Featured Stories
TUSD Board, Pedicone need to condemn Michael Hicks’ implication middle school students might have been molested at UA
February 6, 2012
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by David Safier This is truly beneath contempt. While TUSD Board member Michael Hicks was on Garrett Lewis' Morning Ritual Interviews on KNST February 2, Hicks implied there was a possibility TUSD middle school students were molested, like children allegedly were at Penn State, while they were at University of Arizona on a day they … Read more
Behind every silver lining is a dark cloud
February 6, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
If you listen to Willard "Mittens" Romney and the rest of the GOP presidential field, their talking points are that the economic recovery would be doing better if not for President Obama's interventionist economic policies (which began under George W. Bush in late 2008 by the way).
It is important to keep in mind that these Tea-Publicans are all true believers in the "invisible hand" of the freee market place. What they are really saying is that the economy should have been left alone to sink into a Great Depression and the "creative destruction" of a depression would have cleaned out the inefficiencies in our economy. The human cost and destruction of lives be damned.
This is not new. It is as old as Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon's "liquidationist thesis": Andrew Mellon advised President Hoover to “Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate.”
Here's the full quote from President Herbert Hoover on the advice given to him by Mellon:
…the “leave it alone liquidationists” headed by [my] Secretary of the Treasury Mellon, who felt that government must keep its hands off and let the slump liquidate itself. Mr. Mellon had only one formula: “Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate.” He insisted that, when the people get an inflation brainstorm, the only way to get it out of their blood is to let it collapse. He held that even a panic was not altogether a bad thing. He said: “It will purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down. People will work harder, live a more moral life. Values will be adjusted, and enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people”… (Source: U.C. Berkeley Economist Brad De Long).
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In some ways Andrew Mellon's failed approach resembles the IMF austerity programmes after the 1997 Asian economic crisis that economist Joseph Stiglitz criticized so vehemently in his book Globalization and its Discontents (2002).
It is also the IMF and European Union austerity programmes being put in place today in response to the Euro Crisis that will lead to recession this year – some warn depression — in Europe.
Best Superbowl Ad
February 6, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
My team was not playing in the Superbowl once again this year, so I was not emotionally invested in either team. Despite a close game I thought the game was a little boring, at least until late in the fourth quarter.
Congratulations to Eli Manning and the New York Giants. Giants fans will be insufferable at least until next September.
Madonna is always worth the price of admission, she knows how to put on a show and she delivered with her Cecil B. DeMille cast of thousands Hollywood extravaganza halftime show.
But what about the battle of the Superbowl ads? No contest. Best Superbowl ad goes to Clint Eastwood and Chrysler for its "imported from Detroit" ad, "It's Halftime in America" (below the fold. The NFL is pulling down YouTube posts of this ad for copyright, so catch it while you can). I stood up and cheered. Well done, sir.
And for true sports fans, "pitchers and catchers report" (the four sweetest words in the English language) on February 17 for the Oakland A's and Seattle Mariners, and February 19 for all other teams. Full squads report on February 24.
It’s ‘Guns on Campus – and Everywhere Else Week’ at the Lege
February 5, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Our Tea-Publican legislature has been using "theme" weeks for legislative initiatives. Last week it was "Destroy Public Employee Unions Week." And as Craig McDermott pointed out in his "This Week" post, this week is "Guns on Campus – and Everywhere Else Week":
Monday at 2 p.m. or upon adjournment of the floor session, Judiciary will meet in SHR1. The nastiest agenda of the week. Up for consideration: SB1304, removing the ability of counties and municipalities to pass laws restricting or barring the discharge of firearms within a quarter mile of an occupied structure (you know, like a house); SB1448, making is OK to pack heat in a public building if access to that building is not restricted by a cop or security guard; SB1474, the annual "guns in schools" bill; SB1479, a bill with too many provisions to summarize quickly here, but it's another in the pro-gun/anti-society group of gun bills this year[.]
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Wednesday at 9 a.m., Military Affairs and Public Safety will meet in HHR3. Up for consideration: HB2728, allowing the use of silencers while hunting. I'd make another "jackrabbits" wisecrack, but combined with the "limitless" magazines bill above, the cynic in me thinks that the intended prey for these hunters is a little browner and a lot taller than the average jackrabbit. And that isn't something to joke about.
Tucson has had enough of crazy people with easy access to guns. 4 Dead In Univ. Of Arizona Shooting (October 2002), and of course the mass shooting on January 8, 2011. Is making these kinds of incidents more likely to occur a rational, responsible policy? I think not.
The president of the University of Arizona is voicing opposition to a bill allowing guns on state university campuses. Eugene Sander says bringing guns on campus creates enormous problems for law enforcement. UA president opposes campus guns bill – Arizona Capitol Times
Sander added the Tucson school would be required to spend thousands of dollars to install gun lockers in buildings, an expenditure that Sander says is misguided.
Hmmm, sounds an awful lot like those "unecessary government regulations" that drive up the cost of doing business that Tea-Publicans are always whining about, doesn't it? And this would cost taxpayers money just to humor the "happiness is a warm gun" crowd. Why not charge gunowners a user fee and let them pay for it? Typical Tea-Publicans: always making demands without having to pay for it (unfunded mandates). Deadbeats!
Comedian Daniel Tosh of Tosh.0 on Comedy Central offered a unique perspective on this issue recently in this video "Web Redemption – I Just Shot Myself – Uncensored" (NWS) below the fold: "Anything Arizona is in favor of is probably bad for America."
Let’s stop the ongoing, illegal fast and furious gun running
February 5, 2012
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by David Safier The ill-conceived, poorly executed gun running operation Fast and Furious is over but for the shouting of Republicans who want to turn it into a political issue. But the ongoing problem of guns crossing the border into Mexico continues at a pace both fast and furious. Mayors Against Illegal Guns has written … Read more
Terri Proud and ‘tyranny of the minority’
February 5, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
While we're on the subject of our colonial overlords in the Arizona legislature disenfranchising the citizens of Baja Arizona and usurping our rights of local control, the Arizona Daily Star today has an editorial opinion taking our colonial overlords to task. GOP bill sidelining Huckelberry unfair to 89% of voters:
In their efforts to take power from Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry – a man they truly, deeply don't like – nine Southern Arizona Republican legislators have proposed a law that is grossly unfair to taxpayers in the city of Tucson and unincorporated Pima County.
The county currently has a 25-member bond advisory committee. Each of the five elected county supervisors appoints three members; the five incorporated cities each name one; the two Indian nations each select one; and administrator Huckelberry chooses three.
The committee makes recommendations to the Board of Supervisors about what bond projects it should ask voters to approve.
The proposed legislation would replace this 25-member group with a six-person committee: one each representing the city of Tucson, unincorporated Pima County, Oro Valley, Marana, Sahuarita and South Tucson.
A majority would give proposed bond projects a thumb's up or down. If it said "yes," voters would still have the final say.
A huge problem with the legislation is that it would give equal power to the representative from South Tucson, which has 5,000 residents, and the member from Tucson, which has 520,000 people.
Indeed, the four small jurisdictions – South Tucson, Sahuarita, Marana and Oro Valley – with a combined population of 105,000, could form a majority and outvote the two people who represent the 870,000 residents of Tucson and unincorporated Pima County.
That's hugely unfair.
It’s official: U.S. higher ed is the best in the world
February 5, 2012
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by David Safier A poll has been taken in other countries, certainly in Asian countries, and the consensus is, the U.S. has the finest system of higher education in the world. It's not a poll, exactly. It's students from Asian countries voting with their feet and their dollars, spending huge amounts of money to attend … Read more
Downtown developers, ‘crony capitalism’ and the Arizona legislature’s Rio Nuevo Board
February 5, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Craig McDermott included in his "This Week" post at the legislature this heads up:
"Thursday at 9 a.m., Technology and Infrastructure will meet in HHR1. On the agenda: HB2647, a Rio Nuevo bill…"
Here is the explanation. A group of Downtown Tucson developers and business interests wants the Arizona legislature to make big changes to Rio Nuevo, including a change that could guarantee them financial relief for future projects. Businesses press lawmakers to make Rio Nuevo changes:
Fletcher McCusker, one of the key promoters of downtown redevelopment, is unofficially calling the effort the "Downtown Tucson Initiative."
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Backers said the key to righting the scandal-ridden project hinges on several items:
• Creating incentives for developers to build within the district – potentially waiving development fees, eliminating impact fees, abating property taxes or allowing developers to keep sales taxes collected by their business for five to 10 years.
• Expanding the authority of the Rio Nuevo Board, which can only spend money on a convention center and the as-yet-economically-infeasible convention hotel.
• Streamlining the regulatory burden on developers, to provide more clarity in obtaining building permits.
• Building more accountability and standardization into procurement.
McCusker, whose backers include Jim Horvath, Buzz Isaacson, Kevin Madden, Don Martin and Scott Stiteler, said he fears that with the Rio Nuevo Board and city of Tucson at an impasse and threatening to meet in court, some legislators might decide to pull the plug on the project altogether. This would be a way to show the project still retains support and could get back on track, he said.
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McCusker said he doesn't believe the effort is stepping on any toes, since it's going to need backing from both the Rio Nuevo Board and the city to get through the legislative process.
