Bacon's Rebellion

Ranked by absolute numbers, high-tech employment is growing fastest in Northern Virginia, but ranked in percentage terms, it’s growing fastest in Central Virginia (Richmond and Charlottesville), according to the 4th quarter Regional Scorecard for Virginia’s High-Technology Industries.

The Democrats may have taken power in the state Senate, but people are already worrying how well the new-found majority will hang together. Incoming Majority Leader Richard Saslaw, D-Fairfax, has said the changes could mean more money for Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. If that funding shift comes at the expense of rural Virginia, what happens to the Democrats’ four rural/small town senators?

Tim Craig with the Washington Post has written a piece exploring the potential division within the Democratic majority.

“I think there is already some tension,” said Sen. Phillip P. Puckett (D-Russell), who represents coal country in southwestern Virginia. “I have just asked for some fairness. I understand the seniority system, but at the same time, rural Democratic legislators are concerned.”

As I’ve long maintained, General Assembly politics is driven by regional interests as much as philosophical principles. If the new Democratic majority expends a lot of effort rejiggering funding allocation formulas — most notably for schools and roads — rural legislators of both parties will unite against them faster than you can shake a stick. Things could get messy.

Do gooders across Virginia are fulminating against the evils of payday lenders for “targeting” the poor, charging unconscionable fees and perpetuating the cycle of poverty. In January, the General Assembly considered 16 bills that would have imposed restrictions. Although none of them have passed, the agitation continues against the industry, which generates $1.3 billion a year of business in Virginia alone.

It’s hard not to sympathise with poor people caught in a cycle of debt. And the charges on the micro loans are undeniably high: In Virginia, reports the Harrisonburg Daily News Record, lenders can charge $15 for every $100 they lend. Calculated as an annual rate, the interest comes to 391 percent, although the loans almost never roll over for a full year. Critics are lobbying for a 36 percent annual cap — a rate that payday lenders say would put them out of business.

Frankly, I’m amazed that payday lenders charge only $15 per $100. There are two reasons why the rate seems justified. First, there are paperwork and other administrative costs associated with each loan, regardless of the size of the loan. Secondly, the loans are going to a high-risk group. Although 95 percent of borrowers pay back their loans on time, or nearly on time, that means 5 percent don’t. That’s a high delinquency rate — higher, I believe, than the delinquencies in the infamous sub-prime mortgage market that is roiling the world of global finance.

Finally, I would observe, if the terms of payday lenders are so onerous, why do so many people patronize them? Because a large number of people have a need for emergency cash, and there’s nowhere else to get it… except from Cousin Vinnie and Uncle Guido, who will charge you even more, and they’ll break your kneecaps if you don’t pay on time.

If the Go Gooders think that payday lenders are so rapacious, there’s always one remedy available in a capitalist system. Go into business yourself and lend the money at rates and terms your conscience allows. If your instincts are right, you’ll find lots of customers and be successful. If you’re wrong… you’ll go out of business.

In this week’s column, I expand upon a short blog post I made in late October, “Conservation Capitalism,” which highlighted the Energy Efficiency Partnership of Greater Washington. That partnership, spearheaded by Virginia Tech, has set the goal of reducing energy consumption by 20 percent to 50 percent in some 100 major office buildings in the Washington region over the next five years.

Virginia Tech will drum up awareness through conferences and other outreach programs, Pepco Energy Services will conduct the retrofits and investment banker Hannon Armstrong will arrange an estimated $100 million worth of project financing per year.

While the politicians are talking about climate change and energy conservation, the level of activity on the ground — people actually doing something to increase energy efficiency — is remarkably low compared to other countries, observes Laurel Colless, the cosmopolitan New Zealander, wife of the Finnish ambassador to the United States, and mother of three children, who got the ball rolling. But the Washington region appears to have reached a tipping point. The response to the initiative has been enthusiastic she says. At last count, 38 major property owners had contacted the Partnership about participating.

Pepco will conduct detailed energy audits for serious prospects, ranking a list of energy-saving improvements: from double-paning windows and installing automated lighting, heating and cooling controls to installing solar panels on the roof or building a cogeneration facility to supply electricity, steam and hot water.

Energy service companies like Pepco have been around a long time. The crucial difference now is the appearance of companies like Hannon Armstrong that can bundle the savings into a single project, bridging the gap between the property owner’s expectation of a short-term payback and the 8- to 10-year time horizon required to recoup some of the more expensive energy-saving investments. Hannon Armstrong employs mixtures of equity and debt, and devises arcane structures such as synthetic and leveraged leases.

The energy savings are shared between the property owner, Pepco, Hannon Armstrong and its investors. For the property owners, the value proposition is effortless, risk-free savings. The Partners are confident the idea will take off.

Colless guesstimates that the potential exists to reduce electricity consumption by $3.6 billion a year in the Washington region. That’s just from the commercial sector, not including federal government facilities, hospitals or universities. By deploying energy-efficiency strategies across Virginia, we can delay the need to build expensive and intrusive new power plants and transmission lines for years — potentially until renewable fuels such as solar, wind and biomass are practicable to build economically on a large scale. The result will be lower electric bills and less pollution.

Read the full article here.

The Dec. 10, 2007, edition of the Bacon’s Rebellion e-zine is now online. Subscribe here for free to make sure you never miss an issue. Fan the flames, spread the Rebellion!

Who is former Gov. William Berkeley’s P.R. agent? I want to hire the guy!

In today’s commentary section, the Richmond Times-Dispatch selected “the greatest” Virginians of the 17th century: Capt. John Smith and Gov. William Berkeley. I won’t quarrel with Smith, savior of the Jamestown colony. But Berkeley — “Butcher” Berkeley, defender of the English monarchy, oppressor of Bacon’s Rebellion and instigator of Indian slave trading? Puh-lease.

According to Jack P. Greene, a Johns Hopkins University professor of
colonial history:

[Berkeley] more than anybody else during the seventeenth century, helped to give shape to early colonial Virginia society. He was an improver and during his long governorship endeavored to create a political society in Virginia that would incorporate English legal, political, and social traditions into the warp and woof of the rude agricultural world of the Chesapeake.

He provided the leadership for a people focused heavily on private estate building to insure the protection of property and the rule of law and to provide the religious and political institutional foundations for the transformation of Virginia into a recognizably English polity.

Read “Nathaniel Bacon Vindicated, Gov. Berkeley Shamed,” based on the scholarship of Richard Thornton, to see what we have to say about that!

As for Nathaniel Bacon — leader of the first colonial revolt against English misrule, advocate of landless farmers and freed slaves, and expositor of the “Declaration of the People” — the Times-Dispatch relegates him to the bottom of an article about the “most controversial” 17th century Virginians. Indeed, one Bland Whitley would create a special category, Worst Virginian of the 17th Century, to dishonor Bacon on the grounds that he established “a precedent whereby opponents of governing elites took out their resentment on those even more vulnerable than themselves (in this case the Indians).”

Who is this charlatan Whitley? Apparently, he is employed by the Library of Virginia as a historian and editor. The fact that Bacon represented the interests of white servants and black slaves against the royalist aristocracy once counted for something among historians. That interpretation appears to be out of fashion now that the greatest evil a historical figure can commit is being a European in the civilizational clash between Europeans and Indians!

Bacon probably wasn’t the nicest guy in the world when it came to his dealings with Indians. There was a lot of bad behavior back in the 17th century, when England, and by extension, Virginia, was ruled by a monarchy and aristocracy; a century when brutality and violence were endemic around the globe. Democracy, human rights and respect for multi-cultural diversity hadn’t been invented yet, people!

What do we know about the specifics of Bacon’s conflict with the Indians? Not much for sure. The evidence is incomplete and conflicting. For some reason, though, historians today are all too eager to embrace the narrative spun by the aristocrat Berkeley and his royalist chums, who blamed Bacon for upsetting the finely tuned alliances that enabled the enslavement and trade in the Indians living in the Carolinas and Georgia, over that of Bacon, the tribune of the people. What a travesty!

I can hardly wait to see the T-D’s selection of the greatest Virginian of the 18th century. I’m laying odds on Lord Charles Cornwallis!

Update: Here’s Bacon’s real sin: He was Virginia’s first recorded tax protester! The first of his complaints against Berkeley criticized the Governor “For haveing upon specious pretences of publiqe works raised greate unjust taxes upon the Comonality for the advancement of private favorites and other sinister ends, but noe visible effects in any measure adequate.”

The final count is in: General Assembly candidates raised more than $67 million for the 2007 campaign — more than doubling the $30 million total from four years previously. According to numbers supplied by Clayton Roberts with the Virginia Foundation for Research and Economic Education, Elephant Clan candidates amassed $30.0 million, while Donkey Clan candidates raised $28.3 million.

The biggest single fund raiser of all was Jeannemarie Devolites Davis, who rounded up $1,942,000 — all for a losing bid for a Senate seat.

Cool question: What word pops up when you run “Devolites” through Microsoft Word spellcheck?

Answer: “Desolates”!!

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I am posting this book review on the behalf of Barnie Day. — Jim Bacon

So now comes to the literature of Virginia politics a self-published good look back, “Wading in the Muddy Pool: A Virginia Political Memoir, 1972-1982” ($15.00, Old Favorites Bookshop, PO Box 8347, Richmond, 23226) by Richmond book dealer Gary S. O’Neal.

O’Neal, who began a 10-year sojourn through Virginia’s political corridors in 1972, when he signed on as an aide to Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates John Warren Cooke, has served up a rare inside look that reads like an oral history, despite wording here and there that seems…well…a touch quaint.

I’ll translate one for you: “recently passed from the earthly scene” means somebody died.

Still, this is a good, snappy read, as much for its candid observations as anything. (The two-page memory of the House Clerk’s Office is worth the purchase price.)

Virginia politics now is a bland vanilla team sport. It used to be a game of individuals. Many of the personalities here have “passed from the earthly scene,” and won’t be recognized by anyone, even inside players, under the age of 60, or so.

A few will stir the dust of memory:

“Robert B. Ball, Sr., a Democrat from Henrico County, was a self educated man and one-time butcher who became a success in the hotel-motel business and real estate. He amassed a fortune in the 1950’s by putting pay TV sets in his motels and used to brag that he took a wheel barrow of quarters a week to the bank.”

“William Dudley, Democrat, “Bullet Bill,” a former NFL great and football star at UVA. Nice man, but fairly dense, more adept at attending local sports banquets than debating the issues of the day.”

“George Mason Green, Republican, one of the last Arlington County Republicans before the Democrats became the dominant party in that area. One of the new breed of right-wing ideologues.”

“Frank Mann, Democrat, Alexndria politician and former mayor of that city. Went back on his word to Delegate Lane (Ed Lane, of Richmond) on a committee vote at the 1973 session, a disagreeable man with little character.”

“Thomas W. Moss, Democrat, Norfolk politician, liked the ladies and the bottle.”

“Stanley Owens, Democrat, Prince William County, at that point growing somewhat senile, later known throughout the Assembly for crashing into a water fountain with his car at an Interstate 95 rest stop and then trying to bill the House of Delegates for the damage to his auto.”

“As Speaker, Philpottt (Albert Lee, of Henry County) was more politically assertive than Cooke. He saw the role of the Speaker as that of an active participant in the political process, rather than a nonpartisan referee like Speaker Cooke. I don’t mean that Cooke had no party loyalty, but he exercised it gently while A. L. used a whip.”

“Dorothy McDiarmid, Democrat from Fairfax, whose husband Hugh constantly trailed her around the Capitol.”

O’Neal has given Virginia’s political junkies a tasty appetizer (91 pages). I wish it had been an entrée.

You could do worse than buying this book.