Paranoid liberals at Metro State

Tonight on Backbone Radio, campus editor Sean Doherty related the hilarious, but also deeply paranoid, fears of a Metro State staffer who voiced the following chain of spontaneous word associations in regard to a then-proposed (and since launched) campus newspaper called The Constitutional Reporter. "Constitutional... Klan... Republican... hateful... illegal... Nazi... swastika"

Yes, those are direct quotes. This really happened. Doherty's full notes of the phone conversations are given below.

STATEMENT BY SEAN DOHERTY Senior Political Science Major Metropolitan State College of Denver

Here are the minutes from my phone conversation with a representative of Metro State's administration.

Setting: I had previously asked for permission to put my paper on campus. They agreed. When I asked for written permission, the "gatekeeper" said he would get the permission slip to the right people and contact me. So, on the morning of 2/4/09 at 10:23am, I got the following call (I wrote down the following notes immediately after the conversation)

The gentleman on the phone had spoken with the appropriate people in admin who had him tell me the following:

"This is not a reflection on you as an individual but..." (an important distinction. What he is saying is that they don't know who I am but what concerns them is what they do know: the title of my newspaper: The Constitutional Reporter. They have no knowledge of anything except for the title of the paper)

He then goes on to say that the title Constitutional is concerning since the word is sometimes associated with radicals. He goes into rambling mode and lists a few other concerns such as "how do we know you're not part of the Klan?" He asked specifically if this was a Republican newspaper.

I responded that it was nonpartisan.

He then said that they don't want anything that could be considered hateful or illegal on the campus.

Then, he tried to justify their refusal to sign with this number: "we are for freedom of speech, freedom of speech..." and he explained that they understood this was a state institution and state property but that they wanted to "see an outline of the paper, you know, a business plan, to know what its about because they have to be careful before they give approval for something to be placed on campus.

I objected and said they did not need and could not request a business plan- I'm not even associated with the school other than being a student!

He said that was right but they would still need an outline of some sort.

I knew he wasn't the guy responsible for these concerns; he was just speaking for some administrators behind closed doors. I asked if I could meet with these people and address their concerns specifically so they may see that I am a good guy and certainly not a radical Klan member!

He said that they're busy folks (to which I responded that I am too) and he said they're always in meetings. So I asked him, "what about today at 3:30pm? Are they busy today at that time?" He could not give me an answer one way or the other and brushed off the question. He just told me to bring in an outline and we'd go from there. According to him, if I brought in an outline, then he could schedule a meeting with the administrators who could meet me and sign off giving our paper documented approval.

A day later 2/5/09 and around 11:30am, we have another phone conversation:

He reaffirmed that they were concerned and instead of just a Klan reference, he used the whole term in question: Ku Klux Klan. In addition, he added a new one to the list of concerns: that they did not want a Nazi paper on campus. "they did not want to pick up our paper and see a swastika on the cover."

I questioned him about what could be radical about the term Constitutional. To his credit, he said that the Constitutional Convention and other key events and figures in history were not radical (although, technically, in a way they were radical for that time) but he did not state any specific concerns or examples for what could be radical about the word Constitutional in a modern day context.

I asked him to submit his request to me in writing before I submit any outline in writing to them. I said something to the effect of "if the admin sees fit to request a written outline from me, I want a written outline of what their concerns are"

Nothing. He just told me to do an outline. I then said, basically, "well what if I did a news story about this? Would you want to put it in writing so nothing is mis-quoted?" He answered, "Absolutely not."

www.theconstitutionalreporter.com

To contact Sean Doherty 303.263.2281 kairoshappens@gmail.com

Transparency please, Mr. President

It would likely be impossible for me to deal with the crowd that will attend Mr. Obama's stop in Colorado next week.  Standing in line for a long period of time with folks that are looking at America's future through rose-tinted glasses, oblivious to the lessons history has taught would be more than I could tolerate. I would, however, like a chance to ask questions of our president: 1.  Mr. President, during your campaign you favored tax cuts for small businesses.  In recent days, you've come out with a forceful regulatory tone toward big business.  Your Stimulus Bill does not include those tax breaks for small business.   Is business, small and large, under attack in your administration?  Are the American people correct in observing that you are moving toward as much government take-over of business, in general, as you can push through?  Are you not in favor of providing incentive to Americans that may want to start a business, or grow a business to include additional hiring and productivity?

2.  Would you please explain to the American people why you believe the census should be managed by you and your administrative team?  If you are fearful that not enough minorities are being counted, it would seem most appropriate that you appoint a non-political census task force to conduct this process in a completely transparent, and certainly non-partisan way.  

3.  You have been adamantly opposed to lobbyists since the early days of your presidential campaign.  You've made assertions about not having lobbyists in your White House.  Your campaign team attacked Senator McCain for connections to lobbyists.  Of course, we know now that lobbyists are connected to your administration and yesterday, lobbyists were given the first opportunity to review your Stimulus Bill before members of Congress.  What other campaign promises can the American people expect to see broken?

4.  Your SCHIP bill was recently signed into law and was done so very quickly before the American people had a chance to examine the expansion and revisions.  Funding for this bill will be taken from tobacco taxes.  Your Stimulus Bill provides funding for a nationwide stop smoking effort.  Can you explain the reasoning as to how healthcare initiatives can be funded on one hand with a tobacco use tax, and then on the other hand, we are asked to pay for smoking cessation programs?  It would appear that the costs of the expanded SCHIP program would actually necessitate the need for every American to start smoking.

5.  You have stated that your Stimulus Bill is not perfect.  You acknowledge there are likely some mistakes.  Your vice president went further and stated it may only have a 30% chance of working.  Given our financial crisis, and your own admission that if we don't get this right, we may never recover, shouldn't the American people have a right to expect a better plan from our president, perhaps a plan that has even a projected 50% chance of working?  The fact that you have no prior business or economic experience comparable to the level of your new job and our current situation, should we not expect to see you sitting in your office every day working closely with your advisors to make sure you put forth a plan that has better than 30% odds?  Many Americans are troubled to observe your travel around the country promoting a bill that your administration admits may not have the desired outcome.  Would it not be more prudent for you to spend your time instead, working on a plan that includes historically proven positive outcomes? 

6.  Your Treasury Secretary was asked this week from whom the money will be borrowed to set your Stimulus Plan in motion.  He was not transparent.  He stated some American and some foreign investors will be loaning the government the money.  Since American taxpayers are on the hook to pay back this money, in the spirit of transparency do we not have the right to know the lending sources?

7.  During the campaign, Republicans pointed to your lack of experience and suggested the presidency is not a position that is conducive to on the job training.  You've experienced several set-backs in terms of improper vetting of high ranking appointments.  You left the White House one day unexpectedly when things weren't going well to visit a school, and you've fallen back on your greatest strength, which is public appearances rather than stay at your desk.  Would you admit that the office of the presidency has presented you with more challenges beyond your previous experience than you expected?

8.  In Elkhart, IN, you stated that private citizens will be able to email you with questions or concerns with respect to how your Stimulus money is being spent.  If Americans observe delays, waste or other problems with these public works projects, they will have direct access to you in order to report.  Another campaign promise was your claim that Americans would be able to view all policy and legislation online for 5 days prior to your signing into law.  This has not occurred thus far.  Because there is an early failure to adhere to transparency ethics, can the American people really expect to  email the White House whenever they want to report problems with the spending of Stimulus money and receive a credible response?

The list of questions could go on and on, but the reality of our life here in Obama Land tells us we will not get transparent answers.  We probably shouldn't even dare to ask.   This new transparency is about as clear as mud.

As Obama acts, Atlas shrugs weary shoulders

For almost nine months during the 2008 campaign I wrote about the dangers of Barack Obama's socialist views and liberal voting record -- both in the Illinois State Senate and United States Senate. I argued that his goal of "spreading the wealth" around would amount to a new socialist era in America, with tax and spend policies that were designed to transfer wealth from a shrinking percentage of tax payers to a growing percentage Americans "on the dole". Critics of my views kept telling me that I was wrong -- that Obama is a "new style" politician -- one who understands the importance of compromise and who would govern as a pragmatist from "the center". I was highly skeptical. Nothing in Obama's record led me to believe that he was anything other than a classic "tax and spend" liberal interested in using government for social engineering purposes. "Prove me wrong" I said on many occasions to images of Obama on the television (I said many other things to him as well, but this is a family blog).

Sadly, Obama has instead proven me right. Though he has mastered the image of bipartisanship -- inviting conservative Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration, having Republicans to the White House for tea and cookies -- his actions have shown him to be true to his liberal roots. The so-called "stimulus package" now before the U.S. Senate has become an increasingly unpopular pork-laden spending bill served up by Nancy Pelosi and her cohorts, designed to enact social change rather than economic growth. Rather than choosing a truly bipartisan process for creating the bill -- to include targeted infrastructure spending and tax cuts to stimulate job creation -- Obama chose to throw a bone to every left-wing social and environmental cause, using tax payer money to "stimulate" social policy objectives. As opposition from Republicans grew, Obama chose to attack rather than compromise, lashing out at Republicans for their "tired old ways" of arguing that "government is the problem and that tax cuts are always the answer". To Obama, of course, government is the answer and tax cuts are for the rich -- exactly what you'd expect to hear from a socialist.

It is amazing to me that Obama calls this a job creation bill, for the only jobs this will create are in the public sector. Doling out cash to people to spend is not the same thing as creating an environment where employers will start to hire again. Businesses require structural relief -- tax relief -- to create the economic incentives necessary to spur new jobs. But Obama doesn't see the private sector as the real engine of growth -- he pointedly sees government in that role. For Obama, an economic stimulus that leads to New Deal-style public works programs is the ticket to getting out of this recession. Never mind that the original New Deal in the 1930s only served to prolong the Great Depression. In the minds of big-government liberals, FDR is a hero, and the conventional orthodoxy that government can solve the people's problems is alive and well.

It is hard to stomach what is going on now in Washington -- from the continued wasting of taxpayer's hard earned money to the hypocrisy of Obama's cabinet nominees who don't mind raising people's taxes because they apparently don't pay their own. Now we have the specter of the Federal government telling companies how much they can compensate their top executives because they took public funds -- funds that in certain cases the government forced them to take against their will. It's all so reminiscent of Atlas Shrugged: collectivist action denying the ability for those who create wealth to do so, and then confiscating their gains in the name of societal "good". This cannot -- and will not -- end well.

As I've said many times, elections have consequences. We shall see if a newly resurgent Republicans can use concrete proof of Obama's socialist plans to regain some momentum. 

Centennial Institute launched

(Lakewood, Feb. 3) Former Colorado Senate President John Andrews has been appointed Director of The Centennial Institute, a new think tank being created by Colorado Christian University, CCU President Bill Armstrong announced today. The new entity will work to enhance public understanding of the most important issues relating to “faith, family and freedom,” he explained. The institute will be funded from private contributions, separately from the university’s regular operating budget. The Centennial Institute will conduct research, analyze public policy options, sponsor seminars and conferences and other activities involving students, faculty, staff and outside experts. “We are greatly complimented to have John Andrews joining CCU. He is a nationally recognized public intellectual whose ideas are impacting the thought-life of Colorado and the Nation,” President Armstrong explained.

“I am honored to be part of Colorado Christian University,” Senator Andrews said. “Like CCU, I am committed to defending the permanent things – the timeless political principles of the American founding, together with the moral and spiritual truths of our Judeo-Christian heritage.”

Senator Andrews, who now writes a column for the Denver Post and hosts a weekly radio program on KNUS (710), was a state senator from 1998 to 2005, serving until term limited under the Colorado constitution. First as Minority Leader and then as Senate President, he earned national recognition from the American Legislative Exchange Council which recognized him as National Legislator of the Year. His tireless efforts to protect American families earned praise from the Rocky Mountain Family Council while the Colorado Union of Taxpayers saluted him for exceptional efforts to prevent state tax increases.

Among his legislative achievements were bills cutting the Colorado capital gains tax, providing toll lanes to curb traffic congestion, outlining a statewide water policy and the School Sunshine Act and Colorado’s Defense of Marriage Act. He also played an important role in legislation to establish education vouchers, tort reform, expanding charter schools and requiring parental notification when a minor seeks an abortion.

Senator Andrews was the founder of the State’s foremost conservative think tank, The Independence Institute and was its president from 1985 – 1993.

John was born in Michigan and grew up in the Colorado Mountains. He served as a U.S. Navy submarine officer after graduating from Principia College in 1966. John and his wife Donna have three grown children and a grandson, all living in the Denver area. Senator and Mrs. Andrews are members of Greenwood Community Church.

Manual shows up the bureaucrats

There is lots of demand these days for government to “create” results. But policies pandering to that are misguided. Whether it's jobs, health care, or even successful schools, the idea that people in government, no matter how talented, well-meaning, and well-funded can create sound, sustainable, scalable improvement in the lives of Americans has been proven wrong time and time again. Our government’s attempt to “create” financial security for seniors instead created a Social Security system racing towards bankruptcy. A sustained attempt to “create” widespread homeownership – a bipartisan folly to be sure – instead destroyed the world’s greatest financial institutions. And, public school systems – an attempt to “create” a well-educated public – is a national catastrophe and disgrace, depriving particularly our most disadvantaged children of the opportunities everyone deserves.

That government policies and programs cannot create these things on their own should not be discouraging. Americans can have them, but they must be created through the initiative, motivation, and ingenuity of Americans themselves. What government policy can and should do is remove barriers to success created by government itself – establishing an environment where progress, rather than frustration, is a natural result.

This morning I visited Manual High School in Denver. Manual is an inner-city high school serving a challenged community – more than 80% of the students qualify for free and reduced-price lunches. Nearly the entire student body is composed of minority children. In 2006, the school was closed for chronic failure – only 15% of students were proficient in reading. The school reopened in 2007 under an “autonomy” arrangement that provided new principal Rob Stein with relief from a handful of union and district rules including those regarding school schedules, hiring processes, and teacher compensation. Also, the school board reached an agreement with Stein to permit him to make key budgeting decisions at the school level rather than at the district level.

Stein describes himself as a “culture guy,” and he took advantage of the unusual autonomy to assemble a highly motivated staff and create a school culture of accountability and professionalism. At a twice-weekly school-wide meeting, the school-polo-shirt clad kids hear colleagues who’ve excelled or contributed in the past week receive ”shout-out” recognition (in one case accompanied by a $5 Burger King gift card); and at the same meeting noting that all seventy-one students who had been tardy during the week were required to attend detention that Friday evening. During “advisory,” small group classes meeting three times per week, the students follow a curriculum of social and life skills (e.g., constructive ways to deal with confrontation) – many of which kids from more privileged backgrounds may learn from their parents.

Today, Manual is tied for fourth-best-performing non-charter high school in the Denver Public Schools. It’s easy to imagine a well-intentioned “reformer” drawing the wrong conclusions from the Manual experience. “Let’s require shout-outs and logo polo shirts in all of the schools,” they might say, “and we can improve like Manual.” That would, of course, be missing the point. The terrific progress at Manual was not born of the particular tactics Stein employs, but of the autonomy that has permitted Stein and his dedicated team to implement their own innovative approach to serving the unique needs of children in Manual’s community.

By freeing the Manual team of district and union red tape, the autonomy agreements did not create success – that’s not possible to do from headquarters – but created the circumstances where success could flourish on its own. Freedom to succeed – that’s what American’s need in this challenging time.