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Inclusionary Housing Is A Pea Shell Game by Wayne Lusvardi “Shell game. A form of the game thimblerig in which spectators bet on the final location of an object hidden under one of three walnut shells or cups that have been shuffled.” Encarta Dictionary Politics has been defined as the art of promising something for nothing and of concealing who really bears the burden of taxation. This was demonstrated recently when Bill Bogaard, the mayor of the City of Pasadena, California was quoted as praising affordable housing advocates for pushing for an amendment to the city’s Inclusionary Housing Ordinance that...

Buzz By Date Legislators brace for perilous record votes on Monday The committee substitute for House Bill 3 is a fascinating read and may work. But it also appears to have all types of political pitfalls other than the obvious one of cutting taxes on high income Texans while raising the taxes of the working and middle class. Talk radio around the state has been ripe with questions about why a payroll tax is not a backdoor income tax. I know. I was asked that question on four different radio programs last week. Of course, the answer is that the...

In the early days of Vietnam I commanded a 150 Marine replacement unit arriving in country by ship. As we entered port the ship's Captain summoned me and ordered a perimeter established around the Seabee compound where we docked. It had been receiving probing attacks by the Viet Cong. When the unit was in position I called my four Staff NCOs and told them to move up and down the line all night to keep everyone alert and their spirits high. I reminded them these were very young Marines and that they had never heard a shot fired in anger....

If any California politician must be above reproach, it's the secretary of state, who runs state elections. But Secretary of State Kevin Shelley, who has a reputation of clean politicking, has gotten himself into an ethical scandal. "A San Francisco nonprofit group paid $108,000 from a state grant to two individuals and two companies who then made donations of nearly identical amounts to Kevin Shelley's successful 2002 campaign for California secretary of state," the San Francisco Chronicle, his home-town newspaper, reported on Sunday. "The money came from a $500,000 taxpayer-financed grant that Shelley himself arranged in 2000 when he was...

The United Nations has determined that Saddam Hussein shipped weapons of mass destruction components as well as medium-range ballistic missiles before, during and after the U.S.-led war against Iraq in 2003. The UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission briefed the Security Council on new findings that could help trace the whereabouts of Saddam's missile and WMD program. The briefing contained satellite photographs that demonstrated the speed with which Saddam dismantled his missile and WMD sites before and during the war. Council members were shown photographs of a ballistic missile site outside Baghdad in May 2003, and then saw a satellite...

Syria and the WMD Shell Game April 21, 2004 by Joe Mariani Since the day the first American soldier stepped across the Kuwait-Iraq border in March 2003, everyone who supported the removal of Saddam Hussein from power has been under a relentless attack from the Left. Led by the "mainstream" media, the attack began on the very first day, at the very first CENTCOM briefing, and has continued like a relentless mosquito whining to this day. Despite the fact that every intelligence service in the world agreed, members of the US government agreed, the United Nations agreed and Iraqi officials...

<p>A key question raised in the big political brouhaha over the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq: Why didn't Saddam just come clean? Had he opened up fully to U.N. inspections and proved he had no WMDs, he would still be in power rather than behind bars facing the gallows.</p>

<p>Major liberal donors are demonstrating their willingness to fund a new shadow Democratic Party, according to reports filed Friday by a network of nominally independent organizations committed to defeating President George W. Bush in November. Meanwhile, a drive to bar their activities has gained strength. On Thursday, the legal staff of the Federal Election Commission proposed regulations that could stifle the groups' plans, with backing from Republican Party leaders and campaign watchdog groups.</p>

Same old game, just new players. Although Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promised during last fall's recall election to end the smoke and mirror state budgeting game, the plan he released last week includes many of the gimmicks he vehemently criticized. He described former Democratic Gov. Gray Davis' recent budgets as "shell games" that depended on borrowing and shaky financial assumptions. Guess what? So does Schwarzenegger's $99 billion budget. The largest chunk of proposed borrowing will come in March, when voters will be asked to approve a $15 billion bond measure to keep California from toppling over the brink of bankruptcy. Like...

<p>Remember the aphorism about giant oaks growing from little acorns? It's as true in politics as it is in botany, as the experience with 10 obscure words in the state constitution would attest. Proposition 13, enacted by voters in 1978, limited property taxes to 1 percent of market value, and said that the taxes would be "apportioned according to law to the districts within the counties."</p>

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites) unveiled his first state, including cuts to education and healthcare spending in a bid to curb the largest state's multi-billion-dollar deficit. AFP/Getty Images Photo   The former actor-turned-politician said he had been forced to make radical spending cuts in the face of a projected 12-14 billion dollar budget shortfall for 2004. Aides say Schwarzenegger's plan will balance the state's precarious finances. "Over the past five years the politicians have made a mess of the California budget, and now it's time to clean it up," Schwarzenegger said in a...

<p>Part of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's $99.1 billion budget proposal unveiled Friday calls for shifting $1.3 billion in property taxes from cities and counties to help pay the state's bill to schools.</p> <p>Even in conservative south Sacramento County, the governor's proposal elicited howls from local officials.</p>

<p>The budget proposed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today will take $1.3 billion of property tax from local governments to offset the state's obligation to pay for schools, sources said Thursday.</p> <p>The proposal would closely resemble the property tax shift that occurred in the early 1990s and has been a sore point in the state's relationship with local governments ever since.</p>

<p>GOV. ARNOLD Schwarzenegger moved Thursday to declare an emergency of his own creation.</p> <p>There is no doubt about the authenticity of the crisis. Cities and counties throughout the state were reeling at the prospect of losing a combined $2.6 billion from the governor's inauguration-day rollback of vehicle license fees.</p>

MP3s Are Not the Devil Since every penny I earn depends on copyright protection, I'm all in favor of reasonable laws to do the job. But there's something kind of sad about the recording industry's indecent passion to punish the "criminals" who are violating their rights. Copyright is a temporary monopoly granted by the government -- it creates the legal fiction that a piece of writing or composing (or, as technologies were created, a recorded performance) is property and can only be sold by those who have been licensed to do so by the copyright holder. Without copyright, once a...

After a week of continuous pounding by coalition forces, Saddam's "true colors," as one U.S. general puts it, are starting to show, as reports of atrocities on the part of the Iraqi regime mount. Israeli television Channel 1 reports Iraq is playing a shell game with coalition forces, hiding missile launchers and Scud missiles on specially constructed trucks that move around the country and hide beneath bridges to escape detection by satellite and air surveillance. Master Sgt. Joe Cross ropes off safe area far from uncontrolled natural-gas fire in Rumaylah oil fields Iraq has so far launched 10 missiles toward...

The Claremont Review of Books is a quarterly journal of statesmanship and political philosophy. Click here for more information.Angelo M. Codevilla is Professor of International Relations at Boston University, a former national security analyst for the Reagan administration, and a Senior Fellow of the Claremont Institute.Also by Angelo M. CodevillaTerror War Cannot Be Won Until Fear is GonePosted on December 19, 2001The Way to Missile DefensePosted on May 5, 2001 Looking for something? Enter any text below to search our content. Enter your email address below to join Precepts, our free weekly policy watch newsletter. Home »   Writings...