Whitewater’s forecast calls for a mostly cloudy day, with a high temperature of fifty-eight degrees.
It’s another week of school, and one sees that in the WSJ there’s a story about a (Big Apple) school concern — New School Fear: Bedbugs Coming Home in Backpacks. Reporter Jill Caryl Weiner writes that
The new academic year opened just as bedbugs became seemingly ubiquitous in the city, spreading to retailers, movie theaters, government buildings, hospitals — even the offices of Google and, most recently, this newspaper. School administrators, sensing a wave of parental concern, have adopted a new openness to discussing the risks of student-to-student bedbug transmission.
These new times seem more like old times than anyone would prefer.
A new ranking of the nations 400 biggest charities shows donations dropped by 11 percent overall last year as the Great Recession ended – the worst decline in 20 years since the Chronicle of Philanthropy began keeping a tally.
Hannah Volokh, while at visiting at Emory University’s law school, published an intriguing proposal in the Missouri Law Review: A Read-the-Bill Rule for Congress:
In this Article, I argue that legislators have a duty to read the text of proposed legislation before voting to enact it. A Read the Bill political movement has formed in response to recent high-profile instances of rushed legislation.
Putting aside partisan concerns, a rushed legislative process creates real problems because it forces legislators to vote on bills without having the time to properly evaluate the new legal rules that are being imposed on citizens. If a rule or norm of reading the bill can slow the legislative process enough to provide for thorough consideration of proposed legislation, it would bring a substantial benefit in the form of better laws.
The rule would also draw the attention of legislators to their primary, fundamental role of making good law.
If, for example, the U.S. economy grows at an inflation-adjusted annual rate of 1.7% — about the rate it’s currently growing — government debt will reach 122% of annual economic output as of 2015, up from 93% now. Annual growth of 2.7% would cut that estimate to 110%. The difference equates to about $2.2 trillion, or close to $7,000 a person.
….In any case, the U.S. and other countries will have to get the trajectory of their debts under control, either by cutting spending or raising taxes. In a separate report, IMF economists offer some evidence that cuts are preferable. Looking at the experience of 15 advanced nations over nearly three decades, they find that a spending cut equal to 1% of GDP has, on average, had a negligible effect on economic output over the next two years. A tax hike of the same size has shaved a cumulative 1.3% off output over the same period.
Yet, one often hears — erroneously — that Hoover was a laissez faire Republican, and that Roosevelt’s election marked a sharp break from those policies. That’s not only false, but wildly false. Hoover was a big-government Republican.
(It was Coolidge — who had numerous disagreements with Hoover — who was a defender of limited government.)
In Reason, Damon Root shows how ignorant some remarks about late twenties, early thirties American history really are:
The Atlantic’s Joshua Green just published a long profile of Rep. Ron Paul entitled “The Tea Party’s Brain.” Cato Institute Executive Vice President David Boaz also took a close look at the piece and caught Green making a pretty embarrassing factual error about President Herbert Hoover’s response to the Great Depression….
Now watch as Boaz walks Green through some American history 101:
For a sharp description of how similar were many of Hoover’s and Roosevelt’s policies [but not their political skill in describing them], see The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. The book affords a quick corrective to ignorance and false notions about Hoover’s policies..
In a shocking story from Florida, a cat recovers from severe torture while the cat’s abusers face the law:
[Judge] Nazaretian called what happened to the cat the worst case of abuse he’s ever seen. Investigators say the cat was shot multiple times with a BB gun, locked in a crate and thrown into the water to drown.
The cat, named “Lovie” because she was so affectionate toward her caretakers after being discovered, is recovering, and is in a home with new owners. Vets decided against removing the dozens of BBs embedded inside her to spare her from more trauma.
Here’s a television news account of the cat’s ordeal:
A Massachusetts man is facing an assault charge for allegedly hitting a town hall custodian on the back of the head with a roll of toilet paper because he was angry the cleaning man was whistling while he worked.
I posted on Wednesday about a public hearing on the proposed Whitewater Unified School District budget. See, About that Public Hearing…. In that post, I offered a few suggestions for next year. (Hold the hearing at a convenient time outside of ordinary working hours, “Announce the hearing prominently on the main page of the district’s website,” “Place the entire budget proposal online, on the district’s website….before the hearing…”)
These suggestions are easily implemented. I know that they are, because only a day after I posted them, one finds that the district has announced three public sessions on a referendum to refinance school district debt. (Note: I don’t think for a minute that these sessions were in response to my post; I think they were made public because refinancing for a lower rate is an easier discussion than the budget discussion.)
Here’s a screenshot of the district website announcing the three sessions:
A few remarks about all this, with reference to the district’s budget proposal (and other topics).
Public discussion about the budget should be routine; when it becomes routine, it won’t be so difficult.
There are more important matters than the budget. I don’t think the most important, difficult, or interesting questions concern the budget. The highest topics concern the curriculum and policies of the district. If the budget’s too hard to talk about, then one has no reason to be confident about the district’s willingness to address more important maters.
Avoiding discussion of practical matters only exacerbates political opposition.
Political opposition is far more than a supposedly anti-school or possibly ephemeral pro-Tea Party phenomenon. It may be self-flattering to think that those who favor the status quo are defenders against unwashed hordes, but it’s just a silly pose. People likely oppose the status quo — including the budget — for different reasons. There’s no single, ‘anti-referendum’ or ‘anti-budget’ group. Opposition is diverse.
In my own case, I’m not part of any movement other than the long and proud libertarian movement. (I support the right of peaceful protests now, for other groups, as I did when anti-war protests were common a few years ago.)
People favoring limited government, individual rights, and free markets have been a part of this country’s history long before the present-day term ‘libertarian’ was coined. We were a part of discourse on this continent even before this beautiful republic was founded. We were here long before current political movements; we will be here long after.
Whitewater has lots of very sharp people who would be willing to debate these matters. I have always contended that most people are very sharp. It’s just a silly pose to think that a few, however situated, are the only clever people in town, a clique of ‘wise men,’ etc. Society and the things we enjoy from it do not rest on the shoulders of a few people, but on the skill and insight of many.
If people are frustrated or disappointed, leaders should first look to themselves and ask: How could I have addressed these matters more effectively? Hiding’s not an effective tactic. It’s an ineffective, counter-productive one. If, a year from now, disappointed voters reject one proposal or another, leaders will have themselves to blame.
It’s no longer enough to ‘get your message out’ through a few sympathetic outlets. There’s a naive idea that if an official relies on a fawning website or an obliging reporter, all will be well. Those days are long since gone, such as they were; no one has the ability to deliver one message and set one agenda. Status quo messages are either ignored, or ridiculed, outside of a diminishing number living within an echo chamber. In any event, readership and traffic numbers do not favor defenders of politics-as-usual in Whitewater. A message of independent commentary draws more readers than ceaseless cheerleading.
(Tomorrow, I will show how a recent announcement about Whitewater’s Innovation Center isn’t merely ineffective, but counter-productive, to the interests of that project’s proponents. I’m a critic of the project, and there are times when I think: I wish proponents would publish more announcements, as their notices about the project are so inartful, odd, and self-defeating.)
These are hard times for many; the easy way helps no one.
Today’s suggested topic is open. It’s a free-range forum.
The use of pseudonyms and anonymous postings is, of course, fine.
Although the comments template has a space for a name, email address, and website, those who want to leave a field blank can do so. Comments will be moderated, against profanity or trolls. Otherwise, have at it.
