Tucson City Council Debate and Vote No on Pima Bonds!

 

Tucson City Council Candidate Debate

I attended the Tucson City Council Debate hosted by the League of Women Voters on October 14, 2015.  All the candidates were finally in attendance, as the Democrat council members stood up the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Debate and I was wondering if they would stand up the League of Women Voters too, but all the Democrats did show up last night so the show went on!

It was obvious from the outset that the Democrats were committed to more and more subsidies and more and more borrowing and spending for short term goals.  None of them had a grasp of the gravity of the city’s financial situation, which resembles Detroit.  They were all proud of their accomplishments and want to continue the program.  Their emphasis on constant growth is naïve.   They are like a kid with her first job looking at Corvettes in the showroom, willing to commit to 27 years of heavy debt to just get her hands on the car. 

They are willing to mortgage the future and spend the money now.

We live in a constrained environment.  Water resources are getting scarce.  If drought conditions are declared on the Colorado, we could be impacted right here in Tucson.  Yet the city council is for more annexation and more growth, instead of making an attempt to recognize environmental constraints on dreams of grandeur.   They need to do the job.  The job is to do what the charter says.  Instead we get red light cameras and Parkwise, neither of which raise money for the general fund.  If there were no Parkwise, people could park mostly free and the city would not have to subsidize Parkwise and money would be saved.  Since the city gets negligible income from the red light cameras, the money is being sucked out of the city.  These city council members support these boondoggles and they are not doing their jobs, as per the city charter.   Look at the streets!

The Republican Candidates offered a refreshing view of what could be different in Tucson.  They actually talked about paying down the debt instead of adding to it and they even talked about not raising taxes and the benefits of lower taxes to the local economy.  Kelly Lawton wistfully remembers the Tucson of yesterday, when the streets were good and the economy was healthy and small businesses were king.  I remember those days too and I believe that the era of big government in Tucson is literally bankrupt.  The government should not be a prime source of jobs for the community.  The private sector, the university and the base should be the sources, not bond projects.   

Vote Bill Hunt, Kelly Lawton and Margaret Burkholder for Tucson City Council!

Shirley Scott was so jubilant over the spending in her ‘district’ that was paid for at taxpayer expense, which probably benefitted her supporters’ financial interests!  Of course Ms. Scott is for more borrowing and more money sent out of state, just like other government officials who want nothing more than to get their hands on all that money right now and spend it while it takes decades to pay back.  Ms. Scott is proud of all that development and wants all annexation possible and no doubt is promoting more and more water hookups while the water table and the Colorado River drops.  Archaic attitudes like Ms. Scott appears to hold should be voted out of office.  Ms. Scott wants a $1.2 billion debt added to the $1.4 billion debt the county already has.  It should be in Ripley’s Believe it or Not!

This bond thing is a fight over money and who controls it.  The vested interests want to reap the luxury living gained through taxpayer investment, which they do not call profit but it is a handsome living for the few.  They just set up deals, without financial risk to themselves, which true private enterprise cannot do. 

Mr. Hecker was really interested in Rio Nuevo and now he takes a titanic interest in these bond proposals.  I am uncomfortable with those same old names popping up as the prospect of a new free trough opening up again, just like Rio Nuevo.

The problem with Mr. Hecker’s premise that such a small amount per year increase in taxes benefits everyone through these bond projects that he and his friends control.  They are attempting to use the force of taxes to amass money quickly through borrowing to pay for projects they control and have chosen to put on the ballot.  It’s so easy for them to get something on the ballot.  And it is so difficult to fight their choice of projects and contractors. 

They want $780,000,000, which creates a debt of about $1.2 billion because of the enormous amount of interest paid for the privilege of allowing this group of people to amass and spend this huge sum.  Do you want these people to control this much money, leaving a debt for the children to pay?  Shall the sins of the Fathers be visited upon the children?  In this case, YES, the debt is said to extend 27 years into the future……

I don’t want these people to amass and spend the surplus for the next 27 years.  That is too much money for too long and it is too expensive.  I think the money should remain in the hands of the people to spend as they see fit.  I think the county should take available revenue, pay down the huge debt without rollovers, maintain what the law requires and stop raising property taxes.  Rents go up, payments go up, apartment owners and cooperatives are hit with higher taxes, and everybody pays more to maintain the control and collection of huge money from the little people who might rather use that money every year to buy gifts for grandchildren, rather than to pay for parks and amenities for developers far from the old neighborhoods of the south side. 

The county is trying to get more money for roads when they already have authorization for millions in road bonds.  Why?  They are like the four year old who heaps his plate and reaches for more. 

Mr. Hecker said that private enterprise doesn’t build libraries and museums.   Apparently in Mr. Hecker’s world, government is the end all be all and private enterprise is negligible unless it’s a favored contractor.  Remember the Carnegie Library chain throughout the United States?  Andrew Carnegie financed these through money obtained through private enterprise!  Has Mr. Hecker ever visited a private museum?  Like the Daughters of the American Revolution museum in Washington DC?  Wow!  There are even private enterprise transportation systems!  Look at Uber!  Call your local taxi!   Maybe people would rather spend their money on Uber rather than subsidizing the union controlled bus system milking the taxpayers.  Mr. Hecker is trying to justify the increase in the debt load by defining the meaning of government to include exclusive rights over the building and control of cultural activities and transportation systems.  He is wrong. 

Suppose that $1.2 Billion remains in the Tucson economy the next 27 years instead of going out on these chosen projects?  What could happen if the county were to pay down the debt, which IS the highest in Arizona?

• Taxes might stabilize, which is good for predicting a business model.
• Rents might stabilize. 
• Taxes could even go down, as the public debt is paid off. 
• More ready cash would be in the coffers at the county due to debt paydown.
• Road maintenance, transportation, parks and other services could be paid for with the cash instead of more borrowing and rollovers.
• The debt on the HURF fund would be paid off, freeing up cash to be used in road maintenance.
• Infrastructure conditions could be improved without further debt.

About the Pima bond proposal:  Say everybody has at least $50 a year to spend instead of paying the $50 a year for 27 years or even saving the money and they would have $13,500 plus interest in their personal accounts.  If you own more expensive properties, the amount is even greater.   If people spent some of the money eating out, local restaurants would benefit financially.  If the money were spent on goods and services locally, this money would circulate through the economy many times throughout the years, bringing prosperity by circulating the money locally.  Local businesses would benefit by the money in the economy and from tax relief.

If the bond proposals are passed, this money will be concentrated in the hands of a few contractors and their workers right now for them to spend.  Huge sums of the money will go out of state to pay interest on the debt, which will be of no local benefit.  Contractors using temps from outside Pima County are often hired, which takes money out of the county.  Sure, we get these proposed structures and improvements but so much more could be had if the debt were paid down instead of increasing.  The problem of maintenance of existing facilities has not been met by Pima County and has not been addressed in the budget, yet they want to go into debt to build more facilities to neglect.  Part of their job is to have an ongoing maintenance program that is successful using the amount of funding available.  That is the job and they are not doing it and I don’t think they should have more power to borrow more money. 

VOTE NO ON PIMA BONDS

Media Jackals and the need for Populism

 

Media Jackals and the need for Populism

The Drama plays out as the Media struggles to control the GOP Presidential Primary.  All they wanted was a clash of the dynasties that are beholden to the same financial interests that brought us the Crash, Derivatives, Too Big to Fail and all the other bailouts that ushered in stagnant incomes for the middle class, high levels of poverty and the rich got richer and very little of it trickled down.  The Media is now part of the establishment, much like the state owned Media in other countries.  Their involvement in Media manipulation is reprehensible and does not serve the people as in freedom of the press.   

The Democrat Presidential Primary was said to be all in Bill and Hillary’s control group until Sen. Bernie Sanders dared challenge the Democrat establishment.  Where is the data about the sizes of the crowds Bill and Hillary attract?  I am tired of being ‘directed’ by the Media instead of the Media reporting what is going on.  Of course the Media reserves the right to tell you which ‘fact’ they prefer, like the annoying practice of cutting off a live speech in favor of an interpretation of the speech made by a talking head.  Are they assuming people are stupid and need their assistance in interpreting?  The USA population is extremely literate and I do believe they can decide for themselves what some candidate is really saying.

The CNN people are gleefully reporting that Mr. Trump was hiding after the ‘controversy’ he stirred up by not ‘correcting’ a member of the audience.  Freedom of speech apparently needs defense against these members of the Media.   The only ‘controversy’ about the ‘incident’ was stirred up by members of the Media and now they actually expect viewers to take them seriously as they vilify Mr. Trump for not doing what they thought he should.   I really don’t care what members of the Media believe about the candidates.  I don’t even want to know what they think.  The way they are going about ‘reporting’ is interspersing their opinions into the ‘news’ instead of having an official time for commentary that is clearly defined as an editorial.  They blur the line between fact and opinion and fiction. 

An e message going around shows that the Democrat Machine has placed friends, beneficiaries and relatives in key media positions.  Instead of appealing directly to the people, they chose to go behind the scenes to restrict and slant the ‘news’ they feed to a gullible public.  It’s despicable and is an insult to the intelligence of the American people. 

In just a few minutes, I heard at least six negative references to the GOP frontrunner made by the ‘journalists’ at CNN.  I am not so foolish as to fall for this kind of mental manipulation.  Why should a candidate correct a questioner?  Who decided that?  Bash ‘em!  Set the candidates on each other and report a biased result?  Give us all a break!   And this morning CNN is touting candidates response to Trump’s Obama comment, which was actually made by a member of the audience.  It was too much for Rick Santorum, who put down the Media for even dealing with the fake ‘issue’.  So I see some members of the Media as wildly prejudicial and totally unfair to Mr. Trump.  The Jackals of the Media attack at will and if there is no reason to attack, they make one up. 

Is the fight breaking down as a struggle between the Populists and Wall Street?  It seems that the candidates on both sides are lining up for this epic event and the Media is on the side of Wall Street instead of reporting the news from a balanced perspective.  I detest the idea of the Media choosing presidential candidates.  It’s not their job.    

So why would a struggle between Wall Street and the Populists occur?  A recent opinion on Reuter’s recalled the ‘financialization’ of the nation and the concentration of money in the hands of the few as a result of financial manipulation, rather than in investing in a business and making money on the free market by providing jobs, services and goods.  I always envisioned this as basketballs of money being thrown back and forth above our heads, like lottery balls that never hit your number. 

This financialization has cost jobs and huge sums sit in offshore accounts and I guess there is no more moral imperative to invest in the good old USA.  So where is the reporting on this important topic?  It’s obvious that Mr. Trump is correct when he says some of the financial people need less preferential treatment than they are now getting from the tax code.  Dirty fighting is nothing new from Wall Streeters or politicians but the freedom of the Media should be sacrosanct against dirty influence.   

Rumor has it that Wall Street backed both sides in the Presidential Elections and so won the election, kind of like China allegedly buying ISIS oil and funding it by selling goods to the USA markets?  The emergence of a populist candidate is astonishing in the face of all this certainty that the most well funded candidates will compete and one of them will continue the status quo in favor of continuing the financialization trend. 

Mr. Trump is a populist who made good and learned along the way and I believe he truly wants to do right by the people of this nation.  Investing in the nation and in job creation and grand projects and small businesses and a flowing of money back in the hands of the people with creative employment, services and innovation needs to happen now. 

Responsibilities of the Press

The press has succeeded in turning the next presidential campaign into the social event of the season, complete with raw personal criticism and a neglect of the true issues of the campaign.  The press has a lack of respect for the electoral process, given their willingness to exploit anything that leaves them in control of the discussion. 

Why is there so little on the issues and so much on the personalities?  Let’s talk about the issues instead.

Possible Issues?  How about:

• Defense capabilities and condition of the military and veterans and bases
• The economy and joblessness and interest rates and taxes
• National Infrastructures  
• Forced unionization
• The European Union
• The Middle East
• The Orient
• Latin America

I know there are more issues, many more………

I’m tired of seeing the talking press heads insisting that this presidential campaign be held in the arena of the trivial instead of the land of real issues.  The press is covering the sideshow instead of the main act, which leads viewers to believe the sideshow is the main act.  These candidates need to give detailed analyses of issues so the voters can make intelligent choices and the job of the press is to report on the stands of the candidates on various issues that are of importance to our nation. 

The Media and Self Regulation

To the Media

To the Media and Self-Regulation

 

I just heard on the news that the feds had requested the press stop showing stale footage of the Middle East while discussing new news about it.  I know it is inappropriate for anyone to tell the press what to cover……

However, the stale footage issue is important.  I suggest that the press self-regulate and do this:

If you are showing footage more than x days old, either label it as such or announce it as such.  It is misleading to show old footage while you are discussing what is happening now.  Match the visuals with the actual new news.

Keep track of how many times you show a segment.  Pete and Repeat loses news hounds and if it goes on for days and days like on CNN, it loses the casual viewers also as they see there is no new news and not everybody wants to see the same thing from yet another slant. 

At least program a large, important prime time world news segment that is inviolate and dependable for the viewers.  Viewers are being kept in the dark, like mushrooms, when there’s a whole world out there.    I think part of your duties as Press is to inform and thus educate the public.   

‘Breaking News’ should be reserved for x number presentations as such before it is relegated to normal news.  And ‘breaking news’ is not really just another ‘expert’ opinion.  Avoid trivialization and only use ‘breaking news’ for the most important NEW stories. 

Seek footage that matches the news you are talking about.  If Ferguson is discussed, show the streets as they are now and if you show riots, put the date and time on the segments during the whole segment run.  Matching the view with the words is part of honesty. 

Show respect for the stories you are covering by leaving out the drum beat in the background during news summaries.

 

I love all you reporters who risk their lives to give us the worldwide information our citizens need and crave.  My appreciation goes out to all of you and the people who prepare and present the news in the media, the technicians who bring it to us and everybody else who shares in the process.   

Tucson Unified School District Gives Raise

 

I read about TUSD giving teachers all a $500 a year raise and then noted the fact that all other district employees will get a 2.5% raise. 

Teachers make from $32,000 to $71,000 a year with an average of about $58,000 per year, which shows this is an older workforce.  $58,000 a year would yield about $1450 at 2.5% but $500 is the raise.   There are 1750 regular teachers and 760 special education teachers and the teacher raise is expected to cost about $875,000.

Certificated Administrators make from $58,000 - $107,000 and their raise at 2.5% is expected to cost about $400,000.  There are 237 administrators.     

This raise is expected to cost $1,275,000 for certificated staff, with administrators getting 31% of the certificated money while they are just 13% of the total.   

The Superintendent’s contract has a base salary of $210,000 but is pumped up by bennies to $247,000 and possibly more.   At $210,000, a 2.5% raise would generate $5,250 for the Superintendent.  If the raise is based on $247,000, it would be more.

To quote from Tucson News Now:   “TUSD officials have estimated it will take $4.4 million to implement these increases and that it will be funded by money from the Maintenance and Operations budget.”   It looks to me like this raise is mostly going to support staff.   Given their dire budgetary predictions and dropping student enrollment, can they really afford this raise without taking needed materials from classrooms, cancelling field trips, and limiting student options?

After looking over this ‘raise’, it is obviously a palliative for the teachers and a bonus for the administrators.  If TUSD is truly on the financial ropes, then this raise is only self-serving to the administrators and does not assist the students at all.  As for the teachers, they get $500, which is something in the teaching world but they are being preempted by the administrators, who are getting way more than that.  How about the lower paid workers who get way less than that?  How about a $500 raise for everybody and funnel more money into the classrooms for the use of the students and teachers? 

Preface to A New Timeline

A New Timeline   

Short Introduction

I was born and raised in Tucson Arizona USA, in the heart of El Gran Desierto that spans the present nations of the United States of America and Mexico.  Archaeological ruins abound in that area and my family enjoyed scouting out rock art and pottery strewn sites of the Hohokam and maybe Salado.  Those experiences plus weekly trips to the library where some long forgotten librarians had created a dreamland in history that allowed me to feed a lifelong interest.  I thank to this day whomever it was over there at the library who loved history and passed it on to the citizens of Tucson. 

Receiving a classical education based on Greco-Roman and Anglo thought and achievement, I was taught European and American history and a survey of world history as it was known at that time.  We had Columbus Day off and learned to recite the Columbus poem, never doubting he was the first European to visit the Americas, even though Leif Erickson remained a possibility due to the Norse lobby who maybe could smite with Thor’s Hammer. 

I will say those people who taught history were sometimes wrong about what happened and the further back in time, the greater the error, which tended to compound itself.  I am always amazed by the certainty of historical dogma, which has produced way too many strictures on the examination of knowledge and alternate theories.

I like alternatives, variables, and choices.  The more ways to interpret data, the better.  Data interpretation is not an ego exercise or an artistic exercise but is a factual exercise.  Defending one’s theory is one thing, but suppression of alternative theories is another.  Our world is in a data flux right now, and interpretive data creation is hugely important.  Everybody needs free access to all the historical data and everybody needs to refrain from crowing about other’s mistakes in order for data sharing to proceed.  New data brings new determinations.  Ego need not apply.   

I like Wikipedia and I thank them for all the data, which is so useful in the area of human genetics and so many other areas.  Please donate to their cause.   I love the internet and all the data out there.  That’s what my Timeline is, a small compendium of data as of 2014 AD, the Zodiac Ages, the Maya Long Count, the Melancovich Cycle, Historical data, impact events and climate and sea level trends through a history reaching 3,000,000 BP to the present, with emphasis on the genetic proliferation of Homo from 500,000 BP and the indicators of extremely ancient civilizations previously thought to be mythology.  Electronic publishing is wonderful, because of the opportunities to revise as new data adds to our understanding.  If incomplete data led to a fallacious conclusion, then correct it immediately.  I’m not one to defend the indefensible. 

Dating methods are crucial.  Carbon 14 is possibly not as accurate as portrayed, since factors other than deposition must be considered when judging the accuracy of C 14 dating.  Artificial nuclear explosions deposit C14 as does the sun during certain conditions.   

I also thank the astute authors and players in their TV shows like Ancient Aliens and Decoded and America Unearthed for their interesting interpretations and presentations.  Using their shows for leads, I was able to research topics I didn’t even know existed, like the Ica Stones and Father Crespi and the obvious Inca structures atop far earlier megalithic structures.  I look forward to their shows!  They could be right about aliens landing on Earth but I believe there existed in the misty past, a grand human  civilization that was destroyed at the end of the Pleistocene.  This civilization had settlements in many different parts of the world or locally developed civilizations had hooked up, like ours today.  I do believe that rising sea levels combined with a monster bolide just eliminated it, leaving only tattered remnants of humanity to recreate what they had lost, which remained in mythology and religious compilations.  I thank George Dodwell for documenting an aberration in the ecliptic that coincides with a bolide hit and the drying of the Sahara and Levant and the subsequent fall of nations.  I thank Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, who produced Uriel’s Machine, a comprehensive explanation of the meaning of megaliths and their observatories.  The work of these men contains religious musings, which does not disarm the actual data.  I just concentrate on the facts.      

Rising sea levels and bolide hits and climate change and Antarctica freezing over and now it’s melting again!  We live in flux and cataclysmic possibilities and I think it’s time we guarded our planet with early warning defense systems.  All nations should cooperate and see if we can avert being hit yet again by bolides.  The fall of some human civilizations is inexorably linked to bolide hits…..                                                           

 

Rein in the Border Patrol

$9,127,088,000 is the magic money number required by the Border Patrol for one year of service to the nation in the 2014-15 budget, according to a Border Patrol union source.  Prior figures for the United States Border Patrol show an ever escalating growth in costs, from just $262,647,000 in 1990 up to $3,466,880,000 in 2013 in statistics generated by the Border Patrol at http://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/documents/BP%20Budget%20History%201990-2013.pdf

If these statistics are correct, then the 2014 budget shows a tripling of Border Patrol costs in just one year.  Where did this money come from?  New taxes?  Siphoned from other programs?  Borrowing? 

The outrageous cost increases of the Border Patrol are also accompanied by a perceived growth in the daily jurisdictional areas near the border.  I live in Tucson and must go through Border Patrol inspections miles from the border on at least two major highways into town, and sometimes more.  At the border, I am required to show a passport in order to reinter my own country and must submit to questioning and search.  When I traveled in Texas to Big Bend on the Rio Grande, the area was thick with Border Patrol and we were stopped repeatedly, just so they could look at us, not due to any problems.  I find it hard to believe that these unaccompanied children portrayed as swarming across the Rio Grande were not seen.  Why were they not stopped and prevented, rather than allowed to cross and then apprehended? 

This leads to a crucial question nobody is asking.  Who is responsible for bringing these children to the border?  I’ve traveled extensively in Mexico and it can be difficult, particularly without resources.  Who is bringing these children to the border?  I heard of a Catholic mission located on an island off Yucatan where migrants from Central America come by boat, and then are given arranged passage through Mexico to the USA border.  Are these religious organizations responsible for this mass movement of children?  If the violence is so bad in Central America, why have we not heard about it on the news?  It’s outrageous that a religious organization that touts unlimited breeding is now moving the resultant unwanted children to another location for others to care for them. 

If Mexico let them in in the first place, they should deal with it.  They should have more pride than to allow their country to be used as a conduit for children unwanted in their homelands to be brought to the USA.  Mexico is remiss in allowing it and if the religious organizations and coyotes are smuggling people through Mexico, the Federales should arrest them.  Either that or Mexico should take these unwanted children in.

So it comes out that Border Patrol agents in New York state are getting bonuses for busting illegal immigrants, presents like Home Depot gift cards, cash, free vacations and other perks.  The article I found states that a similar program exists in Arizona.  Does the Texas sector of the Border Patrol award bonuses for apprehensions?  Is this why they are letting ‘unaccompanied’ children into the USA?  Did Border Patrol agents receive bonuses for ‘apprehending’ these children?  Are the Border Patrol agents getting bonuses and the taxpayers get to pay for the care of these unfortunate children whose parents abandoned them?   

So now Southern Arizona is graced by Border Patrol housing units that the federal government paid $600,000 each for, when comparable units cost $100,000 and the average price of homes in Ajo nearby is some $70,000.  The Border Patrol homes are around 12-15,000 square feet.  I have seen these from the outside and they look no better than the usual tract homes around Tucson, which isn’t saying much.  With the budget tripling, I wonder how much more money they will waste when they get their hands on over 9 billion dollars.  See the article at http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/12/immigration-border-agent-housing/2642491/

 

I watched Senator Flake question the Border Patrol during the recent hearing concerning the dumped immigrant children and his basic question was an excellent one:   Why isn’t the Border Patrol on the border rather than so far inland?  I think the Border Patrol honchos are interested in enlarging their jurisdiction rather than perfecting the patrol of the actual border.  Recently, right outside Tucson, the Border Patrol conducted a high speed chase that resulted in a wrecked vehicle, from which the driver broke and ran.  A Border Patrol officer shot him in the back of the head as he was running away.  This man was an unarmed USA citizen but the agent who fired said he ‘made a suspicious movement with his hand’ so he shot him.  I believe that the Border Patrol should quit usurping the jurisdictions of our local sheriffs and police departments. 

The Border Patrol should do their job on the border and I don’t see why their budget appropriation should triple.