Arizona's First Political Blog

E-mail Anonymous Mike at zonitics4-at-yahoo.com

By Anonymous Mike, pseudonymously.

 
Something Wicked this Way Comes

A few months ago when the FY2009 budget passed, there was a piece in the Arizona Capitol Times that stated that it was unlikely that future revenue growth would be sufficient to meet the budget's enacted revenue level.

Well here it comes. On Friday, JLBC released the fiscal highlight for July 2008, yes that would be the first month of the FY2009 budget, and found revenue growth falling short with the revenue $88.9 million below forecast and with the drop in July sales tax revenue the largest monthly drop during the current down turn.

"As a result of this shortfall, FY 2009 base revenues will now have to grow by 6.1% to
meet the enacted revenue level of $9.98 billion.

Given the FY 2008 experience and current economic conditions, 6.1% growth seems highly unlikely. We will need several months of revenue data, however, before attempting to forecast a revision in FY 2009 revenues. A Finance Advisory Committee meeting is currently planned for October 15th and will assist in that process."

A report on the closing balances for FY2008 due September 15, possible shortfall in the papered-over FY2009 budget to be reported October 15. There's going to be alot of things to mull over while one plants the winter grass.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 1:27 PM

 
Ut Veniant Omnes

Yes McCain's selection of Palin to ticket was the biggest news on Friday but the second biggest story was the reaction to the pick. Palin was presumably the surprise pick; few people besides those deep in conservative corners saw this one coming and the latter only in a wish and prayer sort of way.

That surprise, that lack of information beyond the sketchiest of bios, didn't stop the immediate analysis of "brilliant" or "inexperienced" or "desperation pick" or "couldn't attract Hillary voters" and son. Even the Obama campaign stepped in with an initial, same-day reaction that slammed her for being a small-town mayor that the big man himself had to later retract.

In fact the reaction to Palin was a political Rorschach test where the only value gained by the initial reactions was the revealing of how the given speaker or writer saw the world rather than any objective analysis. In short McCain got inside their OODA Loop As I wrote on Friday, I think the pick was made to address certain vulnerabilities in both in the McCain and Obama campaign and whether that works in the long term depends on Palin herself.

It's a high-risk gamble but I've been thinking for a while that McCain needed to shake up the election in order to win, the long-term fundamentals in terms of the weak Republican brand and the Obama media advantage are just too much to overcome in a straight-up fight. If Palin falls, then she becomes another Quayle but with more devastating consequences; however if she succeeds then the commentary barrage over the past few days will resemble nothing but the war movie cliche of the ambush prematurely opening up on the target, expending all of its rounds, only to find the target still standing and ready-to-fight.

Palin is the former small town mayor and mid-way through her first term as governor of Alaska. For Pete's sake, while Palin was on the Wasilla City Council, Joe Biden was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. So why do some Democrats feel this?

“We may be seeing the first woman president. As a Democrat, I am reeling,” said Camille Paglia, the cultural critic. “That was the best political speech I have ever seen delivered by an American woman politician. Palin is as tough as nails.”

Maybe because experience is more than just filling time. Let's see what happens.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 6:40 AM

 
Thoughts on Palin

The big one is "high risk, high reward." I thought that the election was trending toward McCain. The Obama campaign was shooting itself in the foot with a regularity that showed some real dysfunction, Obama was not gaining any real separation in the polls, and he was soon going to be put in a position where he was the weakest- debates. That being said the Republican brand stinks. McCain must have thought that he needed something to add pizazz and that the base wasn't going to accept Lieberman.

The risks are high. As I write this, Governor Palin has made her debut on the national stage and first impressions are forming that will soon into common wisdom taht she will never shake. Remember Dan Quayle and his first few weeks on the nominee? The man actually had a fairly good rep in the Senate before 1988 but a few verbal missteps and the Hoosier was branded the dunce; he never shook that. Even if the first few weeks go well, she will have to debate Joe Biden on her weakest and his strongest suit- foreing policy.

The rewards, however, are immense.

The logical plan of attack for the Obama campaign are along lines that will leave them exposed to counter-attack. On the experience issue, she compares very well to the top of the Democratic ticket Lack of experience? She's been governor for almost as long as Obama was in the Senate before he decied to run and to top it she has executive experience and he has none. Foreign policy experience? What's Obama going to do? Point to his speech in Berlin?

Corruption in Alaska? Palin can point to reformer creds while Obama is a product of the Chicago machine with ties to Ayers and Rezko. Socially conservative? Palin has a Down Syndrome child while Obama was against the Born Alive bill in the Illinois Legislature. Palin is supposedly against gay marriage, is Obama going to attract new votes based ont hat?

In other words Palin is a form of bait. If the Obama campaign attacks her on those issues they inject issues into the campaign that reflect poorly on him.

Other rewards...

She shores up the base in a way that no one else could. Romney? Evangelical problem. Pawlenty? Tax increase. Huckabee? Solidifies the socially conservative wing but brings his history in Arkanases in play. Lieberman? Need I say anything?

She sucks the oxygen out of the Obama campaign after the Invesco speech. The talk today should have been about that great spectacle last night and it was until shortly before noon EDT when Palin was announced. Obama needs a post-convention bounce to relaunch his campaign after a lackluster last few months and instead he gets this. The Obama campaign has lost the initiaive for a while and has to wait for her to misstep

Plus she supposedly used to go moose hunting in the morning before going to school. How great is that?

Personally I like it because besides the downsides, which are substantial, this is playing to win. The best pick this side of Fred Thompson (no good reason for that sentiment, I just like Fred)
posted by Anonymous Mike at 10:43 AM

 
Dreams of Invesco

I got to watch Obama's speech tonight at the gym, which besides seeing 3 different telecasts of the event on 3 different, meant no sound. That meant I couldn't hear the great man, but I could gather some visual impressions:

1) What ever you want to say about the set design with the columns and all, at least it didn't come off as looking like Stonehenge on Spinal Tap. Take a look at a wide-angle shot from a few days ago and you see the stage being lost in the vastness of this stadium. However show that same stage on TV with the stadium with filled with 85,000 people and it looks just fine.

2) I wasn't creeped out by the columns but rather by the video screens on either side of the stage. For some reason my attention was always drawn to one of the telecasts when these screens would show Obama's head in profile, making him look disembodied and superhuman. The effect was probably worst to those in front of the stage.

3) It was quite a spectacle. I agreed with one commentator who said Obama was the only politican he knew who could have pulled it off, filling a stadium with 85,000 people. Think about it, witht he security and all it was an all-day commitment to get into the stadium to listen to a politician speak. On top of that, I heard they cut the beer sales off after Al Gore.

The big impression was this...

I just watched, in the first decade of the 21st Century, a nominee give his convention satdium in a large open-air stadium. I believe Obama was the first since Kennedy, which meant it was before the real impact of TV on presidential elections (think Kennedy-Nixon debates.) In this day and age, there is no reason to use such a venue since you reach far more people over TV.

Unless it's to beam the visuals generated by the mass crowd back to the TV viewing audience. Don't get me wrong, it was a political convention- part party, part jamboree, part campaign kick-off. Having a big ole pep rally for the party faithful never hurts and if you can fill satdium as oppsoed to an arena so much the better. However the real audience for this event was us, nobody in their right mind would compromise for an instant the TV audience for the sake of a mass rally. We were supposed to feel the excitement the man created, to see the people he drew, and get sucked into the magic and those 85,000 people were to help Obama make it all happen.

I find it all, to use that word again, creepy.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 8:55 PM

 
The Difference Between Being Single and Married...

The other evening the whole family was in the car on the way to a social function when we stopped at a red light. In front of us was a Jeep Wrangler driven by a young gentleman. On said Jeep were two bumperstickers, one was "Obama'08" and the other read:

"Please honk if you voted for George W. Bush so I can give you the finger"

I stared at it for a bit, I guess I wasn't the only one looking at it because as my hand went to the car horn my wife said "Don't even think it!"

I pleaded that I was only being polite and doing what the young man in the Jeep asked and that for me not to oblige his request wold be rude. Alas to no avail.

I guess we weren't the only one looking at the bumpersticker because a few minutes later my older boy asked "Mom, what would have happened if Pop honked the horn?"

Well my boy, that depends, do you mean before or after he would've flipped me off? Thank goodness for my wife.

Maybe the guy was part of this group mentioned by Iowahawk: "Obama Pix Hipster Prix to Reclick with Stix Hix"
posted by Anonymous Mike at 5:08 PM

 
Twin Cities Blogging

This is a great time to be in Minneapolis-St. Paul because not only will the Republican National Convention be there next week but the fabulous Minnesota State Fair is going on right now!

Luckily, Zonitics has a correspondent in our Twin Cities bureau and he has been recruited to provide blow-by-blow coverage.

Not of the Convention silly, but of the State Fair. We want to know the weight of the prize winning pig, the flavor of the tastiest pie, and the latest and greatest in deep fried foods- I heard they are doing marvelous things with bacon and poptarts these days.

I am proof positive that this sort of breaking news that Edward Boyd intended for this site to provide

Any yes Lee, you are the correspondent.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 8:09 PM

 
The Prince of Insufficient Light

The fun and joy of reading the local fishwrap; from last week's Arizona Republic's editorial "Time to Dump Pearce":

(Russell) Pearce's association with a White supremacist and much-publicized incidents such as forwarding an e-mail from a neo-Nazi group to hundreds of supporters have made it easy for critics to portray Pearce as the ugly face of the Republican Party. As a result, it is becoming tougher for Republicans to fare well in statewide contests. Voter registration figures show more new voters are shunning the GOP and registering as Democrats or independents.

Whatever you want to say about Russell Pearce, the idea that the Republicans are losing registrants and consequently statewide elections because of him, a representative from Mesa, is fairly laughable. The GOP brand is in a serious funk nationwide and I doubt a voter in Yuma or Glendale even knows who Pearce is, let alone uses Pearce's associations to affect his or her voting behavior.

Plus I love the Republic's use of "much-publicized" with its semi-passive connotations. The paper has gone out of its way to publicize Nathan Sproul's anti-Pearce mail drops. If that voter in Yuma or Glendale knows anything about Pearce, it's probably because they have been reading the Republic.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 6:42 PM

 
Travel to Foreign Lands, Meet Interesting People...

Since Atlanta in 1996, I always say that I won't watch the Olympics. The drugs, the kumbayaitis, the fact that synchronized diving and the half pipe are medal events; all of that just leaves me saying meh.

However I always get sucked in. Usually it's the family watching it and I drift out of the study and find myself hooked. I find I don't even need a few beers now to just put on blinders to all the crap to just appreciate the seemingly superhuman performances; of course keep in mind I have never been able to do a backward roll, let alone a cart wheel so my appreciation of the men gymnasts on the rings is sort of like Stone Age man seeing Neil Armstrong.

I also like having the Olympics in other countries. It's nice watching the people of the host country cheer on their fellow citizens, watching them show sheer joy in the stands.

Okay enough of the mushy stuff.

The real reason I like the Olympics in other countries is that we as taxpayers don't have to pay for them. Spend billions for buildings that for the most part will never be used again for their intended purposes, I think the velodrome for the 1976 Montreal Olympics was converted to a bug museum. I see Chicago is bidding for the 2016 games; with the cost of the 2012 London games heading well north of $10 billion, could we just all agree, Democrats and Republicans, Cubs and White Sox fans, cats and dogs, to just never host another Olympics in this country ever again.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 8:56 PM

 
Political Hardball

Wow some of you didn't like the "bribery or extortion" remark.

Well that's too bad. Like I said, I'm not sure if the contribution to the WCI rises to the criminal definition of either of those 2 terms, but it definitely does stink and just because it might be legal doesn't make it ethical. Once again, the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality has the power to bring remedial action against an offender; when a special and completely unrelated project of the director of ADEQ then profits from the settlement with the offender, well what is one to think?

So let's speculate about next steps. First look at the context.

First the WCI-Honeywell contribution needs to be investigated at some level for the reason I stated above.

Second the Legislature has the power to subpoena under ARS 41-1151. I am not sure of the exact mechanics or even the legal specifics but it seems the raw statutory material is there for the Legislature to investigate this.

Third, while the primary targets are the names on the settlement; Honeywell, ADEQ, and ADEQ's director Steve Owens any investigation is sure to lead to the Governor. WCI is an initiative of the Western Governors Association; Steve Owens owes his position of co-chair of WCI to the Governor and the Governor has used WCI to toot her horn at the national level.

Fourth, the timing of all of this is critical because the Governor has never been more vulnerable.

The sheen of her political juggernaut has lost a bit of its luster. Her two main ballot initiatives for the November election have both failed to make the ballot due to signature snafus. She just reorganized her staff in a manner that smells of need for serious shake-up. She's about to enter the last two years of her second term. Whether these are serious cracks in her organization or just something temporary remains to be seen.

The budget situation remains tenuous. I know I sound like a broken record on this but the budget deals for FY2008 and 2009 involved alot of papering over of problems and those deals, especially the FY2009, are politically her deals. She's betting on either a quick financial recovery which brings the fiscal situation in FY2010 into the black or on an Obama victory in November so she can skip town. More than likely the FY2010 is going to be a bloodbath because Senator Burns, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, is forecasting a starting point of a $1 billion. We don't have to wait until January for the budget follies to begin because we'll have a good idea of where the FY2009 budget is heading in the next several weeks between the July revenue reports and the FY2008 ending balance. If the budget is out of whack, and my guess it is, then the Legislature is going to have to crack it back open, perhaps before January. Whether it's FY2010 or a FY2009 re-do, the Governor is exposed.

Finally... it's not really a secret is it? If Obama wins, the Governor wants to go to Washington. If Obama loses, the Governor may be eyeing an 2010 Senate run against McCain's replacement. Either way she's planning her next step, but with an Obama election the period between the November election and the end of December is critical because that's when the cabinet appointments will be taking shape.

Do you think President-elect Obama wants to appoint an AG someone who both is being investigated for the Honeywell-WCI chicanery and whose state fell into a fiscal meltdown under her watch? The Legislature has a major chance to pee in her pool just at the very moment she needs to take herself nationwide.

The Governor has never been more vulnerable and after nearly 6 years of her hardball tactics, the vials of wrath should be nearly full.

Drop the hammer.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 1:08 PM

 
Voluntary Contributions

During one of his tenures as a major league manager, Davey Johnson fined one of his players for some infraction and had said player pay the fine as a contribution to one of Johnson's charities. This of course was a major no-no, generated alot of heat from the owner of the team and the players union, and contributed to Johnson's dismissal. After all, the ability to punish someone by taking money out of their pocket and then steer the money to your own benefit is well... an abuse of power.

So what to make of this in last week's Arizona Republic?

Arizona Corporation Commissioner Gary Pierce is questioning the legality of a hazardous-waste settlement reached last week with Honeywell International Inc. The settlement, which included a $5 million fine and a $1 million contribution to an air-quality cleanup project, was one of the largest civil penalties ever in an Arizona environmental-justice case.

Later in this story we find what that "air-quality cleanup project" is....

The settlement, which still must be approved by the courts, states that the money will be earmarked for the governors' use as part of the Western Climate Initiative efforts to "develop regional strategies for addressing climate change."

Now Espresso Pundit has been all over this story, but I'll try to add a worthwhile 2 cents.

The agency which reached the settlement with Honeywell was the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality, the director of which is Steve Owens. Mr. Owens is also the co-chairman of the Western Climate Initiative (WCI), which in turn is a project of the Western Governors Association. Keep in mind Honeywell is being fined for ground water pollution, not air pollution. If you parse the language, there is a $5 million fine for the act of pollution and that will presumably will go toward clean-up. There remaining $1 million penalty is in the form of a contribution that will go directly from Honeywell to Mr. Owens' project.

A logical assumption is that Honeywell agreed to this contribution in order to escape larger penalties for their conduct, perhaps there are public relations aspects and all, but you have to believe that at least the fine would have been $6 million if not more. So here's the question...

Who approached whom over the contribution?

Did Honeywell try to escape a larger punishment, either financial or in terms of public relations, by volunteering to help out a project of Mr. Owens and the Governor? Was it instead Steve Owens, with or without the knowledge of the Governor, who approached Honeywell and arranged a contribution to his project?

So was it bribery or extortion?

Think that's putting it too harshly? Maybe it's not either of those in a criminal sense but when money changes hands to the benefit of an outside project of the enforcement officer it's certainly on those grounds in an ethical sense. I expect to see such actions in Chicago or Jersey, not here in Arizona. If the Governor and Mr. Owens need money for their out-of-state projects, they shouldn't be raising it from the very entities that they regulate.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 3:37 PM

 
A Little Help

Nothing like trolling through JLBC and OSPB correspondence to pass the day, but I need a little help...

There's a letter from the directors of those 2 agencies dated July 29th which notifies the Governor, House Speaker Weiers, and Senate Tim Bee that the ending balance for FY2008 (which ended June 30th) is projected to be $99 million in the hole with a final number to be reported September 15th. Now the amount can be more than covered by the Budget Stabilization Fund (BSF) which the letter note has a balance of $250 million.

What I'm not sure is....

1) If there is a need to transfer about $100 million from the BSF, isn't that money already earmarked for the FY2009 budget? Sure FY2008 will be taken care of, but wouldn't the Legislature have to deal with the resulting hole in FY 2009 (or do some sort of voodoo dance to make sure tax revenue rises by that amount)?

2) Why the hole in the FY2008 budget? Remember they just redid the budget in late April, so how did the budget get back out of whack in just over 60 days? Unanticipated spending? Tax revenue even lower than expected?

I guess all will be explained in about 4 weeks but this is curious.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 3:26 PM

 
The Swinging Hammer

Some thoughts on Georgia as both sides declare a cease fire...

For all the talk about the Russians occupying the entirety of Georgia, stopping at the border of South Ossetia and Abkhazia makes too much sense. The lead elements in South Ossetia, a motor rife division, have been fighting for about 4 days and are probably blown and in need of rest and resupply. Futhermore, the division's logistics trail is probably limited to a single road back through the Roki Tunnel into Russia making resupply and future extended operations toward Tbilisi difficult.

I fear that Georgia will be changed all out of recognition. Barring some unforseen diplomatic maneuverings, I just cannot see Russian combat forces leaving either South Ossetia or Abkhazia. Richard Fernandez called Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, the "cork in the bottle" given its control of the road network leading out of the Caucasus and into the Georgia plain. Even if Russia doesn't annex the two regions in question, its control of both that cork and the Kodori Gorge in Abkhazia will give it a predominant military position.

Also there are signs that the Russians plan to bring war crimes charges against Georgia President Saakashivili in both international and Russian courts. While a formal cease-fire would supposedly mean a withdrawal of Russian forces to pre-war positions (or not depending on how you interepret which Russian official says what), the Russians have indicated that they wouldn't sign such an agreement with a war criminal as the other party. Draw your own conclusions.

Finally, a domestic political angle....

With less than 2 weeks before the national conventions start, we now have a major foreign policy issue injected right into the campaign. What should be done? Leave aside the chatter of the blogs and the punditocracy about resurgent Russian bears, neo-cons, and Georgia had it coming. Focus on the key issue. To bring back an image of Dean Acheson and Korea in 1950, McCain and Obama should be asked where the security perimeter of the US lies in relation to both the Russia's "near abroad" and the eastern part of the European Union. With threats toward the Czech Republic over the installation of AMB radars, the attack on Georgia combined with revious emddling in Ukraine and Estonia, and Russia's energy leverage I cannot think of a better time to have this debate.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 8:48 PM

 
The Devil Went Down to Georgia

Thoughts regarding the Russian attack on Georgia...

The 2 main under-reported facts regarding the attack on Georgia both have to deal with context.

The first contextual fact is speed. In a matter of a few days, the Russians have managed to launch both a large armored column and a joint naval-amphibious attack at the periphery of their territory. The complexity, and relative success, of those operations gave lie to the assertion that Russia was only reacting to provocations on the ground and instead give credence to the notion that this operation was a long time coming. You simply don't sortie ships armed for war, hundreds of armored vehicles and pieces of artillery with war loads, and long supply columns without a great deal of preparation. As Ralph Peters points out, the fact that the road into South Ossetia wasn't littered with broken down vehicles shows a degree of preparation beyond a launch out of the barracks. The Russians were poised and waiting.

Second, is both the position of Georgia and disposition of Russia. Putin went on record several years bemoaning the fact that the collapse of the Soviet Union was " the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century." He certainly has acted on this feeling by attempts to subvert the former Soviet states from his cyberwar against Estonia, interference in the Ukrainian elections, and previous pot stirring in Georgia. The joint operation in both South Ossetia and Abkazia coupled with the air strikes in Georgia proper suggest a settling of accounts with Georgia and its pro-US government. The benefits from a toppling of that government are many: reduction of American influence on Russia's southern border, possible restriction of the oil pipeline in Georgia, and a general message to those nations on Russia's periphery regarding whose side is the winning one.

One final thought...

There has been alot of talk regarding the "3 AM phone call" nature of this crisis and how it will interplay with the presidential campaign. I think the focus on the "3 AM" part is misguided but there are effects on the campaign. Senator Obama has pinned a great deal of his foreign policy approach on the twin pillars of accomodation and personal diplomacy, the idea that if he could get in the room with the other side whether the leader fo Iran and Venezuela, that a deal could be struck. Call it Realpolitick or call it appeasement, depending on your political leanings. However it assumes that a deal beneficial to the US could be struck.

The US has sponsored Georgia's entry into NATO, a move that has been tabled for consideration until the end of this year due to opposition of Germany. You think if Georgia was now a candidate for NATO membership thatthe past few days would have happened? The Putin regime is playing for keeps, first isolating, and then attacking the key US ally in the region as part of a long-term strategy to assert Russian dominance.

What the crisis does inject into the campaign is the realization is that the world is still a dangerous place, that there are still those leaders who see the lives of their citizens and the citizens of other countries as mere means to their ends. Senator Obama should be asked how he plans to talk to such people or if he just plans to look into Putin's soul.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 6:37 AM

 
The Big Green Lawn

One of those great father-son moments this morning.

Some time ago I added mowing the lawn to my 12 year-old's chore list. Personally I like mowing the lawn; the smell of cut grass infused with motor oil and gasoline, whipping the unruly grass into line... good times. Growing up I had 2 1/2 acres to mow and with a generous helping of trees, it was an all weekend task. Nevertheless as soon as my father let me use the pushmower, I went at it. For a 10 year-old, there are few things this side of firearms that compares with such a delightful rite of passage as the implementation of internal combustion engines and spinning metal blades (well maybe pellet guns and wasp nests.)

I don't think my 12 year-old feels the same way.

The other month he seemed flummoxed when I informed him that the lawn needed mowing. "But Pop", he objected, "I did the lawn last week!" He was even more bewildered when I told him the lawn would probably need to be mowed next week. You would think this would inspire him to start lobbying for a xeriscaped yard or to take up biology in order to craft genetically-modified grass that would stay short, but no.

This morning took the cake.

The boy is leaving this afternoon and will not be back until Monday so I informed him last night that the lawn would have to be done before he left. When he objected, I told him he could skip the chore if he would be willing to forfeit half his allowance for the week (which is the standard household penalty for not completing an assigned chore.) Nothing like the threat of taking money out of a kid's pocket in order to drive motivation. I suggested he wake bright and early so as to beat the heat.

There is sufficient morning light at about 5:20 AM. About 6:30 AM is late enough in the neighborhood to start operating power equipment, you would think a smart kid would have the mower going by that time and be done with the lawn by 7:30. However 6:30 came and went, 7:30 came went, and by 8:00 AM I informed my Sleeping Beauty that the temperature was now about 95 degrees. With some early morning belly scratching, some contemplative time in the bathroom, and a leisurly breakfast the boy was ready to work by 8:30.

We were already past the first stage, denial. That stage involved his sleeping-in through his alarm clock and the chain-gang mentality after he woke up. It only took a few minutes of mowing for the next stage, anger, to kick-in.

"It's too hot out" Well it is a little warm, but it was less so a few hours earlier.

At this stage, I get a pitcher of lemonade and proceed to a shaded bench and like a modern-day Admiral Jacky Fisher inform him that neither of us will leave until the job is finished. Lest he think that this will give him control of the situation, I tell him that I would spend the time thinking of new chores for him to do

We quickly proceeded to the bargaining stage. "Why do you have to water the lawn, it just makes the grass grow! Cannot you stop it? Please?"

Unfortunately I run out of lemonade, how to get more without deserting my post? Luckily I have a 9-year old who is more than willing to bring a fresh round of the delicious cold beverage. As a reward I allow the 9 year-old to go to the pool where he can both observe his brother and the level of my lemonade pticher while remaining cool and comfortable.

Now we head toward the stage of depression. "Why doesn't the stupid mower work? It's not my fault! You're all against me! I don't care anymore" I asked him if he checked the gas, soon the mower is up and running again. I'm running out of lemonade again.

Finally acceptance. The job is finished by 10:00 AM. Total time to finish 45 minutes of mowing? 1 1/2 hours.

Thank goodness school is starting next week, because I'm thinking my older boy needs a vacation from summer.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 11:28 AM

 
The Big Cigar

Once upon a time there used to be a business columnist for the Arizona Republic. It seemed he would use the same basic 4 or 5 stock columns which drew their inspiration from Richard Florida's genius, the perceived need for shadier parking lots, and the idea that everyone but him and his cohorts was stupid.

An extension of these themes was the need for the "big cigars" to get involved in Valley politics, top business leaders who would be able to work with local political and non-profit leaders to get important projects done and deliver results.

Big cigars like Marty Schultz

As the VP of Government Relations for Pinnacle West, it seems that Marty has his hands in all sorts of various civic and political projects. This year is a big one for Mr. Schultz. He has 2 initiatives that are geared toward the November ballot, one that will consolidate K-12 districts across the state and another that will raise the state sales tax by a penny to pay for state-wide transportation projects.

The first problem is that those initiatives are floundering; as Espresso Pundit has been reporting the transportation tax may not even reach the ballot and I seriously doubt if any of the big school district mergers will be approved by the voters.

However the second problem is the more surprising. Both initiatives were years in the making. If you follow the meeting minutes for the School District Redistricting Commission (SDRC), you get a small glimpse of hell as the Commission members are forced to deal with a host of competing interests and an array of painful but necessary of details. Same with the TIME transportation sales tax, alot of coalition-building, alot of bargaining. All hard work.

The second problem is that despite all of that hard work, despite the involvement of the Big Cigar is how mediocre the final results. Unmet transportation needs in the state? Round up the usual suspects and gather their wish list, call that list "critical needs", and then say you need to raise taxes. Actually that's backwards because in reality they have already told us they need to raise taxes but still, with less than 2 months before early voting in the general election, haven't told us what will be funded.

School Redistricting? Create the biggest districts possible, because we all know that if the past 30 years of corporate America have taught us is that bigger is better when it comes to organizations. Leave aside the facts that the Commission cannot guarantee that there will be any real financial savings from the consolidation or that any savings would be funneled into the classroom. What the Commission can guarantee is that this initiative will create larger, more remote educational bureaucracies. If that was the goal of the Commission then mission accomplished.

Think I'm being too hard? When there was the ballot initiative in the 1980s for Maricopa County to implement a brand new 1/2 sales tax increase for transportation, backers were smart enough to link such a controversial proposal to something specific, the development of a regional freeway system. A specific quid pro quo. When that same sales tax came up for renewal in 2004, backers developed a specific list of projects that would be funded by the sales tax extension and that plan was developed a full year in advance. Compare and contrast.

So what's the secret spice, that something extra that the Big Cigar is adding? Generating proposals for tax-and-spend, growing larger bureaucracies that will be defeated at the polls is something that any of us can do.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 4:17 PM

 
Miscellaneous Debris

Some thoughts....

First I forgot to mention that last week's bloggerfest at Four Peaks Brewery was a big success. One day we'll get El Gringo to come but we may have to bring the mountain to him... block party in El Mirage anyone?

Packer GM Ted Thompson might just a modern day Machiavelli. There are reports both that the Packers offered Brett Favre $20 million over 10 years to stay retired and also that Favre is considering taking it. So Favre may take $20 million so he wouldn't do what he's thinking about doing and instead keeping doing what he said he will? Where I come from such a pay-off in a slightly different context will get you 7 to 10 at Rahway

Here's where the Machiavelli element comes in. Favre has been getting the better of the Packers in the PR game; after a great season, local legend was pushed to retire by cold-hearted souless front office. Now that he wants to come back, all those mean men will offer him as a roster spot; If this was played out in the Astrodome, the whole crowd would be chanting "Let him play!" after all he's just doing it for the love of the game. However now there is word that he might take the money and not play, I mean if he loved the game that much wouldn't he pay millions to play and not the other way around?

Other news...

A little more than a month after it pumped up a state budget that was founded on borrowing and blue sky predictions, the Arizona Republic just discovered what only a genius or someone who can count would know; that state sales tax reciepts shrank during the past fiscal year. The fact that sales tax revenue, which is one of the 3 revenue pillars of the state budget, was declining was reported last month by the JLBC as the budget was being passed. However now with the budget passed and put to bed, only now does the Republic start paying attention to JLBC reports

That was "news" that could have been used... the other month. I bet when the Legislature needs to get called back before January to fix the gaping holes in the FY2009 budget that the Republic would claim it never saw that one coming as well.

So giving his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention in front of thousands of supporters is not enough, presumptive nominee Barack Obama is going to move the speech over to the Broncos football stadium so he can give it in front of tens of thousands of supporters. At first I thought he was going to do it to bump Denver's lagging tourist economy, but now...

In the modern age with mass media and a democracy of hundreds of millions of people, the best way to reach voters is not through speeches in front of large crowds but rather using the electronic media of TV and radio. The only reason to give a speech in front of tens of thousands of cheering supporters is to generate images that can be beamed out tens of millions of voters. The man can give a speech when placed in front of a teleprompter and he can drive a tingle up the media's collective leg so this is going to be quite a spectacle; it's the logic of mass rallies and crowds amplfied by the reach of modern communications.

You think this would be more of a national issue. We have been hearing for the past 7 years about how the current administration has been playing on the fears and emotions of the electorate in order to hoodwink and thereby swindle them. Yet one of the nominees for President not only has the tendency to give emotional yet vapid speeches ("we are the change we have been waiting for"), to show a degree of hubris in those speeches ("this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal"), but to also want to give national speeches in front of tens of thousands of people. Don't get me started on the speech in Berlin in front of hundreds of thousands of Germans while using as a backdrop the Victory Column which celebrates the triumphs of Prussian militarism.

Use of emotion and not reason in a quasi-religious way. Devoid of substance. In front of mass groups of people.
posted by Anonymous Mike at 7:50 AM