I’ve got no soft spot for Utah’s Republican machine but the piling on of Mark Walker seems way too petty to me.
There is some talk that pursuing Walker will bring other legislative unethical behavior into the light but it really seems to me that Utah’s Democrats and their allies are in danger of serious overreach in their pursuit/persecution of Walker.
UPDATE: It has been pointed out to me that Utah’s Democrats are the wrong target for derision in this particular case. It was a group of individual legislators from both parties who pushed the ethics complaint, not the Democratic Party. The criminal investigation of Mr. Walker that is currently underway does seem to be warranted. My link to Utah Amicus labelled their efforts to push the AG to conduct a criminal investigation into the bribery charges as petty. That label seems now to be wrong and stupid. Sorry about that.
Paul Mero posted on Utah Amicus about a gaggle of high school girls (all under 16) in the depressed Massachusetts town of Gloucester who decided it would be cool if they all got pregnant at roughly the same time.
My favorite take on the whole issue comes from Rachel Lucas. If you can handle moderate profanity give it a read. She may be overreacting in her call for mandatory sterilization of all teenagers but after reading the above story it is hard to argue that she isn’t on to something.
The Utah Foundation released a study today on historical trends in taxation and spending in Utah. They included this graph on education spending.
I really didn’t know that education funding had been in such a decline relative to our state’s economy or the rest of our state’s government spending over the decades (see the whole summary report). It is a lot harder to be impressed when our legislature brags about education increases when one notes that education spending as a percentage of our economy has declined to such an extent over the years. It is also harder for me to sympathize with those who stubbornly argue that Utah can’t afford to do better than last in the nation when it comes to per pupil spending when the information from this graph is considered.
Thanks legislators for the increases in ‘08 and ‘09. Would you mind bringing relative public education spending back in line with what was being spent in 1991 when I graduated from high school? I’d sure like it if you tried a little harder not to shortchange my kids.
Check out the whole Utah Foundation Report and Summary.
H/T KVNU’s For The People
This one has made its rounds before but I saw it for the first time yesterday and loved it.
H/T Agitator
Major Kudos to Obi Won Liberali for his excellent post on property tax issues in Utah. In his comments section he wrote that he’s “taking a swim in Jeremy’s pond” by posting on the issue. Wrong. His post is a far better analysis than I’d be able to come up with.
It will be interesting to see how things go when assessment notices are sent out in Davis County this year. The southern part of the county was re-appraised last year and homeowners cried bloody murder at the tax increases they received. The assessor’s office has re-visited values in most of the rest of the county this year and tax levies are being decreased across the board. It will be interesting to see how the decreased levies and increased assessments effect the newly re-appraised cities and neighborhoods mostly located in the northern portion of the county. I’ll post again when more information is available.
