So when you hear that state and local governments are facing tough times, this is what it means to communities. From The Columbian’s Michael Andersen:
What will change the most?
Probably public health, code enforcement, drug and mental health treatment and (don’t scoff) the county’s internal computer team.
The public health department will change radically, laying off a third of its staff by the end of 2009 and instead trying to recruit nonprofits to do the same work for less pay. The county will lose three of its seven code enforcement officers. Nobody knows yet where the cuts will come in drug and mental health treatment, because they depend on state decisions next year. And with five positions cut from the computer team, all the county’s computers will crash more and employees won’t be trained as well in using computers.
Will any county services improve?
The county sheriff’s road patrols will add four new deputy positions in 2010. The sheriff says that’s not enough to keep up with the population, so it’s an open question.
One thing worth noticing is that large portions of relatively urban areas are not incorporated in Clark County. We’re basically an unincorporated city being governed by county government, replete with all the resulting tension between urban and rural needs.
This area includes Salmon Creek, Felida and Hazel Dell, if you know the geography here. Lots of houses, schools and shopping areas were built in these places in the last fifteen years, but because of historical animosity towards Vancouver, the odds are the city will never be able to annex. Past efforts to form a separate city have failed miserably.
So we’re stuck being governed by a three-member county commission, the same system of government that we had at statehood. Right now control of that body is technically still in doubt as we await the results of an automatic recount in a county commission race, a recount which is being held up by a computer glitch. Most observers expect, though, that Republican Tom Mielke will hang on to win by about 200 votes.
We have all the challenges of other urbanized areas: traffic, crime, a need for more family wage jobs, etc. But our form of government is the same as when everyone grew peaches for a living. Don’t know if there were a ton of untreated mentally ill folks wandering around peach orchards back in the day, but it looks like one possible future for life in Clark County. Such are the costs of the Bush Depression.
Depression, hell. It’s a manic recession, max. (Source: Goldy’s DSM.)
Code enforcement is to take a hit in King County. I heard 4 postions were going away.
The people of Clark County could always set up a charter form of government, and have a county council elected by districts — either partisan or non-partisan.
Having created a depression, wingnuts will soon get their wish — no government — and the chaotic and lawless society they’ve long dreamed of living in.
The Bottom Line
“For American and European savers it has been a lost decade. After two booms and two busts, stockmarkets have earned them nothing, or less, in the past ten years. Low interest rates have made bonds and bank deposits unrewarding too. Were it not for the tax relief they receive, contributors to personal pension plans would have been better off keeping their money under their mattresses. … Any American who has diligently put $100 a month into a domestic equity mutual fund for the past ten years will find his pot worth less than he put into it; a European who did the same has lost a quarter of his money.”
Quoted under fair use from the conservative British newsweekly The Economist.
Roger Rabbit Commentary: This should put to rest any argument that Republicans are better at managing the economy. Only a fool believes that. And lots of fools who did vote Republican are now getting an education in the school of hard knocks.
There’s been 30 years of bi-partisan consensus that regulation was bad and that banks should be able to play roulette with paper and that the dot com bubble and the housing price bubble and credit card debit were a great basis to replace the outsourced manufacturing jobs. It’s too bad Obama doesn’t seem to have any economic advisers that didn’t buy into this consensus.
Minnesota Recount Update
The hand recount wrapped up today, and about the only thing that can be said right now is that no one agrees on what the numbers are.
The Associated Press reports that GOP incumbent Coleman leads by 192 votes, a slight decline from his Election Day margin. However, this doesn’t include over 5,000 disputed ballots to be decided by the state canvassing board, nor does it include approximately 2,100 votes from a precinct where officials are searching for 133 missing ballots. Most of the voters in that precinct are University of Minnesota students.
The Franken campaign’s tally, which includes the disputed ballots and assumes all will be counted by the canvassing board, puts Franken ahead by 4 votes. If this holds up, the precinct not included in the tally should expand his margin somewhat.
So, take your choice — depending on who you want to believe, either Coleman leads by 192 votes or Franken leads by 4 votes, but either way, these totals don’t include a precinct that has about 2,100 ballots or the 133 missing ballots from that precinct.
@6 Horseshit. De-regulation was a strictly conservative show. Yes, some conservative Democrats went along with it — with emphasis on the word conservative. You won’t find any liberals who ever thought bank deregulation, or electricity market deregulation, or most other kinds of deregulation, were a good idea. Only you stupid conservatives signed off on that piece of manure.
No love here for Franken but if he gets in by four votes, countless Republican heads will explode. That’s good enough for me.
@ 9
Oh sweet Jebus, I want this to happen! Billo Bumbly and Limpdick will be catatonic and apoplectic all at the same time!
Conservative blowhard brains will rain down from the sky!
I want to see this day!
Horseshit. De-regulation was a strictly conservative show.
—————–
The Democrats voted for the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act in overwhelming numbers in November of 1999:
http://www.govtrack.us/congres.....=s1999-354
http://www.govtrack.us/congres.....=h1999-570
Bill Clinton signed it into law on November 12, 1999. Here’s what he had to say about it at the signing:
“You heard Senator Gramm characterize this bill as a victory for freedom and free markets. And Congressman LaFalce characterized this bill as a victory for consumer protection. And both of them are right. And I have always believed that one required the other.”
See: http://bulk.resource.org/gpo.g.....2_2080.pdf
Here’s what Senator Chris Dodd had to say about it as recently as March 2007:
“I am proud to have had Tom’s and the Chamber’s support on some of the most important pieces of legislation with which I have been associated. Laws like the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act; the Y2K litigation reform act; the Class Action Fairness Act; the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which has helped bring our financial services sector into the 21st century; and the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act, which in the aftermath of 9/11 has played a crucial role in keeping our economy strong.”
See: http://dodd.senate.gov/index.php?q=node/3779/print
8Rabbit
I’m not a conservative you idiot.
Patty Murray signed off on the repeal of Glass-Steagall.
Darcy Burner called for ‘tax relief’.
I call that buying into the deregulation meme. The democratic party as a whole gave up being liberal a long time ago.
Remember, Pelletizer derailed the thread with his Minnesota recount post.
So………………..On a different note, may I present to you Kansas City Mayor Mark Funkhouse, PhD.
“In a sworn statement, Squitiro acknowledged making sexual references but insisted they were jokes.” Any conservative does that and fire and brimstone comes from the loony lefties…
Don’t look at the URL yelling loser boy… your head will explode cuz it’s CBS.
The depression is caused by Democrats who lobbied and bullied their way into allowing sub prime loans being mandated onto the lending industries. That’s what caused the financial crisis which is now resulting in economic turmoil.
The Bush Depression is a new tactic being tried by those with Bush Derangement Syndrome. Problem is that both sides of the aisle had a hand in this. Wishing it away doesn’t make it so.