As a former National Security Emergency Preparedness Liaison Officer-EPLO-for Arizona in the 1990s I have been perplexed at the lack of concern about a potentially very dangerous phenomena–EMP or Electromagnetic Pulse. It would be relatively easy for a simple small nuclear device to be detonated over some part of the United States that would cause this phenomena and that could disable virtually all electronic equipment which contain microprocessors. In today’s world this means the vast majority of motors, engines, cars, buses, computers, and……electric utility transformers. Imagine instantly losing power and communication. Then imagine the related food shortages and panic that would ensue.
What are we doing about this threat? Virtually nothing. Senator Jon Kyl was one of the most prominent politicians to take a strong stand and now the leader of this effort is Congressman Trent Franks. Franks is the most prominent advocate in the United States, maybe in the world, for an aggressive approach to addressing this problem. He speaks at international conferences on the subject and has introduced a bill in congress called the SHEILD act. It has several provisions but, significantly, it would encourage electrical generating utilities to insulate their transformers against this threat.
Because some other countries are already taking steps to address this problem; and because the need for electricity and electronic equipment is more critical every day; and because Arizona has one of the most outspoken leaders in the world on this subject; Arizona should take the lead. We all should thank Congressman Franks for staying on top of this issue and we should ask our utility companies and their regulator, the Arizona Corporation Commission, to present a plan for minimizing this threat to Arizona citizens.
With all the clamoring for Obama to give us a strategy for stopping ISIS I wonder why none of the critics are offering suggestions for what that strategy should be.
Justice Sandra O’Connor is wrong in her Sep 7 Arizona Republic editorial “Strength of our democracy relies on individuals turning out to vote” when she states that “It is essential that all citizens vote.” She seems to forget that governments are formed to protect liberty and that this is their only legitimate role. We should not encourage citizens to vote who want government to perform improper roles such as wealth transfer, or running the health care system, or running the education system, or preventing people from working by licensing laws, or enacting job killing measures like minimum wage laws, or any of the other innumerable improper functions that some people will use the voting process to promote.
Justice O’Connor starts out on the right track in her editorial when she emphasizes the “importance of every citizen’s right to vote” but she starts to get off the track when she claims that voting “is not just a right but a civic duty.” It is illogical to encourage people to vote who are not voting to enhance and further the proper functions of government.
Why did Barack Obama win? The answer is fairly simple: It is hard to vote against Santa Claus. Both political parties steal lots of stuff through taxation and regulation and then use that stuff to bribe voters to vote for their candidates. Democrats are just willing to steal more stuff to give away than the Republicans. That is why Alexander Tytler said over 200 years ago that Democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury.
This year we get another “opportunity” to vote on legislative pay. Whenever legislative pay is discussed you hear arguments like “The low pay and huge time commitments of serving as a state lawmaker keep many people from running for the Legislature.” Conventional wisdom says working more hours is better and being paid more is better but, with respect to legislative pay, conventional wisdom is wrong. We shouldn’t want our legislators to work more. We already have too many laws. Why would we want to do anything that would tend to make legislators work longer hours?
You will also hear comments with respect to the pay issue like “you get what you pay for.” The people making these comments are often the people who, at the same time, will talk about legislators as public servants. Where is the “public service” if all we are getting is “what we pay for?” Will Rogers told us years ago, “you ought to be glad you don’t get all the government you pay for.” As point of comparison, there are hundreds of Arizona citizens who volunteer countless hours on boards and commissions, all without any pay, except for expenses such as mileage reimbursement. This is far less than the per diem which Arizona legislators get……in addition to their salary. And, if you divide the length of the legislative session (the goal is 100 days and many of these days are not full days) by the current yearly salary of $24,000, you get a daily compensation of $240 (plus expenses). How many Arizona taxpayers earn that much?
Another argument you will hear is the concern about all the people who can’t afford to serve because the pay is too low. We do not need every person in Arizona to serve in the legislature. We only need 90 people. The rest of us (Arizona’s four million adults minus the 90 legislators) have to work at regular jobs to make a living and pay taxes. Besides, we don’t want legislating to be a “career.” We want people to serve a short time and then rejoin the ranks of ordinary citizens.
As someone who has been active in politics for many years, I respond to the “good people can’t run” notion by asking anyone who uses this phrase to cite one legislative race where there were an insufficient number of candidates and the problem was the low pay. I have yet to have anyone come up with a single race. Furthermore, no matter what pay level you set, there will always be those who earn so much above that amount that it will be economically foolish for them to give up their day job. And it probably would also not be good for the rest of society if these people gave up their day jobs because, the fact that they are so highly compensated, probably means that they are very productive. Why should we want them to give up that productivity if there are others who will serve? An alternate approach to this dilemma would be to have the legislature meet at night and on weekends so more people could serve as legislators. That would also allow more regular working citizens to participate in the process.
The supporting comments you always see that advocate higher pay frequently come from lobbyists attempting to curry favor from legislators and from people who like big government and who want to generate more jobs and higher-paying jobs in government. If legislators are paid more, then they will likely work more, which means they will probably pass more laws, which will cause government agencies to employ more people. It will also likely mean that other government employees will be paid more. It is a vicious cycle that is counterproductive to the cause of liberty. Actually what we should do is reduce the pay to where we cover only their expenses. It will reduce the amount of legislation to only the amount we really need and will result in legislators truly being—–public servants.
The easiest and simplest answer to the question of why government programs are wasteful and inefficient, and often corrupt, is to observe that people take care of their own stuff better than they do someone else’s stuff. (Has anyone ever washed a rental car?) Examples close to home that I have witnessed over the last several years involve various construction projects at Encanto Park. The most recent one is remodeling the rest rooms. This is a project that should take a private owner a couple of weeks at the most. But this remodeling at Encanto Park has been under construction for several months. During a recent walk through the Park I stopped to ask the private contractor foreman about this and, not surprisingly, he said that the reason for the many delays is the micromanagement of the Park employees and the number of changes they frequently make in the plans. This foreman confessed that these delays were so embarrassing to him that he was thinking of taking down his company’s sign on the project to preserve his reputation.
Another example at Encanto Park is the fencing that was recently put up around perimeter. This took over two years and was a job that should have taken a month at the most. Again, a lack of proper incentives is the reason. No Park employees lose their jobs over such delays and I am sure that some event get rewarded for coming up with clever ideas of changes that need to be made while construction is underway. The taxpayers have to foot the bill for these changes. This kind of behavior is what produced the famous saying “There is no end to amount of good you can do when you are spending someone else’s money.” Maybe it is time to privatize park management.
If anyone still wonders whether we can trust our government, I would recommend watching the PBS Frontline special “United States of Secrets.” It covers the actions of the NSA in spying on Americans (all Americans, not just suspected criminals or terrorists) and reveals in great detail the lying and deceiving that our government officials will engage in to keep the details of this secret surveillance from the people. Because this deception is carried on by some elected officials, including members of Congress and US Presidents, there is nowhere we can turn for relief, except whistleblowers like Edward Snowden. Because of the revelations in this PBS series I have chosen to elevate Snowden to the status of hero in my own mind, certainly not traitor, as some right wingers would have us believe.
Remember, we live under a government that was established by our founders with checks and balances so that no government official could gain too much power. But, if it is impossible to find out what our government is doing, and if the highest government officials will lie when confronted with accusations or questions, then these checks and balances cannot work.
Lately we have been hearing a lot about seeking public input for one of three possible routes for the proposed train between Phoenix and Tucson. These invitations are deceitful and disingenuous. First, they make it seem that the train is coming and we just need to determine the route. Second, there is no mention of seeking input regarding whether the train should be funded at all. This a very deceptive strategy. I once served on the Arizona Department of Transportation Technical Advisory Committee and I have been very active in transportation policy issues for over 40 years. In my opinion, if this train is funded, it will be the most extravagant and wasteful government boondoggle in the history of Arizona; costing several billion dollars. It will make the billions we are wasting on light rail seem like conservative investments.
Heavy rail passenger construction in Arizona makes absolutely no economic sense. Arizona citizens should put a stake through the heart of this ill-conceived plan now, before it sucks any more of the lifeblood from our economy.
I would like to issue a challenge to Democrats. See if you can find a group of people that are generally thought of as bad and try to disprove my thesis that the majority of people in any such groups would be registered as Democrats (to the extent that they are registered at all). These groups could include fathers who don’t pay their child support, mothers who keep having babies they can’t afford to take care of (often without benefit of marriage), those people who live off the various welfare entitlements while refusing to work, inmates of various incarceration facilities, those who have multiple DUIs on their record, those who have multiple bankruptcies, those who are obese, smokers, those who do not exercise, etc, etc. I would also include those with a large number of tattoos or piercings and other extreme appearance items that make it difficult for them to get a job.
If my thesis is correct it would then be instructive to ask why this is so. The answer seems obvious to me in the simple observation that Democrats generally prefer more government entitlement programs and more government regulations. Republicans are more inclined toward individual responsibility, low taxes, less regulation, and more reliance on private charity to help those in need. It therefore, seems logical to conclude that those people who are the least likely to accept responsibility for their own actions are more likely to be Democrats.
The concept of “man-caused global warming” was replaced a few years ago by just “global warming” when the socialist fear mongers realized that the public was questioning their proposed Orwellian controls on various sources of emissions. Then, when even the general notion of global warming could not be proven, the term “climate change” was substituted. Since the climate has always been changing and always will continue to change, no one could now reasonably dispute this new concept.
But the scare mongers have always wanted the same thing; more government controls on our lives and their use of a term like “climate change” does not disguise their intentions. This strategy is simply a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
roymilleraz 