What Could Lincoln have Done?

Thursday, April 14, 2011
Port Hudson Battlefield, Louisiana

WAS THE CIVIL WAR REALLY NECESSARY?

One Hundred and Fifty years ago this week, the first shots of the Civil War were fired at Fort Sumter in South Carolina. During the next four years, carnage, mayhem and death were the order of day after day. By the time the dust settled and the South had surrendered, some 620,000 soldiers had died on the battle field. The Union lost around 360,000 soldiers, and the Confederacy lost 260,000. More than twice that number were injured. Fifteen decades later, here’s the question that needs to be asked: Was it really necessary to have this war?

Here in my home state of Louisiana, we are surrounded by remnants of the bloody battles that took place. When I began my law practice in Northeast Louisiana across the Mississippi River from Natchez, my home was the Lisburn Plantation, just north of Ferriday. To make his final siege of Vicksburg in one of the final and decisive battles of the Civil War, General Ulysses S. Grant commandeered my future home to headquarter for several days before crossing the Mississippi River and attacking Vicksburg from the South.

As Grant undertook his offensive against Vicksburg, Union Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks’ army moved against the Confederate stronghold at Port Hudson on the Mississippi River just north of my current home of Baton Rouge. On May 27, after their frontal assaults were repulsed, the Federals settled into a siege which lasted for 48 days. On hearing of the fall of Vicksburg, the Confederate garrison of Port Hudson surrendered, opening the Mississippi River to Union navigation from its source to New Orleans. There were 12,208 casualties at Port Hudson of which 7,208 were Union soldiers. Hundreds of similar battles took place with devastating results of death and destruction for both North and South.

Could Lincoln have done more to stop the fighting? Was there a middle ground to buy time for ongoing discussions? It was not like the South’s eventual leaders, from Jefferson Davis to Robert E. Lee, were from a foreign land. Davis was a U.S. Senator, and Lincoln asked Lee to take over command of the entire U.S. Military. They were colleagues in government. Couldn’t Lincoln have been more persuasive?

Lincoln stayed at the Willard Hotel in Washington the night before he was sworn in as President. The Willard, situated just across from the White House, was then the nation’s largest hotel. For the previous three weeks at the same hotel, 131 delegates from 21 states met continually to find a solution for saving the Union without war. Judges, legislators, and even former president John Tyler argued, cajoled, and pleaded with one another for a way out of the looming conflict. As a last effort, the delegates pleaded with Lincoln to join them for some direction and leadership. Lincoln declined.

Imagine the public reaction today if either George Bush or Barrack Obama stood by and let some six million Americans kill one another in battle. That’s the number of deaths based on today’s comparative population. There would be open revolt and an immediate cry for new leadership. Did Lincoln fail the test then? Oh, he did take action. Lincoln suspended parts of the constitution including habeas corpus, arrested numerous political opponents, and shut down several hundred newspapers. Sounds like Iraq redux, but at least that’s half way around the world and not here in our own backyard.

Was Lincoln obsessed with freeing the slaves? Here are his words in a letter written to New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley on August 22, 1862: "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.”

So was it a total commitment to keep the union intact? Not if you believe Lincoln’s words a few years before the Civil War began. “Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable—a most sacred right— a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can, may revolutionize and make their own so much of the territory as they inhabit.”

Professor David Goldfield has written a new book called “America Aflame, How the Civil War Created a Nation.” He’s a guest on my radio show this weekend. Goldfield computes the total monetary cost of the war to around $6.7 billion in 1860s currency. He asserts that if “the government had purchased the freedom of four million slaves and granted a 40 acre farm to each slave family, the total cost would have been $3.1 billion, leaving $3.6 billion for reparations to make up for a century of lost wages. And not a single life would have been lost.”

What about the morality of a president declaring unbridled warfare on his own citizens? One can well argue that saving human lives would have been far more important than keeping the Union together. How can a President responsible for so much bloodshed be thought of as the greatest President in US history? I understand that Lincoln wanted to avoid the Civil War. However, was preserving the Union worth the cost of spilling so much blood on both ends of the battle field?

Lincoln went on to lead the country in reconstruction, and offered exemplary leadership as the nation healed it’s all too deep wounds. Maybe it was because he was brand new at the job as the war began. But it seems clear that when real leadership was called for in an effort to save hundreds of thousands of his fellow citizens, Abraham Lincoln blinked. And the country is still, after these 150 years, still reeling from this national tragedy.

“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter, and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”
~Abraham Lincoln
Peace and Justice

Jim Brown


Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com.

An Ugly Decision by the U.S. Supreme Court

Thursday, April 7th, 2011
New Orleans, Louisiana

DEATH ROW, NEW ORLEANS, AND THE
SUPREME COURT’S BETRAYAL OF JUSTICE.

There is an aura of myth that surrounds Lady Justice, who is pictured standing tall with the balanced scales of justice in her hands. She is blindfolded to assure impartiality and fairness. But if she read the decision about the death row inmate from New Orleans that was handled down by the U.S. Supreme Court last week, one could only wonder whether she dropped her scales, pulled off her blindfold, and wept.

If there was ever any doubt about the lack of fairness, competence and fundamental decency among the current majority composition of the Supreme Court, such doubt was put to rest by a decision that would make any oppressive and dictatorial government proud. Heavy words, that’s true. But one would have to look long and hard to find a more repugnant decision.

Here are the facts. New Orleanian John Thompson was convicted back in 1982 of first degree murder and given the death sentence. He came within days of being executed after spending 14 years on death row and 18 year’s total in prison. Five different prosecutors were involved in the case and all knew that a blood test and other key evidence had been hidden that showed Thompson was innocent.

On his death bed dying of cancer, one of the prosecutors confessed to a colleague that he had hidden the exculpatory blood sample. The colleague waited five more years before admitting that he too knew of the hidden evidence. Thompson, after 18 years, received a new trial, and his lawyers were finally able to produce ten difference pieces of evidence that had been kept from Thompson, that overwhelming showed he was innocent. The new jury took less than 35 minutes to find him not guilty.

Hiding evidence that can find the accused innocent is nothing new for prosecutors in New Orleans, both in state and federal court as well as with the FBI. The Innocence Project of New Orleans reviewed a number of convictions over the past 25 years in the city and concluded that prosecutors gave a "legacy" of suppressing evidence. The project said 36 men convicted in Orleans Parish alleged prosecutorial misconduct. Nineteen have since had their sentences overturned or reduced as a result.According to the Innocence Project in New Orleans, favorable evidence was concealed in a quarter of the murder convictions from 1973-2002. In 19 of 25 non-capital cases, the prosecutors withheld favorable evidence; in the other six cases, the courts ruled that evidentiary hearings were needed.

With full justification, Thompson sued the prosecutor’s office in New Orleans for ripping away and stealing 18 years of his life. He had two sons that he never saw grow up. A New Orleans jury awarded him 14 million dollars. Some said it was too much money. Would you give up 18 years of your life in solitary confinement on death row for 14 million dollars? On appeal, the Fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals, reputedly the most pro prosecutorial circuit in the nation, upheld the award in favor of Thompson.

But a bitterly divided Supreme Court said to Thompson “no way.” In a 5-4 decision, his case was tossed out by the Supreme Court– not because they disagree that the prosecutor’s office hid evidence (in fact all 9 justices agree on that point). Instead they tossed the case because, in their divine judicial opinion, they didn’t see any “pattern” of the prosecutor’s office doing this to other people besides Thompson (because one life ruined is apparently not enough). Sounds like a John Grisham novel with a bad ending, right? If only that were so. Unfortunately, this is real life and John Thompson gets nothing for his 18 years in jail. Not a red cent. Tough luck fella. The system failed you, but “stuff happens.”

This was not a decision based on a conservative interpretation of the law, even though the so called conservative block voted in lock step to deny Thompson’s claim. A true conservative justice would be strongly opposed to government oppression and the encroachment on the liberty of a falsely accused person. After all, when a prosecutor can operate with impunity, totally absent of any criminal or civil check on their actions, the seeds of fascism are planted. No, a true conservative judge would have held these rogue prosecutors fully accountable.

John Thompson, stunned by the Supreme Court's decision, says he intends to spend his life working to help wrongly convicted inmates. He has founded a new group called Resurrection after Exoneration. Sadly, he will not have the financial resources that the lower courts rightly concluded should have paid to help him pursue his goal.

The judicial system failed John Thompson. Along with Lady Justice, we all should shed a tear.

*******
“There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.”
- Elie Wiesel

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com.

Colleges Taking Advantage of Athletes!

Thursday, April 9, 2009
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

MARCH MADNESS
ARE ATHLETES BEING SHORT CHANGED?

Millions of rabid college basketball fans have been glued to their TVs over the past month as March Madness reached its crescendo this Monday night. My North Carolina Tar Heels came close in an effort to win its second national title in the past five years. And the big bucks have been rolling in. There are lots of winners, with coaches getting big salaries, and colleges spiting up their percentage of huge TV and admission revenues. But there is one group that is being both exploited and shortchanged. It’s the players, themselves.

There’s certainly not a shortage of income. This year in the NCAA tourney, television income is estimated to be some $750 million, with an additional $50 million from ticket sales and sponsorships. The cost of a thirty second spot for Monday night’s championship game exceeds $1 million. And college football is awash with the same increasing yearly income. More bowl games, and the ever increasing television revenue allows most college football programs to cover the cost of a growing array of minor sports.

One sign of the growing sports revenues is the dramatic increase in coaches’ salaries. The University of Kentucky hired basketball Coach John Calipari from the University of Memphis with a salary package of $35 million over the next 10 years. Head coaches whose teams made the NCAA tournament have an average salary of $1 million. And that doesn’t include all the perks like free cars, country club memberships, housing subsidies, access to private jets, and generous severance packages.

In college football, the numbers are even higher. LSU football fans are still incensed over former Coach Nick Sabin taking a salary package estimated at close to $ 4 million at arch rival Alabama. South Carolina Football Coach Steve Spurrier was enticed to take the job with a free country club membership at Augusta, home of this week’s Masters Golf tournament, which includes the use of a private jet to get him there for a quick 18 holes. LSU is paying assistant football coaches as much as $700,000 a year or more. The University of Tennessee announced it would pay two assistant football coaches $650,000 or more, each, for the coming year.

The average compensation for these NCAA tourney coaches is almost triple that of the typical university president, which shows us the perverted priorities of these institutions of higher learning. Little wonder that American industry has not been standing up too well in world competition.

Fans pay through the nose to attend major college athletic events. As an LSU football season ticket holder, I personally pay $840 just for the right to buy my season tickets. The seat ticket itself is $54 per game. So there are big bucks coming into major college programs all over the country. Top-level college sports are big business. LSU, for example, receives some $100 million in revenue each year from ticket sales, television rights, concessions, parking and logo sales, which is about five times what the school receives from tuition.

All this income comes from one source…the athletes. Yet only college expenses -- room, food, tuition, books, and maybe a summer job -- the basics are paid to these young men and women. No pocket money to go to the movies, no gas money, no extras whatsoever. So we have college athletic programs raking in millions on the backs of talented, disciplined, hardworking athletes, without sharing the revenue with those responsible for generating it. Such a system is ill-defined at best and hypocritical at worst. The universities, administrators, and coaches are reaping great value -- even luxury -- provided by their recruits, and the players, themselves, are given only a Spartan subsistence.

It was a little better than 40 years ago when I was lucky enough to attend the University of North Carolina on an athletic scholarship. I was given a housing and food allowance that exceeded my costs, as well as “laundry money” that allowed for weekend dates, gas, and a few frills above the basic scholarship costs. What I received then was equivalent to some $250 in pocket money if the same were allowed today. But it’s not. The NCAA tightened up the rules, and college athletes get less today than athletes like me received some years back.

Supporters of the present system will argue that there is the opportunity for these athletes to move on to the pros and make big financial returns. But we all know that very few make it to that level. They may not even end up with the basic skills necessary to succeed in other workplaces, since only a minority of student-athletes in major sports even graduate. LSU football and basketball players generally graduate at a rate of less than 40%
.
There is a system in place now that’s allows our young college athletes to be exploited, and the exploitation is being committed by their adult mentors. What a deal -- your body in exchange for a pittance of basic expenses. A little monthly expense money is not about to corrupt the system. Providing $300 a month to all athletes on full athletic scholarship seems reasonable. March Madness, as is always the case, turned out to be a financial bonanza -- but not for the kids that many of us paid to watch. They deserve a better shake and a small piece of this huge financial pie.
*********
“The coaches own the athletes’ feet, the colleges own the athletes’ bodies, and the supervisors retain the large rewards. That reflects a neoplantation mentality on the campuses that is not appropriate at this time of high dollars.”
Walter Byers, former executive director of the NCAA.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show live each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. Many radio stations throughout the country carry the program at various times throughout the week.

The Unpatriotic Act by Congress!

Thursday, March 17, 2011
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

BIG BROTHER HAS YOU UNDER CLOSE WATCH
THANKS TO THE PATRIOT ACT!

When Tea party candidates throughout the country ran for office last fall, most members offered soaring campaign promises to defend liberty of ordinary Americans, and fight governmental intrusions on basic freedoms. But whatever hopes there were that newly elected Tea Partiers would put the brakes on intrusive domestic surveillance, illegal wire wiretapping and warrantless searches went out the window just 20 days into the new Congress.

With only minor whimpers, Tea Party leaders did an about face by abandoning their previous opposition to the so called Patriot Act, voting to indefinitely extend this Orwellian law that flouts the Bill of Rights. The federal government has now been given carte blanche to spy on everything you do online, every call you make, and every trip you take. “But there is danger out there,” says your congressman. “So just get used to it!” Privacy is gone, so get with the new world. No more basic constitutional protections? “Get over it.”

As Brian Doherty writes in the American Conservative: “Thanks to the massive security apparatus erected after 9/11, the government now wiretaps telephone calls without warrants, creates profiles of citizens even if they’re not suspected of specific crimes, and seizes information without judicial oversight.” In this brave new world, private companies that maintain massive data bases of information on what we are saying, writing, buying and thinking, willingly turnover reams of information about their customers.

Here’s one example. Sprint Nextel provided the government with GPS locations on its subscribers 8 million times in a recent one-year period. Thanks goodness I use AT&T, who, to its credit refused to provide such private information to the FBI without receiving a warrant signed by a judge.

William Pitt stood up in Parliament back in 1763 and declared: “The poorest may, in his cottage, bid his defiance to all the forces of the Crown, the storm may enter; the rain may enter….but the King of England may not enter.” But because of the betrayal of a majority of the members of Congress, including most Tea Partiers, the FBI can now enter our personal cottage of electronic communications without the nuisance of any court oversight.

And three cheers to US Senators on both sides of the aisle who had the courage to stand up for the Bill of Rights. They include Sens. Mike Lee (Utah), Jon Tester (Montana), Rand Paul (Kentucky), Tom Udall (New Mexico), Jeff Merkley (Oregon), Ron Wyden, and (Oregon), and six other courageous senators. Boos to my home Louisiana delegation, who marched in lock step with political party leadership, and voted against basic American freedoms.
Peggy Noonan was Ronald Reagan’s speech writer and now writes a regular column in the Wall Street Journal. Here are her thoughts on the basic intrusions of the Patriot Act. “When we lose our privacy, we lose some of our humanity; we lose things that are particular to us, that make us separate and distinctive as souls, as, actually children of God. We also lose trust, not only in each other but in our institutions, which we come to fear. People who now have no faith in the security of their medical and financial records, for instance, will have even less faith in their government”

George Bush began the deep decline of basic civil liberties, but Barack Obama, has been no better a protector of the Bill of Rights. The President recently signed into law provisions allowing “roving wiretaps” that allows the FBI to wiretap phones in multiple homes without having to provide the target’s name or even phone number. The mere possibility that a suspect “might” use the phone is enough to justify the wiretap

The FBI continually protests that their investigations will be hindered if they have to go find a judge to approve such invasive surveillance. Getting judicial consent, a foundation of our basic protections, just “slows down the process,” they say. “Hogwash,” says Fox News commentator and former Judge Andrew Napolitano. Here’s his response.

“The time-is-of-the essence argument is nonsense. I once issued a search warrant in my gym shorts from my living room at 3 am, and I know a former FISA court judge who did the same from his cell phone while riding a motorcycle. While neither of these situations is optimal, there are at least written record of what was done to whom and why.”

The so called “Patriot Act” has driven a stake trough the heart of the Bill of Rights, violating at least six of the ten original amendments-the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eight Amendments, as well. Conservative columnist John Whitehead put it this way: “In the name of fighting terrorism, government officials are now permitted to monitor religious and political institutions with no suspicion of criminal wrongdoing; prosecute librarians or keepers of any other records if they told anyone that the government had subpoenaed information: monitor conversations between attorneys and clients; search and seize Americans’ papers and effects without showing probable cause, and jail Americans indefinitely without a trial.”

Many Tea Partiers and other Patriot Act vindicators continue to hound us with the supposition that we have to choose between liberty and security. And if your only concern is security, then certainly if we lived in a police state, it would be much easier to catch the terrorists. If we just would allow the government to listen to your phone conversations, read through your mail, look at all your email communications, search your home on a whim, and lock you up because what you write or think, then we would surely catch more terrorists and other bad guys. But is that what America is all about? Do you want to live under such a restrictive cloud? Is that the kind of country that we ask our young volunteer soldiers to fight and die for?

In Herbert Hoover’s winning campaign backing 1928, his slogan was “A chicken in every pot, a car in every garage.” Today’s slogan could well be “a government agent on every corner, a wiretap on every phone.” It is, after all, for our own security, right?

*****
“Some things are unforgivable in a democracy. The patriot Act should be at the top of the list. Nobody who has supported this wretched law should ever be allowed to brag of defending liberty again.” Former CIA Agent Susan Lindauer

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com.

Lessons to be learned from Green Bay

Thursday, February 3rd, 2011
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

WHY LOUISIANA SHOULD BE
FOR THE GREEN BAY PACKERS!

So who ya’ rootin’ for in the Super Bowl game on Sunday? It’s an easy choice for me living down here in Louisiana. The Packers are one of the best examples of how a sports franchise should operate. They don’t go to the state capitol hat in hand, looking for a handout. The team is owned by citizen stockholders all over Minnesota, and the Packers’ management doesn’t regularly try to blackmail public officials into giving more handouts under threat of picking up and moving the franchise.

Recently, when it came time for Green Bay to revamp and refurnish legendary Lambeau Field, the state of Wisconsin didn’t put up one penny. All proceeds to pay for the renovations came from the private sector. Season ticket holders were charged a one-time user fee of $1,400, which fans can pay over several years. In addition, the Packers did a stock offering, just like many corporations do for capital improvements. And finally, the packers took out a team loan to be repaid out of yearly revenues. No sweetheart deals from the state, no special considerations, no coming to the public trough for taxpayer money.

What happens in some states, including my home state of Louisiana, is that team owners cry wolf saying that they will have no choice but to move their franchise elsewhere if, the tax incentives and outright dollars are not bountifully offered. But a review of the NFL team financial arrangements will show that team income is structured in such a manner that it is theoretically possible to run a profitable franchise even in a small location like my old home town of Ferriday.

Unlike other professional sports operations, television revenues are not sold by individual teams. In baseball, the New York Yankees get broadcasting revenues significantly greater that what a smaller market team like the Kansas City Royals receives. In pro football, every team shares in one gigantic pie. Little Green Bay receives the same television revenues as does a team in New York or Chicago.

The other major factor that lets a small market stay competitive without taxpayer dollars is the National Football League salary cap. Not only is the incoming revenue approximately the same for each team, expenditures are also more or less the same, as each team shares the same parameters as to just how much can be spent on team salaries. This means salary limits, which allows a small market team like Green Bay to stay competitive year after year.

Finally, the Packers have bought up 28 acres spending more than $27 million to develop an entertainment district. This would give the team revenues that it would not have to share with other clubs. It is a business strategy that a number of NFL franchises are undertaking. Yes, the New Orleans Saints are following this diversity approach. But here’s the difference. The Saints get it all paid for by Louisiana taxpayers.

The Saints receive $6 million in direct funding, from the state of Louisiana, each year. But there is much more the Saints will receive that is every bit as valuable as direct payments. $85 million will come out of the state treasury to upgrade the Superdome. But the upgrades greatly benefit the Saints and mean significantly more profit. Most of the money will go towards building new luxury boxes and new club lounges, all which mean more high priced tickets for the Saints to sell. The state pays the cost, and the Saints get the income.

Then there is the agreement for the state to lease office space in a downtown office building adjacent to the Dome being purchased by the Saints owners. The state is to lease more than 320,000 feet at $24 dollars square foot, which is one of the highest rental rates in the state today. So the Louisiana taxpayers are basically paying the cost of the building the Saints ownership is buying.

But what about all these projections of how much the economy in New Orleans will be positively impacted, with millions more in tax revenue. Figures are being wildly thrown around, with little study, indicating a $500 million economic impact. A University of New Orleans study, quoted in a New Orleans Times Picayune editorial, estimated some $22 million in state revenue is produced by the Saints. Here’s the fallacy. Any such study assumes that all of the dollars spent at Saints games are dollars that are new to the region’s economy. Most dollars spent going to the Superdome are dollars that would have been spent on other leisure activities in the area. There are numerous choices as to how to spend leisure dollars. Going to a football game is just one.

The Brookings Institution’s recent 500 page study titled, Sports, Jobs and Taxes, concluded that professional sports teams “realign economic activity within a city’s leisure industry rather than adding to it. Professional sports,” they write, “are not a major catalyst for economic development.” They are saying, in effect, that all the public subsidies accomplish is to help shift spending from other forms of entertainment to stadiums like the Dome, with little net employment gain or significant increase in new tax dollars.

A later report by Brookings found that numerous other studies have concluded the same thing. “Independent research by a number of independent groups has uniformly found that there is no significant positive correlation between sports facility construction and economic development.” Consultants, often hired by team owners who say otherwise, according to the Brookings study, “are peddling snake oil.”

So I’ll be pulling for Green Bay on Sunday. They got to the Super bowl as a wildcard team, and played some outstanding playoff football. But more important, the Packers represent the best of the American free enterprise system. They built a championship team by paying their own way without trolling for taxpayer dollars. It’s the way a franchise should be run. Go Packers!
*****
“The Green Bay Packers never lost a football game. They just ran out of time.”

Vince Lombardi

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com.

Who's Going to Pay the Piper?

Thursday, December 16th, 2010
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

IN WASHINGTON AND BATON ROUGE,
THEY’RE SPENDING LIKE DRUNKIN’ SAILORS!

It’s the holiday season, and we always talk a good bit about watching our weight and curtailing our appetite. We just cannot pass up all the tempting finger food at holiday parties, washed down with too much to drink and desserts galore. Wait till the New Year, right? That’s the message we received from Democrats and Republicans alike in the final days of the 111th congress. Both parties are supporting a second stimulus package that will blow another $1 trillion hole in the budget. Forget the ever growing deficit. It’s just not the right time.

What a well worn phrase. It never seems to be the right time in Washington. After all, we are continually told, the economy is fragile and the recovery is halting. But when is the “right time?” It wasn’t that long ago when the economy was churning. So instead of planning a reduction of the deficit, both parties joined the fray by adding massive entitlement programs, cutting taxes, and entering two wars that cost several trillion dollars. Who cares about the debt? The mantra to follow is Mark Twain’s -- "never put off until tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow."

It should be obvious to Republicans in congress that the president was wrong to believe that the United States could fight a war, cut taxes and increase federal spending all at once. Yet here they are, embracing Keynesian economic arguments they have denounced for years.

When I was on the radio in New Orleans on WRNO a few years back, I enjoyed my regular economic policy arguments with Rob Couhig, a lawyer friend who preceded me on the early morning time slot. Rob would often stay over for my show, and it was a standing joke that he would constantly bring up the theories of Nobel Prize economist Milton Friedman, working Freidman’s thoughts in to any and every conversation.

Friedman's ideas were embraced by President Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, and lauded by many in the business world. But they were also controversial because of the deep cuts in government spending and the more restricted role they entailed for government in buffering citizens from economic forces. To most Republicans, Friedman’s views represented the “holy grail” of how government spending policy should be implemented.

But we sure have seen an about face by Republicans and conservative Democrats alike. Now, Republicans have joined hands with Democrats in a Kumbaya embrace of the Keynesian arguments that they have denounced for years. As Time economist Fareed Zakaria points out: “John Maynard Keynes argued that when private demand weakens, the government should pick up the slack. He advocated either of two paths: government spending or tax cuts.” Republicans and democrats alike have irresponsibly embraced both options with no one around to pay the bill.

And what’s all this ballyhooing for bipartisanship? Both parties are so proud of themselves for “reaching across the aisle” to find the middle ground. But how does this really get the best result? Does this, “I’ll take a half a loaf if I can’t get the whole loaf” theory really benefit anyone? Voters want solutions that work, and problems to be solved. Not so much “bipartisanship,” but more “post partisanship.”
It’s not easy for a new congressman arriving in Washington not to be seduced by the swarm of vested interests licking their chops to bring the new lawmaker into the partisan fold. Platoons of Wall Street bankers, 13,000 corporate lobbyists, corporate media flacks, Demodon’ts, Republican’ts, war machine promoters, tea party yackety-yackers, and other powerful forces of business-as-usual politics are not so easy to resist. I wrote last week about the throng of Tea Party candidates who ran against the Washington establishment – and that within weeks of their election victory they were jumping at the chance to have these same lobbying interests pony up at one big money Washington fundraiser after another. The early lesson is to stay in lock step with your respective party leadership, and, from the very start, gather up campaign dollars. No time here for post partisanship solutions.

State governments are not immune from the Washington mentality of spending with little regard for cutting back. In my home state of Louisiana, the governor is proposing the selling off of state buildings and other state properties to fill the current year’s budget shortfall. This means doing away with an asset to pay for years worth of debt. Huey Long would be rolling over in his grave on the front lawn of the state capitol, except for the fact that he might be part of the onetime fire sale. Any way you look at it, this is an irresponsible way to pay stare expenses.
Louisiana Treasurer John Kennedy, who is a dwindling voice of reason in state government, put it this way, "A junkie can go sell his television and sell the radio and pay for a fix," Kennedy said. "But sooner or later... he's got to face his addiction. I would prefer to have us face our addiction."

Louisiana workers, by the way, will see significantly less help in the new proposal than most of the rest of the country because of the greater number of low wage earners. Any employee making $20,000 or less will not get the benefit of a $400 tax credit, and state employees, who are exempt from payroll deductions will also see a tax increase compared to those who make significantly higher wages.

Americans are borrowing more and spending more. And they are running up a higher personal and national debt. We keep hearing that our national debt is now above $13 trillion dollars. But when you include Baby Boomer demographic demands that include Social Security, union, pension and health-care obligations that all end up drawing on the public purse, the national debt skyrockets.

China lends us cash so that we can give ourselves one more big tax break. So when all is said and done in Washington, Democrats and Republicans alike, find it much easier to give away $ one trillion, than to make any meaningful effort to curtail spending. Congress is merely buying time. Sadly, that’s not what leadership should be about.
*****
Govern a great nation as you would cook a small fish. Do not overdo it.
Lao-Tzu

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all is past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. The show is televised at http://www.justin.tv/jimbrownusa.

Hypocrisy and Tea Party Candidates

Thursday, December 9, 2010
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

ARE TEA PARTIERS, ESPECIALLY IN LOUISIANA,
SELLING OUT FOR CAMPAIGN MONEY?

It was just a few months ago when we listened to Tea Party candidates across the country declaring that they were going to Washington in order to shake up the political establishment. No more “politics as usual” was the battle cry. But in a matter of a few weeks, these new guys and gals on the block have rapidly embraced the Washington culture of big-money fundraisers. Special interests galore and numerous lobbying groups are falling all over themselves to host fundraisers for these progressive agents of change. And the new so-called reformers are taking the bait and gathering up the big bucks for their campaign war chests. The more we hear about change in Washington, the more things stay the same.

In my home state of Louisiana, newly elected congressman Jeff Landry was the Tea Party’s poster boy for opposing the Washington culture of bowing to special interests. On election night, he told his followers that it’s going to be a new day in Washington, and “we need to get our country back on the right track.” Three weeks later, Landry was in the heart of Washington at the posh Capitol Hill Club on the hunt for Washington campaign dollars. He’s two months away from even being sworn into office, yet Landy is asking for money from K Street lobbyists and other Washington power brokers.

Getting to visit with Landry doesn’t come cheap. The high priced “meet and greet” with the new Louisiana 3rd District Congressman carried a price tag of $5,000 for the “PAC Gold Level; $2,400 for the individual Gold Level; $2,500 for the PAC Silver Level, and $1,000” just to get in the door. All of a sudden, just weeks after getting elected, many new congressman like Landry found that Washington went from a “cesspool” when they were campaigning, to a “hot tube” once elected.
A guest on my weekly nationally syndicated radio show this week will be Gabriela Schneider, who tracks political fund raisers for the Sunlight Foundation, a watchdog group. She observes that “the lobbyists are all saying, ‘Welcome to Washington -- let me help pay off your debt.’ It’s particularly interesting when so many of this year’s freshman congressmen were running against Washington. But as soon as they get elected, they come to Washington and put out their hand.”

Another guest on the program this Sunday will be Meredith McGehee, who serves as policy director at the Campaign Legal Center in Washington. She told me this week that debt-retirement events and other post-election fundraisers “are God’s gift to special interests,” that allows corporate PACs and lobbyists to curry favor with grateful congressmen. And she says these early fundraisers for newly elected lawmakers are a way to get an inside relationship for some lobbyists who had ignored or even opposed the congressman-elect back during the campaign.“If you were on the wrong side or just AWOL during the election, this is your chance to make it up,” McGehee told me. “It’s a great way to get in good with members of Congress.”

The good news for Landry and other new Republican congressman is that, with the Republicans now in control of the U.S. House, the campaign money spickets have opened and are abundantly flowing. These new GOP Tea Partiers strongly oppose earmarks, unless the earmark is a campaign donation sent in their direction. The bad news is that many states like Louisiana could well become the “wild, wild west” for political fundraising with candidates no longer in control of their own campaigns.

Earlier this year, the US Supreme Court declared that corporations and unions can now spend money on political advertising. In the future, corporate boardrooms will soon become political cockpits for plotting the success or demise of candidates like Landry. Better tow the special interest line, or guess who just might come after you?
It’s no secret that in the majority of elections there are two key elements in getting elected to a major political office. The first is money. I’ve forgotten the second. My home state of Louisiana is often the most expensive for campaign spending, per capita, in the nation. Out of state corporate and special interest money regularly flood into the campaign coffers of Louisiana candidates.

Current Governor Bobby Jindal has raised over $10 million for his re election campaign. The New Orleans Times Picayune reported this year that Jindal has more contributions from outside Louisiana than from within. One might wonder why almost 1000 California contributors are so interested in Louisiana issues.

How do Louisiana citizens benefit when large amounts of campaign cash flood into the state to influence Louisiana elections? The same question could be asked about out of state dollars being sent in to any state. Isn’t there a built in conflict of interest as to where an official’s loyalties lie when large, out of state donations are accepted?

There is a simple and constitutional way to keep Louisiana elected officials focused on Louisiana issues. A candidate for public office should only raise campaign funds in the district from where he or she is running. If a candidate is running statewide, he or she should raise all their financial resources within the state. If a candidate is running parish or countywide, the limits should be within the home district. Legislators would be limited to raising campaign dollars from within their respective districts. Simple. Keep fund raising local. Make the candidates focus and be responsive solely to the voters in the boundaries that put them in office.

To be sure, there would be loud protests from lobbyists who hand out the campaign dollars to gain their “special access.” And incumbents, who can work the system from day one in office, would object at having to forgo all the many out of district fund raising opportunities. The voters would be the beneficiaries. But don’t count on any groundswell of change. The recent Supreme Court decision was touted as a catalyst for major campaign changes. But as long as out of state money floods into any state, it’s going to be the same old, same old in both Baton Rouge and Washington. Yes, the more we hear about change, the more it’s just the same old song and dance.
*****


People used to complain that selling a campaign was like selling a bar of soap. But when you buy soap, at least you get the soap. In this campaign, you just get two guys telling you they really value cleanliness.”— David Brooks

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all is past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. The show is televised at http://www.justin.tv/jimbrownusa.

Louisiana Governor and sabbaticals!

Wednesday, November 24^th, 2010

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

GET OFF BOBBY JINDAL'S BACK

ABOUT TAKING A SABBATICAL!

So what’s with all the criticism about taking a sabbatical? It’s become a big issue in my home state of Louisiana with educators, legislators, and good government groups debating the value versus the cost of taking a little time off. A sabbatical let’s a person get away from pressures and responsibilities back home at the job they were hired to do. Traveling around the country let’s one do research to better focus on the job at hand when the time comes to get back to the real world of responsibility. So let’s quit all the criticizing. Let Bobby Jindal travel and take his sabbatical in peace.

The cost of sabbaticals for academicians has been an election focus for Jindal, as he crisscrossed the nation during the campaign season in support of Republican candidates. But Republicans running for office in Louisiana were not able to garner the Governor’s endorsement as he took a “hands off” approach and refused to endorse his incumbent U.S, senator as well as a fellow Republican’s bid to be second in command as Lt. Governor. But be a conservative leaning candidate in just about any other state from coast to coast, and Jindal has been glad to lend a hand in any needed fund raising effort. Louisiana incumbents who found themselves in political trouble, like New Orleans congressman Joseph Cao, were left to fend for themselves with no hopes of any help from the popular governor.

When the election season came to an end in early November, many expected Jindal to come home and face his gubernatorial responsibilities. After all, the state is facing a monumental deficit that now approaches $2 billion for the coming fiscal year. Education at all levels is on the chopping block with universities facing major cutbacks requiring wholesale layoffs to make up the shortfall. The state health delivery system is mired in controversy as the medical community raises troubling questions of how indigent healthcare needs will be met and paid for. Time for the Governor to come back home and take control.

But that’s like asking an LSU professor to cut his year abroad short by coming home and, God forbid, actually have to go into a class room and teach. You do have to set your priorities in both the business of teaching and government -- right? Look, when one is on sabbatical, problems at home will just have to take care of themselves. Professors and governors need a little break from the humdrum life of teaching and governing.

Remember the scene in “Animal House when the Delta Tau Chi fraternity is close to being kicked off campus for various shenanigans? The members turn to John Belushi for advice. What does he propose? Toga party! So we have Louisiana facing major financial and governmental service problems that continue to grow with no rational solution in site. And what does the Governor propose? Book tour!

Jindal is traveling the country, hyping his first book, on the talk show circuit. The book is titled “Leadership and Crisis.” Some cynics in his home state are suggesting that the Louisiana Governor drop the “and” in the title of the book. The focus of Jinadal’s book is to pound the inadequacies of the federal government and in particular, the short comings of the Obama administration. Personal comments by the President to Jindal are all put on the record.

In last week’s column, I listed a number of ambitious potential national office seekers from the South. In that mix were Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, Texas Governor Rick Perry, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, and newly elected Florida Senator Marco Rubio. They each have harsh words for Washington politics, but they have shied away from direct attacks on the President.

As one Barbour aide told me recently, “Haley ain’t no fool. He’s still getting much more out of Washington than Louisiana is. You don’t personally bite the hand that’s pouring federal dollars into your state unless you’re an announced candidate against Obama.”

Jindal’s sabbatical will apparently last a while longer as national interview opportunities continue to pour in and book sales increase. So who’s running the state? Here’s an idea. While Jindal continues his sabbatical in the weeks to come, Sarah Palin brings her book signing tour to Baton Rouge next Tuesday. She bailed out of being Alaska Governor after only a year and a half in office.

But now Palin is rested, ready and full of vigor and venom. Maybe we could borrow her for a few months until Jindal finishes his sabbatical. Kind of like being a fill-in professor at LSU while the regular professor takes take a much needed leave with pay. She gets to know Louisiana. He can go up and sell books in Alaska. And who knows? It could be Jindal-Palin, or Palin-Jindal in 2012. Ain’t these sabbaticals grand or what?

*****

"Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book." ...Ronald Reagan

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the South. You can read all is past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also hear Jim’s nationally syndicated radio show each Sunday morning from 9 am till 11:00 am, central time, on the Genesis Radio Network, with a live stream at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. The show is televised at http://www.justin.tv/jimbrownusa.

Not Insurance Relief from Louisiana Legislature

Thursday June 11, 2009
New Orleans, Louisiana

LOUISIANA HURRICANE SEASON
DO YOU FEEL LUCKY? WELL DO YA?

A dangerous hurricane season this year? Forecasters are predicting nine to 14 named tropical storms with four to seven of them expected to be hurricanes. And three could be major. Or as Dirty Harry would say: 44 Magnum hurricanes, the most powerful hurricanes in the world. So what is the Louisiana Legislature doing to give homeowners protection and relief? Nothing. It’s every homeowner for themselves. So the only question you can ask is, do you feel lucky?

Thought out the gulf south, other states are scurrying to develop legislative strategies to hold the line on rising property insurance costs. In South Carolina, a number of new initiatives passed the legislature including the establishment of catastrophe savings accounts that are tax free, allowing new self-insured procedures for homeowners, and giving tax credits to those who make their homes more storm resistant. Georgia has beefed up its state property insurance association of last resort with the purchase of reinsurance to cover any major disaster.

Alabama is following the South Carolina model mandating companies to give cheaper premiums in exchange for structural improvements to homes. Mississippi is using federal funds to bolster their state run insurance company of last resort, so as to keep insurance rates down. Some $25 million in federal dollars were also obtained in initial funding for the state‘s wind damage mitigation program. Homeowners can get up to 75% of the cost of such improvements, and once the work is done, a significant reduction in premium costs, as much as 50%, is the immediate result.

Texas has adopted a long list of changes in recent years, and recently bolstered its windstorm insurance program to cover damages exceeding one billion dollars. What this means is that Bermuda reinsurers pay the bill instead of Texans. Taxpayers in Texas don’t get stuck like they do in Louisiana. Just last week, Texas legislators became so incensed at the lack of effort by the Texas Insurance Department to lower rates that they voted to abolish the entire department. A special session will have to be called by the governor, but lawmakers made no bones about their desire to get property rates reduced.

Florida Governor Charlie Crist, who has made insurance reform a front burner issue since the day he took office, continues to push an aggressive insurance agenda. Several years ago, Florida formed a Hurricane Catastrophe Fund that offered cheap backup coverage or reinsurance to private insurers. Since then, 40 new companies have flocked to Florida. Louisiana legislators keep hands off any such changes. The result? Just last week, the AAA Insurance group announced they were pulling out of Louisiana, becoming the latest company to do so.

Florida also brought in Warren Buffett’s company Berkshire Hathaway to develop a plan for responding to a massive hurricane hit. Buffett’s firm has pledged up to $ 4billion in state bonds if such a disaster would take place. Florida too has a Citizens Property Insurance Company. But while Louisiana’s similar company continually has raised their rates to the highest in the country, Florida legislators has frozen any such rate increase for at least the next three years.

What can be seen here is an aggressive approach by legislators and insurance departments all along the gulf coast to mitigate exposure, provide back up for private companies, and offer reinsurance to the private insurance market. But there is one exception, and that’s here in Louisiana. The legislature in the Bayou state is now in session, and so far, only two insurance proposals of any significance are making their way through the process. First, there exists a fund of some $100 million to attract new insurance companies to the state. The idea has proven to be a mistake and the present law says the leftover money, some $70 million, is to be refunded to policyholders. Paid back to you as a homeowner. Not so say current legislators. They are diverting this money back to the general fund, breaking their promise to the policy holders of the state.

The other proposal working its way through the process involves complicated legislation affecting take out companies that sell property insurance in south Louisiana. Bottom line is that under this new proposed law, many homeowners will see their yearly premiums rise by as much as 20%. So the best you can expect in Louisiana is to lose your promised refund and see your insurance rates go up. That’s it. Nothing else. NO creative thinking or even an effort to copy a number of good, working proposals in other gulf coast states.
So how do rates compare along the gulf coast when data is rev

iewed that is supplied by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners? In the latest figures available, Louisiana policyholders paid 3.31 percent of the state’s household median income for a homeowner’s insurance policy, the most expensive in the country. This was almost 40% higher than the nationwide average. Along the gulf coast, Florida pays 3.16%, Mississippi pays 2.81%, Alabama is at 2.31%and South Carolina comes in at 2.05%

When you look at the comparisons figures or cost per $100 of residential property insurance, Louisiana property owners again lead the nation by paying an average $1.006. Texas comes in second highest at 93.9 cents, Mississippi paid 79.8 cents, Alabama paid 71.5 cents and Florida paid only 69.3 cents. That’s right. Florida, the state that Louisiana insurance officials and legislators dismiss as being too pro active, is at the bottom of the gulf south list while continuing to attract new insurance companies to the Sunshine state.

Louisiana continues to have the highest property insurance rates in the country, and makes less effort by far than any other gulf coast state to get skyrocketing premiums under control. If another major hurricane hit the state, affordable rates would become, for most homeowners, nonexistent. About the best you can hope for during this hurricane season in Louisiana is to keep your fingers crossed and ask the basic question: “Do I feel lucky?”

Well do ya?
********

“The threat of hurricanes and the Ku Klux Klan; those two things made me decide not to build on the Alabama coast.” Writer Shelby Foote

Peace and Justice
Jim Brown

Jim’s syndicated column appears weekly in numerous newspapers and websites throughout the south. You can read all his back columns by going to www.jimbrownla,.com.