Column 95 - Fox News & the NDP

With the move of the Nevada Presidential Primary up to January of 2008, Nevada has assumed an unaccustomed place in the national spotlight. Unfortunately, to some extent, that spotlight seems to have blinded the Nevada Democratic Party leadership to some things.

We have already had one debate among all the Democratic candidates save Obama in Carson City a couple of weeks ago. Another is scheduled, and for reasons that completely escape me, the state party contracted with Fox News to cover the debate. Now I’m no media expert, but that seems to me about as logical as having Al Jazeera cover a Zionist Organization of America convention.

Sure enough, a great hue and cry arose from various Liberal organizations protesting this choice, most notably from MoveOn.org. Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News and a former Nixon aide (and the man responsible for bringing Rush Limbaugh to national attention) immediately jumped on this as “outside forces” attempting to affect Nevada politics (an area that Ailes has shown no particular interest in in the past).

This seems to me to be a bit disingenuous on Mr. Ailes’ part. While the debate was to take place in Nevada and was aimed at the Nevada primary, it was nonetheless a debate among presidential candidates and as one of the early primaries, it is arguably of national interest and import, but Fox news, which is also the TV home of Bill O’Reilly and what he (without a trace of irony) calls “the no-spin zone” has repeatedly shown that it is not interested in being “fair and balanced,” but is a mouthpiece for Conservative views.

With the issue starting to be raised, Democratic candidates began to rethink their participation in the debate. Finally Ailes gave them and the Nevada Party the excuse they needed to get out of the mess without looking like they caved in to those big bad liberals at MoveOn. In a speech last week he conflated Obama and Osama in a poor attempt at humor and the debate cancelled Fox’s coverage, which Tom Collins, Nevada Democratic Chair should have had the guts to do a long time ago and the judgment not to have done in the first place.

There are 21 months left until the Presidential Election of 2008, and everyone I know is looking forward to it with dread, not because of the candidates or the issues but because it looks like it will bring one more very long round of mudslinging and dirty campaigning that will make the “swiftboating” of John Kerry look like a Sunday School picnic. Fox and other right-wing outlets are already trotting out unfounded insinuations about Hillary’s “thick ankles” (if that’s a disqualifying attribute, Newt Gingrich should give up now) and her supposed sexual preferences, Obama’s fictional mid-East ties, etc., and it will only get worse unless we, the public let the candidates and the media know we’re sick of it. Not much hope there, I’m afraid, but it’s worth a try. What do you say? Send a letter to your favorite media outlet, whether it’s Fox, Air America, CNN, or the local stations and to your party’s potential candidates and let them know you’d like to see a campaign on the issue and not on nonsense. Hey – it could happen.

Column 94 - Let's Talk Trash

Let’s Talk Trash

Overall, “trash” is a profit center for IVGID; if you include the franchise fee paid by Waste Management to IVGID. Within that profit center; recycling loses money, more than one half of which is offset by the recycling fee paid by each property of $1.25 a month. That’s right, each homeowner and homeowners association pays a whopping $15 a year for this service. Seems like a bargain to me.

No one I’ve talked to or heard from is against the recycling program, but according to figures given to IVGID by Waste Management, only about 40% of the properties that put out garbage also put out recycling – not a great showing, but better than nothing. Waste Management recycling has been called limited when compared, say to California, where state law requires a much broader scope of recyclables be picked up and processed. WM takes all kinds of glass (except blue – sorry Skyy drinkers), most metal containers, and plastic bottles with a number 1 or 2 recycling classification. They also take newspaper and other kinds of paper. You can recycle corrugated cardboard, but only if you bring it to the WM facility on Sweetwater, which is open normal business hours during the week and until noon on weekends.

Recycling is one of the few things around that has almost no downside. The more products we recycle and reuse, the less energy is needed to manufacture new products, the fewer trees are cut down to make new paper, the more money the recycling companies make and the more money comes back to IVGID under the contract with WM. The 40% rate of recycling participation here may be due to lots of part-time residents or to a need for education. Making recycling easier and recycling more materials may also help increase participation.

The argument has been advanced that expanding the recycling program might increase the cost to homeowners. Okay, but even if it were to increase by a factor of 5, that means we’d go to $6.25 a month or $75 a year, a figure that’s not going to break or even be noticed by anyone. I spend more than $6.25 a month at Starbuck’s. Right now we recover about 3.25% recyclables from the total volume of trash collected. Estimates are that expanding to other plastics, picking up cardboard at curbside, etc. could increase that recovery rate into the teens.

The one troubling thing in all this is a question that no one I’ve asked has answered to any degree of satisfaction, namely why the contract for trash/recycling pickup is not put out for competitive bid. I’ve heard explanations ranging from “all the potential bidders subcontract to WM (true) and won’t bid against them (maybe)” to “WM is mob-connected and bad things would happen (patently ridiculous). But we won’t know if competitive bidding will make a difference if IVGID doesn’t put out a request for bids and see if they get any.

While I know that there is such a thing as no-bid (also known as sole source) contracts, these are generally used only in unusual situations. Such as when only one firm has a product that will meet the government's needs or only one firm can do the work, or when national security is involved. I see no compelling reason for IVGID to sole source contract for trash and recycling.

There is still time to make your thoughts known to the Board. I for one would like to see (a) recycling expanded to include a wider range of plastics and curbside pickup for corrugated cardboard, and (b) Requests for bids to go out to other providers in the area – if no one bids, fine, but let’s give the little guys a chance against WM, the thousand pound gorilla of the industry. What do you think?

Column 93 - Responsibility

Well, last week the wider world intruded on us in an unpleasant way. Four Incline High Juniors are accused of sabotaging the school buses in a way that could have resulted in damage and even potentially loss of life. As usual, school officials and people who know the accused say they are nice kids, never would have expected it, etc., and I have no doubt that is true.

Now this is no Columbine, but it still is cause for concern. I’m sure the four of them never thought far enough ahead to realize the potentially disastrous results of their actions, but while that might mitigate their guilt, it does not remove it. These are eleventh graders – if they don’t already drive, they will be eligible to drive soon, and they are a scant 18 months from leaving home, high school graduates, ready to go out on their own into the world – I don’t think it’s too much to expect that they should have given the implications of their actions more thought.

No one knows for sure why many young people today seem to be so prone to irresponsibility. I don’t think it’s all young people or even a majority, but it’s a large enough number for the problem to keep showing up – in school shootings, vandalism, graffiti, and now in cutting brake lines on school buses. As a psychologist who used to work with children, adolescents, and their families, I feel like I should understand, but have no confidence that I do. One possibility is that the consequences are just too remote for people of that age to think about.

Here’s an example: When I was about 10 or 11 years old, Nancy Brown and her brother Bruce offended me in some way that I can no longer remember, so some of my friends and I got a bright idea – we took some excelsior (shredded paper that bananas came in) and a .22 caliber bullet that we got God knows where, embedded the bullet in the paper, put it under Nancy’s window, lit the paper and ran away. Within minutes two things happened: a neighbor put out the fire and a police car, called by another neighbor, pulled up in front of my friends and me and took us into custody. Not more than 15 minutes after setting our primitive IED, I was in front of my parents with a policeman behind me, confessing what I had done and on the receiving end of some serious consequences.

It seems to me that this would be unlikely to happen nowadays. More likely the neighbors, if they were looking at all, would have felt it best to mind their own business, the police, if they were called, would have been careful not to violate any rights I might be thought to have, and my parents would have tried to understand or defended me against the police rather than punishing me. Perhaps I’m being too harsh, but it seems to me that we have lost sight of the facts that (a) children are essentially amoral beings who have to be taught right from wrong and (b) the systems – police, teachers, parents – that are there to teach them and to make sure that bad choices have undesirable consequences have had their hands tied by fear of seeming abusive, violating “rights” that may or may not be useful and a culture of psychologism that makes responsibility a bad word.

I feel for the parents of these four children, but I hope that, if they are guilty, their punishment is significant enough to have them learn something useful. The worst thing they could learn would be that they can do something wrong and then they or their parents or a lawyer can game the system so that they escape the consequences of their choices and their actions.

Column 91 - Recycling

Most of you will be relieved to hear that I won’t be writing another column about John Bohn, but I will take one last word. If last week’s letters in which Bohn and his cronies trotted out the “sore loser” chestnut is the best he’s got, then I think that it’s likely that the complaints filed with the state and any recall effort anyone decides to undertake will likely be successful. The State Board of Ethics has let me know they have decided to look into the matter, so I’ll leave the rest up to you, the residents to say what kind of person you want on the Board.

Now to other matters that deserve our attention. As you may have heard by now, the IVGID Board, at its meeting tonight, will have its first hearings on the renewal of the contract with Waste Management, the company that handles trash and recycling in the District. In this hearing, the public has the opportunity to give the Board its input on this matter, one that affects all of us.

To be sure, Waste Management has been doing a good job for the District to date. They have shown that recycling is a viable business for them in Incline and when you factor in the fees they pay, it is profitable to the District as well. For a very small part of our utility bill we have the advantage of having much of our recyclable trash picked up at curbside and the ability to bring other recyclables, particularly corrugated cardboard, to the facility as well.

Still, we could have more. Right now only number 1 and 2 plastic bottles are accepted for recycling, leaving other plastics to go into the trash. Judging my what I see in the streets on trash pick-up days, many people do not bring corrugated cardboard in to be recycled, and non-corrugated cardboard of the type used in many household items is not accepted for recycling. Finally, the trash/recycling facility on Sweetwater is open only until noon on weekends.

If you believe as I do that recycling has a clear benefit to the environment, tonight’s meeting is an opportunity to let the Board and Waste Management know you want more – not because there is anything wrong with the job they’ve done to date – there isn’t - but because we’ve sent the benefits of that to the District and to the environment and want to extend those benefits.

I would like to see pickup of all cardboard – corrugated or not – at curbside, extension of the plastics recycling to containers other than bottles and extension of the facility’s hours until 4 or 5 on weekends so that residents who spend their day building or cleaning up aren’t restricted to the morning hours to bring in their trash or recycling.

Whether you agree with this or not, tonight is an opportunity to make your views heard by the Board early in the contract renewal process, while there is still time for them and Waste Management to research the impact of these proposals and see what makes economic and environmental sense.

If we can turn out a couple of hundred people for a debate on a non-issue like “affordable housing” then surely we can pack the hall for this, an issue that will have immediate effects on all of us.

Column 92 (National) - Education

Due to a combination of work travel and a death in the family, I missed the deadline for a head-to-head column with Jim Clark last Sunday. The Bonanza was kind enough to provide space today, and since Jim addressed education, I’ll do the same.

I agree with Jim that the data on all-day kindergarten are not persuasive, and it was probably a good move on Governor Gibbons’ part not to commit to it. I don’t know that I would attribute quite the same dark motives to those who support all-day kindergarten that Jim does, but in a time of limited education budgets, it doesn’t seem like a good bet to me.

For the past year or so I’ve been working with an organization called the Center for Excellence in Research, Teaching, and Learning (CERTL) at Wake Forest University in North Carolina. CERTL has mostly been involved in curriculum improvement, but more recently was impressed with a very substantial body of data that indicates that communication and collaboration amongst teachers, administrators, students, and parents is a, if not the critical determinant of student achievement. Based on that, CERTL asked the organization I work for to join with them under a grant from the National Education Association to do a pilot program to see if, by improving communication we could impact student achievement. We are working with six schools in Winston-Salem – we purposely targeted the six schools in the district that are in the most trouble under No Child Left Behind standards and have been working with the Principals and key staff in these schools.

I just got back from our third workshop session with the teams from the schools – we have two people from CERTL who provide on-site coaching and support between the workshops – and was very impressed with the progress the schools are making. Trust and morale levels are rising, even in a couple of the schools where communication had been pretty much non-existent. More importantly, students are starting to feel the impact of the change. Let me tell you about one example:

Jerilyn is a first-grader who has been a behavior problem since day one. Finally the teacher called in the school guidance counselor, who is a participant in our program, to evaluate him. The counselor, using communication and listening skills she attributed to her work with us, heard something and asked Jerilyn “do you like to read?” Jerilyn replied in his usual surly tone “yeah.” She went on to ask, “do you like to read hard books?” “yeah.” So she had him start reading – first grade, second grade, third grade level books – he breezed through them all, so she took him to the Librarian who gave him more advanced books – up to fifth grade level and he aced them all. She gave him a comprehension test and found he understood what he was reading perfectly. The Counselor then took him around to the Principal, the Assistant Principal and others and had him read for them.

On the way back to his classroom, Jerilyn burst into tears. Asked why, he said “This is the best day of my life! Nobody ever bragged on me before, nobody ever told me I was smart.”

Jim talked about the Edmonton Experiment in schools running themselves – that experiment is based on the same premise as our work in Winston-Salem – that if you give teachers the freedom to teach and don’t hogtie them with tests, regulations, arbitrary standards, and red tape, they will teach and students will learn – that’s all they want to do, and given the opportunity they will do it. It’s very early days for Governor Gibbons, and readers of this column will know that I’m no fan of his. But if he is serious about implementing self-determination for our schools and our teachers, he’ll have my support on that at least, and I’d urge you to ask our representatives in the legislature to support this very worthwhile program.

Column 90 - The Board's Responsibility

Tom Meyer’s article in Sunday’s Bonanza asks “Did the Board Fumble the Process” of selecting a replacement for Bev Mapps. I’m afraid the question could be answered “yes” based at least on the expectations the Board created in people’s minds.

Last week, as most readers will know by now, the IVGID Board of Trustees selected Chuck Weinberger to fill the seat vacated by Bev Mapps’ resignation. I say “selected” rather than “elected” because by all accounts the process that IVGID HR Director Susan Johnson designed and the Board spent hours debating in December went by the boards (no pun intended) when push came to shove.

To forestall reaction, let me be clear – I have no issue with Mr. Weinberger’s being selected, I think the idea of a younger member of the community on the Board is a good one, and his background seems very well suited to the job. I held no particular brief for or against any of the other 13 candidates, and do a little dance of joy every time I remember that I withdrew my name from consideration.

At the same time, I think there are a couple of issues that can’t be ignored. The Board had a procedure that they were understood to have adopted (though it’s not clear that they actually did); it was thought by many who attended the meetings that they were to select from the 14 candidates a top 3 and then debate that top 3 to elect a new Trustee. They spent all day interviewing the candidates then the Board discussed their top 3, and on a pre-emptive motion elected Mr. Weinberger. At the very least this flouted the expectation the Board had created with many in the community and in the view of at least some of those who put their hat in the ring disrespected their candidacy.

This clumsy process may be reflective of good reasons, but it further undermines public confidence in a Board that has already seen its integrity compromised by a (now former) Chairman’s ill-considered, unethical, and possibly criminal actions last year and by that same individual’s high-handed dealing with the public in what are, by law, supposed to be open and transparent processes. The new Chair is Trustee Bea Epstein, and I can’t think of a better person for the job, but she has her work cut out for her in restoring the public’s confidence that the IVGID Board are really acting as Trustees of the District’s and its residents’ interests.

Hopefully Ms Epstein will take the lead in ending the Boards appearing by its silence to tolerate Trustee Bohn’s actions last year in withholding news of Ms Mapps’ resignation until after he was re-elected. Complaints have been filed by residents with the Nevada Commission on Ethics, the Sheriff’s Department, and the Attorney General’s office, but the Board’s has thus far allowed Bohn to stonewall the public and stifle any inquiry into what to me seems a clear conflict of interest. If my email and conversations around town (many with people who start by saying they have never agreed with anything I’ve written before) are any indication, a large segment of the public in both Incline and Crystal Bay has lost any confidence they may have had in the Board and in the governance of the District.

What is likely is that the Ethics Commission, the Sheriff, and the Attorney General will be too long in following this up if they follow it up at all. If the Board does not take action to call Trustee Bohn to account and Bohn does not do the honorable thing and resign, the only recourse left to the public will be a recall. By my reckoning, this would require the signatures of 800 to 900 District voters, which is not an impossible number and there are people who will take it on, I’m sure.

Still it would be far better for the community if the Board were to police itself, and I hope that Chairwoman Epstein will make this a high priority – I can think of no better way to start a new term of the Board than by making a clear statement that arrogance and wrongdoing will not be tolerated.

Column 89 - civility

I’ve spent the past week or so in Hawai’i on vacation, and while I’m here, as I always do, I’ve been reading the local newspapers. One thing that struck me here is that the Hawai’i legislature has overwhelming Democratic majorities in both houses, the recently re-elected Governor is a Republican. Despite this disparity, the legislative and executive branches seem to work together well and accomplish a great deal.

Interestingly enough in addition, the letters to the editor in the Honolulu Advertiser and the Star-Bulletin are quite civil. Writers certainly do not hold back on their opinions but they state those opinions without personal attacks and name-calling. Friends and family here who read the Bonanza are quite surprised and disconcerted at the nastiness of letters to the editor in our little paper.

I wonder why this is so. Are people in the Aloha state somehow more polite? Are they smarter? Or does the balmy island weather just take their edge off? Or is there just a small group of people in Incline who prefer personal attacks and name-calling to reasoned discourse?

I think I speak for Jim Clark and Andy Whyman when I say that those of us who write opinion columns in the Bonanza try to keep those columns reasoned and on the topic. We don’t expect everyone to agree with us or even anyone to agree with us – these are, after all, our own opinions – but it’s interesting to me that there are four or five people who seem to think that vituperation is a clever or intelligent response.

When I began to write my column and then again when I ran for office last year, a great many people told me they hoped I had a “thick skin,” and for the most part I think I do. But at the same time I have to wonder what motivates people who think that the fact that Andy or Jim or I state our opinion in a public forum gives them license for personal attacks and name-calling.

To give these individuals their due, I guess it takes a modicum more courage and integrity to write a signed letter to the editor (the Bonanza doesn’t accept unsigned letters) than it does to flame someone anonymously on the web, but I don’t think it’s that much more. I don’t doubt that they have friends who prefer to remain anonymous and who cheer them on, and I guess that’s a plus.

Still I have noted that I never see these individuals at IVGID meetings, particularly the ordinary meetings, or active in Rotary or Parasol or other community activities. Maybe they think their contribution lies in the supposed cleverness of their shots at those who do, but I have to say that after being in Hawai’i it just seems petty and nasty.

So I’ll keep writing and speaking out, as I’m sure will Jim and Andy and others, and I won’t give the snipers the satisfaction of our silence or withdrawal. I just wish they’d come up with something useful to say.

Column 87 - Bohn Must Go

As one who is committed to seeing the issue through to a just conclusion, I’ve found the community’s response to the Bohn/Mapps issue at IVGID gratifying. At one holiday party I literally could not cross the room without being stopped repeatedly for a discussion of what is happening and people’s reaction to it. The main thing I noticed was the degree to which Chairman Bohn’s campaign of deflection and obfuscation seemed to be working in the absence of concrete information on why Ms Mapps resigned, when she resigned, and what she said in her letter(s) of resignation. As long as those things remained unknown, people naturally gravitated there rather than to the more important question of the propriety of Mr. Bohn’s withholding the information.

With the publication of Ms Mapps’ first letter in last Wednesday’s Bonanza, we have almost everything out in the open. We have seen both of Ms Mapps letters of resignation and, admirably, she has written her side of the story in a letter to the editor and submitted to an interview besides. So let’s review the bidding:

In early September, Ms Mapps submitted a letter of resignation to Chairman Bohn. This is the letter that was published last week. The letter contains serious accusations regarding the General Manager’s behavior toward a variety of people, and of Mr. Bohn’s handling of the issue. Ms Mapps chose to resign over these issues. You can argue with her choice, but:

HER RESIGNATION IS NOT THE ISSUE; THE ISSUE IS JOHN BOHN’S ACTIONS

The issue is also not what Mr. Horn did or did not do – these are matters for the Board to investigate and deal with. Ms Mapps says she requested that Bohn submit the letter to the other trustees so they would know why she was resigning. She states “They should have known and been told. That was John’s doing.” Even if she had not resigned, allegations as serious as those in her letter should have been made known to the Board, in confidence if necessary, but made known.

With regard to a specific allegation in Ms Mapps’ letter, she states she was told by Bohn that he had spoken to the Board Counsel about a concern she had and she later found out he hand not spoken to the Counsel – in other words he lied to her. In his brief interview, Bohn does not deny that charge.

We further know that, after a conversation with Bohn Ms Mapps wrote a much milder letter of resignation, which she was then persuaded by Bohn and possibly Scott Brooke to withhold until after the election. We also know that Bohn did not confer with any other Trustees about persuading her to do this, and that he stated in an earlier interview that he did it out of a concern for the “fairness” of the upcoming election. To withhold this information from the Board and the public would be questionable under any circumstances, and is at the least an inarguable conflict of interest when Bohn was a candidate in the election in question.

We also know that Bohn has given statements about his actions that are grossly inconsistent, saying in one case that he decided to withhold the information and later in an unagendized statement at the December 6 Board Meeting, placing all the responsibility for the decision on Ms Mapps with no reference to his own participation in the decision.

None of the above is speculation, analysis, or conclusion – these are the facts and they are on the record.

The residents of IVGID are free to draw their own conclusions, but if Bohn’s actions do not rise to the level of unethical behavior as defined in Nevada's Ethics in Government Law (NRS 281.411 through 281.581), then to paraphrase the immortal Barbara Jordan, perhaps that 20th Century document should be consigned to a 21st Century paper shredder.

In my last column I called upon those who are outraged by this flagrant abuse of the office of Trustee to be heard, and they have been. John Bohn has demonstrated and been publicly criticized for his contemptuous treatment of the public he was elected to serve. He treats public comment in a patronizing and offhanded manner, as if it were an annoyance.  He is probably also contemptuous enough of the public to think that this will die out over the holidays. Mr. Bohn, it will not die out. As an ex-military man I know you are acquainted with the requirements of honor and I call upon you to do the honorable thing and resign from the office you have dishonored. If you do not, I and many others have pledged to do everything in our power to see that you are removed. You have already put a Trustee through having to deal with resigning – do not force the voters into the further misery of a recall.

Column 87 The Government They Deserve

The phrase “public office is a public trust” is part of the American political ethic. NRS  281.421 (the state’s ethics statute) states that “In Nevada, a public office is a public trust held for the sole benefit of the people. Public officers and employees must commit to avoid conflicts of interest between private interests and public duties.”

In this regard, a great many people have spoken and written to me to express their outrage at IVGID Chairman Bohn’s withholding Beverly Mapps’ letter of resignation on his own decision, yet few seem to be taking any action. If I am the only voice for what seems to be pretty widespread community outrage, then what is predictable is that the issue will die a quiet and unfortunate death.

The tactic of some to attack the messenger (me) both personally and by distorting what is said and then attack based on those distortions has hit a new high (low?) on this issue, recalling Churchill’s observation that “Some people's idea of [free speech] is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage.”  Let me see if I can clarify a few things for those who are interested in facts and clarity.

First of all, none of this is an attack on Ms Mapps, or her resignation – this was her right. The issue, which some would have us ignore, is that the Chairman, a candidate in the election, (a) chose to decide what the electorate should or shouldn’t know, (b) chose not to consult with anyone else except the resignor and the attorney for the Board, and (c) chose to flout established Board procedure by withholding Board Correspondence from the agenda.

There is one point worth noting, though. Ms Mapps’ letter of resignation contained strong criticism of the Board, which criticism has been lost, in part because Chairman Bohn seems to have felt that the Board could wait to hear this criticism from one of its members who felt strongly enough about it to resign.

Secondly, this is not about how the election might have gone if this information was made public – the law is clear that the election would have been for two seats, with the third then appointed by whatever means the Board chose. One could, however, argue that the resignation and Ms Mapps’ criticism were something the voters had a right to know as they decided how to cast their votes.

Thirdly, as I’ve pointed out repeatedly, this is not about my supposed vaunted ambition to be on the Board – if that were what I wanted to do, the smart thing would have been to keep quiet, kiss up, and do my best to be appointed on December 13th. One factor in my withdrawing last week was that I got tired of this specious argument being used to deflect attention from the real issues.

I believe the facts indicate that, at the very least, John Bohn violated his public trust in that he had a conflict of interest. I do not find it credible that someone of his background and experience is, as one correspondent suggested, naïve or unaware of this. If he could not see at least the appearance of a conflict he acted incompetently; if he could see it he acted unethically; if he did so in order to maintain the dubious power of being a Trustee and the minor honorarium it carries with it, he acted criminally. I don’t claim to know which is the case, but I do believe that the residents of the District are entitled to an accounting by Mr. Bohn and also from Ms Mapps, who remains an elected official. What we have gotten instead is silence from them and  attacks, distortions, and name calling from people “defending” them.

David Simon said that “one of the sad things about contemporary journalism is that it actually matters very little. The world now is almost inured to the power of journalism. The best journalism would manage to outrage people. And people are less and less inclined to outrage.” That seems to be the case here in Incline where outrage is short-lived, and seldom translates to action. The Board meets tonight to decide on their procedure for interviewing candidates and next week to select a new Board member. Both meetings will include public comment. If you feel strongly one way or the other on the issues I’ve outlined here, I urge you to go to the meetings and use your three minutes of public comment to demand an accounting and express yourself.

If you will allow me one last quote, de Tocqueville said that “in a democracy, the people get the government they deserve.” I will do my best to make sure this issue doesn’t go away, but if I am the only voice of the outrage many people profess, then the issue will fade away and, I suppose, the residents of Incline will have the government they deserve.

Column 86 (National) A Modest Proposal

A Modest Proposal

As you can imagine, I found the results of the mid-term elections, in the words of that guy in the credit card commercials, “rewarding – very, very, very, rewarding.” As Frederic Hertzberg in the current New Yorker, “This election was a crushing rebuke to Bush and his party. The rest is interpretation. Nearly everyone agreed that public anger about the Iraq catastrophe was paramount. To the surprise of much of the political class, exit polls suggested that corruption was almost as formidable a factor, especially among Independents and disaffected Republicans.”

The spinmeisters on the Right are working overtime to put some lipstick on this pig, but clearly Bush has spent not only his supposed political capital, but that of a lot of other Republicans as well. Now the Democrats are in control of the Legislative Branch, and could be considered to have the edge in the race for the Presidency in 2008. Unfortunately, that consideration requires that we ignore some unpleasant realities about my party of choice.

Without stretching too much, one could make the case that the Democrats did not win the election so much as the Republicans lost it. The incompetence and corruption on the GOP side made it easy to run on a “we’re not them” platform, and while I wish it weren’t so, the Democrats did not have much more of a coherent story or message than they did in 2004. For the Dems to take advantage of their newfound political capital we will have to do more than clean things up over the next two years – we will have to find our ideological feet and get them solidly underneath us.

The key issues of the day are, for the most part, not very arresting or not ones on which the left and right disagree in compelling ways. The war in Iraq is an unmitigated disaster, and the only real issue is how to withdraw and how fast. Predictably Bush will find some way to get the GOP off the hook on this one over the next two years and, by referencing the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, defusing the war as a political issue. Minimum wage, gay marriage, the death tax do not admit of a clear political divide and in any case are not real “grabbers.”

There is, I think, an issue on which the two parties clearly divide and that is of sufficient importance and impact that the Democrats could build a platform around it, and that is the environment. At this point the scientific community is as unanimous as it can ever get on the issue of climate change. While pundits, columnists, and novelists who would be pundits insist the scientific evidence is equivocal, there has not been a single peer-reviewed scientific article that dissents from the view that the climate is changing in the direction of global warming and that that change is potentially calamitous. Even Bush has admitted that America’s addiction to fossil fuels, particularly oil, is dangerous, the Republican Party remains in thrall to oil interests and to vested big business interests in general.

So my recommendation to the Democrats, regardless of whom they run, is to start early and often to build a campaign around the environment – not spotted owls or endangered fish (though those are important also) but around energy policy, alternative energy sources (solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, and, yes, nuclear), and reversing global warming. That’s a horse (or a donkey) they can ride to the White House.

Column 85 - He's Back

He’s b-a-a-a-ck.

I warned people who didn’t like my column that they should vote for me or I might be back. Well… Seriously, though, Andy has been doing a great job and has graciously offered to alternate weeks (and months for the national columns) with me, so here I am.

It’s been an interesting six months. Everyone should run for office at least once in their life if only to get a feel for what the political process looks like from the inside. I must say that the local races were (with one notable exception) remarkably civil, particularly as compared to the state contests, and while I’m disappointed that Nevada didn’t follow the national trend toward rebuking the Administration, I was gratified by the results nationally, some of the state results, and most of the local results.

Now we have a new wrinkle in local politics. IVGID Trustee Bev Mapps has resigned, and in her letter of resignation takes a swipe at her fellow Board Members. It seems odd to me that Ms Mapps’ idea of how to meet the Board’s responsibility “to provide a level of oversight to IVGID and its management” is to resign, but that’s what she has done.

What seems more odd to me is that Mapps’ letter of resignation is dated September 11th but was not made public until after the election. Rumors abound that someone received the letter well in advance of November 8th, so one has to wonder if someone sat on it and why. Would the results of the election have been different if Mapps’ charges were known and if it were known that the first duty of the new Board would be to appoint another member? I believe that the residents of IV/CB have a right to know if this news was withheld and by whom, and to inquire into the motives and ethics of whoever was involved in hiding this information.

Chairman Bohn is quoted in the Bonanza article giving a whole list of criteria the Board will consider in making this appointment including the ambiguous “personality that would be a good fit with the other trustees.” Conspicuous by its absence is any reference to the fact that there was just an election in which 40% of those voting expressed their preference for new people and new thinking on the Board. It seems to me that this should be the major thing the Board considers.

The first announcement was that the Board would interview candidates and make a decision on January 10, after Mapps’ resignation takes effect on December 31st. Now the date has been moved up to December 13th, when Mapps will still be on the Board. Again, one wonders why. The Board has 30 days from December 31st to make an appointment before the issue goes to the County, so why move it up? Will Mapps vote on her own replacement or will she (as I believe she should) recuse herself?

Also, if four Board members vote on the fifth, what happens in case of a tie? NRS 318 calls for the County Board of Commissioners to fill vacancies on the IVGID Board – presumably the County Board has delegated this responsibility to the IVGID Board, but who breaks a tie? My guess would be the Commissioners – do IV/CB residents want this decision taken at the County level?

Obviously I have a dog in this fight. I still want to be on the Board for all the reasons I made clear in my campaign. More importantly I want to see the views represented by the 2,649 votes cast for Tripp Hudson and for me (only 1,266 less than the combined total for the incumbents) honored in filling the vacancy on the Board.

The Bonanza has opened a forum on the North Tahoe Living website (www.northtahoeliving.com) on this issue and I urge residents to make their views known to the Trustees, to Jim Galloway our Commissioner, and to each other through the forum and the paper. Most importantly, let the IVGID Board members know if you want them to honor the results of the election or if you are OK with their electing a Trustee to a two-year term on their own.

Column 83 - Experts

IVGID could save a lot of money by firing their entire professional staff – I mean the golf staff, the tennis staff, the ski staff, the Rec Center staff – the whole lot. After all, they can just ask some Incline residents how to maximize the return on our multi-million dollar investments, particularly in the recreation area.

What gave me this brainstorm was reading all the sage advice proffered by residents regarding maintenance of the golf course, how to speed up play, and similar advice over the past couple of years about golf course maintenance during the winter, staffing of the golf course and tennis programs, how to run the ski area, dogs on the beaches, etc. It seems we have an awful lot of people who must be experts on these matters. I don’t have any idea of their credentials, but they give their opinions with great certainty and not a hint of a possibility that trained professionals might know more than they do.

Now don’t get me wrong – everyone has a right to their opinion, and the First Amendment guarantees their right to express it. At the same time, I’ve never cared for what an old boss of mine used to call “a guy in a diner.” If you’ve ever been in a diner late at night you’ve encountered the guy who sits at the counter with a cup of coffee and offers (usually loudly) to all within earshot his opinions on the government, the economy, and anything else he can think of.

Too bad there’s not a diner in Incline – it would make a fortune.

I suppose for someone who expresses views publicly to criticize others who do so might be unseemly. I like to think, though, that I do my homework and while some (many) might not agree with what I say, I think most would agree that I have some basis for it beyond just how I would like it to be so that it’s convenient for me.

IVGID hires really top quality professional people, from the General Manager on down, to be stewards of valuable assets belonging to the entire village. Stewardship means to hold in trust property belonging to another and to maintain or hopefully increase the value of that property. IVGID professionals are hired for their expertise and expected to do just that – to ensure a return on our investments. In doing this, they must make decisions that will not meet everyone’s desires. The fact that the golf course is a public facility owned by the District, does not mean that everyone should be able to do whatever they want with it, whether it’s cross-country skiing in winter or driving carts on the fairways in the spring, if those activities will, in the judgment of the experts, damage the asset.

In case I’m not making myself clear, the key word in the last sentence is experts. Not everyone is an expert and to say, in effect, “I own the golf course so I know what is best for it” is like putting water in the gas tank of your car and expecting it to run just because you think it should.

These self-appointed critics also make their attacks personal. The IVGID staff put hours of work and study into their recommendations (if you don’t think so, go to a Board meeting when any of them are presenting to the Board and you’ll see the professionalism and careful analysis behind their reports), but never mind that: if you don’t like what they recommend, call them names, say they’re “spending like a drunken sailor,” and generally disparage their hard work and dedication. If you seriously think you are their employer, you should know better than to treat valued employees that way.

But what the hell. If you’re a guy in a diner, you don’t have to be responsible, just sling mud around to show how much smarter you are than everyone else. After all, no one will hold you accountable if it doesn’t turn out.

Column 81 (National) - Iran

Try out this scenario: In the Middle East there is a country populated almost completely by Muslims. The political leader of that country is notoriously intemperate in his public remarks, including being publicly committed to his country’s right to develop, own, and if need be to use weapons of mass destruction, though the evidence that the country has, at present, more than trace amounts of WMD materials is scanty at best. What should the US do?

Based on past experience, the answer for President Bush might well be a preemptive strike.

Preemptive warfare by presidents is not a new phenomenon. In 1848 a young congressman expressed his opposition to going to war against Mexico in this way: "Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose -- and you allow him to make war at pleasure. If, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, 'I see no probability of the British invading us'; but he will say to you, 'Be silent; I see it, if you don't.' “ That congressman was Abraham Lincoln.

As Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. points out in a recent article in the Washington Post, this is precisely how George W. Bush sees his presidential prerogative: Be silent; I see it, if you don't .The guiding strategy during the Cold War was the formula developed by George Kennan of “containment plus deterrence.” Remember, our enemies in the Cold War had real WMDs. For those keeping score at home, we won the Cold War without invading anyone. Now George Bush has changed US strategy from the Kennan formula to Be silent; I see it, if you don't and the 33% of Americans who still support him blindly follow.

There is no question that nuclear weapons in Iran’s hands would be a disaster. The Iranian President has called for the destruction of Israel, has denied the Holocaust, and is an avowed enemy of the West. But Iran does not have nuclear weapons now and has a long ways to go until they have them (even the Bush Administration is not pretending that WMD’s currently exist this time). This means plenty of time to bring international pressure to bear and if that fails to put together a true military coalition so that turning Iran from a destructive path is a world, effort, not another US solo adventure.

Unfortunately we have an election coming up in November, one in which the Republicans stand to lose a lot of their power and that will be seen as a referendum on the Bush Administration. With Karl Rove now giving his full attention to politics and Bush’s demonstrated win at any cost mentality, we can expect lies, dirty tricks, smears, and the probability of an “October surprise” is high. Some think that surprise will be the resignation of Dick (the mighty hunter) Cheney and his replacement with someone more popular to gain votes in ’06 and tee up a candidate for ’08. I fear, however, that there will be “evidence” produced in August or September that will lead to the bombing and/or invasion of Iran in October, and that will be a disaster that will cost thousands of lives in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world.

It’s time for Americans to stop buying “'Be silent; I see it, if you don't” from an president and an administration that has consistently lied and distorted the facts. The Kennan formula was good enough for Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and even Nixon, in the face of a genuine nuclear threat, and it is what will work now – contain Iran in a circle of international pressure and deter them by threat of worldwide retaliation. Preemptive war is not a viable option.

Column 79 - The Nevada Races

With the primaries about four months off and the election not until November, you wouldn’t expect things to be heating up in the state races quite yet, but you’d be wrong. Maybe it’s because we have the unusual situation of every constitutional office being up for grabs with no incumbents running this year (the first time since statehood), or maybe it’s just the tenor of the times, but things are already starting to get interesting.

Apparently Senator Bob Beers or his campaign sent out an April Fools Day press release saying that Jim Gibbons had come out in favor of Beers’ pet initiative, the TASC (Tax and Spend Control) amendment. Now Gibbons, displaying his characteristic lack of humor and tendency toward overreacting has demanded that Beer retract the joke release and has threatened legal action. To be fair, one of our local TV stations (who hereby forfeit the “sharpest tool in the shed” competition) thought the release was straight and aired it as fact, but having read the release I think that is more of a comment on the political savvy of the news editor than on the plausibility of the release. You can read the release at http://www.rgj.com/blogs/inside-nevada-politics/documents/FakeNewsRelease.doc and judge for yourself.

I have to admit that as a Democrat it’s fun to see GOP candidates tearing at each other for a change. Here we have the delicious spectacle of Gibbons taking his usual loud and pompous umbrage at Beers suggesting that he (Gibbons) is a fiscal conservative! As the regular reader of this column (there must be one) will know, my first priority in this year’s race for governor is ABG (anybody but Gibbons), but between Beers’ ill-advised advocacy for TASC and his apparent lack of judgment (and a sense of humor – the release is sophomoric), I’m not sure he’d be that much better.

Fortunately we have some good alternatives on the Democratic side and, so far at least, the two main candidates have refrained from the kind of internecine warfare that has killed off so many Democratic candidates in the past few years. Both Dina Titus and Jim Gibson have spoken to the Incline Democratic Club in the past months, and I was very favorably impressed by both of them. Senator Titus has some very creative ideas on how to approach state issues, and Mayor Gibson has good ideas of his own as well as a solid track record as Mayor of the state’s third largest city, and both would, I think, make excellent governors.

Gibbons, on the other hand is the perfect representative of the Republican Party in 2006. He is arrogant, not very bright as far as I can tell, and ready to respond to any opposition with guns and epithets blazing. The simple fact is that America is getting sick and tired of the neoconservative GOP’s culture of cronyism and corruption, and their hiding, from the President on down, behind the 21st Century version of red-baiting and spurious arguments about national security to justify actions that would have gotten any pre-9/11 president impeached.

We in Nevada have before us this year a unique opportunity to send a clear message to the Republican Party in Congress and to the President that, like at least two-thirds of the people in the country we are mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it any more. We are spending billions of dollars on a war that was, at best, ill-advised, the President holds himself above the law, authorizing surveillance on Americans without benefit of due process (e.g., by obtaining a FISA warrant), authorizing the leak of classified material, directly violating the law, and top GOP members of Congress have been caught up in corrupt relationships with a lobbyist that and other corrupt activities, and the American people are sick of it.

My only concern is that if there is a clear off-year shift toward the Democratic candidates Bush will have to do something desperate to try to salvage the ‘08 elections. Like invading Iran. But that couldn’t happen, could it? Could it?

Column 78 - Democracy in Action

Having lived in Incline for almost 11 years now, I’ve seen my share of community controversy. We’ve had the Chateau controversy, the skateboard park, issues over the beaches, golf and tennis personnel, and of course the perennial dog park issue.

The recent debate over IVGID’s purchasing 5 acres of land at Incline Lake for $1 million was a controversial as any I’ve seen, but was different in some important ways that, I think, show how much we’ve grown as a community.

I don’t know how many people attended the IVGID Board’s meeting last Wednesday, but the room was more than packed, with a significant number of people standing in the lobby. The debate began (or continued, actually) with the Board discussing the pros and cons and asking questions of IVGID staff and others that were clear and thoughtful, however pointed they may have been. The debate among the Trustees was respectful without losing any of its force. Then, when Chairman Bohn opened the floor for public comments he divided the room with pros lined up on one side, cons on the other and neutral commenters in the middle. The comments went on for some two hours, and the tenor of the debate was again rational and respectful, though by no means dispassionate. The Board sat until 10 pm and when everyone present who wished to be heard had been heard, they voted in favor of the issue 3 to 2, a margin that, I think, reflected the community’s sentiment.

I have not always been a fan of IVGID Boards. In my early years here I was “asked to leave” more than one Board meeting after loudly objecting to what I felt were unfair or high-handed interactions with the residents who were present. This Board, however, went out of its way to hear every voice on the issue and their internal debate reflected not only their own views, but the input they had received. It was a show of participatory local government at its finest.

One complaint I have heard from time to time around controversial local issues is that the Board didn’t listen. I don’t think anyone can claim that about this Board on this issue, unless their criterion for listening is agreement. Personally, my criterion for listening is learning – if I walk away from a conversation having learned something, I have listened. If the person with whom I am speaking has learned something from my view, I have been listened to. Realistically, I think this is a more realistic criterion for listening than agreement, particularly on complex issues where a variety of views are being expressed. By my observation, this Board learned and listened, and whether you agree with their decision or not, they gave it their best and I congratulate each of the 5 Trustees.

Now the real work begins. As Trustee Gene Brockman pointed out at the meeting there has been, from the beginning, a ‘chicken and egg” problem that has complicated debate on the purchase. One often-heard objection has been that no concrete plan has been submitted for the use of the land (though many ideas have been advanced). On the other hand, the Board was loath to commit staff time and IVGID funds to the creation of a business plan before it was decided whether the land would be bought. Arguments could be made for planning first versus purchasing first, and the Board opted for purchasing first. Now, assuming the purchase will be consummated (this depends in part on approval from the State), we need to see which of the possible uses provides the best return on investment and that will be the occasion for another round of decision making. While a Nordic Ski Center has been the idea that has been heard the most, consideration must be given to year-round uses and to business issues including profitability and ROI. Other ideas have been advanced, including leaving the land in its natural state, perhaps selling the coverage to recoup the purchase price. Here again all voices should be heard and, based on the Board’s exemplary performance in making the purchase decision, we can, I think, expect a clear and participatory process.

Ain’t democracy grand?

Column 77 - An Historic Week

Monday the Place-Based Planning (PBP) process kicked up into full gear. In the afternoon the consultants met with the “Working Group” to plan the evening session, and in the evening over 100 people came to the Chateau for the first of three working sessions that will form the Washoe/IVCB part of the ultimate plan that goes to TRPA.

The Working Group are the 12 person committee that was the focus of the “pay to play” controversy earlier this year. After clearing up some miscommunication it turned out that IVGID had only 6 seats on this committee, and Washoe County the other 6. Commissioner Jim Galloway appointed the 6 from the County, including several from IV/CB. (I’m an IVGID appointee to the Working Group) The Working Group will provide the continuity between the Community Workshops, provide a direct link for the community into the process, and will work directly with the consultants to ensure that the output of those workshops is retained and translated into the final plan.

That 100 people came Monday evening for a three-hour working session is testimony to the work that Incline Vision has done since the Community Meeting in November. The people at the meeting said what they thought were the most important places in the village and also what they saw as the greatest opportunities for improvement over the next 20 years. Given the high degree of agreement among the ten teams working independently, what they came up with was probably pretty representative of thinking in at least one segment of the community.

Still, there is work to do. Unlike November’s meeting, Monday’s workshop was populated, largely by older, established residents. Missing were young families and their children, Latinos, renters, and probably part-time residents as well. The Working Group needs to make a concerted effort to collect and communicate these groups’ input to the consultants and to have these groups represented in large numbers at the second and third Community Workshops.

It’s important to remember that this is a process that is intended to be as inclusive as possible. If you feel that you or some group of which you are a part is not being heard or represented, don’t wait for the Working Group to find you – contact us to ensure we get your input. I can tell you for sure that all the data collected by Incline Vision and that will be collected in the workshops is being kept, listened to, and will be included in the end product, which will be a report and recommendations from the consultants to TRPA. At the end of the day what will translate all this into a real, concrete future for Incline and the Basin is new regulations, ordinances, and thresholds on the part of TRPA, the counties, and the communities and the consultants’ report will presumably be the basis for these changes.

The next Community Workshops are on May 22 and July 17 – mark your calendar now and plan to be there with as many of your friends and neighbors as you can bring.

The other big event this week is the IVGID Board meeting Wednesday night, where the Incline Lake purchase will get its final hearing and be put to a vote. After considerable study and thought, I’ve come to the conclusion that this is a gamble worth taking. A million dollars is real money, to be sure, and anyone who thinks our payment as residents will end with a one-time assessment of $125 is probably naïve. Notwithstanding that I think we should take the opportunity. A Nordic ski area for the winter and another recreation area for summer use are probably a good bet to produce revenue and, as importantly, enjoyment for residents and increased tourism income. If the negotiations with the Forest Service don’t work out, the added investment over the initial million will not have been great and the land is likely to be salable at a profit that will match any other prudent investment of the money.

Maybe it’s the circles I travel in, but I haven’t spoken to anyone who opposes the purchase. I suspect opposition is out there and waiting for the Board meeting to come forward. If so, then Wednesday’s meeting should produce some interesting debate; if not, then those who attend will be present for an important piece of Incline’s history.

Column 76 - Iraq

Wars do strange things to presidents – they often become insular, defensive, and paranoid about dissent. This phenomenon is not limited to presidents of either party or to the current president. We saw it, for example, with both LBJ and Nixon during the Vietnam era.

This President, and his advisors seem to have a view of the war that fewer and fewer people share with them. This has been true to some extent for most of the three years since we invaded Iraq. The President has his own set of facts that often do not coincide with what is observable to others, starting with WMD’s and yellowcake from Niger, and now including “victory” and “civil war.”

Mr. Bush said this week that we will stay in Iraq until we achieve victory, and clearly expects this involvement to extend well beyond his administration, but he has yet to define what he has in mind by “winning.” If the goal was to bring democracy to Iraq, they have a democratically elected government, and a recent poll of the Iraqi people found that 87% of them want us to leave. Democracy would seem to indicate that if we leave at the request of a government that represents the will of its people, we’ve won - Zbigniew Brzezinski has proposed just such a plan.

Former Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi stated unequivocally this week that Iraq is in a state of civil war, but the President denies it while admitting that there is a “significant insurgency.” This is mincing words at best, and when Donald Rumsfeld says that leaving now would be like turning post-war Germany back to the Nazis, it seems to indicate that (a) there is a civil war and (b) we are propping up the weaker side, but the President denies that there is a civil war.

This week President Bush said “if I didn’t believe we would win, I would not send our young people over there,” and I believe he is sincere in that statement. What bothers me is that this President is willing to send our troops in harm’s way based on his private belief, a belief that is not shared by military strategists that are far more expert than he is.

The President’s justification for our long-term commitment in Iraq is based in his “War on Terrorism” which, as Brzezinski has pointed out, is a euphemism. War is “a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations,” but terrorism is not a nation or state, it is a strategy of killing people to alter the political process.

Notwithstanding this, Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld continue to use this “war” as a justification for an unprecedented accretion of power to the Executive Branch, and when others object, they again redefine reality. For example, no serious Democrat has, to my knowledge, advocated eliminating the use of surveillance against suspected terrorists – they have objected to doing this illegally, particularly when fast, effective legal means exist. Yet the President in last week’s news conference said that if the Democrats are against using these weapons against terrorism, they should run on that platform, blithely ignoring the key factor, namely his breaking the law.

At the end of the day the issue is not whether we should be in Iraq. The overwhelming majority of Iraqis and an increasing majority of Americans say we should not. The issue is why we are there and how we will exit, and this president seems to think we should trust him on the first and to be content to leave the second to future presidents to work out.

Lastly I’d like to take a few things out of the conversation. I am unequivocal in my support for our armed forces. My opposition to the war does not in any way disrespect those who are, in line with their commitment in joining the armed forces, prosecuting it to the best of their ability. Second, I reject any imputation that dissenting from the administration’s policies or actions is in any way unpatriotic –I concur with Jefferson’s statement that “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism.”

That I have to say all that, to me, speaks to the sorry state that political dialogue in this country has come to.

Column 75 - We Ain't Had Our Best Day Yet

People sometimes ask me if it’s hard to write a weekly column. My stock answer is that it’s not, if I have a topic – the hard part is coming up with something to write about each week that will be informative and, hopefully, stimulate some thinking beyond the reflex attack that comes when someeone’s pet ox is gored.

This is one of those tough weeks. It seems like everything is either settled or on hold, and all of it has been discussed to death – Incline Lake, Place-Based Planning, the Shorezone standards, workforce housing, the tax revolt, timeshares – I for one don’t have anything new to say and don’t see the point in rehashing old conversations. I had hoped to devote this column to the County Democratic Convention, to which I was to be a delegate, but a combination of business and family matters precluded my attending, and so I don’t know what went on there as I write this.

Seems like the most interesting thing going on is the season premiere of The Sopranos, and even that’s not “local” in focus.

I’ve had occasion these past several weeks to spend more time than usual in the Bay Area, specifically in San Jose. I’ve been struck all over again with all the reasons I moved to Incline over ten years ago. The traffic, which I honestly thought could not have gotten worse, has. Last week Emy and I made the mistake of going shopping at the Valley Fair Mall at about 4 pm on Saturday. First of all, I’m quite sure there were more people in that mall than live in Incline. The parking lot, which is two levels and about the area of Tyrolian Village, was jammed, and every driver seemed to think he or she had a right to a parking space within 50 feet of a mall entrance. I also noticed something I’ve observed in airports, namely the number of people who seem oblivious to the fact that there are other people around, and that those other people actually occupy physical space and, when they walk or drive, have a certain momentum on a certain trajectory. Many people move as if they are alone in the world or, at least, others should make way for them.

Now I’m not saying that none of that happens in Incline, though I confess to a bias that has me, when someone acts this way in Raley’s, to seek evidence that they are flatlanders visiting and not locals. I do know that, even when Raley’s parking lot is jammed on a weekend, people with Nevada plates seem generally polite and cooperative, and the only thing I’ve seen that is close to a traffic jam is leaving the ski areas at 4:30.

So overall I think we have it pretty good here, issues notwithstanding. I had to miss the opening meeting of the basin-wide Place-Based Planning group to which I had the honor of being named, but I’m optimistic about the process. I’ve heard good arguments both ways on the wisdom of the land purchase at Incline Lake, and have enough confidence in the IVGID Board to feel it will turn out well, and overall I think the future looks pretty good.

There’s an old Peanuts cartoon where Lucy, in her advice booth, tells Charlie Brown that it stands to reason that, at the end of the line, there will have been one day in our lives that will have been the best day we had, and one that will be the worst. Then she asks Charlie Brown “What if you’ve already had your best day?” For me, it’s an article of faith that my best day hasn’t happened yet, and I think that’s true for us as a community as well. If you had told me ten years ago that 350 people would come together and launch an active planning process I would have thought they were nuts, yet here we are.

So this is a column about nothing (hey – it worked for Seinfeld!), the point of which is “we ain’t had our best day yet!”

Column 74 - Timeshares

Anyone who has lived in the Bay Area will be familiar with the radio and TV commercial for a dairy called Berkeley Farms that ends with a bovine voice exclaiming “Farms? in Berkeley? Mooooo!” The local version of this at the moment seems to be Timeshares? in Incline? Noooooo!”

To make it clear at the outset, I’m no big fan of timeshares, and neither do I consider them a blight on the universe. Actually, aside from assiduously avoiding getting hooked into listening to marketing pitches on them, I don’t have much opinion either way on timeshares (though by way of full disclosure, I did attend a presentation years ago at South Shore and came away with a really nice set of cheap, shoddy luggage).

I am a fan of reason, though, and it seems to me that the current brouhaha over the issue of timeshares in Incline is lacking in that fine commodity.

There may be some fine point of law or regulation that distinguishes between a time share and a house that is rented out as a vacation rental, but in practice I can’t see the difference. If I (or my brother, my cousin, and my friends Ed and Don and I) buy a house, use it for ourselves for a few weeks a year and rent it out to vacationing families the rest of the year, that seems pretty much the same thing as a time share to my untrained eye.

Now here’s the joke: There are houses and condos all over Incline that are rented out on exactly that basis. Timeshares in Incline? We’ve always had them!

Now here come Paul Zahler and Phil Gilanfarr wanting to put them up near Diamond Peak and you’d think somebody was proposing affordable housing or something.

What I’ve heard from the anti-timeshare side is concerns about traffic, parking, noise, and the like. OK, those are valid concerns for anyone in any neighborhood, but from my understanding what is being proposed is not a high-rise or condo development but a number of single family homes. Again, I think the concerns are legitimate, but they are not, I think, concerns that are unique to time shares. When my neighbor across the street put his house on the market and, while it was being sold, rented it out in three sections to groups of young, unrelated people, I had the same concerns, and had recourse if I wanted to pursue it under the CC&R’s of the neighborhood. How is this different from a timeshare, and how is it different if Messrs. Zahler and Gilanfarr went in and built a bunch of houses that they then sold? Particularly if the purchasers then rented them out as vacation rentals?

Somehow I think there is more involved here than meets the eye. For one thing, Paul Zahler has been subjected to some personal attacks on the issue that I think are out of proportion to a relatively simple zoning dispute. I don’t know Paul well, we don’t socialize, and we don’t agree on a lot of political matters. I have, however, served with Paul on a number of committees and boards and have had occasion to scrutinize his performance in public service on the CAB and the Fire Board and it’s my view that he is an honest man, however misguided he may be politically, and that he has a big and authentic commitment to the community. Those things alone, in my view, make ad hominem attacks a particularly egregious form of opposition. I’ve met Phil Gilanfarr in a business context and have no reason to think that either Paul or Phil are up to any nefarious business here – they’re just doing what architects and developers do – looking for an opportunity to develop something – that’s their profession.

The point is, once again, that we live in a community and that living in a community means that (a) there are laws and regulations that apply equally to everyone – they aren’t something to be invoked when the ox being gored is yours and (b) Sometimes, as Mr. Spock said, the good of the many may outweigh the good of the few, and some people are not going to like something that, under our laws, is perfectly legitimate to do. Let’s decide this issue in the realm of laws and regulations, not in the court of public attack.

Column 72 - Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney – L’Etat, c’est lui.

In the grand scheme of things, the furor over the Vice President’s hunting accident would be a tempest in a teapot. Hunting accidents happen – it’s almost inconceivable that a group of people armed with rifles or shotguns and firing at fast-moving game will not occasionally hit something other than what they were aiming at, and sometimes that will be another hunter. It’s fortunate that the outcome of this particular accident was not much worse.

In our free society, when something that could happen to anyone happens to a public figure, it becomes fodder for the talk mill and the comedy shows – Carter had his encounter with the “attack bunny,” Clinton his stops at McDonalds, and Ford his famous falls and Quayle his spelling impairment – so at worst l’affaire Cheney should have been good for a few laughs at the Veep’s expense.

But humor ranks right below candor in this administration’s value system. Not long after the incident, the blogosphere began buzzing with stories of lies and cover-ups and then on Saturday the AP published an article detailing what it called “a week of shifting blame, belatedly acknowledged beer consumption (not ‘zero’ drinking after all) and evolving discrepancies in how the shooting happened, its aftermath and the way it was told to the nation.”

Arrogance has been a hallmark of this administration, and Cheney is in a close race with Rumsfeld for most arrogant. Beginning with the campaign, every piece of unwelcome information has been met by defaming the messenger. Questions about Bush’s military record and Cheney’s having “other priorities” than serving in Viet Nam? Get Rove’s minions together to smear John Kerry and Max Cleland, who did answer the call to serve. Unwelcome facts about the supposed yellowcake from Niger? Send Scooter to smear Joe Wilson and expose his wife as a CIA agent. And so it goes right up to Cheney and the White House blaming the poor sap who got shot.

While there is no evidence that beer drinking impaired Cheney’s judgment, drinking while hunting is an unsafe practice. The solution? Lie. Katherine Armstrong, the ranch owner and doyenne of Texas Republicans said “No one was drinking. No, zero, zippo” – that they drank Dr. Pepper with their lunch. Later Cheney acknowledged that “I had a beer at lunch.”

There is more, of course – the minimizing of the extent of Whittington’s injuries, the fact that Cheney’s licenses were not in order, and the speculation of experienced hunters that if, as was stated, the victim was 30 feet from Cheney, and if he were wearing the sort of layers of clothing that would be expected given the temperatures, the pellets should not have penetrated and harmed him below the one that hit his face – yet clearly they penetrated enough to get into his system and be carried to his heart. Most importantly there is the constipated flow of information both to the White House and to the public that has the appearance, at least, of an attempted cover-up.

Dick Cheney epitomizes the attitude of this administration that they are accountable to no one but themselves, and least of all to the public. They lie, cover up, and rationalize their behavior under the umbrella of national security and the war on terror. Yet these chickens are starting to come home to roost. In an administration that was accountable, that had not lost touch with all but the most blindly partisan segment of the public, that had an approval rating that was not in the cellar, this would have been an unfortunate case of bad judgment. In the case of this administration and its arrogant disregard for the public, it is an example of Lord Acton’s maxim that power corrupts.