2012 State of the State Address

A Strong Economy Fosters Healthy Communities and Prosperous Families

Lt. Governor and Mrs. Bell; President Waddoups; Speaker Lockhart; members of the Utah Legislature; members of my Cabinet; Justices of the Utah Supreme Court; Utah’s First Lady, my beautiful wife, Jeanette; and my fellow Utahns:

It is an honor and a privilege to address you this evening. As we assemble in this beautiful and historic chamber, let us take time to acknowledge those who protect our freedoms and keep our homeland safe. This past August, I traveled to Iraq and Afghanistan to meet with some of our deployed Utah servicemen and women. It was a humbling experience. Our liberty – the free exercise of our God-given rights – is preserved by the men and women of our Armed Forces who willingly put themselves in harm’s way for God, family and country. This past year, in the span of just over a month, we lost six Utah soldiers, sailors and marines in Afghanistan. These brave servicemen made the ultimate sacrifice in defense of this nation and the ideals which make it great. We also acknowledge the loss of Agent Jared Francom, tragically killed in the Ogden shooting incident just a few short weeks ago.

Tonight, we have as honored guests in the gallery, family members of those we have lost at home and abroad. As they stand, please join with me to acknowledge them, and thank them for their loved one’s service and sacrifice.

As Governor of the great State of Utah, I am pleased to report that the state of our State is strong – and growing stronger. I want you to know I am very optimistic about Utah’s future. While our national economy continues to struggle, the economy in Utah surges ahead. Our unemployment rate continues to steadily fall. We currently have the second-fastest rate of job creation (more…)

As Prepared for Delivery –

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, members of Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow Americans:

Last month, I went to Andrews Air Force Base and welcomed home some of our last troops to serve in Iraq. Together, we offered a final, proud salute to the colors under which more than a million of our fellow citizens fought — and several thousand gave their lives.

We gather tonight knowing that this generation of heroes has made the United States safer and more respected around the world. For the first time in nine years, there are no Americans fighting in Iraq. For the first time in two decades, Osama bin Laden is not a threat to this country. Most of al Qaeda’s top lieutenants have been defeated. The Taliban’s momentum has been broken, and some troops in Afghanistan have begun to come home.

These achievements are a testament to the courage, selflessness, and teamwork of America’s Armed Forces. At a time when too many of our institutions have let us down, they exceed all expectations. They’re not consumed with personal ambition. They don’t obsess over their differences. They focus on the mission at hand. They work together.

Imagine what we could accomplish if we followed their example. Think about the America within our reach: A country that leads the world in educating its people. An America that attracts a new generation of high-tech manufacturing and high-paying jobs. A future where we’re in control of our own energy, and our security and prosperity aren’t so tied to unstable parts of the world. An economy built to last, where hard work pays off, and responsibility is rewarded.

We can do this. I know we can, because we’ve done it before. At the end of World War II, when another generation of heroes returned home (more…)

Rocky Anderson, two term mayor of Salt Lake City, recently announced his candidacy for President of the United States under the label of the newly formed Justice Party.

This was his acceptance speech at the nominating convention:

Ross C. “Rocky” Anderson Accepting Justice Party Nomination for Candidacy for President of the United States (website)

I am proud to accept the nomination of the Justice Party to run as its candidate for President of the United States.

This is not my campaign.  This is a campaign of, for, and by the people.  We join together in this endeavor for the sake of justice – social justice, environmental justice, and economic justice.   We pledge to organize and act, tenaciously and over the long haul, for the sake of the public interest, to enhance and protect freedom for all, and to vindicate the sacred promise of justice for all.

Those who understand that our great nation and its people have been harmed severely, and are at tremendous risk for even greater damage in the future, can be powerful agents of positive change.  We need not settle for governance by the Republican and Democratic parties, which thrive on the corrupt money machine, nor do we have to confine ourselves to voting for the lesser of two evils, if indeed there is a lesser evil among the common choices.

If we have the vision, the courage, and the will, we can, together, forge a very different way – a way that will lead to a future of fiscal responsibility and respectful regard for the economic burdens we leave for later generations; secure jobs and fair compensation; decency and rationality in our cruel, self-destructive criminal justice system that is largely based on an irrational rage to punish; an investment in our nation’s infrastructure, education, and innovation that is as substantial as our need to re-gain our global competitive edge; compassionate and rational immigration reform; respect for fundamental human and civil rights; victory over the stranglehold of the military-industrial-congressional complex; protection of our air, water, and wild lands; essential health care for all, as in every other nation (more…)

Published on Monday, February 21, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

Waking Up in Wisconsin

by David Michael Green

Whodathunkit, eh?

Insignificant, backwater, third world banana republics like Tunisia and Egypt pioneering the way for the greatest superpower and richest country on the planet.

That’s not supposed to happen.

I mean, we pay for a military that costs as much as every other one in the world, combined, even though it can’t win endless wars against insignificant, backwater, third world banana republics.  They can’t say that about their militaries!  We’ve got annual deficits that are bigger than their entire economies.  The size of our economy is half-again bigger than the number two in the world (with one-fourth the population), and we’ve managed to produce a health care system that ranks 39th globally.  Who else can claim that badge of honor?  No doubt that ranking partially explains why our life expectancy figures are lower than just about every country in the developed world.  Our education system, once the envy of the world, is crumbling, along with the size of our college enrollments.  Ditto our infrastructure, much of which hasn’t been maintained in decades.  Who can touch that?  We have the highest polarization of wealth in the entire developed world, and more than any country in the Arab world too.  Sweet!  Another cool thing is our incarceration rate.  It’s 743 per hundred thousand people.  The next highest country has less than half that figure.  Our use of torture and rendition and the remote-controlled aerial bombings of civilians has earned us the scorn and hatred of the world, while our political leaders, unmatched in their capacity for hypocrisy and buffoonery, have made us a laughingstock that few puffy-chested, medal-covered third world dictators can match.  You got Mugabe?  We got Palin.  You got Charles Taylor?  We got George W. Bush, in a democracy no less.

So, with a record like that, who in the world are these punky backwater countries to teach high and mighty America anything about anything?!?!

Darned if it hasn’t happened, though.  I mean, you can say it’s a coincidence if you want, and you may even be right.  But I can’t help thinking that the people of Wisconsin have been inspired by the people of Egypt.  Who were themselves inspired by the people of Tunisia.  Both of whom have inspired the people of Bahrain, Jordan, Iran, Libya, Yemen, Iraq and beyond.  Meanwhile, Wisconsin seems to be inspiring Americans in other states finally to fight back.

It would seem that people power is in the air in early 2011, and that it’s quite contagious.

Whatever is the explanation for the Cheesehead version of Tahrir Square, it is unbelievably welcome, and just (more…)

Published: February 20, 2011 11:45PM

The Utah Legislature has a history of starving public schools and then criticizing them for failures. Bills in the current session would label struggling schools with D or F grades but offer no resources to help them improve and would funnel scarce public funds to private online schools.

Thus, legislators continue to encourage parents to abandon traditional public schools for private or charter schools. Obviously, despite the resounding defeat in 2007 of a voucher law that would have sent public money to private schools, the Legislature has not given up that battle.

In Senate Bill 65, Sen. Howard Stephenson would set up a statewide online education program that would direct taxpayer money to private providers of online courses. It has passed the Senate.

Sen. Wayne L. Niederhauser and Rep. Greg Hughes are sponsoring a bill to have public schools graded, based on statewide assessments, and for high schools, the graduation rate. They are modeling this legislation on a similar program in Florida. It would provide parents with information to justify abandoning those schools.

That is the Republican agenda–do away with government! And the biggest part of local government is public education! And it has been systematically dismantled by the Republican legislature (more…)

Politicians need to stay out of athletics

By Doug Robinson

Deseret News

Published: Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2011 12:49 a.m. MST

Memo to state legislators: Butt out.

Stay out of high school sports.

Find something else to meddle with.

Oh, wait, we’re supposed to tone down the rhetoric.

Butt out … pa-lease.

Remember the little drama that began last summer when the state Legislature, led by Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, wanted to turn the high school transfer rule on its head by having NO RULES WHATSOEVER? A kid could transfer anytime, anywhere. He could play three different sports for three different schools in one school year.

That was a doozie, wasn’t it? Which is why legislators went back to work on the bill and modified it. The hope was that common sense would prevail, and they’d forget the whole business when (more…)

Published: February 7, 2011 12:15AM

There’s a modern analogy to the old proverb “robbing Peter to pay Paul.” It’s paying your Visa bill with your Mastercard.

No matter what idiom you use, moving money around is not the same as increasing the amount in the pot. But Sen. Lyle Hillyard, R-Logan, and Rep. Merlynn Newbold, R-South Jordan, convinced the Legislature to do just that. And then to claim they have provided the new money needed to educate an expected influx of more than 14,000 new students in Utah schools next year. That’s pure baloney.

It’s not like the Tribune to call ‘baloney’ on Senator Lyle Hillyard. He is the best the hill has got on state budgeting and financial matters. However, it appears that nothing has been done to fund the increase in students and the status quo isn’t good enough let alone continue to fall farther behind.

The base budget for education passed by the Legislature last week would take $76 million from one education-fund pot, called the flexible allocation WPU (weighted pupil unit) distribution, and use it to fund enrollment growth. The problem with that is that the flexible allocation distribution is money Utah schools are already allotted and are using to help pay for mandatory retirement and Social Security costs.

If the flexible allocation distribution is used to hire teachers or buy supplies for the thousands of new students, then school districts will have to cut their budgets for such programs and services as reading, remedial assistance, busing and school nurses in order to make up the difference.

Sen. Karen Morgan, D-Cottonwood Heights, calls the maneuver “smoke and mirrors,” and we agree with her. To claim (more…)

Tribune Forum Letter

By Brian Slade

Published: February 7, 2011 12:15AM

This past year I kept reading about the report that two-thirds of Utah third-graders don’t read at grade level, and how this benchmark is critical because through third grade, students learn to read. After that, they read to learn. If we fail them by the third grade, we’ve failed them for the rest of their lives.

The noise about this was so loud, tragic and embarrassing that I thought surely the 2011 Legislature would address this pivotal problem upon which turns so much else, from classroom cohesion to dropout rates to crime and a vibrant Utah workforce.

This is a problem that is solvable: by not (more…)

January 26, 2011

Voucher Program Would Undermine Civil Rights And Civil Liberties And Add To The Budget Deficit

by Barry Lynn, Executive Director, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State

House Speaker John Boehner’s plan to subsidize religious schools in the District of Columbia would undercut civil rights and civil liberties and add to the federal budget deficit, while failing to improve education, according to Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Boehner has announced that today he will unveil a bill that would resurrect and expand the controversial experimental D.C. voucher program, which pays for tuition at private schools for some students in Washington, D.C.

Americans United says the Boehner move is seriously misguided.

There is a great big DETOUR sign that warns of danger whenever government wanders into the religious realm—but reading isn’t one of the Tea Party’s favorite things to do, and danger is just their call to arms.

The country survived the John Birch Society and we will survive its reincarnation in the form of the Tea Party, but not without lots of cuts and bruises. These guys intend to do some damage.

“I can’t imagine a worse time to unveil a new federal subsidy for religious schools,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director. “This proposal would add to the federal budget deficit while subsidizing schools that indoctrinate and discriminate in hiring.

“Public funds should be directed toward improving public schools, not private schools (more…)

In Writings of Obama, a Philosophy Is Unearthed

By PATRICIA COHEN

When the Harvard historian James T. Kloppenberg decided to write about the influences that shaped President Obama’s view of the world, he interviewed the president’s former professors and classmates, combed through his books, essays, and speeches, and even read every article published during the three years Mr. Obama was involved with the Harvard Law Review (“a superb cure for insomnia,” Mr. Kloppenberg said). What he did not do was speak to President Obama.

This article was written by Patricia Cohen of the New York Times and is a brief book review of Reading Obama: Dreams, Hopes, and the American Political Tradition written by Harvard history professor James T. Kloppenberg. Interested readers can also get a glimpse of the book by reading an article by Professor Kloppenberg that appeared in Harvard Magazine, November-December issue. The link is www.harvardmagazine.com and entitled ‘A Nation Arguing With Its Conscience.”

“He would have had to deny every word,” Mr. Kloppenberg said with a smile. The reason, he explained, is his conclusion that President Obama is a true intellectual — a word that is frequently considered an epithet among populists with a robust suspicion of Ivy League elites.

In New York City last week to give a standing-room-only lecture about his forthcoming intellectual biography, “Reading Obama: Dreams, Hopes, and the American Political Tradition,” Mr. Kloppenberg explained that he sees Mr. Obama as a kind of philosopher president, a rare breed that can be found only a handful of times in American history.

“There’s John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and John Quincy Adams, then Abraham Lincoln and in the 20th century just Woodrow Wilson,” he said.

To Mr. Kloppenberg the philosophy (more…)

Hatch skips DREAM Act vote he calls “cynical exercise”

Published: Monday, Dec. 20, 2010 6:40 p.m. MST

SALT LAKE CITY — Sen. Orrin Hatch said he skipped a vote on the failed DREAM Act over the weekend because it was a “cynical exercise in political charades” by the Senate’s Democratic leadership.

The act, intended to help undocumented youths earn citizenship by attending college or serving in the military, failed 55-41 on Saturday with the support of just three Republicans, including Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah.

In today’s Senate where Republicans are filibustering everything, the 55 vote majority is not enough for the bill to pass the 60 vote requirement.

Bennett was one of three Republicans (more…)

Salt Lake Tribune Editorial

Published: December 18, 2010 01:01AM

A 3rd District judge was right about one thing when he ruled that in choosing candidates for this year’s state school board election, “The nominating committee clearly violated the state’s Open Meetings Act on numerous occasions.”

But we take issue with his conclusion that those violations “only moderately damaged the act’s policies of conducting the public’s business openly.” The Utah Open Meetings Act is not simply a set of policies; it is state law. And if the committee did not sufficiently break the law in this case, it would be difficult to imagine one in which Judge Anthony Quinn would say the law had been more than “moderately” broken.

The judge ruled that the law was broken, but offered no remedy. The undemocratic election was allowed to stand. The judge in essence said, “Democracy be damned, it is just too big a nuisance.”

Once again the community is enlightened by a vigilant press—The Salt Lake Tribune.

The nominating committee failed to give public notice of at least a half-dozen meetings (more…)

Published on Friday, December 17, 2010 by The Guardian/UK

WikiLeaks: The Emperor Wears No Clothes

Now WikiLeaks has laid bare the lies and collusion, we pledge to not just witness but actively participate in its fight for democracy

by John Pilger and Others

We are writing this statement in support of democracy.

Since Sunday, 28 November, WikiLeaks and five major newspapers from around the world (the Guardian [1], the New York Times [2], Der Spiegel, Le Monde, El Pais) have been publishing redacted versions of leaked US diplomatic cables in an ongoing story that has become known as “Cablegate”. The identity of the original leaker is – as yet – unconfirmed.

As this Wikileaks melodrama unfolds we shall see whether Barack Obama really believes in transparency. We shall see! We are adding our name to this statement. Join with us by adding a comment. There is a place to add comments at the end of the story.

This is not the first leak of confidential documentation that exposes governmental lies – and it won’t be the last. Secret information has long been used by elites to build and maintain power over huge populations of citizens, workers, armed forces and others. But when the secrets of the elite are revealed, the power they represent can be confronted and reversed.

Nor is this the first time that state (and other) forces of power have acted to prevent dissemination of information on the internet – and it won’t be the last.

Sites have been removed by their hosting companies [3], servers seized by police or other governmental authorities, take-down requests issued under the rule of law: none of these prevented information spreading.

But the issues run deeper than this. As former US president Thomas Jefferson once stated, “information is the currency of democracy”. (more…)

Football coaches’ salaries may not pay off on the field

Published: Thursday, Dec. 9, 2010 1:09 a.m. MST

So, what are we paying college football coaches these days.

And why? USA Today came up with its annual report on the salaries of the nation’s major college football coaches. The newspaper obtained tax records and other information to decipher base salaries, outside university income and maximum bonuses paid. There were private schools, including BYU, Boston College and Notre Dame, where no information was available.

You might be interested in a few of these paychecks and who is paying for what.

This article is not a legitimate study of the relationship between college football salaries and their won-lost records. A much more scholarly study would be interesting.

Nevertheless, the salary numbers mentioned in this article should be enough to startle the good sense of Americans.

College presidents and governing boards have let (more…)

Published: Monday, Dec. 6, 2010 11:13 p.m. MST

The following editorial appeared in the New York Times Dec. 4.

Not all the political news this year involves the rise of partisan extremism and government by rage. There has been lots of that. But maybe there is a limit, a point when people of good sense and good will band together to say no. As they have just done in Utah.

Political, business, law-enforcement and religious leaders there have endorsed what they call the Utah Compact. It is a statement of principles meant to address, with moderation and civility, “the complex challenges associated with a broken national immigration system.” What a welcome contrast it draws with the xenophobic radicalism of places like Arizona.

The signers, who hope to influence the shape of state immigration policy, include the mayors of Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County, the state attorney general, two Republican former governors, a former United States senator, and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City, the Chamber of Commerce and a host of other civic groups and citizens. The prominent and powerful Mormon Church did not sign on but issued a “statement of support” calling the compact “a responsible approach to the urgent challenge of immigration reform.”

A clearer expression of good sense and sanity than Utah’s would be hard to find. It says immigration is an issue between the federal government and other countries — “not Utah and other countries.” It says local police agencies should focus on fighting crime, “not civil violations of federal code.” Because “strong families are the foundation of successful communities,” it opposes policies that unnecessarily separate them. It recognizes immigrants’ value as workers and taxpayers.

It ends by urging a humane approach (more…)

By Elizabeth Stuart

Deseret News

Published: Monday, Dec. 6, 2010 11:16 p.m. MST

SALT LAKE CITY — The New York Times’ gushing support of the Utah Compact on Sunday may win the state public relations points with the nation, but most agree it’s unlikely to affect the state’s immigration discussion.

In its editorial the New York Times pointed to Utah as a place where “people of good sense and good will” have banded together to call for an end to “government by rage.” It goes on to praise the Utah Compact, a policy document designed to guide the state’s immigration debate toward civility, as a “clear expression of good sense and sanity.” It condemns Arizona-style immigration law enforcement as “xenophobic” and radical.

Such a pat on the back from one of the “most influential papers in the world” may help Utah’s image, said Kirk Jowers, director of the Hinckley institute of Politics at the University of Utah.

“Utah rightly or wrongly is maligned and misunderstood nationally and internationally,” said Jowers. “The positive impact of this editorial on Utah business, tourism and education cannot be underestimated. It is very important and very positive.”

States have a certain “caricature” that impacts their ability to attract tourists and businesses, Jowers said. Arizona, which has garnered a lot of national scrutiny for its tough stance (more…)

To help Utah’s uninsured, churches, hospitals and schools team up

By Lois M. Collins

Deseret News

Published: Monday, Nov. 29, 2010 11:02 p.m. MST

This is the final part of a Deseret News series that examines how Utahns are empowering our poor in three areas: homelessness, education and health care.

SALT LAKE — It’s 8 a.m. on a freezing-cold Sunday beneath the 500 South viaduct. Under the shelter of the overpass, a line of volunteers, their breaths clearly visible in the cold air, are serving breakfast on cardboard plates to the homeless.

But not everyone’s focused on the tempting aroma of the hot buttermilk pancakes and meaty gravy that’s being scooped over mashed potatoes. Bob, a tall, skinny man in a tattered gray coat, is searching for the nurse who sometimes shows up. He’s got a bad rash, he says, pushing up his sleeve to show a volunteer the angry red bumps from his wrist to his elbow. Sometimes the nurse gives him ointment that helps.

A few minutes later, a harried mom pushing an overstuffed stroller with a toddler sitting beside what looks like a trash bag full of clothes makes the same request. Did the nurse come?

Not today.

When you’re poor and uninsured or underinsured, health care can be a vexing problem.

Last year in Utah there were 387,100 people without insurance, including 100,500 (more…)

By PAUL ROLLY

The Salt Lake Tribune

Published: November 20, 2010 01:01AM

Utah Republicans, like their counterparts throughout the nation, had a stellar election year in 2010, but the conservative armada failed to slay one of its most coveted targets — Utah State School Board member Kim Burningham.

The fact that the right-wing arm of the Republican Party spent so much time and resources trying to defeat a school board member — who used to be a Republican legislator — in a nonpartisan race says much about the priorities and the agenda of that cabal. The fact that all its might could not defeat the incumbent board member speaks to the disconnect between that conservative wing and rank-and-file Republicans when it comes to education issues.

Burningham has been a target of the Republican Party power base since, as school board chairman, he opposed the Legislature’s attempt to give tax-credit vouchers to parents who enroll their children in private schools. He supported the citizens referendum that repealed that legislation in 2007.

But there are other reasons not related to education that made the GOP want Burningham’s scalp.

He is hated by the right wing in the Legislature for his leadership role in Utahns for Ethical Government, which is attempting to put an initiative on the ballot to create an independent ethics commission. To counter that effort, the Legislature passed its own ethics reform legislation that voters approved Nov. 2 as a constitutional amendment.

And he supported an initiative to take the authority to create legislative and congressional districts out of the hands of the Legislature.

Tea Party Republicans revile Democrats, but they reserve their most vitriolic words for what they call RINOs (Republicans In Name Only.) They consider centrist Republican Kim Burningham to be a RINO, but even worse, he is against vouchers, in favor of ethics, and wants fair boundaries to determine (more…)

Published: November 14, 2010 03:55PM

I just finished Ron Chernow’s acclaimed Washington: A Life. I was struck how George Washington was consistently for a strong national government to solve national problems.

Washington was for a national debt when needed, and he definitely believed in national intervention to solve economic problems.

He had no sympathy for those who wanted to put states’ rights before the federal government.

Those who claim that the Founding Fathers didn’t intend to create a strong, pre-eminent federal government (more…)

By Brian Maffly

The Salt Lake Tribune

Published: November 15, 2010 09:35AM

Ten years from now the senior year of high school could serve as a freshman year in college. Need-based aid might be more widely available. Attendance could be required at certain “gateway” college courses, currently plagued with failure rates approaching 40 percent. And taxing districts might support two-year instruction.

Those are among ideas the state Board of Regents is floating in its HighEd 2020 Plan, assembled in recent months in response to Gov. Gary Herbert’s instructions to better align higher education with Utah’s economic needs. The foremost goal is to increase the portion of the state’s adult population with college degrees from 39 percent to at least 55 percent, and another 11 percent with some kind of post-secondary certification.

The Board of Regents has set forth an agenda based on what we as a state need in higher education, but it will be up to the legislature and the governor to figure out a way to provide the finances to make the plan succeed.

With a right-wing, anti-government legislature don’t count on it. In fact, you can count on a significant decline in education at all levels.  The legislature is not only anti-government, but anti-science as well, and while the governor may have good intentions he has little control over the radicals on the right that have clear dominance.

The Republican Party in Utah is happy with Utah being a backward southern state in the west. We have been moving in that direction for quite sometime.

Finally the LDS Church is becoming aware of the problem that it has helped create as indicated by its aggressive effort to change the direction of immigration policy that was headed down an extremist right-wing direction.

The encouragement by the church of a one-party state has clearly moved Utah out of the mainstream and into backwater country.

“That’s not a goal driven by an educational need. That’s a goal driven by a business need. The best research in the country says we are going to need the eighth-most educated work force by 2020,” Regents Chairman David Jordan said. “If we are going to be prepared for the knowledge-based economy of the future, we need to increase the output of higher education. We have to attract both more students to the system and have to increase our completion percentage.”

Some 66 percent of jobs will soon require some type of post-secondary certification, according to a study by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

“We have a large gap to fill,” Commissioner of Higher Education William Sederburg warned at recent (more…)