Bacon's Rebellion

I am distressed to read that Chad Dotson, one of the bloggers who inspired me to launch the Bacon’s Rebellion blog, will stop making daily posts on Commonwealth Conservative. The demands of his job and obligations to his family make it impossible to keep up the pace. Chad says he will continue participating in the blogosphere mainly through posts other blogs.

Chad’s move to blogging semi-retirement underlines a fundamental weakness of the blogosphere. Over two years, Chad had built CC into what is probably the most heavily trafficked conservative blog with a Virginia focus. His latest metrics indicate daily readership of 1,850 per day — and it was probably higher before the election. All the more remarkable is that he accomplished this with only a couple hours of work every evening.

The work-to-reader ratio is remarkable. Think about it: A small weekly newspaper with a circulation of, say, 18,500, or 10 times CC, would employ 10 full-time editorial employees, not to mention sales staff, administrative staff, printing/production employees and people to deliver the newspaper. Ten times the readers but 30 times the number of employees and 100 times the number of man-hours worked.

Here’s the rub: CC, like other state-level blogs, was a labor of love. As successful as he was, Chad did not develop a sustainable business model that would have allowed him to engage someone else to keep the blog going. With competing real-world priorities like advancing his career and spending time with his family, passion could take him only so far.

The end result will be the dissipation of what could have been a valuable franchise. What a shame. Other conservative voices will arise to replace Chad — OK, no one could ever replace Chad, but others will arise to take his place. Maybe they’ll build a franchise over time, but they’ll face the same tension between passion and obligation. Until we can develop an economic underpinning for blogs, we may be destined to see even the best blogs wink in and out of existence like fireflies. Such a blogosphere may act as a corrective to the excesses of the Mainstream Media, but it is not likely to ever surpass the MSM as a source of authoritative information.

Update: Bart Hinkle ruminates on the role of blogs in light of the Gannett media chain’s announcement that it would begin incorporating reader-generated “citizen journalism” into the news gathering process.

I came into this world as a Republican, and I still veer to the red side of international issues: Although I believe there is much to appreciate about and learn from other societies, I’m an unabashed American-firster. But when it comes to domestic issues and building prosperous communities in a globally competitive, knowledge-intensive economy, I don’t see that the Republicans have any more clue than the Democrats of what to do.

Indeed, in the aftermatch of the 2006 elections, I find myself questioning how useful the Republican/Democratic labels are when it comes to confronting the challenges of state/local governance. I’m sure I come across as “Mr. Republican” to many readers of this blog because of my steadfast opposition to higher taxes — taxes that have emanated primarily, though not exclusively, from the Democratic Party and have been opposed by elements of the Republican Party. I remain convinced that raising taxes is the first recourse of those too intellectually lazy to find more creative ways to address public needs.

But I find much to admire in the “reinventing government” focus of former Gov. Mark Warner and, to the extent that he embraces it, Gov. Tim Kaine. In other words, I like my government small — but what it does, I want it to do well.

Likewise, I share the views of many in the environmentalist/ conservationist lobby, most of whom are Democrats, that Virginia’s transportation system is broken, that our land use policies are dysfunctional, and that our human settlement patterns are not sustainable. We are depleting our natural capital, and we are perpetuating energy-intensive forms of development even as we enter an increasingly energy-constrained global economy. (Indeed, with the way things are heading in the Middle East, I believe that we need to protect ourselves from the risk of oil cut-offs that will make the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973 look like a picnic.)

The ability of Virginians to adapt to new realities are constrained (a) by our tribal loyalties as members of the Donkey Clan or the Elephant Clan (as Ed Risse calls them), (b) our mental frameworks for understanding the world that we inherited from the past, and (c) the defense of the status quo on the part of those special interests who benefit from Business As Usual.

Richard Florida, the author of the “Rise of the Creative Class,” argues that there is a fundamental realignment going on in American society. The emergence of the Knowledge Economy, and the rise of a “creative class” comprised of individuals who own their means of production, i.e., their own brains, creates an entirely new constituency in American politics. While the elephants wage the culture wars, while the donkeys still sound the class warfare rhetoric of a century ago and the Civil Rights movement of a generation ago, the most critical issues for our future go undiscussed in the political arena: How do we increase the creativity, productivity and capacity for innovation of our workforce, our businesses and our communities?

At some point, Florida speculates, a new political party may emerge to articulate these concerns. We need to be asking ourselves: What old institutions much change? What new institutions must we invent? How do we make our communities more liveable?

I have endeavored to use Bacon’s Rebellion as a forum for re-thinking the way we approach transportation and land use. But we also need to fundamentally re-think how we educate our children, indeed, how we continue re-educating ourselves as adults. We need to fundamentally re-think how we deliver health care services. We need to fundamentally re-think our energy and environmental policies. We need to fundamentally re-think the very meaning of economic development, and how we Virginians will compete in a global economy in which 1.3 billion Chinese and 1.0 billion Indians, and assorted other nationalities hungry for progress and uncorrupted by an entitlement mentality, are educating themselves by the millions and doing high value-added jobs we once considered our exclusive preserve.

No one running for office as a member of the Donkey Clan or the Elephant Clan addressed these issues. The Senatorial race in Virginia was an absolute travesty. The attack ads were a disgrace. The level of discourse was sub-literate. If there’s any lesson to be learned, it’s how bankrupt the two-party system has become. As we survey the wreckage, perhaps it’s time for members of the Creative Class to articulate a new set of principles and priorities.

Little Poquoson on The Peninsula is the first or second most Republican voting city of 134 cities and counties in the Commonwealth. In recent elections Poquoson keeps one of the top three highest per cent voter turn outs.

Our voter turn out was 62.44% (5270 voting out of 8440). Well above the State average.

We had a local race for city council and treasurer. That boosted turnout.

George Allen got 69.07% of the vote. He should have gotten 72 to 75% – at least. That means George didn’t get at least 154 to 293 votes that were his in the super safe Conservative city.

Rep. Jo Ann Davis got 78.80% of the vote. Jo Ann ran 481 votes ahead of George.

Marriage may have had a higher turn out 72.71% of the voters (6137 voting out of 8440). There is a discrepancy between the State Board of Elections (64.14% Yes of 5184 votes) and Daily Press (69.70% Yes of 6137 votes) numbers.

Using DP numbers, Yes for Marriage got 69.70% of the vote which is very close to Allen’s per cent. But, Yes ran 638 votes ahead of Allen and No ran 290 votes ahead of Webb.

Conversely, using SBE numbers Marriage ran behind Allen but No votes didn’t help Webb.

I conclude the Marriage Amendment didn’t boost Allen’s numbers in Poquoson.

So, what cost him?

I wrote in my blog, Deo Vindice, in September ( Friendly Note to George Allen/Thelma Drake: Elected Republicans Cost You Votes) about label fatigue for Republicans at the Federal level and in the Virginia General Assembly.

I have anecdotal evidence on where we lost from 150 to 480 votes in our Super ‘C’ city. Older retired military officers and younger defense engineers gave me an earful on why Rumsfeld should have been fired and, thus, Bush had screwed up prosecution of the War in Iraq.

Reliable Republicans, former dues paying partisans, told me that they were sick of the Repubicans at the Federal level doing nothing (and spending way too much) except two good SCOTUS appointments – and those were to be determined for their real future strength, a tax cut not made permanent, the lesser of two evils on the WW IV against Islamist Terrorism but making mistakes in Iraq…and Virginia Republicans in the General Assembly who raise our taxes and keep trying to cram Regional Governments down our throats.

A usually Republican voter, retired Air Force Officer and Vietnam Marine enlisted Vet, from my church told me last Sunday that Allen lost his vote when he brought up Webb’s writing. This guy said it was over reach, a sign of desperation, and just too much mud. Perhaps, the paid, professional analysts can show me that the loss of his one vote was offset by gaining other votes I don’t know about. My evidence is anecdotal purely. My experience tells me that each contact I have living in grassroots politics is indicative of more votes.

Before the election I didn’t know that these reasons and others actually would take the 3 to 6 % and corresponding 150-481 votes from Allen. Apparently, Larry Sabato did when he called Virginia for Webb.

The Conservative votes lost to Allen and gained by Jo Ann Davis show that in our microcosm there isn’t an ideological shift. We haven’t morphed Liberal.

Every election is about candidate, issues and campaign. Need all three to be right to win.

I haven’t kept up with this story as I promised, but it looks like Greenvest LC’s push for greater development densities in the Dulles South area of Loudoun County is heading for defeat. According to Dusty Smith with Leesburg2day:

The board of supervisors last night signaled the defeat of a proposal to increase the residential densities in Loudoun’s Transition Policy Area near Rt. 50, even after offers came to reduce the number of new homes permitted from more than 33,000 to fewer than 8,000.

What comes next, I don’t know. The virtue of the Greenvest project was that it made an honest effort to create a growth-that-pays-for-itself business model, in which the developer would have used the Community Development Authority mechanism to make massive up-front contributions to local schools, roads and other infrastructure. Foes raised legitimate concerns that Greenvest wasn’t taking all costs into account, and made a strong argument that growth could be more efficiently accommodated in other parts of the county.

Now the county has new issues to deal with: If Greenvest and neighboring developers cannot build an additional 33,000 homes in Dulles South, as they proposed, where will those 33,000 houses go — and what kind of monetary contribution will Loudoun County get from the developers of those homes?

Will growth leapfrog to Clark, Warren, Frederick and Fauquier counties, forcing people to commute longer distances and congesting even more miles of Interstates and arterials? Or will developers focus on Leesburg, Ashburn and Sterling, overloading Route 7 and other local roads? If so, will they match the financial contributions that Greenvest was willing to make?

My high-altitude perspective from down here in Richmond is that channeling development into the Route 7 growth corridor makes the most sense — if the development is done right. It needs to be compact, it needs to permit a finely grained mix of uses, and it needs to allow spots of urban-level density. Developers and planners also need to integrate shared-vehicle systems such as buses and vans into the design. If Loudoun just gets more of what is already there, it will be a disaster.

Perhaps readers from Loudoun can illuminate where the inevitable growth will occur and what that growth will look like.

Update: It’s official. The Board of Supervisors has spiked the rezoning. The Washington Post has the morning-after report here.

As of 8:15 a.m. today, it looks like Jim Webb will be the next U.S. Senator from Virginia, assuming that he holds his razor-thin lead after a recount. When Virginia elects Democrats to the Senate, it elects conservative Democrats — at least they’re conservative by the standards of the national Democratic Party. Somehow, I’m not expecting Webb to rack up a really high score from the Americans for Democratic Action.

While electing a populist Democrat who likes guns and excoriated liberal elites before he started taking money from them, Virginia voters also passed a constitutional amendment outlawing same-sex marriage with 57 percent of the vote.

Although voters approved $51 million in road improvements in Loudoun County and another $370 million for roads in Prince William, voters in Stafford County rejected a proposed $238 million bond issue that would have funded local roads and park/recreation facilities. Northern Virginia voters approved a slew of other bond issues, mostly for schools. (See the round-ups in the Washington Post and the Free Lance-Star.)

If there’s a seismic shift in underlying political sentiments here, I don’t see it. George Allen fell victim to an increasingly unpopular war and a string of verbal gaffes. At the same time, cultural conservatives won the big culture-war issue of the day, same sex marriage, by a wide margin. And voters in fast-growing Stafford County voted against bankrolling a major road-building program. Stafford residents may dislike traffic congestion, but it appears that they dislike the prospect of spending public money to fix it even more.

From my obsessed perspective as a transportation policy wonk, I find the Stafford vote the most interesting. If Gov. Timothy M. Kaine thinks that voters will rise up in 2007 and throw out legislators who thwarted his plan to raise taxes, he needs to re-think his logic. They certainly aren’t going to evict House Speaker William J. Howell, who happens to represent Stafford County!

In Loudoun and Prince William, voters did approve a number of transportation projects — but they were specific projects that voters could appraise the need for. Voters were not approving a $1 billion a year in taxes for state lobbyists and politicians to divvy up.

It was just a matter of time before someone made this connection: The rising incidence of obesity in the United States doesn’t just lead to diabetes, high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol, it also increases fuel consumption in passenger vehicles, according to a study by Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Americans have gained an average of 24 pounds since 1960. That weight gain has resulted in an extra 938 million gallons of fuel consumed annually, according to the study, which was funded by the National Science Foundation. That’s nearly three times the total amount of fuel consumed by all passenger vehicles each day based on current driving habits.

An interesting experiment in the sensitivity of motorists to increases in toll charges is taking place in the Dulles Greenway. For the first three quarters of 2006, traffic is down 6.6 percent, despite soaring population growth in Loudoun County, in the aftermath of a $.30 toll increase. “The 2006 traffic drop is likely a real indicator of elasticity as the average toll has increased by 30 percent between December of 2004 and September of 2006, well above an inflationary increase,” reports Fitch, the bond-rating service, in giving the Greenway a BBB rating.

October results suggest, however, that demand may be on the upswing again. Meanwhile, toll revenue for the first three quarters of 2006 is up 20.8 percent over the same period in 2005. Revenue has been maximized by the toll increase, application of the peak toll to all hours of weekday traffic, and also aggressive enforcement action, including a $25 administrative fee.

According to Fitch, the TRIP II partnership that owns the toll road has submitted a rate increase application to the State Corporation that would jack up the maximum toll from the current cap of $3.00 to $4.00 by 2012. The application also requests the ability to use variable pricing that would raise the peak hour toll in 2012 to $4.80.

The Macquarie Infrastructure Group, of Australia, is the managing partner of TRIP II, and has agreements to acquire 100 percent ownership by 2020. Details can be found in the Fitch press release.

Kudos to Bart Hinkle for the most brilliant, hysterically funny political parody of the year: “The Tragicall Historie of George and Jim: A Comedie in Several Acts.”

(Sadly, the rhyme loses its impact because someone republished Hinkle’s poetry without differnetiating between lines of verse. Someone deserves to be flayed! But read it anyway.)

The pundits at the Virginian-Pilot are making progress: They’ve finally acknowledged that there’s more to solving Virginia’s transportation woes than raising taxes. Instead of blowing off the remedies proffered by the House of Delegates leadership as meaningless obstructionism, the Pilot stated in an editorial yesterday: “Somehow, some way, the House, the Senate and the executive branch have got to start dealing with one another.”

In times past, such rhetoric meant that the House had to do all the compromising. But not this time. Yesterday’s editorial highlighted three points of agreement with House Speaker William J. Howell and Del. Leo Wardrip, chairman of the House transportation committee:

• With Medicaid and pension “crises” looming over the next few years, Virginia can’t address every financial need with higher taxes. “By branding everything as a ‘crisis,’ we sometimes don’t get in and look at the roots of a problem,” Howell said.
• The private sector is going to play a significantly larger role in 21st century transportation solutions. We don’t go so far as Del. Wardrup in embracing tolls on interstate highways (“We’re just going to have to have that, and that’s going to be good in my opinion,” he said), but we don’t doubt that the largest projects will require private investment, repaid through tolls.
• Virginia needs to stay abreast of innovations such as congestion pricing, maximize the effectiveness of the Virginia Department of Transportation, and hold localities more accountable for land-use decisions that drive up the demand for roads.