Governor Beverly Perdue has sent out misleading messages about “Protecting Public Education.” While this state has an unemployment rate over 11 percent and a record $4.7 billion budget deficit, she calls for more spending—“investments”—for “green energy jobs” and education.

Frantically, her message declares: “We are at a crossroads: We can choose to protect core education…,” or we’ll “allow the economic crisis to cripple our classrooms.”

Actually, decisions by school districts throughout the state to spend heavily on support services and staff has diverted money from classroom instruction. Spending rates outside the classroom “far exceed enrollment growth.” And what have we gained? Nothing. In fact, this spending “had a negative effect on student test scores,” according to a John Locke Foundation report by Terry Stoops.

For the past ten years school districts have received huge sums of money from all levels of government. Adding non-instructional staff has cost plenty. Last year North Carolina school districts spent nearly $10 billion on salary and benefits; 83 percent of public education spending and over twice the budget deficit.

The governor’s hysterics about “protecting public education” are cries to protect public jobs and bureaucracies rather than calls to improve classroom instruction and student performance.

Like so many of our public programs, education evolves into a political spoils system rather than true public service with a results-oriented mission.

Entrepreneur Randy Lively is building a wireless-internet system covering the coastal strip from Morehead City to Jacksonville, Florida. As the Greater Wilmington Business Journal reports, Lively’s firm is setting up a network of repeater radios to provide the service:

Those looking for Internet connections within the range of the receivers can choose “ICWIFI” with their wireless connection and choose a payment plan for service. Available plans include $3.00 for 24 hours, $10.00 per week or $35.00 per month.

“We’re charging very competitive rates for our service,” Lively said, adding that they do not have to install cables to homes. For some areas, ICWIFI will utilize solar panel receivers for areas where electricity is not readily available.

Launched in January with six employees, Lively estimates that the company will install thirty to thirty-five receivers from Wrightsville to Carolina Beach. Some service is
currently available in the Wrightsville Beach area. The company wants to install receivers in Myrtle Beach by the end of the year, with aims for Jacksonville, Fla., by 2011.

“Jacksonville is a natural target,” Lively said. “We wanted to have a powerful signal pointing north.”

I wonder if Lively thought to check with the “experts” who say only the government can do this.

The Jacksonville Daily News has a great editorial today on the state legislature’s proposed expansion of the retail sales tax to include digital downloads. A key point:

Supporters of collecting taxes on such Internet sales say that it’s a matter of tax fairness. If a North Carolina customer purchases an item at a department store, the store has to collect (and the customer has to pay) the taxes. The same rules should apply when a North Carolina customer purchases the same item online, they say.

Do these legislators really expect us to believe they are interested in tax fairness? These are the same legislators that give sweetheart tax deals to companies such as Apple, Google, Merck, RJR and Fed-Ex. And they’re oh so eager to provide additional tax credits to the film industry.

If lawmakers gave a flip about tax fairness, you’d never see them even entertain the idea of unequal taxation to land these businesses, some of which would only provide a few dozen jobs.

The state lawmakers are not interested in tax fairness. They’re interested in getting their hands on more of our money. And they appear to be willing to risk hurting North Carolina businesses to do so.

This post was based on a Wilmington Star-News article by Joe Johnson:

It was reported that you were a bit “bewildered” about the crowd that showed up in Raleigh “intended to oppose” HB-1410; your bill to “bring more public scrutiny to industrial recruitment.” We might applaud your assumed good intentions, but there are at least three reasons why this opposition does not surprise me:

1) Your collaboration with Sen. Julia Boseman, D-New Hanover who has sided with the Stop Titan gang to stall the permiting process for Carolinas Cement Company. Although you said “This is not aimed at Titan,” the proposed legislation is suspect in that case.

2) Closing “a loophole in state law” is also suspect. When we hear politicians propose this it’s likely to result in more restrictive rules that will be imposed by government on citizens and businesses. If, as you say, “the last thing I want to do is harm our ability to attract new business to the state, then, don’t do it. Even in the opinions of some state agency representatives your bill “could effectively shut down all future economic development prospecting.”

3) Environmental lobbies, I suspect, are behind this. They have a devious history of using our elected officials to do their bidding–usually not in the public interest. Also suspicious is your concern that if this bill fails there are “deeper reaching implications.” They are, according to your comment, allowing the State Environmental Protection Act to be “challenged.” Maybe it’s time that SEPA should be exposed to scrutiny. Does it really serve the public interest, or is it a tool of environmental activists used for their self-serving purposes?

Instead of trying to “tweak” public policy “a little bit,” you should spend a lot of time and energy in reducing government regulations and preventing the waste of our money on “incentives” that favor some businesses over others.

The Obama administration’s plans to spend gobs of federal tax money on “high-speed” passenger rail have gotten lots of transit boosters excited, including officials and activists here in North Carolina.

JLF has just published a report by Randal O’Toole that takes a close look at the proposal. Except for the fact that the service wouldn’t really be high-speed, it wouldn’t attract much ridership, it would cost an arm and a leg, and it wouldn’t help the environment or traffic congestion, there may be some case for it, anyway.

But O’Toole couldn’t find one. You can read his report here, CJ coverage here.

I’ve heard complaints in other Coastal Carolina towns about overly aggressive towing policies, but this column from the Island Gazette’s Willard Killough makes Carolina Beach’s policy sound downright abusive:

One couple went to pick up their child from the baby sitter. They admittedly parked in a restricted parking spot but only planned on being there for a few minutes. Before they could get back to the parking lot their truck had been towed.

The wrecker service evidently snatched the vehicle, drove around the block to secure the vehicle, and then started back into Wilmington some 30 or 40 minutes away (Depending on traffic). Even while they were on the phone with the wrecker service office, they were told they would have to travel to Wilmington to retrieve their vehicle and pay a fine of over $100.

If approached, a tow truck driver must release a vehicle to the owner and charge only a “drop fee” which is supposed to be $50 according to the Police Department.

Sounds to me like someone wanted get the car and get out of there as soon as possible to hurry back to Wilmington. I can’t say that was in fact the intent of the driver, to avoid the lower drop fee and instead win the higher yard fee (And daily storage fee if not picked up the same day).

Maybe the driver was just in a hurry. You be the judge.

Killough proposes some reforms that sound reasonable to me. Parking control should be about safety and promoting efficient use of scarce space, not maximizing revenue to the town.

I was fascinated by this News Reporter account of an economic-development presentation in Columbus County. Yeah, I’m just that weird.

One of the more-interesting passages had to do with potential transportation access to industrial sites in the county. Presenter Robin Spinks, an economic-development consultant, made some insightful points about rivers and rail:

The fact that the county has 11 of the 97 available buildings in the region is important, Spinks said.

“That’s a high percentage,” she said. “You have a good variety, and can offer something to just about anyone out there.”

Spinks also suggested the county try to take better advantage of rail lines and the Cape Fear and Lumber rivers. Both rivers are navigable, and Spinks said either could handle barge traffic.

She also cautioned the group that “rail frontage doesn’t mean rail access.

“You might have 1,000 feet of rail frontage, but none of it is useful if the railroad says no,” she said. “There are a lot of factors that play into making the best use of railroads.”

Spinks emphasized the need to compete on land and service prices, too. Anyway, perhaps it’s because my kids and I just watched some old Davy Crockett episodes over the weekend, but any talk of river barges makes me think of the legendary Mike Fink.

Cracks in the “global warming” scam appear like those spreading from a sharp impact on tempered glass. A big one comes in a report sent by the John Locke Foundation (www.johnlocke.org) published by the Heartland Institute (www.heartland.org).

Anthony Watts, a broadcast meteorologist, has documented the unreliability of ground temperature recording stations in the United States. Over the past few years he did a comprehensive study of 860 of the 1,221 National Weather Service monitoring stations. He found that nearly 90 percent of them failed to be properly located according to NWS standards. Higher than normal air temperatures have been reported because the stations are located near parking lots, buildings, sidewalks, air conditioning units, rooftops, airports and wastewater treatment plants—heat reflecting sources.

Watts and his volunteers also found that data gaps have been filled with records from nearby sites, a practice that compounds the errors. The erroneous records “exceed by a wide margin the purported rise in temperature” of 0.7 degrees Centigrade during the past century, writes Mr. Watts in the Executive Summary of his report: “Is the U. S. Surface Temperature Record Reliable?” The Heartland Institute, Chicago, IL, 2009. This report has a wealth of supporting data and photographs of station locations shown by state and name. Watts’ website, www.surfacestations.org, also shows the photos.

Skeptics and believers alike can’t afford to ignore this report. In an unexpected way this study shows that “warming” is caused by us—our construction activities, not carbon dioxide emissions result in higher than normal ground temperature readings. Clearly, they have been misapplied to climate studies. More importantly, they should not be used as a basis for public policy decisions to add more taxes and restrict our lives.

A free download of this report is available online at www.globalwarmingheartland.org.

Dear Mr. Smith:

Thank you for writing to me about H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act. I appreciate hearing from you on this important issue, and I share your concerns.

As you know, H.R. 2454 would establish a program to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in our atmosphere through a cap-and-trade program. This program would require entities that emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to either reduce their emissions or purchase allowances from entities that remove carbon from the atmosphere. Electric utilities, manufacturing facilities, and industrial operations will be required to meet these requirements which could significantly drive up the cost of doing business. Those cost increase would then be passed along to consumers causing increases in utilities rates, the cost of food and household items, and vehicle fuels. When the program is fully implemented in 2030, retail electricity rates could rise as much as 45%, our GDP could fall as much as $350 billion, and the economy could lose as many as 2.5 million jobs even after accounting for those generated by new, green business. This is a price American families simply cannot afford to pay.

In addition, the bill would establish a Renewable Electricity Standard (RES), which requires electric utilities to generate a specific amount of energy from renewable sources. The RES does not take into account regional differences in capacity for renewable generation. The southeastern region of the United States does not have the same renewable generation capacity as states out West blessed with ample sunlight to warm solar panels and constant wind to drive turbines. I am concerned that the costs associated with both cap-and-trade and the RES will be merely a tax on consumers without the benefits of reduced emissions or more renewable generation.

God’s beautiful earth must be protected and preserved, but this bill is not the answer. It will cost jobs, increase electricity rates, pass on financial burdens to the next generation, and hurt our country in the global economy. It would potentially allow more jobs to go overseas to countries like China that do not comply with the same standards.

My commitment in Congress has been to help working families and keep Southeastern North Carolina moving forward. During these challenging economic times, this bill is a hardship that our citizens and communities cannot afford. I voted against this bill as it places far too great a burden on our working families, small businesses, and family farmers.

Thank you for contacting me about this important issue. I will continue to be a strong voice for you in Washington. If you would like to receive my periodic e-newsletter, visit my website at http://www.house.gov/mcintyre/.

Sincerely,

Mike McIntyre
Member of Congress