Fiscal Cliff Diving

       The decorated gates at the White House are closed and the occupants have flown to Hawaii for Christmas vacation, and there is still no solution to avoiding the impending dive over the fiscal cliff established by Congress and the President last year. The situation I described in my last post at the end of November has not changed at all. The elected officials in Washington have made no progress; reached no agreed deals on a bi-partisan solution; taken no action to solve the crisis.
        Ever since Obama was re-elected, Speaker Boehner has made proposals to extend the current tax rates and cut taxes that the White House and Senate Democrats have rejected. Then the White House makes a counter-proposal that the House Republicans reject. Each of these exchanges is characterized by dueling press conferences attacking the other side's proposal. What is not seen is all key parties sitting down together to work out a compromise that all can live with, even if not fully to each side's liking. Business deals are reached like this around the world every day, but politicians seem more interested in repeating their tired old policies and talking points that demean the other side.
        It's no wonder that business leaders have no confidence in our federal government and the financial markets see the US political system as dysfunctional. Another downgrade of the US credit rating is very likely after the new year starts unless a post-Christmas miracle occurs next week.
         The irony is that the public and the press have already decided that, if the nation fails to avoid the fiscal cliff and taxes rise for everyone after January first, it will be the Republicans' fault. Yet the Washington Post reported today on facts that are little known by the public:
              “The House has already acted to stop all of the looming tax hikes and replace the automatic defense cuts” scheduled to hit in January, Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck said in a written statement, a reference to a measure the House passed last summer to extend the George W. Bush-era tax hikes for taxpayers at all income levels....                
             Like their counterparts in the House, Senate Republicans are eager to avert the fiscal cliff — Washington shorthand for more than $500 billion in automatic tax hikes and spending cuts set to hit in January. Unless Congress acts, taxes will rise for nearly 90 percent of Americans, potentially knocking the nation back into recession.
          Polls show that a majority of Americans would blame Republicans for that outcome. Surveys also show that voters overwhelmingly support Obama’s proposal to deal with record budget deficits in part by raising taxes on the wealthy."
            This report seems to indicate that a bill has already passed the House and is sitting in the Democratic controlled Senate that would avoid the fiscal cliff calamity about to occur. If the Democrats want to raise taxes on the wealthy, as Obama and the majority of the public who voted him in for a second term have indicated, why doesn't the Senate bring the House bill to the floor and amend it with a Bush tax rate extension limited to those who make less than $250,000 (or as Obama seems to now accept $400,000) and then take the bill to Conference, as all bills normally do. There are very likely enough Republican Senators at this stage who would favor such a compromise, thereby assuring there would be no filibuster. Then key members of both parties from each house of Congress could sit down together to discuss the threshold over which tax rates should rise.
               Boehner already agreed to $1 million in income as the tax increase threshold, but the tea party faction of his party refused to vote for that option. However, there were many Republicans who would have voted for this so-called Plan B. By going to Conference on differing bills passed by both houses to reach a compromise on a final bill, key members of both parties will be able to sit down in a room and reach an agreement. This is the way governing under the US Constitution is supposed to work!
                Now is the time for all elected officials in Washington (or Hawaii) to carry out their Constitutional duties as the voters elected them to do.


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Fairness, not the Economic Growth, Drives Obama Agenda

           The chart above (published by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) after President Obama was re-elected earlier this month) demonstrates what the Romney campaign tried to explain to the voters. No matter how bad the economy was when Obama took office, the recovery since the recession ended has proceeded at a pace below that usually experienced after prior recessions. Obama was re-elected even though the unemployment rate is still close to 8% and even worse for minorities who voted in large majorities for Obama: the unemployment rate for Blacks has increased from 12.7% to 14.1% (almost twice the unemployment rate of whites) since Obama was inaugurated in 2009 and, although the unemployment rate for Hispanics has decreased slightly since 2009, at a rate of 9.7%, it still exceeds the national rate of 7.9%.
           During a recession in 1992, Bill Clinton ran a successful campaign to defeat an incumbent President by focusing on the poor economy. Never has a President been re-elected with an unemployment rate as high as it is currently nor with such a slow economic recovery.
           Pundits are analyzing the election results based on standard  measures of the past, but it appears that Obama may have changed the usual way to influence a majority of voters. His tenure in office and his campaign have been more focused on "fairness" rather than economic growth that can lead to a better life for hard working Americans and improved conditions for governments at all levels to balance their budgets.  And apparently a majority of voters have accepted that concept as an appropriate driving force to guide national policy decisions.
           This new guiding principle of decision-making is clearly seen in the on-going attempts to solve the fiscal cliff of reduced spending and tax increases that will automatically take effect on January 1, 2013 if Congress and the President cannot agree on another solution to the US budget deficit.
            The President wants to allow the scheduled tax increases for those families making over $250,000 a year to go into effect while extending the current rates for those in lower income brackets. This does not fix the budget problem.
               "President Obama’s proposed tax hike would raise roughly $65 billion in 2013. At the same time, the president proposes to increase spending next year by $202 billion. The tax hike would pay for only 32 percent of the proposed new spending. ... That means that not a penny of Obama’s proposed tax increase would, in fact, go toward reducing the budget deficit, let alone paying down the debt. Rather, every cent of the tax hike would go toward paying for increased federal spending." http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/308439/obama-tax-rich-michael-tanner#
               Since the annual budget deficit has been at least $1 trillion each year Obama has been in office, a reduction of $65 billion would amount to about 6.5% of the total deficit. Some analysts say that Obama's proposal actually includes additional provisions affecting high income taxpayers that would bring the total revenue enhanced by the White House proposal to $86 billion. That would still only reduce the deficit by about 8.5%.
                It is, therefore, clear that allowing tax rates on the highest income earners to rise back up to the Clinton era rates will not solve the deficit problem. In his first remarks in the White House after election day, Obama said:  "If we’re serious about reducing the deficit, we have to combine spending cuts with revenue -- and that means asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more in taxes."
               The President's remarks recognize that spending cuts are needed for an effective solution to the US government's deficit spending problem and that the problem will not be resolved by his proposed tax increases alone. That means that to eliminate the rest of the annual $1 trillion deficit more than 90% of the deficit gap will have to be closed with spending cuts. Yet the rhetoric among Democratic members of Congress and the White House since the election has been solely fixed on raising tax rates on the wealthiest Americans.
                The continuing focus on taxing the rich rather than addressing the whole problem by sitting down to negotiate a comprehensive solution that both sides can agree to is consistent with Obama's governing philosophy that has contributed to the gridlock in Washington and the slow economic recovery demonstrated in the graph above. He would rather continue campaigning against high income earners than exercise some leadership in crafting comprehensive solutions to the nation's most serious fiscal problems.
                  Even the Washington Post (one of many mainstream media outlets to endorse Obama's re-election) has noticed the failure of the victorious Democratic Party and its leader in the White House to engage in sincere negotiations to find common ground:
                   "Elections do have consequences, and Mr. Obama ran on a clear platform of increasing taxes on the wealthy. But he was clear on something else, too: Deficit reduction must be “balanced,” including spending cuts as well as tax increases. Since 60 percent of the federal budget goes to entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, there’s no way to achieve balance without slowing the rate of increase of those programs....
               Mr. Obama has understood this since at least 2009, when he told The Post’s editorial board that he would tackle entitlement reform.
             'What we have done is kicked this can down the road. We are now at the end of the road and are not in a position to kick it any further,” he said then. “We have to signal seriousness in this by making sure some of the hard decisions are made under my watch, not someone else’s.'
                 Four years later, has the moment arrived? Since his reelection, Mr. Obama has fueled a campaign-style effort to pressure Republicans to give ground on taxes. That’s fine, but it won’t be enough."               
                 The President's continuous campaign for higher taxes on so-called "millionaires and billionaires", without any serious proposals to cut spending, is consistent with his long term political goal of reducing income inequality in America, as described in a Washington Post op-ed last Sunday:
                  "[B]eneath his tactical maneuvering lies a consistent and unifying principle: to use the powers of his office to shrink the growing gap between the wealthiest Americans and everyone else.... Viewed through this lens, the imminent debate over the “fiscal cliff” is not simply a war over taxes, spending and how to tame the nation’s mushrooming debt. As Obama did in legislative fights during his first term, he also will be striving to reduce a three-decades-long wave of rising income inequality that has meant that fewer Americans have prospered while more struggle to get by."
                  Since the President is more concerned with reducing the wealth of the high earners of the US than with balancing the budget, there is a real danger of either going over the fiscal cliff or reaching a short term solution that just kicks the can down the road again. Either result would likely worsen our sluggish economic recovery. A report released last month by the National Association of Manufacturers predicted that the damage to the economy would deepen considerably if Washington fails to avoid the cliff, "destroying nearly 6 million jobs through 2014 and sending the unemployment rate soaring to near 12 percent."
                  Moody's Analytics, Tax Policy Center has also warned that going over the fiscal cliff could lead to another recession, driving GDP down 3.53% in 2013. The chart below illustrates Moody's analysis.
                  Obama needs to address the nation's fiscal health in a comprehensive way to find common ground rather than playing politics - that divides members of Congress along party lines impeding those who are trying to find bi-partisan solutions. Obama's constant attacks on the financially successful class of Americans also creates uncertainty among business leaders who could help increase employment, improve economic activity and enhance the prospects for prosperity among more Americans who have suffered through the worse economic recovery in 70 years. 
                  If Obama fails to exercise leadership in pursuit of the nation's public interest (rather than his narrow interest of punishing the country's top earners to close the income inequality gap), the prospects demonstrated in the Moody's chart below could become reality.
 
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Elections Have Consequences

It has been less than a week since Barack Obama was re-elected President of the United States and the consequences of that decision by the voters are already sending shock-waves through our still sluggish economy.

1. STOCK MARKET HAS PLUNGED: Since election day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has dropped over 400 points. It dropped over 300 points just on the day after election day. The major reason seems to be that financial markets realize that the so-called "fiscal cliff" (which includes automatic tax increases and budget cuts) will occur at the end of the year unless addressed by Congress and the President soon, and that, after months of expensive campaigning, the voters basically left the government in Washington just as it was before the campaigns began. We still have a Democratic controlled Senate, a Republican controlled House and the same President - none of which could resolve the fiscal cliff before the election.

2. PARTISAN ATTACKS CONTINUE: Although House Speaker John Boehner offered right after the election to discuss revenue enhancements (in the form of eliminating certain deductions for high income taxpayers) as part of a legislative deal to avoid the fiscal cliff, two days later President Obama (in his first public announcement since the election) said:

"But as I’ve said before, we can’t just cut our way to prosperity.  If we’re serious about reducing the deficit, we have to combine spending cuts with revenue -- and that means asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more in taxes..... I’m open to compromise.  I’m open to new ideas.  I’m committed to solving our fiscal challenges.  But I refuse to accept any approach that isn’t balanced." 

Since the Republican Speaker already expressed his willingness to discuss increased revenue why does the President have to keep attacking an approach limited to budget cuts? Such partisan attacks do not encourage cooperative working relations with Congressional leaders of the other party that could lead to compromise.

President Obama would benefit in his attempts to reach consensus by following the example set by Abraham Lincoln, a President who won re-election in 1864 while the country was still fighting a bloody Civil War. As bad as our current fiscal and economic problems are today, they pale in comparison to the violent clashes that grew out of political differences in the mid-nineteenth century. After winning re-election in 1864, Lincoln said:

"Now that the election is over, may not all, having a common interest, reunite in a common effort, to save our common country?" - November 10, 1864

Does not Barack Obama think that Republicans, as well as Democrats, have a "common interest" in resolving our country's problems?


3.  COMPANIES ARE ANNOUNCING LAYOFFS DUE TO OBAMACARE TAXES AND COSTS SOON TO GO INTO EFFECT: The health care law commonly called Obamacare imposes new taxes and penalties effective in 2013 on certain employers and companies. Among the most troublesome taxes are new taxes on medical devices. In January, medical device manufacturers in the U.S. will be asked to pay a 2.3 percent tax on medical devices. Consequently, now that Obamacare will remain the law of the land, many medical device manufacturers have announced (some since election day) lay-offs and plans to move certain facilities out of the US:


Welch Allyn, a company that manufactures medical diagnostic equipment in central New York, announced in September that they would be laying off 275 employees (about 10% of their workforce) over the next three years.  One of the major reasons discussed for the layoffs was the Medical Device Tax mandated by the new healthcare law.

Stryker, one of the biggest medical device manufacturers in the world, will close their facility in Orchard Park, New York, eliminating 96 jobs in December. In addition, they plan to slash 5% of their global workforce - an estimated 1,170 positions.

 Boston Scientific announced last year that the company would be cutting anywhere between 1,200 and 1,400 jobs, while simultaneously shifting investments and workers overseas - to China.

 Medtronic, another medical device maker, warned that Obamacare taxes could result in a reduction of  1,000 jobs. That plan became reality when the company cut 500 positions over the summer, with another 500 set for the end of 2013.
 [Information above taken from FreedomWorks website at  http://www.freedomworks.org/blog/grusbf5/good-morning-america-heres-those-layoffs-you-voted]

"Other medical manufacturers will follow: Smith & Nephew, with 770 layoffs; Abbott Labs, 700; Covidien, 595; Kinetic Concepts, 427; St. Jude Medical, 300;.. and Hill Rom, 200.

[Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/oct/27/shirley-medical-device-tax-will-impact-jobs-and/#ixzz2BxZOFF9H - vcstar.com]

But medical device manufacturers are not only companies laying off employees due to the costs of Obamacare. Dana Holding Corp., an auto parts manufacturer, warned their employees of potential layoffs, citing "$24 million over the next six years in additional U.S. health care expenses".

4. COMPANIES ARE REDUCING HOURS OF PART_TIME WORKERS TO AVOID OBAMACARE COSTS: Under the Affordable Care Act (AKA Obamacare) "any business must provide health insurance if it employs 50 or more full-time employees - but only to full-time employees. Businesses are exempt from providing health insurance to part-time employees." Employers that fail to provide health insurance to part-time workers will have to pay a $2,000 penalty per employee after the first 30.

Since Obamacare defines part-time employees as those who work at least 30 hours a week, many companies are considering reducing hours for part-time workers (who were defined under existing labor laws as those who work at least 35 hours a week) to less than 30 hours per week.

"Papa John's founder and CEO John Schnatter said the president's signature health-care reform law would increase his business costs and possibly result in employees' hours being cut." At the company's shareholders meeting in August, Schnatter said that Obamacare "would result in a 10- to 14-cent increase for customers buying a pizza." 

 "Darden Restaurants -- owners of about 2,000 outlets including the Red Lobster and Olive Garden chains -- is studying ways to shift more employees under the 30-hour ceiling. About three-quarters of its 185,000 workers are already under, says spokesman Rich Jeffers. The question is "can we go higher and still deliver a great [eating] experience." The financial stakes are sizable. Suppose Darden moves 1,000 servers under 30 hours and avoids paying $5,000 insurance for each. The annual savings: $5 million....Many companies, especially in the fast-food, retailing and hotel industries, will explore similar changes." 

5. CIA DIRECTOR PETRAEUS RESIGNED.  On Friday following Obama's re-election, it was announced that CIA Director David Petraeus resigned due to an extra-marital affair discovered by the FBI during an inquiry into e-mails sent by Petraeus biographer Paula Broadwell. While the resignation is solely due to the former Director's personal conduct, the loss of Petraeus as the head of the CIA just before new Congressional hearings are scheduled into the attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya is unfortunate. Petraeus personally briefed Congressional leaders on the attack within days of the event on September 11, 2012, and it was at that briefing that first CIA reference to the attack being the result of a protest over an anti-Muslim video was presented. Prior to that briefing, CIA officials on the ground reported no protest and described the attack as a coordinated terrorist assault on the US facility and personnel.

Following Petraeus' first briefing to Congressional leaders, the Obama Administration repeated the storyline that the attack followed a protest for a couple of weeks at daily White House press briefings. Most significantly, the US Ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, repeated this description on every Sunday morning talk show on the Sunday following the attack.

While the CIA Director was scheduled to testify at Congressional hearings next week, Petraeus will now be replaced by the new Acting Director. Petraeus may eventually testify personally even as a civilian, but it does not appear that he will do so next week.

This development adds more questions to the list of those that already exist regarding the lack of security at the Benghazi consulate, the lack of adequate military reinforcements to help protect US personnel under attack, the failure to secure the site after the attack, why it took the FBI sent to investigate the incident several weeks to get to the consulate and, of course, why the Administration insisted on giving an inaccurate description of the events in Benghazi to the American public for so long.

With so many new developments and revelations already occurring within days of Obama's re-election, it appears that the rocky performance we have experienced in the past due to Obama's broken promises of transparency and post-partisanship will continue FORWARD just as before.

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President Obama Emphasizes Trust at an Unfortunate Time

At a campaign rally in Florida yesterday, President Obama made the following statement:

"There is no more serious issue in a presidential campaign than trust."

Unfortunately for Obama, today's news highlighted  a couple of stories that raise questions about whether Obama can be trusted. After his Administration spent about two weeks suggesting that the September 11, 2012 attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya that killed four Americans arose out of a protest over a video that insulted Islam, Reuters reported today that it obtained e-mails sent from the US Embassy in Tripoli while the attack in Benghazi was underway stating "that the diplomatic mission in Benghazi was 'under attack. Embassy in Tripoli reports approximately 20 armed people fired shots; explosions have been heard as well." One terrorist group even claimed responsibility within a couple of hours of the attack, but withdrew that claim later. Among the recipients of the e-mails during the attack were the State Department and the White House. 

Typical of the explanations for the protests in the Muslim world, including the attack in Benghazi, that started on September 11, 2012 (the eleventh anniversary of the worst terrorist attacks in history on US soil) was this statement at a press briefing by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on September 14: 

             "We also need to understand that this is a fairly volatile situation and it is in response not to United States policy, not to obviously the administration, not to the American people.  It is in response to a video, a film that we have judged to be reprehensible and disgusting.  That in no way justifies any violent reaction to it, but this is not a case of protests directed at the United States writ large or at U.S. policy.  This is in response to a video that is offensive to Muslims." (emphasis added)

Even UN Ambassador Susan Rice appeared on all Sunday morning talk shows on September 16 stating that the best information the Administration had suggested that the Benghazi attacks followed protests over the anti-Islam video. Only after a counter-terrorism official testified at a Congressional hearing about two weeks later stating that the Benghazi attack was an act of terrorism against the US mission did Jay Carney and other Administration officials admit that the attack on the Benghazi Consulate was an act of terrorism that was not preceded by an anti-video protest.

Also today it was revealed that the President gave an off-the-record interview to the Des Moines Register, the largest circulation newspaper in Iowa, that outlined Obama's plans for a second term. The content of what the President said about his plans does not seem to be very different from what has previously been generally known, but the newspaper's editor complained about the White House request to keep the interview from the public. After Governor Romney has been criticizing President Obama for not disclosing his plans for a second term, why would the President ask to keep such an interview off the record? That is the type of information that should be discussed in a Presidential campaign.

So on the day after Obama tells a campaign rally that "trust" is important in a Presidential campaign, the news media reports two examples of how the Obama Administration tries to hide information from the public.         
                  Is this a President we can trust? 

Update:  Since writing this post, the following new information has been published which emphasizes further the points made and the consequences of the President's questionable actions described above:

        FactCheck.org article entitled "Benghazi Timeline" (Oct. 26, 2012):  This article sets forth a detailed timeline of statements made by Obama Administration officials from the time of the Benghazi attack until October 24, 2012. Analysis of this timeline led the FactCheck organization to come to this conclusion:

           "We cannot say whether the administration was intentionally misleading the public. We cannot prove intent.... But, at this point, we do know that Obama and others in the administration were quick to cite the anti-Muslim video as the underlying cause for the attack in Benghazi that killed four U.S. diplomats, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens. And they were slow to acknowledge it was a premeditated terrorist attack, and they downplayed reports that it might have been."

        Des Moines Register endorsed Mitt Romney for President (Oct. 27, 2012): For the first time since 1972, the Des Moines Register endorsed a Republican candidate for President after Obama insisted on giving an off-the-record interview to the editorial staff. But it was the newspaper's analysis of the two candidates' past performance and their future plans that led to the endorsement of Romney:

           "The nation has struggled to recover from recession for the past 40 months. Still, the economy is growing at an unacceptably anemic rate of around 2 percent a year and could slip back into recession depending on what happens in the European Union and China.
           The workforce is still 4.5 million jobs short of the nearly 9 million that were lost in the recession. Longer term, looming deficits driven by Social Security and Medicare pose the single greatest threats to the nation’s economic security.
           The president’s best efforts to resuscitate the stumbling economy have fallen short. Nothing indicates it would change with a second term in the White House.....
           Barack Obama rocketed to the presidency from relative obscurity with a theme of hope and change. A different reality has marked his presidency. His record on the economy the past four years does not suggest he would lead in the direction the nation must go in the next four years. 
           Voters should give Mitt Romney a chance to correct the nation’s fiscal course and to implode the partisan gridlock that has shackled Washington and the rest of America..." Sphere: Related Content

Apology in Egypt and followed by Killings in Libya

 

Mitt Romney is being criticized by the Obama Administration and its enablers in the "mainstream press" for expressing his view that the US Embassy in Cairo should not have issued a statement condemning “the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims" shortly before the Embassy was stormed, as shown above, by protesters angry about a video depicting the prophet Mohammad unfavorably. Eight hours after the protesters attacked the Embassy, climbing the walls around it, tearing down American flags, trying to burn them and raising a black flag commonly used by Muslim extremists, the Embassy issued another statement saying "This morning's condemnation [of those who made a film "hurting the feelings" of Muslims] (issued before the protest began) still stands. As does our condemnation of the unjustified breach of our Embassy."

Romney's statement criticizing the official statements by the US Embassy in Cairo was issued four hours after the Embassy restated its original condemnation of those exercising their rights of free expression in the US and three hours after the first unconfirmed reports of a death of a US diplomat in Libya. Within minutes after Romney's statement regarding the Cairo Embassy's first inclination about the Mohammad video being to condemn those who made a film that could hurt the feelings of Muslims, the Obama Administration issued this statement from Washington, DC: "The statement by Embassy Cairo was not cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government.”

 

Twenty minutes after the Obama Administration officially rejected the Cairo Embassy's twice repeated apologies for hurting Muslim feelings - just as Mitt Romney had done earlier - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirmed that US diplomats had been killed in Benghazi, Libya. The attackers set the consulate on fire, as shown above. Today it was reported that the American ambassador to Libya was killed as a result of smoke inhalation during the fire. In Secretary Clinton's statement to the press condemning the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, she also added that “the U.S. deplores any intentional effort to denigrate the religious beliefs of others.”

So while US diplomats are being attacked and killed in North Africa, the Obama Administration tempered every response expressing outrage at the senseless violence by indicating sympathy for the thugs carrying out the violence because their religious "feelings" were hurt!

So why is Mitt Romney being criticized? Was it because he said that the US should not apologize for its values - that include freedom of expression and tolerance for differing religious beliefs - when our foreign service representatives are being literally attacked in other countries by those who use violence and bloodshed rather than peaceful protests to demonstrate their anger at the acts of private American citizens in our free society? Or was it because Romney made his statement before anyone in the Obama Administration in Washington clarified that the statements made hours before by the US Embassy in Cairo were not "cleared by Washington" and do not express the views of the US government.

Why did it take the Obama Administration about twelve hours to officially reject the Cairo Embassy's "apology" - which was later reconfirmed by the Embassy after the protests were underway? Did Romney wake up the Obama officials in Washington to what its Cairo foreign service officers said before and after the angry protests started?

It is clear that the Obama Administration came to the same views as Romney did about the misguided statements issued by its own Embassy in Cairo after Romney's statement of condemnation of the ill-advised attempt at appeasement, which was answered with the violent attacks in Cairo and Benghazi. We may find out in the days ahead whether the more violent attacks in Benghazi were inspired by the weak US response in Cairo earlier in the day or whether Muslim extremists possibly used the Cairo protests against the Mohammad film as a pretext to launch a pre-planned attack on the consulate, which was not as adequately protected as more fortified US Embassies generally are.

These events on September 11, 2012 also raise questions about why our foreign service personnel were not better protected in Muslim countries in that volatile part of the world on the eleventh anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, particularly after violent protests began to rage in Egypt.


The timeline for these events in North Africa on September 11, 2012 can be found at: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0912/81114.html?hp=t7_7.

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Malpractice in Academic Governance

I have been a member of the governing boards of two state universities (Northern Illinois University and Christopher Newport University), and I have been appalled at what I have read about the mismanagement  of the shared governance process at Penn State University and the University of Virginia in recent months.

At the University of Virginia, the Board Chair (called the Rector in Virginia) was reported to have talked to other Board members about her displeasure with the University's President due to the President's failure to give priority attention to pursuing new technological developments in higher education, such as those being offered by other prestigious schools, including Stanford, Harvard and MIT. In a memo explaining her criticism of the President, the Rector stated: "The University of Virginia has no centralized approach to dealing with this potentially transformational development."
                  
The Rector of UVA then arranged a meeting with the President and one other Board member to inform the President that the Board intended to fire her at its next meeting. When the Board held its meeting, the Rector followed through and called for a vote to fire the President. When this news hit the campus and the state, it created a firestorm of protest. The loudest protests came from faculty, students and alumni, who were taken completely by surprise by the Board's action.

The protest reached Richmond, and even the Governor, who appoints the members of each state university governing board, threatened the UVA Board to quickly act to resolve the controversy, or he would replace all members of the Board. Within a few days, the Board met again and withdrew its dismissal of the University's President.

Now, this week, it is reported that the University of Virginia has agreed to join a consortium of universities started by an organization named Coursera, which is part of a new wave of massive open online courses, or MOOCs. The development of MOOCs is a new trend that has started among leading institutions of higher education.

           "Coursera launched last fall at Stanford, then expanded in April to Princeton, Penn and Michigan. MIT and Harvard responded the following month by re-launching MIT’s global online initiative as edX, with a $30 million investment from each school. Coursera struck back this week by adding 12 new schools to its consortium, including U-Va., Duke, Johns Hopkins and CalTech..... Seven of the top national universities (as measured by U.S. News) are now involved in the MOOC push, along with U-Va., Georgia Tech and the universities of Illinois and Washington among the top publics." http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/college-inc/post/u-va-leaders-appear-not-to-have-known-of-looming-online-deal/2012/07/17/gJQAYXR9qW_blog.html

Following this announcement (the subject of which is directly related to the Board Rector's complaint about the University President when the Board tried to fire the President just one month earlier), it is being speculated in the press that neither the President nor the Board knew last month that some members of the faculty and staff at the University were working on this potential agreement with Coursera. How could that be?

Apparently, the Rector was correct in noting that there is "no centralized approach" at the University for dealing with potential opportunities regarding technological developments in higher education. Otherwise, the President would have known about this possible development when the Rector told her she was going to be fired over this issue.

If the Rector did not tell the President why she was displeased with the President, there must be a basic problem of communication between the President and the Board. There should be on-going dialogue between the University President and key members of the governing board to assure a common understanding of the institution's priorities and future direction. The President and the Board Rector should be communicating on a regular basis to determine the issues to be discussed at Board meetings. All important issues regarding the future direction of the institution are commonly covered in the Board's public meetings at which all board members are present. If there is disagreement about the University's direction, there would be discussion of those issues at the Board meetings, where representatives of other affected constituencies at the University, such as the faculty, administration staff and students, can be in attendance. That is how shared governance in higher education is intended to work.

No governing board should act to fire its President without full discussions of the issues involved. If the need for a better way to seize technological opportunities had been discussed at UVA Board meetings, the President would have learned about the Coursea project in development in order to brief the Board about it. If the Board had problems with Coursea approach, that could have been discussed. It is also likely that the University's leaders would have come to a common understanding of the need for a "centralized approach" to addressing such opportunities.

Penn State has been faced with a much more serious matter and a much more egregious failure of proper oversight by both the governing board and the University's President.

The recent trial and conviction of Jerry Sandusky (a retired football coach at Penn State) on 45 counts of abusing underage boys over 15 years has been thoroughly reported in nationwide media. Even after his retirement from Penn State, it was reported by witnesses that Sandusky committed some of the acts in question at Penn State facilities where he was given continued access.

Campus safety must be a priority for every institution of higher education. The failure to report crimes on campus to appropriate authorities is not only required by federal law, but is critical to properly protect the safety of the students attending the school, as well as the employees of the institution.

The two governing boards on which I was a member gave continuing priority attention to campus safety. We would get regular reports from the Chiefs of the Campus Police forces. We would discuss potential risks on campus due to new developments, such as construction sites, new traffic patterns or new walking paths. We sought assurances that campus police were providing adequate coverage of the campus during normal days that school was in session and were prepared for special events when large crowds and heavier than usual traffic was expected.

In addition, the universities' lawyers were consulted by university staff on any new development of significance where the university risked potential liability if proper steps were not taken to assure compliance with the university's legal responsibilities.The lawyers would then inform the governing board about significant liability risks or pending legal issues about which the board should know in order to competently fulfill its oversight responsibilites.

Based on my quick review of the Special Investigative Report recently issued by former FBI Director Louis Freeh's firm into the actions of Penn State officials with regard to Jerry Sandusky, it appears that the University's administration officials whose areas of responsibility included the football program (two of whom will be tried shortly for failure to report certain Sandusky allegations to proper authorities) did not consult University counsel or risk management staff in 1998 when a boy's mother reported an incident in a Penn State shower involving her son and Sandusky to local police. As a result of the police investigation, the District Attorney considered whether to file criminal charges but decided there was not enough evidence of a crime at that time.

Nevertheless, the boy's mother reported the incident to Child Services, and child psychologists interviewed the boy involved, as well as one of his friends who was identified by the first boy as also having experienced Sandusky's special attention in the University shower. While various investigations of the mother's report were being undertaken by campus, local and state officials, one of the top school administrators had the campus police chief keeping him informed of the progress of the investigations. It appears that the main reason he wanted to stay informed was so that he could give reports on the inquiries' developments to the University President and Head Football Coach Joe Paterno.

Even though the District Attorney's office, the state Child Services office and local police all followed up with interviews of the boys involved and Sandusky himself, none of the University staff aware of those investigations appear to have taken those inquiries as a call to action to determine if Sandusky had engaged in similiar acts with other boys in the past or to assure that no such incidents would ever reoccur. In 1998, only the state child services caseworker and the campus police detective engaged in the investigation of the mother's allegation took the step of talking to Sandusky about his behavior and telling him to stop showering with young boys.

After Sandusky retired in 1999, he was given continued access to University facilities. In 2001, he was observed by an assistant football coach again engaging in inappropriate behavior with a young boy in Penn State's showers. The assistant coach reported the incident to Head Coach Paterno, who reported it to the same two officials who had been kept informed of the 1998 investigations. These two officials informed the President about the new Sandusky incident, and one of them consulted the University's outside counsel. Since the advice given by counsel at that time is subject to the attorney-client privilege and all parties involved declined to be interviewed by Freeh's investigators, it is not known what was discussed between the University administrator and the outside counsel in 2001. However, it appears that again no effective action was taken to determine the extent of Sandusky's inappropriate conduct and who his victims may have been or to assure reporting to appropriate authorities or to institute effective steps to prevent future misconduct that could harm other minors.

It also appears that the University's General Counsel was not informed about any of the incidents until she received notice that a Grand Jury would be convened in late 2010. Furthermore, no University officials notified the University Board of Trustees about the 1998 investigation nor the similar allegations reported in 2001. Since university general counsels are commonly involved in all governing board meetings, it appears that the decision to consult outside counsel in 2001 was made to avoid disclosing the Sandusky incidents to Penn State's General Counsel who could have assured disclosure to the governing board long before they first learned about the Sandusky issues in 2011 after a state Grand Jury was convened.

Rather than inform the University's Board about the 2001 incident, the Penn State staff informed the board of the charitable organization (Second Mile Club) for which Sandusky then worked. This Club provided mentoring services to young boys that included sports activities. This gave Sandusky continued opportunities to work with young boys and to take them to Penn State sports facilities for work-outs that ended in showers.

Not only did the University administrative staff most familiar with the Sandusky events fail to take action to inform outside authorities or the University's governing board, but neither did Penn State's President who was repeatedly informed of the various allegations. Beyond that, the Freeh investigation found that the Board of Trustees had no committee structure for receiving reports of potential liability risks to the University.

When the press reported that the University President, Coach Paterno and several members of the University's Athletic Department testified before the state's Grand Jury in March 2011, one of the Trustees who read the reports asked for more information about the investigation. The University President and General Counsel did not brief the Board about the Grand Jury investigation until the Board's next meeting in May 2011. The briefing given did not fully describe the nature of the allegations against Sandusky or cover the potential liability or public relations issues that could arise if indictments would be issued. Apparently, no member of the Board made sufficient inquiries to learn more about the allegations involved or how the University's administration had been responding to the issues involved.

Freeh's report concluded that, from March 2011 (when press reports disclosed the Grand Jury proceedings) to November 2011, the Board did not take any action to protect the University, such as engaging outside counsel to conduct an independent investigation or preparing the University for the consequences or reactions to possible Grand Jury action.

The first time the President informed anyone on the governing board about the allegations was in April 2011 when he informed the Board Chairman about the Grand Jury investigation prior to the Board meeting in May. If the Board Chairman knew the gravity of the allegations and the potential exposure to the University, he did not inform any others on the Board until it was learned that Sandusky and the two University administrators discussed above were about to be indicted. After the indictments were announced in early November, Penn State's President decided to more fully inform the whole Board about the nature of the charges by conference call.

Within a few days after the full Board learned about the indictments, the Board Chair stepped aside and turned over his duties to the Vice Chair. The Board decided to terminate the President, Head Coach Paterno and one of the staff members. The other staff member was put on administrative leave. The Board also decided to start the special investigation by Louis Freeh's firm.

The conclusions of the Freeh investigation spell out continuing failures by key Penn State officials and the University's Board to effectively oversee University activities to assure proper safeguards are in place to protect the institution against severe liability risks and/or criminal acts within the University's scope of responsibility. There was apparently no standard practice to have the Penn State Board routinely informed about major risks or potential liabilities. Without such information, the Board would not be able to make needed inquiries about the extent of risks reported. Furthermore, even after the Board first learned about the Grand Jury proceeding through the press (not University officials), it took no action to seek more information about what led the state to convene the Grand Jury and how the proceeding might affect Penn State and the community that depends on it.

The boards on which I was a member had committees that provided oversight of specified areas of responsibilty, such as finances, campus life and safety, student affairs and academic matters. At the committee meetings, we would have the responsible staff members report on university activities and developments about which the board should be kept informed. The committee structure allowed us to ask questions and make further inquiries into matters of concern. Committee chairmen would then report on their committee meetings to the full board at its regular meetings. I found nothing in the Freeh report that suggests that such oversight mechanisms were in place at Penn State.

The Freeh report on the failures of Penn State's governance systems and the inappropriate actions of its key officials for more than a decade is a disturbing description of mismanagement and governing board malpractice that is shocking for such a well-known high profile institution. The report can be found at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303740704577522603440183734.html#project%3DFREEHREPORT%26articleTabs%3Dinteractive

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 UPDATE: On July 23, 2012, the NCAA announced sanctions against the Penn State football program as a result of the Sandusky case. Among the sanctions are common sense actions that should have been taken by the University's senior management and its Board of Trustees over a decade ago. Specifically, the following NCAA requirements could have been implemented by the University, instead of hiding the embarrassing criminal conduct of one of the football program's former coaches who continued to enjoy access to the school's facilities:

           "Penn State and the NCAA agreed that the university will follow a number of conditions and requirements imposed by the association. Among those is that Penn State adopt all the recommendations in the Freeh Report. Among those are that the university:
                 —Hire an independent monitor of the athletic department who will report to the NCAA, the Big Ten Conference and the Penn State Board of Trustees quarterly on the school’s progress and make recommendations to help implement the terms of the agreement. The selection of the monitor will be done by the NCAA, in consultation with the Big Ten and the university
                 —Appoint a compliance officer and have him or her lead a council of faculty and senior administrators that will oversee ethical and legal matters.
                 —Create a hotline for anonymous questions or disclosure of issues regarding athletic department and NCAA issues.
                 —Provide yearly training on “issues of ethics, civility, standards of conduct and reporting of violations.”    http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/colleges/ncaa-and-big-ten-sanctions-of-penn-state-announced-monday/2012/07/23/gJQA5Upb4W_story.html?tid=pm_sports_pop
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Independence Day for All as Explained by Abraham Lincoln

On the 4th of July, Comedian Chris Rock stirred up the age old question of what Independence Day means to Blacks in America since most of their ancestors were slaves at the founding of our country. Chris Rock sent this tweet out on the 4th of July: "Happy white peoples independence day the slaves weren't free but I'm sure they enjoyed fireworks."

In 1852, Frederick Douglass, a far more eloquent speaker than Chris Rock and a freed slave who actually experienced the horrors of that "peculiar institution", gave a speech to a white audience shortly after July 4th in which he said: "The blessings in which you this day rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me."

Douglass, of course, made that statement while slavery still existed in America; not in the 21st Century when many Blacks like Chris Rock and others in business, entertainment, sports and other professions have become very successful in a more free and equitable country (in which the incumbent President is of African descent) than Frederick Douglass could have never imagined would ever exist from his vantage point in the mid-19th Century.

But before becoming President of the United States in 1861 with the hot winds of civil war starting to blow, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech that foretold how the aspirational values expressed in the Declaration of Independence in 1776 would lead America to become more free and equitable in generations yet to come: 

"They [the Founders] grasped not only the whole race of men, then living, but they reached forward and seized upon the farthest posterity. They erected a beacon to guide their children and their children's children, and the countless myriads who should inhabit the earth in other ages. Wise statesmen as they were, they knew the tendency of prosperity to breed tyrants, and so they established these great self-evident truths, that when, in the distant future, some man, some faction, some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, none but white men, or none but Anglo-Saxon white men were entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their posterity might look up again to the Declaration of Independence and take courage to renew the battle which their fathers began, so that truth and justice and mercy and all the humane and Christian Virtues might not be extinguished from the land; so that no man hereafter would dare to limit and circumscribe the great principles on which the Temple of Liberty was being built."
(Abraham Lincoln's Speech at Lewiston, Illinois on August 17, 1858 during debates with Senator Stephen Douglas)

Let us hope that such words of inspiration would find their way into our public discourse more often than the ill-advised tweets and Internet statements of celebrities and others that seem to dominate news cycles in our modern 21st Century society with its easy access to wide-spread dissemination of words expressed by anyone with a smart phone, laptop or tablet linked to the Internet.


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My thanks to an excellent Townhall.com article by Ken Blackwell, a contributing editor at Townhall.com, who is a senior fellow at the Family Research Council and the American Civil Rights Union, for inspiring my thoughts and identifying the quotes above. Blackwell's article can be found at http://townhall.com/columnists/kenblackwell/2012/07/06/chris_rocks_tweet_beyond_the_pale. Sphere: Related Content

Liberals Preview HBO's "Game Change"

The liberal entertainment crowd mixed with liberal Washington elites last night in DC to preview the HBO movie "Game Change" that focuses on the McCain-Palin campaign of 2008. The Washington Post sent reporters to cover the event, and the Post story today included this observation:

"Why dramatize those events?

To help us make sense of the nonsensical? To merely amuse ourselves with the highlights of a heyday? To fashion a moral out of a morass?

'It allows us to ask questions that are profound to society,' said Strong, the screenwriter. 'Should celebrity and charisma be a deciding factor in choosing our leaders?'

The film’s answer is “no,” and this moral seemed well received by audience members, who, in unscientific exit polls, gave “Game Change” a thumbs-up." http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/game-change-premiere-lets-washington-insiders-relive-drama-of-election-2008/2012/03/08/gIQAvRtS1R_story.html

So the screenwriter apparently thought the key message to be shared with the HBO viewers is that "celebrity and charisma" should not be deciding factors in choosing our leaders. Then how does that explain the election of Barack Obama as President? What did he have to offer to voters in 2008 other than "celebrity and charisma"? He had no extensive list of accomplishments in his political life.

Obama had been a US Senator for only four years when he was elected to the Presidency and most of those four years were spent campaigning for President. It has been reported frequently that people in the crowds at Obama rallies have fainted from the aura of Obama's sterling charisma. He certainly gained a huge celebrity status as the darling of the liberal Democratic Party class and the mainstream media as the first African-American candidate to gain his party's nomination for President.

Beyond Obama's brief term as a US Senator, he had served in the Illinois legislature, worked as a law professor at the University of Chicago and gained experience as a community organizer. He had never been a manager or executive in charge of running anything other than his own legislative offices and political campaigns. So making a wild guess that most of those who attended the DC preview showing of "Game Change" last night voted for Obama in 2008, how could they agree with the screenwriter's moral that "celebrity and charisma" should not be "a deciding factor in choosing our leaders"?

If they were thinking of Sarah Palin's charisma in making such a conclusion about the movie, it should be pointed out to these Obama fans that Palin is in Alaska, not in a federal office. Sarah Palin and John McCain were not chosen to be our leaders. The candidate who won was the person who had nothing to offer but "charisma and celebrity".

We can only hope that this crowd will take the screenwriter's message to heart in this year's election and think about how well Obama's charisma and celebrity have improved our economy and uplifted the spirit of Americans who are unemployed, seeking jobs, fighting foreclosure of their homes, whose 401k accounts have been diminished and, although recently graduated from college, are still living in their parents' homes for lack of opportunity.

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Since writing the post above, I have now seen the HBO movie. The movie actually refers to both Sarah Palin and Barack Obama as having the attributes of charisma and celebrity. However, McCain's campaign manager is shown saying that there is an important difference between the two: while Sarah Palin cannot name a Supreme Court case (referring to her interview by Katie Couric), Barack Obama was actually a law professor. What is omitted from that phony comparison is that Obama was not running against Sarah Palin. He was running against John McCain, a war hero with three decades of experience in the US House and Senate.

So if the screenwriter's point is that, in electing our Presidents, charisma and celebrity should not be deciding factors, I would agree. Sphere: Related Content

The Democrat Walk-Out Trend

It seems that ever since Tea Party backed Republican candidates won Governorships and majority control of several state legislatures in the 2010 elections, the elected Democrats in those states, apparently not used to being the minority party, have responded by walking out on their duties as state officials to prevent action by the majority party officials and/or Republican Governors trying to reduce government spending.

The scene above shows the public union backed protesters who descended upon the Wisconsin state Capitol in early 2011 when newly elected Governor Scott Walker introduced legislation to gain control over union contracts and increase state union workers' contributions to their pensions. To try to prevent a vote on Walker's proposals, the Democratic Senators of Wisconsin fled the state so a quorum could not be convened to allow the Senate to vote on the legislation. After a month of protests and litigation by the unions, the budget bill finally became law.

Wisconsin was only the first such "Walk Out" to gain national attention. Since then Democrats in other states have followed the same tactic. Early this year, House Democrats in Indiana walked out. The House Democratic leader said "his members had been forced to boycott the first day of the new session to thwart a Republican effort to quickly ram the so-called right-to-work measure through the house.... Without the Democrats in attendance, the House does not have the quorum it needs to conduct business. Under the proposed law, employees at unionized private workplaces would not be required to pay union dues. Supporters say the move would attract jobs to Indiana. Critics call it union busting."

But this was not the first time Indiana Democrats fled the scene of their official duties. "Last year, House Democrats fled the state to neighboring Illinois to avoid voting on a similar right-to-work bill and other legislation they viewed as anti-labor and anti-public education. The bill died, and other bills were altered. The absentees were fined and a bill that raised the amount of money that could be collected from absent legislators was enacted." http://news.yahoo.com/walkout-indiana-democrats-stalls-anti-union-bill-005825947.html

The Indiana House Speaker said there would be no fines involved with this year's absences, but he criticized the Democrats for failing to do the jobs they were elected to do.

In Iowa, House Democrats walked out to protest proposed new gun laws under consideration early this year. "One bill would allow people to use deadly force to protect themselves and the other called for writing gun rights protections into the Iowa Constitution. The second measure would have to be approved by another legislative assembly next year and then be referred to voters." http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/iowa-house-approves-2iowa-house-approves-2-1367592.html The forty Iowa Democratic House members returned to carry out their elected duties after they decided that their action had made their point.

Now this tactic has taken a new twist in my home state of Virginia. Instead of walking out, the Democratic Senators in Virginia (who hold 20 seats in the state Senate, the same number as the Republicans) are simply voting "No" on the state budget bill which requires 21 votes to pass. One local newspaper called the Democrats' action a "tantrum" because the committee chairmanships were not shared between Republicans and Democrats. Instead Republican Lt. Governor Bill Bolling determined that he could cast tie-breaking votes on committee assignments under the state constitution. As a result, Republicans chair all Senate committees to the disgust of the Democrats. However, Bolling cannot vote on budget bills, which has given the Democrats a new weapon to demonstrate their disapproval over committee assignments.

The Virginia Senate Democrats objected to the budget bill because "it didn't include enough money for public schools. It didn't have enough for safety net programs. It didn't sufficiently buy down the cost of impending road tolls here and in Northern Virginia.

All are decent points that deserved to be heard. But not one of the 20 Democratic senators brought up those concerns or any others when the budget came up for a vote two hours earlier. Instead, Democrats sat silently and pressed a button to vote 'Nay.'" http://hamptonroads.com/2012/03/democrats-tantrum-over-states-budget

Of particular concern to me is that my own newly elected state Democratic Senator (for whom I did not vote) did not even show up to vote on the budget bill since she apparently knew that the fix was in to prevent 21 votes for the bill. Instead, State Senator Barbara Favola appeared on "Hardball with Chris Matthews" on MSNBC to discuss the "Republican War on Women", as she described the bills regulating abortion in Virginia that have been under consideration.

Since Senator Favola's absence did not affect the outcome due to the Democrats' straight party line "Nay" vote, she said her television appearance served the "greater good". Favola was not the only Senator to miss the vote. Two other Democratic Senators failed to vote as well. Presumably they were also serving the "greater good" by attacking Republicans somewhere instead of performing the duties to which they were elected. Sphere: Related Content

Government Waste and Abuse

For the third consecutive year, the U.S. government posted an annual budget deficit in excess of $1 trillion for the fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30, 2011. The shortfall totaled $1.3 trillion for fiscal 2011, up from $1.29 trillion in 2010 and became the second-highest deficit on record, according to Treasury Department data. The highest deficit ever was $1.42 trillion in 2009. Next week the White House will release its budget for next year which will show an even higher deficit for fiscal 2012 than in 2011, up from $1.3 trillion to $1.33 trillion.

Furthermore, as of January 31, 2012, the gross federal debt of the US government was $15.356 trillion. With the annual gross domestic product (GDP) at the end of 2011 at $15.087 trillion, the total public debt outstanding reached 101.8% of the country's entire GDP.

It would certainly be appropriate for our federal government leaders and workers to handle their responsibilities as public servants by prudently spending our taxpayers' money in a manner that would eliminate the continuing deficits. But after three years in a row of spending more than $1 trillion in excess of receipts (and a projection of a fourth consecutive year), it does not seem that they are even trying to be careful in how public funds are spent nor does it appear that there is much of an effort to find ways to cut expenses and reduce the mounting deficits.

Furthermore, they are not even paying their "fair share" of taxes to help increase the revenue side of the budget. As Vice President Joe Biden stated during the 2008 campaign, are government employees "doing their patriotic duty" by paying their taxes?

President Barack Obama has preached that all Americans should pay their fair share in taxes, but a government report finds that tens of thousands of federal employees -- from staffers in Congress to those in federal agencies and even Obama's executive office -- collectively owe the government billions in back taxes.

"Data from the Internal Revenue Service show that more than 279,000 federal employees and retirees owed $3.4 billion in back income taxes as of Sept. 30, 2010. The data includes 467 employees of the House of Representatives, or about 4.2% of the workforce, who owed more than $8.5 million. In the Senate, 217 employees, or about 3% of the workforce, owed $2.13 million. Obama's staff was not immune, either, with 36 people in Obama's executive office of nearly 1,800 workers -- about 2% -- owing the government a total of $833,970 in back taxes." http://money.msn.com/tax-tips/post.aspx?post=ab789642-9f66-414f-8683-8dbc20504dc0

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In addition, members of Congress abuse the appropriations process when deciding where to spend public funds.

"Some members of Congress send tax dollars to companies, colleges and community groups where their spouses, children and parents work as salaried employees, lobbyists or board members, according to an examination of federal disclosure forms and local public records by The Washington Post.

A U.S. senator from South Dakota helped add millions to a Pentagon program his wife evaluated as a contract employee. A Washington congressman boosted the budget of an environmental group that his son ran as executive director. A Texas congresswoman guided millions to a university where her husband served as a vice president.

Those three members are among 16 who have taken actions that aided entities connected to their immediate families....

Members of Congress have more leeway than executive branch officials or individuals in publicly held companies, who operate under stricter conflict-of-interest rules that generally prevent them from taking actions that might benefit businesses or institutions where their relatives work. The legislators set and enforce their own rules, giving themselves broad latitude to take steps that can end up directly benefiting their immediate family." http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/congress/capitol-assets-some-legislators-send-millions-to-groups-connected-to-their-relatives/2012/01/10/gIQAyrzdxQ_story.html?hpid=z4

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The tendency for government officials to misuse public funds is unfortunately not limited to federal government workers in the Washington, DC area. The Washington Post has also reported that about 60 former D.C. workers have cashed unemployment checks they were not entitled to.

Shortly after the first Washington Post story appeared "the District government suspended nearly 90 employees for receiving the payments. Another 40 former employees were also implicated. City officials estimate that $800,000 in benefits were doled out to working city employees since 2009." http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/dc-wire/post/dcps-bus-drivers-among-top-offenders-in-city-unemployment-fraud-nathan-says/2012/02/08/gIQAuMABzQ_blog.html?wpisrc=nl_buzz

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Even County government officials in states surrounding the DC area take advantage of their access to taxpayer funds. Documents obtained by The Washington Post show that 95 Fairfax County, Virginia workers returned to the Fairfax County payroll for at least part of last year or longer after participating in a retirement option that allows early pension payments to be deposited in interest paying accounts for three years before actual retirement. Several employees who took the option last year are eligible to earn more than $100,000 a year in salary as they continue working for the County.

"The [Fairfax County] Board of Supervisors has launched a broad review of retirement benefits as many state and local governments find themselves struggling to fund current needs and the promises made to former employees. Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) wants to shift some state pension costs to counties; Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) has asked state workers to contribute more to their retirements. In Fairfax, critics have argued that pension costs could become unsustainable." http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/for-some-fairfax-public-employees-retirement-means-collecting-a-nest-egg--and-returning-to-work/2012/01/25/gIQApShDvQ_story_1.html

We can, at least, be thankful that Virginia's Governor recognizes one logical solution to the pension cost liability that state and local governments face in the current slow economy. As noted above, Gov. McDonnell is actually asking the government workers themselves to help pay for their retirement benefits.

Contributing to your own benefits and carefully spending your organization's funds to avoid waste and excessive costs are practices that are common in the private sector because continuing deficit spending outside of government leads to bankruptcy or business failure. Unfortunately, governments have no such swords hanging over their operations since they think they can just raise taxes or keep selling bonds to China to fund continuing public operations and payrolls.

In the meantime, if government workers cannot be frugal and prudent in their use of the public's money, it would be nice if public workers would at least pay the taxes they owe and follow the law on unemployment benefits.
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