California kicks the can (again)

You have to love the politicians in Sacramento -- maybe not as embarrassing as those in Congress but pretty darn close! As I've written previously, the state has been in a fiscal mess of its own making, issuing high-interest IOUs in lieu of cash. Its just the latest annual budget fiasco in a state that spends more than it takes in -- in part because it gets over half its tax base from a tiny percentage of its richest residents whose incomes don't stay steady. Add to that an annual "cost of living increase" baked into the state's huge employee and pension contracts (regardless of annual revenue) and you have the kind of deficit spending that government is so good at. Now news comes tonight that the state has -- at least according to the questionable standards of the  San Jose Mercury News -- made a Budget Breakthrough solves California's long fiscal nightmare. Only it hasn't "solved" anything -- other than the current fiscal problems. What it didn't do is come to any kind of structural or long-term solution:

The deal would include Democratic concessions of more than $14 billion in program cuts — hitting the poor, children, the elderly and disabled while avoiding outright elimination of the state's welfare-to-work CalWORKS program and the Healthy Families health insurance program for children.Though they failed to get permanent reductions in welfare programs, Schwarzenegger and Republican legislators were able to uphold their vow of no new taxes with a series of accounting shifts and an enforced "loan" of nearly $4 billion from local governments.

Those accounting tricks include accelerating income tax withholdings from residents' paychecks by 10 percent,effectively shifting millions of next year's revenues into this year's budget, and delaying state workers' June 30, 2010 paychecks by one day — and thus, into next fiscal year.

From the beginning, Democrats had little hope that they could win approval of tax increases, though they proposed popular measures such as $2 billion in taxes on oil companies, alcohol and tobacco sales and the closing of numerous corporate loopholes.

Although they represent barely more than one-third of either the Senate or the Assembly, Republicans have near-veto power over the proceedings, thanks to the constitutional requirement of a two-thirds vote for budgets and taxes.

Despite an ardent lobbying effort, cities and counties likely will take a major hit, with the state poised to borrow nearly $4 billion in revenues from property taxes and gas taxes. Critics say that will result in a devastating impact on local services.

Only in California, then, can you fail to make any headway on the longer-term issue of out-of-control spending and a shrinking revenue base while solving the problem with accounting gimmicks -- and call it a "success".  What the state has done is simply to kick the can down the road yet again, so that next year it will have to go through this all over again. Now that's what I call inspired political leadership!

What do you expect from a legislature that is bought and paid for by the unions and special interests, and a governor who talks tough but doesn't really have the stomach (or principle) for the kind of show down that might have really fixed this problem once and for all?  Creative accounting followed by a huge passing of the buck to local governments, which will now have to make the tough choices that Sacramento didn't have the courage to make.

And we now are going to give health care to Washington? Are we completely nuts?

When kindness is against the law

[T]he fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such there is no law.- St. Paul In the face of domination of the world by the Roman Empire, the most energetic of the Christian apostles asserted that moral virtue was still lawful. Of course, Paul knew that virtues were not widely practiced or held in high regard. Are virtues any more safe to practice now than they were two millenia ago?

This question may strike some as perverse, for are we not living in a society, as Abraham Lincoln once said, "conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty than any of which the history of former times tells us[?]" And are we not committed to caring for the less fortunate through vast government programs?

It is true that, while the tribulations of the human condition are not absent in our country, the daily practice of the virtues by millions of people–in families, at work and play, in government and the private sector–make self government not only possible but eminently desirable.

But no blessing can be taken for granted. Virtuous living, like any other great and good thing, requires practice and even habituation. Are there any threats here and now to the continuing beneficial effects of human virtue in our midst?

Let’s focus on the virtue of kindness. Some years back, genuine concern was expressed about the utter lack of kindness implicit in the random acts of violence too often committed in our inner cities, college campuses, places of business and governmental offices. The not entirely playful response by some was to urge everyone to engage in random acts of kindness instead.

No doubt the suggestion was well meant. But a moment’s reflection makes it clear that violence can be discouraged much more by habitual acts of kindness. In a well-governed political community such as ours, it is no accident that people tend to be kinder to each other than in tyrannical regimes in which the rulers treat their subjects as if they were a lower order of being.

Indeed, when slavery was legal in America, even the most benevolent slave master was free to indulge his whims. Thomas Jefferson, a slave master himself, wrote, "The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other."

Classical philosophy and Christianity both teach that friendship is the cement that holds societies together. The Greek philosopher Aristotle observed that democratic societies, which are based on the principle of equality, are more conducive to friendship than any other. Jesus taught us where we can to make friends out of enemies.

Those of us living today, as Lincoln observed in 1838, "toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of [these fundamental blessings]." As in antebellum days, so in ours, we have the obligation to pass moral virtue on to our descendants.

The most fundamental threat to the lawfulness of the most gracious virtues lies in widespread rejection of what Jefferson called "the moral law.". Clearly, portrayal of gratuitous sex and violence in the popular arts does not teach kindness. For if other persons are merely the objects of one’s unbridled will, no kindness will be shown except by accident or cold calculation.

The rebel, the person with "an attitude," has been glorified in movies and television for years. More, the Constitution and laws of the country have been perverted by the special protections that have been carved out for anyone who does as he pleases with no regard for the rights of others. We are enjoined by elites to be kind to such obnoxious persons rather than expecting them to be kind to us.

The massive government programs that take the responsibility of caring for the needy from families, friends and neighborhoods and assign it to impersonal bureaucracies have made kindness almost unnecessary. Kindness depends on reciprocity as well as good intentions, for people more freely come to the aid of others when they know that, if circumstances were reversed, they could count on that aid. In fact, we are coerced into being compassionate by the law. Is that kind?

There is no law against kindness or the other virtues, but we are living on the edge, so to speak, pushing matters to such an extreme that, as Alfie was inclined to believe in the popular song of that name, "only fools are kind" and "it is wise to be cruel."

How Ritter got my vote

John's Denver Post column 7/19(Salida – Nov. 15, 2010) What a year it’s been. Who knew my fellow Republicans would be so unforgiving? Here I am, exiled from Denver’s red suburbs and hiding out in Ed Quillen’s attic, merely for having endorsed Gov. Bill Ritter in the recent election. Where’s the sin in that? It was an unusual move for unusual times. Since the fall of the economy and the rise of Obama, ours have been unusual indeed. Ritter “grew in office,” as they say, but he grew rightward and became that rarity, an irresistible Democrat. Smitten, I signed up. The family disowning me was harsh.

Our governor’s reinvention of himself began in late 2009. Democrats everywhere were getting panicky as the recession dragged on, prolonged by Obama’s clumsy mixture of taxes, regulations, bureaucracy, and bailouts. Republicans won the governor’s races in Virginia and New Jersey. Ritter’s poll numbers and fundraising were anemic. He fled the state, ostensibly for some golf at Hilton Head.

Then came the confessional press conference. Boy Scout Bill wasn’t vacationing in South Carolina after all. He had followed his heart to Chile. Stolen hours at the mansion with an old college econ book had nerved him for the secret weekend in Santiago, tutoring with Chicago-trained free marketeers. “My soul mate is Milton Friedman,” he gushed. The YouTube video got a million hits in 48 hours.

Statehouse reaction was mixed. Adam Schrager of 9News said Ritter’s rift with the White House made him the new Ralph Carr, a profile in courage. GOP chairman Dick Wadhams voiced suspicion, but admitted he’d prefer a Ritter roaming right to a Schwarzenegger lurching left. Speaker Terrance Carroll, an ordained minister, offered the governor pastoral counseling.

But as the 2010 session began, legislators had their hands full with what Ritter called his “New Democratic agenda on old Democratic principles.” He called for a zero corporate tax to attract jobs, a rollback of the unpopular 2009 vehicle fees, and a drilling-friendly rewrite of oil and gas rules. Dems should take their cue from the frugal Grover Cleveland, the tax-cutting JFK, and the deregulating Jimmy Carter, the governor said.

The ex-president was furious, however, when Ritter remarked on “Meet the Press” that Carter’s warning about “inordinate fear of communism” was off base. “My party’s much bigger problem, including the current president,” asserted Ritter, “has been inordinate fear of capitalism. I’m out to change that.” The Coloradan’s popularity shot up when the Georgian angrily counter-attacked.

“Our QB calls his own plays,” boasted a Ritter campaign ad after he rescinded the executive order for labor unions in state government, redirected money from Planned Parenthood to crisis pregnancy centers, and urged voters to toss four activist justices off the state Supreme Court. New York Mayor Robert Wagner, who once ran for another term on a reform platform against his own previous term, had nothing on our Bill.

Is it any wonder some of us Republicans decided this fearless troublemaker was worth reelecting, if only to bedevil Obama, Huey Long-style? Ritter was on a roll. He put Bill Owens and Hank Brown on an economic recovery board with Charlie Ergen and Norm Brownstein. He named Lt. Gov. Barbara O’Brien his school voucher czar and replaced her on the ticket with GOP Rep. Amy Stephens, whom he called “Sarah Palin South.”

Politically written off not long ago, the Democratic incumbent led as election day approached, bucking a national trend of revulsion against his party that looked to rival 1994. At the end, though, Ritter’s better-funded and more credibly conservative Republican challenger surged past him, and Colorado went red again.

Tough luck for our gamecock Guv, but no great heartbreak for me. This was one election where good ideas couldn’t lose. Can I come home now, honey?

Fighting for the American dream

Slated on Backbone Radio, July 19 Listen every Sunday, 5-8pm on 710 KNUS, Denver... 1460 KZNT, Colorado Springs... and streaming live at 710knus.com.

One of the very few things I have in common with President Obama is that we've both met Samuel Wurzelbacher and found him an outspoken, common-sense guy. But it's safe to say I enjoyed the experience in June more than Barack did last October -- since this is the guy whom America knew within hours as Joe the Plumber, a huge headache to the Democratic candidate from then to election day. Did Samuel, or Joe, make Obama boast about "spreading the wealth around" with new taxes and giveaways? No, the candidate did that on his own, and since being inaugurated he's been true to form. So has Wurzelbacher, who spoke in Colorado last month and will talk with our listeners this Sunday.

** Joe the Plumber joins me on Backbone Radio to talk about his book, "Fighting for the American Dream," and his adventures since that fateful day on the ropeline in Ohio.

** Plus Scott McInnis, former congressman who is seen as the man to beat in next year's Republican primary for Governor of Colorado.

** Plus economist Paul Prentice of UCCS and the Centennial Institute, spelling out the moral case for capitalism over command & control economics.

** Plus Gary Marx on this week's battle over a Supreme Court seat in DC, along with Bill Banta and Matt Arnold on next year's battle over four of them in Colorado.

Funny thing about the American dream; it doesn't come by dreaming. It comes by working, preparing, sacrificing, daring -- and sometimes, yes, by fighting. That's where the backbone comes in. What a great time to be alive!

Yours for the plumbing that flushes liberalism, JOHN ANDREWS

Judicial Reform: Hear the Podcast

Learn about practical remedies for our often-unaccountable judiciary when you listen to "Under the Dome," my issue special for July, podcast on this site and airing 7/16 at 7pm on 710 KNUS and streaming live at 710knus.com. Click this link to hear the podcast.

Why do most Colorado judges routinely win another term from the voters, even though many people worry that our courts are out of control? What’s different about next year’s round of judicial retention elections from anything we’ve seen before? How can all of us do our part toward improving the state Supreme Court?

"Under the Dome: Judicial Reform 2010" looks at the answers. It's my conversation with attorney and constitutional scholar Bill Banta, a former member of the State Judicial Performance Commission and long active in the Colorado Bar Association, along with citizen activist Matt Arnold, campaign chairman for a group called Clear the Bench Colorado.