Sioux Falls

Health of the Mother

John McCain’s Debate explanation when Obama explian’s his voting record on abortion.

“Health of the Mother… this has been stretched by the pro-abortion movement to mean almost anything.”

Sound Familiar? Vote Yes For Life has been trying this angle once again, in claiming the exceptions for the health of the mother are clearly defined within Initiated Measure 11. They are really hoping you won’t read the fine print (or understand it).

But it seems clear to the lawyers for Sanford Health:

“The health-of-the-mother exception imposes a standard that is not clearly defined. Medical facilities and providers have learned, through the malpractice arena, that whether a physician’s clinical judgment comports with ‘accepted standards of medical practice’ can be a matter of debate. Initiated Measure 11 borrows the civil litigation standards, which can be ambiguous and subject to different interpretations, and attaches criminal penalties for failing to comply with the potentially vague, undefined standards. As a result, for those instances where a pregnant woman faces uncertain, but potentially very serious health risks, Initiated Measure 11 will require a physician to choose between possibly committing a felony or subjecting a pregnant woman to a higher degree of medical risk that what would otherwise be clinically desired.

Mr. McCain, with all due respect, no one is pro abortion. We all would like to see abortion to be limited, but until those trying to stop it (VYFL) do not do it in a truthful manner, and to contradict themselves in saying “All life is precious”, yet are flip about “the health of the mother”, you My Friend, are selling us lipstick on a pig.

The MSM’s FEAR of the Advertising Tax

The MSM pretty much sucks all over our country. I often find myself watching BBC news in the middle of the night just so I know what’s going on in the world (and in our country). Ever wonder why 80% of Europeans support Obama over McCain? Because they are INFORMED! Don’t get me wrong, Obama ain’t no savior but he’s a Hell of a lot smarter then Mr. 890th or something in their graduating class compared to Obama’s Editor of the Harvard Law Review under his belt.
Now to my point. The media, especially our local jokalists pander to advertisers, whenever they have a chance, and if it seems like they are endorsing a position that is not in line with those advertisers they squash the speculation. It’s been called advertorial writing. Disguising advertising as news.

Some magazines don’t have a problem admitting that’s what they are, for example ETC. and SF Woman. Their main objective is to kiss ass and sell advertising. Duh. But what about our local TV news and our only daily newspaper? Isn’t the Fourth Estate supposed to be watching out for us? The citizens? To often they are looking out for their bottom line.
My involvement with the petition drive for the sales tax decrease has reared the Sioux Falls MSM’s ugly head. It all started when I emailed KELO-TV shortly after they ran an episode of Inside Keloland about the sales tax increase. The program featured only one opponent, Councilor Staggers, and no citizens. I told the news director that was wrong. Nothing happened. Recently I posted some stuff on my KELO political blog link about the petition drive. KELO deleted the posts saying I can’t post that stuff because I was directly involved and it makes it look like KELO is endorsing my endeavor.

Bologna.

First off it says right at the top of the political blog page “The views and opinions expressed on this page are strictly those of the blog author. “ on top of that, I have noticed other contributors to the page on both sides of the aisle have consistently promoted their political agendas. They haven’t been deleted.
What do I think the reason KELO-TV deleted my posts and why our daily rag endorsed the sales tax increase?
1) I’m sure someone cried to the station and paper, I’m sure it was an advertiser or a developer, or some other corporate welfare recipient in our town that takes our tax dollars in the form of handouts and tax incentives.
2) The media loves sales taxes because it keeps them from paying taxes on advertising. See, advertising isn’t taxed in South Dakota, because if it was, it would cut into how much profit they could make from an advertiser on a budget. The Fourth Estate doesn’t have a problem with old ladies on fixed incomes paying taxes on food to help pave our streets, build Jr. football fields and putting historically correct million dollar windows in the Pavilion, just as long as it is not coming out of their bottom line.
The MSM in Sioux Falls supports growth, just as long as they don’t have to pay for it. F’ing hypocrites.

So will Munson get to spend his bloated CIP budget afterall?

This doesn’t look good. The taxpayer’s may get saved afterall from overspending in the CIP budget. I found this portion of the article interesting;

In Sioux Falls, growth in sales tax revenue for 2008 is well below projections. The city plans to borrow $124 million in bonds over the next five years to pay for capital projects – more than half of that coming next year.

City Finance Director Eugene Rowenhorst said some of those projects could be put off a year “without doing major damage.” They include a new library, money for the zoo and a junior football complex.But one project that would be more difficult to put off is a $22 million financing needed to upgrade the levee system along portions of the Big Sioux River and Skunk Creek.

I doubt they would cut the levee project. I guess we know where the city’s priorities are, don’t we? Or is this a scare tactic from Gene ‘Montgomery Burns’ Rowenhorst? Of course it is. I think they should have budgeted for a skid steer so they could clean all the BS out of City Hall faster.

And notice that next year’s CIP budget is $62 Million dollars, yet King Dave crys about $5 million cut from it in the tax decrease initiative. Give me a break!

What does L & C water system have to do w/Sales Tax? NOTHING!

Mayor Munson seems to be up in arms over the sales tax decrease initiative (Argus Leader), which is no surprise, well it kinda is. It will have NO EFFECT on his budget and will have to be dealt with by the next mayor and council. By the time this takes effect, there will be at least 3 to 5 new councilors and a new mayor. Secondly Munson seems to be spinning the story,

Munson bristled at accusations that he hasn’t overseen responsible growth during his time at the helm, pointing to major street construction projects on 57th and 26th streets as recent examples.

“We planned Lewis & Clark for growth,” he said, referring to the water project. “Maybe under their scenario we don’t need Lewis & Clark. I think that’s crazy.”

First off, this decrease won’t take ANY money away from street construction (I’ll get to that later) and secondly Lewis & Clark is being paid by a loan the city took out that is being paid off from increased water rates, not sales tax. We also may receive money from the Federal Government (don’t hold your breath though, it seems neither presidential candidate is too interested in that). Like Rudy Guilliani and 9/11 everytime someone wants to cut the budget, Dave brings up Lewis & Clark. Cut the bull Dave.

As for street construction money being taken away, this is also a myth;

Officials warn that Sioux Falls will continue to lag on new road construction if the tax doesn’t go to a full cent. That, in turn, would hurt economic growth at a time when the national economy already is in precarious shape.Officials warn that Sioux Falls will continue to lag on new road construction if the tax doesn’t go to a full cent. That, in turn, would hurt economic growth at a time when the national economy already is in precarious shape.

It is merely $5 million dollars that will have to be cut from the Capital Improvement Budget (Basically a slush fund that pays for all the goodies (wants) in our city). In fact Munson mentions a great cut in the article.

Munson pointed out that McKennan Park next year is budgeted to receive $615,800 for upgrades.

Huh?! They just received upgrades this year already. Another example of wasteful spending.

And it seems councilor Costello went over to the dark side,

“They are fully within their rights to do what they are doing,” Costello added. “I personally would not sign that petition.”

Why wouldn’t you sign it Pat? I sign petitions all the time with stuff I don’t agree with. I signed the Initiative 11 petition, I signed Nader’s and Bob Barr’s petition to be on the ballot in South Dakota. I think it’s good to let the citizens decide. This is what a democracy is about. Do we want to let citizens decide on what they want to spend $5 million dollars on, or do we want 4 councilors, developers, special interests and a mayor decide?

I think we know the answer to that question.

What’s so wrong with open government?

I did this toon in response to an Amendment that councilor Staggers proposed on changing the language in a budget appropriation. He wanted it to state that raising property taxes is a ‘tax increase’ (which technically it is). The council was split, which surprised me, and Munson voted against the proposed (transparent) language. Very dissapointing.

Here it is from the minutes;

A motion to amend was made by Council Member Staggers and seconded by Council Member Anderson Jr. to amend the title of the ordinance to comply with City Ordinance 2-22 (d), to read “An Ordinance of the City of Sioux Falls, SD providing appropriations and the means of financing them which includes a property tax increase of 2.9% or $1,101,930 of tax levies for the Fiscal Year ending December 31, 2009″.

 
Vote to amend:  Roll Call:  Yeses, Litz, Staggers, Anderson, Jr., Beninga, 4.  Noes, Brown, Costello, Jamison, Knudson, 4.  Mayor Munson broke the tie with a no vote.  Motion Failed.