Is anybody in it for the right reasons?
In Ohio, the FOP has come out in a strong way for the expansion of gambling in Ohio. Its ads have been especially bold because of the emphasis they have placed on “telling the truth” for the gambling interests. (Remember when gambling was a crime.)
Could it be the FOP’s support has something to do with 2 percent of the annual tax revenues from this gambling proposal being slated for law enforcement training?
Unions and, in some cases, businesses, are big backers of the kind of health care reform being pushed by Democrats in Washington. Is it to help their members’ (or employees’) health care, or for another reason?
Investor’s Business Daily reported last month:
Unions argue a medical overhaul will let them take health care benefits off the table during contract negotiations, freeing them to push for higher wages.
The House version of the bill also includes $10 billion in relief for troubled pension funds. While not specifically earmarked for unions, as written the relief would be available to most union-run pensions.
And, of course, businesses can see the government takeover of health care as a way to free them from the cost of handling it for their employees.
(Not that this is necessarily bad. Indeed, one reform that is worthwhile is breaking the lock of health care insurance with employment so that losing or changing jobs does not take away one’s insurance. But that’s not why many businesses want out of health care.)
Then there’s this, which is as funny as it is disappointing. Tom Suddes wrote in his column Sunday about how First Energy was going to give some ratepayers 2 CFL bulbs for “free” to, you know, save energy (just don’t break one).
However, these free bulbs, worth about $7, would actually cost customers more than $21 through a three-year monthly charge to, you know, compensate First Energy for possibly selling less power due to the use of the CFLs.
This came with a government imprimatur but the ensuing controversy has left the plan in limbo.
What’s next? A fuel-efficiency surcharge on cars that get more than, say, 30 mpg to, you know, compensate oil companies for the fewer barrels of oil they’ll sell?
(Note to potential employers: If I was in your communications department and presented with the CFL deal, I would have told you it wasn’t such a bright idea.)
Finally, though the list is probably unending, we have another example of the ostensibly strange bedfellows climate change/green initiatives create. Jonathan Riskind talked about how Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown is a key player in the cap and trade bill, though Riskind kept calling it a climate-change bill.
(My apologies if he was referring to some other legislation. Whatever it is, Riskind explained that “Brown’s short-term challenge is trying to keep a climate-change bill from harming Ohio. “Harm” being a point many supporters of such bills fail to mention.)
But for today’s discussion, Riskind noted that:
Brown has worked to placate not just the unions but the normally GOP-friendly manufacturers, as well. The National Association of Manufacturers has endorsed Brown’s proposal for a $30 billion manufacturing revolving-loan fund.
One could say this is the way it’s always been; “let’s make a deal.”
That’s not good enough. And wrong.
Do you remember Alistair Cooke’s “America”? If memory serves, in one episode he said that one thing our leaders were able to do to move this country from concept to existence was “compromise, compromise, compromise.”
Now, this can be a pejorative but Cooke meant it as a compliment. Sadly, the examples listed above do not rise to such grand founding-of-America aspiration. They simply seem to descend to petty what’s-in-it-for-me compensation.
