If Dems prevail, no more voting on taxes

After imposing more than $1 billion a year in tax and fee increases - without once seeking voter approval - liberal Democrats in the Colorado legislature now want voters to permit them to raise taxes without limitation and without ever asking voters again. Can you say, "Oblivious to irony"?

Colorado's constitutional stipulates that taxes cannot be increased without asking the voters. But voters have an annoying habit of saying "no" to big-spending politicians who think their priorities are more important than those of the voters, so in just the past four years Democrats have:

· Increased vehicle licensing taxes by $40-$50 per vehicle per year, plus substantial penalties, and called them "fees" just so they didn't need to ask for voters' permission.

· Increased assorted taxes on Colorado families and businesses by $50 million last year and another $130 million this year, again without ever seeking voters' permission.

· Increased your property taxes by some $150 million this year alone, again without voter approval, calling that scheme the "Colorado Children's Amendment."

Apparently, liberals are betting that voters have a very short memory because, as you may recall, the 2007 Children's Amendment was touted as a "commitment to pre-school programs, full-day kindergarten and local school districts" and as a plan to prevent the State Education Fund from becoming insolvent, according to a press release from Gov. Bill Ritter.

Now, we're told, schools are on the brink of financial catastrophe and, oh by the way, the State Education Fund is broke anyway.

House Concurrent Resolution 1002 asks voters to exempt K-12 education and higher education - which account for 60 percent of state general fund spending - from all constitutional spending limits and from the requirement that tax increases must be approved by the voters.

Because money is fungible, it would eviscerate the last meaningful taxpayer protection in the state constitution.

To be sure, local school districts have had a couple tough budget years. But so has the State of Colorado and so have taxpaying families and businesses.

Despite numerous attempts to shield education from economic reality, the legislature's bag of tricks finally ran out this year along with taxpayers' money. Since voters adopted Amendment 23 ten years ago, in yet another plan to give schools all the money they need, schools have been exempted from the cuts that confronted the rest of the state budget.

Ten years ago, the state spent an average of $5,168 per pupil. In the recently-approved 2010-11 budget, the average is $7,279 - a cumulative increase of 40 percent.

Last year, even after the legislature rescinded $148 per student, schools still received an average increase of more than $200 per student over the previous year.

Despite two recessions in the last decade, per pupil spending has increased each and every year. That doesn't mean that schools haven't experienced increasing costs for health care, for energy and for funding retirement pensions or that the legislature hasn't cut back in other areas. However, these are conditions that businesses and families must manage as well - and they must do so without the power to tax.

Because it seeks to amend the state constitution, HCR 1002 needs a two-thirds majority in both the Colorado House and Senate. It will almost certainly fall short of that goal. However, proponents could put their proposal on the ballot via petition.

Selling it to voters will be an uphill climb, as proponents of Amendment 59 learned in 2008. That proposal, which sought to repeal parts of TABOR and Amendment 23, was far more even-handed, backed by more than $2 million and opposed by less than $50,000. Nonetheless, voters rejected it 54 to 45 percent.

The prospect that voters, whose trust of government is near an alltime low, would reward the tax hikers with even more power to tax is a longshot.

That liberal Democrats are so tone deaf that they are forging ahead anyway demonstrates their abject isolation from the financial hardships facing ordinary Coloradans.

Hip guy vs. square guy

The choice for Governor of Colorado is showhorse vs. workhorse, hip guy vs. square guy, says John Andrews in the April round of Head On TV debates. And he notes that Scott McInnis, the square Republican, leads cool Democrat John Hickenlooper in the polls. But Susan Barnes-Gelt scoffs that McInnis has a mistaken-prone style as well as baggage on his resume. John on the right, Susan on the left, also go at it this month over Obama's nuclear policy, the Catholic sex scandals, the financial reform bill, and Tea Party influence in Colorado's US Senate race. Head On has been a daily feature on Colorado Public Television since 1997. Here are all five scripts for April: 1. HIP vs. SQUARE IN GOVERNOR’S RACE

Susan: Scott McInnis's refusal to release his tax returns is big blunder. What does he have to hide from Colorado voters in November's gubernatorial election? Hickenlooper is a rich guy and not afraid to release his financial records. McInnis is not the kind of leader Coloradans can trust.

John: The choice for governor is between a Democratic showhorse and a Republican workhorse. The financial strip search is an irrelevant media stunt. Colorado is hurting. We need jobs and economic growth. Gov. Ritter and Mayor Hickenlooper have flunked that test. Scott McInnis will get government out of the way. That’s why he’s leading.

Susan: Other than employing his wife as part of a defunct congressional campaign, just how many jobs has McInnis created? Perhaps a few to make the signs when he named 123,400 acres in Mesa County the McInnis Canyons National Conservation Area. He is a career politician - period, the end.

John: After just three years, Bill Ritter was thrown by the bucking horse that is Colorado’s governorship. Who will voters put in the saddle next? The hip candidate is Democrat John Hickenlooper, a former brewmeister from Lodo. The square candidate is Republican Scott McInnis, a former cop from Glenwood. Polling favors McInnis.

2. OBAMA’S NUCLEAR POLICY

In refusing to use nuclear weapons to defend our country against chemical and biological attacks, President Obama endangers all Americans and invites our enemies to do their worst. We’ve never had a president so committed to deliberate weakness in defending the United States of America. FDR and JFK would be horrified.

Susan: Puh -leese John - The biggest risk to our security is stateless terrorism and cyber war. Nuclear arsenals were an issue 60 years ago and certainly served as deterrents. In today's world, nuclear disarmament among legitimate governments makes sense. FDR & JFK would be proud.

John: Disarmament has never worked and never will. Presidents of both parties understood that overwhelming military strength is the best way to prevent and win wars, until the time of Jimmy Carter, Mr. Weakness. Now we have Mr. Apology, Barack Obama, taking weakness even further. God help this country.

Susan: The new policy is both revocable and subject to review and modification if circumstances warrant. The recent summit of 47 nations to deal with nuclear risks advanced global cooperation. Any nation that attacks us with biological or chemical weapons can count on a rendezvous with their stone-age ancestors.

3. CATHOLIC SEX SCANDALS

John: Sexual molestation of a child by an adult cannot be tolerated by any organization under any circumstances. School systems, youth agencies, and religious institutions have all fallen short of this standard. The Catholic Church, to name one, has been far too lax in the past. But since the 1980s it has improved vastly.

Susan: The Catholic Church has been lax in coming to grips with sexual abuse of a child by an adult - throughout its history. For the Pope to believe that acknowledging the "church has been wounded by its sins" is an insult. The church is facing its biggest institutional crisis in centuries.

John: Anti-religious critics apply a dishonest double standard in their eagerness to discredit Christianity. Here in Denver the Catholic archbishop instantly suspended an accused priest, at the same time teacher unions were stonewalling a policy to notify parents if a public school employee is arrested. What hypocrisy.

Susan: The issue is one of the richest and most powerful world institutions consistently abusing basic principles of trust and then protecting the violators. Because of the worldwide stature and moral authority of the Catholic Church, the crime and hypocrisy rises to a higher level. All politics is NOT local.

4. SENATE PRIMARIES

Susan: The decisions by Dem incumbent senator Michael Bennet and Republican challenger Jane Norton to pursue the signature route to qualify for the August primary reveal the weakness of both with the base of their parties. Neither Norton nor incumbent Bennet appeals to their party's base.

John: On April 15, Tax Day, thousands of us protested at the State Capitol against big oceans of debt engulfing our grandchildren, government out of control. Democrat Senate candidates Bennet and Romanoff don’t get that. A Republican victory for Jane Norton, Ken Buck, or Tom Wiens will depend on capturing that Tea Party spirit.

Susan: The typical tea partier? a well-to-do, educated, older, white male. The movement threatens the Republican Party. Fiscal conservatism is one thing - mean spirited, libertarian populism is another. Want to build your own roads? Deploy your own fire department? Have a tea bag.

John: Susan, Susan, jealousy does not become you. The Tea Party is ordinary Americans pushing back against big government. When liberals tried to start a Coffee Party, it flopped. As far as Colorado’s next senator, it will not be Bennet the empty suit or Romanoff the labor guy. This one’s going Republican.

5. BANKING REFORM

Susan: Watching Mitch McConnell call banking reform a recipe for bailouts, challenges reality. McConnell has raised $2.7 million from Wall Street and his colleagues on the Senate Banking Committee have collectively raised more than $12.5 Million & House R's,, nearly $11 million. Nearly $25 Million - just thru March!

John: The financial crisis of 2008 and the recession since then were mainly caused by government itself, sending false signals to borrowers and lenders until the crash came. The worst culprits were the wildly corrupt Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, which aren’t even addressed in Obama’s financial reform bill. It’s a dud.

Susan: And the tooth fairy left a million bucks under my pillow. Financial deregulation began with Clinton and went on steroids with Bush and resulted in financial meltdown. The antics at Goldman Sachs illustrates that government intervention is essential in the face of unregulated trading favoring rich insiders.

John: The insider money machine better known as Government Sachs gets no sympathy from me. But there’s a bad smell about their cozy relationship with Obama’s campaign fund, Obama’s personal lawyer, Obama’s SEC board, and Sen. Dodd’s legislation. This is a Chicago-style power play that deserves to fail.

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US weak on purpose: Why?

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In the 1930s Franklin Roosevelt realized that U.S. leadership and power were the indispensable elements in any acceptable world order and with extraordinary skill and courage overcame the forces of isolationism in his own country and moved America to the forefront of the titanic struggle against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. Ever since then the United States has accepted its role as the world’s principal champion of freedom and chief guarantor of international stability. In pursuing this mission the United States has made many mistakes both large and small, but any credible historical analysis recognizes that on balance America has been the world’s greatest force for good throughout the period in question.

There is however an alternative narrative originating in the left wing of the American and European political spectrum first coming to prominence in the Vietnam Era that sees the mistakes as far outweighing the good, and regarding the exercise of American power as a negative rather than a positive force in world affairs.

For forty years this alternative narrative has been essentially a minority viewpoint able to carp and criticize but only rarely able to dominate the main thrust of American foreign policy. In the last fifteen months however this minority viewpoint has become the reigning orthodoxy of the regime now dominating both the Executive and Legislative branches of American government. Accordingly this ruling majority has boldly moved to reshape American foreign policy in ways consonant with its long held world view.

Evidence steadily mounts that the broad theme of the New American Foreign Policy is best described as “Abuse your Friends, while Kow-Towing to your Enemies”. A major corollary of this policy is that America makes concessions to its enemies in return for nothing, while demanding that our friends also grant concessions to their enemies in return for nothing. A further theme is making serial apologies for imagined American arrogance and misuse of power while blithely ignoring the very real transgressions of our enemies.

The background music to all of this is endless talk from an Administration that believes no world problem is so great that it cannot be solved by yet one more speech by President Obama.

For some specifics in this indictment, let us first look at how we have been treating our friends.

Poland and the Czech Republic- After both at considerable risk to themselves agreed to SDI installations on their soil despite Russian bluster and bullying, the U.S. on the flimsiest excuse abruptly cancelled the whole project.

Israel - While West Bank settlement freezes have never been a precondition of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, on Day One the Obama Administration made that demand, while asking no similar up front concession from the Palestinians. When Netanyahu refused what no Israeli Prime Minister could agree to, the U.S. began a serial campaign of very public sulking and petulant verbal abuse of our only ally in the volatile Middle East while at the same time signaling clearly that regarding the existential threat from Iran the only U.S. support for Israel would be empty rhetoric.

Iraq- The leaders of this fledgling democracy and their enemies see very clearly that the overriding imperative of the new Democratic Administration is rapid withdrawal. They know that U.S. caveats about “conditions on the ground” and residual “technical advisors” are a very small counterweight to the obsessions of Obama’s political base.

Britain- Secretary Clinton’s public pressure on Britain to open talks with Argentina regarding the Falkland Islands- heretofore a settled matter of international law- was a stunning slap in the face to the one great power that has consistently expended its blood and treasure on foreign battlefields in support of U.S. Troops.

Afghanistan- Brought to power by Americans who valued his inclusiveness President Karzai within the last year has been subjected to a steady barrage of public pressure, threats, and insults regarding corruption, electoral practices, and military performance. Karzai who faces daily risk of assassination because of his association with Americans, must increasingly see the U.S. as a distant power that entered his country without invitation in pursuit of its own interests, suffered far fewer casualties than the Afghan army, and now has loudly announced that its soldiers will begin leaving in July. Like his Iraqi counterparts Karzai regards the Obama administration as of most dubious reliability and cannot be blamed for recognizing that he must deal seriously with those who aren’t leaving i.e. Iran, Pakistan and the Taliban.

In contrast to this back of the hand treatment of our friends, the Obama administration has bent over backwards to be generous to our opponents. Principal examples to date include:

China- Beijing has just said “No” to the U.S. on appreciating their currency, sanctioning Iran, curbing North Korea, reducing carbon emissions, promoting human rights, and moderating unfair trade practices, while undiplomatically giving us blistering lectures on Taiwan arms sales, meeting with the Dalai Lama, and our fiscal policies.

The Obama Administration’s response has been an embarrassingly supine Presidential visit to China, delaying the Treasury report on currency manipulation, disrespecting the Dalai Lama, repeatedly announcing imagined “ signs of progress” ( a great conference call!), and an increasingly obvious willingness to settle for just about anything- however hollow- that could be portrayed as Chinese support for Iran sanctions.

Iran- The mullahs’ unrelenting march to nuclear weapons, brutal suppression of democratic opposition, sponsorship of murderous attacks on Israel, and continuing export of sophisticated weapons to kill American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan has done little to curb the Obama administration’s feckless talk of “outreach” and “engagement” regarding Iran. The endless series of unmet “deadlines” concerning nuclear development does much to justify Teheran’s contemptuous mockery of U.S. resolve.

Russia- Moscow has followed up its victory on SDI by toying with the U.S. regarding Iranian sanctions while continuing to sell Teheran arms and technology for their “peaceful” nuclear projects. Similarly they have disingenuously partnered with China in frustrating U.S. efforts to rein in North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. The real stunner however is Russia’s success in persuading the U.S. to sign a nuclear arms treaty that will have no practical effect on Moscow’s decrepit nuclear arsenal but require significant reductions in American nuclear armaments. This treaty in tandem with the bizarre and baffling public announcement that future U.S. policy bans any use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states even if they attack us with biological or chemical weapons of mass destruction, overturns a fundamental American defense doctrine that for over sixty years has been absolutely central to world peace and stability.

All of the above has greatly emboldened our enemies and certainly encourages them to push their new advantages even harder in the future. Conversely our friends are discouraged and alarmed.

The emerging profile of the new American foreign policy is an amalgam of wrong-headed ideology, naiveté, and incompetence. When added to America’s domestic economic and political disarray, we see a United States weaker than at any time in living memory and most dangerously diminished as a force for international peace and stability. Reversing this deeply disturbing downward spiral will not be easy, and perhaps not even possible.

William Moloney is a Centennial Institute Fellow and former Colorado Education Commissioner. His columns have appeared in the Wall St. Journal, U.S.A. Today, Washington Post, Washington Times, and Philadelphia Inquirer.

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