You really do need to care about how the sausage is made

Witness what even the News Journal called "a debacle" yesterday when Representatives Rebecca Walker and Helen Keeley decided that, despite legions of people signed up to testify for and against a bail modification bill, even limiting participants to 60 seconds was too much lip-service to the concept of citizen input:

Rep. Jeff Spiegelman had seen enough, noting that lawmakers had only minutes earlier been handed a thick booklet of information about the bill and had no time to do their “due diligence.’ He called for a tabling of the bill so a full and fair hearing could be held.
Keeley objected, urging members to send the legislation to the full House with the promise that differences would be ironed out before she called for a full vote.

Yep, Walker calls for a hearing the same day that HB 35 is up for public comment and is then surprised to find herself in trouble. Keeley decides that committee members neither need to read their materials nor hear from citizens before voting on the bill.

Thankfully, the whole committee voted down these idiots.

But as you watch this all happen in Legislative Hall, you begin to understand why none of our lawmakers is really all that gung-ho for transparency.

If we actually watched them "do their jobs" we'd most of them for incompetence or arrogance.

Comments

Anonymous said…

In one of the previous articles it stated that abolishing the death penalty would save money. How does frying someone save money over housing, feeding, educating, entertaining them for 20, 30, 40 years?

March 14, 2013 at 12:21 PM

The Obligatory Libertarian Tax Day Post

The most disturbing factoid that I learned on Tax Day was that the average American must now spend a full twenty-four hours filling out tax forms. That's three work days. Or, think of it this way: if you had to put in two hours per night after dinner to finish your taxes, that's two weeks (with Sundays off). I saw a talking head economics professor on some Philly TV channel pontificating about how Americans procrastinate. He was laughing. The IRS guy they interviewed actually said, "Tick, tick, tick." You have to wonder if Governor Ruth Ann Minner and her cohorts put in twenty-four hours pondering whether or not to give Kraft Foods $708,000 of our State taxes while demanding that school districts return $8-10 million each?

New Warfare: I started my posts with a discussion.....

.....on Unrestricted warfare . The US Air force Institute for National Security Studies have developed a reasonable systems approach to deter non-state violent actors who they label as NSVA's. It is an exceptionally important report if we want to deter violent extremism and other potential violent actors that could threaten this nation and its security. It is THE report our political officials should be listening to to shape policy so that we do not become excessive in using force against those who do not agree with policy and dispute it with reason and normal non-violent civil disobedience. This report, should be carefully read by everyone really concerned with protecting civil liberties while deterring violent terrorism and I recommend if you are a professional you send your recommendations via e-mail at the link above so that either 1.) additional safeguards to civil liberties are included, or 2.) additional viable strategies can be used. Finally, one can only hope that politici

More of This, Please

Or perhaps I should say, "Less of this one, please." Or how about just, "None of them. Ever again. Please....For the Love of God." Sunshine State Poll: Grayson In Trouble The latest Sunshine State/VSS poll shows controversial Democratic incumbent Alan Grayson trailing former state Senator Dan Webster by seven points, 43 percent to 36 percent. A majority of respondents -- 51 percent -- disapprove of the job that Grayson is doing. Independents have an unfavorable view of him as well, by a 36/47 margin. Grayson has ignored the conventional wisdom that a freshman should be a quiet member who carefully tends to the home fires. The latest controversy involves his " Taliban Dan " advertisement, where he explicitly compares his opponent to the Taliban, and shows a clip of Webster paraphrasing Ephesians 5:22 -- "wives, submit to your husbands." An unedited version of the clip shows that Webster was actually suggesting that husba

Search This Blog