Liberals Make Up Your Mind

Democrats have a great strategy when it comes to taking down Republicans.  It helps that they have to media to be their mouthpiece.  The strategy is simple, take an issue and attack Republicans on both sides of the issue.

The prime example of this is high gas prices.

Liberal Criticism #1 - Gas prices are so high because evil gas company executives are greedy.
Liberal Criticism #2 - Evil gas company executive was to do more drilling and build refineries and they don't care about the environment.

Evaluation of Criticism #1 - Liberal are taking the side of the poor and attacking greed.  How can the poor who have to travels to their jobs afford to work with gas prices so high.  Let's punish gas companies by taxing them more.  Gas companies need to lower their price so that gas is more affordable to the working man.

Evaluation of Criticism #2 - Liberals are taking the side of the environment. Don't let gas companies do anymore drilling or upgrade and build new refineries, because gas and cars are destroying the planet.  Gas prices should be high, you evil SUV owner.

How can you win?  You can't because to the liberal it's not about improving society.  It's about maintaining political power.  Democrats need to take Republicans down, so they will attack for the sake of attack.

You have to remember the Immutable Law of Liberals, they don't need any ideas, they just need to be in office.

Dark Tuesday

As you can tell, I'm a conservative.  I was very disappointed by the results of last night's election.  I may not be in tune with Governor Schwartzenegger from a social standpoint, I am in sync with him on the public policy agenda.

He supported four very good pieces of legislation and they all when down to defeat.

The problem was that the propositions in and of themselves were good and smart ideas.  They just happen to go up against people we should admire - Teachers, Police, Firefighters and Nurses.  All four groups deserve a lot of respect.  Unfortunately, they were made the targets of these propositions, when the real targets should have been the unions they belong to.

Proposition 74 - I love teachers and they deserve to be paid more, but at the same time, a principal should be able to fire bad teachers.  Bad teachers should not be allow to hide behind tenure.  The issue is not what's in the best interest of bad teachers, it's what's in the best interest for our children.

Proposition 75 - I love teachers, police officers, firefights and they deserve to be paid more.  Their unions on the other hand should represent their members.  If they did, there would have been no reason to even have this proposition on the ballot.  The unions spent $100 million on political campaign. If the liberals think the money on the Iraq war should have gone to inner cities, then money to political campaigns should go to the membership, instead of raising dues to pay for ads.

Proposition 76 - I love schools and it's important to educate children no matter race or economic position.  But at the same time you can not hamper a state's budget with guaranteed funds.  If the state is going through an economic crisis, the governor and legislature should be allowed to reallocate funds as necessary.  This makes sense to me.  Otherwise the only alternative is to raise taxes.

Proposition 77 - Who do I trust to draw district boundaries?  Politicians who want to keep their jobs or an independent council of judges and the people of California.  Think about it.

I feel better now.

Ng's in the News

Kim Ng, Assistant General Manager, for the Los Angeles Dodgers was the first person to interview for the main post as General Manager for the Dodgers.

 

Other famous Ng's...

 

Rita Ng, Miss California

Evelyn Ng, Professional Poker Player

Charles Ng, Serial Killer

 

I thought this was interesting.

Supreme Court Candidate Alito

So far so good on Bush's Nominee.  One Democrat senator from the Gang of 14 has complimented Judge Alito on his openmindedness and void of political agenda.

Here's an interest word from AP - In college, Samuel Alito led a student conference that urged legalization of sodomy and curbs on domestic intelligence, a sweeping defense of privacy rights he said were under threat by the government and the dawning computer age.

Three decades before the Supreme Court decriminalized gay sex, Alito declared on behalf of his group of fellow Princeton students that "no private sexual act between consenting adults should be forbidden." Alito also called for an end to discrimination against homosexuals in hiring.

But they saw in the 1971 report a prescient thinker taking on issues ahead of their time, including the need for computer encryption, stronger oversight of domestic intelligence and curbs on the surveillance powers of states.

"The document itself is amazing," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "It is a dramatic statement in support of the right of privacy.

We'll see what's to come.

Prop 75 Impact

Will Prop 75 have an impact?  In Utah, they passed a similar law and found political participation drop from 68% to 7% and in Washington 80% to 11%.  The key point to notice is that again, union leadership did not speak for the constituents.

In California, the teachers' union spent 60 million between 2000 to 2004 on political campaigns for its 335,000.  That's $36,000 per member per year.  What do you think would happen to the quality of education and the happiness of teacher had the union put $36,000 in a retirement account for each member every year?

How about this?  What if they union took half $18,000 per member and placed that in a retirement account, and spent the rest on political causes?  I don't necessarily support that, but it's staggering to think about the possibilities.

Proposition 75 - Why Liberals Lie

I'm always frustrated during election times.  Mostly because of the lying sound bites you get from both sides of the aisle (although mostly from Democrats).  Today is Prop 75.

In a nutshell, Prop 75 requires written permission from union members to use a portion of their union dues for political use.  For example, union dues can be used for supporting or opposing propositions or candidates.

Under current law, a union member can opt out.  Under proposition 75, a union member must grant permission.

I obviously support this law.  Recently unions have raised union dues specifically to fund political campaigns.  It is not fair for a person to have their dues raised without their permission and then used to support a cause they don't believe in.  That's why the AFL-CIO lost some major unions recently - http://www.mypalal.com/blog/UnionsBolt.html. The AFL-CIO spent the majority of their time and money supporting political campaigns that they lost their membership base.

The reality is there would be no need for Proposition 75 if the unions spoke on behalf of their membership.  Then again, if the unions did actually represent their membership, they have nothing to fear from Proposition 75.