Category: Oliver Read
Jeffords ‘Absolutely’ Sure on Party Switch (UPI)
WASHINGTON, Feb. 1 (UPI) — Eight months after Vermont Sen. James Jeffords threw Washington into turmoil by leaving the GOP and handing control of the Senate to the Democrats, he said Republican stinginess with education dollars convinced him he “absolutely” did the right thing.
“Many people have asked me given everything that has happened, if I would do this all over again,” Jeffords, now an Independent, said. “My answer is, ‘absolutely.’”
“As Congress debates the economic stimulus package, the annual spending bills [and] a national energy policy, because of my switch, the Democrats have a seat at the table and will be part of the final decision-making process,” Jeffords said.
“It is not that I believe the Democrats should get their way on every issue, or that the Republicans should get their way on every issue.
“My decision to become an Independent has forced all branches of government to compromise, to seek moderation, and to find a balanced consensus.”
Jeffords criticized Republicans for stripping a provision to allocate $450 billion over 10 years for education from last year’s budget. He also announced a new task force with Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., to push an education agenda for very young children.
“It was a clear signal to me that the Republican leadership had no intention, nor need, to work with the moderate wing of the Party,” Jeffords said of the budget experience. “Something radical needed to be done.”
Republican spokesman Kevin Sheridan dismissed Jeffords’ complaints.
“The president has put education at the very top of his domestic agenda,” she said. “We’re very proud of the leadership he’s brought in finally bringing all sides together and achieving this historic education bill.”
Bush signed the bill into law last month.
Jeffords’ speech at the National Press Club in Washington comes three days before the Bush administration was set to release its budget for the next fiscal year. Bush has said he would dedicate vast new resources to the Pentagon and for domestic security — leaving Democrats and some interest groups staring at the prospect of shrinking budgets.
In his response to Bush’s State of the Union speech Tuesday, House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., said the government must spend more on education as it sets new performance standards for public schools.
“We want to work together to recruit high-quality teachers and invest more in our schools while demanding more from them,” Gephardt said.
Jeffords said that at least last year, the GOP was unwilling to compromise on education funding, leading to his famous decision.
“There was a feeling of extreme partisanship from those in the majority, almost a lust, with no reason for compromise,” Jeffords said.
Published in The Bangor Daily News, in Maine.
Maine Receives An “F” For Its Child Safety Gun Laws
WASHINGTON, Jan. 30--Maine has received a failing grade for 2001 because its gun laws were judged inadequate to protect children from gun violence. This marks the fourth year in a row that the Brady Campaign, a Washington-based lobbyist group focused on preventing gun violence, has given the state an "F."
In conjunction with Maine Citizens Against Handgun Violence and the Million Mom March of Maine, the Brady Campaign last week rated Maine's gun laws on seven criteria, ranging from the minimum age at which someone may purchase a gun to communities' legislative power to change their gun laws.
While some Mainers hope the newest "F" may impel some state legislators to reconsider current gun laws, others say that despite the state's uncomfortably high suicide and domestic violence rates, Maine is "an incredibly safe place to live" and the gun laws are fine as they are.
"Maine is not a Washington D.C. Maine is not a New York City," State Representative Edward J. Povich (D-Ellsworth), chairman of the House Criminal Justice Committee said. The same gun-laws that apply to cities where homicide rates are high should not apply to Maine, he said, where owning a gun is "traditional." In Povich's view, it's the "city-folk opposing the country-folk."
The Brady Campaign "is an interest group that looks at figures in an extreme way," he said.
Cathie Whittenburg, executive director of Maine Citizens Against Handgun Violence and the mother of two, doesn't think of herself as an extremist: "My concerns come from being a mother." She pointed to Maine's high teen suicide and domestic homicide rate as reason enough to "tighten the laws."
The Brady Campaign based its numbers on statistics from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which show that Maine had 10 firearms-related deaths of children and youth up to 19 years of age in 1998, the most recent year for which data are available. According to the CDC, the rate of firearms-related suicides in Maine that year was 3.89 percent per 100,000 people, and the rate of firearms-related homicide was 2.68 percent.
Massachusetts, in comparison, had lower rates of firearms-related suicides (2.37 percent) and homicide (1.98 percent) than Maine among children and youth 19 and under in 1998. The Brady Campaign gave Massachusetts an "A-."
George Smith, executive director of Sportsman's Alliance of Maine, a non-for-profit organization based in Augusta, said the suicide rate is a "real issue of concern," but added, "The Brady people are looking at a place they know nothing aboutá[Maine] is an incredibly safe place to live."
Smith said that Maine is a hunting state that has the second-highest gun ownership per capita in the country. He also pointed to an award the Children's Rights Council gave Maine in 2000 that distinguished it as "the best state in the country in which to raise a child."
Stephen McCausland, public information officer for the Maine State Police, agreed with Smith that Maine has a longstanding hunting tradition that is not taken into consideration by the Brady Campaign's "harsh" report.
This report is "not indicative of what we're doing up here," McCausland. One of the things the State Police are doing to protect children, he said, is providing free gun locks to gun owners who ask for them.
He said Maine's low rate of homicide is indicative of how the safe the state is. According to McCausland, the number of homicides in Maine in 2001 was 19, which was "one of the five lowest in the country."
Not everyone is convinced, however, that Maine's low homicide rate justifies the state's gun laws. "We do have a low homicide rate, but we're not immune to gun violence," Whittenburg said.
Whittenburg and Brenda DiDonato, president of the South Chapter Million Mom March, said that the firearms-related suicide rate should justify stricter gun laws.
Whittenburg also said that there are "adverse effects" when other states have strict gun laws while Maine does not. She said criminals from Massachusetts will "hop" up to Maine for their guns.
Most advocates of new gun laws say that Maine doesn't have strict background checks for gun buyers. At gun shows, for example, buyers are not required to go through background checks when purchasing a gun - the basis of another failing grade for Maine in early January awarded by the American Gun Safety Foundation.
According to the Brady Campaign report, Maine received an "F" for having no law that prohibits teens and children from possessing guns; no safety standards for handgun locks; no laws that give communites the right to regulate guns; and no background checks at guns shows. The state was also chided for handing out concealed weapons permits, and received a "D" for having a weak child access prevention law.
Despite the failing grades, Maine legislators are not overwhelming concerned about changing the rules: "The legislature doesn't agree that private gun-ownership is a problem." Povich said.
Published in The Bangor Daily News, in Maine.
Government Affairs Committee Investigating Enron: Sen. Collins Looks Into Conflicts of Interest
WASHINGTON, Jan. 24--Senator Susan Collins, a member of the Governmental Affairs Committee, yesterday called the Enron case "a tragedy" for the small investors and employees who have lost their retirement accounts. She spoke after participating in a hearing on what the government might have done to prevent the financial debacle.
"The Enron scam should never have happened. It represents a colossal failure of all the mechanisms that are supposed to safeguard the investing public," Collins said.
Arthur Levitt Jr., the former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), testified that the Enron scandal was an example of the "cultural, economic erosion created by a business community that is highly competitive."
Levitt was among five witnesses who talked about how the Enron collapse could have been prevented and what should be done to make sure something like it does not happen again. The hearing launched the first phase of investigations that will also look at alleged internal malfeasance and conflicts of interest by Enron and its former accounting firm, Arthur Andersen LLP.
Committee chairman Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) said the panel will consider "changes in law and regulation that will strengthen the watchdogs in and out of the federal government so that nothing like the Enron scandal ever happens again."
Much of the talk during the hearing concentrated on how Enron hid from its employees the failing stock value of the company and on a possible conflict of interest involving its former accounting firm.
"There are too many conflicts of interest that affect the presentation of fair financial statements," Collins said. "In the case of Arthur Andersen, not catching and not revealing to the public the deceptive financial data on Enron's financial statements is a kind of conflict of interest."
Conflicts of interest between companies and their auditors, the witnesses and committee members agreed, are one of the major causes of corruption.
Collins and Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Governmental Affairs Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, will look into the inner workings of Enron's collapse, while the full committee will investigate how federal agencies and federal laws could have better protected the thousands of Enron employees from losing pension funds.
According to Collins, independent investors are the losers when the investment analysts who are supposed to be recommending stock choices fare better financially when the stock does well.
On the other hand, Collins said, two brokerage firms downgraded the stock when Enron-affiliated investment analysts falsely told employees the stock was strong. The firms were identified as Merrill Lynch and Prudential by Collins's press secretary, Felicia Knight, who added that the two firms had no ties to Enron.
"For a system that places heavy reliance on the obligation of some to safeguard the interests of others," Collins said, "we are remarkably lenient - perhaps even lax - in allowing conflicts of interest."
Published in The Bangor Daily News, in Maine.
