Getting it Right- “It Just Isn’t Right!”

10/9/08
By Sid Riley

As we live and experience our short lives and encounter people, actions, and issues we are often faced with decisions relating to how to handle something when we know it "Just Isn’t Right". If you will just pause for a moment you will probably be able to recall or list several such instances that you have encountered. While doing this….reflect on how you handled the situation.
The easiest way to handle it is to merely turn your back and ignore it. "It doesn’t impact me, I’ll let someone else deal with it", is the weak willed, chicken way to handle it. Personally, I have a difficult time allowing or tolerating any situation, procedure, or action that hurts some person or group at the benefit of others. I just can’t keep my mouth shut and walk away from it.
These situations are all around us. Let me cite some examples:
1. At last nights meeting of the Marianna City Commission they began to deal with the unfunded mandate apparently required by State legislation that requires a detailed review of every city and county comprehensive plan for functionality and performance. This doesn’t sound too bad on the surface…but then comes the realization that the review and study will cost the city approximately $100,000. Multiply this by every city and county in the state and you will see that this requirement ends up costing the taxpayers in Florida millions of dollars. All it really accomplishes is shuffling bureaucratic paperwork and keeping ex-bureaucratic consultants wealthy. I applaud our city commissioners for resisting this suspect scheme and seeking less costly options. It Just Isn’t Right!
2. This morning’s television news is full of stories relating to voter registration fraud that is being discovered across the nation (10 states so far), relating to the activities of the organization known as ACORN. One woman named Marthae Ray was found to have been registered twenty times by ACORN. Now, if they do prove voter fraud, the government will merely slap their hand and say Bad Boy! The same is true if illegal aliens are caught sneaking across our border, using our medical facilities, our welfare, and in some instances even voting. They are carried back to the border, slapped on the hand and told Bad Boy! But just let some tax paying, struggling citizen get caught driving without a seat belt, going a little fast because they are late getting to work, or even having a tail light out….and they get a whopping fine, points, higher insurance payments, and a bad mark on their driving record. It Just Isn’t Right!
3. Then take the DROP program for government workers. A government worker can retire, begin to draw a big, juicy retirement check and then go back to work for the government at full salary. They can thus effectively double their income during the last years of their career…and it is tax money. Nothing similar to this benefit exists in the private sector. It Just Isn’t Right!
4. The Washington bureaucrats and politicians have created a separate, more lucrative social security system for themselves, while they steal from our social security funds causing it to be endangered. It Just Isn’t Right!
5. The Senate version of the bailout legislation that was finally passed last week is a good example of the depth of corruption that exists in Washington. They routinely prove they are prostitutes and their vote can be bought if you only pay the going fee. The revised bill had over $100,000,000 in pork filled "earmarks" that were cleverly designed to "buy" the vote of specific Senators and Congressmen. This even included tax breaks for a company making wooden arrows. That is no way to conduct government of our land. There should be a rule passed that prohibits any non-related amendments from being attached to a piece of legislation. This same system exists in State government. It Just Isn’t Right!
6. Our constitutional officers in Florida have created a situation that is unfair to the tax payers, the County Commissioners who have budgetary responsibility, and all other county employees across the state. They used their lobby organization (union) to have our game playing legislators pass laws that allow the constitutional officers to submit lump budgets which effectively "hide" line item expenditures from the sunshine that is supposed to exist when public funds are involved. As a result the opportunity is given to these officials to violate normal salary-benefit guidelines and create special deals and bonus payments for their favorites or any kinfolk that might work in their office. The commissioners are left with the budgetary responsibility, but without the authority to analyze the situation. I have heard of one instance where a Commissioner began to resist this approach, and as a punishment his house was reappraised and his taxes increased in reprisal from the Constitutional Officers. It Just Isn’t Right!
7. The State has established a grants system that causes every school board and county function to grovel at their feet, eagerly jumping up and down, begging the state "crats" to throw them a grant. These grants are frequently merely vote buying gifts for unneeded projects and programs that give our State Representatives a photo opportunity as they bring the check "home" to our county. This creates a wasteful philosophy of "If we don’t get it and spend it…someone else will". With this approach taken by every bureaucrat and politician in the system, huge amounts of waste are created throughout the state. This type of thinking led to our new EOC building, our new Health Department Building, $500,000 in parks construction in Bascom, Marianna, and countless other towns across the State, and billions of tax dollars in other grant funded items. It Just Isn’t Right!
8. Through their control of taxation and procedures of dolling this money back to the counties, the State government is steadily removing local control of the schools and other routine county functions from local county direction and placing direction and control into Tallahassee (Disney Land North). It Just Isn’t Right!
9. In Washington, the very regulators who were supposed to be monitoring the activities of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were being "bought" by these organizations through huge donations they made to their campaign funds. They were thus bribed into cooperation and were on the "take" just like a corrupt politician. Specifically this included Congressman Barney Frank and Senator Christopher Dodd, Barack Obama, and John Kerry, who received "gifts" exceeding $100,000 from these organizations. It just isn’t Right!
I could fill issue after issue of many papers with thousands of examples of abuses, special arrangements, favoritism, nepotism, cheating, and questionable deals that exist and thus diminish the effectiveness of our governments, and the use of our precious tax dollars.
When you encounter one of these situations, do not turn your back and walk away. Be active and critical of anything that Just Isn’t Right…do this and you will be Getting It Right!
Rudiments: Odds and Ends Worth Mentioning-
- They are supposed to begin paving of Kelson Avenue down the hill to Jefferson Street next week…….Proof there is a God!
- Please mark your calendar for October 16 (Thursday evening) for "The Last Forum" at the Marianna High Auditorium.
- We have chartered a bus to go to Ohio to register and vote the same day, illegally. If you would like to take part in this unethical political activity please be at the bus at 7:00 AM on Monday morning.
- Our old high school in Marianna continues to decay…Wal-Mart building sits vacant, and our rent payments to the county’s bureaucratic landlords around the courthouse square continues to be paid each month.
- May God bless our struggling nation.
Note: The opinions stated in this column are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Hatcher Publications.