Bacon's Rebellion

The House of Delegates looks like it has its political act together. In marked contrast to the 2004 session, in which tax-hike foes repeatedly backtracked and compromised, the House has passed its transportation package lock, stock and smoking barrel. Many measures passed unanimously, which means that even House Democrats are on board, and even the most controversial measures won approval by comfortable margins.

There will be no repeat of 2004, in which a Democratic Governor successfully triangulated between two Republican-controlled chambers of the General Assembly.

For a list of all the bills that will be referred to the Senate, refer to our post on the Road to Ruin blog.

The national Mainstream Media has lost all credibility with me. I believe nothing, and I mean nothing, that I see on network TV. The facts reported by the MSM may be accurate (most of the time) but context is everything. What facts were omitted? What was the spin? What other stories simply go unacknowledged and unreported? The bias, usually constrained in the past, is now totally out of control.

State/local journalists haven’t descended to the depths of their national counterparts, but their failures and limitations are glaring even so. I dedicated my most recent column, “Breakthrough,” to castigating the superficial and incomplete treatment of the House of Delegates’ transportation initiative. In the post below (“What is the ‘Senate GOP Trust?’”), I take note of the MSM’s failure to illuminate what appears to be a formalized schism within the GOP ranks of the state Senate.

A recurring theme in this blog is, “Who Will Gather the News?” As the MSM business model fails, resources are cut and the quality of its political reporting continues to flag, where will people get their news? The news, I think, will come increasingly from bloggers and the newsmakers themselves.

In touting the contribution of bloggers, I would refer to my own humble efforts. Every column I write for the Bacon’s Rebellion e-zine is based upon outside research and interviews. But I am not the only blogger doing reporting. To cite one recent example, I refer you to the reporting by Norm Leahy at One Man’s Trash of remarks that former Gov. Jim Gilmore made to the Tuesday Morning Group. (Click here and scroll down to “Jim Gilmore at TMG.”) I would also commend the work of Waldo Jaquith, who blogs direct from the General Assembly, and Conaway Haskins at South of the James who does a lot of fact gathering for many of his columns.

Of even greater interest, perhaps, is the commentary coming directly from the newsmakers themselves — bypassing the MSM and going straight to the public. Ken Cuccinelli’s “Cuccinelli Compass” is a good example. (See post below.) In the 2005 General Assembly, the Governor’s Office and the two political parties were the most reliable source of news and quotes, updating their websites and spitting out e-mails. This year, the number of press releases and e-mail communications seems to be increasing exponentially.

A daily news clipping service distributed by Scott Leake at the Senate’s Republican Leadership Trust packages the MSM news in a useful, easy-to-read format that saves readers the trouble of consulting a dozen individual newspaper websites. The Tuesday Morning Groups sends out daily e-mails updating readers on legislation of interest to that group. Virginians for Death Tax Repeal provide frequent e-mail updates. In just the last few days, I’ve received updates from Gov. Tim Kaine, Senate Majority Leader Walter Stosch, House Speaker Bill Howell, Attorney General Bob McDonnell and Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling. I dare not even contemplate the number of lobbying groups that are blasting out e-mail alerts — thankfully, I’m not on their distribution lists.

If I’m getting these communications, so is every other political blogger in Virginia who posts an e-mail address. For anyone who cares, it’s easier than ever to get their news straight from the source. Why bother reading he said/she said newspaper articles when you can read what he/she said unfiltered and unadulterated?

Republicans in the Virginia state Senate have a “Republican Caucus” that, in theory, convenes periodically to hash out legislative and political strategy. But it appears that decision-making power has shifted to an entity referred to as the “Republican Leadership Trust,” which excludes the handful of conservative Republicans in the Senate.

I first heard of this group in one of the periodic e-mail missives distributed by Sen. Ken Cuccinelli, R-Centreville:

Well, I’m sitting on the Senate floor at 1:30 p.m. on crossover day. The Senate is in recess until 3 p.m. I believe that part of the reason that we’re in recess is so the Senate GOP Trust Senators (the leadership, etc.) can meet to plot legislative strategy. I and some other conservatives are not members of “the Trust,” so I have a bit of a break. I can’t help thinking that that sort of discussion is exactly what a
Republican Caucus is supposed to do…

I’m not exactly what you’d call a General Assembly insider — I’ve yet to set foot in the state Capitol so far this session. But I do read the press accounts with some frequency. If anyone in our intrepid press corps has written about the “Republican Leadership Trust,” I haven’t seen it. I am almost certain that no one has made the existence of this GOP schism the focal point of a story.

It’s certainly not news that there are divisions within the Senate GOP. But it is news that a sub-set of the GOP Caucus is now formally excluding conservative members from important deliberations. One of the jobs of the media is to track the shifting loci of power in the General Assembly. If the MSM fails in its duties to provide context and meaning to events in the General Assembly, new mechanisms and institutions will arise to replace it. Which leads me to my next post…

Update: As readers have informed me in the comments section, the press has covered the Republican Leadership Trust. I take full responsibility for my ignorance of the subject and will readily admit, in this particular regard, that I was too quick to blame the press corps for not writing about it. Additionally, it is important to note that the Trust did not “exclude” other senators, as I stated above, but that some senators declined to participate. Still, it is interesting to note that decision making, on some issues at least, has shifted from a caucus of all Republican senators to this smaller body.

Edgar Olson is calling for an end to public housing as we know it. Rather than sticking poor families in federally run housing projects, the University of Virginia economics professors argues, the government should give them vouchers. (Read the UVa profile here.)

“It costs much less to provide equally good housing with housing vouchers than with public housing projects,” Olsen wrote in a prepared statement he was scheduled to deliver in testimony to Congress Wednesday. “Therefore, shifting the budget for public housing to housing vouchers would allow us to serve all of the families served by public housing equally well … and serve hundreds of thousands of additional families.”

The federal government has proven itself to be one of the world’s worst property managers, but it is proficient at redistributing income. It just makes sense: Instead of building housing for poor people, just stroke them a check to find an apartment of their own.

Vouchers would make good social policy too, a point that the brief article doesn’t make. Housing projects concentrate poor people in places where there are few successful role models and few working/middle class people to constrain criminal behavior. Giving poor people vouchers gives them more latitude in where they live.

Sounds great… except for one thing. It’s the old slippery slope argument. Give ’em vouchers for housing, and the next thing you know, they’ll be asking for vouchers for schools. Can’t have that!

The Wall Street Journal has published a front-page profile (reprinted here in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) of Don Blankenship, CEO of Richmond-based Massey Energy Co., who has spent millions of dollars of his own money trying to make West Virginia more business-friendly. With the impetus to raise taxes here in Virginia, I wish he’d be a little more active in his headquarters town.

Truth be told, Blankenship is a West Virginia boy, born and bred, and he spends most of his time in West By God Virginia, where the bulk of Massey’s coal operations are located. Despite its size — revenues exceed $2 billion — the company keeps an incredibly low profile here in Richmond.

Back in the 1970s, SW Virginia coal barons ranked among the largest campaign contributors in the state. When the coal business went bust, they largely dropped out of the picture. With their fortunes reviving — Alpha Natural Resources has assembled a $1.5 billion-a-year enterprise, and the United Company is reconstituting its old coal empire — it may not be long before United’s Jim McGlothlin and Alpha’s Michael Quillen become familiar faces on the political scene once again.

Does anybody respect property rights anymore? The House of Delegates passed a bill restricting the rights of property owners from keeping guns off their premises (see “NRA Taking Your Property without Compensation“). Now the state Senate has backed legislation prohibiting cigarette smoking in most public, indoor buildings, including restaurants. If we’re lucky, the House and Senate will shoot down each others’ bills. (Where is Dick Cheney when you need him?)

According to John Reid Blackwell with the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the legislation “would make smoking illegal in indoor places frequented by the public, with few exceptions, such as specialty tobacco shops, tobacco manufacturing plants and home-based businesses…”

I don’t smoke, my wife doesn’t smoke, and I discourage my children from smoking. But I think this is a bad idea. Restaurant owners should have the freedom to cater to their clientele as they wish. Most restaurants already have smoking and non-smoking sections. If some people aren’t satisfied with such separation, there is no lack of competing restaurants for them to patronize. Perhaps restaurateurs will make an effort to make them happier — perhaps by installing better ventilation.

Advocates of the liberal state, to my way of thinking, are just as intrusive as the cultural conservatives they dislike so much. A pox on both their houses.

In a globally competitive economy, Virginians will prosper only to the extent that we increase the level of our collective education and skills. While the public focuses on K-12 and higher education, no less important is the training and professional development that occurs after graduation — where people learn specific skills they apply in the workplace.

As a fallible memory serves me, the Gilmore administration estimated that Virginia spends $350 million a year in state, local and federal workforce training programs, and that number doesn’t include support for community colleges. Gov. Jim Gilmore appointed a workforce development czar to rationalize the overlapping, redundant welter of programs but accomplished little. Gov. Mark Warner also grappled with the problem, but got taken to the mat. Warner declared that one of his greatest disappointments as governor was his inability to solve the problem.

Now comes Sen. Frank Ruff, R-Clarksville, with a new proposal to streamline workforce training. His bill would anoint the Governor as “Chief Workforce Development Officer” for the Commonwealth and task him with creating a statewide strategic plan. The plan would establish performance measures for some 24 different programs, evaluate performance based on those metrics, and redirect resources based on performances.

For the past year, Ruff has been working with Del. Kathy J. Byron, R-Campbell, on a legislative commission studying how to reduce duplication and promote the best programs. Byron is introducing a companion bill in the House. Kudos to both. It’s refreshing to see the General Assembly approaching a problem with the philosophy of making government work more efficiently rather than giving it more money.

The February 13, 2006, edition of Bacon’s Rebellion has been published. You can read it here.

Breakthrough
Newspapers treated the House transportation plan as a routine story about spending and taxes. It was so much more: House leaders are shifting the debate to land use and privatization.
by James A. Bacon

A World of Commonwealth
Immigrants contribute many of the skills and ideas Virginia needs for the future. So, if opportunity knocks, why keep keep the door shut?
by Doug Koelemay

Another Legislative Impasse?
The usual suspects are pushing hard for another tax increase this year, but their position is weaker than it was two years ago.
by Patrick McSweeney

No Magic Beans
The shell building approach to economic development is obsolete. Communities like Martinsville must look to education, entre- preneurship and unconventional assets.
by Barnie Day

Mollycoddle Mania
Hither Mark Warner? Another run for governor… or a run for president? Southern pro-business conservative… or tax-hiking, soft-on-crime liberal?
by Steven Sisson

Dance with the Devil
Rosalyn Dance and other black legislators are supporting ideas like charter schools and vouchers that would have been inconceivable a decade ago. And that’s a good thing for the kids.
by Chris Braunlich

Ten Reasons Not to Raise Taxes
Apparently, some GOP legislators need to have it explained why they shouldn’t raise taxes. Here’s a list of reasons to start with.
by James Atticus Bowden

Thinking Outside the Box
House Republicans have released their transportation package. Unlike competing proposals, this plan would not raise taxes at a time of unprecedented budget surpluses.
by Philip Rodokanakis

Nice & Curious Questions:
Families in the Mansion:
Life in the Governor’s House
by Edwin S. Clay III and Patricia Bangs

Uh, oh, the e-mail wars are heating up. I’ve just received another e-mail, this one from a group, “Moving Virginia Forward,” that features a message from Gov. Timothy M. Kaine. Now that the House of Delegates has nixed Kaine’s nearly $1 billion-a-year tax plan, proposing instead to transfer money from the General Fund surplus, the Tax Lobby is pushing for a “permanent” solution.

His transportation package, Kaine says, “will establish fiscally responsible, long-term, stable sources of funding for transportation while giving local communities the power to grow only as fast as their transportation infrastructures allow.” (Bold face in the original.)

It’s going to be a hard sell convincing people that Virginia needs to raise taxes for transportation while a $1 billion surplus is sloshing around the General Assembly. Allowing communities “the power to grow only as fast as their transportation infrastructures allow” sounds good — but it’s also a recipe for a housing shortage. Where is the development/real estate lobby on this issue?

Former Gov. Jim Gilmore has entered the debate over transportation and taxes. In an e-mail distributed this afternoon, he urged recipients to contact their legislators and voice opposition to higher taxes for transportation improvements.

“The right way to solve Virginia’s transportation problems,” Gilmore wrote, “is to adopt a plan of specific road projects and exhaust all possible options for funding that plan without increasing taxes on hard working Virginia families. You and I must act now to deliver this message to members of the General Assembly.”

“Do not believe this battle is won because our friends in the House of Delegates have already had votes against the tax hike package,” he added. “Just like two years ago, the Governor and the Senate will use every legislative trick they can to pass these taxes during the 2006 Session.”
The e-mail links to a website under the name of Working Virginians for Affordable Transportation. The policy prescriptions listed there are a bit vague:

• Stop using current tax money dedicated for roads to pay for other spending. Lock-up Transportation Trust Funds.
• Pass specific priority road projects using money generated by today’s taxes and economic growth.
• Require VDOT to implement new traffic and mass transit strategies and cut bureaucratic costs.

I’d like to know what those “new traffic strategies” are, and what “bureaucratic costs” Gilmore is referring to. I’ve got some opinions on the subject, but I have no idea if we’re thinking of the same things. The obvious hole in the listed remedies is the lack of any reference to the need for more rational patterns of development. Regardless, with Gilmore acting as a lightning rod, the transportation debate is bound to get more interesting.

Update: Gilmore will appear as a guest at next week’s “Tuesday Morning Group,” a monthly gathering in downtown Richmond of conservative activists from around the state. According to host John Taylor, Gilmore “will address the transportation issue in Virginia as well as what Republicans must start doing to be successful in the commonwealth.” Expect Gilmore to become a vocal factor in the tax debate.

Today the House of Delegates approved a bill, HB 162, that prohibits private property owners from establishing or enforcing any policy that prohibits a person from storing a firearm in a locked car or truck parked on their property. What’s more the bill says that you can be sued and required to pay damages if you seek to enforce such a policy.

This bill is brought to us by the National Rifle Association which was incensed when Weyerhaeuser fired an employee for violating a company policy prohibiting firearms on its property. The NRA pledged to outlaw such policies in every state in the union. Hence this bill offered by Delegate Lingamfelter. Listen to an NPR report on the push to enact these laws. Read more.

In an act of some irony, given the intent of the proponents, big companies with secured parking lots got an amendment to the Virginia bill that exempts them from coverage.

So whose private property rights would be secondary under this legislation to another person’s gun “rights”?

The property of any “person, property owner, tenant, employer, or business entity” to which access is not “restricted or limited through the use of a gate, security station, or other means”. In other words, every mom and pop store, home on a residential street, office building or restaurant with an open parking lot, shopping center, church, open campus private college, etc.

Now, mind you, if we were talking about 1st amendment rights, the property owner’s right to restrict access would be and is sacrosanct. If you don’t believe me, ask the candidate for the House of Delegates who was arrested at a Charlottesville shopping center for distributing political literature in violation of that private property owner’s policy restricting what would have been protected free speech on a public sidewalk.

To my mind, it is one thing for the state to adopt a policy that all public property should be open to lawful gun toting citizens, whether public parks or the House of Delegates’ office building.

But, I would argue, it is quite another thing for the legislature to tell me that I cannot have a policy at my business that prohibits my employees and customers from bringing guns onto my property and leaving them “stored” in their cars, (unless, of course, I’m a big employer with a controlled access gated parking lot whose lobbyists made sure that I was exempt). And, is it “limited government” to say to me that I risk a lawsuit if I tell people coming to my house and parking in my driveway that they can’t store a gun in their car while on my property?

I find small comfort in the fact that the bill says that the property owner can’t be sued if someone breaks into a car parked on his/her property and uses the gun “stored” there to commit harm to others or if the gunowner him or herself commits mayhem while on your property.

Why might I want to establish that guns are not welcome in my office or on my office property? The rising incidence of workplace violence, for one thing. The number one cause of death for women in the workplace is homicide. Partners and boyfriends commit 13,000 incidents of workplace violence a year. As a private property owner, I should be able to decide that these statistics warrant a “no guns” policy in my workplace and in my parking lot.

The gun rights folks will say that anyone who established a no guns policy on a shopping mall parking lot or at a multi-occupied office complex would risk commercial boycotts and worse. So be it.

If you don’t want to leave your gun at home, and I want to prohibit you from “storing” it in the car while you shop at my store, visit my office, or eat at my restaurant, I should have the right to do so at the risk of losing your business but not at the risk of being sued under a wrong headed law that makes my private property rights subservient to your gun rights.

The economy of the New England states have a lot going against them: High labor costs, high cost of living and high taxes. That’s a deadly combination when it comes to retaining an industrial base, but it hasn’t yet crippled the region’s Knowledge Economy. New England’s secret to survival: World-class universities supported by fat college endowments.

A new study underwritten by the Bank of America sheds light on this little-recognized competitive advantage. Although schools in New England account for 5 percent of the national student body, their endowment assets represent 23 percent of the national endowment total ($62 billion of the total $267 billion in 2004). Endowments in the six New England states generate $3 billion a year for discretionary spending!

It’s not that New Englanders are any more philanthropic than anyone else. I suspect that one could trace the endowments back to the Gilded Era when New England played a leading role in the nation’s economy. Building on the gifts of the era’s super-rich industrialists, universities like Harvard and MIT achieved a preeminence that allowed them to attract the brightest students from across the country. When those students graduated, they dispersed, became successful and donated in turn. As a consequence, New England institutions of higher education have a large and affluent alumni base that continues to donate extraordinary amounts of money — and perpetuates their competitive advantage.

In sum, through the mechanism of fund-raising and endowments, colleges and universities pump human and financial capital into the New England states, shoring up what would otherwise be moribund and uncompetitive economies. No one disputes the importance of building strong universities in the Knowledge Economy, but the critical contribution of endowments and alumni fund-raising is understood only dimly.

In Virginia, the University of Virginia is the only educational institution that comes close to playing in the same league as the New England universities– and even UVa falls short. I would like to know: How well equipped are Virginia’s universities to compete in such an environment? Does state funding and affiliation help or hinder them? Would they be more competitive as private institutions?

Commonwealth Conservative, for one. The popular blog will host Attorney General Bob McDonnell tonight between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. The purpose of Wednesday’s event is to allow any interested Virginian the opportunity to ask a question of the Attorney General.

The “live blog” will become a regular event for the Attorney General, rotating between various host blogs which are still to be determined.

Update: Read the interview here. Well-informed questions, solid responses. As an outside observer, I would rate the event a success.

I spoke at the York County Republican Committee meeting last week. My message to the grassroots committee folks was that their District (America’s First) Committee and the State Central Committee had not stuttered in their opposition to tax increases in ’04 or now in ’06. This opposition to new taxes for transportation was warmly received at the meeting. One of Republican Sen. Marty Williams’ aides was there. She said she was surprised (Shocked! Shocked, I tell you!) that so many were against new taxes because they have not heard from constituents opposing the tax. That is interesting in several regards.

How can any politician get elected to public office in Virginia, and especially in Tidewater, and not know the political culture that put them in office? Virginians, and especially Tidewater folks, have a special respect and trust for elected officials – because they are expected to keep their campaign promises and do what is right. It’s not gentlemanly and ladylike to nag politicians on every issue. Once elected, a politician – Democrat or Republican – becomes ‘our’ representative and has a pretty good chance to hold on to office for as long as they don’t abuse power. Exceptions prove the rule.

So, apparently, a Republican elected to the State Senate has to be told by his constituents to not raise their taxes – or he will just listen to the squeaky wheel of those special interests who profit from government spending. This begs more questions.

Does a State Senator represent those who nominate him from one political party, and the wider electorate that elected him for his campaign of lower taxes, limited government, etc., or just those who contact him during the legislative session?

Does a State Senator ignore the Republican Party of Virginia creed – which he hears or repeats at every GOP gathering – because special interests activists want him to do so?

Does a State Senator not understand the principles of the Party – and the underlying reasons (Like taxes kill jobs. Lower taxes limit government. Taxes, opportunity and individual freedom are cojoined…) so he has to be reminded for every vote?

It seems that Republican representation requires Republicans to remind some Republican legislators what the Republican principles and positions are on issues. What a bore to have to do that. Yet, I guess it’s necessary.

Okay, Republicans across the Commonwealth, please contact your State legislators and remind them to not forget to vote AGAINST new, extra taxes. While you are at, you might remind them that we, Republicans, are for Motherhood and apple pie.

The looming showdown in the General Assembly looks like deja vu all over again.

In 2004, a Democratic governor and a Republican-controlled state Senate agreed on the need to raise taxes, primarily to fund increases in K-12 spending, while a Republican-controlled House of Delegates fought the increase.

Two years later, the situation is eerily similar: A Democratic governor and a Republican-controlled state Senate want to raise taxes, this time for transportation improvements, while the Republican-controlled House of Delegates finds itself in opposition. Indeed, yesterday, the House Finance Commitee nixed measures backed by Gov. Timothy M. Kaine to boost the tax on car sales and car-insurance premiums.

We all remember what happened in 2004: The House buckled under pressure from the Governor and the Senate, and a tax increase was pushed through. Will history repeat itself in 2006?

I don’t think so. My sense is that the House sentiment against a tax increase is even stronger than in 2004, and public support for another tax hike is considerably weaker.

In 2004 , Gov. Mark R. Warner and his allies, including then Lt. Gov. Kaine, argued that the state faced a long-term, “structural” budget deficit in the years ahead. It turns out they were wrong. Economic growth brought in far more revenue than the Warner team had forecast, and the state piled up massive surpluses.

The embarassment of riches has two implications. First, as the House Republicans have argued effectively, it’s ridiculous to raise taxes when the state is enjoying large surpluses. Secondly, the fact of the surpluses casts the pro-tax camp as the boy who cried wolf. The Big Tax zealots cried “fiscal crisis” in 2004, and it turns out they were wrong. The Big Tax apologists argue that road funding is facing a crisis as well, but they have less credibility than they did two years ago.

Here’s another important difference. The Democrats are less united behind a tax increase today than they were in 2004. Two years ago, the tax hike went to a cause that all Democrats could feel good about: public schools. Democrats are more ambivalent about raising money for transportation improvements, the bulk of which will go to roads. The influential environmentalist/ conservationist wing of the Democratic Party loves Gov. Kaine’s proposal to give local governments more power to restrain growth. But the Smart Growth activists have been less than vocal in their support for more money to build more roads. Indeed, many Smart Growth proponents regard it as a huge mistake to ramp up spending on transportation until fundamental land use reforms have been put into place first — and the Governor’s land use reforms only scratch the surface.

Here’s one more difference. In 2004, spending money on schools had broad bipartisan support across every region of the state. In 2006, voter frustration with traffic congestion is concentrated mainly in Northern Virginia and, to a lesser degree, in Hampton Roads. Outside those two metropolitan areas, legislators aren’t feeling any pressure to raise taxes. As long as a transportation tax scheme is statewide in scope while traffic congestion is localized, it will be a very hard sell.