Presto :
Suddenly I can see it, the reason for the loud complaints
about bloated government programs,
public sector unions that reward inefficiency,
dysfunctional community organizing campaigns,
and many other things.
Why could I suddenly see this obvious ? Because Steven
Malanga knows how
to communicate the problem. Or a major part of it.
Here is a meta-problem, however, unwillingness of the Right
to admit something else
that is obvious, let's call it "Lifestyles of the Rich and
Famous."
Again and again there is the litany about how the rich need
their millions ( or billions )
in order to expand business and hire new workers. To some
extent this is true.
But what is also true is a fact of life pointed out by
Thorsten Veblen a century ago,
namely the overwhelming urge on the part of the wealthy
toward conspicuous
consumption of luxury goods, viz, yachts, private jets, de
luxe mansions,
vacations on the Riviera, $ 400 haircuts, evening gowns
that sell for $ 20,000
and a host of other things including spending as much on
one meal as
a middle class family of four spends of food for a week.
And , O yeah,
being able to brag to other rich sons-of-bitches how you
have most of
your money in Switzerland or the Caymans and have
outsourced
half of your work to Mexico or Asia.
As long as people insist on looking at the problem in
strictly partisan terms
we will be stuck in this morass, organized public sector
employees bilking
the public for huge amounts ( $ 150,000 salaries for cops
in Oakland,
$ 80, 000 to teach grade school in New Jersey ), plus
outrageous benefits.
Personally I am pixxed off about both these phenomena.
Really pixxed off
considering what I have gone through in life and my
compensation for a
helluva lot of hard work, a pittance compared with an
Oakland cop
or a NJ 3rd grade teacher with half my formal education.
But one reason I have never given a rat's ass for
Republicans is the fact
that they prefer to be hoodwinked by the financial elite,
as if the elite always
deserve their riches, which is a ludicrous and stupid way
of looking at things.
How to the rich get their millions / billions ?
Several ways, starting with inheritance, but extending to
social connections
and pricey attorneys able to carve out special breaks for
favored clients
that grease their way to fortunes. But listen to the Big
Shots in the
Republican Party and 100% of the rich are hard working
entrepreneurs
who innovate, invest in employees, and are frugal to a
fault.
Such a viewpoint is pure crap.
What we need is a Radical Centrist approach which takes
both the
Left and Right to the woodshed. Well, thanks to Malanga, I
can now see
much better, in ways impossible to me before hearing him on
C-Span,
just how fiscally and otherwise immoral a good number of
public service
unions are, and how half baked are many social service
programs,
and still other things. But to claim that the Republicans
have
"the answers" is what is has always been, a sick joke.
Yes, a war against government spending that is
unjustifiable is necessary.
Indeed, it has been going on for a long time. But its like
the old military
when generals didn't give a hoot about the political side
of things and
didn't bother to learn how to deal with the civilian
government. Again and again
perfectly sound military ideas went down in flames on
Capitol Hill. Since
the post Viet Nam era that has changed drastically The
generals, with
Petraeus as prime example, with Mc Crystal as throwback to
the "old style,"
now know how to communicate, and think is terms of nuance
not just
assertion and complaining, indeed, they are damned smart
and good at thinking,
and they usually are successful in their dealings with
government.
When is the GOP going to learn the same lesson ? CAN the
GOP learn this lesson ?
I really, really, really have my doubts --because to have
any credibility Republicans
would need to admit that Veblen was correct and that
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
is as much the problem as bloated gvt programs or unethical
unions.
Should I repeat this ? Maybe I should :
Veblen was correct.....that Lifestyles of the Rich
and Famous
is as much the problem as bloated gvt programs or
unethical unions.
"Communication," the word means a heckovalot more than
expressing one's self
or being accurate, if even these skills are sometimes weak
for politicians.
It means being convincing
through being honest and seeing both sides of an issue,
and looking for remedies that take into account everything
that should be taken
into account. Yes, it can mean taking very strong stands.
It sometimes can mean
taking a partisan stand, but 100% of the time ? Not a
chance in hell unless you
don't care about credibility with anyone except other
partisans.
Being convincing is the key. That means, more than
anything, being objective
as much as possible, and being willing to drop partisanship
when called for,
which in my estimation is a minimum of 50 % of the time on
average.
Anything less is "politics as usual."
Billy
=====================================================
Washington Examiner
Steven Malanga: Politicians win, taxpayers lose as
government funds failed projects
By: Steven Malanga
from his book : Shakedown
OpEd Contributor
October 8, 2010
Part five in a five-part series
In 2005, the Bush administration proposed to eliminate
one of the last and least effective vestiges of the War on
Poverty: aid to cities doled out in the form of
community-development block grants. The effort failed,
even though for 30 years the program has expended some
$120 billion in thousands of communities, with little to
show for the effort.
Over the years, officials have squandered billions of
taxpayer dollars by financing unworkable projects that
often went bust, investing in new businesses that couldn't
survive in depressed neighborhoods, and funding social
programs with little idea of how they might actually
strengthen their communities. But the block grant program
has powerful friends in Washington who continue to protect
it.
President Obama, himself a product of government-funded
community groups, has promised to vigorously expand block
grants.
How has the program spent taxpayer money? It has poured
hundreds of millions of dollars into businesses in poor
communities, often financing companies that had difficulty
repaying their debts, backing projects that went bust, and
rarely creating jobs in the distressed areas at which they
were targeted.
Nationwide, nearly 25 percent of block-grant-backed loans
wind up in default, according to an analysis of dozens of
community-lending portfolios.
Shakedown:
The Continuing Conspiracy Against the American
Taxpayer
Part 1: Obama’s ascent heralded by
government-funded activists
Part 2: The White House’s big payout to
activists and public-sector unions
Part 3: Public-sector unions run amock in New
Jersey
Part 4: California’s cautionary budget-busting
public-sector union story
Part 5: Politicians win, taxpayers lose
as government funds failed projects
In Los Angeles after the 1992 riots, for instance, the
federal government plowed an astounding $430 million into
a loan program. Since its crime-ridden target area
remained an economically inhospitable place, the program
had trouble finding companies to lend to.
Criticized for not making loans quickly enough, it then
started pouring money into local businesses which racked
up big losses. Eventually, the Los Angeles City Council
shut down the costly program, supposedly a national model
for lending in troubled areas.
Like Los Angeles, Buffalo has received huge infusions of
federal urban aid--more than half a billion dollars in
community-development block-grant money alone in 30 years.
If this kind of urban aid truly worked, Buffalo would be a
shining star in the economic-development constellation
because it has gotten more block-grant money per capita
than any other U.S. city.
But as a series in the Buffalo News revealed, the city
has almost nothing to show for its massive block grant
aid, having squandered it on a succession of failed
projects, including nearly $60 million into trying to
revive its theater district, with numerous loans and
grants to private businesses that then defaulted.
Over time, local officials and Congress have allowed
billions in block grant aid to go to politically connected
groups--a far cry from the original intention of using the
money to revive depressed neighborhoods.
In recent years, for instance, congressmen have lavished
millions of dollars for grants to zoos, for opera houses
in Connecticut, Michigan, and Washington State, for the
Southern New Mexico Fair and Rodeo, the Alabama Quail
Trail, and the Iao Theater in Wailuku, Hawaii.
In addition, well-off municipalities have used the
program to build tennis courts, to finance arts centers,
or to pretty up their downtown shopping districts. Bergen
County, New Jersey, where annual household income is 55
percent above the national average, spent nearly $280,000
in block-grant money to keep alive a privately owned arts
center less than half an hour from Broadway.
The block-grant program is a tiny part of our now huge
national budgetary problems. But there is a larger message
in the survival of block grants.
For 30 years, critics have been unable to reform or
eliminate a program that is ineffective at best, with no
clear goals, and a clear patronage machine for politicians
and community groups at worst. The block grant effort
illustrates how difficult reform becomes once a government
program becomes entrenched.
Steven Malanga is senior fellow at the Manhattan
Institute and author of "Shakedown: The Continuing
Conspiracy Against the American Taxpayer."
-- 