Bacon's Rebellion

Sean Tubbs’ podcast on the Bloggers’ Summit is up on his website, the Charlottesville Podcasting Network.

“I just received my copy of “Notes From the Sausage Factory,” edited by Barnie Day and Becky Dale, and I haven’t been able to put it down yet.

I’ll have a full review when I finish the book, but I can already tell that it’s a Virginia political junkie’s dream. Go buy it now. “

— Commonwealth Conservative

One of Gov. Mark R. Warner’s final acts as governor will be to present his version of a “transparent” budget understandable to the public. Buried in his speech to the General Assembly joint money committees Monday, he previewed the budget he will submit in December.

Jettisoning the program structure which has existed since the 1970’s, the new budget will be organized around “the identifiable services that each agency provides.” Within the budget bill and budget document, each service will be associated with its related funding, and will provide quantifiable objectives and performance measures. All information will be accessible to the public through the Web.

Including performance measures with the budget numbers will allow citizens to appraise the program’s effectiveness. For example, the governor noted,

If our objective is to reduce the number of repeat juvenile offenders, we will be able to tell what the Department of Juvenile Justice spends on that service, and how many juveniles are convicted of a new misdemeanor or felony. If our objective is to help welfare recipients obtain jobs, we will be able to tell how much the Department of Social Services spends on training, and we will measure how many welfare recipients are employed six months later.

Budget transparency represents a big step towards public accountability. We look forward to seeing what the governor comes up with.

The Road to Ruin blog has the scoop on an important transportation story. Former Gov. Gerald Baliles has proposed a network of tolling stations on Virginia Interstates that could raise $1 billion a year to fund maintenance and improvements. Read the details here.

First, Washington Post Virginia political reporters Michael Shear and Chris Jenkins started a blog (Race to Richmond); now, the Fairfax Extra section of the Post has started a “community blog.”

The blog’s maiden post yesterday generated a healthy 27 comments. Several commenters wondered when Maryland communities would get a blog. Most of the rest wanted to debate the tenure of Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Gerald Connolly.

Will Arlington, Alexandria, Loudoun, and Prince William get blogs? Is the Post in the blog business for the long haul, or are they just experimenting?

Someone in the Warner administration should ask Joe Luter, CEO of Smithfield Foods, why he can’t expand hog production in Southeastern Virginia. Here’s an advance peek at a story running in tomorrow’s VA Newswire:

Smithfield Packing to Consolidate Hog Processing Operations

SMITHFIELD—Smithfield Packing Company will shift hog processing operations from its Smithfield South facility to its Smithfield North and Tar Heel, N.C., facilities in October, allowing the company to use vacant plant space to install a production line for pre-cooked microwave bacon next year. The changeover affects approximately 570 of the company’s 4,000 employees in Southeast Virginia. The company hopes to rehire all affected employees over the next nine months.

Explained CEO Joseph W. Luter IV: “This difficult but necessary decision to discontinue hog processing at the Smithfield plant is driven largely by hog availability and competitive industry conditions. This lack of hog supply is the direct result of the moratorium on hog farms in North Carolina and the de facto moratorium in Virginia.” (My emphasis.) More.

Jerry Kilgore and Tim Kaine, can you sniff a new campaign issue?

Bacon’s Rebellion has added three new bloggers recently to its line-up of contributors. The first to join us, with little fanfare, was James Atticus Bowden, a military futurist by day and Poquoson Republican Party activist in his spare time. Next was Steve Haner, a former Republican operative and chief lobbyist for the Virginia Chamber of Commerce, who has launched a private lobbying practice. Most recently (today), we added Claire Guthrie Gastanaga, a lobbyist active in the Democratic Party. Although we tend to be a “right of center” blog, as Jeff Schapiro referred to us, we do value diversity of opinion and viewpoints. Claire will join Barnie Day in keeping the rest of us honest.

Our three new bloggers will replace Phil Rodokanakis and Steve “Blue Dog” Sisson. Phil, the newly appointed president of the Virginia Club for Growth, had to cut back on his blogging — although we still occasionally hear from him. And the Blue Dog has started his own blog. He, too, still drops by for the occasional blog.

I am confident that all three of our new bloggers will help fulfill the Bacon’s Rebellion mission of maintaining a forum for the open and reasoned exchange of ideas in the realm of Virginia politics and policy.

Delivering his mid-year report on the Commonwealth’s economic and financial performance, Gov. Mark R. Warner declared that Virginia “is truly on the right track.” Virginia may have run up a massive General Fund surplus (see Steve Haner’s post for details on the exact amount) in fiscal 2005, but it faces $2.8 billion in added needs in the next biennium — and that doesn’t even include perceived needs for transportation funding.

Here’s a list of “known budget requirements” taken from the governor’s speech:

• Re-benchmarking of the State Standards of Quality for public schools – even without funding the new standards adopted by the Board of Education – will require about $1.2 billion;
• Meeting the continuing cost of Medicaid – without assuming any federal cuts or policy changes – will exceed $500 million;
• Providing $950 million a year in car tax payments will require an additional $415 million;
• The cost of paying for higher prices on concrete and steel for capital projects already authorized, and providing equipment for buildings coming on line will exceed $250 million.
• Health insurance, higher VRS contribution rates, and group life insurance costs will together require about $200 million;
• Additional debt service costs for bonds already authorized but not yet issued will exceed $125 million;
• Two new prisons and two expanded prisons coming on line will require about $90 million.

And that doesn’t include meeting Virginia’s commitment to higher education, funding the clean-up of the Chesapeake Bay… yadda, yadda, yadda.

Pardon me, but what the h-e-double hockey sticks is going on?

What is this “re-benchmarking of the Standards of Quality?” The last re-benchmarking cost us $700 million a year. Now another re-benchmarking will cost us a like amount? Educational spending in Virginia is on auto-pilot, with massive funding increases baked into the system. Doesn’t anyone see anything wrong with that?

Runaway education spending is just the first place to start asking questions. Medicaid is the next. We citizens need to start digging into every one of these items. How much is this spending legitimate, how much of it is puff, and how much spending could be cut elsewhere that the governor isn’t talking about? Maybe the Americans for Prosperity (See Will Vehr’s post below) can help provide some answers.

Chad Dotson, the former John Behan, has a round-up on yesterday’s announcement of the Americans for Prosperity creation of a Virginia Chapter, including this Tyler Whitley RT-D story.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m all for organizations that will “advocate free-market, budget-cutting alternatives to tax increases.” Trouble is, it seems to me that several organizations with that mission already exist and they form the Board of Directors for what our friend Barnie calls the “Flat Earth Society.” Most advocate tax cuts in an almost abstract, philosophical way. There’s a need for that, but there’s more of a need now for an organization that will stand up and provide practical, real-world suggestions for budget-cutting and government efficiency to make funding available for better uses or tax cuts. Taxpayers need to be informed of the waste and inefficiency in state government and to realize that it isn’t just “chump change.”

The Americans for Prosperity, Virginia Chapter, looks like it might be a little more focused on the nuts and bolts of budget-cutting. If it is, it will be a great addition to the debate. If not … Barnie will have another foil.

The books have been closed on Virginia’s most recent fiscal year and the report was released today. Pick your surplus figure:

• $1.125 billion
• $544 million
• $0.00

The first is the “unreserved fund surplus,” the cash in the bank at the end of the day on June 30 (less the amount needed to pay any actual bills that really were in the drawer.) There was a time when a Governor would be proud to report that the state had a billion bucks in the bank on the first day of the new fiscal year, but no more. Not politically correct.

The second figure — $544 million — is the figure Governor Warner used in his speech and the press will focus on, the amount that General Fund revenue exceeded the official forecast. But of course that ignores the fact that not every dollar appropriated by the Assembly actually gets spent. When the books are closed some money is left over is just about every agency’s budget, and the dribs and drabs add up. But we don’t talk about that anymore, even though it is the soul of good management.

The third figure — $0 — is the new Politically Correct number. There is no surplus. The entire $1.125 billion has already been allocated or designated or earmarked or whatever euphemism you like for “pulled off the table before the taxpayers could see it.” The biggest chunk is going to the “Rainy Day” reserve fund, the second biggest chunk ($300 million) was assumed to be on the way and already spent by the 2005 General Assembly. The rest is parceled out either by law or at the Governor’s discretion. Surplus? What surplus?

In my book (and any accountant’s I suspect), the unreserved fund balance is the surplus. I don’t really understand why they are so shy about using it. Historially the $1.1 billion surplus is not out of line — good, but not out of line. It was less than ten percent and in other years it has exceeded ten percent. I had a chart showing previous end of year balances in a Bacon’s Rebellion Reality Check last September. In some of those years — some I can remember — the final results were equally at odds with the initial forecasts. Adjectives applied to the Warner Administration need to be carefully chosen, since they might apply to some governors from the other party, as well.

Moving off the General Fund’s rosy news, the report on the transportation revenues is very different. Overall revenue in the transportation accounts was up 3.3 percent — far from the 14.8 percent growth in the General Fund. The FY 2005 motor fuels tax collections were up only .4 of one percent, against a forecast of 1.5 percent. Anybody think highway and transit usage grew only four tenths of a percent last year? Prediction: that revenue source will not only not hit its foreast this fiscal year, it might actually decrease from this year’s collections as gas prices continue to climb.

But it’s only transportation. Barely rated a mention in the Governor’s speech and Secretary Bennett’s presentation.

In the midst of all the “debates” going on now–debating a blogger code of conduct, debating debates among the candidates, and debating the many and various issues in the Virginia gubernatorial campaign–comes a really excellent point about debating that I think we’d all do well to consider.

Mickey Kaus at Slate “fisked” a Malcom Gladwell story in New Yorker magazine about co-pays and health insurance. I think he made a great point here:

Like many New Yorker policy articles, Gladwell’s reads like a lecture to an isolated, ill-informed and somewhat gullible group of highly literate children. They are cheap dates. They won’t think of the obvious objections. They won’t demand that you “play Notre Dame,” as my boss Charles Peters used to say, and take on the best arguments for the other side. They just need to be given a bit of intellectual entertainment and pointed off in a comforting anti-Bush direction.

Forget Gladwell and Bush in the quote–think about that nugget of advice provided by Charles Peters: “play Notre Dame.”

I think all of us are guilty at times of reflexively relying on our partisanship to dismiss arguments, ideas, proposals, or policies offered by the “other side.” We really ought to confront their best arguments because maybe, just maybe, the “other side” might have a point.

We could adapt Peters’ maxim to the Virginia Way: “play Virginia Tech.”

We talked a lot about a blogger “code of conduct” at the Sorensen Blog Summit, but nobody offered one as an example, so perhaps we were describing an elephant to a blind man. Since I happen to believe a code would be a good thing for many bloggers, I thought I’d draft the kind of code that I envision.

My code has three basic parts: why I blog, how I will blog, and what I’ll do if something goes wrong. If my model were to be adopted, every blogger would have a different why, a similar how, and a slightly variable what. Here is my rough draft:

1. I blog under my legal name to stimulate discussion of important issues and media coverage of those issues. The opinions I offer on those issues are my own, arrived at from my own reading, research, and personal experiences. I do not seek nor will I accept any payment for expressing opinions without advance notification to my readers. Occasionally, I will post satirical material that will appear similar to my factual work, but this material will be easily identifiable.
2. I will always credit the work of others and provide links to that work wherever possible.
3. I will not knowingly publish information that is false or incorrect. Should I publish anything shown to be false or incorrect, I will offer a correction and an apology, if appropriate, as quickly as possible, in at least as visible a position as the original false or incorrect information appeared.
4. I will avoid personal attacks or unfair characterizations of the subjects of my published works and the readers who offer comments.
5. If I perform the work of a newsgathering journalist in the course of my blogging, I will endeavor to follow generally accepted codes of journalistic conduct, including shielding sources when the reason is explained.
6. I will not censor or edit the feedback I receive except for foul language or malicious intent. I will endeavor to be accessible to my readers and to respond to their complaints and suggestions.

A lot of summit bloggers seemed to think that a code was unnecessary because they believed their integrity stood on its own. While that may be true, a new reader might not know me from a drunken lout hollering on the corner. I would want that reader to have some means of verifying that, unlike the drunk, I’ll stand by what I was hollering the next morning.

It’s a draft. Questions, comments, suggestions, or gripes are welcomed.

There was a palpable change of atmosphere at the Blog Summit yesterday when someone questioned Ken Stroupe of the Center for Politics about allowing Russ Potts into the televised gubernatorial debate. I suspect the group would have been happy to argue the issue for the rest of the session, but Summit leaders quickly put a lid on it.

Today’s Daily Press editorial page continues to shill for letting Potts into the debate just on his own recognizance:

Potts deserves more than a single session with Democrat Kaine. He brings a striking measure of candor to the 2005 gubernatorial election – on transportation, education and public finance – and does so when the like has been in scant supply in recent years. Potts deserves to be heard and seen, and anything that artificially thwarts that does no favors for Virginia.

The debate about the debate will continue, but we really ought to open up a second front in this war of words and perceptions.

Did Tim Kaine and Jerry Kilgore discuss William Redpath’s exclusion from the gubernatorial debates in 2001? I doubt it. Wouldn’t anything they said back then be pretty relevant now?

Well, let’s ensure we have some real “markers” to use in 2009. We know that whatever they say, the four downticket candidates are running not just for Lt. Gov and AG–they’re running for the right to be their party’s natural candidate for governor in 2009. So let’s get them on record now as to what they believe about gubernatorial debates.

Here’s the basic question: Will you agree to participate in at least one state-wide televised debate with all candidates on the ballot if you run for governor in 2009?

If Bolling, Byrne, Deeds or McDonnell start weaseling, let’s find out what they think makes a candidate “credible” and worthy of a spot in a debate. Let’s run through some scenarios with them:

1. Just gaining a spot on the ballot through signatures?
2. 15% in the polls? 10% in the polls? 5% in the polls? Doesn’t matter?
3. Green Party endorsement? Libertarian Party endorsement? Any party endorsement?
4. Current or former VA elected officeholder?
5. Retired military or former appointed Federal offical?
6. Wealthy business person?
7. Celebrity?
8. Long-time activist?
9. Woman or racial minority?
10. Religious or ethnic candidate?

In today’s Richmond Times-Dispatch, Michael Hardy looked at the AG candidates and Pamela Stallsmith reviewed the Lt. Governor candidates. Nothing the downticket candidates are talking about is as remotely interesting as what the gubernatorial candidates are talking about–debating or not debating Russ Potts. Let’s get the downticket on record about debates now. Think of the benefit–one less peripheral issue next time out!

The “Summit on Blogging and Democracy” represented a critical step in coalescing the identity of Virginia’s blogging community. Kudos to the Sorenson Institute, Waldo Jaquith and Chad Dotson for organizing this seminal event.

While the conference raised a number of interesting issues, it left many untouched. To move Virginia’s blogosphere forward — from a means of self expression to a force for change — I sense the need for a follow-up meeting. Here are some key issues that, in my humble opinion, need to be addressed.

Credibility. Bloggers have done a phenomenal job of pointing out the biases, inaccuracies and flaws of the Mainstream Media. But the blogosphere has tremendous credibility problems of its own. Many bloggers write anonymously or under pseudonyms, making it very difficult to evaluate their credibility or their motives in making the statements they do. (Just who is the infamous “Not Larry Sabato?”) While criticizing reporters for failing to reveal their sources, bloggers don’t always divulge theirs. While lambasting reporters for making factual errors, bloggers are often guilty of spreading misinformation as well.

The beauty of the blogosphere is the ability of people to hash out their disagreements online, critiquing each other’s arguments and facts. But not all readers are inclined to plow through lengthy threads of commentary to get to the truth. One could argue that bloggers need to be more assiduous about checking their facts and citing their sources, that they need to be more forthright about who they are, where they’re coming from and what their political and professional conflicts of interest might be. What standards should bloggers adopt? The answer may not be the same for everyone. But we cannot evade the questions.

Lack of Resources. Most bloggers are individuals who publish their blogs on their own time. Very few enjoy the flexibility to engage in fact gathering during business hours, which largely restricts their research to what can be found on the Internet. When it comes to reporting, Virginia blogs are no match for the old media. Like-minded blogs should consider pooling their limited resources, or at the very least coordinating their coverage. The idea of setting up blogging co-ops and collaboratives — an Old Dominion Blog Alliance on steroids — might be worth exploring.

Business model. Ultimately, if blogs and other digital media (websites, e-zines) want to compete with the “old media” for readers and credibility, we must establish a business model that allows us to invest hard cash, not just volunteer time, into news gathering. Collectively, we do reach a large, growing and influential audience. Any number of special interests would be willing to pay to deliver their advertising message to our readers. We need to ask ourselves: Is there any way to aggregate our readership, package it and sell it to advertisers? … What standards must we adhere to in order to gain credibility with advertisers? … And would we accept advertising even if it were available.

I am not — repeat not — suggesting that standards and business models be imposed on anyone. The blogosphere is too anarchic to control, even if anyone wanted to. The beauty of the blogosphere is its kaleidsocopic diversity of viewpoints, many of them intensely personal and downright eccentric. I am talking about a “coalition of the willing,” so to speak, of those who aspire to take blogging to a higher plane.

The Creative Change Center in Richmond has offered to host and organize a follow-up blogging conference if there is any interest in one. I see this conference as being very hands-on, digging into the nitty gritty of blogging operations. I’m very open to any suggestions of topics to be addressed, and would welcome the participation of anyone who would like to play an organizing role. Communicate through this blog or by e-mailing me at [email protected].

Virginia’s blogosphere marked an important milepost Saturday with the gathering of some 50 bloggers and other digital-media publishers in Charlottesville at the “Summit on Blogging and Democracy in the Commonwealth,” hosted by UVa’s Sorenson Institute for Political Leadership.

The bloggers came in all sizes and stripes, from teen prodigy Kenton Ngo, the 14-year-old author of the 750 Watts blog, to grizzled newspaper veteran Frosty Landon, the former executive editor of the Roanoke Times who now runs the Virginia Coalition for Open Government. Participants included office holders, former office holders and would-be office holders. Lawyers, lobbyists, citizen activists and gadflies all took part.

Most encouraging, I found, was the attendance of four respected political journalists: Jeff Schapiro and Pamela Stallsmith with the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Mike Shear with the Washington Post (who has his own blog) and Bob Gibson with the Charlottesville Daily Progress. As much as we bloggers like to torment the “old media” for its failings, we also crave its credibility and legitimacy. We were glad to see that serious journalists deemed the summit worth attending.

The most important thing about the blogfest is that it happened: Bloggers who had known each other only digitally got to put faces to the names. I agree with Will Vehrs’ characterization below that the Summit got off to a slow start with a couple of “good government” sessions only tangentially related to blogging. But the pace definitely picked up with a presentation by Chris Piper with the Virginia State Board of Elections. Piper offered bloggers a dose of harsh reality. The good news is that the politicians are paying attention to what we’re saying. The bad news is, they don’t always like what they hear, and there seems to be increasing interest in regulating what we do.

If there’s one thing that can unite bloggers of all political persuasions, it’s any threat to their untrammeled freedom of speech and right to free expression. For the most part, the audience responded negatively to the idea of regulation by politicians. At the same time, it should have been clear to anyone who listened carefully that bloggers do not publish in a vacuum, free of constraints. Bloggers must come to grips with the following:

1. State election law. The State Board of Elections has the power — like it or not — to compel people to report their campaign contributions. That extends to the blogosphere. Anyone who blogs for a candidate in coordination with that candidate or his agents must abide by the same reporting requirements as someone who donates any other “in kind” contribution. This won’t affect most bloggers who, for the most part, are free agents. But it will affect bloggers for hire. Left unanswered is what recourse the state has when shills blog anonymously or under pseudonyms. In practice, state election law may prove difficult to enforce.

2. Libel. Freedom of speech does not include the right to slander and libel people. End of story. The blogosphere thrives on rumors and innuendo, much of which borders on libel. It is only a matter of time before a blogger gets sued.

3. Privacy. We have not yet seen the emergence of a blogger paparazzi, but that day may not be far away. In one recent incident, a Virginia blogger reported online the substance of an elected official’s private conversation he had overheard. The politician was incensed, prompting queries to the State Board of Elections. Cell phones now come equipped with cameras, making it easier than ever to invade someone’s privacy by taking his picture and posting it on a blog. It’s only a matter of time before a blogger offends a politician, who then seeks retribution through regulation.

The bloggers at the Summit didn’t come close to resolving any of these issues. Getting hyper-opinionated bloggers to agree on anything may prove as frustrating as prodding Iraqis into agreeing on a constitution. But if Virginia’s blogosphere is ever to achieve the legitimacy of the old media, if bloggers are ever to reach the audience and attain the credibility we desperately want, we need to begin setting standards for ourselves.