Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 129, No. 95, Ed. 1 Sunday, November 27, 2011 Page: 4 of 20
twenty pages : ill. ; page 22 x 12 in. Digitized from 35 mm. microfilm.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
-
'‘SIP % '■
il&fi
? • §Ms
7W&'-
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 27,2011
Combs overreached in
FI deal, GLO chief says
Patterson requests AG's
opinion on $250M gift
AUSTIN - Texas Land
Commissioner Jerry Patterson
is asking Attorney General
Greg Abbott to investigate the
legality of Comptroller Susan
Combs' $250 million taxpayer
gift to bring Formula One
racing to Texas.
This deal to give away a
quarter of a billion in taxpayer
dollars is a real turkey — New
Jersey got their race and didn't
have to pay a dime for it,"
Patterson said. "Comptroller
Susan Combs exceeded her
authority and ignored the tow
to cut this deal and she's now
Dying to hide her mistakes.”
Patterson is asking Abbott
if "the Comptroller of Public
Accounts had the authority
to commit to support an
event with die Major Event
Trust Fund without first
receiving a request from a
local government or nonprofit
or without first determining
the incremental increase of
tax receipts attributable to
the event." according to his
written request for an attorney
genera] opinion.
Patterson points to a May
10. 2010. letter Combs
wrote to London-based race
organizer Formula One World
Championship Limited, in
which she unequivocally
pledges 10 years of funding,
at $25 million a year, to bring
a Formula One United States
Grand Prix race to Texas.
“in response to the
requirements of the race
promotion contract...! hereby
certify the following: With
the understanding that the
first Formula I United States
Grand Prix race will be held
in Texas in 2012, full funding
of the entire sanction for 2012
will be paid to Formula One
World Championship Limited
i -FOWC") no later than July
31.2011. In subsequent years,
two through ten. of the race
promotion contract it. 2013
through 2021. we will be
sending $25 million dollars to
FOWC by the end of July 31st
each year preceding the actual
race event "
State tow requires a
city, county or organizing
committee to first request
funding from the state's Major
Event Trust Fund before the
Comptroller has any authority
to spend that money. As
of May 10. 2010. no city,
county or local organizing
committee had asked Combs
for funding.
Other requirements of the
tow — approved by the 80th
Legislative at Combs' request
— werealsoignored. AsofMay
10. 2010. Combs’ office had
not made any determination
of the incremental tax increase
an FI race might bring. As of
May 10. 2010. Combs' office
hadn't even established what
market area would be likeiy
to experience measurable
economic impact. Both steps
are also required by state tow.
"I’m not opposed to FI,
but I am opposed to getting
screwed." Patterson said.
"I'm also opposed to elected
officials abusing theirauthorify
and committing a quarter
billion taxpayer dollars they
have no statutory authority to
commit."
Tax hikes inevitable when congress compromises
W
Supercommittee's failure
comes at no surprise
A Audi hot air has been
lYlexpended, with
much to come, about the
failure of Congress’ Joint
Select Committee on Deficit
Reduction to reach an agree-
ment to forestall $1.2 trillion in
budget cuts beginning in 2013.
Thanksgiving was the dead-
line. but the players threw in
their cards on Monday. The ‘su- ’
peroommittee" thus confirmed
the worst suspicions about this
Congress: It is not capable of
addressing the nation's debt
crisis, not if it would imperil its
members' individual interests.
That 9 percent approval rating
Congress got in the mast recent
New York Times/CBS Foil now
looks 9 points too high.
Floating in the hot air are all
maimer of excuses: President
Barack Obama failed to lead.
The Republicans wouldn't
give on tax expenditures. The
Democrats wouldn't be spe-
cific about cuts to entitlements.
Etc., etc.
Ignore it all. Three words
explain (he supercommittee's
failure and, indeed, much of
the debt crisis itself: Bush lax
cuts.
Had Congress not enacted
President George W. Bush s
tax-cut proposals in 2001 and
2003. at least $22 trillion more
would have flowed into the
Treasury between 2001 and
2010. according to the authori-
tative Tax Poficy Center of the
Urban Institute and Brookings
Congress re
i a Medicare
not decided
drug ben-
efit and wage two wars off the
books, the picture would have
been even brighter.
Water underthe bridge, right?
Well, here’s some water that’s
still upstream : If Congress were
to allow the tax cuts to expire
next year (they’ve already been
extended two yean because
of a deal Obama struck with
congressional Republicans) it
would mean an additional $4
trillion to the Treasury between
2012 and 2020.
Four trillion dollars is pre-
cisely the amount that the lead-
ers of the National Commission
on Focal Responsibility and
Reform recommended test
December as being needed in
the next 10 years to stabilize
the debt crisis.
But the commission couldn't
get the 14 votes among its
members to send its plan to
Congress.
That was Failure to Deal No.
I. Failure to Deal No. 2 came
during tost summer's debt-ceil-
ing negotiations, which was
resolved with the appointment
of the supeicommittee, which
just executed Failure to Deal
No. 3
All of them, and more to
come, stem from the Primal
Failure, the Bush tax cuts.
None of this will be settled
before the 2012 elections are
over: The campaign will be,
and should be, about the as-
cendancy of greed. it is a fight
worth waging. It is a battle
worth winning.
ST. LOUIS POST- DlSPATCH
DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS
COM
ashington is once
again in a deal
making mode,
and you are about to lose
again. When Congress passed
the massive debt increase bill
earlier this year, it abdicated
legislative responsibility
to craft a solution to the
spiraling debt. They gave the
legislative responsibility to
what Congress calls the Joint
Select Committee on Deficit
Reduction.
The committee was then
loaded with legislative
"vetcrans”tolimittbeinfluence
of the recently elected Tea
Party Republicans. Since its
inception, the committee has
been pushing a mountain
of tax increases using the
popularity of the concept of
balancing the Federal budget.
The only question at this
point is how much the two
sets of Washington elites will
raise taxes.
Obama and the Democrats
have laid down the gauntlet.
They will accept not one
penny less than one trillion in
new taxes. Republicans have
already agreed to raise taxes
by at least 250 to 300 billion.
We favor another path, no
agreement.
FLOYD AND MARY
BETH BROWN
Now if you talk to the
governing elite in Washington
DC the resulting chaos of
no agreement is the end of
the world. According to the
earlier passed tow if the taxes
are not increased, then we
may actually see a decrease in
the rate of spending growth.
According to this
agreement, spending will be
cut across the board in non-
entitlement programs by a
mere 75 billion a year in
military expenditures and 75
billion a year in non-defense
discretionary programs.
Remember in Washington-
speak the budget that is cut
can still increase in real
terms.
According to the Wall
Street Journal. “Total
domestic discretionary
spending doubled to $614
billion in 2010 from $298
billion in 2000. Even if there
were a 10-year $1.2 trillion
“cut," total discretionary
spending would still rise by
$83 billion by 2021 because
those cuts are calculated from
inflated “current services"
projections."
This sleight of hand is
accomplished by the way
Washington budgets. The cut
is actually an increase.
So expect to hear lots of
scary talk over the course
of the next few days about
the end of the world as you
know it. Children will starve,
will ciOfiA* mnerp
and fire protection will end, spending,
planes will fall from the sky
and scariest of all our enemies
in Iran and North Korea will
rejoice.
The truth of the situation is
schools should be funded by
states and local communities,
we shouldn't miss one
dollar because much of the
money spent by DC actually
raises the cost of schooling
children through unnecessary
regulation. The same
should be true of foodstuffs.
Washington actually raises
the cost of food through
agricultural price supports
and regulations. Turn the
regulation of food back to the
states and let communities
where regulators actually eat
the food be the judge.
As for the military budget,
America can absorb these
cuts in defense spending if we
bring our troops home from
around the globe just a little
faster. Maybe Obama could
do something revolutionary
such as defend our borders
as opposed to the borders of
Iraq and South Korea. And
let's strip out all the dollars
stuffed in the defense budget,
which is really foreign aid
AS
Congress and Obama can
always go back and make
adjustments to the actual cuts
because none of this is set to
affect the budget until 2013
anyway.
We say. let’s cut the budget
across the board. If not now,
when?
©2Oil Floyd and Mary
Beth Brown. To comment
on this column, e-mail
browns@caglecartoons.com.
Newt Gingrich, child labor and you
I
ip---—-
POLK COUNTY
ENTERPRISE
jWSESj ALVTNHO
ALVIN HOLLEY. PUBLISHER
"i-.| —-----
(ISPS 4J7-34S)
■ WtaOSnaLmaMittniri
rfm
t's like an early
Christmas gift to
columnists! GOP
presidential hopeful Newt
Gingrich told an audience at
Harvard's Kennedy School
of Government that the
nation's child labor tows are
“truly stupid" and called for
vastly increased employment
eligibility for kids who
haven’t reached their mid-
teens.
In particular. Gingrich
spoke wistfully about the
notion of firing most of
the unionized janitors at
inner-city schools and
(underlying students
to do the work. Gingrich
said such radical steps are
justified because the kids
need to develop a work
ethic, because the kids need
to lake pride in themselves
and because shoeshine jobs
and "tote that barge, lift that
bale” jobs have *sigh* gone
the way of penny postcards
and malt shops.
As 1 understand it.
Gingrich is publicizing this
custodial makeover with an
ad campaign along the lines
of "Silly rabbit! Toilet snakes
are for kids!”
Some pundits have a
knee-jerk responae to
label Gingrich’s plan as
That is not
DANNY TYREE
should be seat and not heard
— unless the coal mine
collapses. Then they better
holler pretty loud, while the
air tests...")
Critics warn that the child
labor revamp is just one
way Gingrich is planning
to turn hack the clock on
progressive achievements of
the 20th century. A campaign
spokesman says nothing
could be further from
the truth. (“Newt doesn't
like to mess with clocks,
since they're part of a vast
unionist/socialist plot. And
once he’s in office, he vows
to send Navy SEAL Team
Six to eliminate all those
(“Hey. I can’t even decide
if I like Judy or LIKE like
Judy”)
Gingrich's ideas were very
sketchy in all the news reports
I read, but the hints certainly
entice the imagination into
overdrive. Think about kids
as high-voltage linemen,
NASCAR drivers, alligator
wrcstlers, social workers
("He followed me home.
Mom — can I keep him?”)
But the most wrenching
changes would take place if
federal jobs got taken over
by youngsters. Just imagine
underage Secret Service
agents ("He just shot the
president! KewHThatoughtta
be worth a lot of points!") and
EPA inspectors (“Whoever
smelt it, dealt it”).
Whatever your position
on safety, breadwinner
job security and idyllic
childhoods, there's no
question that our entire
cultural landscape will
the child labor
change if
paradigm
will advertise
"Indentured servants eat
free!" Embryonic stem cell
research will skyrocket. (“If
stem cells can be coaxed
into replicating tissues and
organs, maybe they can be
coaxed into driving heavy
equipment and digging
ditches!!!”)
And piggy banks? Piggy
banks will figure out some
way to charge their owners
HIDDEN FEES.
Perhaps our labor tows do
need tweaking, but I dread the
day when the G-20 economic
summit becomes the G-20
slumber party. (“Girls. I
submit that die euro should
be tied to the current price
of a lock of Justin Bieber’s
hair. All in favor, scream,
'Eeeeeeeee!'")
02011 Danny Tyree
Danny welcomes reader
e-mail responses at
tyrvetyrades @aol.com and
visits to his Facebook fan page
“Tyree's Tyrades", Danny's’
weekly column is distributed
exclusively by Cagle Cartoons
Inc. newspaper syndicate.
promoting
to be
I'm not
(“Quality is Job<
Letters to the Editor Policy
on any subject or issue of
P.O. Box 1276,
i 327-7156 or
—
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Reddell, Valerie. Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 129, No. 95, Ed. 1 Sunday, November 27, 2011, newspaper, November 27, 2011; Livingston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth657254/m1/4/: accessed August 15, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Livingston Municipal Library.