The latest troika of scandals is proving to be not only a serious injury for the Obama administration, but for those covering it as well.

Benghazi is not merely a tragedy — if not criminal negligence — that led to the deaths of four Americans including an Ambassador, but also a tragedy in the refusal of all but one of the major news agencies to cover it until recently.  The unfolding story of overreach by the IRS against groups of conservative ideology amazingly has some in the mainstream media attempting to defend this agency’s abuse of first amendment rights as justifiable scrutiny of right-wing fanatics. The Justice Department obtaining phone records of Associated Press (AP) employees secretly and without a warrant has the press justifiably jumping out of their collective skins, while trying not to push too hard, lest it draw attention to their other two failures.

To its credit, the mainstream media should be congratulated for informing the president of what’s going on in an IRS bureaucracy that’s part of the executive branch, since in spite of calling for it in recent speeches, he was apparently surprised that such politically-motivated behavior was occurring on his watch. Attorney General Eric Holder had likewise assumed the comic role of “Sergeant Schultz” within his department where the AP was concerned, having equated the concept of recusal from supervising the offending investigation to remaining oblivious questionable action going on in it.  As for Benghazi — apparently everyone in the CIA, FBI, Defense and State departments and the White House was playing an elaborate email game of “Telephone” where one person passes a story on to another with the end result bearing no resemblance to the original tale.

With such examples occurring, there’s little surprise that no one believes the politicians, press secretaries, spokespersons and bureaucratic drones who feed us lines of politically corrected and meaningless doublespeak from their respective podiums. Perhaps the press can even be forgiven for its failure to “ask a direct question, dammit”; when they know that they will not be given an answer.  The 24-hour news networks and hours of prime time political punditry on them hasn’t helped however. People understand that in these interpretations of the day’s events, that they are getting not fact, but opinion. Sadly, the only choice left to them is whether they are more comfortable listening to the maunderings of Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews or Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity.

However, the mainstream media efforts and product are increasingly moving from the sublime to the ridiculous. Beginning with the introduction of the “comedy news” first used on “Saturday Night Live,” younger audiences are increasingly getting their take on daily events from Jon Stewart’s “The Daily Show” or its spin-off, “The Colbert Report.”

Recent Pew Research Study information points to the fact that almost as many in the 18-to-29 age group are getting their news from the Comedy Channel programs as are getting it from ABC, NBC or CBS (combined). Not to be outdone in madness, Fox News has recently introduced “The Five,” where an afternoon roundtable of its pundits try to achieve a balanced mixture or sophistry and sarcasm plus a late-night effort called “Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld,” where the most sarcastic member of the earlier show teams up with fellow comedians and occasional public figures in a Henny Youngman treatment of the days events. (“Take my news, please.”)

Poor treatment of world events was bad enough when we were laughing at the spokespeople sweating under the lights and the news readers blundering through teleprompter pages, but we’ve moved beyond Andy Rooney’s whiny voice pointing out the obvious and ridiculous world that we live in at the end of “60 Minutes.” The line between news, punditry and standup has now been irrevocably blurred.

Stewart admits he hosts a comedy show, but wants to be taken seriously when he interviews senior statesman like John McCain. (No wait, that has to be a joke.) Stephen Colbert wears his stodgy “Pat Paulson” character like a cheap suit that he can’t remove. “The Five” are far too often funny when they should be serious and serious about things where we should laugh so as not to cry. As for Fox’s “Red Eye,” this occasionally amusing effort misses the mark so often that we can only be glad that it wasn’t called “Bullseye.”

And that’s TV news today. It’s a medium now so afflicted that it seldom recognizes what its mission is. Despite vast technologies at its fingertips, instead of being more informative, more insightful and more entertaining than any time in its history, it has perhaps instead fatally wounded its credibility, its power and its ability to move people.

This latest comic cast left on the stage attempting to perform their sorry roles merely adds insult to that injury.

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This entry was posted on Monday, May 20th, 2013 at 9:10 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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One of the most confusing things about writing can be the right and proper use of words. We’ve all been confronted with the challenge of there, their, and they’re; and in our haste, perhaps even used the wrong one in a sentence. As tricky as this can be however, trickier still can be the uses of capital and capitol for those of us who write about politics.

Capitol, for those who can’t be bothered to look it up, came from the Capitoline Hill in Rome. While the smallest of the seven that made Rome, it was the center of both politics and religion in the great city and featured it’s principle temple (Jupiter’s), and the Tabularium, in which Rome’s state records were kept. The modern use contains two different uses as well. Used with a lower case beginning (though not always), it defines a building used by a state legislature. Used with an upper case beginning, it normally means the building used by the national legislature in DC.

Adding to the confusion however, is another very similar word ‘capital’. Capital can therefore be used to define a state’s official seat of government (you know, where the capitol would be) or Washington DC (where the Capitol would be). It can also be used to describe the prominence of a city in a field, as by saying: “Washington could be considered the power and corruption capital of the United States”. If all that isn’t confusing enough, capital can also be used to describe the wealth of an individual, corporation, or government.

So for example, when someone in the news talks (like they seem to endlessly these days) about ‘Sequestration’; one can’t help but ask whether they’re talking about the result of inability of those who work in the Capitol to agree to an annual budget, the meaningless ‘posturing’ by by both political parties in the nation’s capital of something they once agreed to, but cannot now seem to even agree to disagree on, or an epic distraction created by politicians on either side of the aisle to describe what’s less than two percent reduction in the growth of capital spending by this nation.

When members of both Houses in our nation’s capital are so concerned about what they’ve now described as the impending ‘Doom of Sequestration’ that they … take a vacation; is shirking their fiscal responsibilities wrong because they’re leaving the Capitol in the capital, or ignoring their obligations to the responsible spending of capital in this country.

What shall we call it when legislators in every State Capitol in every State capital around the nation are forced by the Constitutions of their States to not only produce a budget, but make it one which is at least in theory is balanced; but those working in the Upper House in the Capitol (the Senate) in the nation’s capital can ignore their own legal responsibilities of even passing a budget for over three years? What shall we call the behavior of both parties in both Houses of the Capitol who sit in our nation’s capital and continue spending over 30 percent more of the nation’s capital than they are given in way of revenue, without even an agreed upon plan to spend it by? How shall we view their irresponsibility and failure to assist in growing the nation’s capital in any way that would lead to meaningful job growth in this country; while instead using their power to grow the number of drones and bureaucrats in the nation’s capital involved creating and enforcing the very rules and regulations that stifle any such growth in capital.

You can therefore begin to see my confusion and my dilemma. No matter how one would like to be able to distinguish them, every offense committed in the Capitol is is not only by definition, an offense that occurs in the nation’s capital; but is likely to also have a negative impact on not only the nation’s capital, but our personal capital as well. So too, the consistent waste of capital generated through taxes on the local, state, and national level on a constant stream of self-aggrandizing, pointless, or simply wasteful spending is invariably a capital / capitol offense on far too many levels to consider.

Then again, why should the legislators have any concern. Long term service in the nation’s capital is one of the best ways for anyone to accumulate personal capital. Besides, the capital offenses and Capitol offenses that they commit in our nation’s capital are not considered to be the the kinds of capital offenses that would make someone subject to the potential threat of capital punishment.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 20th, 2013 at 8:57 am and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient … (US Constitution: Article 2, Section 3).

That’s what the State of the Union speech is supposed to be about. It wasn’t designed to be political theater for calling out the Supreme Court, the opposition party, or some portion of the American people to give more money to the government. Our second president Thomas Jefferson recognized that it didn’t even require him to show up in person to give this information and sent his SOTU to Congress in writing. It’s only beginning in the Twentieth Century, beginning with Woodrow Wilson, that the current process of pomp and circumstance began.

But let’s face it, in modern times the SOTU seems little more than a political stump speech at best, and at worst an exceptionally long monologue for a late night TV show. While we haven’t installed a laugh track yet, there’s no doubt that the speech is written with designed pauses that the audience is supposed to fill with applause. Some might even call it excessive in a speech that lasted just barely over an hour that there were over seventy-eight such pauses so that the audience could appreciate these efforts of the speech-writer’s art (which in part accounts for the fact that the speech lasted for over an hour).

Aside from the entertainment value however, much of the SOTU these days is familiar to those in Toledo as half-truths, mistruths, and out right lies. Since regardless of the party in power, the president gets to lay out his side of the debate without contradiction, the world will be as he sees it. (I know that there’s an opposition response, but it has neither the power of venue nor the time to be anything more than a sideshow.) As for this year’s”:

Gun control was probably the most dramatic part of the President’s soliloquy, using the presence of recent victims of mass shootings in this nation as a condemnation for Congress to vote on some form of gun control legislation.

Sequestration was an early part of the President’ effort, with another Congress to act, and act now. Few if any I’m sure, heard the President say that this debate had been going on without resolution since 2011 and none in the audience was told that the idea originally came from the White House. Unlike his stance on gun control legislation however, the President seems unwilling or unable to call out the Senate to hold a vote on the nation’s budget, which while it is legally bound to do so, has failed to do for four years.

The President said that Energy costs are down, in spite of the fact that electric rates across the country are up and gas prices are up in his hometown of Chicago are up fifty cents in the last month. On the other hand, the President is correct that wind-generated energy is up. Of course this is probably only so because of generous subsidies, is under increasing attack for the noise pollution that it generates, and is increasingly under pressure for the damage done to migrating bird populations. (They even get a special dispensation from the Feds for killing bald and golden eagle populations.) All of which we deal with today in order to generate 2.5 percent of the nation’s power. Solar wasn’t mentioned (in the hopes we wouldn’t remember Solyndra), which still only accounts for .1 percent of US power.

Of course there was a section on infrastructure reinvestment, which I thought was going to be addressed in the first term’s $783 billion Stimulus Package, though evidently not. This package is only looking for $50 billion, but is unlikely to get further than its predecessor in producing results unless these projects can get past their biggest hurdle … Federal Regulations.

The President would also like money for Preschools, High Schools, and Technical Colleges. He hasn’t figured out how to do keep these kids in school or keep his promises of revenue neutrality however. He’d also like to raise the Minimum Wage thirty percent from $7.25 to $9.00 per hour. The fact that each such raise has in the past led to higher unemployment doesn’t reconcile with ‘jobs as a number one priority’. Perhaps however, those let go due to the wage increase can go back to school to get a job that doesn’t pay Minimum Wage in the first place, a double win for the Administration.

Foreign Policy wasn’t big in SOTU last night, but did mention a “tireless Counter-Terrorism Effort”, which by the way, will be drawing down dramatically in Afghanistan by the end of the year. Those efforts however, didn’t include an apology to the victims of Benghazi for being too tired to make an effort to save their lives, another one to every country whose air space we’ve violated by flying armed drone strikes, and a third one that the only transparency his Administration has shown is in telling our enemies when we’re leaving.

You know, maybe we would be better served by not telling Congress and the rest of the world our state of the union.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 13th, 2013 at 12:45 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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The Election of 2012 has been over for three months, but evidently its message has already been largely forgotten, especially by those who were running for office. Going into that election, it seemed clear that most running for office were clear as to the nation’s issues: unemployment rates were too high, deficits were growing far too quickly, and the national economy was growing far too slowly. Those newly elected once again promised to make these issues their ‘number one priority’.

Well the election is over, and what’s the government’s priority now? Instead of the economy, the debate is about creating comprehensive immigration law. When it’s not centered on our undocumented residents, it’s about adding to the documentation (and restriction) involved with purchasing a gun or the number of bullets it can contain. Soon-to-be-departing head of the Department of Defense Leon Panetta put his distraction in the mix by announcing that women would now be using many of those weapons in active combat situations. When the subject of who gets to buy or use a gun is temporarily set aside, who gets to marry takes center stage. While all of these are discussions worth having, none of them seem to have anything to do with the originally stated number one priority. So what have those in Washington DC done about it?

Well, they once more punted the President’s court of last resort from the Budget Control Act of 2011 (Sequestration), from January of 2013 to March. In fact, the President just announced that he’d like to see it punted down the road a few more months to get a deal that they haven’t been able to reach in two years. Speaking of the Commander in Chief, the subject of the budget is evidently so important to him that he failed for the fourth time in five years to submit his own budget to Congress before the mandated deadline for doing so. Such a failure might be seen as serious, except that the President’s past budgets seem to be considered far less so. His 2012 effort was such a resounding success in fact, that it received a bi-partisan rejection of 99-0. As pitiable as that performance might seem to the addressing a stated number one issue, the Democratically-controlled Senate has performed even worse, having failed to adopt a budget resolution since April 29^th of 2009.

But hey, it’s easy to understand how the party in power could get distracted over the last four years. After all, in spite of their own stated belief that we’re dealing with the worst economy since the Great Depression; it was more important to pass Health Care reform that’s becoming a greater drain on it, auto bailouts that ignored conventional bankruptcy law to protect unions, and the Dodd-Frank bank regulations that would do nothing in the future to prevent the cause of the economic downturn. Of course after years of wrangling, the government did finally agree to ending part of the Bush Tax Rates, but the revenue generated by their effort is likely to equal between five and ten percent of the annual deficits of each of the last four years (but not this year, because Congress just approve spending its equivalent in Hurricane Sandy relief).

Never mind all of that however. In spite of the fact that Democrats control both the White House and the Senate, the fact that this supposed top issue in the nation has not been addressed on more than a temporary basis appears to be the fault of a Republican party that hasn’t been in power since 2007. This isn’t to say that Republicans have covered themselves in glory over the same period, they can hardly be held responsible the failure to show even less backbone than they have since losing the White House. Neither can their timid resistance be held as an excuse for the failure in leadership in both the Senate and the White House.

Maybe I’ve just got this all wrong however. Maybe there’s a secret Democratic strategy to solve the problems of unemployment, the deficit, and the economy by doing no more than they have in the past … paying them no more than lip service. It appeared to work for them in 2012, so perhaps it will prove equally useful for 2014. Then again, maybe now that the election of 2012 is now over, they’ve simply forgotten the question. So paraphrasing the years of Democratic hero and former president Bill Clinton: “Wasn’t it the Economy Dummy?”

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 6th, 2013 at 4:26 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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The 2012 election had it share of controversy, when several states around the country proposed voter ID laws in attempts to counter fraud that seems to threaten every national election. They were concerned yet again over boxes of ballots that sometimes mysteriously disappear and reappear in hard-fought districts, or that tallies in others often seem to exceed the number of registered voters in a given district. Even with regular evidence however, no one has been able to show the existence of an organized conspiracy, nor prove significant impact of such efforts on more than a local level (though there’s some pretty convincing anecdotal evidence from the 1968 national election where Chicago was concerned). Recent attempts to institute such laws by Republicans were met with heated opposition by Democrats, charging that such rules constituted voter restriction and a subversion of democracy. These laws were challenged in the courts, and in most cases set aside for 2012 for based on the cost of such ID’s or time restrictions in obtaining them.

When George W Bush was granted the victory over Al Gore in the 2000 election by a ruling of the Supreme Court, it was Democrats challenging, calling the whole thing a subversion of the Democratic process. The cried out in the name of fairness for recounts; or that the Electoral College be abandoned in favor of awarding the election solely based on the popular vote. Some had evidently forgotten that there was reasoning behind the College’s creation, allowing smaller states to stand in some part on an equal footing with large and more populated ones. Others merely saw an opportunity to ignore the Constitution as an outdated document that needed modern interpretation (conveniently at the times and in ways that favored their party’s candidates).

Something similar happens every time that a state legislature is called on to reorganize congressional districts based on population shifts, added to the list of additional court-mandated conditions determined over years of judicial battles. Regardless of the party in control of that state’s legislature, the results will invariably attempt to gerrymander districts to their party’s advantage; with their political opposition finding serious fault in their plan, and a final ‘redistricting’ design finally approved by that state’s Supreme Court.

Now it’s Republicans who met last week in Charlotte, NC to discuss, not abandoning the Electoral College, but modifying the ways that it might vote. The question was whether it should by congressional district (like Nebraska and Maine do), or remain winner-take-all contests like the rest of the states do. Some perhaps saw such change more as an alternative to efforts to broaden Republican appeal. Others however, saw it instead as recognition of such appeal long unnoticed or stifled by rules applying to the College. Such could not only be touted as more ‘democratic’, but might well have had real impact, as offered in an effort in the Wall Street Journal by Neil King Jr. President Obama may well have been returned to the White House in 2012 with 332 Electoral votes to Mitt Romney’s 206 (270 are required for victory). If the process were modified under one plan considered to grant each candidate a vote for each congressional district they won and two votes for the state’s popular vote winner, Romney wins instead by 273 to 262. Under another plan being looked at, a candidate would be granted one vote for each district won and two votes for the one winning the most state districts. Here, Romney wins by 285-250.

Now before anyone runs off into the woods with the accusation that this is a Republican trick, remember that the last time similar changes were introduced was in the 90′s; when Democrats felt themselves to be in an Electoral College disadvantage and sought relief. Just as for Maine and Nebraska though, the process of College voting choice is a state one. With an increasing number of states run by Republican governors, and with Republican control of many state legislatures; such an effort could well gain traction. Recognizing that perhaps the tables could on them some day, not all Republicans are in favor of such changes. Virginia however, already has something that it’s looking at; and Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin are all have bills for change under consideration as well.

It’s less than two years until the next mid-term election, and while no one likes to talk about it; those with presidential aspirations for 2016 are already beginning to position themselves. It appears however, that in the interim however, State legislatures will have other choices to make as well. While returning to the issue of voter ID requirements, they may also be asked how the Electoral College votes will be counted. In what may become one of this nations most important electoral decisions in many years, States may in fact be forced into obtaining a College Education.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, January 27th, 2013 at 11:34 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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In perhaps the most disappointing debut since Star Wars Episode I, the most-anticipated of the Congressional Benghazi hearings came and went on the 23^rd with little fanfare. The only thing of any surprise in the director’s cut of either the House or the Senate version was its almost total lack of surprise; coming as it did after weeks of hype, the titillation of a month of delay during Secretary Clinton’s illness, the conspiratorial whispers for weeks during and after the election, and the interminable delay of four months bone burying after the actual attack occurred.

In spite of the endless opportunities in the intervening period to improve the script, to rehearse the scenes to a polished perfection, and maybe even bring in some wardrobe and hair people to improve the appearance of most of the actors, this episodic production played itself out rather less successfully than the average community playhouse event. This rather weak drama went forward without illustrating the compelling nature of facts as required of a true documentary; and without taking advantage of the practiced delivery of veteran actors participating in an oft repeated plot.

In fairness, the limitations of the hearing process forced the ensemble cast of elected representatives into desperate grasping after the limelight during their limited time on stage. Their questions often proved to be more comment than query, more convoluted than those of a philosophy final, and so long that they left no time for the witness to answer before the next inquisitor took center stage.

At the end soul-sucking hours of pointless rhetoric, the audience that managed to sit through the entire performance was left empty and unsatisfied, and the critics were given barely enough this tawdry, but troubling tale to review. After being promised a truly epic tale, all were left with little more than a dime novel and the prospect of an unfulfilling sequel.

Of course for those looking for a more prosaic review of Wednesday’s events …

A public that had been led on for months about the enlightenment of Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s testimony was once again left wanting. The only surprise here was the expectation that real answers would be forthcoming. Giving legislators five minutes to ask questions in front of the world’s microphones, is like giving an alcoholic five minutes of free drinks at the bar; entire unsatisfying for anyone. With neither the inquisitional skills, nor the rhetorical self-control of a lawyer trying to keep it simple for a jury, these politicians spent far more of their time opining on the situation than digging for additional facts. As a consequence of this failure, Mrs. Clinton and the State Department will be afforded the time and luxury to respond in writing to the few queries that were offered over the coming weeks; where they can be carefully parsed, nuanced, and buried in enough boring detail so as to be all but lost.

Having already lived through enough professional questioning in her life, the Secretary of State was savvy enough to let them rattle on through the mandatory mutual admiration and customary unproductive self-aggrandizement to make most of the process moot. Republican Senator Ron Johnson alone managed to find enough of a chink in the Clinton armor to force her to respond with emotion, “With all due respect, the fact is we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest, or was it because of guys out for a walk one night who decided they’d they go kill some Americans? What difference, at this point, does it make?”

The answer of course (never given), is that after beginning her testimony with a ‘mea culpa’ and once again taking responsibility; the witness had, at least up until then, managed to accept such responsibility by blaming everything that had happened on subordinates. Having had those under her watch ignore or turn down requests for addition security after earlier attacks, not only the US enclave but the Red Cross and British to the point that both had abandoned their compounds, she apparently took the blame for not knowing of events that most of us just following the news did. She followed by accepting accountability for an issue that resulted from budget cuts to the State Department instead of explaining why a protection detail had been removed from Libya only a month before.

Such grand and curious admissions for guilt might leave at least some to wonder then, whether the misinformation handed to the American public about a YouTube video for weeks afterward was a lack of competence in supervising the gathering and releasing of information by her department, or a purposeful misleading of the American people by the State Department that she ran, especially with regard to the video that she and the President made decrying the values in an cinematic effort that evidently had nothing to do with events. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky called her out during his time, going so far as to say that these failures called for her dismissal; but this is hardly a threat for a cabinet head only waiting for her replacement to be confirmed before heading for the door.

These hearings may now be over, but for all that they’ve discovered they might as well have never begun. And for all the hoopla over this dual venue bit of political bread and circuses, the American public still knows next to nothing after months of investigation and testimony by those who claim the blame.

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 25th, 2013 at 4:01 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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November’s selection process is long over and those who sought our trust what seems an age ago have now taken their elective seats.  For those who craved the opportunity for enlistment into public service, they’re about to get far more than they bargained for.

They may have missed the end of the year’s bitter partisan wrangling over the fiscal cliff agreement that brought a bitter, temporary peace, but they’ll be stuck going forward with one that left more rancor and acrimony between the sides than those of the Treaty of Versailles.  And like that ill-fated prior accord, it’s one that neither party will see as satisfying the one side’s desire to humble its enemies nor the other’s to have something resembling an equal piece.

Never fear though, since before the ink is barely dry, the two sides will likely be crossing swords once more over the credit limit of the nation — the can of sequester that they kicked down the road once again —and the annual contention over a national budget (a process that hopefully the Senate will join after a four-year absence).  It may not be fair that those newly elected be thrown to the wolves amidst this atmosphere of acrimony and aversion, but it’s an ambiance that they as the chosen representatives of the two major political parties as well as those of the people have created.

Since the parties have long since taken up entrenched positions, there’s little chance that any bold new initiatives or strategies will be taken up in coming fiscal combat. It’s far more likely the two sides will trade noisy salvos of rhetoric and tired volleys of insults from behind their well-established partisan fortifications. No attempt to peaceably meet in the no-man’s land of common ground and common sense should be expected, since that would leave one a target for fire from both sides. After all, the next vote is but two years away and it’s never too early to begin running for your next re-election.

The decisions on a local level may not be as weighty in nature as those of their national legislative counterparts, but they are equally important to those represented in the Glass City. Unfortunately, these appear to be similarly timid figures — equally filled with in-fighting, indecision and inability when it comes to something even so simple as filling the open term of one of their own. In this case, that meant all but turning tail and naming Shaun Enright to fill the Council seat vacated when Phillip Copeland was elected to the position of Lucas County Recorder.

No offense to Mr. Enright, but Toledo hardly needs another voice to represent union interests of the city. Neither does the filling of this term in this way bode well after a beginning in which fellow IBEW member, former Local 8 head and Enright supporter Dennis Duffey told The Blade that he didn’t know if Council President Joe McNamara should be “tarred and feathered or de-nutted” for his apparent lack of immediate and enthusiastic support for Mr. Enright. Instead, Council did little more than review a tired list of retread members and candidates along with this union representative — and might point to the fact that more than one of those Council members (with greater political aspirations than they have today) may already have succumbed to the suffering of one fate or the other.

Choice made however, this local legislative group must also soon take up its own fiscal situation once again and, like its larger counterpart, it seems unable to break out of the consistent strategy of nonperformance in its own war of attrition. Despite claims of bold efforts to break out of its own fixed positions, Toledo’s leaders remain firmly entrenched in “inside the box thinking,” the box being an unbreakable and unsustainable coffin of contracts and exorbitant benefits that Council seems reluctant to dig up.  Adding additional union representation to Council does little to make one believe a new strategic initiative will be forthcoming in 2013. Those ahead seem far too likely to look like many of those behind, with Operating Budgets only appearing to balance and Capital Improvement Plan funding raided to cover not unexpected shortfalls to this effort of creative fiction instead of being used  for long overdue infrastructure repairs.

You who have taken up the gauntlet of public service can expect to be held in low esteem, and deservedly so. For both local and national legislators, in spite of the fact that the bar has been set embarrassingly low, you seem unlikely to get over it. Fortunately for you, we no longer seek to have you succeed in the offices you’ve sought, but we will at least ask you to try.

Tim Higgins blogs at justblowingsmoke.blogspot.com.

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 11th, 2013 at 3:07 pm and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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Due to a postal mix-up, I have been receiving letters originally directed to another overweight guy with a white beard. Unlike “Miracle of 34th Street,” these deliveries do not, however, constitute irrefutable proof that I’m the one, the only … well, you know. I did receive a pleasant note from the real big guy though, after forwarding these efforts on to him. (We often visit near year’s end to compare diet goals and white beard grooming tricks). He said that if any of them seemed amusing, I had permission to use them.

I have been looking at a stack of letters I purposely set aside — Santa letters sent by and on behalf of members of Toledo’s government.

A membership to Toastmasters was on a list for Councilman Phil Copeland. Evidently an improvement in public speaking skills is seen not only as a gift to Mr. Copeland’s future in politics as Lucas County Recorder, where he will have to speak for an entire agency, but also a gift in time and translation for the local media and his co-workers, no matter what capacity he serves in.

Speaking of enhancements, there were requests for Santa to bring Councilman Steve Steel a gift certificate for self-defense lessons. I guess many still feel that if he’s going to insist on fighting outside of his weight class, giving him the gift of some martial arts techniques (maybe even ninja skills) might come in handy. There was likewise no shock over requests for adding the book “Basic Debate, Student Edition” to his stocking.

Speaking of books and stockings, there were letters to put a special copy of the Toledo City Charter in Councilman Tyrone Riley’s fireplace-hung footwear. It would be special because Santa would ensure that areas regarding conflict of interest and abstaining in a vote of council were highlighted.

Tom Waniewski

There were a number of requests for a gift for Tom Waniewski as well. Santa has been asked to deliver a few more people with math skills and common sense to join him on Council. Apparently the hope in such a gift is to slow down the juggernaut of regulation, taxation and funding allocation that seems to be running rampant through Council these days. Mr. Waniewski is a Republican, however, and has therefore been on the Naughty List for some time. Despite putting a good word in for him in my North Pole missive, it’s likely he’ll see little beyond a lump of coal.

Many thought that D. Michael Collins had received his present from Santa early, when media nemesis Brian Wilson left the airwaves at 1370 WSPD. Apparently, this was not the only item on his list. My favorites were a Junior Detective Kit for his investigations and a spotlight that could be mounted in council chambers to shine on him whenever he speaks.

Speaking of multiple requests and multiple gifts, there is evidently a groundswell effort using missives to Santa to get Lindsay Webb a whole park. Evidently the thought is that if she had a park of her own, named after her, and with night basketball and swimming programs going on there year-round, she’d leave the rest of the city alone. The word I heard from the North Pole is that you have to be really nice to get such a special gift, and that Councilwoman Webb has been, at best, substantially compliant.

Young Councilman Adam Martinez is also someone who has multiple item requests to Santa. The first is for a really good day planner under his tree. Having missed several Council meetings in 2012 after missing 19 in 2011, I guess he or someone on his behalf figured a better way of tracking his schedule might be of benefit.

George Sarantou

Councilman George Sarantou is asking for one of those Charles Atlas kits that you used to see in the comic books. A longtime member of City Council who is about to be term-limited out, Mr. Sarantou has run for higher office more than once, and each time had a bit of sand kicked in his face. Considered a 97-pound weakling, mostly because of his affiliation with a county Republican Party that weighs even less, this latest soul-sucking loss to a far less qualified candidate in Councilman Phil Copeland for the County Recorder’s office was apparently the last straw in sending off the request. Expect Councilman Sarantou to do a lot of heavy lifting before announcing another effort for higher office.

The most interesting of the letters that I saw was from Councilwoman Paula Hicks-Hudson. It seems that she was sent Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak and has had a heck of a time getting anyone to notice her ever since. She was writing to the North Pole to ask why she had been sent the cloak in the first place, and if it might be possible for Santa to take it back without holding it against her. There are rumors (and I’m not saying about who) that certain members of Council sent letters to Santa on her behalf, as they were unwilling to share the limited limelight of Council meetings with her.

The letters for Councilman Rob Ludeman were rather unique. He has been on City Council for a long time and was even president for a while, but Mr. Ludeman has seemed inconsistent over the years, sometimes seeming like a Republican and sometimes like a Democrat. This voting record seems to have left the Councilman (much like the local Republican Party that endorses him) stuck on the political Island of Misfit Toys from “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Unlike “Survivor,” this made-for-TV island is one he wouldn’t mind some help from Santa in being voted off.

Mike Craig

I looked for a letter to Santa mentioning Councilman Mike Craig, but couldn’t find one. Apparently when you are a former civil servant and now a public servant who has a strong family and union background, including service as a UAW union steward, there’s nothing that Santa can bring you that unions and the Lucas County Democratic Party can’t. There were rumors that Mr. Craig writes no letters because he found out that the elves refused to organize, but I haven’t been able to confirm that locally or at the North Pole.

Santa seems to have found only one request for City Council’s President Joe McNamara in the letters he’s received. While Mr. McNamara’s young political career seems as well-favored as anyone’s, he may be suffering from comparisons to another local Democratic politician of youthful appearance and legal training who once put his political stamp on Toledo.  By now most of you realize that Mr. McNamara might in fact be suffering from “Konop Regional Antipathy Problems.” As it did for the original victim and long-time carrier, this condition can doom even the best political efforts of a candidate, no matter how well-intentioned the ideas or well-connected the family. Santa tells me that regardless of being on the Nice list (after all, he’s not an evil Republican), there may be problems even Santa can’t fix with a box and a bow.

Last, but not least, Mayor Mike Bell didn’t have a lot on his list this year, but there have been a couple of requests on his behalf to get the Ghostbusters in town to service One Government Center. Like Ebenezer in “A Christmas Carol,” the mayor may have been recently haunted by the spirits of former mayors Jack Ford and Carty Finkbeiner (both now asking Santa to put Mr. Ford in Phil Copeland’s soon-to-be-vacant Council seat).

These efforts are not so much hauntings, as attempted demonic possessions. There’s now concern that the fiscally conservative practices from early in Mr. Bell’s term have been taken over by the spendthrift “three-card monte” spending that his predecessors were famous for. I’m told that such things may be beyond even the ability of Santa, but that he’s at least trying to arrange a visit by Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and Harold Ramis for the pilot for their new reality show, “Celebrity Exorcism.”

Tim Higgins blogs at justblowingsmoke.blogspot.com.

Tags: Adam Martinez, Brian Wilson, Carty Finkbeiner, D. Michael Collins, George Sarantou, Jack Ford, Joe McNamara, Just Blowing Smoke, Lindsay Webb, Mike Bell, Paula Hicks-Hudson, Phil Copeland, Rob Ludeman, Steve Steel, Tim Higgins, Toledo City Council, Tom Waniewski, Tyrone Riley

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 20th, 2012 at 4:03 pm and is filed under Featured, Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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With both the election and Thanksgiving long over, and with even the leftover goodies have been disposed of by now, it’s time once again for the nation’s focus to shift beyond politics and gorging ourselves on turkey, stuffing, and political rhetoric. It’s time to set up the tree, hang the lights, and turn our attention to a calorie-challenged guy with a white beard. Apparently some of you out there think that it’s me rather than the guy with the reindeer farm and the red suit. (No Federal laws were violated in this effort, nor were any Postal Inspectors harmed in this effort.)

This is not to say that I blame anyone, as the resemblance is sometimes striking; though he’s more often depicted with a pipe rather than a cigar. Nevertheless the Christmas lists keep pouring in; and there are times when my curiosity gets the better of me and I read a few. Of course I have a slightly more twisted version of the ‘naughty and nice list’, and I cannot help but pen my own recommendations into the margins before passing them on.

I don’t know whether my scribblings will make any difference, nor do I think sharing some of them will hurt anything. In the hopes of trying to keep some of the identities secret, I attempt to reach a consensus in the requests I share with you to produce a list that might at least be mildly entertaining. Those that I’m sharing this week are a number of wishes coming from those of the Conservative persuasion; which I will of course put in the form of one of those letters I have mistakenly received.

Dear Santa,

I know that I’m an evil Conservative and according to some should be permanently placed on your naughty list. I would like to point out however that like many of my fellows, I am one of those conservatives who is more generous than my progressive counterparts. I also always attempt to be fair in my criticism of other, regardless of political ideology.

In the hopes therefore that I have earned at least a shot at the nice list, I am sending you this list of gifts for Christmas:

• A presidential candidate who is conservative more often than when he’s trying to win the Republican primary. This whole thing with these “I’m next” candidates is killing me. And since it seems you have to run for four years in order to serve for four, I’d like him now please.
• A government that believes that stops believing that it can balance its checkbook by taking more of anybody’s money instead of spending less of it. I know that everybody likes presents, but I would think that by now you’re getting pretty tired of government attempting to usurp your position, and year round too.
• I’d like a Congress where Conservatives could debate important issues without being called idiotic, obstinate, and stupid (among the more polite insults) by a group of people who, after doing so, complain that we’re being mean.
• I’d like the Senate to pass a nation budget at least once in the second term of the President. I know that in sports, having a guaranteed contract for six years can make you lazy and uncaring about your job performance; but one budget every six years or so wouldn’t be asking too much, would it?
• I’d like the US Constitution to be more than a booklet handed out by Conservative groups. Back when they still taught US history, I learned a lot about it, and how it was a brilliantly original concept of government and one of the greatest legal documents ever created. It would be nice if that were taught again.
• I know that this is a tough one, but I would like to have you replace the personal entitlement in so many hearts these days with personal responsibility. I know life is pretty tough these days, but it might be easier if as many as could took responsibility for themselves so that we could more clearly see those who really need the help.

Listen, I know that most of these gifts will benefit other people than me as well (even liberals), but that’s OK with me as long as you can see your way to helping out on a couple of them. After all, you’ve done pretty well by me over the years anyway, so there’s certainly no reason why I can’t wish for others. Besides, as a not-so-tiny Tim friend of mine likes to quote from his literary predecessor in “A Christmas Carol”: “God bless us, every one”.

Next week, I hope to have a rather special list for you, one with a compilation of wishes with rather more of a local focus (and less anonymity). While I have already forwarded all of them to the North Pole, I have to admit that I made some notes in the margins on some of these as well.

Tags: Christmas, Conservatives, Just Blowing Smoke, Tim Higgins

This entry was posted on Friday, November 30th, 2012 at 8:25 am and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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Disclaimer: The Toledo Free Press takes no responsibility for the insanely mixed metaphors in the following piece.

Sporting events have always been a favorite in the Glass City, whether we’re talking about the college-level efforts at UT or the more professional ones of the Mud Hens and Walleye. This goes a long way to explain the considerable amounts expended to provide top-line venues at the Glass Bowl, Fifth-Third Field and the Huntington Center. In recent days however, a surprising one might have been added to that list, as One Government Center saw its debut with a political multisport event.

Play began innocently enough when Mayor Mike Bell sought to raise the ranges of pay (not the pay itself) for some of the city’s nonunion employees; pointing out that the last time that range had been increased was back in 1998. Now such an opening move would not normally be regarded as good first play call, coming at a time when the city has seen some preliminary bouts of budget balancing with labor unions that came out as little more than a draw. Since raises for politicians are never a popular opening gambit to those in the stands, few would have seen this as a time for a relative newcomer to turn it into a pugilistic opportunity.

Fate however, occasionally allows a hitter with an 0-2 count a big, fat hanging curve ball to take a swing at. Such was the delivery from City Councilman Steve Steel in his attempt to send Mayor Bell to the dugout, cap in hand. Not many realized this however, when he proposed an ethics pledge to the mayor not to accept campaign contributions from those same city employees whose salary range the mayor was asking to increase. Fellow Democratic Councilman and Council President Joe McNamara (Bell is an independent) even attempted to hold a block for Steel, saying to 13ABC of such contributions, “It’s not illegal, but it’s shabby to accept money from who he can hire and fire.”

Failing to recognize that this was not the mayor’s first rodeo, both could only watch open-jawed as the mayor returned this weak serve with a solid cross court volley. Instead of the expected prevent defense, Bell in fact blitzed his opponents, firing back to Steel that “his proposal was an excellent one, but I thought it went a little short.” Assuming a seasoned poker face, he saw their employee contributions and raised them “all in” with a city ordinance that would prohibit candidates from taking contributions from current city employees, their family members or the bargaining units that represent city employees.

Now Councilman Steel came from the more rarefied intellectual atmosphere of the Toledo Board of Education (wait, is that a contradiction in terms?); so he might be forgiven for attempting to move the play toward the more elitist sport of fox hunting by (as reported by WSPD) calling the mayor’s play a “red herring” (red herring were used to fool fox hunting dogs while training them to properly track scent). Calling it a “diversion” however, was in fact little more than a diversion itself or, maybe more accurately, fumbling the ball. Since it was Councilman Steel who brought the whole thing up in the first place, going further by calling it “an SB5 like attack” might even be considered a personal foul for piling on.

Being an appointed at-large Councilman, Steven Steel may now have a different sport to begin training for, that of political back-pedaling (amateur, of course, if he ever hopes to make the Olympic team) as he attempts fundraising and running for election. Even at this early stage of his athletic career though, he might take heed from Lance Armstrong and avoid potential contact with substances like steroids and testosterone that promise potential fame and glory, but can shorten even the most promising career.

As for the proposal and counterproposal on political contribution restrictions by the mayor and council, it’s possible that a lively debate might ensue, but it’s far more likely that it will end faster than a three up, three down inning. Anything passed probably would face a court challenge that was largely decided by “Citizens United.” Money was deemed free speech, and neither City Council nor the mayor can go toe-to-toe with the Supreme Court and expect to win.

As for Councilman Steel, he might also want to be more careful in picking his future bouts and opponents. He would probably fare better next time fighting in his weight class (no offense Mayor Bell, I’m talking experience, not mass). He might also want to seek some minor medical attention. I’m sure that I’m not the only one that noticed a little fluid leaking from his face recently. He did after all, get tagged.

Tags: Joe McNamara, Just Blowing Smoke, Mike Bell, Steve Steel, Tim Higgins, Toledo City Council

This entry was posted on Friday, August 31st, 2012 at 8:00 am and is filed under Just Blowing Smoke, Opinion.
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