of these same outfits.

Moreover, the hypocricy of screaming about this less than 1 percent of the AIG money devoted to bonuses intended to insure an employee stays put as long as the company needs him yet forgiving the pork-laden stimulus bill because the earmarks “only” comprised 1 percent of the total is nearly beyond belief until you look at who’s in charge of the place.

It’s more unfortunate that Congress is becoming interested in selecting the winners and losers in American business. Those in the financial sector being counted on at one time to save the venerable AIG ship were instead tossed overboard in a fit of rage because what Congress and both the Obama and Bush administrations have attempted as a fix hasn’t worked very well if at all. On the other hand, Congress received its annual raise and they’re not moving swiftly to enact a 90% tax on that which they were legally entitled to (because of legislation written in such a manner to make raises automatic without a recorded vote for them) but didn’t earn based on lousy performance.

Given the results of what has come to pass in recent days Congress shouldn’t have earned a penny over the last two sessions and it’s dubious that much in the two to three previous ones is worthy of compensation either.