I favor Senator Orrin Hatch's plan to test for drugs before granting a person public assistance. His reasoning is that too often the money is taken and spent on drugs, an outrage, I say.
One of the replies has been to ask where this will leave children, as the drug-taking parent's benefits often support children in addition to the parent. If some children would be left out as a result of the drug testing, and they cannot be picked up through other programs, let's make changes to accommodate them.
Another argument against the Hatch plan is that the person might be a drug addict, but that doesn't mean we should dump him (or her) helpless and hopeless into the street. One thought here is, we could make it so the assistance available only comes in the form of food, not cash. But, I also see the wisdom of the no-assistance-at-all-if-you-test-positive approach. If the drug addict has all the comforts of life, what incentive does he (or her) have to get off the drug? Given the choice of comforts or no comfort, some will leave their drugs behind.
The drug abuser should not have the comforts of the laborer, but should not be left uncared for.
When they test positive, let's not allow them government housing, unless it is of the rescue mission variety, roll-your-bag-out-on-the-floor help. And, let's not give them cash, itself, to spend, but rather issue them food only, and not high-end food, but subsistence food. make it clear they are committing a crime. We also need to do something toward preventing a person from going to the store, using welfare funds, and then selling the food to their neighbor. What safeguards are possible? We can hardly send government workers into the homes to check to see if all the bought food is there, and hasn't been sold or given to neighbors.
But, there is one thing we can do: simply give notice that selling of welfare food is illegal. It's fraud. Have a written notice in large letters placed on all grocery bags leaving the store when the items are bought with welfare money. If we make it more of a crime by giving more of a notice, it will have an impact. People are more inclined to follow the law when you spell it out loud and clearly. Have the notices on the grocery sacks say what the punishment is for welfare fraud and have the the same notice ask for anyone observing such fraud to report it, giving a number to call.
More, it would be good if such notices were on the walls at stores, encouraging people to report fraud.
It is the nature of some in society to assume they are not breaking the law, unless you spell it out very clearly. But, when you make sure they cannot misunderstand, many will then keep the law.
This is something we are not doing that will make a difference. So many problems trace back to drug and alcohol abuse.
Startling statistics from Senator Hatch, who got them from the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University:
Of the incarcerations in the U.S., 80 percent are for crimes associated in some way with drug or alcohol involvement.
And, of the $10.6 billion that states spend on child welfare, $74.5 billion is caused or exacerbated because a parent has a substance-abuse problem.
Okay, that doesn't mean all of society's problems trace back to drugs and alcohol. We still have Iraq to deal with. We still have a sour economy. But, wow, if such statistics are correct, look how many of our problems ARE due to drugs: Up to 80 percent of our crime and 3/4 of welfare involving children.
Perhaps my reading of the figures is leading to an overstatement of the problem. Perhaps the the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University overstated the problem. I just know if what I am reading is correct, it is shocking.
Why the low turnout in the primaries weeks ago (about 13 percent)? Jay Evensen, that favorite-of-mine columnist for the Deseret News, suggests two things: 1. The Republicans closed their primary some time ago, allowing only those registered as Republicans to participate; and, 2. In 1994, Utah moved the primaries from September to June. The last primary held in September (1992) attracted nearly 50 percent of the voters, but we have not fared better than 20 percent in any primary since.
From another Deseret News columnist, Frank Pignanelli, comes the assertion that Jim Matheson remains one of the most popular politicians in Utah history.
I quite like Matheson, but didn't realize he ranks as one of the most popular of all time
The credit union industry threw a sizable amount of money into Tim Bridgewater's campaign for the Senate. (Mike Lee defeated Bridgewater in the Republican primary.) It is hardly large news that candidates accept money from those who will, once the candidates are elected, hit them up for favorable legislation. It is a money-buys-influence system.
I like Bridgewater (and Lee). I mention Bridgewater's taking the credit union money simply because when I heard it, it reminded me of how even our best and brightest take the money simply because that is the way the system works. They know they need money to conduct a campaign with, and collecting from special-interest causes is simply the way the system operates.
Somehow, though, we've got to make a dent in this. Somewhere, sometime, it would be good to elect someone without their taking special-interest money. And, yes, I'm asking for you -- this time and in this election -- to vote for me even though I will not take political contributions. I've gone so far in talking to some as to suggest this is an opportunity to say THEIR vote cannot be bought. We don't like it when our elected leaders are influenced by money, so why should we let money influence us as voters?
I wonder how Arnold Friberg's "The Prayer at Valley Forge" painting would fare if stacked up against other notable paintings of the last century?
Let's say you put 40 of the top paintings on display and asked people which ones they recognized and which ones they liked the most. How then would Friberg's painting of George Washington kneeling aside his horse fare?
It believe it would be one of the most popular.
From this week's Jay Evensen column (as opposed to the one from last Sunday referred to above), we learn a public school in Seattle that has "facilities more befitting a college." Roosevelt High has not only a large theater with padded seats (that's traditional enough) but a separate room used just for designing sets. The athletic department has a climbing wall and a beyond-normal abundance of weight-lifting equipment. The school offers offers Latin as a course. It sends students to South Africa and Northern Ireland in the fight against hatred and prejudice. Its students worked with NASA to design robots capable of operating in a weightless environment.
All this in one public school?
NOT CHARTER, BUT FOUNDATION SCHOOLS
Here's the underpinning in the above story about Roosevelt High. In the door-knocking I've done, a few have suggested they would be willing to give more money to education. Even while saying our rough economy demands cuts elsewhere, they want more for education.
How about creating foundations to help support public education? Evensen was at Roosevelt High for a class reunion -- his wife attended Roosevelt -- and found a tour of the school ended with a pitch for contributions.
"Are school-specific foundations the way to help public education?" Evensen asks.
This would not be charter schools, but rather foundation schools. Maybe, before long, we will have both.
17,500 NEW SLAVES IN U.S. EACH YEAR?
A Deseret News editorial about a week ago referred to how author Benjamin Skinner has estimated that 17,500 people a year enter the U.S. as slaves? (What -- the Civil War didn't work?)
Can this be? I have never knowingly ran into a human slave here in the Salt Lake Valley, nor in any other place I've lived. And, I stretch to even remember many news reports of people caught for not just kidnapping, but for having slaves imported from other countries.
ASSASSINATION UNDERSCORES URGENT BORDER CRISIS
How serious a crisis is drug crime across our border? The front-running candidate in a border state in Mexico was assassinated this past week. The drug cartels were suspected of having performed the act.
Threats on candidates and fears the drug lords are buying off the candidates has been a theme of the elections in Mexico this year.
SANDSTROM WANTS TO AVOID PROFILING
Stephen Sandstrom, the legislator from Orem who wants to create legislation in Utah similar to what Arizona adopted, this week said he wants to avoid racial profiling.
People would not be stopped for looking like immigrants, but only if there was cause to stop them and question them.
"I want to get away from racial profiling," Sandstrom was quoted in the Deseret News as saying. "That's a concern of mine. I don't want people who are here legally to feel like they are going to be arrested or harassed in any way."
I came away from the Deseret News article, though, still not sure how Sandstrom is proposing that would avoid racial profiling anymore than the Arizona law. If Sandstrom is suggesting a legal stop must be made before the immigration status can be questioned, that is also in the Arizona law. The section and paragraph I am now looking at does not allow a person to be stopped simply for looking like a foreigner, but rather allows their immigration status to be questioned only after "lawful contact" is made.
Says the Arizona law, "For any lawful contact made by a law enforcement official . . . where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States, a reasonable attempt shall be made, when practicable, to determine the immigration status of the person."
Perhaps the difference between the Arizona law and what Sandstrom will propose is that Sandstrom's law will not include the part that says "where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien who is unlawfully present." Perhaps instead, Sandstrom's law will require that every person who is stopped will be asked to show his or her driver's license or paperwork.
UTAH WOULD PREEMPT FEDS ON IMMIGRATION
For all the talk of how immigration is a federal issue, did it occur to you that if Utah approves guest-worker legislation, it will be circumventing the feds?
The immigrant would pull up to the border station, and when the officer asked for his papers, he would not present a U.S.-issued visa or any paperwork issued by the federal government, but rather papers issued by Utah.
(The guest worker program, proposed by Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, the Sutherland Institute, the Salt Lake Chamber and others), would allow a person to be in Utah if they had a work card allowing them to work here.)
Frankly, I like the guest-worker idea. Nor does it bother me Utah would be taking on authority some see as strictly federal. The federal government has the right to issue citizenship, but that is not being changed. Utah is simply saying it has the right to allow those it chooses to work in this state. That is an authority Utah should and does have.
PRO-GUN RULING A PLUS
What of the Supreme Court ruling this past week that the Second Amendment means the government should not be so quick to limit the right to keep and bear arms?
I agree with it. If the Constitution says leave a matter alone, we should follow the Constitution. If we don't like what the Second Amendment says, then work for a new amendment to replace it. The Second Amendment is but a single sentence long. "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
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