Two years ago, I explained that the Town of Oriental had a problem with water rates. I pointed out, as I had at Town Board meetings, that the Town had been losing money on water. Not only that, the water system had been subsidized by the general taxpayers.
This meant, among other things, that taxpayers had paid for reduced water rates for the Town's biggest water users.
Our interim town manager has recently done a more thorough examination of costs properly chargeable to the water system. His review revealed that the general taxpayer's subsidy to the water system was even higher than I had thought.
An inevitable consequence of this subsidy is that it reduced tax resources available for other town priorities. Many times over the past few years, Board members have avoided expenditures for projects that residents desired, claiming we don't have the resources. The money ($150 - $250 thousand) unknowingly spent over the past decade subsidizing the water system could have gone a long way toward meeting those needs.
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
White Smoke over Town Hall
Oriental residents claim to have seen white smoke from the chimneys at Town Hall. Could it signal the election of a permanent Town Manager?
It has been about six weeks shy of a year since the Town last had a permanent manager. During much of that time, some commissioners even disputed that the town had a council-manager form of government. It does.
The firing, last July 1, was not Oriental's finest hour. No item on the agenda that night suggested that the manager's removal would be considered. The Town had previously spent more than $20,000 for an employment attorney to "investigate," in apparent hopes that she would find some legal cause to fire the manager. Apparently she didn't.
The motion to terminate the manager's employment was made at the end of a long meeting, as a "non-agenda item," simply introduced by the commissioner who had been fetched to the meeting earlier by the Chief of Police at the direction of one of the Town's part time secretarial employees.
To say that this was an improper exercise of the Town Board's legislative and investigative powers is an understatement. The lack of proper notice was a clear violation of North Carolina's open meetings act.
The account of the proceedings that appeared on a local web site here accurately describes what I saw that night, with some additional details that the reporter witnessed personally.
Without arguing the merits of the board's decision that evening or whether the board had the power to take the action (the Commissioner who made the motion accurately asserted that the Board has the power to terminate the manager without any reason), it is also true that the Board never gave the manager the opportunity, either in closed session or open session, to confront his accusers, to be given any information as to the board's views of what he might need to correct.
In short, it was an irregular, illegal (from the standpoint of public notice), underhanded and less than courageous procedure.
It would be good in the future if the board would remove the "non - agenda item" category from the monthly agenda and follow a procedure similar to that used by the Pamlico County Board of Commissioners. The chair of that body asks the commissioners at the beginning of the meeting whether any commissioner has an item to remove or add to the agenda. If the commissioners agree unanimously, the chair then formally modifies the agenda. This procedure is used sparingly, but gives the board some flexibility to deal with last minute emerging issues.
The issue of the town manager's employment was not a last-minute emerging issue.
I hope the members who went along with this kangaroo court procedure have reflected on their actions and resolved to do better in the future.
I understand an announcement will be made at a Town Board meeting at 5:00 pm April 21.
It has been about six weeks shy of a year since the Town last had a permanent manager. During much of that time, some commissioners even disputed that the town had a council-manager form of government. It does.
The firing, last July 1, was not Oriental's finest hour. No item on the agenda that night suggested that the manager's removal would be considered. The Town had previously spent more than $20,000 for an employment attorney to "investigate," in apparent hopes that she would find some legal cause to fire the manager. Apparently she didn't.
The motion to terminate the manager's employment was made at the end of a long meeting, as a "non-agenda item," simply introduced by the commissioner who had been fetched to the meeting earlier by the Chief of Police at the direction of one of the Town's part time secretarial employees.
To say that this was an improper exercise of the Town Board's legislative and investigative powers is an understatement. The lack of proper notice was a clear violation of North Carolina's open meetings act.
The account of the proceedings that appeared on a local web site here accurately describes what I saw that night, with some additional details that the reporter witnessed personally.
Without arguing the merits of the board's decision that evening or whether the board had the power to take the action (the Commissioner who made the motion accurately asserted that the Board has the power to terminate the manager without any reason), it is also true that the Board never gave the manager the opportunity, either in closed session or open session, to confront his accusers, to be given any information as to the board's views of what he might need to correct.
In short, it was an irregular, illegal (from the standpoint of public notice), underhanded and less than courageous procedure.
It would be good in the future if the board would remove the "non - agenda item" category from the monthly agenda and follow a procedure similar to that used by the Pamlico County Board of Commissioners. The chair of that body asks the commissioners at the beginning of the meeting whether any commissioner has an item to remove or add to the agenda. If the commissioners agree unanimously, the chair then formally modifies the agenda. This procedure is used sparingly, but gives the board some flexibility to deal with last minute emerging issues.
The issue of the town manager's employment was not a last-minute emerging issue.
I hope the members who went along with this kangaroo court procedure have reflected on their actions and resolved to do better in the future.
I understand an announcement will be made at a Town Board meeting at 5:00 pm April 21.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Vote for the Candidate, Not for the Party
Balderdash!
Remember: if politics were an Olympic event, it would be a team sport, not an individual competition.
The most important fact to know about a candidate for public office is the candidate's political party.
Why is that?
Since the dawn of the American republic, we have had at least two political parties - one that pursued the interests of the wealthy and another that pursued the interests of the common man. (At the beginning, only men could vote, so it was accurate to speak of the "common man," which meant, of course, white men.)
Just try to imagine how the people's business could ever get done if our representatives in Congress consisted of 435 supremely confident egotists in the House of Representatives with no underlying organization. Suppose they had to form coalitions from scratch for every bill. Nothing would get done. Voters need to know what the parties stand for, because they are essential to the process.
Over the past two centuries, party labels have changed, and we occasionally had one or more additional parties, but they always shake down to two. Sometimes a candidate tries to hide the identity of his party. Two years ago, the Republican party candidate for the state house had a float in Oriental's annual Croaker Fest parade. Nowhere on the float did it identify his political party. Only that he was a conservative (whatever that means).
So when a candidate is elected and voters say, "I didn't know he was going to support..." - for example, measures to reduce funding for public schools - it shouldn't be a surprise, but it often is. Pay attention to the party and the program of the party's movers and shakers.
Just ask the voters in Wisconsin.
Remember: if politics were an Olympic event, it would be a team sport, not an individual competition.
The most important fact to know about a candidate for public office is the candidate's political party.
Why is that?
Since the dawn of the American republic, we have had at least two political parties - one that pursued the interests of the wealthy and another that pursued the interests of the common man. (At the beginning, only men could vote, so it was accurate to speak of the "common man," which meant, of course, white men.)
Just try to imagine how the people's business could ever get done if our representatives in Congress consisted of 435 supremely confident egotists in the House of Representatives with no underlying organization. Suppose they had to form coalitions from scratch for every bill. Nothing would get done. Voters need to know what the parties stand for, because they are essential to the process.
Over the past two centuries, party labels have changed, and we occasionally had one or more additional parties, but they always shake down to two. Sometimes a candidate tries to hide the identity of his party. Two years ago, the Republican party candidate for the state house had a float in Oriental's annual Croaker Fest parade. Nowhere on the float did it identify his political party. Only that he was a conservative (whatever that means).
So when a candidate is elected and voters say, "I didn't know he was going to support..." - for example, measures to reduce funding for public schools - it shouldn't be a surprise, but it often is. Pay attention to the party and the program of the party's movers and shakers.
Just ask the voters in Wisconsin.
Monday, April 18, 2011
US Pays Low Taxes
The idea constantly hammered into our heads by Republicans is that we pay high taxes, which must be reduced. Not so.
In fact, of all the advanced western-style market economies and democracies (what we used to call the free world), only Australia has lower taxes than the United States.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has published this helpful series of charts showing how we compare.
In fact, of all the advanced western-style market economies and democracies (what we used to call the free world), only Australia has lower taxes than the United States.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has published this helpful series of charts showing how we compare.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Sarkozy v. de Gaulle
Yesterday's New York Times printed an op-ed piece by Roger Cohen, generally complimentary about Nicolas Sarkozy of France, and asserting that Sarkozy has departed from de Gaulle's vision:
"Only in recent weeks has the distance traveled come into focus: France, reintegrated in 2009 into the command structure of NATO, spearheading the United Nations-backed NATO military operation in Libya; providing armed muscle to the U.N. forces in Ivory Coast; and giving its pacifist-trending ally Germany a lesson in 21st-century Atlanticism.
"Only in recent weeks has the distance traveled come into focus: France, reintegrated in 2009 into the command structure of NATO, spearheading the United Nations-backed NATO military operation in Libya; providing armed muscle to the U.N. forces in Ivory Coast; and giving its pacifist-trending ally Germany a lesson in 21st-century Atlanticism.
Adenauer and de Gaulle must be turning in their graves. Here was Germany standing wobbly with Brazil, Russia, India and China — and against its closest allies, France and the United States — in the U.N. vote on Libyan military action. And here was France providing America’s most vigorous NATO support.
This was a dramatic inversion of postwar roles. It revealed the drift of a navel-gazing Germany unprepared to lead despite its power and impatient with Adenauer’s Western anchoring. It also demonstrated France’s break under Sarkozy from the posturing Gaullist notion of a French “counterweight” to America. These are seismic European shifts."
I believe it more accurate to say that Sarkozy has come closest of any French leader to fulfilling and completing the vision of Charles de Gaulle.
From the outset of de Gaulle's efforts to defeat Germany by establishing a Free French government in England, de Gaulle sought equal status with England in the alliance with the United States. He understandably resented being excluded from the US-UK "special relationship." Beyond his personal pique, it is fair to say he doggedly pursued membership in this club because it was in the interest of France.
On D-Day, he succeeded in having French forces under a French general land at Normandy, and French bombers supporting the invasion. He succeeded against great odds in persuading the allies to have a French sector in the occupation of Germany, Berlin, Austria and Vienna.
When NATO was created, the US was given the position of Supreme Allied Commander, Europe and England received Deputy SACEUR. In fact, England received the deputy positions all the way down the chain of command. It is a well-understood principal of military organization that it is the deputy commander who actually runs things.
De Gaulle didn't give up. In September, 1958, de Gaulle proposed to President Eisenhower and to Prime Minister MacMillan that the three countries band together in defense of the free world, coordinating efforts on a global basis under an expanded NATO focus to include the Middle East, Africa, Indian Ocean, and the Pacific, as well as Europe. Eisenhower and MacMillan rejected the idea.
Only after his concept was rejected and after the new Kennedy administration in December 1962 offered to sell Polaris missiles to Great Britain, did de Gaulle move ahead with plans to withdraw from the NATO integrated military structure and develop an independent French nuclear capability, the so-called "force de frappe.".
Now, with French reentry into the NATO integrated military structure, expansion of the NATO area, NATO operations in the Balkans in the 1990's (including French aircraft), participation by French forces in NATO operations in Afghanistan, and NATO operations in Libya, we are finally seeing the fruition of de Gaulle's 1958 vision.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Friday Flick
Last night at the Old Theater in Oriental, we had a showing of the movie Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.
It's among my favorite movies, but I had never seen it on the big screen. When the movie came out in 1964, I was too busy learning how to be a department head on a destroyer to see movies. That spring, I spent some weeks in Norfolk, Virginia learning about nuclear weapons and their control and use.
The previous fall, at 1:00 pm November 22, 1963, I had joined my fellow students in the US Naval Destroyer School at a command performance - a speech by the US Navy's Chief of Naval Personnel. As the Admiral stepped up to the podium, we muttered among ourselves wondering if he knew the president had been shot. He showed no sign of awareness. The speech turned out to be an attack on the defense policies of the Kennedy administration and, in particular, those of Defense Secretary MacNamara and his "whiz kids."
About half way through the speech, the admiral's aid approached the podium and handed the admiral a note. The admiral read it and said, "I regret to inform you that the president has died." He then completed his speech.
After that, I would have to say that nothing in the dialogue of General Jack D. Ripper, General Turgidson, Colonel Bat Guano, or any of the other outrageous characters in the movie seemed impossible. In particular, Major Kong as played by Slim Pickens, was spot on.
There was much about our national obsession with and fear of the Soviet Union and Soviet Communism in those years that was irrational. A movie like this does a great service by revealing absurdities instead of taking them too seriously.
It's among my favorite movies, but I had never seen it on the big screen. When the movie came out in 1964, I was too busy learning how to be a department head on a destroyer to see movies. That spring, I spent some weeks in Norfolk, Virginia learning about nuclear weapons and their control and use.
The previous fall, at 1:00 pm November 22, 1963, I had joined my fellow students in the US Naval Destroyer School at a command performance - a speech by the US Navy's Chief of Naval Personnel. As the Admiral stepped up to the podium, we muttered among ourselves wondering if he knew the president had been shot. He showed no sign of awareness. The speech turned out to be an attack on the defense policies of the Kennedy administration and, in particular, those of Defense Secretary MacNamara and his "whiz kids."
About half way through the speech, the admiral's aid approached the podium and handed the admiral a note. The admiral read it and said, "I regret to inform you that the president has died." He then completed his speech.
After that, I would have to say that nothing in the dialogue of General Jack D. Ripper, General Turgidson, Colonel Bat Guano, or any of the other outrageous characters in the movie seemed impossible. In particular, Major Kong as played by Slim Pickens, was spot on.
There was much about our national obsession with and fear of the Soviet Union and Soviet Communism in those years that was irrational. A movie like this does a great service by revealing absurdities instead of taking them too seriously.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Darwin and the Anarchist Prince
About five years after Charles Darwin published his book On the Origin of Species, a young Russian army officer, Prince Peter Kropotkin, became involved in geographic and biological research in Siberia and Manchuria.
Kropotkin resigned from the Army in 1867, continuing to work as a scientist and also as a revolutionary. Even after arrest and incarceration in St. Petersburg's Peter and Paul Fortress, Kropotkin continued writing important scientific papers.
Later exiled in Western Europe, Kropotkin became prominent as an anarchist, though not of the bomb-throwing kind.
In addition to his activities in anarchist circles, Kropotkin continued writing on scientific subjects.
In 1902, Kropotkin published the book, Mutual Aid: a Factor in Evolution, based on his scientific research of four decades earlier. The conclusion of his book took direct aim at Social Darwinism's claims:
"In the animal world we have seen that the vast majority of species live in societies, and that they find in association the best arms for the struggle for life: understood, of course, in its wide Darwinian sense – not as a struggle for the sheer means of existence, but as a struggle against all natural conditions unfavourable to the species. The animal species, in which individual struggle has been reduced to its narrowest limits, and the practice of mutual aid has attained the greatest development, are invariably the most numerous, the most prosperous, and the most open to further progress. The mutual protection which is obtained in this case, the possibility of attaining old age and of accumulating experience, the higher intellectual development, and the further growth of sociable habits, secure the maintenance of the species, its extension, and its further progressive evolution. The unsociable species, on the contrary, are doomed to decay."
– Peter Kropotkin, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902), Conclusion
In other words, Kropotkin suggests that altruism, so denigrated by Ayn Rand and her followers, plays an important role in the success of the human species.
Interestingly, recent scientific research lends weight to Kropotkin's views. A recent book, Supercooperators: Altruism, Evolution and Why We Need Each Other To Succeed , by Martin A. Nowak, examines the issues. Here is an interesting review of the book.
Even conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks has reported in a recent column about research substantiating the importance of collective achievement as opposed to individual efforts.
Kropotkin resigned from the Army in 1867, continuing to work as a scientist and also as a revolutionary. Even after arrest and incarceration in St. Petersburg's Peter and Paul Fortress, Kropotkin continued writing important scientific papers.
Later exiled in Western Europe, Kropotkin became prominent as an anarchist, though not of the bomb-throwing kind.
In addition to his activities in anarchist circles, Kropotkin continued writing on scientific subjects.
In 1902, Kropotkin published the book, Mutual Aid: a Factor in Evolution, based on his scientific research of four decades earlier. The conclusion of his book took direct aim at Social Darwinism's claims:
"In the animal world we have seen that the vast majority of species live in societies, and that they find in association the best arms for the struggle for life: understood, of course, in its wide Darwinian sense – not as a struggle for the sheer means of existence, but as a struggle against all natural conditions unfavourable to the species. The animal species, in which individual struggle has been reduced to its narrowest limits, and the practice of mutual aid has attained the greatest development, are invariably the most numerous, the most prosperous, and the most open to further progress. The mutual protection which is obtained in this case, the possibility of attaining old age and of accumulating experience, the higher intellectual development, and the further growth of sociable habits, secure the maintenance of the species, its extension, and its further progressive evolution. The unsociable species, on the contrary, are doomed to decay."
– Peter Kropotkin, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902), Conclusion
In other words, Kropotkin suggests that altruism, so denigrated by Ayn Rand and her followers, plays an important role in the success of the human species.
Interestingly, recent scientific research lends weight to Kropotkin's views. A recent book, Supercooperators: Altruism, Evolution and Why We Need Each Other To Succeed , by Martin A. Nowak, examines the issues. Here is an interesting review of the book.
Even conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks has reported in a recent column about research substantiating the importance of collective achievement as opposed to individual efforts.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
The Great Commoner
A couple of weeks ago, Turner Classic Movies showed "Inherit the Wind," a powerful drama with Spencer Tracy as a fictionalized Clarence Darrow-like character and Frederick March as a fictionalized version of William Jennings Bryan.
The setting was the 1925 "Scopes Monkey Trial" in Dayton, TN of a high school biology teacher who taught his students Darwin's theory of evolution.
The drama presents Bryan as a narrow-minded religious fanatic. Bryan was, in fact, a fundamentalist Presbyterian who objected to Darwin's theories as contrary to the Bible. The movie's unflattering and inaccurate caricature of Bryan misrepresented a major source of the man's emotional opposition to evolution.
In a 1905 speech, Bryan objected that "the Darwinian theory represents man reaching his present perfection by the operation of the law of hate, the merciless law by which the strong crowd out and kill off the weak. If this is the law of our development then, if there is any logic that can bind the human mind, we shall turn backward to the beast in proportion as we substitute the law of love. I choose to believe that love rather than hatred is the law of development."
In other words, what had aroused Bryan's ire was the Social Darwinism that had made such claims.
While on the one hand, Bryan was a fundamentalist, he was also a theological and social liberal. He dedicated himself to the Social Gospel, an important school of religious thought emphasizing the need for Christians to serve their fellow man, including giving their lives to public service.
In a word, he believed in altruism.
The setting was the 1925 "Scopes Monkey Trial" in Dayton, TN of a high school biology teacher who taught his students Darwin's theory of evolution.
The drama presents Bryan as a narrow-minded religious fanatic. Bryan was, in fact, a fundamentalist Presbyterian who objected to Darwin's theories as contrary to the Bible. The movie's unflattering and inaccurate caricature of Bryan misrepresented a major source of the man's emotional opposition to evolution.
In a 1905 speech, Bryan objected that "the Darwinian theory represents man reaching his present perfection by the operation of the law of hate, the merciless law by which the strong crowd out and kill off the weak. If this is the law of our development then, if there is any logic that can bind the human mind, we shall turn backward to the beast in proportion as we substitute the law of love. I choose to believe that love rather than hatred is the law of development."
In other words, what had aroused Bryan's ire was the Social Darwinism that had made such claims.
While on the one hand, Bryan was a fundamentalist, he was also a theological and social liberal. He dedicated himself to the Social Gospel, an important school of religious thought emphasizing the need for Christians to serve their fellow man, including giving their lives to public service.
In a word, he believed in altruism.
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