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Election Night coverage on AM-1300 WMEL
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Monday, November 5th, 2012 at 11:15pm
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For anyone jonesin' to hear my voice on the
radio again, I'll be co-anchoring the Election Night coverage alongside John Harper on The Talk-To-Me Station AM-1300
WMEL, starting at 7pm, with Jerry Durney running the control board and providing assistance as well. We'll be bringing
you all the results from the local and state races as they come in, as well as analyzing the national battles for the
House, the Senate, and of course the Presidency.
Should be fun... the last time I was in-studio on election night I think was 2 or 3 years ago, but the time before
that... well, that was in November 2000. Apologies in advance if this election turns out to be as crazy as that one. :)
Talk to you Tuesday night!
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Friday, March 2nd, 2012 at 5:00pm
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The next Presidential election here in the USA is in 249 days. The national debt stands at
$15,356,000,000,000 (over 15 trillion) and is rising. The unemployment rate remains above 8%, higher if you account for people who have
given up looking for work at all. Gasoline prices at the pump are now slightly more than double what they were at the start of 2009, and
our Secretary of Energy just told Congress that's a good thing. The
value of the American dollar is falling due to the Federal Reserve's policy of printing money until the presses catch fire. Inflation is
here, with the prices of groceries and other consumer goods on the rise. Economic growth is so slow that we're not even creating enough
jobs just to keep up with the number of new college and high school graduates who are entering the job market for the first time. And
Iran, a nation that has dedicated itself to eradicating Israel and the USA, stands on the verge of building its first nuclear weapon.
These are all problems that have either been created or worsened by the leftist policies of President Barack Obama, and if the election
is about these issues, Obama and the Democrats will lose in November.
And what are we conservatives talking about right now?
Abortion, birth control,
Obama's birth certificate,
his wife's high-calorie dinner menus, and ZOMG ANDREW
BREITBART WAS MURDERED BY OBAMA Y'ALL.
We, uh, do actually want to win the elections in November, right?
Just asking.
Obama and the political left are keeping the national conversation away from their own economic and foreign policy blunders, the issues
they know they're the most vulnerable on right now. They are masters at staying on-message. We conservatives need to be too if we
want to win.
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Thursday, June 3rd, 2010 at 11:45pm
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Wow. It's hard to
believe it's been two weeks since the last edition of my radio show on WMEL. It's been an eventful two weeks for me as well, so I'm only
just now able to catch my breath, look around, and get back into updating this website again.
I see it's also been an eventful two weeks news-wise in Brevard, in Florida, and across the USA, and there's simply no way to do
everything justice. So, on the theory that something is better than nothing, here's some quick capsule takes on the events of the past
two weeks.
Jim Greer arrested
Jim Greer, the former chairman of the
Florida Republican Party, has been arrested
over allegations that he funnelled some of the party's political donations into his own personal bank account during his controversial time as
the head of the state party. (Wow. What a surprise.) The
list of charges against Greer includes
fraud, money laundering, and four counts of theft. Greer's mugshot is over to the right, along with the photo of the man who hand-picked Greer to
head up the state Republican party, who stood by Greer steadfastly as the complaints over Greer's abuses of power began to stack up, who refused
to allow any investigations or disciplinary acts over Greer's reckless spending of party funds, who still supported Greer right up to the day Greer
resigned his chairmanship in disgrace, and who only reluctantly allowed a criminal investigation into Greer after it was no longer politically feasible
to protect him.
And who is that man? Why, none other than Governor Charlie Crist.
Crist and Greer are birds of a feather. And I won't let you forget otherwise.
Obama on Memorial Day
I'm no fan of President Barack Obama, but I am a fan of fairness and honesty. That's why I was intrigued with the hue-and-cry over
Obama's decision not to attend the Memorial Day observance at Arlington National Cemetery. Shameful! Outrageous! Disrespectful! How dare
he attend a Memorial Day observance at a different military cemetery instead, just
like other American presidents have done in the past! Sorry guys, but this doesn't exactly peg my outrage meter. If he'd blown off the military
entirely to go golfing or something, I'd be right with my fellow conservative pundits on this. But he still honored our fallen heroes at a military
cemetery. I would've preferred him going to Arlington, but I'm satisfied with this.
Mazziotti does the Twist
I am a fan of Palm Bay Mayor John Mazziotti, who has ably led the city out of the mess that General Development Corporation left it in.
But man, does he like to play fast and loose with the rules. First, he ran for mayor despite still being ineligible to vote due to a felony conviction
from his younger days and later had to be removed from office. Then he got his voting rights back and ran again, but did so in violation of the city
charter's residency requirements, claiming that a conflicting city law actually invalidated the city charter. (Isn't the city charter supposed to
supersede city law in a conflict? That's how it's worked every other time it's come up...) And now, there are rumors that Mazziotti may
try to twist Palm Bay's new term limits law to stay in office as mayor
beyond the three terms allowed under law. Mayor Mazziotti, please don't do this again.
Gov. Crist signs new budget
Governor Charlie Crist's signing pen has been busy. He signed the new budget for 2010-2011 into law with a $70,400,000,000 price-tag that will
increase spending by over $2,000,000,000 from last year. Hey, what's a couple extra billion dollars in a recession among friends, eh? Then, in a token
effort to appear "fiscally responsible" or something, Crist used his line-item veto to trim
$371,000,000 in spending. Nice try, Charlie... you approve $70 billion
in spending, spend $2 billion more than last year, and then trim off a mere $371 million, and we're supposed to, what, throw you a parade or something?
I guess I can give you a little credit for also approving the return of the
school supply sales-tax holiday to stimulate the economy, but it's
interesting that you blocked that tax holiday in 2008 and 2009 when you weren't facing an election, then suddenly allowed it for 2010 when you
are facing an election. We see right through you, Governor.
Crist spares funding for St. John's Heritage Parkway
One item that avoided Crist's veto pen is
$4,000,000 in state funding
for the St. John's Heritage Parkway around Palm Bay and West Melbourne. I agree the road will be very important locally here in Brevard, and I'm all in
favor of building it. But its usefulness to the rest of the state of Florida is murky at best. This is a local road, built for a local purpose. Why are
we making Pensacola, Lake City, Ocala, Sarasota, Key West, Sebring, and Panama City pay for a road in Palm Bay? It's a local road. We should pay for it
ourselves, and we should make everyone else who wants a local road pay for it themselves too.
New Brevard Schools budget
Score one for the taxpayers, though... the Brevard County School Board approved a new budget for 2010-2011 that
cuts spending and trims the property tax millage rate, all while
accounting for complying with the state's new stricter class-size rules.
Amazing... elected officials who actually understand that we're in a down economy, that the taxpayers have less money and can't afford to pay as
much in taxes, and that they're just going to have to cut out spending on things that are nice but not essential, such as
freshman football. You know, just like real working families do
when they have less money.
No end in sight for oil leak
The DeepWater Horizon leak continues in the Gulf of Mexico and
could last until August. But the East Coast
of Florida may have caught a big break thanks to the possible formation of
a new Loop Current Eddy which could
keep the oil in the Gulf.
Titusville to property rights: drop dead
Titusville is considering a new ban on developing land within 50 feet
of wetlands. Big problem: this would go into effect immediately, screwing over people who bought land next to a wetland expecting to be able to
build on it only to find out after-the-fact that no, actually, they can't anymore. And good luck selling it to someone else. But hey, they'll still have
the privilege of paying property tax on land they can't use. I understand the need to preserve wetlands, but the City Council of Titusville needs to do
it the right way: buy the land themselves and then set it aside as a conservation park. And if they don't have the money, hey, there's gotta be something
in the budget the city doesn't need to be spending money on that they can cut.
Titusville considers furloughs
Speaking of cutting spending, Titusville is also considering unpaid
furlough days for city workers. I love these, actually, because it quite visibly demonstrates how the government is not nearly as vital as we think
it is. The whole city government shuts down for a day, and yet somehow the city doesn't fall into disorder, chaos, rioting and flames? Amazing!
Commissioners dry out wetlands development idea
The Brevard County Commission has paused debate on new rules that would've made it easier to
build on lands located in floodplains. Why anyone would want to build on
land that floods every ten years is a mystery to me, but apparently somebody wants to.
Palm Bay considers new tax
The city of Palm Bay is considering a new monthly stormwater fee of
$4.50 per month. That's $54 per year, and to a poor family struggling to make it in this economy, $54 can make a big difference. Sorry, Palm Bay, but
this still is not the time to be raising taxes. Stormwater improvements are important, so find something else in the budget that's lower priority, cut it
from the budget, and spend that money on stormwater improvements instead. Don't increase our tax bill just so you don't have to make tough budget choices.
(Oh, what's that? It's not a tax? It's a fee? Don't split hairs with me. At the end of the day, the city is taking money out of my pocket through force
of law. That's a tax. Period.)
Memorial Day parade gets scratched
Melbourne's annual Memorial Day parade to honor veterans was cancelled due to
a dispute over police and fire-protection fees. The veterans group that holds
the parade every year couldn't afford the fees, and the city didn't have enough money left in the budget to eat the cost. Both sides are pointing the
finger at each other, but let's get real. Both the city and the American Legion knew about this dispute months ago. Both sides knew there was a chance
it could keep the parade from happening. And both sides had the chance to pursue alternative funding, such as finding private sponsorships from local
companies. Instead, both sides sat on this for months, waited until it was too late to fix it, and then resorted to childish finger-pointing. Shame on
both the City of Melbourne AND the American Legion for screwing our veterans out of a much-deserved parade in their honor. You now have just under a year
before the 2011 Memorial Day parade, so get it right this time.
Cocoa redevelopment
I still think the Cocoa City Council needs to focus more on law enforcement to clean up their still-rising crime rate, but it's good to see
they're still continuing their efforts to buy and demolish blighted and vacant
buildings and houses. With Cocoa's possible new Amtrak station being
located in the economically-downtrodden central part of the city, more efforts need to be made to rehabilitate that area. One idea that would help
is re-opening Stone Street at the railroad crossing; I'm still not sure
why anyone thought closing it was a good idea in the first place.
Cocoa Village Playhouse
As the debate continues over BCC possibly selling the Cocoa Village Playhouse to the city of Cocoa, the Playhouse is
promising to run more efficiently under the city's control due to BCC
releasing them from their debts. Of course, the same principle would still apply if the Playhouse went private instead of being sold to the city
government...
Ultrasound bill
The new bill requiring women in Florida to have an
ultrasound before getting an abortion hasn't been signed or vetoed by Governor Crist yet, though Crist is leaning towards a veto. Good.
I'm anti-abortion, but the way to fight abortion is not to pass ticky-tack laws that accomplish little besides annoying citizens while
establishing the dangerous precedent that it's okay for government to make a legal medical procedure more difficult if they don't like it. This
bill is just silly, and it makes the entire anti-abortion movement look silly. If we want to protect the rights of unborn children, we can't afford
to make ourselves look like fools.
Possible tax office closure
Tax Collector Lisa Cullen is considering closing the Rockledge tax
office. Good. Workers at the Rockledge office would be re-assigned to other offices, but the county government would still save money by having one
less office to run. And there'd still be six offices left open: Merritt Island, Melbourne, Palm Bay, Indian Harbor Beach, and two in Titusville. It's
nice having extra government offices open, but in this budget environment, we can't always afford to keep what's nice at the expense of what's needed.
Needs have to come first.
Paula bows out
Paula Dockery has ended her campaign for the
Republican nomination in the governor's race. That's good news for Rick Scott's outsider campaign against establishment man Bill McCollum.
Government employee unions
Thank goodness things aren't this out of hand here in Florida. Check out what government employee unions are able to get away with on
behalf of transit workers and
police officers. Retire at age 44 with pension payments bigger than
any paycheck you've ever earned in your life? No problem!!!
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Thursday, May 20th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
See ya on the flip side!
For reasons I mentioned yesterday, tonight will be the final episode of The Vince Young Show,
though my involvement with WMEL will continue behind the scenes, and this website vinceyoung.com will remain active as well. It's
gonna be a fun hour, so let's get this thing started.
Library bumper-stickers were privately-funded
A week ago, I went on a tear about the new "I LOVE MY LIBRARY AND I VOTE" bumper stickers that
have been popping up recently after I was told by a librarian that the library paid to have them printed up. Turns out that the
librarian I spoke with was mis-informed, according to this e-mail I received today:
| Mr. Young,
I was just received a copy of a transcript (I think) of one of your shows with regard to the "I love my library..." bumper stickers.
It states that you were told by someone at the library in Cocoa that they were printed by us, the Library Sytem. That is incorrect
information and I apologize for that. I have since made sure the two individuals answering the phones are aware that these were paid
for with private funding through the Friends of the Library groups. Countywide, these various groups formed an advocacy group and the
decision for the bumper stickers came out of this group. They designed, had printed and paid for everything. Again, I apologize that
you received incorrect information. Please contact me if you need further information.
Catherine Schweinsberg, Director
Brevard County Libraries |
Thank you, Cathy! I'm more than happy to set the record straight on this issue. I also still have an outstanding inquiry with
County Commissioner Trudie Infantini to confirm this, but given that Schweinsberg is a government employee whose e-mails are subject to
the Sunshine Act, I doubt she'd risk lying to me by e-mail. I'm very glad to hear my tax money is not being used to print these
stickers up.
Of course, I now have a different beef: why are our libraries being used to distribute what basically amounts to political literature?
Remember, the libraries are distributing these bumper stickers right from the Reference Desks.
The purpose of these bumper stickers is to put political pressure on the County Commissioners to raise the library tax rate and increase
library funding, all during a time when Brevardians are seeing their incomes drop and can't afford to see an even higher chunk of their
income being seized from them by the government. That's a political message, one that not everyone agrees with.
What if I decided to print up my own bumper stickers with this message: "I'M TAXED ENOUGH AND I VOTE! Freeze the library tax rate."
Somehow I doubt the libraries would agree to distribute my bumper stickers from the Reference Desk right alongside their "I LOVE MY
LIBRARY" bumper stickers. Just a guess there.
Brevard Libraries consider keeping R-rated movies away from children
The Brevard County Library Advisory Board has approved a new policy that would allow parents to keep their children from
checking-out R-rated movies if they fill out a form.
It's up to the County Commission to give final approval now, but I find it hard to believe the Commissioners will reject this
option.
Then again, I also found it hard to believe that many librarians argue that it's wrongful censorship to tell a 6-year-old kid,
"Sorry, but you can't check out Brokeback Mountain unless your mommy says it's okay." But apparently that's the case, since the
American Library Association opposes any restrictions at all on checking out movies. That's the stance Brevard County's libraries
have been following as well.
I understand some parents don't worry about what their children watch. Hey, they're your kids. Raise them the way you want to. If
this policy passes, you won't have to do a thing, and your 5-year-old can still run down to the local library and check out the entire
Saw collection without you having to lift a finger. But for those parents who do give a darn what their children are watching,
I don't think it's unreasonable to give them more control.
Is it always going to work? Heck no. As Advisory Board member Barbara Jagrowski said before voting in favor of the new rule,
"No matter what you put in place, children who are determined are going to find a way around that rule." That's always true, not
just of children, but of adults as well. Murder is illegal, and people still commit murder anyway. So of course kids are going
to find ways to check out R-rated movies, most likely with the library card of someone with inattentive parents. But that's no reason
not to put this rule into place. Right now, parents have no control at all over what their children can check out from
the library. This rule will change that, allowing parents who care to have at least some control over what their own children
can check out. Some control is better than none.
Ethics complaint filed Tobia over exam waivers
An official ethics complaint has been filed against State Representative John Tobia. It's regarding Tobia's 2008 decision
to waive the final exam for his political studies students if
they agreed to volunteer for his campaign or for the campaign of one of his Republican primary opponents. I'll be very interested to see
what turns up from this, especially since the results might come out before the primary elections later this year.
One aspect of this case that doesn't get talked about much is the fact that there were only 5 candidates in that race that year:
4 Republicans and 1 independent write-in candidate who chose not to campaign. There were no Democrats, and all 4 candidates expressed
varying levels of conservative views. As this case moves forward, Tobia will no doubt argue in his own defense that he offered the same
waiver to students who campaigned for his opponents. But considering the age of Tobia's students and the tendency towards younger
citizens to be more liberal, there's a very good chance that many of Tobia's students were faced with this choice: campaign for a
politcal candidate you vehemently disagree with, or take a final exam.
Tobia apparently saw nothing wrong with this. Really says something about Tobia's approach to ethical concerns, doesn't it? If his
attitude towards professional ethics was this cavalier in just this one incident, there's a good chance he's been equally loose in
other situations that we just haven't heard about yet.
I'm a registered Libertarian and can't vote in this primary, but let me offer some advice to my Republican comrades. If you stick
with John Tobia, I promise he will burn you someday. If you re-elect him, don't come crying to me for sympathy when he blows up in your
faces later.
Will Dr. Heidar Heshmati get double-paid by the taxpayers?
Six weeks ago, Dr. Heidar Heshmati retired from his post as Brevard County's health director. As a retiring government employee, he
qualified for the state's pension program and began receiving pension checks.
Meanwhile, Brevard County began the search for a new health director to replace Dr. Heshmati, and they've narrowed down the list to
three candidates. One of them is -- get this -- Dr. Heshmati.
Yep. He's re-applying for the exact same job he retired from six months ago. And get this: thanks to a loophole in state law, if
Dr. Heshmati gets re-hired, he'll get to keep collecting his retirement pension checks and his bi-weekly paychecks as the
health director, both at the same time. It's called "double-dipping," and it's the exact same loophole Property Appraiser Jim Ford took
advantage of when he won re-election, retired before his current term expired, and then took office to start the new term he'd just
been elected to.
Of course, Dr. Heshmati says it's not really double-dipping.
But Florida Today's Matt Reed disagrees,
and Reed is correct on this.
Thank goodness a new law to close the double-dipping loophole takes effect later this summer. I'm tired of government employees looking
for ways to game the system at the expense of the taxpayers. Let Dr. Heshmati stay retired and hire someone else who actually cares more
about the people he's supposed to be helping.
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The end is near for The Vince Young Show
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Wednesday, May 19th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Thursday night will be my last show
Due to increasing demands on my time away from the radio station, I've come to the decision that it's time for me
to end my latest run on the radio. Tomorrow night (Thursday night) at 8:00pm will be the last episode of The Vince Young
Show. I returned to WMEL's airwaves last February and I've had an absolute blast. My sincere thanks to John Harper for
welcoming me back to his station, and my additional gratitude to everyone who has tuned in or called in.
This won't be the end of my involvement with WMEL -- I'll just be working here in a behind-the-scenes capacity. I plan
to keep updating this website, vinceyoung.com, as local news continues to affect our lives, our money, and our freedom,
so keep hitting that Refresh button every now and then. And if I can ever work out a way to fit a radio show back into my
schedule, I'll do it. I still have plenty to say, and one way or another, I'll find a way to say it.
Alright... two shows left. Let's get going.
County Commission continues to ignore reality
The Brevard County government held the first of three scheduled
budget workshops yesterday, and the results
were predictable. Attendees gave some small suggestions on how to help the county save little bits of money here and
there, and believe me, those could be useful. Every little bit helps out. But the format of the workshop was very
restrictive, and it's pretty clear that the organizers were far more interested in suggestions for "new revenue sources"
(translation: finding clever and creative ways to seperate you from your own money) than they were in suggestions for the
sorts of massive spending cutbacks Brevard's government is going to have to make to keep our budget balanced in these
troubling times.
Let's face it: this economy sucks right now, and the future outlook doesn't look much better. The slow unraveling of
the world's economy, the debt load of the federal government, the looming end of the space shuttle program, and the
DeepWater Horizon oil spill all threaten to combine into another serious dent in Brevard's economy. That will lead to
tax revenues for the county continuing their current decline. Simply put, Brevardians simply don't have as much money as
we used to have, which means there's less money available for the Brevard County to seize from us in the form of taxes.
And that truth is only going to get worse next year.
And what is Brevard County's government looking at to balance the budget? Small-dollar gimmicks like keeping the
thermostats warmer in government buildings, combined with raising taxes on a population that is making less money.
Our government tries to do too much at too high a cost. It's time for someone to have the guts to look at every budget
line-item, every government program, every individual employee, and ask the following question: "Is this needed to
protect our citizens' rights to life, liberty and property?" If the answer is YES, then do whatever you have to do to
keep it. If the answer is NO, then cut it.
That will mean that some people in Brevard County who are used to getting extra stuff from their government won't be
able to get it anymore. Too bad. The reason they were getting it is because the County government took money away from
their neighbors and used that money to buy that stuff. We need to acknowledge that it is more important for hard-working
citizens of Brevard to be allowed to keep the money they worked so hard to earn than it is for a few Brevardians to get
some extra goodies from the government.
That will also mean some government employees will lose their jobs. Too bad. Government is not a jobs program. Every
time a government worker gets paid, they get paid with money that was taken away from their neighbors. If
that government employee is doing a vital job that helps protect the rights of the citizens of Brevard, then hey: that's
money well-spent. But if that government employee is just shuffling paperwork around on their desk and can't explain how
the work they do protects anyone's rights, then it's time for them to go. We need to acknowledge that it is more important
for hard-working citizens of Brevard to be allowed to keep the money they worked so hard to earn than it is to pay
a government paper-pusher to do an unnecessary job.
Or we can just keep doing what we're doing: nibbling at the edges of our bloated budget and taxing ourselves even
more. Hey, it's worked so well for us so far, right?
Blue Crab Cove price tags starts to grow
I was worried this would happen. First, we were told that it was vital -- vital -- for the County to buy
some riverfront land along 520 in Merritt Island in order to preserve a "working waterfront." Then we were told that
it wouldn't cost the taxpayers any money thanks to a state government grant -- never mind that the land will no longer
be paying property tax, and never mind that the state government grant is partially payed for by the taxpayers of Brevard.
Well, now it looks like the County Commission was
just getting started with the spending on
Blue Crab Cove. Now they've voted 3-2 to spend an additional $1,800,000 over the next ten years to "upgrade" the land.
Meanwhile, the County government is crying about how low on cash they are.
To Mary Bolin, Robin Fisher and Chuck Nelson, I have a simple question: will anyone's rights to life, liberty, or
property be threatened if this plot of land is allowed to stay exactly as it is now? No? Then why are we spending this
money?
Economic Development Commission stays alive -- for now
In a disappointing 5-0 vote, the County Commission has also voted to
keep funding the failed EDC at a rate of
$1,500,000 a year. The EDC claims they can bring 4,000 new jobs into Brevard over the next five years. But three years
ago, they promised to bring in 2,250 new jobs -- and instead only brought in 256. And there are serious doubts about
how true even that number is.
How many more tries should the EDC get at $1,500,000 a pop? This money is being poured down a rabbit hole, and we're
getting no economic benefit in return.
Quick hits:
Viera traffic circle
probably won't get modified.
West Melbourne City Council wastes time on a
non-binding smoking ban in city parks.
Dr. Jeff Masters says the oil slick
may not affect Brevard's coast much at
all. That's good news.
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Spending like there's no tomorrow -- even though there is
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Monday, May 17th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
County Commission may "roll-up" library property tax rate
The debate over library funding continues on, with library supporters saying more funding is needed
while budget hawks say the library needs to properly manage the money they already have.
(Bumper stickers, anyone?)
It looks like the battle lines are being drawn
in the County Commission, with a proposal gaining steam to "roll-up" the library's property tax rate. What that means is that
the property tax rate for funding the library system would be set to whatever rate is needed to keep the library's funding
amount the same as last year. Since property values are dropping across the Space Coast, that means the tax rate itself would
have to be higher in order to bring in the same amount of revenue. Moderate Commissioners Mary Bolin and Chuck Nelson and liberal
Robin Fisher are for it, while conservatives Trudie Infantini and Andy Anderson are opposed. Any final vote on the tax rate
would probably happen in July.
It sounds like an ideal split-the-baby sort of compromise, doesn't it? The libraries get the same amount of money, and
everyone's tax bill stays the same, right? Well, not exactly.
First of all, the economy here in Brevard continues to sputter, with many people continuing to see their pay cut or losing
their jobs entirely due to layoffs. People are making less money than they used to. If their income drops while their tax burden
stays the same, that means you're taking a higher percentage of their income than you used to. To those residents, that's a tax
increase, plain and simple.
Bolin, Nelson and Fisher are also forgetting about the nastiest aspect of our property tax system here in Florida: the recapture rule.
Here's how it works. Right now in Florida, there is a cap on how much your assessed property value is allowed to increase by from year
to year, which in turn acts as a cap on how much your property tax bill can increase by. You probably know it as Save Our Homes.
What a lot of people don't realize is that if your assessed value is capped one year due to Save Our Homes,
the government can come along the following year and continue to increase the assessed value of your home towards what it would've been
had it not been for the Save Our Homes cap -- even if your home's value actually dropped that year. That's the recapture rule,
and every year it nails homeowners all across Florida.
So how does this tie-in with "rolling-up" the library property tax rate? Well, if the recapture rule bumps up your home's assessed value,
that alone will increase your property tax bill. Add in the library property tax rate being increased, and your property tax bill will increase
even more -- even as Commissioners Bolin, Nelson and Fisher keep telling you that your tax bill will stay the same thanks to their brilliant
compromise.
The libraries need to be smarter about how they spend their money, plain and simple. Don't even try to tell me they aren't wasting a single
penny of their funding right now. No government agency is that efficient.
BCC votes to turn over Cocoa Village Playhouse to city
Well, what a surprise. The Board of Trustees for Brevard Community College has voted to
turn over control of the money-losing Cocoa Village Playhouse
to the City of Cocoa. Fortunately, this isn't a done-deal yet, since the Cocoa City Council still needs to vote to actually accept control
of the Playhouse first. But a decision could be coming up soon -- the next Council meeting is next Tuesday night, May 25th. They'll release the
agenda for that meeting sometime on Thursday of this week, so I'll keep you posted if this shows up on the agenda.
Long-story-short, this is no time for the City of Cocoa to take on yet another spending program, not with the economy continue to falter and
with tax revenues continuing to drop. Let the Cocoa Village Playhouse go private, and let them figure out ways to run more efficiently to turn a
profit just like other private theatre groups do all across the nation. And if the Playhouse is as valuable to Cocoa Village as people claim, then
it seems to me that the businesses in Cocoa Village will see plenty of incentive to support the Playhouse themselves voluntarily as a smart
business decision. Getting the taxpayers involved in funding the Playhouse by force is simply not needed, and it's not what Cocoa needs to be
getting into right now.
Gun-toting vigilantes run rampant along Space Coast!
Today's Florida Today story on citizens standing up against criminals
caught my eye, and I think you'll find it's a good read. It shows once again what you can accomplish when you put firearms in the hands of
well-trained law-abiding citizens. Guns are not the problem. The problem is what people choose to do with those guns. But just like
guns can be used to commit crimes, guns can also be used to stop crimes.
Crist signs red-light camera bill into law
The state legislature's new law allowing and regulating red-light cameras in Florida has been
signed by Governor Charlie Crist. So much for watching out
for the people. But I am heartened by the fact that the new rules require a police officer to review every video, and that cities will be
prohibited from using the cameras to target people who make rolling right-turns-on-red. Rolling rights on red are the most common and thus
most lucrative red-light violation, but they're also by far the least-dangerous red-light violation. Hopefully, with those restrictions in
place, many cities will find that red light cameras won't make enough money to be worth trying, and they'll leave them alone.
Yeah, don't tell me it's about traffic safety and not about revenue. A few cities in Georgia have
proven what a lie that is.
Linda McKinney wants Tea Partiers to get active
Great suggestions from a very smart
lady. Going to Tea Party rallies is great, but it should be Step One. Remember, the goal here is to reduce the size of government, and you
can't do that just by waving a sign around for an hour while listening to speeches.
Supreme Court rules sex-abusers of children can be jailed beyond their sentence
Good intentions run amok. There's
got to be a way to keep sexual offenders in jail longer without diluting everybody's Constitutional rights to due process. The idea that a
government can arbitrarily decide that someone is "too dangerous" to be released from jail at the end of their lawful sentence is a dangerous
line to cross, especially if it gets applied to other types of crime. I've got a better idea: the sexual offenders mentioned in this story had
prison sentences as short as three years. Why not just
make sure their initial sentences are longer in the first place? Three years is way too short for such a heinous crime.
Quick hits:
Concern is growing as the DeepWater Horizon oil slick in the Gulf
gets close to the Loop Current.
Brevard County is holding 3 town-hall meetings
on how to close the $37,500,000 budget gap.
Matt Reed stands up for the
Viera traffic circle.
The Pineda Causeway extension
could finish ahead of schedule.
Palm Bay firefighter pay talks continue to smolder.
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Libraries: so poor, they're burning money to stay warm!
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Thursday, May 13th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
FairTax show encore tomorrow night!
If you missed last week's episode of The Vince Young Show on the FairTax, Friday night will be your chance to
hear it again! My entire interview with Earl Medlen can be heard starting at 8:00pm on Friday night on AM-1300 WMEL.
For more info on the FairTax, check out the program notes for that show.
Libraries waste money to complain about funding
Library funding has been a hot topic for the Brevard County Commission lately. The library board here in Brevard
wants the Commission to raise the library
tax rate on your property tax bill, and supporters of Brevard's libraries
showed up in force at a recent Commission
meeting to demand more money for Brevard's libraries. Personally, I see the library system as important to fund properly,
but they're a government operation. And as with any government operation, I find it hard to believe that they're not
wasting any of their funding, that every penny of their money is being spent wisely. The county's property tax revenues
are drying up quickly, and no government
department should be declared immune from having their budget cut if they're spending money that doesn't need to be spent.
Case in point: those "I LOVE MY LIBRARY AND I VOTE" bumper stickers that have been popping up on cars all around the
Space Coast lately. Guess who paid for them? You did... whether you wanted to or not. I called the Cocoa library myself
not too long ago and spoke with a very nice librarian who cheerfully and proudly declared that the Brevard library system
paid to have all those printed up, and that I could get one for myself at the Reference desk.
So, let me get this straight. Brevard County's libraries are under-funded and desperately need more money in these hard
economic times. But they have the budget to print up bumper stickers to promote a political viewpoint?
This is outrageous.
I pay property taxes in this county, including the library tax. When I pay that library tax, I want the library to spend
it on maintaining the library buildings, operating their computer systems, buying books and research materials, and
paying the wages of the employees. I don't want the library to spend my money to print up political bumper
stickers expressing a viewpoint I disagree with.
Unlike some political commentators on the Space Coast, I like libraries. I think they serve a valuable role to improve
the educational level of our population, and they open up access to books and to the internet for people who would
otherwise find it difficult to pay for that access. When the library sticks to that purpose, library funding is money
well-spent. But printing up political bumper stickers is not the library's mission. And make no mistake:
"I LOVE MY LIBRARY AND I VOTE" is a political message, a threat to vote against any elected official who wants to freeze
or cut library funding.
If some private volunteer group wants to print up bumper stickers with that message, great: they can take up donations,
print 'em up, and slap 'em up on their cars. Free speech. It's wonderful. But the instant they want the taxpayers
of Brevard County to pay for those bumper stickers, they have crossed a big fat line that should not be crossed.
Hey, Library Board: if you're really so short on funding, don't waste your valuable money printing up political bumper
stickers. Spend your money more wisely, and we won't be so tempted to take it away from you.
Hard times call for hard choices
In stark contrast to Brevard's libraries spending our money printing bumper stickers to complain about how poor they
are, Brevard's school Superintendent Brian Binggeli actually
understands the reality of our county's revenue
situation. The economy is still sluggish, tax revenues continue to drop, and the end of the shuttle program and the
DeepWater Horizon oil spill are threatening to deliver a one-two punch to Florida's economy. And on top of it all, the
state's school class-size rules are about to get a lot stricter.
Given these truths, Binggeli could be running around demanding higher tax rates and increased funding. Instead, he's
combing through the budget and looking for ways to hire more teachers to meet the new rules while cutting spending
elsewhere in order to be able to afford those new teachers. He's proposing to eliminate vacant (and thus unneeded) school
jobs and to lay off media assistants that, while nice to have, aren't needed for the proper education of our children,
and he's pushing for other spending cuts as well. As Binggeli recently told the School Board, "Everyone must share the
burden. We are going to tell our community that there are some things they might be used to seeing that they aren't going
to see anymore."
See, Brian Binggeli gets it: there's only a certain amount of money available for him to work with, and raising the tax
burden on Brevard's citizens during this economy will simply make it even more difficult for already-struggling families
to pay their bills. No matter how good or worthy a spending project is, if you don't have the money to pay for it, you
don't have the money to pay for it. He knows he's going to anger some people by cutting unneeded programs and laying off
unneeded workers, but he also realizes how important it is to make those cuts to save the rest of the school system. But
it's a tough job, and I applaud Binggeli for having the guts to do what needs to be done.
Looking to our north, New Jersey's new Republican Governor Chris Christie has similar choices to deal with. Facing a
deficit of
$10,700,000,000 on a state budget of $29,300,000,000, Christie has rolled up his sleeves and started cutting. He has
no choice: it's either drastically cut the state's spending programs across the board, or watch New Jersey slide into
utter financial ruin. And despite this stark reality, the people whose government programs and government jobs are being
cut are screaming bloody murder about it, basically declaring that their own selfish gain is more important than preventing
the financial collapse of an entire state. Christie, to his credit, isn't listening to them.
Government officials and elected representatives at all levels need to take a lesson or two from Brian Binggeli and
Chris Christie. The old ways of spend-spend-spend lead to nothing but huge public debts and people who are so dependent on
government that they have lost the ability to take care of themselves. More of that model will simply lead to more of those
problems. Kudos to Binggeli and Christie for recognizing the need for change -- true change.
Confirmed: Cocoa Village Playhouse loses money for BCC
Following up on yesterday's discussion about Brevard Community College possibly handing
over control of the Cocoa Village Playhouse to the City of Cocoa... Florida Today confirmed it this morning. In 2009,
the Playhouse cost BCC $263,000 to run. That
explains why BCC is so hot to turn over control of the Playhouse and to force the taxpayers of Cocoa to cover those
losses.
My idea remains the same: let the Playhouse go private, and let them make the decisions they need to make to operate
more efficiently as a for-profit business. They wouldn't be the first for-profit theatrical group, and I'd be willing to
bet that many Cocoa Village merchants would see it as a wise business decision to support the Playhouse to increase their
own customer base.
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Cocoa and Titusville keep looking for ways to spend your money
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Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Cocoa considers taking over Cocoa Village Playhouse
Just to lay this out there right now... I understand how important art is. I've dabbled with
writing music and acting and
storytelling myself in the past, and I've been known to enjoy paintings and sculptures from time to time.
Arts of all kinds are important for advancing and preserving any culture, including the culture of the state of
Florida and of the United States of America.
What I'm not a big fan of is government funding of the arts. When I was a musician, I never stuck my hand out to
ask for a government grant. It sure would've been convenient to ask the government to take money out of someone
else's pocket and put it in my hands so that I could've devoted more time to my music, but as convenient as it would've
been, it would've been wrong. If my music had been good enough, people would've been willing to make a private
decision to support my music, either by giving me donations or by buying copies of my songs. Instead, I never made a
penny off of my music, because nobody thought it was good enough to pay for. And if it's not good enough for someone to
choose to buy it, then why should the government have the power to come along and force everyone to pay me for my music
anyway?
So, it was with great interest that I read a story on Florida Today this afternoon saying that Brevard Community
College has asked the city of Cocoa to consider
taking over the Cocoa Village Playhouse.
The city is nowhere near making a final decision, but the City Council has stated they're interested, though they want to
study the Playhouse's financial situation first.
Now, BCC is already a government institution in and of itself, but it tries to run itself somewhat similarly to a
business so that it doesn't have to rely on quite as much government funding. So switching control of the Cocoa Village
Playhouse from BCC to the City of Cocoa would put it more directly under government control. For that reason alone, I
prefer the Playhouse to stay under BCC's wing.
But ask yourself this question: why does BCC want to give up control of the Cocoa Village Playhouse? Think about this.
BCC has limited financial resources based on a combination of government funding, private donations, and student
tuition payments. There's only so much money to go around. If the Playhouse is making a profit off of box office ticket
sales, then there's no way BCC would want to give up such a valuable source of income. So, that must mean one thing: the
Playhouse is losing money, which means it's costing BCC money. That would be a great incentive for BCC to want to hand over
control of the Cocoa Village Playhouse to someone else to free BCC of that burden.
If the City of Cocoa takes control of the Playhouse, that means the City of Cocoa would be losing money on the
Playhouse instead of BCC. That means the city would need to make up the difference between the ticket revenue and the bills
and expenses. And how would they get that money? By taxing you, of course, since the City of Cocoa doesn't have a single
penny of money that it hasn't seized from somebody through force of law. That's how governments get their money.
But if Cocoa is like the rest of Brevard's cities (and it probably is), their land values are dropping, which means
their property tax revenues are dropping. And between the unsettled economy and the upcoming end of the space shuttle
program, that's likely going to continue for the forseeable future, which means less money available for the City of Cocoa
to spend.
Given the trouble every city in Brevard has been having just paying for the expenses that are already on the books,
can the City of Cocoa really afford to add one more thing to spend your money on while that money is drying up? Taking
over the Cocoa Village Playhouse would be a costly mistake, one the city can't afford right now.
If Brevard Community College is concerned about the money they're losing on the Cocoa Village Playhouse, then it's time
for them to cut the Playhouse loose and let it stand on its own, as a private business. Let them study their income and
expenses and figure out how to save money and run more efficiently. There are theatre groups all across the nation,
including here in Florida and even right here in Brevard, that operate privately, either as private charities surviving on
donations and ticket sales, or even as for-profit businesses. There is absolutely no reason -- no reason --
why the Cocoa Village Playhouse can't convert to that model too. It will be difficult, but many of things worth doing in
life often are.
Art will not shrivel up and die in this nation without government funding. Hollywood seems to do just fine. So does
Broadway. So do small-time musicians and artists in concert venues and museums all across the country. If art is worthwhile,
people will pay for it voluntarily on their own. They already do it every day. There's no need for the government to force
people to pay for it at the point of a gun as well.
Let's tax existing businesses to bring in new ones!
The Titusville City Council has voted unanimously to
offer cash incentives to businesses to
move into the city in a move clearly meant to counter the perception that Titusville is business-hostile. And hey,
on the surface, it sure sounds nice. Of course, new businesses will have to jump through all sorts of hoops and fill out
forms to qualify for these grants, not exactly business-friendly practices.
But here's a bigger question: where is Titusville going to get the money to pay for these cash incentives? That's
right: by taxing the citizens and business owners who already live in Titusville. Remember, this is an added expense to
the city's budget, which is already facing a $5,000,000 shortfall due to rising spending and declining tax revenue.
That means the city will need to take more money away from the businesses that are already in Titusville to pay for
bringing in new businesses.
How does this make any sense at all? In order for Titusville's economy to grow, existing businesses need to be supported
in addition to bringing in new businesses from outside. But instead, Titusville is going to make it harder for
the businesses that are in the city right now to stay open by taking more of their money away. That shiny government
grant may bring in a new business from outside, but at the cost of killing off a business that was already there by taxing
them too much to stay profitable.
As usual, Titusville is missing the point here. There's a reason businesses are avoiding your city: your taxes are too
high and your regulations are too strict. Lower your taxes and loosen your rules, and you will see businesses lining up
from outside to join the ones that are already here. That's the road to prosperity, not coming up with more ways to
spend money that you don't have.
Oops! Add $115,000,000,000 to the ObamaCare price-tag
That pushes the price tag for ObamaCare over the
$1,000,000,000,000 mark over the next ten years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. And didn't I warn you
that ObamaCare would end up costing more than President Obama and the Democrats were claiming? Government programs
always end up costing more than predicted. Always.
Quick hits:
Brevard School Superintendent Brian Binggeli is
preparing for stricter class-size rules.
Scott Ellis will step
down as Clerk of Court at the end of the year.
Gov. Crist signs bill requiring civics
classes for middle school students.
Titusville City Council delays their vote on
one-way trash pickup.
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Crist gets slick on oil; Brevard's budget woes
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Tuesday, May 11th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Crist flips again on offshore drilling
Governor Charlie Crist is calling for a special session of the State Legislature. Why? To get
a ban on offshore oil drilling in
Florida onto November's ballot for a constitutional amendment vote.
I've talked before about Crist's other famous flip-flops, so add this one to the list.
Back in 2008, Crist softened his stance
against offshore oil drilling as public support turned in favor of drilling. Now that public opinion has turned against
offshore drilling again, now Crist is against it again. What a surprise.
To those of you who still support Crist's run for the US Senate as an indie candidate: can you please tell me what,
exactly, Crist truly believes in? Can you honestly say that he won't ever change his mind on the issues that matter
to you? He may agree with you today, but there's no guarantee he'll agree with you tomorrow.
Titusville faces $5,000,000 budget gap
With grim economic prospects, the city of Titusville now needs to find a way to cover
a $5,000,000 shortfall in their next
budget. Just like in the rest of Brevard,
taxable land values are continuing to drop, which means so is tax revenue.
Titusville's solutions? Well, they're talking about raising taxes, of course. No surprise there. They're also
talking about cutting spending programs, to which I say good. But they're also talking about eliminating vacant
city government jobs, thereby admitting that those jobs are unneeded, since the city government didn't fall apart when
the person who previously held that job left it. That tells me something very important: that job wasn't needed in the
first place.
If those now-vacant jobs weren't needed, why did they ever exist at all? Why was the city of Titusville seizing money
from its citizens in the form of property taxes to pay the salary of a government employee who was carrying out a job that
was not essential to the operation of the city? And more importantly, how many un-needed city employees are still
on the payroll right now, sucking down tax money?
Government is not a jobs program. And there should never be such a thing as an "unessential" government employee.
Either they're essential, or they shouldn't be a government employee. Cut 'em loose.
If it ain't broke, don't break it!
Why mess with things that are working just fine? Titusville's mayor is suggesting having trash trucks
only collect garbage from one side of the street
to save money. Meanwhile, Cocoa Beach is thinking about taking State Road A1A, currently two one-way streets through the
downtown area, and converting it into two
different two-way streets.
In both cases, things are working just fine the way they are now. Why try something different just for the sake of
trying something different? That's how you end up with things like
the Viera traffic circle.
Aren't we taxed enough already?
USA Today says that Americans are paying the
lowest percentage of their income in taxes
since 1950. That may be true. But USA Today makes the further leap that this is one of the reasons the national debt is
so high. I disagree: the reason our debt is so high is because Congress keeps spending more and more of our tax dollars
with no regard whatsoever to even trying to balance the budget.
Leave the tax rate alone: we're taxed enough already, and we used to be taxed too much. (Some would argue we still are.)
Cut federal spending and get the debt under control that way.
Work a job, or get free money? Hmm...
You'd think that with Detroit's economy in such a shambles and with unemployment obscenely high that people in
Detroit would jump at the chance to get a job as a landscaper that pays $12.00/hour to start. Well, guess again: people
are turning down job offers in Detroit so that they can
keep cashing unemployment checks without having to work!!! Interestingly enough, that's actually illegal. If you're on
unemployment, you're required by law to actively seek a job. And if you turn down a suitable job offer, you can lose
your benefits. But people are applying for jobs that they have no intention of accepting just so they can tell the
unemployment office that they're "actively looking for work." And when they get surprised with a job offer, they turn it
down and hope nobody notices so they can keep cashing the checks.
Hey, why work an honest job for eight hours a day outside when you can make almost as much money sitting on your butt
at home watching Elimi-Date on TV? And it gets even better since Congress keeps extending everyone's unemployment benefits.
Who needs a job?
Florida Republican Party releases credit card records
Now that the state Republican party has
released the spending details from
the much-maligned party-issued credit cards, Governor Charlie Crist is going to have a delicate line to walk. On the one
hand, Crist will want to remind people as much as possible that Marco Rubio, as the one-time Speaker of the State
House, had one of those cards and even charged a small number of personal expenses to that card. (Never mind that
Rubio re-imbursed the state party for those charges quite some time ago.)
On the other hand, if Crist pushes that story too far, it could blow up in his face. Who was the chairman of the
state party who made the decision to hand out those credit cards? Why, none other than Jim Greer, who also paid very
little attention to who was charging what on those cards. And who was the close political ally who called in multiple
favors to make sure Jim Greer got that chairman job? Why, none other than Charlie Crist. And remember, though Crist
himself didn't have a party credit card, he has acknowledged that some of Jim Greer's credit card charges were on
Crist's behalf. Crist got the guy into office who issued those cards and made this whole mess possible, and Crist
benefited directly from the existence of those cards. That means Crist has far more to answer for on this issue than
Rubio.
By the way, how much did everyone charge on these cards anyway? The St. Petersburg Times
has the totals.
Let's compare and contrast! Jim Greer charged $478,000 to his card, and Greer's own right-hand man Delmar Johnson
charged a mind-blowing $1,400,000 to his card. Marco Rubio? Try $87,000 total.
Quick hits:
Cocoa Beach is bracing for a code
enforcement fight.
Cocoa's water superintendent suspended, accused of
giving contracts to friends.
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Tonight: the FairTax and special guest Earl Medlen!
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Wednesday, May 5th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
The FairTax
You've heard me mention the FairTax on the air before: a proposal to replace all
federal income taxes on people and businesses with a national retail sales tax. But I've never really gone into detail
about what, exactly, the FairTax is, how it works, and why it could be such a benefit to the United States of America --
or to any other nation that beats us to the punch and implements it first.
Tonight, it's time to change that. I'll be joined in the WMEL studios tonight by Earl Medlen from the
Florida FairTax Educational Association as we lay out the case for switching to
the FairTax.
The basics
Right now, the government of the United States is primarily funded through income taxes on both people and businesses.
You know all about personal income taxes already: just look at your paycheck every pay-day. The government takes three chunks
of taxes out of your gross pay: one chunk for Social Security, one for Medicare, and one for income taxes.
The side most people never see is businesses taxes. When a business owner decides what prices to sell their products at, they
have to make sure they're setting a high enough price to cover their expenses: paying their employees, paying rent, paying for
utilities... and paying taxes. Businesses look at taxes the same way they look at any other business expense, and they set their
prices high enough to cover all of their expenses. In a way, businesses don't actually pay even a single penny in business taxes;
you do, every time you buy something from that business.
The amount varies depending on the product, but studies have shown that
for every dollar you spend buying something (a loaf of bread, for instance), about twenty-three cents of the price is to cover
that business's tax bill. Economists call this an "embedded tax." But you never see it, just like you never see how much of that
dollar is to cover their electrical bill, or their payroll, or any other expenses. All you see is that it costs you a dollar to buy
that loaf of bread.
That brings us to the FairTax. The FairTax is a national sales tax on all goods and services purchased at the retail level. Under
the FairTax, all personal and business income taxes would be eliminated and replaced with a national retail sales tax rate of 23%. In
addition, every American citizen would receive a "pre-bate" check every month to cover the cost of any FairTax you would pay for the
basic necessities of life, with the amount based on the number of people in each household.
What would this mean for you? First of all, look at your paycheck. Remember those three chunks the federal government takes out of each
paycheck for Social Security, Medicare, and income taxes? Gone. Your gross pay becomes your take-home pay.
But what about when you need to buy something, like that loaf of bread from before? Doesn't it cost more now? Actually, no. Remember,
the $1.00 price tag on that loaf of bread included $0.23 cents in embedded taxes: 23%. But now the store doesn't have to pay income taxes
anymore either. Those embedded taxes go away. Of course, now we have the FairTax, and the store has to account for the FairTax in the
price of that loaf of bread: 23%. Notice how it's the same percentage as the embedded taxes used to be? So you still end up only paying
$1.00 for that same loaf of bread. Before, the store would spend $0.23 cents of that dollar to pay their income taxes. Now, they take that
same $0.23 cents and send it to Washington as the FairTax on that loaf of bread.
And that's just the start.
April 15th now becomes just another pleasant spring day, as Neal Boortz likes to say.
The pre-bate checks make sure that poor families aren't overly burdened by the new tax system. The underground economy
starts paying taxes too, as drug dealers and under-the-table workers who used to just hide their income by not filing
their income tax forms now start paying sales taxes whenever they buy something. (Hey, the crack dealer down the street
has to buy bread too, and he buys it the same way you do: at the store.)
Want to know more?
There's plenty of details I just don't have time to get into here. For example, just for starters, there's
the debate over whether the FairTax is 23% (which is the inclusive rate) or really 30% (which is the exlusive rate).
There's plenty more questions you may have, and plenty of false arguments you'll hear from opponents.
If you want to learn more about the FairTax, a great place to start is, of course,
FairTax.org. Clicking on the "About the FairTax" link in the upper-left corner will
take you to some good general information and
FAQs. Earl Medlen's group, the Florida FairTax Educational Association, has a
great website for hooking up with other Floridians who support the FairTax. There's also
FairTax Nation if you want to use the Internet to reach out to other supporters
across the USA. And of course, if you're a real policy wonk, you can read the actual text of the Fair Tax Act of
2009 that is being considered in Congress right now: H.R. 25 in
the House of Representatives, and S.296 in the Senate.
Oh, books too! WMEL radio talk show host Neal Boortz and Georgia Representative John Linder (Republican) have teamed up
and written two excellent New York Times bestselling books on the FairTax, with Linder providing the intellectual heft and
Boortz providing the entertainment value. (A book on tax policy that's fun to read? Who knew!)
The
FairTax Book introduces the concept and answers many questions and concerns. And
FairTax:
The Truth: Answering The Critics offers rebuttals to many of the tired, old, and often wildly inaccurate criticisms
of the FairTax that have come out as the plan has gained political traction across the USA.
EDIT: If you have any questions you'd like to ask Earl Medlen about the FairTax, he
has graciously allowed me to share his phone number with you here on the website: (772) 202-4062. He lives in Barefoot Bay,
so don't worry: while it's technically long-distance, it's a cheap call. And hey, if you have a cell phone with free
long-distance calls, then you're set.
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Next week's tentative schedule
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Saturday, May 1st, 2010 at 11:45am
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Since my show gets pre-empted for Orlando Magic basketball games, the Magic's NBA Playoffs
schedule affects my schedule. The Magic have already won their 1st-round series, so they're waiting for the 1st-round series between
the Atlanta Hawks and the Milwaukee Bucks to end so that the Magic can play the winner in the 2nd-round of the NBA Playoffs.
The Hawks won Game 6 last night, forcing Game 7 to be played Sunday night. That guarantees that I will have a show on Monday night, May 3rd
at 8:00pm, since the NBA won't force the winner of Game 7 to immediately play the Magic the very next night.
As for the rest of next week... from what I can tell, the Orlando Magic will play the winner of the Atlanta/Milwaukee series
on Tuesday 5/4 for Game 1 and on Thursday 5/6 for Game 2. That means I would get pre-empted Tuesday night and Thursday night, along
with the Friday Night Locker Room pre-empting me on Friday night. That would leave me with another show on Wednesday night, May 5th at
8:00pm. But that schedule hasn't been confirmed by the NBA yet, so it's still subject to change.
But for now, I'm going to aim for Wednesday night being FairTax Night with Earl Medlen from the
Florida FairTax Educational Association. I'll update this website if that changes.
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Infantini wants answers; oil slick spreads; Crist get blasted
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Friday, April 30th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Yes, it's Friday night, and I have a show!
Since the Friday Night Locker Room did a special Thursday night show last night, that means they don't have a show
tonight... which means I do. Alas, their game last night meant I got bumped at the last-minute... as did our scheduled guest,
FairTax expert Earl Medlen. Details on that here, but suffice it to say we will still have him on,
hopefully sometime in the next week. As soon as I can lock down a date, I'll let you know.
Next week's schedule still unknown
The Orlando Magic are waiting to see who wins the NBA Playoff series between the Atlanta Hawks and the Milwaukee Bucks, with the
winner of that series taking on the Magic starting next week. Alas, until the Atlanta-Milwaukee series finishes, we won't know the
schedule for the Magic games, which means I don't know what nights I'll have shows next week. Milwaukee currently leads the series 3-2,
so if Milwaukee wins Game 6 tonight and wins the series, the schedule for next week will probably be announced Saturday morning. But if
Atlanta wins tonight and forces Game 7 to be played on Sunday, that would guarantee a show for me on Monday night, but it would leave
the rest of the week's schedule up in the air until Monday morning.
Basically, just watch this website. As soon as I know my on-air schedule for next week, I'll post it here.
Infantini: Show me the jobs!
I love this. County Commissioner and fiscal watchdog Trudie Infantini is
challenging the Economic Development Commission.
Since October 2007, they've been getting about $1,500,000 in taxpayer money every year to try to create jobs here in
Brevard, with the stated goal of creating 2,250 jobs in the next three years. But after almost three years and $4,500,000
they've only created 256 new jobs in Brevard, about $17,578 spend per job. And Infantini is challenging the EDC to prove
that they've really even created those jobs at all.
Keep in mind where the EDC gets the money for "creating" these jobs: by taxing hard-working business owners and citizens
here in Brevard County in the form of property taxes and business license and permit fees. That's money that people
could've spent to pay bills, improve their businesses, or -- *gasp* -- hire new workers.
For far too long, the EDC has been immune to spending cuts and has ceaselessly chanted the mantra, "We're creating jobs.
It's money well-spent!" I'm thrilled to see Infantini holding their feet to the fire and demanding results. This is
precisely why we sent Trudie to Viera: to bring more accountability to the County government. Great job!
More local pork, this time in Titusville
Democratic Congresswoman Suzanne Kosmas had a brilliant idea recently:
Let's make the rest of the USA pay $2,000,000
for a helicopter school in Titusville! Absolutely incredible... once again, we sent a bunch of money from Brevard
County to Washington DC in the form of income taxes, and then held out our hands and asked for some of it back. I've got
a better idea: let's keep the money here in Brevard County, pay for the helicopter school ourselves (if at all, since it
should be the free market making that decision anyway), and cut out the federal middle-man.
What allowed this culture of federal pork to flourish? Attitudes like this:
| "We’re not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success
that's fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money."
- President Barack Obama,
April
28th, 2010 |
It's not your money, President Obama. It's our money. We earned it through our own hard work.
And how, exactly, do you calculate the figure of "enough money?" $100,000 a year?
$50,000 a year? We consider $15,000 a year to be "poor" here in the USA, but I can think of a few poor Ethiopians who
would consider $15,000 to be "enough money." Who gets to make that decision?
This way of thinking is dangerous. But I would expect nothing less from a borderline socialist like Obama.
Oil spill spreads
This is getting pretty serious. The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico from the wrecked Deepwater Horizon offshore
drilling rig has reached the Louisiana
coast. This after a new leak in the underwater well-head was discovered which made the oil flow rate
5
times worse than before. Florida Governor Charlie Crist has declared a
state of emergency as the slick drifts
closer to the Florida panhandle, and officials here in Brevard County are preparing for the
growing possibility that the slick could reach
the Space Coast.
The second-guessing is getting more serious too. Some critics are pointing out that the Deepwater Horizon
lacked an extra safeguard device
that could've helped stop the leak, though it's important to point out that federal law didn't require the rig to have
that device. It's also important to point out that other countries do require that device on their offshore rigs. As loathe
as I am to support federal government interference in how businesses operate, I think we may want to rethink the decision
to make this safety device optional. Considering how much this oil spill is interfering with the Constitutional rights of
other marine companies to do their business, I do believe there is a valid role for the federal government to step in here.
But while I do think there's room to consider more safety rules for offshore drilling, I also believe the calls from
some corners to abandon offshore drilling altogether are outright foolishness. Solar, wind and nuclear power are simply not
ready yet to take over the nation's energy burden, and may not be ready for quite some time. Until they are ready, we
still need oil. And we can either get it from within our own borders using environmentally-safe practices that far outshine
the rest of the world, or we can buy all of our oil from hostile foreign nations and ship it into the country using oil
supertankers with a far worse spillage record than that of American offshore oil rigs.
That's why I had to chuckle when I saw Jeff Schweers on FloridaToday.com criticizing Republican State Senator Mike
Haridopolos for supporting
offshore drilling in Florida just days before the spill. If Schweers is shocked by that, I can't wait to see his
reaction to me continuing to push even harder for offshore drilling after the spill. As for Haridopolos, well, he
has some pretty lofty company:
| "It turns out, by the way, that oil rigs
today generally don’t cause spills. They are technologically very advanced. Even during Katrina, the spills
didn’t come from the oil rigs, they came from the refineries onshore."
- President Barack Obama,
April
2nd, 2010 |
Yep, that's the Democratic President of the United States of America, just a couple of weeks before the spill, pushing
for offshore drilling. It'll be interesting to see if Jeff Schweers posts this on his website too.
Speaking of the safe record of offshore drilling in the USA (41 years between major oil spills, doncha know), the
liberal Huffington Post website inadvertantly made that point for me with their list of
9 major American oil spills.
Let's review:
Exxon Valdez in 1989: oil tanker spill
Argo Merchant in 1976: oil tanker spill
North Cape barge in Rhode Island, 1996: oil tanker spill
ExxonMobil tanker in Port Arthur, Texas in 2010: oil tanker spill
Greenpoint, Brooklyn in 1978: refinery spill
PEPCO Chalk Point station in Maryland, 2000: refinery spill
Citgo refinery in Louisiana, 2006: refinery spill
Santa Barbara, California in 1969: offshore rig spill
C.P. Baker rig blowout in 1964: offshore rig spill
While trying to make the case for how dangerous offshore oil drilling is, their list includes 4 oil tanker spills, 3
refinery spills... and just 2 offshore rig spills from 1964 and 1969, 41 and 46 years ago. HuffPo wants us to stop
drilling offshore for oil, but since we don't have any way of replacing that oil with anything greener at the moment,
that means we'll have to switch to foreign oil being shipped in on supertankers. (See: major spills in 1976, 1989, 1996,
2010, and other tanker spills not on the list.)
And the HuffPo thinks they're being environmentally responsible with this?
Let's get real. Increased safety rules on offshore oil drilling? Absolutely. Stopping all offshore drilling
immediately? No way.
Fallout spreads from Crist going indie
Crist's indie run will be challenging.
Brevard Republicans blast Crist's switch.
LeMieux won't support Crist.
Palm Bay defends code enforcement
At a special meeting of the Palm Bay City Council, Council members stated their belief that
their code enforcement practices are fair.
Oh, really? I think the Palm Bay citizens who didn't get any notices at all from 2004 to
2008 while their code enforcement fines spiraled into the stratosphere might disagree with that.
Illegals to Arizona: "You can't arrest us! We're leaving!"
Um... isn't that kinda the point?
By the way, while I do have concerns with how broadly-written Arizona's new illegal-immigrant law is and the potential
for a few rogue cops to harass law-abiding citizens, I'm in favor of this law overall. Any officers who do overstep their
proper role can be punished by their superiors, just like what happens now if an officer gets too zealous enforcing any
other law that's already on the books. If a cop mis-behaves, it's not the fault of the law; it's the fault of the cop.
Bottom-line: if the federal government had done what we've been asking them to do for over a decade now and secured
our borders, Arizona wouldn't have felt the need to pass legislation like this at the state level. If a poor family with
no money and little education can get across our border, then so can a trained Islamic terrorist with money, training and
equipment. That concerns me a hell of a lot more than some guy named Pablo Gonzales sneaking into Texas to mow lawns.
Quick hits:
The Brevard County government will hold 3 budget
and spending workshops starting next week.
Parking meters could be coming to the town
of Cape Canaveral.
Florida Tech will start a college
football team in 2013.
FPL and Cocoa Beach continue to bicker
over shoddy power poles.
Palm Bay man uses licensed gun to halt a
bank robbery. Attaboy!
Tired of left-lane slow-pokes? Check out Left Lane Drivers of America.
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Thursday night's FairTax show postponed!!!
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Thursday, April 29th, 2010 at 7:30pm
|
My apologies to all of you and to Earl Medlen from the Florida FairTax
Educational Association... there's been a last-minute change to WMEL's on-air schedule for tonight. Instead of my
show, we're carrying a special Thursday-night edition of the Friday Night Locker Room and their coverage of local high
school baseball from 7:00pm until about 9:00pm, pre-empting my show for tonight.
For those of you who were looking forward to Earl Medlen, fear not: he will be back, and he's an absolute
saint for driving all the way up from Barefoot Bay to Cocoa only to learn at the same time I did that we wouldn't have a
show tonight. As soon as the Orlando Magic's schedule for the 2nd round of the NBA playoffs gets set, I'll pick a new day
for Earl to come back in here, and we'll get the FairTax show on. We'll also be dedicating a second show at some point to
code-enforcement abuses, an issue that Earl has some first-hand experience with.
The only good news in all of this? Since the Friday Night Locker Room is covering a Thursday night game this week, that
means I'll have a rare Friday night edition of The Vince Young Show on Friday, April 30th! So I'll talk to
all of you on Friday night at 8:00pm, on the Talk-To-Me Station, AM-1300 WMEL!
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Crist goes indie; I got something wrong
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Wednesday, April 28th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Thursday night is FairTax Night!
Join me this Thursday night (that's tomorrow night!) at 8:00pm on AM-1300 WMEL as we talk to Earl Medlen from the Florida FairTax Educational Association.
If you've ever had any questions about the FairTax, or if you're not even sure what the FairTax is,
this will be your opportunity to talk about it with one of the biggest and brightest supporters of the FairTax you'll find around here.
Thanks to Earl for agreeing to come to the WMEL studios for this!
A correction and an apology
The oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig that exploded and sank last week continues to spread in the Gulf of Mexico,
with crews rushing to contain the slick before it hits Louisiana's coastal marshes. In fact, the Coast Guard is making plans to
set parts of the slick on fire, a
crude but effective way of containing the spill and saving the marshes.
While I've been keeping my eye on this story, Florida Today ran an article today talking about how the Loop Current in the
Gulf of Mexico could pick up part of the oil slick, pull it down between Cuba and the Florida Keys, and then carry it north along the
Gulf Stream current -- potentially all the way to the Space
Coast. Nobody's saying it's likely, but it's certainly possible.
As I read the article, something in my brain clicked. So I pulled up VinceYoung.com, searched for the phrase "Loop Current," and
found this:
| "And speaking of Brevard's environmentalists...
Amy Tidd and Tony Sasso sat down with Matt Reed at Florida Today and promptly showed they don't know much about
offshore oil drilling. Note to Tony Sasso: you might want to double-check which direction the Loop Current flows
in over in the Gulf of Mexico, for example."
- Vince Young, November 12th, 2009 |
The Florida Today article is long-gone at this point, buried behind their pay wall. But from what I remember of it, both Amy Tidd
and Tony Sasso, local environmental activists, were both taking the usual shots at offshore oil drilling, trying to paint it as
horribly filthy and polluting. In the process, they were of course completely ignoring the fact that, prior to last week's explosion
and spill, the last major oil spill from an offshore rig in American waters happened in 1969, 41 years ago. Going 41 years between
major accidents is quite an accomplishment, one that Sasso and Tidd want you to disregard entirely.
But I digress.
At one point in the article, Tony Sasso painted a scenario in which an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico could get picked up by the
Loop Current and carried to the shores of the Space Coast. I remember reading that at the time and thinking it was ridiculous, since
the Loop Current flows counter-clockwise around the Gulf of Mexico, meaning that any oil slick in the Gulf would get carried away from
Florida and wouldn't get the chance to come around to us.
Boy, did I get that one wrong. The Loop Current actually goes clockwise around the eastern half of the Gulf of Mexico, putting it
in the perfect position to possibly pick up this new oil slick and carry some it around to our coast, making Sasso's scenario come true.
Turns out what I was thinking of is called the Loop Current Eddy, a current that sometimes breaks away from the main Loop Current and
causes a counter-clockwise flow in the western half of the Gulf of Mexico. The Loop Current and the Loop Current Eddy are two
different things, and when Tony Sasso mentioned the Loop Current, my brain jumped to the Loop Current Eddy instead. Stupid.
So, on this one point, I feel the need to correct the record and apologize to Tony Sasso. On the Loop Current, you were right and
I was wrong.
That said...
In defense of offshore drilling
In 1979, the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania suffered a partial meltdown, cementing into place a public
mood that had already started to turn against nuclear power. The accident was the result of a variety of safety violations, and the
American nuclear power industry learned their lesson well, turning a renewed emphasis on safety into a clean record ever since that day.
But the American public over-reacted, deeming nuclear power to be too risky at all, and the number of new nuclear reactors plummetted.
But as a growing nation with growing energy needs, the USA still needed to get its energy from somewhere. So, we turned back to
our old standbys: oil, coal, and natural gas. And rather than basing our energy systems around cleaner nuclear power as much of Europe
has done, we stuck with our addiction to pollution-heavy fossil fuels. And we've paid the price for it ever since. Heck, had it not been
for our over-reaction as a nation to Three Mile Island, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that exploded and sank last week might not have
been needed at all, thus averting the slow-motion disaster playing out today. One isolated accident in 1979 was enough to derail
nuclear power and keep us addicted to oil.
Now, the Deepwater Horizon has the potential to become the Three Mile Island of offshore oil drilling. Nobody is disputing the
seriousness of this accident, with 42,000 gallons of oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico every day. A full investigation is
needed to find out why existing safety rules weren't enough to head off this disaster, and every offshore oil drilling rig in the future
will need to apply the lessons learned from this spill to keep it from happening again.
But remember: this is the first major spill from an offshore oil rig in American waters since
1969. You cannot dispute that 41 years between major accidents in
any industry is a darn good track record. And it's a far better track record than any environmental activist would care to
admit.
As much as "clean energy" gets pushed by the environmentalist movement, they've been telling us for the past 20 years that
clean energy is "just 10 years away." We still don't have any way of fully relying on solar cells or wind turbines to power our nation.
The sooner we can reach that point, the better.
But in the meantime, like it or not, our energy economy is still centered on fossil
fuels and oil, which means in the short-term, we need fossil fuels and oil. We can get them from one of two places. We can drill for it
on American soil and in American waters, cutting down on transport costs and controlling the environmental impacts as best as we can.
Or we can buy it from foreign nations, many of which are hostile to us and which have environmental standards that are far below those
of the USA, and then ship it in across the ocean in giant oil tankers with a far worse spillage record than American offshore oil rigs.
Think the Deepwater Horizon spill is bad at 42,000 gallons a day? It would take 262 days for Deepwater Horizon to top the
11,000,000 gallons spilled by the Exxon Valdez oil tanker in 1989. And
that's still nowhere near the top of the worst oil spills in history, not
even among tanker spills alone.
I prefer to get our oil from right here in the USA, thank you. And to do that, we'll need to drill more on land and drill more
offshore right here in the USA. If we let Deepwater Horizon scare us away from that, we'll stay stuck right where we are right now:
buying oil from hostile and polluting foreign nations and shipping it in on tankers with a bad spillage history. And we can all agree
that's not a good place to be.
Crist to go Indie on Thursday
The cat's out of the bag. Governor Charlie Crist will run for the US Senate
as a No-Party-Affiliation
candidate, setting up a likely three-way race between Crist, Democrat Kendrick Meek, and Republican Marco Rubio. The official
announcement comes Thursday.
Part of me is annoyed, since Crist going indie threatens to split the Republican vote and tip the Senate race to the Democrat. But
as a third-party Libertarian troublemaker myself, part of me is thrilled. Once again, someone has a chance of winning a major election
without needing the support of one of the two major parties: Jesse Ventura, then Joe Lieberman, then the Conservative Doug Hoffman in
New York's Congressional race in November 2009, and now Charlie Crist. The stranglehold of the two major parties on the American
political system is slowly slipping away. And the sooner these two bloated and corrupt political dinosaurs die off, the better.
That said, my support in this race is firmly behind Marco Rubio. He's simply the most conservative candidate in the Senate race.
Titusville selects new motto
The winner: Gateway to Nature and Space. Yay.
Too bad business owners still find Titusville to be too
unfriendly and the residents of the city still find it to be
too boring. With all the problems currently facing Titusville
and the end of the space shuttle program looming on the horizon, you'd think the City Council would've had bigger things to worry
about than a new motto. No wonder that city is falling apart.
Quick hits:
Sheriff's investigation stalls compensation for
William Dillon.
Melbourne awards event parking contract to Lanier after
local firm gets out-bid.
Brevard County hopes to cash in on beach
volleyball tournaments. Not a bad idea, actually.
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Tallahassee approves red-light cameras AND keeps spending your money
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Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Magic sweep means more talk-time for me!
With their win in Game 4 on Monday night, the Orlando Magic swept the Charlotte Bobcats 4-0 in the opening round of the NBA playoffs.
That means the Magic won't need to play any games for the rest of the week, which means I'll be talking to you on Wednesday night and
Thursday night!
Looking ahead, the Magic will play the winner of the Atlanta Hawks-Milwaukee Bucks series in the next round of the playoffs. But with
Atlanta and Milwaukee tied at 2-2, that means that series won't end until at least Friday night. And if the Hawks and Bucks split their
next two games, that would force a Game 7 on Sunday, which means the Magic might not even have their next game until next Tuesday or
Wednesday night. But it all depends on what happens in the Hawks-Bucks series. As soon as I know the Magic's schedule for next week, I'll
also know my schedule for next week, and I'll post it right here on VinceYoung.com.
Thursday night is FairTax Night!
Join me this Thursday night at 8:00pm on AM-1300 WMEL as we talk to Earl Medlen from the Florida FairTax Educational Association.
If you've ever had any questions about the FairTax, or if you're not even sure what the FairTax is,
this will be your opportunity to talk about it with one of the biggest and brightest supporters of the FairTax you'll find around here.
Thanks to Earl for agreeing to come to the WMEL studios for this!
Red-light cameras could go statewide!
A new bill setting statewide standards for red-light cameras has been passed by both
the State House and the
State Senate in Tallahassee, and now
goes to Governor Charlie Crist's desk for a signature. And look who one of the biggest supporters of this bill was: none
other than Brevard's State Senator Thad Altman.
Now, there are two provisions in the bill which should help cut down on some of the biggest abuses of red-light cameras that
have popped up in other states. All cases would have to be reviewed by a police officer watching video of the violation, so it won't
just be a private monitoring company with a per-ticket commission making the call. And cameras would not be allowed to target drivers
who make a rolling right turn on red, which is both the most-common and
least-dangerous red-light violation.
But overall, red-light cameras are still a bad idea. Proponents of the cameras always say it's about traffic safety, not about raising
money through extra ticket revenue. But six cities
in Georgia proved what a bunch of malarky that is back in 2009 after they each shut down their red-light cameras. Why? Because
the red-light cameras weren't making any money.
A new Georgia state law took effect in January 2009 which forced cities with red-light cameras to make their yellow lights last one
second longer. And when the yellow lights got a second-longer, red-light running at the camera-equipped intersections
plummeted overnight,
even at intersections where the cameras had been up for well over a year. Fewer violations means fewer tickets, which means less revenue
for the cities. And suddenly, the same city councils that had been claiming the cameras were about "safety, not revenue" were shutting
down their cameras due to the lack of revenue. The same story also played out in
Denver,
Colorado and in San Carlos, California
under similar circumstances.
See, it turns out there's a study that shows that making yellow lights one-second
longer does more to reduce red-light-running than red-light cameras do. This is because the vast majority of
red-light violations are violations of less than a second, while most red-light violations that cause actual crashes are violations of
more than a second. This means that red-light cameras are mainly catching the sort of violators who only rarely cause accidents.
And when Schaumburg, Illinois realized that their red-light cameras were targeting the wrong type of violators under the false guise of
increasing traffic safety, they took down their cameras too.
I've seen people attack the longer-yellow study, so let me point this story out as well. Remember those cities in
Georgia who took down their cameras after making their yellow lights longer? Well, the longer yellow lights
are still working, and red-light running remains down.
When a city puts up red-light cameras using the "safety, not revenue" argument but then takes them down when they stop
making money, that really puts the lie to the safety argument, doesn't it?
But thanks to the Florida Legislature, red light cameras are about to get a lot more common here in Florida. Smile!
(Oh, and if you don't think these cameras can be abused, check out this old story from
Vancouver,
Canada.
State budget deal reached; state worker pay will stay the same
The State House and State Senate have reached
a new budget agreement for the 2010-2011 budget.
Price tag: $69,000,000,000. That's over $2,000,000,000 higher than the 2009-2010 budget of
$66,540,000,000, which means our state government
is spending even more of our money in a year in which we the people have less money to begin with thanks to the economy.
Less money, that is, unless you're a state worker. While many of us in the real world have been dealing with salary cuts and
layoffs, state worker pay will stay exactly
the same. I guess they get a special exemption from economic reality.
Tobia gave students extra-credit for working on his campaign
Melbourne's State Representative John Tobia (an embarrassment to the Republican Party) gave his students
exemptions from final exams if they agreed to
volunteer for his 2008 political campaign or for the campaigns of any of his Republican primary opponents. This on top
of somehow paying cash for a
luxury condo on a community college professor's salary, plus claiming his parent's house in Brevard as his primary
residence to be eligible for office while he owned a home outside of the district. Tobia gets more and more questionable
by the day.
Protests erupt over Arizona's new illegal immigrant law
If the federal government would do its job and enforce the border, states wouldn't see the need
to pass laws like this. It's that simple.
Cut field trips? Or cut Blackberries at Viera? Hmm...
The Brevard School Board may be about to
choose poorly. Meanwhile, parents have
better ideas.
Oil rig spill continues to spread in Gulf of Mexico
This spill could get serious, though for
perspective, 97% of the spill is a thin oil-water mix,
with only 3% "pudding-like" oil, so it's not as bad as it sounds. But
as I predicted last week, that hasn't stopped opponents of offshore oil drilling from pointing
to the first big oil rig spill in 40 years as a reason to halt expansion of future drilling. And even
Governor Crist is getting in on it!
Quick hits:
Brevard Libraries may finally ban children from getting
R-rated DVDs.
Cocoa water rates may go up.
The Palm Bay City Council is reacting to a loophole that
voided many red-light camera tickets.
A bill to ban texting-while-driving is dead in the State House.
Should voting be mandatory? A Colorado town is considering it.
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Two chances to meet me this weekend!
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Thursday, April 22nd, 2010 at 9:00pm
|
You'll have two chances to meet me in-person this weekend at local events here
on the Space Coast!
First up: Friday night at 6:30pm, Clerk of the Court Scott Ellis and Melbourne Councilwoman Joanne Corby will be
hosting a forum at Kay's BBQ in Cocoa, on 520 just west of Clearlake. Topics will include code enforcement abuses,
the possible creation of a new elected Comptroller position here in Brevard, and the ongoing county charter review. I'm
not an official part of the event, but I'm planning to be there, and I hope you'll drop by and say "Hi."
Second, Sunday afternoon from 12-noon to 5:00pm, I'll be manning AM-1300 WMEL's table at the Melbourne Art Festival in
downtown Melbourne. Check out the artwork displays and the live performances, and then come introduce yourself to me
at WMEL's table. We'll have various WMEL staffers and on-air hosts at the table all weekend long, not just me, so keep
stopping by and see who's there.
See you this weekend, and then I'll talk to you on the radio again on Tuesday night at 8:00pm on the Talk-To-Me
Station AM-1300 WMEL!
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Will oil rig explosion sink offshore drilling in Florida?
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Thursday, April 22nd, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Sunken rig in Gulf of Mexico is spilling oil -- lots of oil
The floating oil rig that exploded and caught fire off the coast of Louisiana has now sunk. Now, the wreck of the
drilling rig is leaking -- badly. There are reports that the rig could spill
336,000 gallons of oil and 700,000 gallons of
diesel fuel. That's a lot.
Given how hot a topic offshore oil drilling in Florida has been over the past couple of
years, I fully expect drilling opponents to point to this explosion and oil spill as Exhibit A in the case against drilling.
And make no mistake, supporters of drilling in Florida will have to factor this into their thinking. You don't downplay
an accident that kills at least 10 people and spills over 1,000,000 gallons of fuel and oil combined into the ocean.
But if we're going to discuss this accident, let's discuss the whole picture. First of all, while 1,000,000 gallons is
not a small amount, it pales in comparison to the Exxon Valdez oil spill along the coast of Alaska in 1989,
which spilled 11,000,000 gallons of crude oil. And the Exxon
Valdez spill itself is dwarfed by even larger oil spills that have occurred in other parts of the world. The Valdez spill
also occurred just offshore, while this week's spill in the Gulf of Mexico is much further away from the coast. So between
the size and the location, the environmental damage from this explosion and spill will be much, much smaller.
Digging even deeper... right now, the USA gets a rather large amount of oil from overseas. We pump it into giant oil
tanker ships and float it all the way across the ocean into our ports, where we pump it out and refine it. Now, take a
look at a list of worldwide oil spills over time. Pay extra
attention to the spills here in the USA. Notice what they're almost always caused by? Oil tankers crashing into things
and spilling their load. Very, very few spills in American waters have come from offshore oil drilling rigs. In fact,
the spill we're seeing in the Gulf of Mexico right now is the
first such spill since 1969, when a rig spilled oil just offshore from Santa Barbara, California. That was 41 years
ago. Going 41 years without a major oil spill from an offshore rig in American waters shows just how good a job we do of
protecting the environment, and it shatters the myth that offshore oil drilling will automatically ruin the coasts of
Florida.
Look: I want to see the USA get completely away from burning oil someday. Nuclear, wind, solar, tidal, hydroelectric...
those will be the power sources of the future. But the future is just that -- the future. Right now, we need oil -- a lot
of it. We're not ready to stop burning oil, not even close. And in the meantime, we need to get that oil from somewhere.
We can either drill it right here in the USA using offshore oil drilling rigs that have major oil spills about once every
41 years, or we can ship it in from overseas using oil tankers with a pesky history of regularly crashing into things and
spilling that oil.
This week's explosion in the Gulf of Mexico is a tragedy. But it really doesn't change the argument in favor of
offshore oil drilling. One accident in 41 years shouldn't derail the entire concept of offshore oil drilling. The last
time we made that mistake was Three Mile Island, which derailed the concept of nuclear power in the USA for decades --
leaving us dependent on oil.
State workers whine about proposed pay cut
State government employees
and teachers in Brevard are getting grumpy
about not getting pay raises, or in the case of state employees, possibly seeing their pay get cut. Check out this quote:
| "State employees have gone four years without a general pay raise,
while the consumer price index has gone up on the order of 10 percent."
- Doug Martin, lobbyist for state employee union |
Mr. Martin... you do realize that many, many workers in the private sector haven't been getting raises lately
either, right?
Government is not a jobs program, and government employees have no right to demand pay increases. Every
penny of their pay comes from being seized from the citizens of the state of Florida in the form of taxes. So
whenever a government employee demands a raise, they are saying that they deserve your money more than you
do.
In this economy, we're all hurting. Government employees do not deserve some special exemption from the economic
realities the rest of us have to deal with every day.
Arizona House may pass bill requiring presidential candidates to show birth certificate
And of course, people are saying this is just
some sort of crazy "birther" thing. Look: take Barack Obama
out of the equation and think about this. Right now, there is absolutely no requirement for any Presidential
candidate to prove that they are Constitutionally eligible to hold that office. Are you really comfortable with that?
Quick hits:
November ballot amendment could exempt
Florida from Obama's health insurance mandate.
Amy Kneessy discusses school funding and control with Matt Reed.
Federal investigation opens into Florida GOP-issued credit cards.
Crist continues to try to push his-man-Greer's
troubles onto Rubio.
Money-grab? Melbourne charges for parking at Art Festival.
Rockledge police cleared cleared in death of arrestee.
Appeals court denies Melbourne's appeal in
Daily Bread expansion lawsuit.
YouTube video parodies Titusville's night life,
ruffles city officials.
County Commission votes 3-2 to approve development
along Palm Bay beltway.
County Commission delays final decision on looser
floodplain development rules.
West Melbourne looks to cut budget by 5%.
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Crist might go indie; FCAT gets declawed
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Tuesday, April 20th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Florida F.A.C.E.OFF
Last night, I talked with Cindy Williams on the show about her fight with Brevard County's
code enforcement agency over whether or not she's allowed to own pigs in a rural, unincorporated area. After talking to
Cindy, we also took a call from a local group called
Florida F.A.C.E.OFF, dedicated to fighting and publicizing code
enforcement abuses in Brevard County and across the Sunshine State. They do good work, so I wanted to give them a plug.
Check out their site, and get ready to get angry. Too often, code enforcement agents go far behind the legitimate role of
balancing out the competing rights of neighboring landowners and cross over into bullying and authoritarian abuse.
Thank goodness, my one and only Code Enforcement encounter turned out to be mercifully simple and quick. But the instant
heartburn that I got from seeing their initial violation notice for something I didn't even do is a testament to the
well-deserved bad reputation that Code Enforcement agencies everywhere have picked up.
When law-abiding citizens fear their government, that means government is too powerful. Time to find a new balance.
Another flip-flop: Crist now admits he's considering going indie
As his chances of beating Marco Rubio evaporate in the Republican primary of the US Senate race, Governor Charlie
Crist is now openly talking about running
for Senate as a No Party Affiliation candidate. Under Florida's election laws, Crist has to make up his mind by
April 30th whether to run as an independent or run as a Republican. And if he loses the Republican primary, it will be
too late for him to pull a Joe Lieberman and run as an independent. Recent polls have shown he might win a 3-way race
against Marco Rubio and Kendrick Meek, so that may be his only chance of becoming a US Senator.
Of course, if Crist goes indie, it will yet another classic Crist flip-flop. As recently as April 8th, Crist's
campaign was denying that they were
even thinking about going indie. Given his past record, I'm not entirely surprised to see him flip-flopping on a
big issue yet again.
Most famous is his interaction with President Barack Obama. First, back in February 2009 Gov. Crist
embraced the newly-elected President -- both literally (an on-stage man-hug at a speech) and
figuratively (by welcoming Obama's government-stimulus cash). But later, as Obama's popularity began to wane and as
Crist's lack of conservative credentials began hurting his poll numbers in the Senate race, Crist pulled
about-face. He downplayed the man-hug, calling it an attempt to be "civil," and took out
radio campaign ads that slammed Obama for over-spending -- never mind that a lot of that over-spent money came to Florida
specifically at Crist's request.
There's also been Crist's slow turn-around on for state Republican Party chairman Jim Greer,
who was elected to that chairman's seat specifically because of strong support from Charlie Crist. As criticism of Greer's
authoritarian control and over-spending reached a fever-pitch, Crist stood by his man -- until his man resigned in
disgrace. And now Crist is suddenly in-favor of investigating Greer's spending, despite the
fact that he opposed all such calls while Greer was still chairman.
And finally, there's Crist's veto of the teacher merit-pay bill. Don't get me wrong; I
opposed the bill, and I'm glad Crist vetoed it. But Crist was all in-favor of the exact same bill early on, when nobody in
the state was even aware of the bill. As more and more people found out about the merit-pay bill and how it would strip
even more power away from local school systems, opposition to the bill grew. And as that opposition grew, suddenly Crist
had concerns about the bill and ended up vetoing it, even though the substance of the bill itself remained virtually
unchanged. That means Crist's veto had nothing to do with principle and everything to do with pandering to the voters.
So why, oh, why are so many Republican leaders telling Crist
they want him to stay in the Republican
party? This is a man with no consistent philosophical principles whatsoever, no core beliefs, no central idea of what
government is supposed to be. When he has to make a decision, he licks his finger, sticks it up to see which way the wind
is blowing, and then flashes his perfect politician's smile as he follows along.
Let him leave the Republican Party. He never belonged there to begin with.
Crist signs bill to replace FCAT, toughen graduation requirements
I'll give Crist credit on this one. The FCAT test needed to be
replaced.
Having single-subject final exams makes far more sense to me.
Hey Titusville: help businesses first, pick a new motto later!
Titusville business owners criticized the
city government for making it too difficult to do business in the city. Glad to see the City Council seemed willing to
listen. Now let's see if they set aside their silly quest for a new city motto and actually focus on doing some good for
their residents.
Mom complains about principal adding son to a bully-list
Sounds like Mom is just upset about getting called out for not doing her job and disciplining her own son. Rather
than address her son's bullying behavior, she wants the principal
fired for punishing
her son too severely. Hey Mom: if you don't want your son punished by the school, try punishing him yourself. Then the
school won't see a need to step in.
MSNBC decries use of phrase "Obama regime"
They say that the word "regime" has negative connotations of a dictatorial, illegitimate government.
Never mind that they were rather fond of using the phrase
"Bush
regime" once upon a time.
Quick hits:
Cocoa landlords who cleaned up crime now
face foreclosure.
Matt Reed details Tallahassee's
school funding shell-games.
County Commission considers loosening
floodplain development rules.
Video game website tricks customers into selling
their souls.
Congress may be fined
under ObamaCare for not providing the right coverage for Capital employees.
ACLU will close their Brevard office.
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Commissioners: "Private property rights? When pigs fly!"
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Monday, April 19th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
County Commission limits rural family to one pig
After months of hearings and permit applications, a woman in a rural area near Mims has basically been forced to
pay $1,447 for the privelege of giving up one of her
two pet pigs. See, it turns out there's a county zoning rule that says that you can only have pigs if your home sits on a plot
of land that is at least 2.50 acres. But Cindy Williams's land isn't that big. It's only 2.43 acres. That means it's too small by
0.07 acres.
Now, how big is an acre? Glad you asked. Basically, take a football field. Chop off both end zones, and then chop ten yards off
one end. There you go: that's an acre of land. Basically 90 yards of a football-field.
To legally own a pig at your home in Brevard, you have to own 2.5 acres, basically 225 yards of football-field. And Cindy Williams
owns 219 yards, 6 yards short.
Thanks to that tiny fraction, Cindy Williams isn't allowed to own a pig, let alone the two that she owns. When someone filed an
anonymous code enforcement complaint against her for this egregious violation of the law, county inspectors swooped in and told her she
had to either get rid of both pigs or get a zoning variance from the County Commission -- at a total cost of $1,447 in fees to the
county. And even then, the variance would only allow her to keep one pig, so she'd still have to give one away. Never mind that it's
unincorporated land out in the middle of nowhere. Never mind that her land is just 3% short of the required size. Never mind that many
of her neighbors own higher numbers of farm animals than she does, also against county rules.
So Cindy Williams drove to four different meetings in Viera to finalize the permit. And at the final County Commission hearing,
she was told that the County Commission was -- get this -- doing her a favor by letting her keep one pig, as if she's supposed to
be grateful.
| "We're bending the rules to allow you to keep the hog that's your pet.
If people want to raise hogs or have hogs, then there are zoning categories for that."
- County Commissioner Chuck Nelson |
Rich, huh? Here's a sitting County Commissioner, wagging a finger at a homeowner for daring to have two whole pigs on her rural plot of
land out in the middle of nowhere simply because it's only 97% of the size it's supposed to be to allow pigs. And by the way, Nelson
actually voted NO on her variance, meaning that if he'd had his way, she wouldn't be allowed to have any pigs at all.
I understand zoning rules. I understand telling someone who owns a half-acre in the middle of a subdivision that, no, you can't
raise farm animals in your backyard. Neighbors have rights to enjoy their own land too. But tell me who is being hurt when a woman with
over 2.4 acres of land in a rural farming area owns a whopping two pigs. This is a case where the County Commission should've granted her
a full variance, and really should've considered waiving the fees too. Cindy Williams was hurting nobody, and as long as you aren't
hurting anyone else, I believe your private property rights should be respected by the government.
As to the anonymous neighbor who filed the zoning complaint: get over yourself. If you don't like pigs, don't move to a farm area. Go
move into some deed-restricted neighborhood somewhere where all your neighbors have to paint their houses the correct shade of beige, and
get elected to the Homeowners' Association if you really feel the need to get people in trouble for their grass being a quarter-inch too
tall. Knock yourself out. In the meantime, we'll be over here, away from you and enjoying our freedom and our property.
State budget talks stall over the weekend
The state House and Senate in Tallahassee are having trouble working out the details on
the new state budget. The House wants to spend
$67,200,000,000 and the Senate wants to spend $69,400,000,000.
But keep this in mind. We're still in a down economy. The recovery (if you can even call it that) is slow. Tax revenues are still
sluggish. Florida's unemployment rate remains above the national average, and it's about to get worse with the end of the space shuttle
program. And despite all of this, both the House and the Senate want a 2010-2011 budget that is higher than the 2009-2010 budget of
$66,540,000,000.
And remember too, that was the same budget that was balanced through a combination of federal "stimulus" money and massive fee
increases on driver's licenses, car tags, hunting permits, business licenses, boat permits, and basically every tiny little sticker or
piece of paper that the state sells you to give you permission to do anything in this state. And it was also the same budget that was
voted on by every single member of Brevard's legislative delegation, all of whom are Republicans. And they're all poised to do it again:
voting yes on spending even more of your money in a down economy.
Boy, do we need some primary challenges this year.
What did Senator Mike know and when did he know it?
Speaking of primary challenges, I really don't care if State Senator Mike Haridopolos is poised to become the next Senate President.
Reporters are starting to ask some tough questions about how much Haridopolos knew about the overspending of former head of the Florida
Republican Party Jim Greer, as well as the secret buy-out deal for Greer that may or may-not have actually been signed before Greer stepped
down. And Haridopolos's answers are
unimpressive, splitting legalistic and
political hairs to avoid having to admit anything embarrassing.
The transformation of Haridopolos from an "Aw, shucks!" community college professor to a stereotypical political weasel has been
nothing short of remarkable -- and disappointing. And as cool as it would be to have a Brevard Senator in charge of the State Senate, I'm
sorry, but I'm going to say it right now: Haridopolos needs a Republican primary challenger this year, and Haridopolos needs to be
defeated by a true conservative who won't let political power go to his head. The Republican party needs to clean house, and you
Republicans right here in Brevard can get it started.
And y'all wonder why I'm still a registered Libertarian.
Bill McCollum's poll lead over Alex Sink narrows
Looks like the governor's race is heating up again. The news media is
blaming his lawsuit against ObamaCare, but I'm
thinking it just might have something to do with the Jim Greer situation.
How many people attended last week's Brevard Tea Party?
Florida Today and the Tea Party organizers say 3,000, but
Florida Today's own Matt Reed thinks it was
closer to 1,200. Either way, that pavilion
looked packed to me. Not bad for a Thursday evening.
Titusville narrows new motto list down to 3
I've got one that they missed:
"Titusville: the City with More Important Things to Worry About Than Having a Spiffy New Motto."
Quick hits:
Cocoa's water budget is short by $1,100,000. Oops!
Romney to Crist: don't go all indie on us now!
West Melbourne Councilman Bill Mettrick to run for mayor.
State House changes sex offender buffer zones,
adds Romeo & Juliet clause.
State House will try again on offshore drilling.
TV news continues to insult the Tea Parties.
Brevard's unemployment dips to 12.2% for March 2010.
Connie Mack quits Crist campaign over merit pay veto.
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Zen and the Art of Debt Maintenance
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Thursday, April 15th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
How can we cut the national debt?
Matt Reed has
some excellent information on
the national debt today, and he paints a sobering picture. Our national debt will be
as large as the national economy by 2020
without major changes. The reason? Skyrocketing expenses in the Social Security and Medicare programs. We are quickly
reaching the point where nothing that we try -- cutting earmarks, growing the economy to increase tax revenues, raising
tax rates, or any combination of the above -- will be enough to keep up with the growing costs of those two untouchable
entitlement programs.
This is what happens when we take our responsibility to take care of ourselves and turn it over to the government. As
more and more people expect more and more goodies from the government, the cost of providing those goodies continues to
increase. And it gets harder and harder to find ways to pay for it.
This is simply unsustainable.
And yet what is President Barack Obama's answer to this growing national menace? Obama is content to simply reduce the
yearly deficit. Problem is, any yearly deficit just adds on to the total debt. A smaller deficit is better than a
larger deficit, but it still means a larger debt. We're in a car racing towards a cliff at 50 miles per hour, and Obama
wants to slow us down to 30 miles per hour and then proclaim what a great thing he's done. But we're still heading towards
that cliff. It's just going to take a little longer to get there.
Someone needs to stop the car and get us turned around. Will it be the Republican Party? Or will someone from the
backseat have to climb up front and say "my turn"? Only time will tell.
Governor Charlie Crist vetoes teacher "merit pay" bill
This is a very good decision... the "merit pay" bill had some good parts, but overall it was
the wrong way to increase teacher
accountability. State legislators are already vowing
the bill will be back next year, so
hopefully they'll have time to get it right this time.
Of course, given how many conservative Republicans in the State Legislature were for "merit pay," Crist's veto has
led to another round of rumors that
Crist will drop out of the Republican Senate primary race and run as an independent candidate instead. Polls show he
could win a 3-way race, but he'll have to make up his mind by the end of April. Stay tuned...
Moving endangered turtles? Okay. But at $1,700 per turtle?!?
That's how much Titusville will have to pay
to remove 60 endangered gopher tortoises from a construction site for a new city water main. They will pay a company to
come in, conduct a survey of the tortoise holes, and then excavate them so that they can be taken to a new home
somewhere else.
Personally, I'm just green enough to go along with saving the turtles, rather than the old practice of burying them
alive and moving on with the project. But $1,700 per turtle? A surveying project? Excavation jobs? Somebody is way
overthinking this, and it's driving up the price tag. Just send me out there with a big box and some sunscreen. I'll walk
around and find all the holes, and then I'll grab the turtles one at a time and move 'em. And I guarantee I can do it for
less than $1,700 per turtle.
This isn't an environmental issue; it's a wasteful-spending issue. There is no reason to overspend on something that
needs to be done.
County tries to educate drivers about Viera traffic circle
Can we please make sure nobody ever builds
another one of these in Brevard?
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And CONSERVATIVES are the mean ones?
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Tuesday, April 13th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
"Crash The Tea Party"?
It seemed like just
the sort of thing a group of liberals would do. A website called
crashtheteaparty.org announced a plot to get liberal activists to infiltrate
local tea party events with mis-spelled, racist signs, with the goal of making the tea party look as foolish and
out-of-touch as possible. The news broke on Monday, and conservative pundits across the country jumped all over it.
Well, I always like to get the whole story, so I visited the site for myself and found the initial round of reporting to
be pretty much spot on. But then I noticed the site's message
board. I got curious and clicked on it. Towards the top of the main forum, I saw a thread titled,
"Tea-Baggers are SO gullible!"
Looks like it's all a hoax... a very well-executed hoax, but a hoax nonetheless. That thread states that the whole
purpose of the site was to expose how paranoid tea-partiers are by getting them to believe in a non-existent organized
plot to infiltrate them.
Of course, many people don't believe that thread, and think the claim that the site is a hoax is the hoax, that
such a plot really does exist.
You know what? There's a great way to handle this, and it kills two birds with one stone. If you're at a tea party, and
you see someone with a racist sign or someone saying truly offensive and bigoted things, challenge them. Reject them. Chase
them off. A true conservative believes in equal constitutional protections for everyone regardless of their race,
and any racist who claims membership in the tea party movement is a walking contradiction who needs to be expelled.
Whether they are a sincere racist or a lone-wolf liberal infiltrator (and make no mistake, they do exist, even if
the particular website up above is a hoax), they need to be kicked out before they get the chance to discredit the entire
tea party movement.
The tea party movement is about freedom, not hatred. It's great to spread that message outside the movement, but we need
to remember to spread that message inside the movement too.
(By the way, don't forget about the Brevard 2010 Tea Party later this
week. It's this Thursday night April 15th, 6:00pm to 8:00pm, at the Wickham Park Pavilion in Melbourne on Wickham Road
just south of Brevard Community College.)
Union leader prays for NJ's Republican governor to die!
Check out this quote from a
recent internal memo from a New Jersey teachers union:
| "Dear Lord this year you have taken away my favorite actor,
Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite singer, Michael Jackson, and my favorite salesman,
Billy Mays. I just wanted to let you know that Chris Christie is my favorite governor."
- Joe Coppola, President
Bergen County Education Association |
Governor Chris Christie is a conservative Republican who just ousted a powerful and wealthy Democratic incumbent in last
November's election. He campaigned on fiscal responsibility to get New Jersey out of their dangerous budget situation, and
his proposed spending cuts have angered a lot of powerful liberals and union leaders. So, along comes this liberal
Democrat, president of a county-level teachers union, who writes an internal memo to his fellow union members literally
praying for the death of a governor he disagrees with politically. The memo got leaked to the press, and here we are.
Gov. Christie responded forcefully, calling for the president of the state teachers union to fire that local president.
The state union president refused. The local president issued an apology, calling it a joke that was never meant to be
made public, as if keeping it private would have made it any less offensive.
Now, just imagine if I got on this microphone and this website and said that exact same prayer verbatim, but changed the
ending to declare that Barack Obama is my favorite president. The Secret Service would be on me within 48 hours -- and
rightfully so. They really wouldn't care if I later said it was a joke. They'd still investigate me fully to make sure I
didn't pose a threat to the president's life, and in the meantime there's a very good chance I'd lose this radio show.
Again, rightfully so.
But it's okay to pray for the death of a conservative governor, of course. After all, they're the mean ones,
right?
Superintendent Brian Binggeli wants to cut 155 school jobs
Good. Interestingly,
59 of these positions are already currently vacant, which means the Brevard County Schools have been doing just fine
without someone filling those jobs. Makes you wonder if we ever really need those positions to exist in the first place.
But of course, the School Board tells us every year that they're already running as efficiently as possible, and they
wouldn't lie to us, would they?
Cape Canaveral man sued over negative comment on eBay
This is why we need "loser-pays" in our
legal system.
58%: repeal ObamaCare
People
don't want this law to stay in place. Don't let the Democrats fool you.
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Is the Cocoa City Council trying to sneak Holiday On Ice through?
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Thursday, April 8th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Cocoa City Council may be trying to pull a fast one
Time for an update on Holiday On Ice, the money-losing outdoor ice-skating rink that
the city of Cocoa has foolishly tried over the past two Christmas seasons. At the last Cocoa City Council meeting, the
council members debated bringing Holiday On Ice back for a third try, but in the end they decided to delay the decision.
Well, it's almost time for the next City Council meeting: next Tuesday night, April 13th at 7:00pm at City Hall. The
agenda for that meeting was released earlier today on the city's
public records website, and Holiday On Ice isn't listed there. But
something else is, and it makes me wonder if the City Council is trying to get sneaky on us. Check out page 3,
section VII (Council Business), item #3:
| "Presentation of 2010 Space Cast (sic) Mardi
Gras financials and direction from Council on 2011 Space Coast Mardi Gras Event." |
This triggered something in my memory: a Florida
Today article on Holiday On Ice from March 10th. Check out these two paragraphs, with emphasis added by me:
| "The venture lost $46,000 its first year, 2008, and $29,000
last year, according to city figures. The council agreed to go ahead with the 2009 event, covering losses with Mardi
Gras profits.
"The 2009 "Holiday on Ice" would have lost $59,000. But $30,000 from 2009 Mardi Gras was applied,
reducing the loss to $29,000, which is paid from the general fund." |
The Cocoa City Council has already linked Holiday On Ice and Mardi Gras together in the past in order to cover the
ice rink's losses. And since Mardi Gras is officially on the discussion agenda for next Tuesday night's City Council
meeting, they could very well bring up Holiday On Ice under the theory that the City Council considers it to be part of
the Mardi Gras event. That would allow the City Council to sneak Holiday On Ice onto the agenda without announcing it
ahead of time.
Now, is that what they're actually doing here? I don't know. But I wouldn't put it past them to try something that
tricky. So, I still think it's important for you to show up for the Cocoa City Council meeting next Tuesday night,
April 13th at 7pm just to discourage them from any dirty agenda tricks. Let them know you're watching, and while you're
there, fill out a speaker's card and tell them that losing $105,000 on Holiday On Ice is already enough, and that we don't
need to lose any more on it.
Crime rises in Cocoa and Rockledge, drops everywhere else in Brevard
Want another good reason to attend next Tuesday night's Cocoa City Council meeting? Here's one. The Florida
Department of Law Enforcement has released their
annual report on crime statistics. Across
Brevard County, the crime rate in 2009 dropped by 3.3%, and it dropped in every city in Brevard as well -- every city,
that is, except for three: Cocoa, Rockledge, and Indialantic.
Crime in Cocoa continues to grow, and it's starting to spill over into their neighboring city of Rockledge as well.
Drugs are rampant, violence is spreading, and people are dying needlessly in this city. And yet the Cocoa City Council
continues to spend most of their time on other issues and seems convinced that the only part of the city that actually
matters is Cocoa Village.
The primary job of any government is to preserve, protect and defend our rights to life, liberty and property. All
three of those are in ever-increasing jeopardy in the city of Cocoa, and yet the City Council seems to think their
primary job is to set up outdoor ice-skating rinks downtown.
Now, the crime statistics are on the discussion agenda for next Tuesday night's meeting. If the City Council has
their way, they'll discuss crime a little bit and then move on. And that's where you come in. If you go to that meeting
and make it clear that solving the crime problem in Cocoa is your number-one concern, you can force the City Council
to change their priorities. But you're going to have to be vocal, and you'll have to make sure they know that you stand
ready to vote them out of office if they don't start taking crime more seriously. Make sure the candidates for the
next City Council special election know how
you feel too.
Next Tuesday night. April 13th at 7:00pm. Cocoa City Hall. Be there.
How does a community college professor pay for a $252,000 condo IN CASH?
Good question. But that's
what Melbourne's state Representative John Tobia, a Republican, seems to have pulled off. And Florida Today's
Matt Reed wants to know how.
Income tax: half pay none; top 10% of earners pay 73%
We're quickly reaching the point where the majority of the country will be able to force
a minority of the country to
pay for all
their goodies. And I guarantee, that minority won't put up with it for long. Just ask
Maryland.
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Merit pay lacks merit; Commissioners okay sweetheart land deal
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Tuesday, April 6th, 2010 at 8:00pm
|
Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
State Senate passes merit pay for teachers; House is next
The State Senate in Tallahassee has passed a bill that would
link teacher pay directly to improvement in their
students' FCAT scores, completely ignoring any and all other factors. The merit-pay bill has also
passed a key vote in a State House
committee, and it looks like this plan will pass the State House and then be signed into law by Governor
Charlie Crist.
Supporters of the bill hail this as a new era of accountability for Florida's teachers, and I'm all for holding our
teachers more accountable. However, you don't hold employees accountable for factors that they don't have much control
over. A recent study by the University of Florida shows that a student's performance on the FCAT is
mainly affected by the city and
neighborhood they live in, much more so than who their teacher is. Higher-income families find it easier to stay
involved in their child's education, so a good family situation at home usually translates into better FCAT scores.
Therefore, a lousy teacher with a classroom full of rich kids with involved parents can end up with a higher salary than
a great teacher with a classroom full of poor inner-city kids with uninvolved parents. That is simply not fair, no matter
how you slice it.
There's also a subtle point that I think keeps getting missed: the pay rate is not tied to the FCAT scores, but rather
to how much the FCAT scores improve by. But what if one teacher gets a classroom full of rich kids who already
aced the FCAT test last year? If they're already doing about as well as they can, there's not much room for improvement...
which means their teacher is already screwed no matter how well they do.
Teachers needs to be held more accountable, but this plan is not the way to do it.
County Commission approves lease deal for Merritt Island "working waterfront"
I've talked about this story before, but new details emerged today. The people who sold
the land to the county will get to lease it back. The cost?
$20,000 a year for the next five years.
But keep in mind, those owners
paid
$20,146.08 in property taxes and assessments for tax-year 2009. So, they're basically going to get the equivalent of
a slight break on their taxes, and they'll lock it in for the next 5 years. And we're at the bottom of the real estate
market right now. That means there's a good chance of the value of that plot going up over the next 5 years. That would've
meant more tax revenue for the county. Now it won't.
State House unanimously approves school supply sales tax holiday
Good. Unfortunately, it will
only be three days instead of a full
week.
Is Obama shunning Posey on planned space visit?
According to this article by Matt Reed in Floriday Today, President Barack Obama is making a visit to
Kennedy Space Center on April 15th to discuss the future of America's space program...
but hasn't invited Space
Coast Congressman Bill Posey, a Republican. Considering how vitally important NASA is to Posey's district, leaving
Posey out of the discussion is very strange and needs to be explained. And since the White House has yet to offer an
explanation, we're left to speculate.
Hmm... I wonder if it has anything to do with Posey's bill in Congress to require all future presidential candidates to
prove their eligibility to hold the office. Posey has been raked through the coals over this bill and has been repeatedly
labeled as a "birther," even though he's made it clear that he believes Obama is an American citizen and is eligible to be
President. (For the record, so do I.) And every time Matt Reed mentions Posey's bill, he gleefully points out that Posey
has accepted campaign money from birthers. But regardless of your opinion on Obama or on birthers, this bill makes sense.
Right now, joining Little League requires more proof of eligibility than becoming President. Why would anyone think this
is okay?
If Obama is shunning Posey on his NASA visit just because of this bill, then Obama has reached a new level of political
pettiness.
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And you ask why I'm a Libertarian?
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Monday, April 5th, 2010 at 8:00pm
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Here's what I'll be talking about tonight at 8:00pm on The Vince Young
Show on AM-1300 WMEL, as well as streaming live online at
http://1300wmel.com. Call in at 321-631-1300!
Obama's first pitch? Tiger's first press conference? Who cares?
No, I didn't see President Obama throwing out the first pitch at the Washington Nationals baseball game today. And
no, I don't care how bad a throw it was. I have plenty of more important things to criticize Obama for than his pitching
motion. If baseball skills mattered one bit in presidential performance, our last two presidents would've been Barry Bonds
and Mark McGwire.
No, I didn't watch today's press conference with Tiger Woods. Tiger can nail a 400-yard par-4 (among other things), but
he can't use the force and authority of government to seize my money and limit my freedoms at the point of a gun. There are
people out there right now who can name off half of Tiger's former mistresses but who can't name their Senators, their
Congressional representative, or even the Vice-President of the United States. And that is nothing short of pathetic.
Look... I'm as much of a sports fan as any red-blooded American male. (Go Irish! Go Magic!) But why were these the
top two stories today on CNN? Don't we have more important things to worry about?
Cocoa City Council meeting: next Tuesday 4/13
Don't forget, the next meeting of the Cocoa City Council will take place at City Hall in Cocoa Village next
Tuesday night, April 13th at 7:00pm. They haven't posted the agenda for the meeting on their
public records website yet. But I'm willing to bet they'll
be discussing whether or not to bring back Holiday On Ice for Christmas 2010, outdoor ice
skating rink in Cocoa Village that has lost a total of $105,000 of your tax money in 2008 and 2009. So keep
next Tuesday night open on your schedule... if they decide to put this on the agenda, you need to be ready to attend
that meeting and give them a big loud NO.
And to the Cocoa City Council, I have this warning. If you bring back this boondoggle, don't you dare insult
our intelligence later by telling us that you need to cut back spending on the police department, the fire department
or other essential services in order to balance the city's budget. If you think I'm angry now, you ain't seen nothin' yet.
Come election-time, I will make sure the people of Cocoa remember how you voted on this.
Florida's budget to INCREASE?!?
Let me get this straight. We're in a down-economy, our state's unemployment rate is higher than the national
average, and the end of the shuttle program is about to take a huge chunk out of our economic engine. And yet
the new state budget could be
$67,200,000,000 which would actually be almost a billion dollars more than the last budget of
$66,540,000,000?
Oh, and this is a budget that was put together by Republicans too. And all my Republican friends wonder why
I'm a registered Libertarian.
Tea Party? Or tea party?
As local activists wrangle over
the proper role of the tea party
movement within the political system in general and the Republican Party specifically, there's an interesting survey
out today which shows that 40% of tea partiers are
Democrats or independents.
As the Florida GOP turns...
So first, former Florida Republican Party chairman Jim Greer gets
targeted by a criminal probe for mis-spending
the party's money. Then Greer sues the state
Republican party for not living up to a secret hush-money deal that may or may not have actually been signed. Then
Democratic governor's candidate Alex Sink
questions why her opponent,
Republican Attorney General Bill McCollum, ordered state law enforcement officials to intervene in his own party's
financial woes. This leads to Sink, McCollum, and -- get this -- Governor Charlie Crist all agreeing to ask for a
federal investigation into Jim Greer.
Oh, and who helped Jim Greer get elected as the party chair and resisted all previous calls to investigate Greer's
spending? Why, Charlie Crist of course.
And again... all my Republican friends wonder why I'm a registered Libertarian.
« Archive: March 2010
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