Letters to the Editor and Commentary

Apples and Oranges

When it comes to the Federal Budget, we’re getting numbers thrown at us, like fruit, from every direction. We’re ducking a pittance here, a quadrillion there, here a billion, there a trillion. Like mushy crab apples on the sidewalk, you can’t take a step without getting some on your shoes. Like zucchini in a good year, our bountiful harvest of zeroes and commas is overwhelming.

Congress and the President just agreed to make “historic” cuts in the proposed spending for the remainder of the year, but the cuts were expressed in oranges, and the budget in apples. In the interest of clearing up the confusion, I propose simplifying the whole mess by eliminating the “apples and oranges” comparisons, and will express our current budget in trillions of dollars:

National debt; $14.3 T

2011 “budget”; $3.8 T

Federal deficit; $1.6 T

“Historic cuts”; $0.0 T

How can that be? $0.0? Yep, all the fuss, all the weeping and gnashing of teeth, was over an amount which doesn’t even amount to a rounding error in government spending!

“DEBT, n. An ingenious substitute for the chain and whip of the slave-driver.” -- Barlow S. Vode

Terry Smith
Lanark

Liberal Mind-Set

Mr. Gonzalez in his letter has made a serious mis-statement that needs to be corrected; however it does illustrate the mind-set of liberals brilliantly. He calls Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security “programs that made this country great!”

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Social “safety net” programs are destroying this country financially. Government interference in health care has increased its cost to an obscene level and layered it with bureaucracy. Now that these programs have demonstrably failed the liberals want their standard fix – make it bigger and more expensive.

Our Founders did not meet in Philadelphia to create an enormous welfare state whose prime activity was re-distribution of wealth. They created a new form of government whose citizen’s rights come from God, not the State and in which the government was prevented from interfering in the lives of its people. In a historic first they created a climate in which individuals were free to earn and enjoy the results of their labors and also free to fail if that was their choice.

It worked wonderfully until the progressives got control. The Democrat party gave us a Great War on Poverty. It has been and continues to be a colossal failure. Under government control poverty won, in fact it has flourished. If you subsidize failure you will always get more of it.

Mr. Gonzales, a country does not become greater due to the number of people receiving government assistance. but because of the number of people who do not need it.

Larry J. Farrell
Mount Carroll

Water Facts

In the ongoing matter of Mount Carroll’s mountain of unpaid water bills ($43,909.34 as of the March 22, 2011 report), last week’s Prairie Advocate article seemed to suggest that there is no clear cut point at which an unpaid water bill is considered to be delinquent. Further, the article left the impression that there is no clear point at which delinquent water bills are subject to having the water service shut off.

Those misstatements are completely at odds with the city’s own ordinances which outline in great detail the rules pertaining to due dates, penalty fees, delinquency and shut off. These are given in the Mount Carroll City Ordinance 658, 8-11-1981 (among others) and the pertinent lines follow:

7-4A-1 (I) In the event the charges for service are not paid within thirty (30) days after the date of billing for such service, such charges shall be deemed and are hereby declared to be delinquent, and thereafter such delinquencies shall constitute liens upon the real estate for which such service is supplied, and the city clerk is hereby authorized and directed to file sworn statements showing such delinquencies in the office of the recorder of deeds of Carroll County Illinois, and the filing of such statements shall be deemed notice for the payment of such charges for service. FURTHER, IN THE EVENT THE CHARGES FOR SERVICE ARE NOT PAID WITHIN THIRTY (30) DAYS AFTER THE DATE OF BILLING, WATER SERVICE TO THE SUBJECT PREMISES SHALL BE TERMINATED. (Ordinance 655, 7-14-1981)

This ordinance has been in effect since 1981 so it should not be unclear to the parties involved in collecting and providing water service.

To further clarify statements reported, Water Superintendent Rusty Handel to my knowledge (during at least the past four years) has never had the responsibility for reading meters or turning water service on or off. Those duties are carried out by water department employee Craig Vietmeyer. Suggesting that attending to delinquent water bills is a misuse of Mr. Handel’s time is in my opinion an inaccurate statement.

It is worth pointing out that the ad hoc policy of dealing with each delinquent bill as a one-off situation means the city does not only not enforce its ordinances, but does not treat all residents in a consistent, fair way. People who pay their water bill on time (now the minority of households with 321 properties late as of March 22, 2011) are subsidizing the majority.

While it is certainly true that hard times do impact individual circumstances, and it is true that shutting off water during the winter months violates state statute, some accounts have been on the ‘shut off list’ for months, even years, while the balances climb into the hundreds of dollars. The new council should make it an early priority to work out a consistent policy for clearing delinquent accounts, and agree to a well defined process in the event of hardship. And then it should be implemented consistently, with accountability.

Sincerely,

Nina Cooper

Alderman, Ward 1

Mount Carroll City Council

Teamwork, Economics and Government - Guest Commentary

By Larry Plachno

Decades of research into social problems have shown that our society works very much like a team. When we cooperate, work together, and do what is best for others, we all come out ahead. Most social problems are usually caused when people put themselves first and ignore what is best for others and society.

This is not a new idea but has been around since the beginning of recorded history. Confucius is credited with admonishing us to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” It is also an eye-opening fact that decades of computer statistics and reports on social problems echo and confirm basic Christian teachings on love of God and love of neighbor. When we work together, we all come out ahead and become a winning team.

Ongoing research into social problems shows that the two most important factors in improving things are traditional marriage and parental supervision of children. The statistics surrounding marriage are very positive while statistics show that kids are better off spending time with their parents than with peers or others.

Another interesting thought is that available wages in our society are set by employers and typically based on sales or some similar criteria. No government agency and no private group exists that increases or decreases available wages based on people entering or leaving the work force. Hence, available wages are like a pie. When you split it among more people, each then gets a smaller portion.

One of the major problems with our society is that too many people make decisions based on what they want today without thinking about how those decisions will harm themselves and society tomorrow. Let’s delve into this a little deeper by looking at numbers comparing marriage, parental supervision of children, and available wages. I will offer three basic models. For the sake of simplicity I will use 100 people since that works best with percentages although you could easily use most any numbers and get the same basic result. Hence, we will talk about 50 men and 50 women.

Our first model is what might be called the traditional model. The 50 men and 50 women are married and believe in the family wage. The husband works while the wife stays home with the kids. Simple math tells us that since there are 50 workers, each household, on average, gets two percent of the available wages and the kids have excellent parental supervision.

Moving on, let’s assume that these people decide to eliminate the family wage and send the mothers to work. Since we now have 100 workers, each individual now gets, on average, only one percent of the available wages. However, since there are two workers per family, each family still gets two percent of the available wages. However, parental supervision of children suffers because Mom is no longer home with the kids.

You might want to take a few steps back and think about who gains and who loses with this move. The big corporations come out ahead because they now get two workers for the same wages. Government also comes out ahead because it now gets two salaries to tax. The big losers are kids and society because parental supervision of children has gone out the window.

Taking this one additional step, let’s look at a third model where the people decide to become pro-choice on marriage. Here, our 100 people either decide not to marry or get divorced. We now have 100 households with one worker per household. Hence, each household gets only one percent of the available wages.

Which of these three models do you think is best for society?

Unfortunately, the problem of parental supervision of children goes beyond that. The statistics are terrible on children raised without a father. Boys raised without a father to teach them good and evil are statistically more likely to commit major crimes. Girls raised without a father are more likely to have children out of wedlock and be on welfare.

Married people are statistically less likely to need government assistance than single people. Hence, for many unmarried mothers the government becomes a pseudo husband and a pseudo father, and typically does a rotten job at both. The bottom line is that as marriage decreases, government increases and government spending increases to fill the gap. Which is better for our society, more marriage or more government?

What Does a Government Shutdown Look Like? - Guest Commentary

Dr. Harold Pease

The paranoia with respect to a government shutdown is amazing. The hysteria peddlers using this terminology, and the media that purposely play to it, must know these two words emit such an extremist, emotional response. It appears designed to frighten the least informed either for or against the other party, thus the terminology and subsequent blame game.

So what does a government shut down look like? Do the president and vice president resign now that the government ends? No? Does Congress fly out of Washington D. C. the following day and cease to draw their pay, and the Supreme Court cease to deliberate on constitutional questions? Does the army come home and cease to protect us? NO, No, No! Do states, counties, and cities no longer function? No again, they have their own tax base and cops, prisons, and teachers remain in place.

There will never be a government shut down because none of these things will ever happen short of an overthrow of the government from within or a successful invasion from without. So cease the media frenzy and subsequent over-reaction.

How do we know this? Because we had a five-day shutdown between November 14 and November 19, 1995, and a second one of 21 days, between December 16, and January 6, 1996, and none of these things happened. No! Not even one. In fact, the public as a whole didn’t even notice. So what did happen? “The Federal government of the United States put non-essential government workers on furlough and suspended non-essential services…(Wikipedia).” Essentially all went on as before except some paychecks were a few days late. Apparently the federal government does (when forced to do so) know what non-essential services are after all, and is capable of closing them if it has the will.

So at worst a government shutdown is still really only a partial shutdown of non-essential services. So the federal government goes on a long overdue diet and gets back to the basics. This is precisely the Tea Party position (“cut it or shut it”) and the reason they do not fear such. If you have a budget of $3.7 trillion and you have taxes covering only $2 trillion simple math tells you that either you double taxes or cut half of your expenses. You simply can’t keep increasing the national debt, now nearing $14.300 trillion, which has been laid on the backs of our new slaves—our children.

When you have cancer you must surgically remove the infected tissue. Of course it is painful, but the longer you wait the more painful, drastic, and life threatening it becomes. Most of the programs cut in both shutdowns, were not areas of clear constitutional authority as defined in Article I, Section 8, so in time such cuts should become permanent cuts or be subjected to the amending process for appropriate authority.

Usually diets have some benefits in and of themselves. In the case of the federal government shutdowns of 1995 and 1996, both parties benefited: Democrats, under President Bill Clinton, because thereafter he was credited with “the first four consecutive balanced budgets since the 1920’s” and Republicans because they retained control of both houses of Congress largely because of the popularity of their hard line on the budget (Wikipedia).

So a government shutdown is really only a partial shutdown that may actually be healthy. Lets call it such in the future so that we don’t frighten the less informed?

Dr. Harold Pease is an expert on the United States Constitution. He has dedicated his career to studying the writings of the Founding Fathers and applying that knowledge to current events. He has taught history and political science from this perspective for over 25 years at Taft College. To read more of his articles, please visit www.LibertyUnderFire.org.

How “Radical” is the Ryan Plan? - Guest Commentary

By Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson

Question for those of you concerned about the size of federal debts and deficits: Would you endorse a plan which would add another five or six trillion dollars to the federal debt over the next decade while increasing Uncle Sam’s annual expenditures by $1.1 trillion? If so, you’re in luck. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) recently unveiled just such a plan.

Naturally, Democrats immediately denounced Ryan’s plan as “radical.” They think the increases in spending and debt should be much larger. It shows how far the goalposts have been moved in American politics that adding multi-trillion-dollars of debt is the most conservative proposal anyone in government has made. How would you like your government debt, Mr. or Ms. Citizen—gargantuan or astronomical?

The Ryan Plan, if implemented (more on that in a moment), would cut $179 billion from President Obama’s planned spending in 2012 and another $241 billion in 2013. Why is it not “radical” to raise spending by $787 billion in one year, like Obama did in 2009, but “radical” to propose a decrease of $179 billion?

Ryan proposes to reform Medicare and Medicaid so that they don’t bankrupt the country. Why is that demonized as “war on the elderly and poor” (the phraseology of Illinois Democrat Jan Schakovsky), but nobody talks about waging “war on the young” by saddling the rising generation with trillions of dollars of debt?

Ryan’s plan is bold in comparison to the status quo in Washington, but it isn’t radical. You want “radical?” How about getting government out of the medical field entirely? Since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s, medical costs have soared far beyond the rate of inflation. More than that, market competition has been diminished and fraud and inefficiency have ballooned apace with the growth of these two medical bureaucracies. (Why do liberals rant and rave about the Pentagon’s inefficiencies, but remain silent about the similar inefficiencies of Medicare and Medicaid?) Ryan’s plan is statist to the core, promising seniors large government subsidies with which to choose from a slate of government-regulated health care plans.

At this stage, Ryan’s plan is academic. Its combination of spending cuts, tax cuts, and devolution of administration of government programs from the federal to the state level—while a significant improvement over the fiscal insanity of recent years—is dead in the water until at least 2013.

If you doubt that, look at the recently concluded “government shutdown” soap opera. The government is going broke, the Republicans were asking for a giveback of less than 10 percent of the Obama/Pelosi/Reid spending increases, but the Democrats—famous for extolling bipartisanship—threatened to shut down the government rather than make such a modest compromise.

It will be interesting to see how long Ryan’s fellow Republicans in the House stand by his proposals. The coming vote is largely symbolic. The real test will be when Republicans have to face the voters in close re-election races next year. A majority of Americans may say that they favor reduced federal spending and smaller deficits, but when push comes to shove, how many will vote for a legislator who actually shrinks programs from which voters benefit?

Even if Ryan’s plan, by some miracle, were to be enacted, nothing fundamental would change. Uncle Sam will remain a gigantic, meddling nanny, interfering with our lives and progressively eroding our liberty, entangling us in a corrupt network of special privileges that murder justice and bury the rule of law.

Ryan’s plan is a futile attempt to square the circle. He is trying to find a way to preserve an inherently flawed system—a democratic transfer society—whereby government somehow takes care of all of us without eventually spending itself into bankruptcy.

The Ryan Plan is not radical; that is, it doesn’t get to the root of the problem. It never questions the legitimacy of government redistribution of wealth. The mechanisms, rationale, and justification for Big Government remain unchallenged. Although a significant step in the right direction (i.e., less federal spending), Paul Ryan’s plan ultimately is not a cure for what ails us.

Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson is an adjunct faculty member, economist, and fellow for economic and social policy with The Center for Vision & Values at Grove City College.

Capitol Report

By Jim Sacia, State Representative, 89th District

“This is why people laugh at us.” Those prophetic words were spoken to me by my good friend Frank Mautino (D-Spring Valley) while Keith Farnham (D-Elgin) presented House Bill 1262 which requires the State Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) to conduct a survey of businesses that have left Illinois to ask them why they left. You have got to be kidding me. The bill is supported by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) which certainly gives it some credibility, and it passed the House with 83 “yes” votes. Mine was not among them.

I’ll tell you why businesses are leaving and the state can save the money the survey will cost - we have a tax structure which is crippling. We have the most onerous workers compensation laws in the nation. We are not pro-actively supporting our business community in any way. Remember, they are the ones who create jobs.

You may remember that a month ago I wrote about Hirschbach Trucking of East Dubuque, Illinois. This amazing, well-run trucking company has more than 500 trucks coming and going from their terminal in East Dubuque and nearly 100 office employees. They want to stay in Illinois, but they have only a short time left on their land lease and Dubuque, Iowa has offered them nearly $2 million in incentives to move across the river. On two occasions I have contacted the Governor’s Deputy Chief of Staff Jerry Stermer and begged the Governor’s Office to intervene. I also shared with you an open letter I sent to the Governor. I received no response.

A.J. Tucker, one of the company’s owners, said to me “Jim, at least give us a Subway Sandwich.” The company wants to stay. Simply put, Illinois just doesn’t get it.

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is actively recruiting Illinois businesses to move across the border. Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels is erecting billboards along the state line inviting our businesses to move east. Representatives of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce are visiting Illinois businesses and commercial realtors bringing gift bottles of Jack Daniels to help woo those who will listen (it’s amazing how far a little Jack will go.)

The CEO of Caterpillar, to his great credit, has contacted Governor Quinn - not to threaten that they are leaving as some have erroneously reported - but rather to say Governor, we have to turn this monster around or you will lose us and many others.

Do you remember in 2004, when then-Governor Blagojevich increased the state license fee for semi tractor trailer trucks by thirty six percent? The result was that more than 17,000 heavy trucks that had been registered and paying fees in Illinois moved their registration to other states. At a loss of $3,000 per truck license per year…you do the math. We have done nothing to try to bring them back.

Sally Huggins, my Legislative Assistant in Freeport, gave me the perfect close for this article when I read it to her. “Why don’t you commission a study to determine why we have ridiculous studies?” Amen, Sally, and many thanks.

As always, you can reach me, Sally or Barb at or e-mail us at . You can also visit my website at www.jimsacia.com. It’s always a pleasure to hear from you.