Category: Commentary

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Commentary

The Quartzsite Affair

When a small town reporter was removed from a public meeting and its mayor replaced by the chief of police, Quartzsite, Arizona showed how quickly democracy can devolve into dictatorship.

On the morning of July 11, 2011, residents of Quartzsite, Arizona, a small town of 3,677, awoke to find themselves in the midst of a bloodless coup. Sunday night, the five-member town council held a closed session in which they declared a state of emergency, ousted the mayor, and installed the chief of police as chief executive. Their alarming actions were the latest salvo in a battle over a woman who was arrested for speaking out at a Quartzsite town council meeting the previous week.

On June 28, Jennifer Jones, publisher of the Desert Freedom Press, rose during the “call to the public” section of the meeting, in which members of the public are invited to speak. Jones began to address rules that had been recently introduced by the town council, at which time one council member, a Mr. Joe Winslow, ordered her to relinquish the microphone. When she refused, Police Sergeant Fabiola Garcia attempted to forcibly remove the microphone from Jones’ hands.

Quartzsite’s mayor, Ed Foster, who was elected in May 2010 on a platform of fighting corruption, protested the removal and even told the officers that they were violating the rules of order. This was not the first time the mayor and the town council had been at odds. Mr. Foster had recently uncovered a ghost payroll totaling around $250,000 a year, and suspected the town council members themselves were involved with the graft.

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Commentary

Fortuna and the Free Market

Photo by Naim Benjelloun on Pexels.com

“And thus does Fortune’s wheel turn treacherously
And out of happiness bring men to sorrow.”
~ Geoffrey Chaucer

Imagine you and another person are standing around a roulette wheel at a high-end casino. You place $50 on black and the other man places $50 on red. The ball has landed on a black or red number a dozen times, and you are confident it will land on either black or red once again. Both you and the gentleman are hoping to double your money.

Your odds are not 50/50, however. In an American roulette wheel, there is a single zero and a double zero, both green, nestled among the other 36 numbers. The odds of hitting these are slim, and so you both shrug off that probability.

The attendant calls for final bets, and at the last minute, an elderly lady places $5 on zero. The wheel spins. The ball lands on the single green zero, and the elderly lady walks away with $180.

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Commentary

Social Justice, Marxism, and Christianity

Christian social justice is a positive concept. It can and should be taken back from the secular left.

Simply defined, social justice is the view that everyone deserves equal access to economic, political, and social rights and opportunities, which is a concept most people can get behind. This perspective has become controversial, however, largely because of its co-option by the secular left, Marxists and socialists. The term “Social Justice Warrior” conjures images of hysterical activists and has become a pejorative even for people outside the political right wing. 

It doesn’t have to be that way.

Social justice incubated in the Catholic Church. In the 1840s, Father Luigi Taparelli used the term to criticize the major economic theories at the time for ignoring moral philosophy and for undermining the unity of society by dividing it into competing classes. Since then, the Catholic Church has been clear about its condemnation of both Marxism/socialism and unrestrained capitalism. 

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Commentary

Where’s the Beef?

We should be celebrating the fact that innovation and entrepreneurship has brought a wide variety of food options to the table for people of all economic backgrounds, and not attacking a company for providing cheap food at a cheap price.

By all accounts, Taco Bell is a story of success. Since Glen Bell opened the first Taco Bell restaurant in Downey, California in 1962, the franchise has expanded to 7,072 restaurants with over 200,000 employees worldwide. In 2015, the company (which is currently owned by Yum! Brands) brought in $1.98 billion in revenue. It is no secret why this restaurant has experienced such growth.

Like its rivals in the fast food industry, Taco Bell specializes in offering meals to its customers at the cheapest possible price. In 2011, the company came under attack by a publicity-seeking law firm and a news media that was all-too-eager to exploit any potential controversy, no matter how frivolous. What should have been a story about how a private business feeds millions of people for what amounts to pocket change was instead a pseudo-investigation into what qualified as ground beef.

No one has ever gone into a Taco Bell under the illusion they were purchasing quality food, because we are all aware that you cannot stuff 460 calories into a burrito and charge 99 cents without sacrificing something. Its cheapness is the foundation of its appeal, and even the company acknowledges this fact with its advertising slogans “Big Variety, Small Price,” and “Why Pay More?”

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Commentary

When “Fairness” is No Longer Fair

Photo by Max Fischer on Pexels.com

When a girl was denied admittance to her school’s gifted program because her family’s income was too high, it exposed the inherent unfairness of certain policies designed to redress economic inequality in public school.

In February 2010, Hannah Workman, a fifth grader and straight-A student in Florida’s Clay County School District, was denied entrance to her elementary school’s gifted program because she did not score high enough on the entrance exam. Remarkably, her mother later learned that Hannah would have scored high enough to enter the program if her family earned less. 

The standards on the entrance exam, she discovered, were based on income level and English proficiency. Students who qualified for free or reduced lunch or who spoke limited English only had to score in the 90s to qualify, while other children needed to score at least 130.

Though seemingly a minor footnote in the story of America’s public schools, the testing policy of this Florida school district cuts to the core of the philosophical debate over the role of education raging among educators and policy makers. It reveals much about the changing definition of “fairness” and the problem with using publicly-funded education to redress social inequality.

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Cast Down Your Bucket Where You Are

Every dollar spent at a locally owned business pays dividends in your community. If you wish to see a viable economy, choose local businesses over chain stores.

In 1895, educator and author Booker T. Washington cajoled members of his community to “cast down your bucket where you are” instead of seeking labor or employment somewhere else. Likewise, I believe more can be accomplished for the benefit of our community by casting our talents and our dollars where we live by buying and producing locally, as well as abandoning a “there’s nothing I can do” attitude.

It’s tempting in the face of seemingly intractable problems to uproot and leave, convinced that nothing can be done. Individuals and families make this choice every day. I spoke to dozens of friends and acquaintances who have left Illinois for greener pastures over the past several years, and I can count myself in that number. 

For a community to be successful, however, a collective effort is needed to bring the kind of entertainment, businesses, and recreation you want to see, as well as support those places already in existence. Supporting local businesses means using your dollars like votes in favor of the businesses you want to remain. 

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Commentary Saudade

My First Foray Into Local Politics

Running for public office can be a rewarding experience, if you learn the right lessons. It’s a crash course in local government with few downsides but, perhaps, a bruised ego.

In 2012, while living in Rockford, Illinois, I did something I never thought of doing before. With little money and little experience, and with a lot of personal reservations, I decided to run for public office. While I ended up losing the race, I gained valuable insight and experience into local politics, and I saw a side to the process that most people never see. I hope demystifying this process will encourage others to get involved.

It began with a casual suggestion: We need people like you to run for office. Then, a thought: Why not? I chose to run for a seat on the Winnebago County Board in the Republican primary election. 

In Winnebago County, Illinois in 2012, an aspiring candidate only needed 25 signatures for his or her name to appear on the primary ballot for the position of County Board Member (other elected positions require hundreds or thousands of signatures, and it is always a good idea to get twice as many as you need). After introducing myself and announcing my intentions at a community meeting, and being greeted by rowdy applause, I decided to commit myself to the race. Three other candidates, including the incumbent, joined me in declaring their intention to run.

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