Unnecessary Elective Offices

"Yes, we can do without the offices of state treasurer, secretary of state and lieutenant governor."
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editorial, Sept. 2, 2010 (page 10A)

Wisconsin voters will be nominating Democratic and Republican candidates for these (plus other) state offices Tuesday, September 14. But should these three offices continue to be elective?

Lieutenant Governor
The only real role of this official is to succeed the governor in case he or she cannot complete the term of office. The governor may also assign duties to the LG. Our posting of August 29 recommended that each nominee for governor nominate a running-mate, instead of leaving the selection to a primary; the present system allows the selection of a nominee for LG that the governor can't stand, or one that would effectively sink the ticket. (1)
But if the office were eliminated, as suggested by the JS editorial, who would succeed the governor? The Constitution could be amended to designate some other official, such as the Attorney General or Speaker of the Assembly. The trouble is that the successor may be a member of a different political party, so that a change in the office of governor would also lead to massive changes in the entire executive branch. Moreover, if the legislature were led by the opposite party, there would be a perverse incentive to impeach and remove the governor from office.
The only way to guaranty a successor from the same party is to have the successor selected on the same ticket, as is the LG today.

State Treasurer and Secretary of State
These officials are responsible for distributing abandoned bank accounts, notarizing acts of the governor, appointing notaries, and other mundane tasks, none of which involve making policy. The JS is right that there is no need to elect them at all, especially on a partisan ballot.
All of these duties can be handled by the Department of Administration, which is controlled by the governor.
Incidentally, the Secretary of State (now Douglas J LaFollette) is second in line to become governor in case both top jobs are vacant at the same time. If this elective job were eliminated, the governor should be authorized to nominate a new LG if that office became vacant, subject to confirmation by both houses of the legislature. This would parallel the process used to fill the office of Vice President of the United States in case of a vacancy.

Let's demand the new legislature in 2011 begin the process of amending the state constitution to make these changes.
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(1) For example, if Republicans voted en masse for Spencer Coggs for LG in the Democratic primary, they would virtually assure the election of the Republican ticket. (Don't tell them!)

Nominate Nelson

Of the four candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for Lieutenant Governor (LG) of Wisconsin in the September 14 Primary Election, only two have legislative experience: State Senator G Spencer Coggs of Milwaukee and
Assembly Majority Leader Thomas Nelson of Kaukauna. Here is why each man claims that he would do more to enhance the Democratic ticket in November than any of his rivals (1):

Coggs says that he would "deliver the minority vote ....he would counter the negatives (Milwaukee Mayor Tom) Barrett has accumulated through his pursuit of a mayoral takeover of the Milwaukee Public Schools and backlash over the July floods."

Nelson says, "I'm the only one running who has any experience taking on a tough Republican opponent and beating them (sic) in their own backyard."

So, who has the better case? Let's evaluate Coggs' claim first: his presence on the ticket would be a significant factor in getting "minority" (i.e. black) votes for the Barrett ticket. In 2006, Milwaukee's overwhelmingly black First Aldermanic District gave the Democratic nominee Governor Jim Doyle 8,950 votes to 1,339 for the Republican Mark Green. Of Doyle's vote, 5,999 was straight Democratic, while only 284 of Green's was straight Republican. ( In partisan elections the tendency of blacks to vote Democratic is even stronger than their tendency to "vote black." (3) ) Doyle did not need a black running-mate to run-up this lopsided result, so why does Barrett?

Perhaps Coggs is right about the lack of enthusiasm for Barrett among black voters: after all, he defeated the first black Mayor of Milwaukee, Marvin Pratt, in 2004. But I contend that even if Coggs loses the LG primary, very few black voters will back the Republicans. That is because blacks are disproportionately poor, and so depend more on social welfare programs (such as Medicaid, food stamps, etc.) that the Democratic Party supports. They are not so sore at Barrett that they would prefer a candidate likely to cut state spending on these programs. Moreover, if Barrett becomes Governor, Common Council Chairman Willie Hines will become the city's second black Mayor! That is a huge incentive for blacks to vote for Barrett, no matter who is nominated for LG.

I will concede that having Coggs on the ticket might "goose-up" turnout among black voters, and thus increase the Democratic vote, but that effect may be more than offset by the number of whites who would vote Republican if he were slated.

Since Coggs introduced the "race card" into this contest by implying that his race would help the Democratic ticket, it is only fair to also consider the downside of nominating him for LG. In the entire history of the State of Wisconsin, only one black candidate, Vel Phillips, has ever been elected to statewide office, Secretary of State OK, Barack Obama carried Wisconsin in 2008. But Louis Butler was the only incumbent Justice of the State Supreme to lose an election since 1967, and his race probably worked against him.

Although nominating Coggs would balance the ticket racially, it would severely unbalance it geographically: both Barrett and Coggs live in the City of Milwaukee. No one from Milwaukee has been elected Governor of Wisconsin in about a hundred years, and even incumbent (Acting) Governor Martin J Schreiber of Milwaukee could not win a term of his own in 1978. Maybe voters from other parts of the state suspect that a Milwaukeean would show preference for his home town in allocating state resources, but the bias against our fair city is undeniable. (4) To nominate another Milwaukeean (regardless of race) for LG would place the ticket at an insurmountable disadvantage.

On the other hand, Tom Nelson, who defeated a Republican incumbent in 2004 in Kaukana, would bring some needed strength to the ticket in the Fox River Valley, a "swing district." It is significant that in less than six years Nelson rose to the position of Majority Leader of the Assembly; although Coggs has been in the State Senate one year longer, he is not a leader of that chamber.

Comparing the competing claims of these two rivals for the nomination indicates that Nelson's claim to enhance the electability of the ticket rings true, while Coggs' does not. But beyond that, note that Nelson's claim is based on what he has done, while Coggs' claim is based on who he is. Every politician is a member of some ethnic or religious group, but only some trade on their identity. I prefer those who do not.

The name "Nelson" has been lucky for Wisconsin Democrats in the past, and I hope that they will go with it again now.

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(1) Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Aug. 28, 2010, page 3B.

(2) Election Commission of the City of Milwaukee, 2006-07 Report

(3) In 1988 a black businesswoman named Helen Barnhill was the Republican nominee against white Democratic Congressman Jim Moody in the old 5th District, then the northern half of Milwaukee. Moody trounced Barnhill in every black neighborhood of the district.

(4) However, Herb Kohl of Milwaukee was elected US Senator in 1988 and ever since. Unlike Schreiber, Kohl never represented Milwaukee in the legislature or Congress, so many voters either did not know or did not care what city he lived in. Also, US senators have no role in allocating state resources.

Losing Lebanon

"Those who want to help the Lebanese Army , but place conditions on how their funds or weapons are used (i.e. not against Israel), should keep their money."
Elias Murr, Defense Minister of Lebanon (1)

"We..believe that investing in the Lebanese.... military serves as a stabilizing influence and strengthens Lebanon's sovereignty."
Phillip J Crowley, spokesman for the US Department of State (1)

The first quote indicates that our side has lost the struggle to keep Lebanon out of the Arab-Iranian alliance against Israel, and the second quote shows that our government does not yet know it.

Since 2005 the US has provided the Lebanese military with over $400 million in military aid, about $100 per citizen, a figure second only to per-capita military aid to Israel. (2) Congress cut-off military aid to Lebanon earlier this month after a Lebanese soldier killed an Israeli soldier and wounded several others in a border clash. But just what military threat does Lebanon face?

Lebanon is on Israel's northern border and is otherwise surrounded by Syria and the Mediterranean Sea. Syria, which has treated the tiny republic like a wayward province, occupied Lebanon's Bekaa Valley with over 15,000 troops until pressured to withdraw by the Western powers in 2005. However, Syria still wields major political influence in the country through its non-uniformed agents and Hezbollah (the Party of Allah), the militia of the Shiite population. Since Hezbollah is a major factor in the Lebanese government (a Hezbollah-led alliance finished second in the 2009 parliamentary election), the use of Lebanese armed forces to disarm or otherwise restrain Hezbollah would rekindle the Civil War, which tore the country asunder between 1975 and 1990. Similarly, the prospect of the 75,000-man Lebanese Army defending the country against Syria, the top supplier to Hezbollah, is absurd.

So why does the Lebanese military need hundreds of millions of dollars worth of American arms and ammunition? The answer, unfortunately, is on the sole remaining border: that with Israel. While the US government has considered the Lebanese military a counterweight to the growing power of Hezbollah and other Muslim militias in the country, the statement by the Defense Minister shows that the present government will use its arms only against its real enemy: Israel. The border clash noted above, combined with the abject failure of Lebanese forces to keep Hezbollah out of the southern zone that borders Israel, confirms this conclusion.

Lebanon is a deeply divided country: about 28% Sunni Muslim, another 28% Shiite, 39% Christian (mainly Maronite) and 5% Druze. (2) During the late 1970's Israel tried to form an alliance with Lebanese Christians against the Palestinians and other Muslims, but that effort failed. Today, most Lebanese Christian politicians are aligned with Syria or Hezbollah. Although large numbers of Lebanese resent Hezbollah for starting a war with Israel in 2006, I believe that most hate Israel even more for the extensive bombing of the country, whose effects remain to this day in many southern villages.

If the Lebanese Army will do nothing to restrain Hezbollah, there is no reason to resume military aid to the country, which will just be used against Israel in case of another war. Although I pray for peace three times a day, I believe that Hezbollah will launch a rocket attack against Israel in the near future. That is because the Shiite militia has acquired about 40,000 rockets, and the impulse to use them cannot be resisted indefinitely. However, I also believe that the IDF will use any Hezbollah attack as a pretext to bomb Iran's nuclear reactors and missile sites, triggering a full-scale Mideast war that will probably involve Syria as well.

Our only hope for peace is that Iranian and Syrian leaders will use their influence to restrain Hezbollah, if only to prevent Israeli bombs and missiles from landing on their heads. This situation is eerily similar to the that of the summer of 1914, when the party with the least to lose (the Bosnian Serbs) were able to spark a terrible war with just one act of violence.

I just hope I am wrong!
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(1) National Council of Young Israel, Aug. 18, 2010 e-mail.

(2) Wikipedia article on Lebanon.

Mosque Madness

"There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York as long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia."
Newt Gingrich on his website

And there should be no women drivers in NYC as long as there are no women drivers in Riyadh. Moreover, there should no elections for President of the United States as long as there are no elections for the head of state in Saudi Arabia. After all, what's good for the Saudi goose is good for the American gander, right?

Unlike former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R, Georgia), I am not inspired by the Saudi example of human rights or principles of governance. Instead, I want the controversy over the erection of an Islamic Center, including a mosque, at 51 Park Place, about two blocks from the former site of the World Trade Center, to be decided on the basis of American legal principles.

Whether you like Islam or not (and I don't like it much), the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the US Constitution prohibit local governments from treating Islam any differently from any other religion practiced in America. Local governments may restrict the building of churches and other houses of worship by zoning and building codes, but they cannot discriminate on the basis of religion. The fact is that the area of the proposed mosque is zoned commercial, and there are churches nearby. As both Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City and President Obama have noted publicly, the Muslims have the right to build a mosque in that location.

But in the toxic atmosphere of contemporary American politics, if you are not on the side of the "9/11 Families" who are outraged by the proposed mosque, you are on the side of the Muslims, the very group whose members destroyed the World Trade Center in the name of "jihad" (holy war). And didn't the leader of the Muslims behind the project say that US policies "were an accessory to 9/11?" (1) And won't the new building be named "Cordoba House" after the city in Spain in which Muslims converted a church into a mosque?

Osama Bin Laden, whose terrorist group carried-out the 9/11 attacks, is by no means the acknowledged leader or spokesman for Islam. In fact, no one is. Rather he is the charismatic leader of a religious homicidal/suicidal cult, an Arab Jim Jones or David Koresh. He issued a fatwa (psak) in 1996 declaring America the enemy of Islam, and called upon all Muslims to commit jihad against this nation. Although millions of Muslims admire Bin Laden, only a few actually put his words into action. And those who seek to build the Cordoba Mosque are not among them.

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin implored peace-loving Muslims to "refudiate" (sic) the proposed mosque because it would "stab hearts." But even the peace-loving Muslims (if she can find them) know their rights and intend to exercise them.

About 70% of Americans are against a mosque on Park Place, so the politically popular stance is to oppose it. I do not endorse or support building a mosque there either. But on matters of religious expression in a free country, the majority does not rule, and so the Cordoba Mosque will be built, even though most Americans find it insensitive or even offensive.

The Cordoba Mosque will not loom over Ground Zero, no matter what is ultimately built there. The Cordoba Mosque will be on the other side of West Broadway and two blocks north of Vesey Street, the northern border of the World Trade Center site; aerial photos of the area show numerous multi-story buildings between the two more than two blocks to find it.
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(1)AssociatedContent, Aug. 17, 2010.

Have Record, Will Work

"Companies using criminal records ...to screen out job applicants might run afoul of anti-discrimination laws.....according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)"
Sam Hananel, Associated Press, Aug. 12, 2010 (1)

The EEOC, created by President Lyndon B Johnson as part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, is considering filing discrimination complaints against several firms that reject all ex-convicts, since the policy has a "disparate impact" on black and Hispanic job-seekers. The incarceration rate for blacks is six times that for whites and that for Hispanics is 2.3 times as high. (1)

"Disparate impact" is considered discriminatory if the policy has no bearing on job performance. For example, requiring proficiency in French for a janitorial job would be discriminatory. But is criminal conviction a reasonable disqualification for any job?

Consider this fact: Of persons released from American prisons, about 68% are arrested for a new crime within 3 years of release. (2) Since not all crimes result in arrest, and not all arrested people are actually guilty, this figure does not equal the percentage of ex-cons that re-offend. However, in my judgment, more unsolved crimes are committed than innocent people are charged, so the actual recidivism rate is really higher than 68%.

Job performance depends on following directions, but the essence of criminal behavior is ignoring rules. Crime is spurred by greed, addiction, impulsiveness and a general disregard for the rights of others. Although we would like to believe that our prisons encourage inmates to repent and "go-straight" after release, the facts indicate that at least two-thirds of them commit new crimes. This means that if a business hires an ex-con, the odds are more than two-to-one that the new employee will offend, possibly at the workplace. This risk is borne by the other employees, customers and the business itself.

Accordingly, I contend that the EEOC would be wrong to charge an employer with discrimination for rejecting all ex-convicts. I understand that if this policy is widespread, released it will be more difficult for convicts to get jobs and become law-abiding citizens. But that is their problem, it should not be that of prospective employers. Many Americans are out of work nowadays, and most of them (including most minority-group members) have never committed any crime.

A policy that shows preference to applicants with a clean record is just one more reason that crime does not pay.
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(1) Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Aug. 12, 2010, page 3D "Job Screening tactics assailed."

(2) Wikipedia: Recidivism.

Bogus!

"Fool me once, shame on you!
Fool me twice....that's the whole point, you can't fool me twice!"
George W Bush

I walked up to the teller window at the Pelham Parkway branch of the Bank of America on August 5 and presented a check. The check was made payable to Gerald S Glazer in the amount of $3,550 and drawn on an account at a Fifth Avenue (Manhattan) branch of the Bank, signed by Pam Daniel of Informa Economics, 775 Ridge Lake Blvd, Memphis, Tennessee. The check included a security watermark and routing digits.

I had received this check by FedEx on July 22 from Patricio Anita of 3716 10th Avenue, Rochester, NY, along with a letter:
"Hello Candidate, Please follow the instructions below carefully, complete the transactions. 1. All you need to do is get the payment cashed at your bank and deduct your commission from it and send me the rest of the money via Western Union Money Transfer. Send the rest of the money to Barbara Jones, 40-A Garden Village Drive, Apartment 3, Cheektowaga, NY 14227."

Since I never heard of any of these people, I became suspicious. I called Bank of America to find out if the check was real, but was told I would have to present it in person. Since I was planning to visit New York in early August, I decided to bring it along and present it there.

But the next day I received an e-mail from one Jacob Clark telling me to send the money to Shu Ping Liang in Guangzhou, China. Clark also asked for my phone number "ASAP". The following day Clark e-mailed me again, this time writing, " My good friend, what the position? Have you sent our money? Please, I need an update ASAP."

I replied that I was going to verify that the check was good before sending money to anyone. I added, "I do not give out my home phone number, but if you want to talk to someone, feel free to call Mr Behr at 414-771-3040."
Milwaukee readers will recognize that as the number of the County Zoo, and I hope that Mr Clark called long-distance and asked to speak to Mr Behr.

It did not take long for the teller to determine that the check was bogus. She asked if she could send it to the Bank of America Security Department, since the Bank was trying to determine who was printing these bogus checks. Since the Bank of America has more resources to investigate this scam than I do, I let her keep the check.

I have not received any further communications from Jacob Clark. But I did get an e-mail yesterday from an African bank employee asking me to help him smuggle "11.5 million USD" into the US in exchange for a share of the loot, allegedly from an abandoned bank account that would otherwise be seized by his corrupt government.

I did not reply, and have not seen any of the 11.5 million USD.

Confirm or Reject?

"..I'm afraid we have a dangerous, progressive, political-type nominee"
Alabama Republican Senator Jeff Sessions, July 28, 2010

I presume that Senator Sessions means to distinguish Elena Kagan from previous nominees such as John Roberts and Samuel Alito, who must have been non-polltical. They certainly were not progressive. But really that is the whole point: judicial nominees tend to share the general political orientation of the President who appoints them, or at least the President thinks so.

Unlike Senator Sessions, I have no problem with a "political-type" nominee, even one whose political ideology is very different from my own. One of the consequences of a presidential election is the philosophy of the federal judges that the new president will appoint. If liberal presidents appoint qualified liberals and conservative presidents appoint qualified conservatives, over time the courts will be filled with qualified people with varying viewpoints; I believe that this is the way our system should work. Since most policy-making decisions are made by appellate courts with three to nine members participating, these decisions will reflect a broad consensus of judicial philosophies.

It has become customary in recent decades for Supreme Court nominees to say as little as possible about their political or judicial views at confirmation hearings, promising only to render fair decisions based upon the law. The truth is that anyone in public life long enough to be nominated to the Supreme Court would have some well-considered opinions about how the Constitution should be understood and applied, and I would prefer that nominees would be more open about them. For example, if a nominee were asked whether Brown vs Board of Education (1) should be affirmed or reversed, I would prefer the nominee to respond without hesitation, "I would vote to affirm Brown!" Recent nominees have refused to comment on cases that may come before the Court.

If Supreme Court nominees should not be rejected for their judicial philosophies, then when should a nominee be rejected? During my lifetime only three nominees were rejected by the Senate (Haynsworth, Carswell and Bork) while three other nominations were withdrawn ( Thornberry, Ginsburg, and Miers). I wish the Senate had also rejected Clarence Thomas, who shamelessly played the "race card" by labeling his confirmation hearings a "high-tech lynching." Thomas, who had been accused in sworn testimony of repeated acts of sexual harassment, was confirmed anyway.

The Bork story is a good example of a justified rejection. Older readers will recall that Bork was US Solicitor General during the Watergate era. When President Richard Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Special Counsel Archibald Cox (despite pledging not to interfere with his work), Richardson resigned rather than carry out the reprehensible order. Nixon then ordered Deputy AG William Ruckelshaus to fire Cox, and he, too, resigned rather than comply. But when Nixon then ordered the Acting AG Robert Bork to fire Cox, Bork fired him. This outrageous act ultimately brought Nixon down.(2) Fourteen years later, Democratic senators remembered this when they voted to reject President Ronald Reagan's nomination of Bork to the Supreme Court.

Of course Elena Kagan is a liberal, as would be anyone that Barack Obama could conceivably nominate. (In his later years retiring Justice John Paul Stevens was also often aligned with the liberals, although I doubt that President Gerald Ford considered him one when he appointed Stevens to the Court in 1975.) Maybe Senator Sessions and most of his fellow Republicans are so intent on beating Obama on something that they would vote to reject any Obama nominee. But Kagan's credentials are solid, and her closet has no skeletons. Four Republican senators are already committed to voting for her, and that is more than she will need for confirmation.

Mazel Tov!
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(1) This decision ruled that segregation of public schools in Topeka, Kansas, was unconstitutional. It was a landmark ruling in breaking down segregation and white supremacy in the South.

(2) The Cox dismissal spurred calls for impeachment hearings by the House Judiciary Committee, which voted to impeach Nixon in early August, 1974. Nixon resigned August 9.