By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
Gen. David Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces there, also reported the recent capture of "more than the usual numbers" of weapons caches. One consisted of more than 120 improvised explosive devices, some of which were the "particularly lethal" anti-armor munitions being used against U.S. troops.
Perhaps you're wondering what a straight news story is doing here, in a commentary section. It's because there doesn't seem to be enough room in the media's straight news sections to report positive developments in the Iraq war. So, as a reader service, I am writing a news story involving the possible saving of at least 120 GIs' lives.
This story is based on a PBS interview of Petraeus by Jim Lehrer and reporting by Sharon Behn of The Washington Times. (Yes, I know that liberals consider the Times to be a hopelessly biased conservative rag, much as many conservatives consider The New York Times to be a hopelessly biased liberal rag.) For what I can tell, no one reported Petraeus' comments with this emphasis.
"There have been some encouraging indicators in Baghdad, in terms of a reduction in sectarian murders," he said. "There have been some families returning; there have certainly been revivals in the markets," which he called one of the main measures of progress. He particularly noted the return of "tens of thousands" of Iraqis to an enormous, vibrant, milelong market because of increased feelings of security. "... [T]here are soccer leagues out here. The national soccer team is on its practice fields. There are signs of normality in Baghdad, albeit, again, in a city that may have been hit by violence on that given day." He pointed to a "major development" in Anbar province, a place that "many were ready to write off as a lost cause."
"[A]ll of a sudden you have cities all the way from the border, Al Qaim through Haditha, Hit, Ramadi and Fallujah, where tribes have volunteered for the Iraqi security forces." He said it is a "stunning development and reflects the frustration that the Sunni Arab tribes in Anbar have had with Al Qaeda and what Al Qaeda has done to them, to their sheiks, their families, their young men and, frankly, to their businesses and livelihoods. It has really had a devastating effect. And they have said, 'No more,' and stood up and voted with themselves and with their young men."
Petraeus corrected Lehrer's misimpression that large numbers of troops had been pulled out of the countryside to protect Baghdad. Actually, coalition forces are taking on the enemy as they have migrated out of Baghdad, as expected, pursuing them to new fronts.
Asked about how he can see any "progress" in the doubling of deaths among Iraqi police, Petraeus said, "One thing it tells us is that Iraqi security forces, certainly, are on the front lines and are fighting and dying for their country. They are committed to this endeavor." Meanwhile, the Iraqi government, noting the success of recent raids on death squads, eased the Baghdad curfew to 10 p.m. The action came as some Iraqis hailed the improved security. One woman, Layla, noted that shops were beginning to reopen on the shell-pocked main street of her neighborhood, which once bustled with juice stands, coffee shops, hamburger restaurants and small kitchenware stores.
So, where's the bad news in the story? Just as so many stories don't report the good news, I'm leaving out the bad. It seems only fair when The New York Times, for example, reported Petraeus' comments deep in a story headlined: "Bush Acknowledges Americans Weary of Iraq War." And only briefly, missing the positive comments. In the news business, what's "normal" isn't usually reported because, by definition, it isn't news. Unless it is in a country that is supposedly in ever-deepening chaos. Then the rare appearance of normality, indeed, should be news. But the appearance of normality in Iraq doesn't get reported. Maybe that means that the media consider the increasing normality in Iraq the norm. Or maybe it's just bad reporting.
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Monday, April 09, 2007
Monday, April 02, 2007
Let parents rule on kids' issues
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
With the development of a vaccine that protects women against cervical cancer, some people think it is a good idea to require that all pre-pubescent girls be inoculated. That, indeed, may be a good idea. But would the advocates of such mandatory inoculations be as enthusiastic if a yet-undiscovered HIV-AIDS vaccine was mandated for high-risk groups, such as gays, IV drug users and women married to bisexual men? They too are endangered by a life-threatening disease, and if a vaccine can be forced on children, then why not adults?
Not that I'm seriously proposing such a measure; it's just a thought experiment that might illustrate some of the problems of finding the appropriate balance between individual liberty and government intrusiveness. More to the point: How much power should the government have in telling parents how to raise their children? Or the reverse: How much power should the government have to prevent parents from raising their children as they see fit?
Some legislation now being debated by Illinois legislators in Springfield illustrates the last point: House Bill 317 would give every girl the right to have an abortion without telling her parents. All they'd need do is tell a "specified adult family member or a member of the clergy." It's as if to say that notifying a sympathetic aunt is the same as notifying a parent.
This issue keeps popping up because years ago the legislature passed a law affirming a parent's right and obligation to know if his child is to have an abortion. But because a politically motivated state Supreme Court refused for years to issue rules to implement the law, it never took effect. Now, after a court more acquainted with its obligation to enforce the law issued the rules, the abortion lobby is pushing this bill that would invalidate previous ones. About two-thirds of the states have a parental notification law, and polls consistently show that wide majorities of the American public favor such notification. The pro and con arguments have been well trod; I'd just add an observation: Have parents done such a bad job of raising children that the job should be turned over to the children themselves?
House Bill 1727 would require libraries to install filters on their computers to protect children from Internet porn. It was introduced in the face of vehement opposition from groups with radical individual-rights agendas, such as the American Library Association, which believes that kids should have access to "anything they want" in their libraries, according to ALA literature. This is a parent empowerment act, which would help create a safer environment for their children when they are in their libraries.
Some folks think this is a conflict between free speech and parental rights. It isn't. There's no law or court decision that requires libraries to stock porn, whether on the shelves in their youth sections or on their child-accessible computers. That is so sensible that you're right to wonder why a law is required.
House Bill 466 would further limit the number of charter schools in Illinois, denying parents and their children greater choice in how they will use their tax money to educate their children. Charter schools have proven they can develop successful teaching methods and environments, if they are free of the suffocating and costly regulations of school bureaucracies and labor unions. And there's the obvious explanation for why the unions are so anxious to pass this legislation. That they are not even slightly ashamed to be demanding such anti-child, anti-parent legislation says much about their blind self-interest.
There is a constant struggle between just how much control government should have in child-raising. Sometimes government must step in, for example, to prevent abuse, to protect children against diseases and to provide a safe environment. But there should be no argument when government gives every child the right to a virtually secret abortion and to view pornography in public places with official sanction, while forcing most children to attend schools crippled by red tape and exhausted, unmotivated, uncaring or incompetent teachers.
Chicago Tribune
With the development of a vaccine that protects women against cervical cancer, some people think it is a good idea to require that all pre-pubescent girls be inoculated. That, indeed, may be a good idea. But would the advocates of such mandatory inoculations be as enthusiastic if a yet-undiscovered HIV-AIDS vaccine was mandated for high-risk groups, such as gays, IV drug users and women married to bisexual men? They too are endangered by a life-threatening disease, and if a vaccine can be forced on children, then why not adults?
Not that I'm seriously proposing such a measure; it's just a thought experiment that might illustrate some of the problems of finding the appropriate balance between individual liberty and government intrusiveness. More to the point: How much power should the government have in telling parents how to raise their children? Or the reverse: How much power should the government have to prevent parents from raising their children as they see fit?
Some legislation now being debated by Illinois legislators in Springfield illustrates the last point: House Bill 317 would give every girl the right to have an abortion without telling her parents. All they'd need do is tell a "specified adult family member or a member of the clergy." It's as if to say that notifying a sympathetic aunt is the same as notifying a parent.
This issue keeps popping up because years ago the legislature passed a law affirming a parent's right and obligation to know if his child is to have an abortion. But because a politically motivated state Supreme Court refused for years to issue rules to implement the law, it never took effect. Now, after a court more acquainted with its obligation to enforce the law issued the rules, the abortion lobby is pushing this bill that would invalidate previous ones. About two-thirds of the states have a parental notification law, and polls consistently show that wide majorities of the American public favor such notification. The pro and con arguments have been well trod; I'd just add an observation: Have parents done such a bad job of raising children that the job should be turned over to the children themselves?
House Bill 1727 would require libraries to install filters on their computers to protect children from Internet porn. It was introduced in the face of vehement opposition from groups with radical individual-rights agendas, such as the American Library Association, which believes that kids should have access to "anything they want" in their libraries, according to ALA literature. This is a parent empowerment act, which would help create a safer environment for their children when they are in their libraries.
Some folks think this is a conflict between free speech and parental rights. It isn't. There's no law or court decision that requires libraries to stock porn, whether on the shelves in their youth sections or on their child-accessible computers. That is so sensible that you're right to wonder why a law is required.
House Bill 466 would further limit the number of charter schools in Illinois, denying parents and their children greater choice in how they will use their tax money to educate their children. Charter schools have proven they can develop successful teaching methods and environments, if they are free of the suffocating and costly regulations of school bureaucracies and labor unions. And there's the obvious explanation for why the unions are so anxious to pass this legislation. That they are not even slightly ashamed to be demanding such anti-child, anti-parent legislation says much about their blind self-interest.
There is a constant struggle between just how much control government should have in child-raising. Sometimes government must step in, for example, to prevent abuse, to protect children against diseases and to provide a safe environment. But there should be no argument when government gives every child the right to a virtually secret abortion and to view pornography in public places with official sanction, while forcing most children to attend schools crippled by red tape and exhausted, unmotivated, uncaring or incompetent teachers.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Free Speech and the Right to Disagree
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
If a high school gives students permission to openly express their support of homosexuality, then why shouldn't other students be allowed to voice their disapproval?
A federal court judge in Chicago might have to answer that question after a high school student in Naperville, IL, a suburb southwest of Chicago, filed suit charging that her civil rights were violated by school officials by not letting her wear a pro-heterosexual T-shirt last year.
Neuqua Valley High School's refusal to let Heidi Zamecnik, 17, wear a T-shirt saying "Be happy, not gay" on the back and "My day of silence, straight alliance" on the front was especially egregious because it came on the same day that the school permitted other students on the national "Day of Silence" to openly express their support of homosexuality.
Read more at RealClearPolitics.com
RealClearPolitics
If a high school gives students permission to openly express their support of homosexuality, then why shouldn't other students be allowed to voice their disapproval?
A federal court judge in Chicago might have to answer that question after a high school student in Naperville, IL, a suburb southwest of Chicago, filed suit charging that her civil rights were violated by school officials by not letting her wear a pro-heterosexual T-shirt last year.
Neuqua Valley High School's refusal to let Heidi Zamecnik, 17, wear a T-shirt saying "Be happy, not gay" on the back and "My day of silence, straight alliance" on the front was especially egregious because it came on the same day that the school permitted other students on the national "Day of Silence" to openly express their support of homosexuality.
Read more at RealClearPolitics.com
Monday, March 26, 2007
Games plan tough to follow
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
Hey, wait a minute. I thought that Mayor Richard M. Daley said holding the 2016 Olympics in Chicago wouldn't cost taxpayers anything.
Now we discover it could cost hundreds of millions. Of course, some cynics might say, Daley made the promise before the election (BE) and now it is after the election (AE) when everything said earlier is off the table. But I don't think the election had anything to do with it. He could have unveiled the complex financing plan the day before the election and who would have cared or understood?
A broken promise isn't the problem with the plan; it's the financing itself, which might be compared to a house of cards, if I understand it correctly. Which I'm not sure I do, but I guess that's the point. Columnists have more fun writing about outgoing Ald. Arenda Troutman's (20th) outrageous comparison of the 2016 Olympics with Adolf Hitler's 1936 version than trying to fathom the details of the Games' financing. You can skip a couple of paragraphs if you're not interested in details and take it for granted that if it involves local politicians, there's something odorous about it. So here goes:
The Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority (McPier), a city-state agency controlled by the city, sells the air rights it owns over land south of McCormick Place to a developer who builds walls of apartment buildings for the Olympians that are converted later to commercial housing, and McPier gives the money to the city, which gives it to Chicago 2016, the local Olympic organizing committee that likes to work out of the public view, which uses the money to help fund a temporary Olympic stadium, which later is converted to public use for concerts and so forth, but McPier retains a part ownership in the property, which it then sells outright or leases to an operations manager.
Now, if this and other aspects of the Olympic financing end up in red ink, Chicago must come up with $500 million in guarantees out of the public purse and who knows where else, but the mayor soothingly assures everyone that he remains committed to his promise not to use public money to support the Olympics. After the City Council was briefed privately about these and presumably the other intricacies--and surely, they understood them all--it later overwhelmingly approved the package like good boys and girls.
The public was kept in the dark until the Tribune sniffed it out. When asked later about his pledge that it wouldn't cost taxpayers anything, Daley responded, "we're not putting any actual money in," meaning, I guess, that selling public assets--the air rights--isn't actually putting any actual money into it. Maybe that's technically right, even though city, suburban and state taxpayers no longer own the assets--whose value may have spiked up to $100 million thanks to the Olympics-generated demand, even if Chicago is not awarded the Olympics. It's sort of like not actually putting actual money into the purchase of a new car when you trade in the old. I guess.
All of Daley's great assurances are not comforting when the cost of the 2012 London Olympics has tripled to $18 billion. In the face of this, we are expected to believe that Chicago can pull off the Games for $5 billion. Daley assures us, again, that 2012 and 2016 are not comparable, because Chicago would not be building a lot of new stuff, like London. We've already got the United Center, U.S. Cellular and Wrigley Fields, O'Hare International Airport and so forth, he said. "They had to build all the parks, all the transit," he said, as if the CTA will really impress the Olympic selection committee.
When Daley first suggested getting the Games here, I said the idea should be given a chance to prove itself. So far, the proof we've been allowed to peek at hasn't been all that convincing. But that apparently doesn't matter to the Olympic planners here; they said some secrecy is necessary because we don't want to give anything away to our competitors in Los Angeles.
But there's also some of the public-be-damned way the public's business is conducted here, based on the belief that the public, even if it could understand what's going on, would screw things up. That's too bad; the skepticism that they've already created with this approach hasn't served their cause well, because the project won't get anywhere without public support. At least that's the theory.
Chicago Tribune
Hey, wait a minute. I thought that Mayor Richard M. Daley said holding the 2016 Olympics in Chicago wouldn't cost taxpayers anything.
Now we discover it could cost hundreds of millions. Of course, some cynics might say, Daley made the promise before the election (BE) and now it is after the election (AE) when everything said earlier is off the table. But I don't think the election had anything to do with it. He could have unveiled the complex financing plan the day before the election and who would have cared or understood?
A broken promise isn't the problem with the plan; it's the financing itself, which might be compared to a house of cards, if I understand it correctly. Which I'm not sure I do, but I guess that's the point. Columnists have more fun writing about outgoing Ald. Arenda Troutman's (20th) outrageous comparison of the 2016 Olympics with Adolf Hitler's 1936 version than trying to fathom the details of the Games' financing. You can skip a couple of paragraphs if you're not interested in details and take it for granted that if it involves local politicians, there's something odorous about it. So here goes:
The Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority (McPier), a city-state agency controlled by the city, sells the air rights it owns over land south of McCormick Place to a developer who builds walls of apartment buildings for the Olympians that are converted later to commercial housing, and McPier gives the money to the city, which gives it to Chicago 2016, the local Olympic organizing committee that likes to work out of the public view, which uses the money to help fund a temporary Olympic stadium, which later is converted to public use for concerts and so forth, but McPier retains a part ownership in the property, which it then sells outright or leases to an operations manager.
Now, if this and other aspects of the Olympic financing end up in red ink, Chicago must come up with $500 million in guarantees out of the public purse and who knows where else, but the mayor soothingly assures everyone that he remains committed to his promise not to use public money to support the Olympics. After the City Council was briefed privately about these and presumably the other intricacies--and surely, they understood them all--it later overwhelmingly approved the package like good boys and girls.
The public was kept in the dark until the Tribune sniffed it out. When asked later about his pledge that it wouldn't cost taxpayers anything, Daley responded, "we're not putting any actual money in," meaning, I guess, that selling public assets--the air rights--isn't actually putting any actual money into it. Maybe that's technically right, even though city, suburban and state taxpayers no longer own the assets--whose value may have spiked up to $100 million thanks to the Olympics-generated demand, even if Chicago is not awarded the Olympics. It's sort of like not actually putting actual money into the purchase of a new car when you trade in the old. I guess.
All of Daley's great assurances are not comforting when the cost of the 2012 London Olympics has tripled to $18 billion. In the face of this, we are expected to believe that Chicago can pull off the Games for $5 billion. Daley assures us, again, that 2012 and 2016 are not comparable, because Chicago would not be building a lot of new stuff, like London. We've already got the United Center, U.S. Cellular and Wrigley Fields, O'Hare International Airport and so forth, he said. "They had to build all the parks, all the transit," he said, as if the CTA will really impress the Olympic selection committee.
When Daley first suggested getting the Games here, I said the idea should be given a chance to prove itself. So far, the proof we've been allowed to peek at hasn't been all that convincing. But that apparently doesn't matter to the Olympic planners here; they said some secrecy is necessary because we don't want to give anything away to our competitors in Los Angeles.
But there's also some of the public-be-damned way the public's business is conducted here, based on the belief that the public, even if it could understand what's going on, would screw things up. That's too bad; the skepticism that they've already created with this approach hasn't served their cause well, because the project won't get anywhere without public support. At least that's the theory.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Handgun bans' logic got shot full of holes
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
Our good and well-meaning friends in Chicago, Wilmette and other towns that have outlawed the possession of handguns, even in the sanctity and privacy of the home, might want to notice that the nation's second-highest court has tossed out a similar weapons ban.
By overturning a Washington, D.C., handgun ban 10 days ago, the district's federal appeals court affirmed that bearing arms is an individual right, in existence even prior to the writing of the Constitution. The ruling puts the court at odds with 10 of the 11 other federal appeals courts, which have ruled that bearing arms is a just a collective right, meant only to ensure that the civilians who serve in state militias are armed.
This doesn't mean that the D.C. decision applies here, but the conflicting rulings invite the intervention of the U.S. Supreme Court, where three sitting justices--Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Antonin Scalia and David H. Souter--said in a 1998 dissent that "bearing arms" goes beyond a collective right in the context of a well-ordered militia. Combined with the votes of recent conservative appointees, the high court could sweep away draconian laws that don't even allow the possession of a handgun to protect yourself and your family in your home.
Self-defense is hardly an esoteric legal question for Hale DeMar, a Wilmette resident who was fined $750 in 2003 after shooting a man who burglarized his home for two consecutive nights. DeMar's fine wasn't for defending himself but for possessing a handgun, meaning that he should have used a baseball bat, I guess. Or called out the militia. (The burglar, Morio Billings, recovered from his wounds and got a 7-year sentence. He got out after serving 2 1/2 years and was promptly arrested for burglary, in Wilmette.)
The idea that you can't use arms to protect yourself in your own home would have stunned James Madison and the other authors of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, if the appeals court's reading of history is correct.
The court's decision came in the case of a federal guard who was permitted to carry a gun at work but, upon application to the District of Columbia, was forbidden to keep one at home. The guard and other plaintiffs sued, claiming they had a right to possess "functional weapons" at home that would be readily accessible for self-defense. They weren't challenging laws against carrying a gun outside the home or other restrictions, such as handgun registration.
The district argued that the wording of the 2nd Amendment ("A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed") does not "bestow any rights on individuals except, perhaps, when an individual serves in an organized militia such as today's National Guard," the court said in summarizing the case. This is called the "collective-right" model, often cited by gun-control advocates, as opposed to the individual-right model, often cited by right-to-arms advocates.
Some collective-rights advocates go as far as arguing that the 2nd Amendment was written for the exclusive purpose of preserving state militias, and therefore individuals have no claim whatsoever on its protections. Some argue that there's no individual right because the "militia" of the late 1700s no longer exists; or that today's analogue, the National Guard, supplies its own weapons, or that today's weapons are different than flintlocks. To carry the logic of that last notion to its extreme, I supposed its proponents would argue that you can keep all the flintlocks you want at home.
The court swept away this logic with a close examination of the history, concluding: "The pre-existing right to keep and bear arms was premised on the commonplace assumption that individuals would use them for these private purposes [hunting, self-defense] in addition to whatever militia service they would be obligated to perform for the state." Self-defense, the court said, meant resistance to either private lawlessness or the "depredations" of a tyrannical government, foreign or domestic.
I'd add this to what the court said: Arguing that you have only a "collective" right to bear arms as part of a militia is as ludicrous as saying that the Bill of Rights protects your free speech rights only as a part of a larger group, such as the American Civil Liberties Union.
Self-defense is a self-evident human right. Thankfully, a court finally has reaffirmed that the Constitution and common sense are in alignment on your right to defend yourself, using reasonable force (i.e. a handgun, but not a bazooka) within your own home.
Chicago Tribune
Our good and well-meaning friends in Chicago, Wilmette and other towns that have outlawed the possession of handguns, even in the sanctity and privacy of the home, might want to notice that the nation's second-highest court has tossed out a similar weapons ban.
By overturning a Washington, D.C., handgun ban 10 days ago, the district's federal appeals court affirmed that bearing arms is an individual right, in existence even prior to the writing of the Constitution. The ruling puts the court at odds with 10 of the 11 other federal appeals courts, which have ruled that bearing arms is a just a collective right, meant only to ensure that the civilians who serve in state militias are armed.
This doesn't mean that the D.C. decision applies here, but the conflicting rulings invite the intervention of the U.S. Supreme Court, where three sitting justices--Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Antonin Scalia and David H. Souter--said in a 1998 dissent that "bearing arms" goes beyond a collective right in the context of a well-ordered militia. Combined with the votes of recent conservative appointees, the high court could sweep away draconian laws that don't even allow the possession of a handgun to protect yourself and your family in your home.
Self-defense is hardly an esoteric legal question for Hale DeMar, a Wilmette resident who was fined $750 in 2003 after shooting a man who burglarized his home for two consecutive nights. DeMar's fine wasn't for defending himself but for possessing a handgun, meaning that he should have used a baseball bat, I guess. Or called out the militia. (The burglar, Morio Billings, recovered from his wounds and got a 7-year sentence. He got out after serving 2 1/2 years and was promptly arrested for burglary, in Wilmette.)
The idea that you can't use arms to protect yourself in your own home would have stunned James Madison and the other authors of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, if the appeals court's reading of history is correct.
The court's decision came in the case of a federal guard who was permitted to carry a gun at work but, upon application to the District of Columbia, was forbidden to keep one at home. The guard and other plaintiffs sued, claiming they had a right to possess "functional weapons" at home that would be readily accessible for self-defense. They weren't challenging laws against carrying a gun outside the home or other restrictions, such as handgun registration.
The district argued that the wording of the 2nd Amendment ("A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed") does not "bestow any rights on individuals except, perhaps, when an individual serves in an organized militia such as today's National Guard," the court said in summarizing the case. This is called the "collective-right" model, often cited by gun-control advocates, as opposed to the individual-right model, often cited by right-to-arms advocates.
Some collective-rights advocates go as far as arguing that the 2nd Amendment was written for the exclusive purpose of preserving state militias, and therefore individuals have no claim whatsoever on its protections. Some argue that there's no individual right because the "militia" of the late 1700s no longer exists; or that today's analogue, the National Guard, supplies its own weapons, or that today's weapons are different than flintlocks. To carry the logic of that last notion to its extreme, I supposed its proponents would argue that you can keep all the flintlocks you want at home.
The court swept away this logic with a close examination of the history, concluding: "The pre-existing right to keep and bear arms was premised on the commonplace assumption that individuals would use them for these private purposes [hunting, self-defense] in addition to whatever militia service they would be obligated to perform for the state." Self-defense, the court said, meant resistance to either private lawlessness or the "depredations" of a tyrannical government, foreign or domestic.
I'd add this to what the court said: Arguing that you have only a "collective" right to bear arms as part of a militia is as ludicrous as saying that the Bill of Rights protects your free speech rights only as a part of a larger group, such as the American Civil Liberties Union.
Self-defense is a self-evident human right. Thankfully, a court finally has reaffirmed that the Constitution and common sense are in alignment on your right to defend yourself, using reasonable force (i.e. a handgun, but not a bazooka) within your own home.
Monday, March 12, 2007
Moral musings instead of fiscal management
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
"What I'm proposing is big, and historic. It solves all the problems we've been talking about for 30 years."
--Gov. Rod Blagojevich, describing his budget
Nothing better reveals Blagojevich's delusions than that defense he made of his fantasy budget last week on WGN radio. Here we've been flailing away for 30 years trying to solve the state's health care, education, pension, deficit and other crushing problems. Until now. Fear not; here's Rod.
The sad part is that some people actually believe it. Perhaps even Blagojevich himself. Certainly, the education, health-care and labor union lobbies, among others, believe it, because they, like the governor, are committed to the idea that scattering lots of money their way will solve everything. Already, they're saying that people who love children must support the budget; implying, of course, that if you don't, you don't love children.
The proposals in Blagojevich's State of the State speech rest on his assertion that they are prescribed by "a moral imperative." Good versus bad. Virtue versus evil. I presume that those who indignantly tell me to stop imposing my morality on others now will turn their wrath on the governor.
Actually, the governor and I agree that the public policy is informed by morality. Most laws have some moral component, the most obvious being the one against homicide. But here's where the governor is wrong: Yes, we have a moral imperative to educate our children. But no, that doesn't mean that the means of getting there has equal moral certitude. My saying that Blagojevich's budget isn't the best way to do it doesn't make me evil. If it does, then I'll tell you what is immoral. It is wrong to:
- Promise things you know you can't deliver, as does Blagojevich; to make false promises to those who are desperate for help and to feed their cynicism when your promises are broken.
- Jeopardize the pensions of state employees with "the largest pension obligation bond in history" (this from House Speaker Michael Madigan), as it is stupid for you to pay off massive credit card debt by charging it to another card. Even if it's at a slightly lower rate, it still doesn't solve your problem, as Blagojevich would have us believe.
- Raise taxes so high and inequitably that it'll drive jobs from the state.
- Sustain ever-larger deficits, possibly leading the state into bankruptcy, while pretending that you're not.
- Propose all sorts of extravagant new programs without solving the problems at hand.
- Tell whoppers.
Take how he claims that he balanced the budget by eliminating the $5 billion deficit he inherited. Like statistics, budgets can be made to say anything. The truth is closer to Democratic State Comptroller Dan Hynes' figures, which show a fiscal year 2006 deficit of $2.3 billion.
Or take his claims about the "unfairness" of the state's income tax system. For all of Blagojevich's rhetoric, you might get the impression that individuals ("the people") are paying twice the rate of businesses. In fact, the state income tax rate for individuals is 3 percent of net income; for businesses, it is 4.8 percent.
Logic would dictate that if loopholes in the state tax code allow large businesses to "legally forgo paying billions in state income taxes," as Blagojevich claims, then you should fix the loopholes, not junk the entire system in favor of one that creates new problems.
Blagojevich, for example, insists that his proposal for taxing businesses transactions wouldn't drive away jobs. In other words, he says a new tax that supposedly will extract billions more dollars from businesses that aren't "paying their fair share" won't discourage businesses from staying in or moving to Illinois. Tell me, how does that work?
There's a reason why it's more reasonable to tax a corporation's net profits instead of its gross revenues from sales. A company pulling in a lot of sales revenues may actually be losing money on the bottom line. It's unfair to put an extra burden on firms that are breaking even or losing money, taxing them at the same rate as companies whose margins on sales are much bigger. It's the same reason that you're taxed on your income after deductions, instead of your actual wages.
Well, that's just a few of the many problems with this budget, problems that are causing members of Blagojevich's own party to balk. Even those who believe that government can solve "all the problems we've been talking about for 30 years" aren't biting.
-
Chicago Tribune
"What I'm proposing is big, and historic. It solves all the problems we've been talking about for 30 years."
--Gov. Rod Blagojevich, describing his budget
Nothing better reveals Blagojevich's delusions than that defense he made of his fantasy budget last week on WGN radio. Here we've been flailing away for 30 years trying to solve the state's health care, education, pension, deficit and other crushing problems. Until now. Fear not; here's Rod.
The sad part is that some people actually believe it. Perhaps even Blagojevich himself. Certainly, the education, health-care and labor union lobbies, among others, believe it, because they, like the governor, are committed to the idea that scattering lots of money their way will solve everything. Already, they're saying that people who love children must support the budget; implying, of course, that if you don't, you don't love children.
The proposals in Blagojevich's State of the State speech rest on his assertion that they are prescribed by "a moral imperative." Good versus bad. Virtue versus evil. I presume that those who indignantly tell me to stop imposing my morality on others now will turn their wrath on the governor.
Actually, the governor and I agree that the public policy is informed by morality. Most laws have some moral component, the most obvious being the one against homicide. But here's where the governor is wrong: Yes, we have a moral imperative to educate our children. But no, that doesn't mean that the means of getting there has equal moral certitude. My saying that Blagojevich's budget isn't the best way to do it doesn't make me evil. If it does, then I'll tell you what is immoral. It is wrong to:
- Promise things you know you can't deliver, as does Blagojevich; to make false promises to those who are desperate for help and to feed their cynicism when your promises are broken.
- Jeopardize the pensions of state employees with "the largest pension obligation bond in history" (this from House Speaker Michael Madigan), as it is stupid for you to pay off massive credit card debt by charging it to another card. Even if it's at a slightly lower rate, it still doesn't solve your problem, as Blagojevich would have us believe.
- Raise taxes so high and inequitably that it'll drive jobs from the state.
- Sustain ever-larger deficits, possibly leading the state into bankruptcy, while pretending that you're not.
- Propose all sorts of extravagant new programs without solving the problems at hand.
- Tell whoppers.
Take how he claims that he balanced the budget by eliminating the $5 billion deficit he inherited. Like statistics, budgets can be made to say anything. The truth is closer to Democratic State Comptroller Dan Hynes' figures, which show a fiscal year 2006 deficit of $2.3 billion.
Or take his claims about the "unfairness" of the state's income tax system. For all of Blagojevich's rhetoric, you might get the impression that individuals ("the people") are paying twice the rate of businesses. In fact, the state income tax rate for individuals is 3 percent of net income; for businesses, it is 4.8 percent.
Logic would dictate that if loopholes in the state tax code allow large businesses to "legally forgo paying billions in state income taxes," as Blagojevich claims, then you should fix the loopholes, not junk the entire system in favor of one that creates new problems.
Blagojevich, for example, insists that his proposal for taxing businesses transactions wouldn't drive away jobs. In other words, he says a new tax that supposedly will extract billions more dollars from businesses that aren't "paying their fair share" won't discourage businesses from staying in or moving to Illinois. Tell me, how does that work?
There's a reason why it's more reasonable to tax a corporation's net profits instead of its gross revenues from sales. A company pulling in a lot of sales revenues may actually be losing money on the bottom line. It's unfair to put an extra burden on firms that are breaking even or losing money, taxing them at the same rate as companies whose margins on sales are much bigger. It's the same reason that you're taxed on your income after deductions, instead of your actual wages.
Well, that's just a few of the many problems with this budget, problems that are causing members of Blagojevich's own party to balk. Even those who believe that government can solve "all the problems we've been talking about for 30 years" aren't biting.
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Fix Bad Government with More Government?
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
The partisans who are scoring political points by gnashing their teeth over the outpatient failures at Walter Reed Army Medical Center are missing the point: The government did it.
It is especially aggravating because many of these same partisans want to turn the nation's health care system over to...the government.
Or have they somehow missed the fact that the care of veterans is the responsibility of the government? Do they somehow believe that a single-payer health care system, or universal health care, or whatever else they want to call it will be immune to the kind of bureaucratic insensitivity, apathy and bungling that is integral to government?
Would the stampeding fault-finders please explain to the world how they would ensure that civilian outpatients, under a bureaucracy rivaling the military's, would not be ignored in the same manner that the military bureaucracy abandoned the wounded veterans in Building 18? With hundreds of millions of civilian patients, instead of thousands of wounded veterans, would someone give us a clue how the government would keep track of them all? With outpatient veterans getting lost under mountains of paperwork and red tape, how would government be more responsive to the needs of hundreds
Read more at RealClearPolitics
RealClearPolitics
The partisans who are scoring political points by gnashing their teeth over the outpatient failures at Walter Reed Army Medical Center are missing the point: The government did it.
It is especially aggravating because many of these same partisans want to turn the nation's health care system over to...the government.
Or have they somehow missed the fact that the care of veterans is the responsibility of the government? Do they somehow believe that a single-payer health care system, or universal health care, or whatever else they want to call it will be immune to the kind of bureaucratic insensitivity, apathy and bungling that is integral to government?
Would the stampeding fault-finders please explain to the world how they would ensure that civilian outpatients, under a bureaucracy rivaling the military's, would not be ignored in the same manner that the military bureaucracy abandoned the wounded veterans in Building 18? With hundreds of millions of civilian patients, instead of thousands of wounded veterans, would someone give us a clue how the government would keep track of them all? With outpatient veterans getting lost under mountains of paperwork and red tape, how would government be more responsive to the needs of hundreds
Read more at RealClearPolitics
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Is Obama Black Enough?
By Dennis Byrne
Human Events
For a while there it looked like he wasn’t, at least among African Americans who said that he didn’t share their heritage of American slavery, and therefore couldn’t understand The Experience.
Many of these same African-Americans, however, called a white man -- Bill Clinton -- the “first black President” because he understood The Experience, even though he didn’t actually live it. That sentiment apparently had rubbed off on Hilary Rodham Clinton who, by extension, presumably was the first black First Lady and looked like she would inherit the black vote in her presidential quest.
But wait. Polling last week is showing that Obama is cutting into her popularity among black voters. A Zogby poll last Wednesday showed that Obama actually leads Clinton among black Democratic voters, 44% to 30%, compared with a January poll having her ahead of Obama 60% to 20%. A Washington Post/ABC News poll last Tuesday picked up the same trend, showing Obama closing in on Clinton.
This, of course, confounds certain black elites (activists and commentators) who obliquely questioned Obama’s racial authenticity. They explained that blacks would stay with Clinton because here’s a white person (Clinton) who has a better understanding of The Experience than a black person (Obama) who hasn’t had The Experience. This may be a good thing, because it shows that the race of the person is not as important as how the person votes on race. At least that’s what passes for progress these days.
Not that any of this conforms to reality or the rules of logic.
Read more at Human Events
Human Events
It turns out that Barack Obama is black enough to be President after all.
For a while there it looked like he wasn’t, at least among African Americans who said that he didn’t share their heritage of American slavery, and therefore couldn’t understand The Experience.
Many of these same African-Americans, however, called a white man -- Bill Clinton -- the “first black President” because he understood The Experience, even though he didn’t actually live it. That sentiment apparently had rubbed off on Hilary Rodham Clinton who, by extension, presumably was the first black First Lady and looked like she would inherit the black vote in her presidential quest.
But wait. Polling last week is showing that Obama is cutting into her popularity among black voters. A Zogby poll last Wednesday showed that Obama actually leads Clinton among black Democratic voters, 44% to 30%, compared with a January poll having her ahead of Obama 60% to 20%. A Washington Post/ABC News poll last Tuesday picked up the same trend, showing Obama closing in on Clinton.
This, of course, confounds certain black elites (activists and commentators) who obliquely questioned Obama’s racial authenticity. They explained that blacks would stay with Clinton because here’s a white person (Clinton) who has a better understanding of The Experience than a black person (Obama) who hasn’t had The Experience. This may be a good thing, because it shows that the race of the person is not as important as how the person votes on race. At least that’s what passes for progress these days.
Not that any of this conforms to reality or the rules of logic.
Read more at Human Events
Monday, March 05, 2007
Transit `reform,' yet again
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
Commuters will be happy to know why their CTA train and bus service stinks: It's the organization chart's fault.
And here you thought it was malfeasance, corruption or incompetence.
We have been told by legislators, consultants and assorted observers that the Toonerville Trolley, the Chicago Transit Authority's sorry excuse for "rapid" transit; crummy maintenance; decaying equipment; underserved neighborhoods and communities, and now, the tiresome warnings of fare increases and service reductions can be laid at the feet of how the Regional Transportation Authority is organized.
And therefore, for the third time in more than 30 years, we're about to have another political battle over a major restructuring of the region's mass transit system. And just like before, it eventually might not matter a fig because some politicians will see it as a way to grab extra power over the lode of jobs and contracts.
We're about to relive history, folks, and it ain't pretty.
Back in the early 1970s, when the remnants of a once glorious but bankrupt private transit operation serving the city and suburbs were wheezing their last breath, the government took over responsibility for funding and running it. Thus the RTA's creation.
Mayor Richard J. Daley first opposed its creation, not wanting to hand the suburbs (and Republicans) the slightest control over the CTA (even though it served about 30 suburbs). Eventually Daley saw that what the suburbs might do to him, he could do to them. So he supported its creation and engineered the installation of a public works commission to run it.
Thus began years of ineffectiveness, thanks to infighting over how to divvy up revenue and service between the city and suburbs and their political potentates.
The RTA, as created, was intended to exercise tight professional control over the operations and finances of the CTA and the suburban rail and bus operations. It didn't, and sure enough, a decade later, another financial crisis arrived. So did a major reorganization, which decentralized some of the RTA's powers, and pushed them down into the operating units: the CTA and the newly created Metra rail and Pace suburban bus operations.
Not unexpectedly, the wasteful duplication of service, contracting and administrative functions didn't end, but that wasn't the whole problem. Mass transit was underfunded, thanks in part to the reluctance to charge riders what they should be paying (more than what they are now), generous CTA labor contracts and high CTA absenteeism, among other systemic problems.
Those problems existed--and will continue to exist--because the political powers in this feudal system did not allow the RTA to impose a solution.
The promised benefits of consolidation, cooperation and coordination under the original RTA still echo in my ears from when I covered the agency's creation in the early 1970s. Riders were guaranteed some form of "universal fare card," which would permit easier transfer between bus and train systems, thus attracting more riders. And where does it stand?
Last year--32 years later--a consultant came up with some recommendations for finally getting it done. Last month, the RTA announced that a deal had been worked out--ta-dah--to install some CTA transit-card vending machines in two more downtown train stations, so Metra riders who ride the CTA in the second leg of their commutes don't have to go elsewhere to buy their CTA card.
Should have happened years ago. Pathetic.
This is more than a matter of rivalries between agencies. It is a reflection of the deeper political divisions that drive the agencies' actions and inactions. There is no one willing to crack down on the CTA--the main source of the RTA's problems--because no one dares take on the city's power, meaning Richard M. Daley's power.
And Daley can't reform, even if he wanted to, the CTA, as he claims to have done with the schools and the housing authority, without the legislature's help, meaning our money. But the state isn't in any better shape with Gov. Rod Blagojevich's extravagant and utopian promises for other pet projects. The pressure is on.
There'll be a lot of talk about giving the RTA a stronger hand, to improve coordination and so forth. But will it be all talk? More important, will a Democratic governor and a Democratic legislature really be willing to step over the line and crack down on the CTA, especially in light of Daley's landslide re-election?
Or will the legislature again just reshuffle the organization chart to make it look like something has happened, while continuing business as usual?
Chicago Tribune
Commuters will be happy to know why their CTA train and bus service stinks: It's the organization chart's fault.
And here you thought it was malfeasance, corruption or incompetence.
We have been told by legislators, consultants and assorted observers that the Toonerville Trolley, the Chicago Transit Authority's sorry excuse for "rapid" transit; crummy maintenance; decaying equipment; underserved neighborhoods and communities, and now, the tiresome warnings of fare increases and service reductions can be laid at the feet of how the Regional Transportation Authority is organized.
And therefore, for the third time in more than 30 years, we're about to have another political battle over a major restructuring of the region's mass transit system. And just like before, it eventually might not matter a fig because some politicians will see it as a way to grab extra power over the lode of jobs and contracts.
We're about to relive history, folks, and it ain't pretty.
Back in the early 1970s, when the remnants of a once glorious but bankrupt private transit operation serving the city and suburbs were wheezing their last breath, the government took over responsibility for funding and running it. Thus the RTA's creation.
Mayor Richard J. Daley first opposed its creation, not wanting to hand the suburbs (and Republicans) the slightest control over the CTA (even though it served about 30 suburbs). Eventually Daley saw that what the suburbs might do to him, he could do to them. So he supported its creation and engineered the installation of a public works commission to run it.
Thus began years of ineffectiveness, thanks to infighting over how to divvy up revenue and service between the city and suburbs and their political potentates.
The RTA, as created, was intended to exercise tight professional control over the operations and finances of the CTA and the suburban rail and bus operations. It didn't, and sure enough, a decade later, another financial crisis arrived. So did a major reorganization, which decentralized some of the RTA's powers, and pushed them down into the operating units: the CTA and the newly created Metra rail and Pace suburban bus operations.
Not unexpectedly, the wasteful duplication of service, contracting and administrative functions didn't end, but that wasn't the whole problem. Mass transit was underfunded, thanks in part to the reluctance to charge riders what they should be paying (more than what they are now), generous CTA labor contracts and high CTA absenteeism, among other systemic problems.
Those problems existed--and will continue to exist--because the political powers in this feudal system did not allow the RTA to impose a solution.
The promised benefits of consolidation, cooperation and coordination under the original RTA still echo in my ears from when I covered the agency's creation in the early 1970s. Riders were guaranteed some form of "universal fare card," which would permit easier transfer between bus and train systems, thus attracting more riders. And where does it stand?
Last year--32 years later--a consultant came up with some recommendations for finally getting it done. Last month, the RTA announced that a deal had been worked out--ta-dah--to install some CTA transit-card vending machines in two more downtown train stations, so Metra riders who ride the CTA in the second leg of their commutes don't have to go elsewhere to buy their CTA card.
Should have happened years ago. Pathetic.
This is more than a matter of rivalries between agencies. It is a reflection of the deeper political divisions that drive the agencies' actions and inactions. There is no one willing to crack down on the CTA--the main source of the RTA's problems--because no one dares take on the city's power, meaning Richard M. Daley's power.
And Daley can't reform, even if he wanted to, the CTA, as he claims to have done with the schools and the housing authority, without the legislature's help, meaning our money. But the state isn't in any better shape with Gov. Rod Blagojevich's extravagant and utopian promises for other pet projects. The pressure is on.
There'll be a lot of talk about giving the RTA a stronger hand, to improve coordination and so forth. But will it be all talk? More important, will a Democratic governor and a Democratic legislature really be willing to step over the line and crack down on the CTA, especially in light of Daley's landslide re-election?
Or will the legislature again just reshuffle the organization chart to make it look like something has happened, while continuing business as usual?
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Hollywood in Fantasyland
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
Among the environmental slogans sprinting across the big screen during the Oscar's paean to Al Gore was this stumper: We can reduce human greenhouse gas emissions to "zero."
I might have read it wrong; it might have said that we can reduce increases in the emissions to zero, which still is utopian silliness at best, or, if it were remotely possible, a formula for global economic disaster.
In any case, it is true. We can eliminate all human global warming emissions--if all 6.7 billion of us on Earth were dead. That way, there'd be no one around exhaling huge quantities of carbon dioxide, reportedly the most ruinous of the greenhouse gases.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
RealClearPolitics
Among the environmental slogans sprinting across the big screen during the Oscar's paean to Al Gore was this stumper: We can reduce human greenhouse gas emissions to "zero."
I might have read it wrong; it might have said that we can reduce increases in the emissions to zero, which still is utopian silliness at best, or, if it were remotely possible, a formula for global economic disaster.
In any case, it is true. We can eliminate all human global warming emissions--if all 6.7 billion of us on Earth were dead. That way, there'd be no one around exhaling huge quantities of carbon dioxide, reportedly the most ruinous of the greenhouse gases.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
Monday, February 26, 2007
They would be creamed
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
If all goes according to plan, the bulldozers will arrive sometime after midnight to start knocking down thousands of Chicago homes to clear a path for the Crosstown Expressway.
That's an exaggeration, of course: The destruction of entire neighborhoods, with their homes, businesses, schools, churches and parks, won't be as easy as Mayor Richard M. Daley's midnight obliteration of Meigs Field.
Still, the revival of the Crosstown Expressway project--running from the Edens-Kennedy Expressways junction, along Cicero Avenue to Midway Airport then cutting east to the Dan Ryan Expressway along 75th Street--was sprung on the tens of thousands of people who would be creamed by the expressway with all the surprise of a midnight raid. House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago) was the first to drop the bomb and Daley joined in, saying that the failure to build the expressway 30 years ago was a huge mistake--a proposition needing some proof.
Daley, with his usual aplomb, tried to soften the bombshell, saying it was only an idea and that the Crosstown would only be a two-lane, truck-only freeway. But Chicagoans with any memory will recall that the truck-only idea was considered 30 years ago, and junked. Not just because an accident would create a nightmarish truck jam, but also because it wouldn't be much less expensive or destructive than the full Monty.
And, so it is with all the other cockamamie permutations of the expressway that Daley's father and special interests dreamed up to overcome the strong grass-roots opposition. Someone suggested running the road below grade. Someone else seriously proposed double-decking it, with one level going north and the other south. All options were rejected as politically unfeasible, impossibly expensive and destructive.
Those same overwhelming problems of dislocation, cost and ineffectiveness remain with a project that would cut such a big swath through Northwest, West and South Side neighborhoods.
Take the old debate over where to run the south leg. Aside from causing significant destruction, the idea of dumping Crosstown traffic onto the Ryan at 75th was problematic: Besides creating a traffic bottleneck there, it was too far south to serve as an effective bypass that would connect with the Chicago Skyway. Then it was suggested, with a straight face, to run the leg south instead of east, connecting to Interstate Highway 57, following an even more destructive path that would completely nullify any claims that it is a bypass highway.
Then there's the cost, low-balled at about $1 billion, which today doesn't come close. Few new expressways are slashed through the hearts of cities anymore for good reason; the costs fly beyond anything reasonable or conceivable. Even if it were built as a toll road, how high would other tolls in the region have to be raised to cover the financing?
If not from tolls, then how to finance a mega-billion-dollar project? The Dan Ryan reconstruction, even without its outrageous cost overruns, has gobbled up a good hunk of Illinois' share of federal highway funds for years to come. Would the suburbs and Downstate tolerate another Chicago money grab?
And this: Before a cent in federal aid can be ladled out, the law requires convincing evidence that the highway is cost-effective. In other words, does the value of the highway's benefits outweigh the highway's actual cost, including the dollar value of environmental, social and economic destruction? I don't see how it can be honestly done.
Just about the only thing good to come out of the Crosstown fiasco was the law that now requires federal compensation of anyone, anywhere in the nation, who is uprooted by such a huge federally funded project. Still, as a practical matter, the law falls short of providing true dollar-for-dollar compensation for the loss of habitat or livelihood.
As if Daley doesn't have enough concrete to pour to keep him and his contracting buddies content for the rest of his lifetime reign. Maybe the city should buy up a bunch of vacant lots that he can pave over just to keep him and his pals happy. It certainly would be a better use of the money.
Thirty years ago, when a stake was driven through the heart of this bad idea, everyone thought it was so dead that, to this day, the Crosstown doesn't show up on the region's long-range transportation plans. But that won't stop the city's business and other elites from rushing forward to support this bad idea. If anything, the miraculous resurrection of the Crosstown proves that when it comes to government, no bad idea is truly dead.
Chicago Tribune
If all goes according to plan, the bulldozers will arrive sometime after midnight to start knocking down thousands of Chicago homes to clear a path for the Crosstown Expressway.
That's an exaggeration, of course: The destruction of entire neighborhoods, with their homes, businesses, schools, churches and parks, won't be as easy as Mayor Richard M. Daley's midnight obliteration of Meigs Field.
Still, the revival of the Crosstown Expressway project--running from the Edens-Kennedy Expressways junction, along Cicero Avenue to Midway Airport then cutting east to the Dan Ryan Expressway along 75th Street--was sprung on the tens of thousands of people who would be creamed by the expressway with all the surprise of a midnight raid. House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago) was the first to drop the bomb and Daley joined in, saying that the failure to build the expressway 30 years ago was a huge mistake--a proposition needing some proof.
Daley, with his usual aplomb, tried to soften the bombshell, saying it was only an idea and that the Crosstown would only be a two-lane, truck-only freeway. But Chicagoans with any memory will recall that the truck-only idea was considered 30 years ago, and junked. Not just because an accident would create a nightmarish truck jam, but also because it wouldn't be much less expensive or destructive than the full Monty.
And, so it is with all the other cockamamie permutations of the expressway that Daley's father and special interests dreamed up to overcome the strong grass-roots opposition. Someone suggested running the road below grade. Someone else seriously proposed double-decking it, with one level going north and the other south. All options were rejected as politically unfeasible, impossibly expensive and destructive.
Those same overwhelming problems of dislocation, cost and ineffectiveness remain with a project that would cut such a big swath through Northwest, West and South Side neighborhoods.
Take the old debate over where to run the south leg. Aside from causing significant destruction, the idea of dumping Crosstown traffic onto the Ryan at 75th was problematic: Besides creating a traffic bottleneck there, it was too far south to serve as an effective bypass that would connect with the Chicago Skyway. Then it was suggested, with a straight face, to run the leg south instead of east, connecting to Interstate Highway 57, following an even more destructive path that would completely nullify any claims that it is a bypass highway.
Then there's the cost, low-balled at about $1 billion, which today doesn't come close. Few new expressways are slashed through the hearts of cities anymore for good reason; the costs fly beyond anything reasonable or conceivable. Even if it were built as a toll road, how high would other tolls in the region have to be raised to cover the financing?
If not from tolls, then how to finance a mega-billion-dollar project? The Dan Ryan reconstruction, even without its outrageous cost overruns, has gobbled up a good hunk of Illinois' share of federal highway funds for years to come. Would the suburbs and Downstate tolerate another Chicago money grab?
And this: Before a cent in federal aid can be ladled out, the law requires convincing evidence that the highway is cost-effective. In other words, does the value of the highway's benefits outweigh the highway's actual cost, including the dollar value of environmental, social and economic destruction? I don't see how it can be honestly done.
Just about the only thing good to come out of the Crosstown fiasco was the law that now requires federal compensation of anyone, anywhere in the nation, who is uprooted by such a huge federally funded project. Still, as a practical matter, the law falls short of providing true dollar-for-dollar compensation for the loss of habitat or livelihood.
As if Daley doesn't have enough concrete to pour to keep him and his contracting buddies content for the rest of his lifetime reign. Maybe the city should buy up a bunch of vacant lots that he can pave over just to keep him and his pals happy. It certainly would be a better use of the money.
Thirty years ago, when a stake was driven through the heart of this bad idea, everyone thought it was so dead that, to this day, the Crosstown doesn't show up on the region's long-range transportation plans. But that won't stop the city's business and other elites from rushing forward to support this bad idea. If anything, the miraculous resurrection of the Crosstown proves that when it comes to government, no bad idea is truly dead.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Mayor-for-life reigns in a faux democracy
Voters seem content to seal Daley's power and ignore challengers
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
And now, a question from the department of metaphysics: Is it really a democracy when nearly everyone votes for the same guy, whether the reason is that he has ...
A. Performed so wunnerfully that no one else in sight could do better. Or,
B. Gathered so much power unto himself that few, if any, challengers have a chance of beating him.
Thus, the Chicago mayoral election, in which Mayor Richard Daley is considered to be a cinch to be recrowned as city sovereign for one, or both, of the above reasons. Serious voters can ponder why they have so little choice, which is the essence of a functioning democracy. True, getting three out of every four votes is not the same thing as the 100 percent that the Kremlin regularly turned out because no one else was on the ballot.
Chicago is not alone in this. In countless suburbs, you literally have no choice, because only one name appears on the ballot for many village, school and other municipal offices. There, few challengers step forward because few are interested in volunteering for a non-paying job that easily can turn into a full-time one. There, candidates are elected by acclamation.
This pretty much describes the Chicago mayoral race, as Daley's competition has been written off by the power elites--business, media and so forth. And by legions of folks who say they don't plan to "waste" their vote by voting for a "loser"--one of the most stupid concepts ever to undermine democratic government. Even organized labor, which is pouring money into anti-Daley challengers in some aldermanic races, dares not make a serious effort to unseat Daley.
Which has to fry the patience of Daley's two major opponents.
In any other city, a candidate who racked up 800,000 votes in a prior election--as Daley challenger Dorothy Brown did in Chicago during her 2004 re-election as Cook County Circuit Court clerk--would be considered a strong opponent. Here, she is casually written off as not having a chance, despite an impressive resume. She is an attorney, a certified public accountant, holds a master's degree in business administration and now manages an office with an annual operating budget of $100 million and a workforce of more than 2,000 employee positions. Daley's other major opponent, William "Dock" Walls, an aide to the late Mayor Harold Washington, is no Spanky the Clown (the perennial local candidate who, indeed, never had a chance).
For a while, it looked like we'd have what many folks considered to be a "real" race, as Democratic congressmen Luis Gutierrez and Jesse Jackson Jr. were stoking up their mayoral campaigns with heavy rhetoric about Daley's failings, principally the administration's dismal history of corruption.
Mocking Daley, Gutierrez said, "The essence of [Daley's] message is, `You know me, trust me, I have a record, but the hiring incident isn't part of my record. Jon Burge [former police commander] isn't part of my record. The scandals of contracting, those aren't part of my record. Every time there's an issue, `that's not part of my record.'"
Good stuff. But then, when Democrats won control of the House, Jackson and Gutierrez opted for the sure thing--more powerful positions in the House. In endorsing Daley, Gutierrez decided Daley wasn't so bad after all, saying Daley has made significant steps to clean up corruption.
Even for a town as cynical as Chicago, this was an act of towering cynicism.
It has been a generation now since Chicago was last bitten by real democracy, and the wounds apparently never have healed. The bitter battles that split aldermen in "council wars" during the Washington administration is the only reference point for many Chicagoans. That democracy can descend into such hostility may have been too much for Chicago voters to handle, because they've settled down to ratifying a mayor-for-life every four years.
Still, this election is a chance for voters to take democracy out for a test drive. For the first time in years, there's real competition in a number of aldermanic races, involving real, qualified candidates. True, it might be a scary thing for some Chicago voters to get back on after getting thrown by council wars. But if democracy can blossom in Eastern European capitals after decades of autocracy, why not Chicago?
Maybe it's time to give it another try.
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
And now, a question from the department of metaphysics: Is it really a democracy when nearly everyone votes for the same guy, whether the reason is that he has ...
A. Performed so wunnerfully that no one else in sight could do better. Or,
B. Gathered so much power unto himself that few, if any, challengers have a chance of beating him.
Thus, the Chicago mayoral election, in which Mayor Richard Daley is considered to be a cinch to be recrowned as city sovereign for one, or both, of the above reasons. Serious voters can ponder why they have so little choice, which is the essence of a functioning democracy. True, getting three out of every four votes is not the same thing as the 100 percent that the Kremlin regularly turned out because no one else was on the ballot.
Chicago is not alone in this. In countless suburbs, you literally have no choice, because only one name appears on the ballot for many village, school and other municipal offices. There, few challengers step forward because few are interested in volunteering for a non-paying job that easily can turn into a full-time one. There, candidates are elected by acclamation.
This pretty much describes the Chicago mayoral race, as Daley's competition has been written off by the power elites--business, media and so forth. And by legions of folks who say they don't plan to "waste" their vote by voting for a "loser"--one of the most stupid concepts ever to undermine democratic government. Even organized labor, which is pouring money into anti-Daley challengers in some aldermanic races, dares not make a serious effort to unseat Daley.
Which has to fry the patience of Daley's two major opponents.
In any other city, a candidate who racked up 800,000 votes in a prior election--as Daley challenger Dorothy Brown did in Chicago during her 2004 re-election as Cook County Circuit Court clerk--would be considered a strong opponent. Here, she is casually written off as not having a chance, despite an impressive resume. She is an attorney, a certified public accountant, holds a master's degree in business administration and now manages an office with an annual operating budget of $100 million and a workforce of more than 2,000 employee positions. Daley's other major opponent, William "Dock" Walls, an aide to the late Mayor Harold Washington, is no Spanky the Clown (the perennial local candidate who, indeed, never had a chance).
For a while, it looked like we'd have what many folks considered to be a "real" race, as Democratic congressmen Luis Gutierrez and Jesse Jackson Jr. were stoking up their mayoral campaigns with heavy rhetoric about Daley's failings, principally the administration's dismal history of corruption.
Mocking Daley, Gutierrez said, "The essence of [Daley's] message is, `You know me, trust me, I have a record, but the hiring incident isn't part of my record. Jon Burge [former police commander] isn't part of my record. The scandals of contracting, those aren't part of my record. Every time there's an issue, `that's not part of my record.'"
Good stuff. But then, when Democrats won control of the House, Jackson and Gutierrez opted for the sure thing--more powerful positions in the House. In endorsing Daley, Gutierrez decided Daley wasn't so bad after all, saying Daley has made significant steps to clean up corruption.
Even for a town as cynical as Chicago, this was an act of towering cynicism.
It has been a generation now since Chicago was last bitten by real democracy, and the wounds apparently never have healed. The bitter battles that split aldermen in "council wars" during the Washington administration is the only reference point for many Chicagoans. That democracy can descend into such hostility may have been too much for Chicago voters to handle, because they've settled down to ratifying a mayor-for-life every four years.
Still, this election is a chance for voters to take democracy out for a test drive. For the first time in years, there's real competition in a number of aldermanic races, involving real, qualified candidates. True, it might be a scary thing for some Chicago voters to get back on after getting thrown by council wars. But if democracy can blossom in Eastern European capitals after decades of autocracy, why not Chicago?
Maybe it's time to give it another try.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Health-care check, please
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
It's nice and compassionate that Cook County is giving away free health care to thousands of people from the collar counties.
But with Cook County looking at a deficit approaching a half billion dollars, it's irresponsible, and the mooching by the collar counties should stop now.
Certainly not in a way that would suddenly throw indigent families from the collar counties who travel to Stroger Hospital and other Cook County health facilities into the cold. But in a way that Lake, DuPage, McHenry, Kane and Will Counties would at least pony up their fair share. Or take care of their own indigent. But in the four weeks since the news broke of the sponging, no one has stepped forward to say they should or would pay.
What can account for such generosity when doctors, nurses and clinics are getting the boot in Cook County because of budget cuts? Why, when tens of thousands of Cook County residents are waiting interminably in long lines for health care and medications, are thousands more non-residents allowed in line?
Are the boards of the collar counties jumping up and saying, let's do an accounting of how many of our residents are using services that we are morally and legally obliged to provide, and at least reimburse Cook County? Are the collar counties so poor that they can't pitch in for their share?
Apparently, the mooching had been going on for a long time, until Dr. Robert Simon, the county's health chief, tried last month to stop it. Patients, he said, would have to prove they are Cook County residents; those who aren't either must be referred to the public health departments of their own counties or pay in full. Elective surgeries or procedures would have to be paid up front.
But just before the policy could be implemented, Cook County Board President Todd Stroger rescinded it. A Stroger spokesman, speaking in the usual language of bureaucratic equivocation, left room for rescinding the rescission, or not. At the risk of appearing hard-hearted, the County Board should take matters into its own hands while it is struggling to find ways to balance its budget and end the practice.
County officials did not respond to requests by the Chicago Tribune for information on how many non-residents are served and at what cost. Whatever it is, it probably wouldn't cut very much into the mountainous deficit, which Stroger initially addressed with a cynical demand that county officers make across-the-board 17 percent cuts in their budgets.
Cynical because Stroger dodges the difficult job of finding and pushing for cuts that are more deserving than others. That would require sniffing out the worthless and undeserving who have infiltrated the ranks of county workers during his father's tenure. Stroger obviously doesn't want to be the one wielding the ax.
Cynical because it puts the onus on county commissioners to make the difficult choices. Cynical because he can veto the board's cuts, blaming the commissioners for supposedly (1) not cutting deep enough or (2) heartlessly cutting essential services--whichever serves his political purposes.
In demanding a sweeping cut of 17 percent, Stroger knew that he would raise a hornet's nest of protest, so, superficially, it appears to be a courageous act. Especially among the people who voted for him. Now, the same folks are calling it obscene and a betrayal.
If it weren't for the essential services being indiscriminately cut by Stroger, it would be hard to work up much sympathy for those voters and critics. They ignored the obvious dangers of voting for a political hack who is putting and keeping relatives and friends in well-paying positions. Some refused to vote against him because they couldn't bring themselves to vote for a Republican, any Republican. Others were so suffused with their pro-choice, anti-gun ideology that they couldn't bring themselves to vote for the reform that was so obviously needed. Many of them were self-styled progressives who, this time, couldn't stomach change or reform.
Time to let Stroger know that we don't like what he's doing, we're told. Call him up, give him a piece of your mind, attend a protest, send an e-mail. Too late. No use. He has almost four years left in his term, and when the next election arrives, he knows that the same people will vote for him again, for the same ridiculous reasons.
Chicago Tribune
It's nice and compassionate that Cook County is giving away free health care to thousands of people from the collar counties.
But with Cook County looking at a deficit approaching a half billion dollars, it's irresponsible, and the mooching by the collar counties should stop now.
Certainly not in a way that would suddenly throw indigent families from the collar counties who travel to Stroger Hospital and other Cook County health facilities into the cold. But in a way that Lake, DuPage, McHenry, Kane and Will Counties would at least pony up their fair share. Or take care of their own indigent. But in the four weeks since the news broke of the sponging, no one has stepped forward to say they should or would pay.
What can account for such generosity when doctors, nurses and clinics are getting the boot in Cook County because of budget cuts? Why, when tens of thousands of Cook County residents are waiting interminably in long lines for health care and medications, are thousands more non-residents allowed in line?
Are the boards of the collar counties jumping up and saying, let's do an accounting of how many of our residents are using services that we are morally and legally obliged to provide, and at least reimburse Cook County? Are the collar counties so poor that they can't pitch in for their share?
Apparently, the mooching had been going on for a long time, until Dr. Robert Simon, the county's health chief, tried last month to stop it. Patients, he said, would have to prove they are Cook County residents; those who aren't either must be referred to the public health departments of their own counties or pay in full. Elective surgeries or procedures would have to be paid up front.
But just before the policy could be implemented, Cook County Board President Todd Stroger rescinded it. A Stroger spokesman, speaking in the usual language of bureaucratic equivocation, left room for rescinding the rescission, or not. At the risk of appearing hard-hearted, the County Board should take matters into its own hands while it is struggling to find ways to balance its budget and end the practice.
County officials did not respond to requests by the Chicago Tribune for information on how many non-residents are served and at what cost. Whatever it is, it probably wouldn't cut very much into the mountainous deficit, which Stroger initially addressed with a cynical demand that county officers make across-the-board 17 percent cuts in their budgets.
Cynical because Stroger dodges the difficult job of finding and pushing for cuts that are more deserving than others. That would require sniffing out the worthless and undeserving who have infiltrated the ranks of county workers during his father's tenure. Stroger obviously doesn't want to be the one wielding the ax.
Cynical because it puts the onus on county commissioners to make the difficult choices. Cynical because he can veto the board's cuts, blaming the commissioners for supposedly (1) not cutting deep enough or (2) heartlessly cutting essential services--whichever serves his political purposes.
In demanding a sweeping cut of 17 percent, Stroger knew that he would raise a hornet's nest of protest, so, superficially, it appears to be a courageous act. Especially among the people who voted for him. Now, the same folks are calling it obscene and a betrayal.
If it weren't for the essential services being indiscriminately cut by Stroger, it would be hard to work up much sympathy for those voters and critics. They ignored the obvious dangers of voting for a political hack who is putting and keeping relatives and friends in well-paying positions. Some refused to vote against him because they couldn't bring themselves to vote for a Republican, any Republican. Others were so suffused with their pro-choice, anti-gun ideology that they couldn't bring themselves to vote for the reform that was so obviously needed. Many of them were self-styled progressives who, this time, couldn't stomach change or reform.
Time to let Stroger know that we don't like what he's doing, we're told. Call him up, give him a piece of your mind, attend a protest, send an e-mail. Too late. No use. He has almost four years left in his term, and when the next election arrives, he knows that the same people will vote for him again, for the same ridiculous reasons.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Congress to launch a hot air resolution
By Dennis Byrne
Political Mavens
As Congress, supposedly speaking for all Americans, debates resolutions that trash U.S. efforts to secure freedom and security for millions of Middle East peoples, here’s what I, a mere citizen, would like to see in the resolution, but won’t:
Whereas, the people of the United States have endowed its government with the obligation of protecting and promoting certain unalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and
Whereas, the government of the United State affirms that these unalienable rights extend to all human beings, and
Whereas, a democracy is the best political system designed by man for ensuring these rights, while dictatorship, theocracy, monarchy and other forms of autocracy are not, and
Read more at Political Mavens
Political Mavens
As Congress, supposedly speaking for all Americans, debates resolutions that trash U.S. efforts to secure freedom and security for millions of Middle East peoples, here’s what I, a mere citizen, would like to see in the resolution, but won’t:
Whereas, the people of the United States have endowed its government with the obligation of protecting and promoting certain unalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and
Whereas, the government of the United State affirms that these unalienable rights extend to all human beings, and
Whereas, a democracy is the best political system designed by man for ensuring these rights, while dictatorship, theocracy, monarchy and other forms of autocracy are not, and
Read more at Political Mavens
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Bad Research, Worse Reporting on Global Warming
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
In trying to prove that the Bush administration is throttling research into global warming, the Union of Concerned Scientists rolled out some breathtakingly bad science.
The group unveiled a supposedly scientific survey of more than 1,600 federal climate scientists as evidence that the administration was engaged in "wide-ranging political interference in research related to global warming."
"The new evidence shows that political interference in climate science is no longer a series of isolated incidents but a system-wide epidemic," Dr. Francesca Grifo, Director of the UCS Scientific Integrity Program, said in a press release. "Tailoring scientific fact for political purposes has become a problem across many federal science agencies."
Grifo obviously doesn't' appreciate the irony when he trots out a poll that is so flawed that it is manifest evidence of exaggeration, incompetence or dishonesty on his group's part.
You don't have to be a social scientist to understand that the survey was deceptive, for example, when it lumped into the same category scientists who said they actually experienced the alleged tampering and scientists who simply "perceived" that it happened to someone else. For example, the group's press release said "Forty-three percent of respondents reported they had perceived or personally experienced changes or edits during review of their work that changed the meaning of their scientific findings." But turn to the study's appendix, and you'll find that only 15 percent of the respondents said that they had actually experienced such interference.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
RealClearPolitics
In trying to prove that the Bush administration is throttling research into global warming, the Union of Concerned Scientists rolled out some breathtakingly bad science.
The group unveiled a supposedly scientific survey of more than 1,600 federal climate scientists as evidence that the administration was engaged in "wide-ranging political interference in research related to global warming."
"The new evidence shows that political interference in climate science is no longer a series of isolated incidents but a system-wide epidemic," Dr. Francesca Grifo, Director of the UCS Scientific Integrity Program, said in a press release. "Tailoring scientific fact for political purposes has become a problem across many federal science agencies."
Grifo obviously doesn't' appreciate the irony when he trots out a poll that is so flawed that it is manifest evidence of exaggeration, incompetence or dishonesty on his group's part.
You don't have to be a social scientist to understand that the survey was deceptive, for example, when it lumped into the same category scientists who said they actually experienced the alleged tampering and scientists who simply "perceived" that it happened to someone else. For example, the group's press release said "Forty-three percent of respondents reported they had perceived or personally experienced changes or edits during review of their work that changed the meaning of their scientific findings." But turn to the study's appendix, and you'll find that only 15 percent of the respondents said that they had actually experienced such interference.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
Monday, February 05, 2007
Obama the Hack
By Dennis Byrne
Human Events
Turns out that Barack Obama, the sainted Democratic presidential hopeful, can be every bit the hack as the next run-of-the-mouth politician.
Not long after announcing the creation of a committee to explore his possible presidential run, the Illinois senator high-tailed it to New Orleans to throw some of the mud left behind by Hurricane Katrina on President George W. Bush.
With due solemnity, Obama joined the chorus of political opportunists blaming Bush's incompetence and indifference for New Orleans' sorry state. Talking to a special hearing of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Obama said that in the weeks after the hurricane,"an ashamed nation looked at what had been allowed to happen here and said, 'Never again. Never will we turn our backs on these people. Never will we forget what happened here.'" (One would hope that in the future he would never again resort to the cliché "never again.") Money, he said, is "still not reaching ordinary folks" quickly enough. "Until it does, all the numbers, the meetings and the planning that's being done is inadequate."
Read more at Human Events
Human Events
Turns out that Barack Obama, the sainted Democratic presidential hopeful, can be every bit the hack as the next run-of-the-mouth politician.
Not long after announcing the creation of a committee to explore his possible presidential run, the Illinois senator high-tailed it to New Orleans to throw some of the mud left behind by Hurricane Katrina on President George W. Bush.
With due solemnity, Obama joined the chorus of political opportunists blaming Bush's incompetence and indifference for New Orleans' sorry state. Talking to a special hearing of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Obama said that in the weeks after the hurricane,"an ashamed nation looked at what had been allowed to happen here and said, 'Never again. Never will we turn our backs on these people. Never will we forget what happened here.'" (One would hope that in the future he would never again resort to the cliché "never again.") Money, he said, is "still not reaching ordinary folks" quickly enough. "Until it does, all the numbers, the meetings and the planning that's being done is inadequate."
Read more at Human Events
Tug o' war and Constitution
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
Now that the Super Bowl is over, we can return fulltime to idolizing Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama.
Just kidding. But now that I have your attention, does anyone think that the Iraq war is pushing us into a constitutional crisis? President Bush, citing his constitutional powers as commander in chief, says he decides whether to increase U.S. troops in Iraq. Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and others are holding out the possibility that constitutionally they can force an end to the war by defunding the troops.
True, this isn't as much fun as fulminating about Joe "Mouth-Run-Amuck" Biden's remark that Obama is the first "clean" African-American presidential candidate, or laying into Democratic hypocrisy for giving Biden a pass while skewering former Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) for his "macaca" comment.
But it's more important, because America's system of checks and balances could face a tough test. The Constitution's framers separated our government's powers to prevent the abuse of governmental powers exercised by kings and would-be tyrants, such as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. The framers, tutored by such political theorists of their time as Baron de Montesquieu, concluded that the best way to check the abuse of governmental power was to divvy it up among different, sometimes competing, branches of government. Hence, the executive, legislative and judicial branches of our federal government.
It has worked well, except when an issue falls into that in-between gray area, when opposing branches stubbornly claim jurisdiction. Such as with war powers. The Constitution explicitly gives the president the exclusive power to command the armed forces, meaning he gets to decide how they are used. The Constitution gives Congress the explicit power to declare war, and to raise and support armies.
But does it give Congress the power to undeclare a war? Can it tell the president to roll it all up and send everyone home? Anti-war lawmakers say it can, because only Congress can appropriate the money that the president spends, whether it is on a war or a memorial to the late bandleader Lawrence Welk. Without money to, say, buy ammo, the Army would have no choice but to pack up and fly home. Or stay with empty rifles and be slaughtered. One might say that no congressman in his right mind would want to leave the president with that sort of choice.
On the other hand, Congress can appropriate money for, say, sending the troops "over the horizon" to Kuwait, but the chief executive can defy Congress (beyond using his veto) by simply refusing to deploy the troops.
This could be a fine mess, precisely the kind of dispute that the Supreme Court often wants to avoid. So what to do? Congress can't raise its own army to "force" the president to do what it wants. The president can't send a tank or two over to Capitol Hill to make Congress do what he wants.
So, it comes back to doing what is reasonable and wise. And if you want a case in which it was unreasonable and unwise for Congress to conduct a war and, in effect, make foreign policy (another of the president's explicit powers), check out how the Vietnam War ended. Officially, the Paris Peace Accords, negotiated by the chief executive, ended it, but the war between the North and the South continued with our chiseled-in-stone promise to reply with "severe retaliatory action" if the North ever violated the treaty.
Which the North did by expanding its military force in the South. President Gerald Ford confessed he could do nothing about it because Congress had passed the Case-Church Amendment that forbade any more U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia. All Ford could do was respond with diplomatic protests, which further emboldened the North and demoralized the South. When Congress subsequently withdrew its financial aid for the South, the end came. It was a North Vietnamese tank that broke down the gates to the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, not a pajama-clad Viet Cong. Thanks to Congress, we lost an ally and the North imposed a brutal and deadly regime on the South.
Notwithstanding the Constitution, it has been a long-held belief and practice that the conduct of wars and foreign policy belong to the president.
That's for a reason. Because while the president might or might not bungle how he uses those powers, it is nearly certain that Congress will.
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
Now that the Super Bowl is over, we can return fulltime to idolizing Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama.
Just kidding. But now that I have your attention, does anyone think that the Iraq war is pushing us into a constitutional crisis? President Bush, citing his constitutional powers as commander in chief, says he decides whether to increase U.S. troops in Iraq. Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and others are holding out the possibility that constitutionally they can force an end to the war by defunding the troops.
True, this isn't as much fun as fulminating about Joe "Mouth-Run-Amuck" Biden's remark that Obama is the first "clean" African-American presidential candidate, or laying into Democratic hypocrisy for giving Biden a pass while skewering former Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) for his "macaca" comment.
But it's more important, because America's system of checks and balances could face a tough test. The Constitution's framers separated our government's powers to prevent the abuse of governmental powers exercised by kings and would-be tyrants, such as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. The framers, tutored by such political theorists of their time as Baron de Montesquieu, concluded that the best way to check the abuse of governmental power was to divvy it up among different, sometimes competing, branches of government. Hence, the executive, legislative and judicial branches of our federal government.
It has worked well, except when an issue falls into that in-between gray area, when opposing branches stubbornly claim jurisdiction. Such as with war powers. The Constitution explicitly gives the president the exclusive power to command the armed forces, meaning he gets to decide how they are used. The Constitution gives Congress the explicit power to declare war, and to raise and support armies.
But does it give Congress the power to undeclare a war? Can it tell the president to roll it all up and send everyone home? Anti-war lawmakers say it can, because only Congress can appropriate the money that the president spends, whether it is on a war or a memorial to the late bandleader Lawrence Welk. Without money to, say, buy ammo, the Army would have no choice but to pack up and fly home. Or stay with empty rifles and be slaughtered. One might say that no congressman in his right mind would want to leave the president with that sort of choice.
On the other hand, Congress can appropriate money for, say, sending the troops "over the horizon" to Kuwait, but the chief executive can defy Congress (beyond using his veto) by simply refusing to deploy the troops.
This could be a fine mess, precisely the kind of dispute that the Supreme Court often wants to avoid. So what to do? Congress can't raise its own army to "force" the president to do what it wants. The president can't send a tank or two over to Capitol Hill to make Congress do what he wants.
So, it comes back to doing what is reasonable and wise. And if you want a case in which it was unreasonable and unwise for Congress to conduct a war and, in effect, make foreign policy (another of the president's explicit powers), check out how the Vietnam War ended. Officially, the Paris Peace Accords, negotiated by the chief executive, ended it, but the war between the North and the South continued with our chiseled-in-stone promise to reply with "severe retaliatory action" if the North ever violated the treaty.
Which the North did by expanding its military force in the South. President Gerald Ford confessed he could do nothing about it because Congress had passed the Case-Church Amendment that forbade any more U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia. All Ford could do was respond with diplomatic protests, which further emboldened the North and demoralized the South. When Congress subsequently withdrew its financial aid for the South, the end came. It was a North Vietnamese tank that broke down the gates to the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, not a pajama-clad Viet Cong. Thanks to Congress, we lost an ally and the North imposed a brutal and deadly regime on the South.
Notwithstanding the Constitution, it has been a long-held belief and practice that the conduct of wars and foreign policy belong to the president.
That's for a reason. Because while the president might or might not bungle how he uses those powers, it is nearly certain that Congress will.
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Dems Should Dump Ethically Challenged Harry Reid
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
Instead of talking in sweeping platitudes about "ethics reform," Senate Democrats might want to prove they mean it by dumping their ethically challenged majority leader, Harry Reid.
The Nevada lawmaker has been implicated in yet another land scheme that this time could net him a tidy $50,000 to $290,000. Los Angeles Times investigative reporters Chuck Neubauer and Tom Hamburger, this week revealed that Reid paid $166 an acre for valuable northern Arizona land whose market value, according to the county assessor, four years ago was worth $2,144 an acre.
Who would be a big enough fool to sell Reid the land at such a ludicrously low price? A long-time pal who would financially benefit from some obscure legislation that the senator has often sponsored.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
RealClearPolitics
Instead of talking in sweeping platitudes about "ethics reform," Senate Democrats might want to prove they mean it by dumping their ethically challenged majority leader, Harry Reid.
The Nevada lawmaker has been implicated in yet another land scheme that this time could net him a tidy $50,000 to $290,000. Los Angeles Times investigative reporters Chuck Neubauer and Tom Hamburger, this week revealed that Reid paid $166 an acre for valuable northern Arizona land whose market value, according to the county assessor, four years ago was worth $2,144 an acre.
Who would be a big enough fool to sell Reid the land at such a ludicrously low price? A long-time pal who would financially benefit from some obscure legislation that the senator has often sponsored.
Read more at RealClearPolitics
Monday, January 29, 2007
A super pioneer in own right
By Dennis Byrne
Chicago Tribune
By now, anyone who has ever heard of the Super Bowl knows that for the first time a team in it will be coached by an African-American. Make that two: the Chicago Bears' Lovie Smith and the Indianapolis Colts' Tony Dungy.
For a professional sports league that once banned black players, it's a measure of how far they--actually we--have come. A few morons occupying the sumps of wild-eyed racists may oppose black National Football League coaches, but they're so deep underground, where they belong, we rarely, if ever, hear from them.
So, as we're about to start Black History Month, it might be a good thing to review our progress. By going back to when there were rules against blacks doing much of anything except staying out of sight. Now, there not only is an absence of rules against, say, black coaches; the welcome mat is out with a rule requiring that at least one black candidate be interviewed for each opening.
So, as Black History Month begins in a few days, we should not forget men such as Percy Julian.
The fact that most readers are asking "Who?" makes my point. Percy Lavon Julian, an African-American, may be one of the greatest chemists, if not scientists, of our time. If you're curious about how great, the popular PBS science series "NOVA" mentions him alongside Albert Einstein, Galileo and Isaac Newton. The 100th anniversary of his birth (1899 in Jim Crow Alabama, as the son of a railway clerk) passed with barely any notice outside of his profession--obscurity that can be racked up not just to the American public's scientific and engineering illiteracy, but also to his race. Amazingly, that's particularly so in Chicago, where he spent much of his remarkable career establishing a global reputation for his accomplishments in organic chemistry, especially in the synthesis of medicinal drugs.
In 1935 he synthesized physostigmine, a critically important drug for treating glaucoma, which had been available in only limited supply from its natural source, the Calabar bean. Over the next decades, the American Chemical Society has noted, his work led to numerous breakthroughs, from soybean protein, adopted by the Navy during World War II for fire-fighting foams, to chemical substances ("intermediates") that are key to the mass production of synthetics for treating rheumatoid arthritis.
Despite these achievements, and along with his master's degree from Harvard and his PhD from the University of Vienna, he still could not find employment because of active--not passive--discrimination against minorities.
Even DePauw University, where he graduated valedictorian and was elected Phi Beta Kappa, denied him a faculty position.
Rejected by academia, he turned to industry, where rejections continued until 1936, when W.J. O'Brien, a white vice president of Glidden Co. in Chicago, offered him a job as director of research for the company's Soya Products Division. There, as one chemist said, he made "an industry out of the simple soybean." In 1953 he established Julian Laboratories, which he later sold for millions. Despite his stature, folks still tried to burn down and bomb his Oak Park home.
He died on April 19, 1975, the first African-American chemist inducted into the National Academy of Sciences.
You'll want to know more about this great man, even if your interests don't bend toward process chemistry, atom economy and waste minimization. Next week you can, as "NOVA" airs a two-hour documentary about Julian, called "Forgotten Genius." (In Chicago, the program will air on WTTW-Ch. 11 at 8 p.m. Feb. 6.) Hampered by a paucity of documentation because of his race, "NOVA" spent years tracking down and interviewing his aging contemporaries.
A moving force behind keeping Julian's memory alive is James P. Shoffner, emeritus chemistry professor at Columbia College and former board member of the American Chemical Society.
"Since I lived through some of those times, I can vouch for the honesty and integrity of the film," said Shoffner, an African-American. The movie, he said, honors a man who "was an inspiration and motivational figure for many young men and women. Although this was especially true for students and researchers of color, it was more generally true for all, no matter what their race, ethnicity or gender."
Still, said Joseph S. Francisco, a Purdue University chemistry professor, "Many African-American chemists are still struggling with some of the same issues."
Something to keep in mind as we celebrate the success of the Super Bowl coaches.
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
By now, anyone who has ever heard of the Super Bowl knows that for the first time a team in it will be coached by an African-American. Make that two: the Chicago Bears' Lovie Smith and the Indianapolis Colts' Tony Dungy.
For a professional sports league that once banned black players, it's a measure of how far they--actually we--have come. A few morons occupying the sumps of wild-eyed racists may oppose black National Football League coaches, but they're so deep underground, where they belong, we rarely, if ever, hear from them.
So, as we're about to start Black History Month, it might be a good thing to review our progress. By going back to when there were rules against blacks doing much of anything except staying out of sight. Now, there not only is an absence of rules against, say, black coaches; the welcome mat is out with a rule requiring that at least one black candidate be interviewed for each opening.
So, as Black History Month begins in a few days, we should not forget men such as Percy Julian.
The fact that most readers are asking "Who?" makes my point. Percy Lavon Julian, an African-American, may be one of the greatest chemists, if not scientists, of our time. If you're curious about how great, the popular PBS science series "NOVA" mentions him alongside Albert Einstein, Galileo and Isaac Newton. The 100th anniversary of his birth (1899 in Jim Crow Alabama, as the son of a railway clerk) passed with barely any notice outside of his profession--obscurity that can be racked up not just to the American public's scientific and engineering illiteracy, but also to his race. Amazingly, that's particularly so in Chicago, where he spent much of his remarkable career establishing a global reputation for his accomplishments in organic chemistry, especially in the synthesis of medicinal drugs.
In 1935 he synthesized physostigmine, a critically important drug for treating glaucoma, which had been available in only limited supply from its natural source, the Calabar bean. Over the next decades, the American Chemical Society has noted, his work led to numerous breakthroughs, from soybean protein, adopted by the Navy during World War II for fire-fighting foams, to chemical substances ("intermediates") that are key to the mass production of synthetics for treating rheumatoid arthritis.
Despite these achievements, and along with his master's degree from Harvard and his PhD from the University of Vienna, he still could not find employment because of active--not passive--discrimination against minorities.
Even DePauw University, where he graduated valedictorian and was elected Phi Beta Kappa, denied him a faculty position.
Rejected by academia, he turned to industry, where rejections continued until 1936, when W.J. O'Brien, a white vice president of Glidden Co. in Chicago, offered him a job as director of research for the company's Soya Products Division. There, as one chemist said, he made "an industry out of the simple soybean." In 1953 he established Julian Laboratories, which he later sold for millions. Despite his stature, folks still tried to burn down and bomb his Oak Park home.
He died on April 19, 1975, the first African-American chemist inducted into the National Academy of Sciences.
You'll want to know more about this great man, even if your interests don't bend toward process chemistry, atom economy and waste minimization. Next week you can, as "NOVA" airs a two-hour documentary about Julian, called "Forgotten Genius." (In Chicago, the program will air on WTTW-Ch. 11 at 8 p.m. Feb. 6.) Hampered by a paucity of documentation because of his race, "NOVA" spent years tracking down and interviewing his aging contemporaries.
A moving force behind keeping Julian's memory alive is James P. Shoffner, emeritus chemistry professor at Columbia College and former board member of the American Chemical Society.
"Since I lived through some of those times, I can vouch for the honesty and integrity of the film," said Shoffner, an African-American. The movie, he said, honors a man who "was an inspiration and motivational figure for many young men and women. Although this was especially true for students and researchers of color, it was more generally true for all, no matter what their race, ethnicity or gender."
Still, said Joseph S. Francisco, a Purdue University chemistry professor, "Many African-American chemists are still struggling with some of the same issues."
Something to keep in mind as we celebrate the success of the Super Bowl coaches.
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Bush's Iraq Strategy is More Than Just Escalation
By Dennis Byrne
RealClearPolitics
How can so many people--Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), the Boston Globe, Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson, anti-war senators and on and on--be so ignorant about such a simple concept?
They are acting as if President George W. Bush's "new strategy" in Iraq is just to "escalate the war" by sending in 20,000 more troops. As anyone one notch above simpleminded ought to be able to understand, the core of Bush's new strategy is about how to fight the enemy.
Instead of clearing an area of insurgents and then leaving, as U.S. troops have been doing for too long, they'll now clear and stay, to secure the neighborhood. They'll stay to provide what has been most missing in this war and what poll after poll say that Iraqis want more than anything else: protection and peace.
If ever there is a recipe for defeat, whether in a traditional war or one against insurgency, it has been the previous Bush administration policy to fight to the death to clear out the enemy, and then promptly leave so that the enemy can pour back in virtually on your heals. How can you expect to get commitment and cooperation from civilians that know that the insurgents will return next week with their threats, violence and brutality?
Read more at RealClearPolitics
RealClearPolitics
How can so many people--Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), the Boston Globe, Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson, anti-war senators and on and on--be so ignorant about such a simple concept?
They are acting as if President George W. Bush's "new strategy" in Iraq is just to "escalate the war" by sending in 20,000 more troops. As anyone one notch above simpleminded ought to be able to understand, the core of Bush's new strategy is about how to fight the enemy.
Instead of clearing an area of insurgents and then leaving, as U.S. troops have been doing for too long, they'll now clear and stay, to secure the neighborhood. They'll stay to provide what has been most missing in this war and what poll after poll say that Iraqis want more than anything else: protection and peace.
If ever there is a recipe for defeat, whether in a traditional war or one against insurgency, it has been the previous Bush administration policy to fight to the death to clear out the enemy, and then promptly leave so that the enemy can pour back in virtually on your heals. How can you expect to get commitment and cooperation from civilians that know that the insurgents will return next week with their threats, violence and brutality?
Read more at RealClearPolitics
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