Endangering lives at Fayette jail

Last week, Officer Luke Valdez blew the whistle on dangerous policies at the Fayette County Detention Center. This week, he is back again with more:

"It will only be a matter of time when the inmates housed at Fayette County Detention Center figure out the times when the minimal amount of people will be able to respond to emergencies. This will happen at least nine times in a twenty-four hour period. Inmates will use this against the officers and take advantage of these windows of opportunity in an effort to maximize the amount of disruption they can cause. I understand that the way we handle breaks and work shifts had to be changed due to the lawsuit, but the officers of FCDC feel that we are being retaliated against because of this. I have been told several times that FCDC officers receive some of the best training in the nation, yet we are not treated in this manner. Currently Operational Order 3.1-2C states that if an officer responds to an emergency tone, without a commander’s permission and is on break, he or she will write a report and the major will take progressive disciplinary action on that officer. That officer is only doing what he has sworn to do. Before the changing of the Op-order, if an emergency tone went off you were required to respond and once you were relieved by a commander you continued your break, and this worked smoothly."

Don't hold your breath waiting for Mayor Jim Newberry to do something about this. As Officer Valdez suggests, this looks a lot like retaliation for the wage and hour lawsuit.

A strong indicator of newspapers' state of decay

If you are looking for proof that agendized newspapers are counting on Sen. Barack Obama to give them the fairness doctrine so they don't have to compete so hard in the marketplace of ideas, look at the Bowling Green Daily News. That paper's whiny general manager is picking fights with high school yearbooks:

"This isn’t even close. High school yearbooks should not be on the agenda or getting awards where budding high school journalists are in attendance."

And if you are still looking for a reason to keep Sen. Mitch McConnell in the U.S. Senate, let this be it. It could well be that in January, Sen. McConnell is all that stands between us and a radical shift to the left none of us want or can afford.

Caring about kids Steve Beshear's way

Gov. Steve Beshear has unveiled a new, expensive program to recruit families who are eligible for public health benefits but aren't partaking of them. Today, he launched the web site and called for a November 18 pep rally.

The program seeks to spend at least $25 million a year on expanded government health insurance benefits. That's $25 million a year we already don't have. That means we will have to borrow it.

Then there is this from the press release:

"To celebrate the launch of the KCHIP initiative, Gov. Beshear and Kentuckians who care about children’s health care will gather at 2 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008, at the Frankfort Civic Center in downtown Frankfort. The public is invited to attend."

Something tells me they aren't going to be much interested in hearing from Kentuckians who care about children's health care and want to improve it by getting the government out of it as much as possible. At a minimum, we could care for kids by repealing Kentucky's counterproductive Certificate of Need law.

Barack Obama shifts to spreading misery

Have you heard about Sen. Barack Obama's plan to bankrupt the coal industry?

Always the last to know

It seems knowledge of Kentucky's fraudulent K-12 school testing system has gone from California to New York and somehow avoided getting picked up in Kentucky. Except, of course, by the Bluegrass Institute.

It's hard to bring up Kentucky's fixation on its flawed assessment process without resorting to name-calling.

Who do you think you're foolin' Obama?

Samuel Thompson is a law professor at Penn State who is circulating an email claiming that Sen. Barack Obama's "spread the wealth" hubbub is only about $4.60:

"What would happen to Joe if he were successful in buying the business and making over, say, $350,000 per year? Under the current Internal Revenue Code, for each $100 Joe earns over $350,000, he would pay a tax of $35. Under Senator Obama’s tax plan, for every $100 Joe earns over $350,000, he would pay a tax of $39.60. Thus, Senator Obama’s plan would tax Joe an additional $4.60 for each $100 Joe makes over $350,000, and this $4.60 is the basis of the argument around Joe the Plumber."

This would only have a possibility of being true if, for starters, you didn't pay any attention to Obama's Social Security tax increase and his health insurance scheme tax increase. And then there are some of us who didn't believe Bill Clinton when he campaigned on a middle class tax cut. That turned into the biggest tax increase in U.S. history. Why should we expect Barack Obama, backed by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, to do any differently?

Term limits would fix this

A Lexington Herald Leader article about Kentucky's dependence on long-time incumbents in Washington D.C. building their careers on how much pork they can bring back to the state features the Bluegrass Institute's Jim Waters:

"That's a great indicator that Kentucky is falling behind the other states economically," said Jim Waters, spokesman for the Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions, a free-market think tank in Bowling Green.

"It really indicates the depths to which our political campaigns have sunk," Waters said. "All we hear from our sitting U.S. senator is the amount of pork he's brought back. We need to be discussing national security and how we're going to strengthen our economy. We're not hearing about any real issues."

Again and again, we see redistribution of wealth serving mainly those who live off the government. The only fair way to fix this is to limit lawmakers' terms in office and cut Kentucky's dependence on federal dollars cold turkey. We will be a wealthier state in the long run with this approach. The old Great Society way isn't getting anything good accomplished.

Obama energy policy

Barack Obama wants to force energy prices higher to lower demand. In his own words:

Hidden camera strikes again at Lexington jail

Correctional Medical Services Director Jonathan Bowen of the Fayette County Detention Center won't allow his nurses to give medical attention to jail staff even in the event of an emergency.

So what was he doing in Assistant Director Todd Eads' office Wednesday administering an allergy shot?

Obama commercial sticks to the facts

It's not a shortfall if you never had it

After yesterday's press conference in Frankfort about our projected overspending of $294 million in Kentucky this year, the big newspapers are all using Gov. Steve Beshear's word for the red ink: shortfall.

This is ridiculous and underscores the biggest problem we have with big government in Kentucky. Everyone knew we were spending in the new budget money we weren't likely to have, but the legislature did it anyway.

Revenues fell short of their political wish list, not of responsible spending priorities. Ignoring that reality allows a politician -- Beshear -- who campaigned on not raising taxes to claim a new and unexpected reality in which tax increases are a "necessity."

It would help if our big media didn't swallow spin about overspending quite so easily. We need more people to see fiscal mismanagement for what it is. That's the only way we will ever stop it.

Finding some Kentucky government waste

On the very day Gov. Beshear admits we will overspend at least $294 million this year, The Bluegrass Institute has the latest on the Kentucky Department of Education's waste-of-time-and-money task force affecting our children.

Education Commissioner Jon Draud and friends may have thought no one would notice.

To learn more, click here.

Another small step for nontaxable income

Even Rhode Island is starting to talk about repealing its income tax and relying instead on consumption taxes.

Massachusetts is actually leading the way this year on income tax repeal. Looks like Kentucky might be getting on board the train as well.

Ted Kennedy, moral leader on the world's stage

Sen. Ted Kennedy sent out an email this morning. Something about, uh, morals and electing Barack Obama and redistributing -- I mean building -- the economy.

Missing another golden opportunity

Years of state and local government overspending will have no reason to correct itself if the feds pass their new bailout package. From the Wall Street Journal:

"House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D., N.Y.), said he wants upcoming fiscal stimulus legislation to funnel aid to states and localities. He said he hopes that package can be approved shortly after the election."
""Our hope is that the leadership of both parties will be able to confer and come back after the election, and see what we can do to provide assistance to our local and state governments, as we have been able to do for our banking and finance industry," Rep. Rangel said at the outset of a committee hearing Wednesday on stimulus discussions."

"U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel said he wants upcoming fiscal stimulus legislation to funnel aid to states and localities."
"State governors and local officials testifying at the hearing put forward to lawmakers a wish list worth tens of billions to help shore up their finances. Their argument: we didn't create the financial mess, and we need Washington's help to get out of it."

Kentucky is never going to shake off its poor-state status if we don't learn to lower our dependence on government. This garbage is a big step in the wrong direction. It will certainly gain widespread bipartisan support.

Jim Keller and his good old yellow dog

In a radio ad for Fayette District Judge Julie Goodman, former Kentucky Supreme Court Justice Jim Keller tells listeners to vote for the Beshear appointee to keep her seat.

That reminded me of a 2006 post quoting Keller, who was then running for the State Senate, on the stump telling listeners to vote for Supreme Court Justice Mary Noble because "she is a yellow dog Democrat!"

Also worth noting in a year most Kentuckians will vote to not turn over the federal government to Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid, that 2006 Congressional candidate Tom Barlow said:

"But the funniest harangue came from congressional candidate Tom Barlow, who said: "We are delivering lower gasoline prices and when we take office in January we are going to bring peace to the Middle East peacefully, we are going to have affordable medical care and high paying jobs!""

That hasn't exactly worked out, has it?

Pandering differently; same type of results

So it looks like we are going to shift from a focus on parents dropping their own children off health insurance policies in favor of putting them on government programs to employers shutting down because their competition was deemed "too big to fail" or "too important not to subsidize" by the government.

Seems that our best hope may be city and state governments bankrupting themselves and having to cut back on spending and nannying just so people will see that small government can work. Out of control public employee pensions just might do the trick in some places. And then there is Birmingham, Alabama which is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy because of the way it tried to finance its sewers.

Another victim for Ron Bishop

A corrections officer at the Fayette County Detention Center has distributed an email at the facility that will earn him the wrath of the secretive thugs running the place. From the email:

"Safety is the major concern. In the event that you are being assaulted by an inmate and I am on break, I will not be allowed to assist you, unless I am given approval by a commander. Understand that if I stop an assault or an attempt to take your life, without direct permission from a commander, I will be progressively disciplined. Keep in mind that we have been trained with a USELESS self-defense method and your hands are tied. PPCT does not protect you from multiple attackers, attackers armed with bladed weapons, or any of the mixed-martial arts that are wildly popular today. So while you wait for designated "responding rovers" and a few command staff, you will be forced to use an incompetent self-defense method. Regardless of the consequences, I will respond to all Signal 7s. DO NOT let our lives be left to the hands of ignorant operational orders."

"By NO means am I asking that we be irrational, irresponsible, or unprofessional. I am asking that we all take the proper steps to make the changes that we need. Whether you have faith in the CWA or not, I suggest that we file our grievances and use them until the option is exhausted. If the union is ineffective then we will act as corrections officers on our own behalf. If the problem persists we will go take it up the chain to LFUCG and stay persistent until an agreement can be made. Please, for the sake of making this a safe and enjoyable work environment, don't just turn a blind eye to the problem and hope that it passes, because it won't."

Rather than address the issues brought up by the officer who wrote this, Director Ron Bishop and friends will likely just fire him. And Mayor Jim Newberry will have no comment.

Kentucky teacher quote of the day

A teacher friend said she received a political phone call at home asking her who she was going to vote for in Kentucky's U.S. Senate race. After answering that she was undecided, the caller told her the Kentucky Education Association supports Bruce Lunsford.

"Well," the teacher replied, "then I'm voting for Mitch McConnell!" And she hung up the phone.

State investment gurus won't show the money

I've been waiting for a week to get information about the toxic mortgage-backed securities held by the $17 billion Kentucky Retirement Systems (KRS).

I specifically asked for the cost-basis of the mortgage-backed securities they hold and their current market value. This morning, after I asked again, I was told that the information is not available.

Poor investment returns combined with fiscal mismanagement by the General Assembly for more than 25 years have combined to create a $28 billion actuarial deficit in the state public employee benefits accounts.