User profile: bsdetector
Joined: Aug. 27, 2006
Comments posted: 150
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Posted on November 13 at 7:23 a.m.
There is hidden sleaze in the claim, that "the companies are not going to set the toll rate." The toll rate will be dictated by state law, which is written and enacted by a pliable and easily influenced legislature. Can you spell L-O-B-B-Y-I-S-T?
Remember, folks, tolls will be determined by the same system that gave us insurance reform, property tax relief, and the buyout (at peak-of-the-market pricing) of the sugar industry. The state administration has proven time and again that it is easily maneuvered by cigar-chomping, back-slapping shills for the moneyed interests. That has not and will not change.
Big Sugar provides the perfect model: here is an industry that was never suitable for this country, neither for the climate, our ecological sensitivities, nor our labor market. Sugar has needed protective legislation from the start -- but high-pressure politics have kept it on artificial life support for decades, the public good cast aside again.
So now we are expected to believe the state will finally bend to the wishes and needs of the people rather than big money? HA!
State law will quietly be amended so that tolls will rise -- not by a COL index as currently written -- but according to the 'needs' of the investors from Spain, or China, or wherever.
This "the state will control the tolls" is just so much malarkey from state officials attempting to steal future toll revenue to squander now to cover up more fiscal irresponsibility.
Think about how much money insurance reform and property tax relief has put in your pocket. Than evaluate this latest scam in that context. Remember, it's the very same bureaucracy talking down to you!
On Residents speak out about Alligator Alley toll increase, proposed lease
Posted on November 7 at 3:59 a.m.
Bonuses or not, there are lawsuits being prepared for filing. Unless they are summarily dismissed (unlikely, given the issues being raised) the matter will be tied up for years and the bidders will simply go elsewhere.
Charlie turned himself from a potential VP candidate to a political liability over this. Even lawmakers who voted for the enabling legislation now see this as a millstone around their necks -- giving the Aronberg bill a good chance of passage.
If it does, this dumb proposal to sell off a public asset for a relatively small amount of cash will become little more than an historical curiosity.
Posted on November 3 at 5:23 a.m.
This is Crist's idea from the beginning. He's getting a well-deserved pummeling over the fundamental irresponsibility of the plan and the sleazy way it's been handled by FDOT.
The scheme to sell Alligator Alley and other state assets has been a major political boondoggle for Charlie, who in a typical politician's response has simply run for cover, hoping the storm eventually passes.
The gov thought he'd found the perfect political scheme: steal revenue from 50 years worth of toll collections and use it to cover up current financial incompetence and mismanagement. The notion of leaving a huge shortfall in future revenues for subsequent administrations to figure out hasn't set well with the public, which has given the proposal a near 90% disapproval rating.
In the process of trying to pull a fast one on the public, Charile squandered his prior reputation as a "popular governor" and quite likely blew any chance he had to be John McCain's running mate.
I suspect Charlie would rather see this whole mess go away, and I am suggesting he may in fact be quietly promoting the passage of Senator Aronberg's bill.
Posted on October 29 at 4:32 a.m.
A letter writer suggests that "President Bush should immediately resign the office of the presidency, thereby turning over the reins to the president-elect."
Sorry, there is no "thereby." The conclusion that a president-elect would ascent to the top office under any circumstances is dead wrong. The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 prevails. A president-elect has no status and is not a factor.
If Bush resigned, Dick Cheney would assume the presidency. Were he to leave office, the job would go to the Speaker of the House. From there, subsequent resignations would result in the presidency being assumed by, respectively, the President pro tempore of the Senate, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, and so on according to the order the offices were first created.
Posted on October 16 at 8:29 a.m.
Yes, the campaigns are trivial, negative, childish, and devoid of any meaningful or substantive matter. A fairly good match to the defining characteristics of the average swing voter.
Unfortunately, most people are too busy or apathetic to be involved in day-to-day politics. Relatively few citizens can name the people who represent them at any level, and fewer still are familiar with any part of our system of government.
For better or worse, campaigns are directed at the lowest common denominator -- the fundamentally ignorant voter who is likely to respond only to base-level notions such as "my opponent is a crook," "I will take money from the rich and give it to you," or "you deserve free health care and I'm going to give that to you as well."
Class warfare and a free lunch are powerful tools in getting elected, followed closely by smear tactics against the other guy that essentially declare "he's an even bigger jerk than I am."
So we wind up with ill-suited candidates. On one side in the current presidential election, we have an academic elitist -- well spoken and a talented presenter -- but a greenhorn in leadership matters; a man who should be running for office in one of the European nanny states, preaching cradle-to-grave theories to those who don't know or care that economic models discouraging incentive -- coupled with an aging population -- are doomed to abject failure.
On the other, a well-intentioned but doddering career politician who has been passed over by time -- if there ever was a time for someone with such confused and unfocused political views to emerge as a brilliant visionary and leader for a country of over 300 million people.
Here we are, days from the election and neither candidate has made the sale -- even in the detritus left behind by 8 years of the most incompetent administration in the history of the country. Polls -- those that matter -- are all within the margin of error and/or the over-polling that some issues and candidates occasion.
It was the brilliant New York City builder Sullivan who popularized the aphorism "Form follows function." Nothing more aptly proves the point than the degenerate process in play electing a leader for the United States with the votes of people who have noting to contribute, an implacable attachment to simplicity, and a third-grade level of reasoning that ties it all together.
Posted on October 14 at 3:54 p.m.
I doubt that any member of the county commission is a true believer in the religion of global warming -- but it's a politically correct thing to do. And how many do you think can actually define 'greenhouse gas' or write a coherent paragraph on the topic?
The "studies" will come to rote conclusions: turn thermostats UP in summer, DOWN in winter, minimize the use of county vehicles, turn lights off, shut computers off during lunch breaks, etc. All stuff that will be piously accepted by the bureaucrats and promptly ignored as each person in authority finds a reason to exempt his/her department from the restrictions.
Cute, but meaningless.
On Collier commissioners OK audit on greenhouse gas emissions
Posted on October 13 at 3:31 a.m.
To those worried that the bailout has initiated 'socialism' in this country: I submit we have been there right along -- you just haven't noticed.
Decades of increasingly fuzzed lines of authority and responsibility between regulators and the regulated, government scratching the back of business, business scratching that of government, cozy deals between lenders and the government ("don't worry about bad loans, we'll just buy them from you,") Members of Congress financially enriched by Fannie and Freddie -- entities it created and oversees, and an ethanol industry based on a false premise but wildly supported by both the bureaucracy and those who benefit from it all clearly make my point.
The bailout doesn't signify the beginning of socialism -- it's simply the coming out party. Wake up!
Posted on October 8 at 4:05 p.m.
From the above news story: "The release stated that the rate would go up either according to the Consumer Price Index or by three percent, whichever is greater."
Yes, as the law is presently crafted. But how long will it take for lobbyists to come in with sob stories for our pliant legislature asking for amendments to the law to adjust for "unforeseen circumstances?"
The 3 percent will change to 4, then 6, and on up the scale. Anyone who buys into this latest scam just isn't paying attention to what has gone on so far -- or believes their huckster-representative in Tallahassee that there are more insurance rate cuts and property tax rollbacks just around the corner!
Posted on October 4 at 11:43 a.m.
"The state is set to release some of the most critical details of the draft lease agreement in the next week to two weeks, project executive Kevin Thibault said. That includes the toll schedule, or the rate at which tolls would rise over the life of the lease, and the operating standards, the level of service a concessionaire would be obligated to uphold."
Yes, obliged to uphold until the law is changed by pliant politicians under the influence of arm-twisting by high-powered lobbyists. It's easy to make statements about how the law -- mumble this part: "as it is presently written" -- specifies this or that. But just as the "public-private partnership authorized by legislation passed in Florida in 2007" was enacted under the public radar, changes to the toll schedule will magically appear buried in last-minute appropriations -- causing only momentary opposition among the permanently apathetic electorate, if any reaction at all.
Selling off existing assets to generate what amounts to cash to fund current needs is a fundamentally flawed concept with no possibility of a good outcome on the long term. Politicians of course can only think as far ahead as their term in office. This begets intellectually bankrupt thinking, as the idea is solely to serve one's immediate interests and dump any resulting messes onto future administrations.
Ditto for transportation officials, who like their fellow bureaucrats care only about today, try to play both sides of the fence -- wanting to reserve a place in the supplicant line "in case" the plan goes through. Somehow it is lost on them that if they get "Sale of Alligator Alley" money, they won't get the funding that would otherwise be there because in fact THAT is the money the administration wants to squander on vote buying and legacy schemes.
Is 'obtuse' a requirement for working in the public sector?
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Posted on November 19 at 8:22 a.m.
The county claims that "water access for all the people" is a top priority but keeps letting marinas and waterfront property slip through its fingers.
For a lot less than half the cost of a landlocked water amusement park that is closed half the year, citizens could have owned the Wiggins Pass Marina and enjoyed its capacity to store several thousand of the boats that currently litter driveways and empty lots across the county.
But the BCC got fooled by a slick pitch that included a "donation" of a couple of million dollars in return for a permit to build more unneeded condos. Now the project is bankrupt, the county doesn't have the money, and all we have to show for it is one more example of having squandered convenient water access for the masses.
You gotta wonder how they will manage to mess this one up, too.
On Collier commissioners put off Port of the Islands marina purchase