Tag: legislation

Con-Gress

Post author By David
Post date March 25, 2009
2 Comments on Con-Gress

Warning: Undefined array key "adf" in /home4/hpvcxhmy/public_html/wp-content/plugins/similarity/similarity.php on line 69

Warning: Undefined array key "sim_pages" in /home4/hpvcxhmy/public_html/wp-content/plugins/similarity/similarity.php on line 70

As much as it may be fashionable to blame congress for many of our problems I think it is fair to take an unbiased look at how congress functions. As I began to do so I realized that no matter how numerous my complaints about the legislation we hear about and the legislative process itself I am pleased to realize that Congress is working as designed by the founders.

I’m reminded of an old joke:

If "pro" is the opposite of "con" then Congress must be the opposite of progress.

It turns out that the major thing that Congress does as designed is to slow down the process of law-making. Obviously we have seen recent exceptions such as the ever-popular bailouts and the patriot act where Congress acted faster than it was meant to act, but the fact that such legislation is so shoddy is proof of why the House and Senate are intended to be deliberative bodies.

What I was very happy to realize was that while I may complain when Congress takes a decent proposal from the executive branch and strips it down (or gums it up) to a barely palatable law, it also takes poor proposals from the executive branch and dilutes them up until they are marginally less toxic. So while we may complain that nothing can come through Congress clean, we should also recognize the flip-side of that truth – that bad legislation is never as potent as it would be without congressional intervention.

I know that the founders envisioned a Congress that would, through their deliberation, pass good proposals with little alteration while preventing or significantly improving poor proposals. That is the ideal for which we should continuie to strive, but at least we can approciate the fact that even a poor congress has some beneficial value to the people.

Tags change congress, legislation

National

I Missed An Option

When I listed the options yesterday for how to deal with the AIG bonuses I obviously missed one. One member of the house thought up the idea that we could tax AIG bonuses at 100 percent. The beauty of his bill is that it is written to apply to large bonuses at any company receiving TARP funds. I like the concept because it leaves private businesses (meaning those not being propped up by Uncle Sam) free from any new restrictions in compensation and id does not affect the people getting small bonuses (the ones least responsible for the problems). The biggest change I would have made to this idea would be to lower the threshold from $100,000 to $25,000 or less.

Tags bailout, legislation, money, taxes

State

Senate Session Wrap Up

The legislative process has been compared to sausage making and we are often told that we don’t want to see the process. At the blogger meeting in the Senate President’s office yesterday what we got among all the talk about various bills was a peek at the sausage making process. Personally I found the insight fascinating because what we may be aware of in the process may not be representative of the reality. I think the best thing that I could do with that is to share some of the notes I took at the time – here they are as I wrote them (with links added later):

Before the meeting started I heard a very telling comment between a couple of interns – they said that nobody could possibly have any idea of what actually happens at the State Capital by reading/listening to the news.

Glen Warchol just showed up and the tone of the meeting immediately changed to be more confrontational. He’s complaining about the ethics bill and the rule about legislators turning lobbyist. Specifically we have Senator Stephenson who is a lobbyist by trade. It seems to me that the people have the choice to elect a lobbyist if they choose. Electing someone and then having them become a lobbyist is a different issue.

Look at the Voter Registration bill – SB25

Glen just left – I’m betting that the rest of the meeting will be more congenial from here on out.

The idea of VMT in place of (or addition to) gas tax is not happening now. I had suggested on a comment once that we could use our odometer readings rather than GPS tracking. Sen Killpack (majority leader) made the observation that out of state trips would be taxed by that method.

Ric Cantrell "If citizens abdicate their responsibility there’s nobody to pick up the slack."

Tags 2009, legislation, legislature, Utah

State technology

Predictable Responses

As newspaper Editorial Boards begin to write about SB 208 their positions mirror what I called the tip of the iceberg and what we expected on the day that SB 208 was announced. In fact, one might almost wonder in passing if the editorial in the Standard Examiner was written by the same person who wrote the editorial in the Deseret News. Both dismiss the idea that they oppose this because it cuts into the revenue they get from publishing legal notices and both suggest that a state run website would not treat all legal notices equally. Also, neither editorial mentioned that this website would help city governments and citizens to save money on all the legal notices that they are required to publish. Essentially all their objections boil down to scare tactics as shown by this response to the Standard Examiner editorial.

As I read the Deseret News version I had a thought about an amendment to the bill that would expose the sincerity of the newspapers in their "public service" claim for opposing this. If the bill were amended to stipulate that the legal notices website allow bulk uploads of legal notices from entities such as newspapers (at bulk rates), and also allow a feed or other source for newspapers to print or otherwise republish the notices from that site (if they so choose) then I can see no reason for newspapers to object – besides the revenue competition. If the papers really are not afraid of the competition – if they honestly believe they are opposing this on public service grounds – they should simply offer to post on the state website any legal notices they receive so that their service complies with the new law (assuming it passes).

The Deseret News also provided two claims that need to be debunked.

In addition, as any Web surfer can attest, Web sites are not dependable. They are subject to technical issues, and they don’t make a reliable and enduring archivable record the way newspapers do.

As a long-time web developer I can say that whatever temporary glitches a website may have does not change the fact that web sites can produce reliable and enduring archivable records. In fact, the most reliable archivable records of newspapers are digital. For proof of that simply go look at archive.org. I can pull up old websites of mine that I know no longer exist on any computer where I ever published them. Even if a government site went down it is not likely that it would be lost.

The bill claims it would cost the state nothing. However, Web sites require considerable maintenance and personnel. Even if this new site were to fall under existing state government Web services, it still would cost taxpayers. Newspapers, on the other hand, store and archive data for nothing other than the cost of a legal notice.

This statement completely ignores what was actually said when SB 208 was first unveiled. The site would not cost taxpayers anything not because Sen. Urquhart is ignoring the cost of running a site, but because the site would charge a nominal fee to cover the costs of the website.

I have nothing against the newspapers – sometimes they have useful information – but they have yet to show a solid reason why they deserve a captive market for legal notices. To prove that, I would encourage a removal of the cap on what they can charge for legal notices (this would be even more broad than what they are pushing for in SB 161) if SB 208 is passed.

Tags connections, Deseret News, laws, legislation, legislature, media, Steve Urquhart, Utah

State technology

Legal Notice – SB 208

I was going to post a summary of the meeting, but many other people have already done a good job of that (Holly, JM Bell, Jason, Bob, Joe). So far, it appears that only JM Bell and BenJoe have taken the time to create something more than a back-of-the-napkin post of quotes and initial reactions. (That’s not a criticism of the other posts, by the way.) From the meeting itself I only want to post one little gem from Sen. Urquhart:

It’s not government’s job to prop up an industry.

I wish someone would tell that to Congress.

Now, my initial thoughts were that I can’t wait to see how the media reacts to this. The very tip of the iceberg comes in the form of a comment that has been posted on a couple of the blogs that wrote initial reactions.

The claim is that the newspapers are already developing a website that would serve a similar purpose of providing more access and wider distribution of legal notices. Personally, I won’t hold my breath. Even if their site is close to production I would have to see it before deciding if it really serves the public. There is no reason that citizens should be mandated to publish through the newspapers – just as there would be no justification for mandating that they could not publish through the newspapers.

If newspapers are pushing to raise the cap on what they can charge for legal notices I have a hard time imagining that they are planning to offer the services of their new website for free or even at a low cost.

I think the heart of the comment is in this paragraph:

As has been the case for centuries, public notice is best served by a third-party, independent source. There should be a be check and balance on government power. In other words, should the fox be watching the henhouse when it comes to legal notices? Also, should the government be in the business of creating its own communications bureaucracy?

I think we need to define who the parties are to this system. The government has nothing to gain by not publishing some legal notice that has been submitted so I’m not sure that you could claim that they are any less independent than the newspapers. I don’t believe that publishing legal notices gives any power to the press. The whole statement sounds like a breathless rush to throw out something that might make people reject this proposal without any real argument against it.

A more thoughtful question was posed during the briefing (I believe by Ethan Millard):

Why should government take over a market that has been a private transaction?

My answer has two parts. First – is it really a private transaction when government has already mandated that the transaction take place? Second – I would not argue that government should take over such transactions, only that there is very little reason why government should avoid making the legal requirement that drives those transactions as painless as possible. If there were already some low-cost way for people to meet the requirements of providing legal notice that provided the requisite distribution of the notice then there would be no reason for this bill.

The fact is that government should not be mandating a captive market, as the legal notice requirement currently does. Newspapers have become dependent on their captive market – that’s not healthy for them and they need to fix it even if SB 208 were not being proposed. Let’s free people to allow publishing of legal notice outside the newspapers and then eliminate the cap on what newspapers can charge for the notice when people choose to publish through the papers.

Tags blogger briefing, connections, laws, legislation, legislature, media, Steve Urquhart, Utah

National

Define “Change”

I have come to the conclusion that I should not listen to national news – it just gets me agitated.

I was driving home listening to NPR and was treated to actual soundbites from the rallying speech that President Obama gave to the Democratic caucus meeting. I had head about that, but hearing these gems really showed that many people must mistake the fact that Obama is articulate by assuming that everything he says must therefore be intelligent and accurate.

The audio clips I heard had the president emphasizing that the people elected him (and the rest of Congress) to change the direction of the country and were not seeking "more of the same." What really got to me was this well phrased analogy:

"I don’t care whether you are driving an SUV or a hybrid, if you are headed toward a cliff you have to change direction."

He’s absolutely right. My reaction was that instead of changing direction when faced with an economic cliff, the president and Congress are accelerating and hoping to grow wings by the time they reach the edge. Let’s examine the "change" that he is promoting.

The president calls inaction irresponsible – it seems to me that inaction is not something that the Bush administration can ever be accused of. In other words inaction would probably be the clearest for of change. Last year the administration got a $150 Billion dollar stimulus bill and later received another $700 Billion to unfreeze the credit markets. That’s $850 Billion in spending last year of money that we don’t have and the result is that we are still in a recession with no end in sight. The change that Obama is promoting is something on the order of $800 Billion in new spending of money that we don’t have. I’m beginning to think the politicians really don’t know the difference between legal tender and monopoly money (too bad the IRS knows the difference all too well).

President Bush and his Republican Congress raised deficit spending to an art form. When Bush got a Democratic Congress there was no change in habits. Now President Obama and his Democratic Congress are trying to build an art acadamy around Bush’s art form – that’s not the change I was looking for.

I understand that the argument Obama is trying to make is that the country is sick and honestly needs surgury. That is an argument that I can accept. The problem is that we have already tried surgury by hatchet – it doesn’t work very well. Our Republican senators are trying to insist on using a scalpel for the surgery. Their profligate economic past opens them up to accusations of hypocrisy – and many of them might very well be acting in full hypocrisy. Regarless of how hypocritical they are being the fact is that surgury with a scalpel is safer and more likely to not kill the patient. This leads to another inconvenient truth. Assuming that the patient survives surgury (whether by hatchet or by scalpel) to get a liver transplant we need to recognize that the disease was not a bad liver, it was alcoholism. Just because you have had a transplant does not mean that it’s safe to go back to the bar.

Tags bailout, Bush, economics, legislation, media, money, Obama

Local State

Legislative Accountability

Post author By David
Post date January 5, 2009
2 Comments on Legislative Accountability

John Florez has a good perspective on what constitutes True government accountability and the forces that work against citizens from receiving the benefits of that accountability. I thought his comparison of the legislature to a corporate board of directors was very apt. My thoughts were sparked by the following statement:

This year, with new legislative leadership, might be a good one to spend more time holding oversight hearings on how effective certain state departments are in solving the problems they were created to resolve — their legislative mandate. . .

For legislators to start asking the tough questions to hold state departments accountable puts their political seat at risk because they threaten and have to fend off special-interest groups that benefit from maintaining the agency status quo. Therefore, it’s critical that legislators, in very real ways, know the public will support them when they hold oversight hearings regarding agencies’ effectiveness and demonstrate what returns taxpayers are getting on their investment. For legislators, those are tough calls but vital in keeping our government working in the public’s interest.

Oversight hearings would provide the openness and accountability in our government that we all want.

Bureaucratic momentum is a powerful force and tends to discourage any real accountability. The first priority of any institution is survival, not the fulfilling of any legislative mandate. Because of that, government bureaucracies have become very adept at promoting their own survival and continuation. In fact, they have learned how to turn failure and ineffectiveness into a tool for budgetary and institutional growth. Bureaucrats have long practice at befriending legislators and promoting their perspectives so that those legislators will be disposed to grant them their budgetary and policy requests. The fact that government jobs are considered to be a very safe area of employment is a testament to how effective their survival tactics usually are.

Despite all these advantages for institutional continuance, I see a glimmer of hope. If legislators will actively seek to cultivate their relationships with the group of voters that they represent they can preempt the ability of any special interest groups to unseat them for asking tough questions when holding real oversight hearings.

Constituents can show that they will support their legislators by being vocal in requesting real accountability and in vocally supporting their legislators through the legislative process. If they do so the legislators should have confidence that they can ask tough questions and demand accountability without fear that doing so will cost them their seats.

As constituents it is to our advantage to focus our efforts on those who represent us. If we voted for our representatives we should have done so because we believe in what they are said they would do, and if we did not vote for them we should be letting them know what we want from our representative. Many politicians say that they intend to represent those who opposed them as well as those who voted for them, but if we do not communicate with our representatives, whether we voted for them or not, they are not able to accurately represent us.

I have found that my efforts are much more rewarded by contacting my representatives, whether I voted for them or not, than if I spend my time shouting into space about what the legislature as a whole should be doing.

Tags civic participation, Deseret News, House 20, legislation, Utah

State

Self-Policing Lobbyists

Often lost in discussions about ethics legislation and lobbyist influence is the fact that there is a legitimate value that lobbyists can bring to the legislative process. I’m in favor of making solid rules of ethics for legislators and lobbyists without removing lobbyists altogether. With that perspective, I really enjoyed this Deseret News story about a lobbyist who carefully limits the money he spends on legislators.

While some lobbyists often take lawmakers to Utah Jazz games — all good seats are over $50 — or to expensive restaurants, {Paul} Rogers is one of a growing number of lobbyists who works in more modest means, even if they have the wherewithal to spend more on legislators.

“My firm, Tetris, has season Jazz tickets. We use those for ourselves and our families. I’m finding that many legislators don’t want those (more expensive gifts),” Rogers said.

One thing I have always believed is that buying a meal for a legislator as a way to sit down with them is generally a perfectly reasonable “gift” for a lobbyist to give a legislator. If our $50 cap on anonymous gift is encouraging lobbyists and legislators to limit their financial back-scratching to such meals then I am pleased with that rule.

I would not consider this to be sufficient evidence that we do not need any more ethics legislation, but I do see it as a good sign that it is possible to have reasonable restrictions to discourage excessive use of gifts for legislators.

Tags Deseret News, ethics, legislation, lobbying, money

National State

Near-Sighted Legislation

The senate is scheduled to vote today on whether to debate the bill to make two new seats in the House of Representatives and give them to give Utah and D.C. My opinion on this can be found in an editorial at National Review Online (no, I didn’t write it, but it expresses the same position I hold). The one new thing I learned from that article was that the bill does not specify that Utah gets the second seat, but that it would go to "the state that stands next in line to receive a seat through the normal process of apportionment. " (currently Utah) I guess I did know that, but I did not realize the wording.

When I wrote about this issue in July I made much the same argument as NRO and stated that Utah had nothing to gain by pushing for a new representative with so little time before the next census. Representative Chris Cannon (R-Ut) points out that we do have something to gain – money. Sending a new representative earlier gives earlier seniority and allows for more pork money to be sent home from Washington. Unfortunately sending pork money home is exactly the way to buy votes for re-election.

I’m sure this sounds un-American of me but if the purpose of a representative is to send more pork home then we should reduce the size of the house to 250 or less rather than increase its size by 2. What we need in this country is not more money being passed around after filtering through the capitol. This only ties us to greater dependence on the federal government and gives more power to what was supposed to be a relatively weak central governing body.

UPDATE: The bill failed. But Senator Hatch promises to keep pushing for it until we pass his flag burning amendment. If we got him a recording contract in Nashville would he retire from the Senate?

Tags Constitution, fourth seat, government, legislation, money

National State

Fourth Seat for Utah

The bill to give Utah a fourth seat in the House of Representatives has been hanging around for quite some time. It has not had too much coverage lately because very little has been happening with it. Yesterday I was surprised to see two editorials on the issue in Utah newspapers (Deseret News, Daily Herald). What really surprised me was that both editorials were against the bill. Back when this bill was getting more attention I was constantly disappointed that most of the coverage of the issue was supportive of the bill.

The reasons given for opposing the bill are that the other half of the legislation (giving Washington D.C. a voting member of the house) was unconstitutional. As the Deseret News pointed out, the goal of giving D.C. a voting member of the house is not without merit, but it is outside the scope of legislation. The proper way to accomplish this is to change the constitution, or make D.C. a state or part of a state. These are the same arguments I have been making on blog posts and comment boards ever since the issue was first raised. (Surprisingly, I discovered today that I have never talked about it here.)

The Deseret News offers one other reason to oppose the bill – timing. I have always argued that Utah should just wait until we get a new seat – we’re growing much faster than the country as a whole so we’ll gain new seats as the census gets updated. The editorial argues that the time is getting short enough now (only 3 years or less before we get new seats anyway) that Utah has nothing to gain by pushing legislation for a provisional seat in exchange for a (currently unconstitutional) permanent seat for D.C.

Tags Constitution, Daily Herald, Deseret News, fourth seat, legislation