The Democrat & Chronicle reverted to its condescending best form today with its editorial entitled "high taxes, duplicated services are connected". The editorial opens with this thoughtful and reasonable premise:
"Frankly, New Yorkers continue to talk out of both sides of their mouths on getting the high cost of living in this state under control."
Not satisfied with one insult to its readers, the editorial went on to opine:
"New Yorkers, who support 4,200 taxing entities statewide, need to either start supporting streamlined, more efficient government operations or stop whining about the high taxes they pay."
Quite frankly, there is little reason to accept the D&C view that local government is too expensive. I am a fairly typical New York taxpayer. The dollar amount of taxes I pay to the Town of Gates comprises less than 8% of the total dollar amount of taxes I pay for State Income taxes, County taxes, School taxes, and Town taxes combined. That does not include sales and excise taxes paid to the State.
From the Town of Gates, I get a Police Department which responds within scant minutes for emergencies, provides a four or five car, 24/7 road patrol, and which takes reports in person, a Highway Department that paves, repairs, and plows my streets, picks up my leaves in the fall and my yard debris every week, a Recreation Department that provides beautiful Town Parks and recreation programs for youths and senior citizens, a library that has been seen as second to none in the suburbs, and provides dozens of other services, as well.
All of that for less than 8% of my total tax expense! I'd say that I get 60- 70% of the services I value and enjoy from my Town government. That's quite a return on my investment.
The D&C doesn't get it. We "whiners" aren't whining about paying for the host of services we get from our local governments. We want the State to stop spending lavish amounts on numerous programs and projects of dubious merit and for which we get little value for our money.
The other big thing the D&C seems to forget is the thing called "the consent of the governed". We are entitled to have the government and services we want. Citizens have a big say in the nature and cost of local government, which is generally low cost and high value. We have virtually no say in our State government, which is a Byzantine, bloated, and dysfunctional entity. Don't lecture us about our local government until the really costly levels of government clean up their acts.
The D&C criticised the people of Holley for agreeing to spend $1.00 per day to have local police. That's only about 20-25 cents more than it costs to buy the D&C every day. Given a choice, I know which one I'd give up.
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2 comments:
Repoman:
I am at a loss about an issue that certain members of the media as well as the political establishment will not let go. Namely, the fact that Geroge Romney is a member of the Chruch of Jesus Christ of Lattter Day Saints. I simply don't get it, and am quite serious about it. Here is a man who appears to be a decent person, from a good family, who has been faithful to his wife and children and who is a faithful member of his religion. Why is he being "knocked" for it? His Dad ran for President in 1968 and it was not an issue. Something like 8 members of the Senate are also members of the same church. Why is this now an issue? Is it an issue with the vast majority of solid middle road people, or only an issue among a segement of Christians? I don't get this one, but do find it more than a bit unnerving. I hope Democrats and Republicans, members of all churches, those of faith and those of no faith, solidly reject this thinking.
Anonymus:
I'm with you on this. I do not understand how a candidate's religion could be an issue, unless that religion advocated something anti-thetical to democracy.
Romney does, in fact, seem like one of the best "people" in the race. His lifestyle could be held up as an example.
As far as why his religion is an issue, I guess we have to give some of the blame the ever-increasing media microscope. That isn't all, though. Today, we have two "ideologies" about the place of faith in the "public square" competing with each other. On the one hand, there is increasingly aggressive secularism, which holds that there is no place for religious or faith-based perspectives in government. On the other, we have the Christian conservatives and "values voters". They believe that our leaders should apply certain religious/moral/faith-based ideals in public policy.
Romney is suffering at the hands of both groups. He has indicated that his faith plays a role in his life. In fact, his recent "Mormon speech" was different from JFK's religion speech in that he did not claim that his faith would play no role in his decision making as President. (Like JFK, he did say that no Mormon precept was inconsistent with his acting as a government official.)
But hard-core "mainstream" fundamentalist Christians have some antipathy towards Mormonism as not being a "true" Christian faith. Mike Huckabee has dissapointed some by his failure to renounce attacks on Romney stemming from those quarters.
Meanwhile, secular liberals also chastise Romney because he does hold strong religious beliefs. Our "progressive" friends don't want a guy with strong moral and ethical beliefs to interfere with the march to political correctness and moral relativism. The Hollywood crowd doesn't like the example of the once (and still) married Romney raining on their "anything goes" parade.
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