Constant Conservative

By nature of my work, I spend a number of hours each week in and around South Dakota’s most populous city: Sioux Falls. As a result, I am quite aware of the marvelous crop of potholes which have arisen throughout that fair city over the winter months. With that said, I had to laugh a bit when reading this article:

[]The City of Sioux Falls Public Works department is beginning its most aggressive campaign ever to repair potholes and make permanent street repairs, Mayor Dave Munson announced today.

Beginning this week, the City will deploy crews into all areas of the city to fill potholes. Once weather further moderates, the City will begin a $33 million street construction program to address 1,200 blocks across Sioux Falls.[]

One of the functions of a city (indeed, one could say the primary function) is proper maintenance of public roads. A city does not need to build an events center, or homeless hotels (though the county is footing the bill for that one) or even to engage in efforts to entice new businesses to put down roots–unless and until it has properly addressed all infrastructure issues. (And it should not do anything which can be better handled by a non-public entity.) Any other approach is little more than putting new wine in an old winesack.

I am glad to see that Sioux Falls is doing what it should. I don’t think, however, that we need an “aggressive campaign” so much as we need a thoughtful, measured approach to performing those tasks which are properly within the purview of local government.

Full disclosure: I have several lawyers in my extended family. With that said, I find the following AP article rather funny:

There are about 1,500 lawyers in [South Dakota]. Most of them are located in Sioux Falls, Rapid City, Aberdeen and Pierre.

Our lovely state has a population of about 800,000 people (the same population, roughly, as San Fransisco). Given the number from the article, that means we have one lawyer for roughly every 533 people.

The total population for the cities mentioned above (if one includes the MSA for each) is approaching 400,000 people. Therefore, it is not so strange that 3/4ths of the state’s lawyers are located in the cities which make up 1/2 the state’s population.

Beside which, I have yet to see someone (outside of the justice quoted in the article) who believes that having more lawyers will somehow help the overall situation. Remember, a dearth of lawyers does not necessarily mean the death of the law.

Good news, in the opinion of most of us who are the proprietors of sites such as this one. Of course, my position on this matter is hardly unbiased. I am a bit surprised at the tone of the AP article on this, however. Here is the title:

Move To Identify Anonymous Blog Defamers Rejected

Just the news folks, just the news–unmixed with the news reporter’s opinion.

What’s the difference between a dog and a bullet? When the dog strays, somebody might just shoot it. When a bullet strays, no one knows who shot it:

The bullet passed through the home’s outer wall, through the dining room and came to rest in an inner wall, according to Evans.

The homeowner was home at the time, but no one was injured.

[...]

He added that unless someone comes forward, it is unlikely the shooter will be found.

I am reminded of another “stray” bullet from my childhood. This one was apparently from a deer hunter, based on the time of year and the caliber. The bullet entered through the kitchen window, passed through the doorway into the living room and ended up embedded in the wall just over the top of a recliner. We were not home at the time–and quite grateful to have been absent.

Here’s the issue. There really are no such things as stray bullets–though there are definitely such things as sloppy shooters. Bullets, unlike dogs, follow quite simple rules of physics. If you are hunting or shooting, always, always, always know where your bullet will stop and stop yourself from firing it if it will not do so safely.

When it comes to matters of law and polity, there are big things and there are small things. From the Argus Leader:

Anthony Noel Weber, 42, of Sioux Falls was a manager at Hurley’s Religious Goods form 2000 through April of 2009.

He allegedly wrote fraudulent checks to himself with Hurley’s money from 2005 through last year.

He faces two charges of grand theft and one charge of aggravated grand theft. If convicted on all counts, he faces up to 35 years in prison.

Does this strike anyone else as entirely wrong? No, not the alleged crime. I’m talking about the possible 35 years in prison. He is not alleged to have killed someone, or destroyed someone’s innocence, or kidnapped and traumatized anyone–he is alleged to have embezzled money. That is something which can be largely put right again (unlike the other crimes mentioned).

He does not need to be put into prison for 35 years (if the allegations are proven); no, he needs to repay the money. He’s 42 years old and the article says the amount was  $161,000. He’s got enough time to work that off that in the next 23 years or so. In fact, the only thing the judge/jury should be deciding (if guilty) is whether he will pay the amount he stole with interest, or some multiple thereof.

If he were to be convicted, not only will the store not get its money (unless there is something more to the story), but you and I will be on the hook for somewhere in the neighborhood of $20,000 a year for the length of his incarceration. While his sentence could be as much as 35 years, it is more likely that he would get a 10-year sentence with parole in 5 years or so. That means the taxpayers of the State of South Dakota would spend another $100,000 to $200,000.

That would mean that innocent people (in reference to the alleged crime) would be punished for a total of more than $250,000 to $350,000 while the guilty (if proven so) does his time and is branded as a felon.

Better than all of this would be for him (if guilty) to repent of the crime he committed, repay all that he stole and by doing both of these things return to a position near where he was in the minds and lives of his family, friends and acquaintances.

A person who embezzles does not need to pay a nebulous debt to a nebulous society–he or she needs to pay a concrete debt to certain wronged persons. It doesn’t get much simpler than this.

A number of us upper plains folks are getting ready for a bit of a blow:

Winds by tomorrow morning should be strongest in South-central South Dakota but the 20-30 miles per hour wind from the north and northwest will increase by Christmas Day. Sioux Falls will have some wind from the northeast tomorrow, but much stronger winds are likely by Christmas Day with blizzard conditions likely.

This is a very dangerous storm. Last minute preparations should be completed today and travel will become impossible in many areas as the storm develops through Christmas Day. It appears Sioux Falls may get its heaviest 2 day snowfall total since 1968.

Here at Constant Conservative central, I’m only about a half-hour, as the snow flies, west of Sioux Falls. We’ve plenty of food and water–and firewood–should the power go out. Some folks in the western part of the state, down by Gregory, have already seen power lines down because of early ice buildup.

Here is a map of South Dakota’s roadway conditions.

Here is a whole page full of South Dakota road cameras.

We weren’t going far for our Christmas. Now we are probably not going to stir from our turkey-perfumed abode. Safe travels to all who must be out and about.

http://fastidious.wordpress.com/, that is. The eponymous blog of Fastidious and her husband, Cosbysweater08, which offers excellent conservative insight from West-of-the-River (If you’re already a reader of theirs then you probably recognize their characteristic format in the title of this post).

After their warm welcome of me to the blogosphere I began visiting their site. I haven’t missed a post since. Fastidious and Cosbysweater are a tag-team of principled and reasoned commentators disecting the issues of  the day.  If you want to know the ‘why’ behind the ‘what’ then I encourage you to add them to your regular reads.  It is well worth your time.

From today’s Argus Leader:

A $25,000 donation from Walmart to support feeding the hungry arrived Wednesday as the South Dakota agency handling the food faces greater demand for its services.

and

That’s in addition to surplus groceries the corporation began giving the agency this year – 475,000 pounds so far from its East River stores. The retail giant also gave the food banks a refrigerator truck worth $85,000, used to pick up food and make deliveries.

Providing for those in need isn’t solely the responsibility of government.  Good for Walmart and good for South Dakota’s needy families.

Last fall Bush Treasury Secretary Paulson told us the financial industry was failing and passing TARP was going to fix it.  Today banks are steadily failing and the FDIC is going broke.

Last winter Obama and the Democrats came to power and they said people were losing their homes.  They said passing Making Home Affordable would fix it.  Today the foreclosures haven’t stopped and the number of people losing their homes continues to rise.

In the spring of this year as the poor state of the economy came into focus, Obama and the Democratic congress passed a so-called stimulus package meant to boost the economy and keep the unemployment rate below 8%.  Today the economy is set to shrink 2.8 percent this year (1.6 percent greater than expected) and unemployment will surpass 10%.

By all reasonable measures these big government efforts have failed to deliver, but the American people are stuck with the $1,500,000,000,000 ($1.5 TRILLION) price tag.

Because of this failure to deliver it should be no surprise to the politicians in power that their plans for healthcare, cap and trade, and card check are being met with resistance by the citizens of this country.

I believe that most Americans are instinctually skeptical of big government.  However, in times of apparent crisis this skepticism yields to the desire for government action.  In the past year we’ve repeatedly yielded to government action and yet the crisis continues to deepen.  The people are seeing the government failures, and they are not happy.  Their skepticism has come back with a vengeance.

This isn’t just a problem at the national level.  All levels of government will be facing serious challenges in the next few years.  How the elected leaders choose to use government to meet these challenges will set the political tone of this country for the next several years.  The voters are watching.  The margin for error is slim.