Vouchers won't fix Utah's schools

Conservatives who believe that free markets are a panacea have recently attempted to use Utah as a guinea pig to prove their point about public schools. Previously, the Republican-controlled Congress did the same for DC, whose ailing public schools are in as bad a shape as Utah's, but for different reasons. The results were underwhelming, to say the least.

Students in the D.C. school voucher program, the first federal initiative to spend taxpayer dollars on private school tuition, generally performed no better on reading and math tests after one year in the program than their peers in public schools, the U.S. Education Department said yesterday.

...[The] only [] exception[] to the conclusion that the program has not yet had a significant impact on achievement: Students who moved from higher-performing public schools to private schools and those who scored well on tests before entering the program performed better in math than their peers who stayed in public school.
[...]
A Republican-led Congress created the $14 million-a-year program in 2004. The five-year initiative provides $7,500 vouchers each year to 1,800 students, from kindergartners to high school seniors, who attend 58 private schools, most of them Catholic schools. ...

... [T]he initiative is one of the few government-run voucher systems in the country. Milwaukee and Ohio have similar plans, and Florida and Arizona offer vouchers to special education students.

In studies of those programs and others funded with private money, researchers tended to find little improvement in test scores after one year, said Paul Peterson, director of Harvard University's program on education policy and governance. He said it takes time for students to adjust to new surroundings.

"Kids lose ground when they change schools. Even if they may be in a better school, they're not going to adjust to that right off the bat," he said. "It doesn't happen overnight. It's a slow process."

That's right the Bush Administration's own Education Department, with NCLB brainchild Margaret Spellings at the helm, says vouchers don't work.

But don't worry, that won't stop Utah Republicans from making dishonest arguments about Vouchers and NCLB.

Utah once challenged No Child Left Behind, threatening to defy the No Child law and forfeit $76 million in federal aid. The Legislature, however, adopted a softer approach, telling state education officials to give precedence to Utah's own assessment standards over federal mandates.
[Scott] Parker [Rep. Rob Bishop's Chief of Staff] says Bishop has been trying to help the state receive waivers from the Department of Education for certain aspects of federal law and to allow Utah to try some pilot programs. But he said the voucher opponents are sending mixed signals by challenging the law.
[state school board chairman Kim] Burningham says Bishop and others are playing politics with the November vote.
''I guess the logic is that the arch conservatives are supporting vouchers nationwide and when we oppose them . . . it therefore weakens other conservative efforts like opposition to No Child Left Behind,'' he said.

NCLB has to do with testing and de-funding schools that underperform. Vouchers are PARTIAL tuition grants for children to go to private (often religious) schools. While an NCLB shut-down/defunded school makes children go elsewhere for their schooling, it has nothing to do with the use of public monies for private schooling. And exemptions to the testing standards has nothing to do with how to use public monies for education. This is just an attempt to confuse the issue.

Good thing our schools are so bad that people might not be able to understand how the Rep. Bishop's of the world are trying to make them worse. I say worse because if you spend more money on something that makes no difference you waste that money that otherwise could have gone to hiring more teachers, better/more teacher training, building more classrooms/schools, buying better/more textbooks, etc.

I think we all can agree that NCLB needs to be massively reformed, if not scrapped altogether. Since states/counties/school districts/schools don't want to lose funding, they have opted to teach to the test and/or make the test easier. Either practice defeats the original purpose of the bill, which was to RAISE standards and make sure our children were being educated properly. Countries like Germany & Japan score much higher on tests for not just math but in virtually every category. Maybe it is time to stop trying to reinvent the wheel and rather try to adapt their practices into the US.

I will give you a hint: they don't use vouchers.

the case for a fourth branch

All this talk about Dick Cheney's ludicrous claim that he is both a member of the executive branch (so he can claim executive privilege for his secret energy meetings with oil and nuclear company executives) and not a member of the executive branch (so he doesn't have to comply to classified document requirements, in case he wants to oh out a covert CIA officer because her husband said true things about the case for the Iraq war) has gotten me thinking about an idea I have been kicking around for a while.

Prior to the 12th Amendment, the Electoral College runner up became Vice President. This was OK when the two men (and until at least 2009 it has always been and will always be two men) agreed on stuff, but was very awkward when they were political rivals (see John Adams vs. Thomas Jefferson). However, without this bitter rivalry, the alien and sedition acts wouldn't have been tested so early. In an age that is just as partisan and nasty as it was then (1990-2000s=1790s-1800s) I think this time it will actually work. This is especially true if the VP was to not be the president of the Senate (a default job the constitutional drafters gave him since they had no clue what to do with the VP) but rather, the head of the Justice Department.

The first attorney general was like Alberto Gonzales, aka just the president's lawyer, at first. However Edmund Randolph quickly saw that he needed to be able to intervene in cases on behalf of the US, not the president. Only one justice at the time agreed with him, James Iredell. Today, the Justice Department has grown far beyond Randolph's desk and now employs thousands of prosecutors & investigators, with broad powers.

Imagine if Bush had gotten the White House in 2000...but Al Gore was made VP/AG with a separate constitutional office and powers of his own. This would have likely prevented many of the scandals you see today, or at least drawn them out into the light of day much sooner before they became cancerous on the Administration. Such a fourth branch would have the power to check into wrongdoing not only of the executive branch, but also of the legislative branch. This also would have obviously prevented the US Attorney scandal since a bootlicker like Alberto Gonzales never would have gotten the second most electoral votes.

The current VP office can be as powerful as junior president for someone like Dick Cheney, or "not worth a bucket of warm piss" for someone like John Nance Garner. The voters don't know what power/role the president will give his vice president, which leaves the office either with little political influence or Dante's political purgatory from which they can run for the presidency or vanish into the night.

The American people deserve an independent Justice Department, and the only guarantee for that is my plan, given human nature. Americans deserve a VP who is ready to take over for the president should something terrible happen, and one who will be wholly independent of the Congress and the President.

Under the current system, someone like Cheney can create a secret shadow government, which can order civilian planes shot down (like he did on 9/11 with Lynne Cheney, and without George W. Bush) and who knows what else. After all, he doesn't want us to know.

But if we had a true fourth branch, which was separately elected from the President and Congress, we would ensure that partisanship does not go awry. After all, if the AG/VP started to investigate members of Congress/the White House for no reason, he could always be defunded/impeached.

important stuff

It seems these days lame duck executives are twiddling the time on really critical matters like these:

By Executive Order, Crocs Aren't Chic
By Robin Givhan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 22, 2007; Page C01
Crocs have been given the presidential seal of approval but this is not necessarily a good thing.
George W. Bush was photographed recently in a pair of black Crocs -- Cayman style, $29.99 -- as he was heading out from the White House to ride his bike.

(Photo Credit: Ron Sachs via Bloomberg News Photo)
OK well maybe that was unfair to Mr. 26%, all he did was wear them. Let's beat up on Rocky instead (a favorite past time of mine)

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson hopes to make his fight against water bottles a national battle.
Anderson, along with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak, will sponsor a resolution today at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Los Angeles calling for a study on the impact of bottled water on cities' budgets and waste-disposal systems.

Why so we can say that bottled water hurts the environment by contributing to global warming and polution? Any idiot can figure that out. Why don't we do a study to measure how many people Rocky has managed treat like crap (including and excluding staff)?

But as the race to replace him rages on and his days in office wane, Anderson isn't worried about being treated like a lame duck.
"I don't think it could get much worse with this council," he said. "They're very slow and very indecisive. I hate to paint with a broad brush, but the majority of the council have been extremely difficult to move toward the kinds of improvements that I think ought to be embraced in this community."
Anderson has created a list of about 100 priorities he hopes to accomplish before he leaves office. He wants to start a Sunday Farmers Market at the city's west-side Jordan Park, complete the Grant Tower rail realignment and replace the light bulbs in all city-run buildings with more efficient types. He also has broader aims, which include explaining to the general public ways to combat global warming.

I would just like to point out that the one guy he endorsed is in fifth place. The man is not popular and that is why he could not win unless it was Dave Buhler vs. someone else conservative...and that won't happen. Either Jenny Wilson or Ralph Becker will make it through to the next round, or both.

If that happens, it will be an embarrassment of riches.

if you can't beat 'em make 'em join you

The old "kicked upstairs" routine. The two Board of Education attorneys that but the law above party are going to probably sucked into the vortex of the Attorney General's office, where I am sure they will have horrible jobs.

The Attorney General's Office is set to weigh whether to bring into its ranks two lawyers working at the State Office of Education who went against its opinion when the school voucher ballot question was before the Utah Supreme Court earlier this month.

Deputy Attorney General Ray Hintze on Wednesday said one of his first assignments in 2001 was to rein in "illegal in-house counsel" at state agencies by making them part of the Attorney General's Office, a move he said was supported by then-Gov. Mike Leavitt.
[...]
"We left these two (attorneys) in place thinking it was a workable situation, and until this issue came up, it has worked very well," Hintze told the legislative Education Interim Committee Wednesday.

Remember, that was the committee hearing where the Board of Education's attorney's said they wouldn't show up to, because they were worried about politicization.

Looks like someone just fired a shot across their bow. Shurtleff's Hintze-man basically told them they were going to sleep with the fishes. That is, be stuck in dead-end jobs AG jobs where no one affiliated with the Utah Republican party would dare hire them.

I don't know about you, but I am tired of the AG using his power like a bully because his power was questions and his judgment was proved false. Mark has egg all over his face but insists on terrorizing a small public agency because he won't admit he was wrong. A bully and a coward, and this man counts as a "rising star" in the Utah GOP.

EXCLUSIVE: Becker's Education proposal

Sources close to Becker for SLC Mayor campaign spoke on condition on anonymity about his education platform and plan.

The plan is a big departure from the current, hands-off approach to schooling that Rocky has made. (Who by the way, realizes his 15 minutes of fame are up and is toying with running again...gag me with a spoon) Here are some of the ideas I like the best:

• Second-Language Proficiency: "by the time every Salt Lake City student is 18 years old, he or she will be able to pass a basic proficiency exam in a second language." This includes not just Sudanese refugees and Mexican kids, but white kids named Jensen. What better way to get a talented workforce ready for a globalized economy than having them proficient in another language? And by the way, it would make missionary language training much easier if one is called to serve in a country that speaks the language you learned in high school. I hope this will mean that not only will the next generation of Utahns know how to speak a language like Spanish, but also languages like Mandarin or Japanese.


• Expanding Excellence in Education ("E3"): E-cubed is based on the idea that schools should not be limited to the knowledge and materials found inside their buildings. Rather, students would be encouraged to participate in "extracurricular learning opportunities" in the form of formal and informal programs with local companies, museums, researchers, etc. The real world is coming soon to a high schooler near you. They need to learn what it will take to make it in the real world without mom and dad's assistance. Maybe one of these programs will inspire a student to go to medical school, architecture school, start a business, become an artist, or dissuade them that working as a mechanic is really going to be great.


• Public-Private Partnerships: "the city will build partnerships with local businesses to help provide opportunities for our children to learn and excel" through grants of money/equipment, as well as employees volunteering. Imagine people who work out at the refinery teaching kids chemistry.

There are several others, like appointing a senior staffer to be the "Ed Czar," monthly meetings with principals and the mayor, city employee engagement, but those are less "sexy" than the other plans in my view.

Anyway, feel free to talk about the merits of these ideas or suggest your own, I am sure Ralph would love to hear them. And it seems his staff read my blog.

Who's the boss

(photo credit: Television Heaven UK)

Remember that crappy 80's sitcom, where it was so funny that a woman could be in charge of men? And that men were stupid (Tony Danza only played characters with the name of "Tony" so he wouldn't get confused) Well it seems to be back in syndication up on Salt Lake's Capitol Hill.

"Although Superintendent (of Public Instruction Patti) Harrington initially may have indicated some availability to attend the Education Interim Committee meeting this coming Wednesday, after due deliberation, I, representing the State Board of Education, respectfully decline to send a representative to that gathering," State Board of Education chairman Kim Burningham wrote in a letter to Education Interim Committee co-chairman Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper.
"It is unclear what role the committee has in relation to what essentially is business to be conducted confidentially, if at all, between the Attorney General and the state board. It is clear, however, that any further politicization of the relationship between the Attorney General and the state board is unwelcome to the board, if not to (Attorney General Mark) Shurtleff, and would be ill-advised in any event."
The letter sent a ripple through legislative leadership Tuesday.
"The State Board of Education cannot refuse to talk to us," said Senate President John L. Valentine, R-Orem, following a meeting Tuesday afternoon of top-level legislative bosses — the Executive Appropriations Committee.

Valentine went to my law school, but he seems to forget attorney client privilege and that his duty is to the people of the state of Utah, not Mark Shurtleff or the executive committee of the Utah Republican Party. [By the way, don't you think it is funny that when they had a choice, they chose a lobbyist? And the lobbyist said that lobbyist are an important part of the GOP coalition?]

Shurtleff was pissed that they didn't follow his advise, claiming they had to. No state agency has to follow the AG's advice, but if they guess wrong and are sued, there will be no immunity. In this case, the state board guessed right, as the Utah Supremes voted unanimously that Shurtleff was completely full of sh!t. But that didn't stop legislators from doing his bidding

After that decision, the education interim committee changed its agenda for today's meeting. The committee had originally planned to discuss the board's decision no to offer vouchers. But a revised agenda released Monday had replaced that item with a discussion of the AG's duties.

All hail partisan hack Mark "Tony Danza" Shurtleff. Who's the boss now, legislature?

Becker gets Ashdown's support

But will it matter? Pete Ashdown got about the same (about 31%) as former State Sen. Scott Howell got in 2000 against Hatch. Pete's walloping was least bad in Salt Lake County, where he got 91,601 votes to Hatch's 109,201. Of course, Salt Lake City is the biggest city in the County and probably the source of the bulk of those 91,601.

But Ralph Becker isn't the only guy with endorsements. Jenny Wilson got Peter Corroon's who actually won Salt Lake County (albeit only the plurality) and will likely win in a landslide reelection next year. All things considered Jenny's endorsement is probably worth more than Ralph's.

people as props

Today's post is on how the media and campaigns use groups of people to make a point and thus to dehumanize them. First up, LDS families:

The Becerras live in Sandy. He is a financial adviser and a stake president who has done voluntary work for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' public affairs department. Because of the latter connection, he got a call from church headquarters asking if he would allow his family to be observed by Sharpton while they held a family home evening.
So the Becerras did what they do every Monday night, or most of them anyway. With Sharpton and his assistants watching, along with an LDS Church official, they sang a hymn and prayed. Daughter Rachael sang a church hymn solo, and Debbie gave a lesson on the Prodigal Son. Sharpton sat quiet until he was asked to read a passage from the Bible.
[...]
Then three weeks later, the church sent another visitor to the Becerra household. This time it was an "NBC Nightly News" crew, headed by reporter Ron Allen. They showed up on a Monday night to observe another family home evening. With cameras rolling and the crew observing, the Becerras sang a hymn and then prayed. Jorge gave a lesson. They ate Popsicles. They played croquet in the yard. The kids, distracted at first by the large TV cameras leaning in for close-up shots, eventually ignored the audience, and it was business as usual.
[...]
After a pause, Jorge [Becerras] added, "We felt like we were under a microscope, but we welcome any interest."
Ready or not, it's coming anyway. CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, Time magazine and newspapers from around the country have all come calling in recent weeks, and more will follow in the months ahead. They all want to know the same thing: What, exactly, is a Mormon?

In both cases, TV cameras, famous African-Americans from New York, and church officials took the "family" out of family home evening, one of the most universally appealing practices of Mormons.

The spectacle makes LDS families seem either like an ants in an ant farm, or nostalgic '50s throwbacks.

Next up, homosexuals

The vote taken by Bay State lawmakers showcases the state's ultra-liberalism and gives the former Massachusetts governor another reason to kick Massachusetts around.
Beyond that, it fires up opponents of same-sex marriage, who constitute a fierce conservative base. They are already expressing fears about what happens now that Massachusetts is the only state where same-sex marriage is legal: Gay couples will travel here, obtain a marriage license, then sue to strike down laws banning same-sex marriage in other states.

First off, Romney and the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed that only Massachusetts residence can get marriage licenses, applying a 1918 law narrowly. This eliminated gay marriage tourism and probably hurt the economy slightly, and made these conservative fears unfounded.

Second, I am glad to see that Romney's people acknowledge they are using gay people to burnish Multiple Choice Mitt's conservative credentials ("It helps Mitt," a Romney adviser said.)

Here's more on his flip flopping

Romney committed himself to pro-choice policies and miscellaneous moderate social stands in order to run for office in Massachusetts, and with good political reason. It would be hard to imagine a pro-life, anti-gay rights social conservative winning a Massachusetts governor's race. Once elected, Romney used Massachusetts as the launchpad he intended from the start. He began the dramatic political retooling that he hopes will win him the Republican nomination, then the presidency.
In that regard, gay rights and the gay marriage issue hold similar peril for Romney. When he was running against Edward M. Kennedy, Romney said he would be a stronger advocate for gay rights than the liberal senator. Conservative critics also charge that as governor, he unnecessarily implemented same-sex marriage after the state's highest court declared that gay couples have a right to marry. In a compilation entitled, "The Mitt Romney Deception," Romney critic Brian Camenker holds Romney accountable for gay marriage in Massachusetts on the grounds that he "jumped the gun and needlessly advanced the homosexual agenda by granting marriage rights without a fight."

And in Romney's defense, he at least rhetorically fought the results. He even tried to campaign for GOPers in 2004 and 2006 in Massachusetts and their power actually decreased in Mass.

Mitt Romney is today's Aaron Burr

(Sorry, I don't have Photoshop so this ghetto mashup of Romney and the third Vice President of the United States is brought to you by Microsoft Paint. )

Anyway, as you probably know, in 1800, Thomas Jefferson overwhelming won the popular vote against John Adams. However, the idiots selected to be electors cast their votes for both Jefferson and Aaron Burr in such a fashion that both had a tie in the Electoral College.

As a result, the election was thrown to the House of Representatives, which was for the moment still controlled by Federalists (but would become overwhelmingly Jeffersonian in a matter of weeks). Rather than be happy with being VP Burr saw an opportunity for power indirectly asked the Federalist to vote him into the presidency in exchange for power in his administration.

Alexander Hamilton, Federalist party chief (and ancestor of yours truly), had a tough choice. He hated Jefferson's ideas, believing he would be a disaster. He hated Burr personally, because as a fellow New Yorker and banker, had seen how loathsome Burr was as a human being. After tortuous deliberation, Hamilton decided "Jefferson is to be preferred. He is by far not so dangerous a man and he has pretensions to character."

By contrast Burr's "private character is not defended by his most partial friends... His public principles have no other spring or aim than his own aggrandizement... If he can he will certainly disturb our institutions to secure himself permanent power and with it wealth..." As V. Lowry Snow put it "Hamilton recognized that Burr was dangerous not because he took a strong stand for what he believed in, but precisely because he took no stand and believed in nothing but himself."

Is it just me, or was the first Treasury Secretary and the author of our national economy describing the former Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts? Mitt's views on everything have changed to suit his electorate--Abortion, Stem Cell research, Guns, Gays, pardons, taxes, even the articles his own faith.

When Burr ran for Vice President, Hamilton said: "Mr. Burr is determined, as I conceive, to climb to the highest honors of the state. He is bold, enterprising, and intriguing, and I feel it is a religious duty to oppose his career." Likewise, I feel honor bound to oppose Romney's rise to the Oval Office.

Barry dishonest

(H/T Bag News notes, photo credit information available at their website).

I really dislike the tactic of campaigns to have the candidate claim to stay above the fray while the staff throw the mud, and then have the candidate pretend he/she knew nothing of these tactics and proceed to scold their staff.

This is the second time Obama's staff have done something old school politics against Senator Clinton and I expect that any minute now, the Senator will issue a statement claiming ignorance and rhetorically blasting his staff for doing the very thing he is supposedly campaigning against. Will said staffers be fired? Don't hold your breath.

The first time was during the Geffin spat, which really had more to do with David Geffin's anger at Bill Clinton's refusal to pardon a friend of his and less to do with either Hillary or Barrack.

This time, some one looked at the Clinton's financial statements and cried foul that Bill was getting lots of money from outsourcing companies, calling his spouse "Sen. Clinton (D-Punjab)" not only is this juvenile, and selective (25 other Senate Democrats took money from CISCO and you see no press release from them) but also slightly racist for a guy who is supposed to be more racially conscience than any candidate in the race.

Indian-Americans are upset about this, and rightfully so. I thought we got rid of Indian bashing after George Allen lost his senate seat. Plus, Obama doesn't strike me as an anti-trade deal kind of guy. Sure, he will complain about outsourcing, but I can't think of one trade package he has voted against, let alone lead the fight on.

In fact, he pretty much was trying to keep a low profile until his fame overwhelmed those plans.

But really, this isn't about Obama as much as the tactic of going high-road/low-road at the same time. If Obama really wants to change "the smallness of our politics" he needs to ditch his conventional, petty staff and get some innovative thinkers.

deja vu all over again

(© 2004 Daniel Bersak)
I have been blogging for a long time, since 2002 in fact. (remember when MyDD was called "my due diligence"?) But I didn't start to get serious traffic until my boss State Representative Debby Blumer (D-Framingham)was called upon to vote in a Massachusetts Constitutional Convention ("ConCon") whether to uphold Goodridge [v. MPH].

Debby was a liberal, but also a pragmatist. So she had supported a bill calling for civil unions for gays and lesbians for a number of years. But after Goodridge came down in November 2003, she and other liberals banded together to strategize how to preserve the courts holding from an onslaught led by then-Gov. Romney (who had realized this was his chance to gain attention so he could run for president like his dad had as Governor of Michigan). As her staffer, I was responsible for among other things, constituent services and contact. Letters, emails and phone calls poured in, not just from her district, or from Massachusetts, and not just from around the country, but from all over the world.

As people began to pour their hearts out to us, sending pictures and telling us personal tales (as well as threats and hate mail), I began to realize why civil unions wasn't enough. I blogged about what was going on inside Rep. Blumer's group and the strategy. That got me in trouble with her, and rightly so.

But I also got emails and comments from people around the country thanking me for explaining to them what the heck was going on. We won that fight, and then-Speaker Finneran's civil union proposal narrowly lost.

Thos opposed to gay marriage, including Rep. Blumer's colleagues in one of her committees (meaning their "offices" was only a few feet away from each other) sued all the way to US supreme court and kept trying to revive a ballot initiative in the state legislature (called the "General Court" in Massachusetts).

Today, the latest one failed again. Rep. Grogen and his allies only needed 50 out of 200 State Representatives and State Senators to support it, but got a mere 41. Nearly four years after Goodridge, the sky hasn't fallen on Massachusetts. The divorce rate in Massachusetts is the lowest in the country (Bush's adopted home of Texas has the highest). The more people get to know gay and lesbian couples, they realize that these couples aren't so different from married friends they have.

I just wish Debbie was still alive today to see that marriage equality was basically guaranteed (the next time they could put it to a vote is 2012, good luck by then) in her home state. So while a flood of memories come back, I am excited for the future.

I have no confidence in Hatch or Bennett

Not surprisingly, my US Senators Hatch and Bennett voted against the no confidence vote on AG Alberto Gonzales.

I wonder what it was about Gonzales' tenure as Attorney General that gave them confidence in his job performance. His lying under oath, which led them to vote to remove President Clinton for the same offense? His repeated lying about the use of the Department of Justice to further the Republican Party's grip on power? His "inability" to recall basic facts? His vast grant of power to his inept deputies to fire and hire DOJ employees based on partisan affiliation? His endorsement of torture as White House Counsel? His eleventh hour visit to then-AG John Ashcroft's hospital bedside to convince the man to sign on to an illegal wiretapping program (remember, Gonzales was unclear if there were other illegal wiretapping programs that he approved of beyond the "terrorist surveillance program")?

Republicans [such as Joe Lieberman] did not defend him, but most voted against moving the resolution ahead.
Monday's vote was not the end of scrutiny for Gonzales and his management of the Justice Department - more congressional hearings are scheduled and an internal department investigation continues.
Short of impeachment, Congress has no authority to oust a Cabinet member, but Democrats were trying anew to give him a push. Gonzales dismissed the rhetorical ruckus in the Senate, and President Bush continued to stand by his longtime friend and legal adviser.
"They can have their votes of no confidence, but it's not going to make the determination about who serves in my government," Bush said in Sofia, Bulgaria, the last stop on a weeklong visit to Europe.

Your government? Actually Mr. President, it is OUR government, remember that "We the People..." bit? Sens. Hatch and Bennett carry water for man who thinks that the US government belongs to him, not unlike Louis XIV. "L'État, c'est moi" said Bush, in Europe.

If I could vote on it, I would vote no confidence in my senators. Instead, I am left to vote against these two every six years.

Bramble's dumb move

Senate Majority Leader Curt Bramble (R-Provo), has the political instincts of Joe Lieberman.

Just a few months ago Bramble announced his support for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, as did 55 of his fellow Republican lawmakers.
McCain's campaign is expected to announce the endorsement Tuesday, but Bramble really switched sides some time ago.
"I think there is room at this stage of the presidential contest to consider several candidates," said Bramble, who does not want his support for McCain to be seen as a criticism of Romney. "I would have no problem if Gov. Romney was the party's nominee."
Bramble signed a Romney endorsement letter that circulated through the Legislature. He also went to a press conference but did not stand on stage with the candidate on Feb. 20.
Less than two weeks later, Bramble spent 45 minutes alone with McCain at the Grand America Hotel. At the end of the meeting, Bramble promised his support.

Now let's look at the obvious. McCain is trying to lower expectations on his second quarter fundraising, which already set a low target of $12.5M. Previously, his campaign had admitted that they really needed to turn things around this quarter to stay viable. Meanwhile, McCain's signature issues-- Campaign Finance Reform and Immigration Reform-- are deeply unpopular with the GOP primary voter. And his Iraq Escalation plan is a huge disaster, both politically and in real terms, for his party and the country. He is now behind not only Giulliani and Fred Thompson, but also "I don't know" in national polling. In the important primary states, he is in a distant third as well.

Meanwhile, Romney raised the most money of all the Republican candidates, and is up by a lot in Iowa and New Hampshire. So much so that Giulliani and McCain gave up on the Ames Straw Poll, a key IA GOP boondoggle. So why would Bramble change horses so dramatically? He says it is taking the unpopular stands on Iraq and Immigration, but I think it is this "McCain's biggest supporters in Utah include Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and Attorney General Mark Shurtleff."

you know you are joke candidate when

You get put in jail (where your sentence could keep you in jail until after election day) and it barely gets a mention in the press.

John Renteria, a perennial candidate for public office who has never won an election, was booked into the Salt Lake County Metro Jail on Friday on a violation of his probation from a previous traffic conviction.
Renteria pleaded guilty in November 2005 to one count of attempted failure to stop at an officer's command, a class A misdemeanor; one count of incorrectly positioned plates, a class B misdemeanor; and one count of failure to obey a traffic-control device, a class C misdemeanor.
[...]
Renteria's attorney, Patrick Corum, said Renteria admitted to 3rd District Judge Sheila McCleve on Friday that he twice drove despite his license having been revoked and that he has drunk alcohol, both in violation of his probation.
[...]
But Corum said he hopes Renteria can go before the judge again to plead his case in the near future.
"I'm very optimistic that we'll be able to get him out," Corum said.
He did not know how Renteria's arrest would affect his run for mayor.
"I've never talked to him about his candidacy," Corum said.

Patrick Corum is a Salt Lake County Legal Defender or as we call them in the biz an LDA. That means that Renteria is really poor, like food stamps poor. To get a public defender, you need to be almost on welfare.

Rolly states the obvious. "Renteria was considered a second-tier candidate and not given much of a chance to win. The last campaign finance disclosure indicated he had raised no money." Note the past tense WAS CONSIDERED. Now he is not going to be even considered, except as a trivia pursuit question.

I called it, this time on vouchers

It seems that a little old JD who can use lexis nexis and westlaw trumped the BS of the state's highest elected attorney.

In a win for voucher opponents, the Utah Supreme Court decided today that Utah's two voucher bills are joined at the hip -- and should live and die on the outcome of a Nov. 6 referendum vote.
The court said the referendum-proof law remaining in Utah code will also die if voters reject the original voucher law.
"If the voters choose to reject [the original voucher law, the amending voucher law] will not create an additional voucher program," said the court's written decision.
The decision came just hours after the court heard oral arguments on the issue from four separate parties, who each got 20 minutes. Justices asked all of them, in one way or another, how they expect the court to clean up the mess created by voucher statute remaining in Utah code.

What the article does not say is that this decision was unanimous 4-0, meaning even without one of the most liberal justices, Chief Justice Durham (who abstained for some reason), the court was unwilling to play politics with the state constitution and the common law.

Michael Leavitt appointee Associate Justice Michael Wilkins asked the obvious question: "Why isn't this a legislative problem?" asked Wilkins in oral arguments. "It would appear to me that the Legislature ... has produced ... what turns out to be a confusing situation. Why are we the ones who get to fix it by exceeding the authority the law gives us?" Yeah why is the legislature too chicken to face the fact that the people don't like their law and want to repeal it, so they created a clever "voucher bill" that really was an amendment.

It seems like you guys need to come up with a new lie now. I am expecting the racism argument, or maybe comparing the public school system to slavery, or maybe some babble about competition and parental choice.

We have a choice, it is called private schools. If you can afford them, or manage to get a scholarship/sponsorship, you get to go. Since Thomas Jefferson, we have believed in public schooling as a right for our children. In fact, it is found in most state constitutions, including Utah's.

"The Legislature shall provide for the establishment and maintenance of the state's education systems including: (a) a public education system, which shall be open to all children of the state; and (b) a higher education system. Both systems shall be free from sectarian control." Utah Const. Art. X, Sec. 1.

Oh and if it ever becomes necessary, remember this too "Neither the state of Utah nor its political subdivisions may make any appropriation for the direct support of any school or educational institution controlled by any religious organization." Utah Const. Art. X, Sec. 9.

Case closed.

Shurtleff fires special DAGs for disagreeing

As Ethan reported, Utah AG Shurtleff fired not one, but two Deputy Attorneys General for advising the school board that Shurtleff's opinion letter was full of it. The Salt Lake Tribune fills in the details of Ethan's exclusive.

The state school board, which is holding its June meeting today, stopped what it was doing and went into closed executive session after receiving the letter. It discussed the matter for more than an hour before announcing it would continue to use Lear and Hill as legal counsel and would seek further discussion with the AG.
[...]
The board ignored Shurtleff's advice during a special meeting May 29 and voted to issue an order saying it couldn't and shouldn't implement a voucher system until a court sorts out legal concerns. That vote led Shurtleff to say he could no longer defend the board's actions. It also appears to have triggered today's letter.

I am glad he created an environment where the school board can get a second opinion on his erroneous legal advice. As I have pointed out before, as a matter of statutory interpretation under Utah law, it is clear that the referendum would repeal the underlying bill and that the second bill is an amendment to the first.

Now you say, but Shurtleff is the Attorney General of the state of Utah, and has been practicing law for decades, and you haven't even passed the Bar yet (so why should I believe you). Well, the AG is a politician (he was a SL County Councilman before becoming AG), one who is allied to the power structure that got us into this mess in the first place. He supported vouchers in the past. So it appears that my taking a course in legislative process and statutory interpretation, where I received the highest grade of anyone else in the course, reigns supreme.

Sure, I have never been a fan of vouchers, but I am not twisting facts to say that vouchers are illegal. I think it is arguable that they violate the Utah Constitution on separation of church and state, even if SCOTUS said they do not violate the US Constitution's 1st Amendment. And even though I disagree with SCOTUS, I am not going to try to distinguish Cleveland's system and our system to make a federal constitutional claim, because it is pretty dishonest.

It is too bad, Shurtleff is being petty by demoting and punishing those who disagree with him. It is fine for him to say you are all liable now since you didn't follow my advice, but he didn't need to de-deputize them just to score political points. Even if it made Ethan happy.

Romney has won Iowa already

If two of the big three and possibly Fred Thompson are ditching the Ames straw poll, then they have all about put up the white flag to the Mitt-ster. So much for calling Democrats surrender monkeys. (H/T Political Wire)

Just hours after Rudy Giuliani announced he would skip the Ames Straw poll in Iowa later this summer, the AP reports Sen. John McCain "quickly followed suit in bypassing the early test of strength."

McCain campaign manager Terry Nelson: "It's clear that the Ames straw poll will not be a meaningful test of the leading candidates' organizational abilities... We have decided to forgo our participation in the event."

In case you forgot, Terry Nelson was deeply involved (and an unindicted co-conspirator) in destroying NH union and Democratic phone banks in 2002 to make sure that John Sununu would be elected to the US Senate.

please take over

dear guest blogger invitees,

please start posting on this blog. I know I said the other day that blogging keeps me sane, but sucking on the multiple choice questions is driving me crazy.

The day I never have to fill in a bubble sheet again will be a happy one indeed. Those things are an abomination. Somehow, I always manage to chose a stupid answer that I never would have. And I always miss a row or mess up which bubble to fill in all the time.

The GRE had multiple choice questions on the computer, where they could vary the questions according to how many of the easy and moderate ones you got wrong. I sucked at that too, but at least I felt that was fairer than worrying about erasing and filling in ovals with a number two pencil or pen (with correction tape).

Standardized tests are evil. Not to sound arrogant, but I am much smarter than my test results. I scored average on my SATs but thankfully Brown looked past that, and I graduated with honors. I did average on the LSATs, but thankfully the U law school looked past that, and I graduated with honors in some classes and semesters. Now at least the Utah Bar, I just need to pass (and get a 133+ on the MBE for the DC Bar), but I still worry about that given how poorly contracts and property MC questions are going.

Anyway, help would be appreciated. I will try to post when I can.

Giuliani: beyond the pale

So you're running for president, and have a huge national lead, but in the states that matter, New Hampshire and Iowa, you are way behind a flip-flopper. You could attack the guy for pandering and flip flopping, but you don't want to remind primary voters that you are consistently against their positions on those issues.

If you haven't guessed already, I am talking about Rudy and Mitt. So what instead did "America's Mayor" decide to do? Attack Romney's religion on things he doesn't even believe (nor does his religion believe).

[T]he "Deputy eCampaign Director" of the Giuliani campaign, Katie Harbath, directs the blogger to the Salt Lake Tribune story — clearly in the hope that the story and its "Romney-as-fulfiller-of-Mormon-prophecy" angle will receive wider play.
[...]
From: Katie Harbath <[redacted]@joinrudy2008.com>
Date: Jun 4, 2007 [redacted] AM
Subject: Is Romney the stuff of Mormon legend?
To: [redacted]

[redacted],

Thought you'd find this interesting. Best,

Katie

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_6055090

From the story, which I quoted from yesterday, there are these quotes "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not accept the legend - commonly referred to as the "White Horse Prophecy" - as doctrine." and this one by the Mitt-ster himself "I don't put that at the heart of my religious belief."

I really dislike Romney, but Giuliani is equally completely unacceptable. It doesn't matter to me that senior Giuliani officials apologized after getting caught.

keeping me sane

I blog daily during bar review thus far because I can't possibly study for 8 hours straight. My mind just turns to putty after about 4 or 5 hours straight, which is great for the two day long exam I will take starting on Pioneer Day.

Sharing my thoughts with you is partly selfish and the other part is to get a dialog going with the 'sphere so that we can advance knowledge and the debate. So anyway, here are my collection of observations today:

• California liberals in the state legislature are trying to get a "should we get out of Iraq?" question on the ballot in time for Super Duper Tuesday The effect of this proclamation could be akin to gay marriage in 2004-- getting out the anti-war left to vote-- and thereby damaging Sen. Clinton's campaign. This could get very interesting.


• Speaking of HRC, my wife has flipped back to her camp given her commanding performance at last night's debate. I still lean most towards Obama, and he did much better, but sometimes he was a bit too wordy. His answer to Wolf's Osama question could have been one crisp sentence, Yes, assuming I don't have to wipe out a whole city but just a training camp. Again Hillary had the best answer and everyone looked to her at that moment. It was amazing. I wasn't bothered by the lack of time to the "second tier" in fact, I don't think Kucinich or Gravel should ever be allowed back into these debates. "I get my meds from the VA." – Mike Gravel.


• According to the Salt Lake Tribune,

  It's Mormon lore, a story passed along by some old-timers about the importance of their faith and their country.
  In the latter days, the story goes, the U.S. Constitution will hang by a thread and a Mormon will ride in on a metaphorical white horse to save it. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints says it does not accept the legend - commonly referred to as the "White Horse Prophecy" - as doctrine.
  [...]
  Romney says he doesn't believe in the supposed prophecy...

  
  The Constitution is indeed hanging by a thread (due to among other things, the suspension habeas corpus at the executive's will) and I would be happy if a Mormon or anyone would come in on a white horse and save it, but Mitt "We ought to double the size of Guantanamo" Romney clearly isn't the one.


• Maybe this is the real reason some support vouchers

  The fear about voucher programs leading to segregated schools exists because it's happened before. The first state-sponsored voucher programs arose in Southern states as a way to help white families avoid sending their children to integrated schools. The schools were dubbed "segregation academies" and popped up throughout the South.
  Eventually, courts ruled those scholarship programs illegal, although many white students continued to avoid enrolling in public schools and those who did often moved to predominantly white districts. Those familiar with the history of segregated schools say current voucher debates bring up painful memories for many, said Marcia Synnott, a University of South Carolina history professor who is an expert on the history of education in the South.

hey big spender

(photo credit: Skip ODonnell, © 2006)
Well the local papers pointed out what I suspected, that Ralph Becker's numbers' weren't as impressive as they sounded.

With summer still on the horizon, and the election more than five months away, Keith Christensen is setting a blistering pace in the Salt Lake City mayoral cash contest, already amassing more than half a million dollars.
Christensen, who has led the fundraising charge all year, has piled up more than $508,000 - much of it from developers and other business owners - according to the latest round of campaign finance disclosures filed Friday.
Salt Lake County Councilwoman Jenny Wilson is in second place with just over $241,000 - less than half Christensen's total. But Wilson also has spent more than any other candidate, leaving her with just $89,000 in the bank.
City Councilman Dave Buhler runs third with $216,000, followed by House Minority Leader Ralph Becker, who has raised $176,000 but has spent relatively little.

Of course, the more important numbers are cash on hand and polls (especially the ones where people vote). But some times fundraising numbers are a good proxy for how the race is shaping up. For example, Hillary has lots of money, then Obama, then Edwards, and then the rest of the crowd on the Democratic side. McCain poor fundraising matches his lackluster polls and overall sinking in the standings, while Giulliani and Romney's prowess relate back to their polling in a way.

But some times, it just means you have rich friends, not that you have lots of friends.

The bulk of Christensen's cash comes from big fish in the capital city's business community. Developers Kem Gardner and Dell Loy Hansen each kicked in at least $7,000, while Spencer Eccles contributed $7,500. Checks for $5,000 or higher also came from mortgage and real estate companies. And Stuart Reid, a former mayoral hopeful and Christensen ally, added $2,500 to the campaign.
Wilson's ledger includes a long list of donors who mostly have given less than $1,000. But there are a handful of private big spenders - Bruce Bastian, co-founder of WordPerfect, floated the campaign $6,500 - as well as small business and real estate money.
Early polls have shown Wilson holding a lead with Buhler in second place. Christensen, Becker and Saxton trail, according to the surveys...

Becker's people will undoubtedly point out that unlike the others, he could not fundraise during the legislative session and that his support is pouring in in May. Most of his checks are much smaller, which may be better ethically, but when others are getting $7,500 checks and you are getting $500, it is tough.
I would really like to see a debate with the top four so the public can decide who the top two should be. When everyone is invited, you can't hear much more than sound bites.

Becker announces his fundraising numbers

According to a press release I just got, Ralph Becker (D-lower Aves) has raised "over $180,000, including more than $105,000 during the second reporting period,...over 50 percent of this cycle's campaign contributions came in May." The mayoral candidate's Coordinator for Fundraising Matt Lyon, claims "Our campaign currently has over $100,000 on hand."

Here's how the picture looked in February, courtesy of the Deseret News:


If someone could give me Wilson's or Buhler's or Christiansen's numbers, I would appreciate it. I don't care about the other folks numbers.

That should buy Ralph a few more nice lawn signs.

1101th post

I am beginning to think that the 2008 presidential race will turn out quite differently than I previously imagined.

On the Republican side, it seems that Giuliani may actually win it. Wingnuts are conspiring to try to take down the authoritarian, twice adulterous, cross-dressing ex-mayor of New York City. But they will fail in all likelihood. Romney has a lead now in Iowa, but his money may run out before people vote (like Howard Dean in 2003). Plus, I just don't think Southerners will hold their noses and vote for him, unlike Giuliani due his perceived bravery and toughness on terrorism/-ists. McCain is imploding, with Fred Thompson to essentially take his place in the horse race.

On the Democratic side, Obama is in a funk. The spark that was 2006 and the first quarter surprises in funding and crowds is slipping away with each over-consulted cautious move and speech. To make up the ground he has lost and to narrow the gap in key states (let alone to win) Obama needs to get back to what got him here: not listening to those Washington consultants. He wrote his own DNC keynote speech, and even though they tweaked it, it purposely did a 180 from his Democratic consultant based radio address that put people to sleep. He needs to unchain himself from consultants and put caution to the wind. Clinton is putting a sleeper hold on the rest of the nominees. John Edwards is flailing about, trying to pander to every Democratic group on everything. But I distrust him and doubt he will go much further than he did in 2004. Richardson's belly flop on Meet the Republicans was horrific. How can you be a Yankee fan and a Red Sox fan? I can respect Yankee players while still hating them and their team (I am a Red Sox fan). I hope Faux News does have its debate with Senator windbag, Representative whinny dwarf, and ex-Senator crazy Grandpa. It will really make Faux News the laughing stock that it is. Oh and Gore isn't going to run...or endorse.

UPDATE: insiders agree with me.

connect the dots

Billmon-style

Deseret News May 31, 2007:

MAPLight.org, a California-based nonpartisan group that says it seeks to illuminate connections between money and politics, looked at donations from payday lenders nationwide. But it focused on seven states where it said the percentage of overall donations that came from payday lenders was higher than elsewhere: Utah, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas.
"We found that during the last eight years, as total industry campaign contributions in these states increased, state laws allowed the industry to continue operating without significant restrictions," it said in a new study.
It said payday lenders gave $76,200 to state-level candidates in Utah between the 1996 and 2006 elections. ...a higher percentage than was given in most states.
...about a dozen bills were proposed but failed in the Utah Legislature in that time either to cap the high interest rates the industry charges or to more tightly regulate it.
[...]
(The study numbers may indeed have problems — but payday lenders may have actually given more than it said. The Deseret Morning News in a quick, noncomprehensive look at databases Tuesday, identified at least $95,000 that such lenders gave in Utah in the period. About 20 percent came of that from out of state. But the study identified only about $76,000, and said 85 percent of it came from out of state.)
[...]
The Morning News found in 2005 that Utah has more payday loan stores than 7-Elevens, McDonald's, Burger Kings and Subway stores — combined.

Deseret News May 27, 2007:

a Deseret Morning News review of all bills introduced in the 2007 Legislature shows, is that a fourth of the session's legislation came with clear or possible conflicts of interest involving the measures' sponsors.
Insurance agents sponsored bills on insurance regulation. Police officers carried bills on criminal penalties. Contractors sponsored bills on construction. Teachers carried bills on education.
The percentage of lawmakers' conflicts of interest may actually be even higher than 25 percent because some lawmakers reveal little of their real conflicts in their personal disclosure forms, using only broad or vague wording.
And Utah lawmakers can't escape their conflicts of interest when it comes to voting on bills. Unlike members of Congress or other state legislatures, Utah's legislators, due to internal rules, must vote on a bill even though they may have a clear conflict of interest.
[...]
Kirk Jowers, head of the University of Utah's Hinckley Institute of Politics, says there is great value in having a part-time, citizen legislature.
But, he adds, there is a hidden conflict of interest on legislation that few people talk about: Legislators' legal ability to take cash out of their own campaign accounts and spend it any way they wish.
"It is almost legalized bribery," said Jowers, "if a lobbyist or special interest group gave money to a legislator's campaign account" in hopes of getting special treatment. "If they gave you $10,000 or $20,000, that is the ultimate conflict of interest."
At the very least, legislators should pass a law that says they can't use campaign cash for personal use, Jowers said.

Deseret News May 31, 2007:

It is "disingenuous" for Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. to call a special session on vouchers before the Nov. 6 public vote, says House Speaker Greg Curtis, who vows to "vigorously" fight against repealing HB174 if such a session is called.

KSL April 12, 2007:

In the House there was a similar show of loyalty to the side that gave the money -- 96 percent who got money from the pro-voucher group voted for and 78 percent who got money from the other side voted against.
[...]
Pro-public school money generally went to Democrats. Pro-voucher donations generally went to Republicans, including GOP House Speaker Greg Curtis, who by many accounts used his considerable clout to pressure some members to vote Yes.

I am happy despite being a Democrat

(Photo Credit: © 2004 NASA)

Recently there was an article that did a study showing that GOPers are happier than Democrats (from Teagan Goddard's Political Wire)

A new Pew Research poll finds that Republicans are happier than Democrats. This finding has been consistent since the survey began in 1972.

"Republicans tend to have more money than Democrats, and -- as we've already discovered -- people who have more money tend to be happier. But even this explanation only goes so far. If one controls for household income, Republicans still hold a significant edge: that is, poor Republicans are happier than poor Democrats; middle-income Republicans are happier than middle-income Democrats, and rich Republicans are happier than rich Democrats."

"Might ideology be the key? It's true that conservatives, who are more likely to be Republican, are happier than liberals, who are more likely to be Democrats. But even controlling for this ideological factor, a significant partisan gap remains. Conservative Republicans are happier than conservative Democrats, and moderate/liberal Republicans are happier than liberal Democrats."

The jerky response would be that ignorance is bliss. Those who watch Faux News know far less about what is going on than those who watch the Daily Show. And the partisan make up of those audiences are skewed heavily.

But despite my anger about what Bush and his allies have done to my beloved country (and what local Republicans are doing to my beloved state), I am still personally happy. I am blessed to have a great marriage with a smart, caring and loving wife. I live comfortably with a nice job, nice house, nice car, and nice pet. I have support from great friends and family members. And generally speaking, I am in excellent health.

So while I am personally at peace, I cannot rest while I see injustices around me. That's why I rant on this and other blogs, why I contribute my time and treasure to candidates, and why I try to get other people to join me in this fight. It is why I went to law school, so that I would have the tools to fight back.

the school board got it right

Today the state school board, after hearing from the Attorney General for hours, voted not to implement a vouchers program for the next school year. The ruling sets up a court battle at the Utah Supreme Court. Look for the court to avoid controversy and narrowly rule on the statutory interpretation, not the constitutionality of vouchers in Utah.

"This to me is the way to get it before a court and get it heard by somebody who can make a decision so we can go forward," said board member Dennis Morrill of Taylorsville. "Everybody ought to be cheering who wants this decided once and for all."
Shurtleff, of course, urged in his opinion letter that the Board should start "a voucher program based on a second law that was drafted to amend the original voucher act but accidentally re-enacted entire sections and completely omitted others."

The very title of the bill is "Education Voucher Amendments" meaning that it relates back to HB 148, which is subject to repeal this November. Mean that HB 174 will be mooted if the voters repeal 148. If that weren't enough, those who voted for 174 who didn't vote for 148 (those making it referendum-proof) did so thinking they were fixing 148, not creating a new bill.

We were ensured it was cleanup legislation — there was confusion among senators and representatives," said Rep. Rosalind McGee, D-Salt Lake. "HB174 is a muddle policy fragment— please don't make state policy based on muddled policy."

For those of you doubt my legal reasoning, here is a primer from the most recent Utah Supreme Court case I can find:

When interpreting statutes, we look first to the statute's plain language with the primary objective of giving effect to the legislature's intent. Savage v. Utah Youth Vill., 2004 UT 102, P18, 104 P.3d 1242. "We presume that the legislature used each word advisedly" and read "each term according to its ordinary and accepted meaning." State v. Barrett, 2005 UT 88, P29, 127 P.3d 682 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Statutes should be read as a whole and their provisions interpreted in harmony with related provisions and statutes. Miller v. Weaver, 2003 UT 12, P17, 66 P.3d 592.

When the language of the statute is plain, other interpretive tools are not needed. Adams v. Swensen, 2005 UT 8, P8, 108 P.3d 725. However, if the language is ambiguous, the court may look beyond the statute to legislative history and public policy to ascertain the statute's intent. Utah Pub. Employees Ass'n v. State, 2006 UT 9, P59, 131 P.3d 208 (Parrish, J., concurring). When viewed holistically, a statute is ambiguous if duplicative, yet plausible meanings are not eliminated from possibility. Id. P60. Martinez v. Media-Paymaster Plus/Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, 2007 UT 42, PP46-47

"My duty to my client is to tell them to obey the law ... sometimes what we say our client doesn't want to hear," Shurtleff said. However Shurtleff didn't do that, because his ultimate client is the Utah GOP, and their out-of-state donors want this bill to be valid, even if the people of Utah don't.

darned whippersnappers

Now I know I am a few years yet from Thirty, but I feel old when I begin today's rant:

Longboarders -- who get their thrills on extended, low-riding, speed-designed skateboards -- say they can share the streets with motorists and pedestrians.
Drivers "get really pissed when they get scared," rider Nic Adams says. "They're just not used to people moving on a longboard on the street with them."
But valley police officers and city officials fear the fad -- illegal in some locations -- threatens public safety.
"Some of the boarders come down that hill [SunCrest Drive] pretty quick, and it's surprising drivers," Draper City Councilman Bill Colbert says. "They have to take evasive action or are afraid they're going to hit one of these kids. I'm worried someone is going to get hurt or killed."
Lynn Rohland, spokeswoman for the University of Utah Police, says longboarding has been rampant across campus for years. Boarders often start at the U. and pick up speed heading downhill on 100 South and into downtown.
"This is everywhere on our campus," Rohland says. "It's a big issue, and we take it seriously."

(photo credit Keith Jacobs)

Note the lack of helmet or any other protective padding. Also note that these idiots tend to weave down a lane to slow down and because they want to go as fast as possible (without cars in the way), they ride down steep streets in the dark with no reflectors or lights in the middle of the lane.

I am sure it is fun to ride, but under those circumstances it is incredibly dangerous. Riders get going up to 60 MPH and have no real brakes other than their feet and if a car driver cannot see them (and riders rarely slow down let alone stop at stop signs or lights), they could very well hit and kill them.

Of course, almost all of these morons are male, teens to 30s. I see them on my street that is quite hilly and South Temple all the time, including well after dark. I can't count the number of times people have almost hit them.

If you want a similar thrill, go skiing or surfing. Or go on a private road. Join an X-games type league that closes off the streets when you long board. But get the heck off public roads, day and especially night. And wear a freaking helmet and reflectors. Ridiculously large headphones don't count.

never forget

while you are out having a nice iced tea and doing your gardening or putting together IKEA furniture like I did this weekend, remember why you aren't at work/school today:

America's armed forces are losing their lives for a failed policy and failed war. But their lives cannot be lost in vain, even if Iraq becomes worse than 2001 Afghanistan.

We must remember their sacrifices and pledge never to let any more lives be lost for one man's pride and another man's greed.

voucher confusion made simple

Pro-voucher forces are trying to muddy the waters. Here's why:
Today's Deseret News

An editorial column in Thursday's paper mixed up the two private school voucher bill numbers. HB148, the main voucher bill, is the subject of a citizen referendum vote on Nov. 6. HB174, an amendment bill to HB148, passed the 2007 Legislature by two-thirds vote and by law is not subject to referendum repeal.

The leading story in that newspaper? Another high profile Dan Jones poll:

Republican legislative majorities to do what those leaders don't necessarily want to do.
Pollster Dan Jones & Associates found that 64 percent of Utahns would want Huntsman and the Legislature to repeal a second voucher law should voters reject vouchers at the polls Nov. 6.
Even worse for the Republicans, 76 percent of Utahns want Huntsman to call a special session this summer during which legislator's could "fix" the two-voucher bill problem — clearing the way for an unimpeded, simple up-or-down vote Nov. 6 on vouchers.
But even with those overwhelming numbers, Huntsman says he won't call a special session this summer. And it's possible that, should voters reject vouchers, Utah would still have a voucher law and the controversial program would go forward — for GOP legislators could refuse to repeal a second voucher law.
Meanwhile, it's hard to tell where Utahns will side in November. Forty-three percent of 410 Utahns surveyed May 21-24 say they favor vouchers, and 47 percent oppose them. Considering the error margin of plus or minus 5 percent, public opinion is a virtual dead heat, just as it was earlier this year before legislators passed the voucher program.

I really hope voters remember how anti-democratic Utah's state leadership--Gov. Huntsman, Speaker Curtis, Sen. President Valentine--all have been throughout this session in particular, and especially on this issue. Next November, throw as many of those bums out as you can.

we're number 50!

(Photo Credit: Bunch of Losers)
Aren't you proud that Utah beat out Mississippi again?

The Census Bureau analysis of state education funding differs slightly from data from the National Center of Education Statistics released in April. Yet both reports list Utah as last in the nation for spending $5,257 per student in fiscal year 2005. The second-to-last state, Arizona, spent $6,261 per student that year.
The results surprise few policymakers, who've all but given up escaping last place. Members of the Utah State Board of Education, legislators and tax watchdogs say it's nearly impossible for Utah to rival spending in other states. Income taxes from Utah's relatively small and low-paid workforce get stretched paying for the state's large population of school children.

To paraphrase Robert Kennedy/George Bernard Shaw, some see things as they are and ask "why," Utah's education policy makers ask "why bother?"

(as an aside, vouchers will only put the state further behind by definition, but PCE couldn't care less about that)

Here's an example of what this last in the nation standing means for Utah children:

Ogden School District says it's cutting projects to save money.
The school board passed a revised building plan that they say will save $23 million.
Two building projects are being deferred. Those are construction of the district campus elementary school, which should save $11.4 million. And the board voted to hold off on the renovation of Ogden High School's science rooms. That cut another $11.8 million.
Voters approved $95.3 million last June for construction and renovation plans to fix the district's aging school buildings.

That's just buildings, what about arts programs, school trips, books, school supplies, teacher salaries, staff salaries, school buses, etc.?

thursday round-up

Nothing especially was enough to get a post, so you all get mini-posts within one...enjoy.

• The best summation I have heard of the legal arguments for and against the DC-Utah bill: "Make no mistake: We are on uncharted territory," Patricia Wald, former chief judge of the U. S. Court Appeals for the District of Columbia, said in testimony submitted to the committee. Still, she added, "In such a landscape, Congress is justified in concluding the balance tilts in favor of recognizing for D.C. residents the most basic right of all democratic societies, the right to vote for one's leaders."


• More posturing on vouchers:

  Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said Thursday he and legislative leaders are putting together a letter pledging to honor whatever decision voters make about private school vouchers at the polls in November — even if Utahns reject the funding program.
  The letter, which Huntsman said may also be signed by Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, "will essentially state that whatever the vote is in November will be respected as a vote up or down on vouchers."
  [...]The governor said there wasn't the "political will" to deal with the issue in a special session.

  Last time I checked, Huntsman, you were the one of the most popular governors in the US. Why don't you use some of your political capital to hold a special session and deal with it like a man? Does this mean that if the voters vote vouchers down that BOTH bills will be scrapped? Or will the AG's opinion rule? Or will you just let the courts decide?


• speaking of which,
  

  A pro-voucher group will announce legal action this afternoon regarding the two voucher laws on Utah's books. Parents for Choice in Education has scheduled a press conference for 1:45 p.m. today in the lobby of Salt Lake City's Matheson Court House.

  The legislature created this mess by voting for this stupid bill that had no real native grassroots support and now want to have their cake and eat it too. I hope all who voted for it lose their seats in the Legislature.


• Is there anything that Romney does that the local papers won't cover in a positive light?

Start with the obvious

Once again, the local press plays dumb:

Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee seemed to have agreed on a single script: defending the former administration official and denouncing the Democratic-led inquiry.

Have you ever watched any cable news? Compared your interview with a national Republican or local Republican on a national topic with another interview of a Republican on the same topic? I am assuming the answer is no, otherwise, why the "seems"?

At least the reporter remember to include the latest edition of "How has Chris Cannon embarrassed his state today?" in the headline.

Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, was so peeved by the proceedings that he asked no questions during his first five-minute round. Instead, he read a Los Angeles Times editorial berating Democrats on an unrelated matter involving ethics and spending earmarks.

It is well worth pointing out as a law student, that normally Goodling would have never been hired by any prosecutor's office, let alone be the DOJ's White House Liaison. Why, because Regent University College of Law sucks. "Regent Law was ranked in Tier 4 by U.S. News, the lowest ranking and essentially a tie for 136th place out of 170 schools surveyed." "According to statewide and national statistics, Regent's four-year average Virginia bar pass rate is 51.5%, which is 21.5% below the statewide average of 73%, and the lowest in the Commonwealth of Virginia." The school used to be named after Pat Robertson's cable channel: CBN [Christian Broadcasting Network] University. Yet Bush's White House hired 150 Regent grads.

For the record, the SJ Quinney College of Law has crept into the second tier but I fully expect it to be back in the top tier soon. Our bar passage rate is high and about average for state averages (but there are only 2 law school in Utah and the bar passage rate is higher than other states).

Slam of the week

McCain on Romney May 21, 2007:
"In the case of Governor Romney, you know, maybe I should wait a couple of weeks and see if it changes, because it's changed in less than a year from his position before. And maybe his solution will be to get out his small-varmint gun and drive those Guatemalans off his lawn. I don't know."

I have to say, the first line was the most effective, the second, a bit obscure and racist and angry. The whole thing to me says that McCain is thinking: "I am losing to this guy?!" And indeed he is in the low double digits with Giuliani in Iowa, either fighting for second without Fred Thompson, McCain's friend, or for third with Thompson included in the polls.

McCain has been running for President for something like 10 years and finds himself in bad shape in the first and most important state. But if he wants to turn it around, he is going to have to tear down Romney and Giuliani and then F. Thompson.

Romney's biggest weakness is his lust to pander so much that he makes switch grass seem constantly still. Giuliani's is that he is corrupt and has liberal social positions. F. Thompson's is that he is a lazy man who never did anything in the Senate. McCain's is his anger, his support of campaign finance reform, and his support of immigration reform...two giant pet issues with the GOP base that are as big as Iraq and Health Care on the Democratic side.

compare and contrast

Or a tale of two bad articles

Here's Thomas Burr's article about the Utah's lone Democrat in Congress, Jim Matheson, on May 19:

Rep. Jim Matheson, a Utah Democrat and self-described fiscal conservative, spent the largest percentage of his office allowance compared with his congressional colleagues in 2005, a new report shows.
Matheson used 99.97 percent of his congressional office budget that year, leaving only $375 unspent, according to the National Taxpayers Union, which compiled office budget data from published House reports.

Now for today's article by the same reporter, this time on brother of the rival daily newspaper, Rep. Chris Cannon:

Rep. Chris Cannon voted against reauthorizing a federal program to put more cops on the street, saying it's a local responsibility.
[...]
Cannon pointed to a recent report in USA Today of an internal audit showing that 3 percent of the COPS grants reviewed found some $277 million was misspent. Additionally, the report says, tens of thousands of jobs funded by the grants were never filled or weren't filled for long.

Now Burr allowed Matheson to explain why he used all but $375 of his budget--his Alabama-size district--but the lede of the article was I repeat "Matheson, a Utah Democrat and self-described fiscal conservative." The Cannon article does not say he is a Republican or call him a "self-described as pro-police."

The article lets others, namely a New York City Democrat (and it does point him out that way), to claim that COPS is a very successful program, but it burries the fact that local municipalities support it and would have more officers if the funding was most assured. And the article fails to mention studies that prove that Bush's defunding of COPS (because it is a Clinton program) has resulted in higher crime rates across the country, TIME magazine did a story on this, using Milwaukee, WI as the example.

JM Bell points out that Cannon's vote happened on May 14th, yet Burr didn't cover Cannon's slap in the face to Utahns until today. "Tommy Burr is one of the best reporters in the country so, what the hell happened? I have a hard time believing that Burr just waited to write it." I think he didn't want to write it until he found his Matheson story to "balance" it with.

Truth over Balance. Progress over ideology.

the house of cards

Republicans believe, since the days of Kennedy's 1960 election by the narrowest of margins, that Democrats use massive voter fraud to win elections. Conversely, Democrats believe that Republicans attempt to intimidate racial and ethnic minorities from voting and that if only more of such groups would vote, Democrats would win.

Both are urban legends, with some truth but mostly falsehood. While some dead people might have voted for Kennedy in Cook County and similar things might still happen today, the margin of such errors is not enough to swing elections. More importantly, it is not based on some plot hatched by liberals in some lair.

Democrats need to turn out more single women of all colors to win elections, not just minorities who might be scared or confused into not voting. Again, no vast conspiracy here there either.

But don't put away your tinfoil hat just yet. It seems that bloggers have stumbled onto a pretty vast conspiracy: the US attorney purge. The purge is indelibly linked to the aforementioned voter fraud myth. Karl Rove and many others believed that in places in swing states like New Mexico, Milwaukee, and St. Louis, massive voter fraud was taking place. And what do you know, they pressured the local US Attorneys in those locals to bring indictments against Democrats for voter fraud. Because there was little to no evidence, the US Attorneys either refused and were sacked, or followed orders only to see their indictments tossed out. In fact, only a tiny percentage of all the voter fraud cases brought by the Bush Justice Department have been successful, despite Rove's push for prosecutions.

Now that the Congress is in Democratic hands and has started asking pesky questions and requesting damaging documents, not only have lots of Justice Department officials resigned, but their outside counterparts have vanished into thin air.

the American Center for Voting Rights, a group that has literally just disappeared as an organization, and for which it seems no replacement group will rise up. With no notice and little comment, ACVR—the only prominent nongovernmental organization claiming that voter fraud is a major problem, a problem warranting strict rules such as voter-ID laws—simply stopped appearing at government panels and conferences. Its Web domain name has suddenly expired, its reports are all gone (except where they have been preserved by its opponents), and its general counsel, Mark "Thor" Hearne, has cleansed his résumé of affiliation with the group. Hearne won't speak to the press about ACVR's demise. No other group has taken up the "voter fraud" mantra.

So who was ACVR? And doesn't it remind you of that scene from "1984" where Winston, working at the Ministry of Truth incinerates photos of handshakes between Eurasia and Oceania "We have always been at war with Eastasia..."?

the group was founded just days before its representatives testified before a congressional committee hearing on election-administration issues chaired by then-Rep. (and now federal inmate) Bob Ney. The group was headed by Hearne, national election counsel to Bush-Cheney '04, and staffed with other Republican operatives, including Jim Dyke, a former RNC communications director.

Consisting of little more than a post-office box and some staffers who wrote reports and gave helpful quotes about the pervasive problems of voter fraud to the press, the group identified Democratic cities as hot spots for voter fraud, then pushed the line that "election integrity" required making it harder for people to vote. The group issued reports (PDF) on areas in the country of special concern, areas that coincidentally tended to be presidential battleground states. In many of these places, it now appears the White House was pressuring U.S. attorneys to bring more voter-fraud prosecutions.

What a coincidence! And their reports ended up as fodder in the WSJ? What are the chances? Let's overlook for a moment that arguing by anecdote is faulty, or that polling-place fraud is way more trouble than it is worth if you are trying to steal an election. The fact that this group is trying to pretend it never existed just as Democrats in Congress start to shine a bright light on the voter-fraud motivated firings of US Attorneys raises eyebrows, to say the least.

Personally, I think these party hacks saw the house of cards begin to fall on the use of the DOJ as political arm of the White House and left like rats fleeing a sinking ship. The name Department of Justice was slowly but surely being turned Orwellian into Winston's employer, the Ministry of Truth.

signs of the times

Today I decided to finally evaluate the many lawn signs that SLC mayoral candidates have sticking in the yards of my neighbors. What follows is not to be viewed as an endorsement of any particular candidate. Rather, the idea is to give them all some advice on graphics and visuals. In no particular order...

Ralph Becker
Having learned from earlier black writing on forest green background lawn signs in earlier state house races, Becker opts for bright contrasting colors. The black silhouette of the city and county building is excellent, especially when one notes that he had the same motif with the state capitol last fall. GRADE: A-

Jenny Wilson

Jenny's sign uses the same schema that her father used when running for Mayor. Jim Matheson used the same color and slogan as his father's for his 2000 congressional race, but it didn't seem dated. Jenny's seems very 1992. Maybe it is the gray star, I don't know. But good for her for having the word "Democrat" on there. GRADE: B-

Dave Buhler
[I will have to take a photo]
Buhler's sign is a enlarged campaign button, round in shape. The top half is white, the bottom is red. The top says "I like Dave," the bottom says "mayor" First off, the shape looks stupid. Secondly, who cares if you like Dave Buhler, it doesn't mean you will vote for him or even support him. "I like Ike" works because the name rhymes and well, Eisenhower was a darned popular ex-general, having saved the world from Hitler etc. "I like Dave" is just lame. GRADE: F [Plus, his website is still not up, really pathetic.]

Keith Christensen

Not bad. I cannot recognize this as the SLC skyline, but then again our skyline is not all that memorable. Maybe it is supposed to say I will be the mayor of downtown and where you live. That's nice too. The colors aren't the greatest and the whole thing is a bit cartoon-y. GRADE: B.

I won't even bother with the rest because either they don't have websites or they have no chance. I saw Nancy Sexton's the other day for the first time and they are pretty lame too. The cursive "Nancy" reminds me of Nancy Reagan, not exactly something you want to evoke in the Democratic strong hold in a super-GOP state. Maybe I will take a photo of that too to show you what I am talking about, since those signs will be even harder to see in person.

silly establishmentarians

Charlie Cook is an astute non-partisan poll reader whose judgment is without reproach inside the beltway. Not because he is right all the time, but because he has a reputation for being right. Official Washington trusts him.

But why? Especially when he gives out such drivel as a successful Bloomberg-Hagel independent ticket (independent is DC for two moderate Republicans that could never win their party's primary nationally, and maybe even in their own state).

Here's his DC "bipartisan" wet dream:

Most believe it would be exceedingly unlikely that the House would elect an independent president. That being the case, an independent would most likely need to win from 38 percent to 40 percent in a three-way race to reach the tipping point, winning a sufficiently large number of states by small margins.

[...]

Initial polling suggests that Bloomberg could make a respectable run as an independent and pull evenly from the two major parties. But getting from respectable to upwards of 40 percent would require cutting into the marrow of at least one, if not both, parties.

This would mean that his candidacy would likely be contingent upon each party nominating either badly flawed or damaged candidates. After all, with his money, Bloomberg wouldn't need to decide until late February, after the nominations are likely to be determined.

The most interesting scenario would be if Bloomberg were to win a plurality of the electoral votes and siphon off enough votes from the left to push the Democratic nominee into third place. Could a Democratic House really pick a third-place finisher to be president, or might they opt for a politically compatible independent who finished first?

Um let's look at those "respectable showing" polls:

Rasmussen Survey of 800 Likely Voters April 2-3, 2007
["If you had a choice between Republican Rudy Giuliani, Democrat Hillary Clinton, and Independent Michael Bloomberg, for whom would vote?"] Rudy Giuliani: 37%; Hillary Clinton: 46%; Michael Bloomberg: 9%.

["If you had a choice between Republican John McCain, Democrat Hillary Clinton, and Independent Michael Bloomberg, for whom would vote?"]
John McCain: 37%; Hillary Clinton: 46%; Michael Bloomberg: 9%

Nine percent is not respectable, although better than Bill Richardson is doing in the Democratic primary. Nine percent is "I don't know" plus or minus a few people upset with their choices of Hillary or Giuliani or McCain. And nine percent also will not get you the top stop going into the theoretical House election of the president, rather the third place. A Democratically controlled House would have no problem voting for a number one finishing Democrat as would happen in this poll.

More importantly, the last time an election went to the House was 1800...208 years ago and before the 12th amendment tried to avoid that from ever happening again.

There is not a chance that the 2008 presidential election will go down to the House, nor if Romney is nominated, that Republicans will win the presidency. The 3-poll average gap is: Clinton +14.0%, Obama +23.0%, Edwards +27.3%.