New Mexico State Senator Sue Wilson Beffort had an excellent opinion piece in today’s Albuquerque Journal. As Beffort points out, it is useful to note that New Mexico has a whole host of public programs available for the uninsured, that people with pre-existing health conditions are not denied insurance (as reform proponents often claim), and that prescription drugs are actually becoming more affordable for both the elderly and the general public. As Beffort summarizes her argument, Congress should consider maximizing these programs and their effectiveness before completely revising our entire health care system.

In addition to this piece, a reader attacked my recent opinion piece. The author, Leon Logan, writes:

Paul Gessing’s column on July 20 is pure propaganda that is a coordinated and intensive effort to maintain the status quo in health care.

He says that the “heavy hand” of the government and its bureaucracy are the reasons for our expensive health-care system. The Food and Drug Administration is given as an example. I suppose his “research” has determined that the “heavy hand” of the government was responsible for our current financial situation. Medicare’s bureaucracy is about one third that of private insurance “bureaucracy.”

The Rio Grande Foundation is supposed to be a “nonpartisan, tax exempt, research and educational organization.” I guess the fact that we have the most expensive health-care system in the world, rank about 35th in results … and the only “free market” system was too obscure for “research” to reveal.

Not surprisingly, Logan argues that I want the “status quo.” This is patently false and I mention some specific reforms at the end of the piece. I’ve also made the case for free market reforms elsewhere. And then he goes on to exempt the government from any and all responsibility for the current financial crisis, a very complex situation that resulted from many factors, including government policy.

Lastly, the cartoon below is an excellent summary of the “uninsured” situation in the United States.

Our good friend Marita Noon over at the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy had an excellent op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal recently (you can read it here). The basic point of the article is that even “green” energy sources like wind power require mineral resources from the earth. Unfortunately, environmental zealots, many of whom preach the benefits of green jobs that they say will inevitably result from a taxpayer-subsidized shift to their preferred sources of energy, often stand in the way of efforts to access those needed resources here at home.

Americans are abundantly knowledgeable about the shortcomings of their health care system. On top of this is the drivel from the mainstream media touting the wonders of socialized medicine overseas. Fortunately, there are many Americans who have first-hand experience with foreign medical systems. And, while personal stories vary based on the individual, the importance of these first-hand accounts cannot be denied.

The Rio Grande Foundation’s Research Director, Ken Brown’s wife Agnes is of Dutch decent and has had significant dealings with the system. In this brief article, “Dutch Health Care, I’ll Take Albuquerque,” Agnes Brown explains how the system places onerous restrictions on end-of-life care and burdens taxpayers.

Also, I will be debating Carol Miller on health care on “In Focus” on KNME (Channel 5 in Albuquerque) this evening at 7pm. Tune in.

The Rio Grande Foundation hasn’t really done any work on the wolf reintroduction issue. After all, the killing of wolves was subsidized by US taxpayers.

That said, we do have serious concerns about the cost and scope of federal programs. That is the tack that our investigative journalist, Jim Scarantino, took in his new report “Does the Federal Government Value Wolves More Than Humans? The Money Says It All.” The press release is available here.

Several governors around the nation have been speaking out in opposition or “with concern” about the health care plans being pushed by President Obama and Congressional Democrats. A New York Times article about this can be found here. In the article, New Mexico’s Bill Richardson is quoted as saying “I’m personally very concerned about the cost issue, particularly the $1 trillion figures being batted around.”

While not explicitly opposing the plan, Richardson’s comments are clearly negative and should be cheered by opponents of government-run health care. Of course, we all know that Richardson proposed his own government-run health care scheme a few years back. Richardson’s proposal was a bit more like the Massachusetts plan that is also failing, but there are enough differences between the two, that I suppose Richardson could support one and not the other.

At this point, an excellent question might be “What say you Diane Denish?”

President Obama has increased spending to unprecedented levels. This has rightfully caused a great deal of consternation among broad swaths of American society. Hopefully it will result in the deaths of legislation that would restrict our health care and energy choices while killing economic growth.

But which president bears the greatest responsibility for our current predicament? As much as Obama has done to grow the federal government, George W. Bush still retains the dubious distinction as the architect of our current economic mess. As Ivan Eland of the Independent Institute points out:

The U.S. government is deeper in debt than it has been since just after World War II. When Bill Clinton, who actually reduced the federal deficit as a portion of GDP, left office, the Congressional Budget Office projected an $800 billion dollar yearly budget surplus for the years 2009 to 2012. Now CBO projects an annual budget deficit of a whopping $1.2 trillion.

Although Republicans are blaming Barack Obama for this gargantuan budget gap, George W. Bush is responsible for 53 percent of the total, according to the New York Times. Another 37 percent is due to the recession of the early part of the decade and the global meltdown that began in late 2007. Obama is responsible for only 10 percent of the total. Yet the reason that Obama’s portion is so small is because George W. Bush, a big-government Republican, was in office for eight years, and Obama has been in office less than six months. Obama has been spending at a phenomenal rate—on a pork-filled stimulus bill and an expansive domestic agenda.

Thus, Obama is guilty of making Bush’s legacy of massive red ink even worse. Obama’s budget would double the projected deficit over the next 10 years. By 2019, federal spending is projected to be an eye-popping quarter of the nation’s GDP. By contrast, for four decades federal taxation has averaged about 18 percent of GDP. These massive deficits, accumulating as a monstrous national debt, could cause hyperinflation and the prolonged economic stagnation (stagflation) that would make the 1970s look like an economic picnic.

The good news is that Obama still has time to pull the country out of this economic nose-dive. If he fails to restrain the federal leviathan, he’ll undoubtedly surpass Bush in the big-spending, big-debtor category.

Jim and I sat down with Albuquerque Dr. Torre Near for an hour-long discussion of health care issues on Saturday. The podcast is available here. While Near is generally free market in her approach, she, Jim, and I certainly don’t agree on all the issues relating to health care reform. I have to say that this is one of the best shows we’ve done.

In case you haven’t seen it already, I have an opinion piece on health care reform in today’s Albuquerque Journal. With not one, but two, recent op-eds having appeared in the paper’s opinion pages on behalf of “Medicare for All,” it is a bit disappointing that the editor felt the need to run a “pro-reform” op-ed alongside mine.

As I wrote yesterday, I was going to be on Channel 4 to discuss a high speed rail proposal that Governor Richardson and Sen. Tom Udall are eying. The story led off the 6pm news and my interview was the bulk of the story.

Check it out here.

The American Petroleum Institute has put out its annual energy quiz. The interactive quiz will ask about 25 questions about energy and energy policy. There are no “gimmees!” I scored only 55%. See if you can beat me and post a comment.

The critics and pundits say that newsprint is dead. Don’t believe it! The Rio Grande Foundation has a print publication focusing on issues relating to the Legislature and state policy issues called Capitol Report New Mexico. You can subscribe to Capitol Report by donating to the Rio Grande Foundation.

Another recently-launched publication is The New Mexico Breeze. The publication attempts to:

1. better inform readers regarding politics and current events with behind-the-scenes information, and

2. provide positive news about the state, leaving readers with a sense of pride as New Mexicans.

Recently they published an article by our own Jim Scarantino on the paper’s front page.

Speaking Freely airs 9am to 10am on Saturdays. Jim and I will be discussing health care reform with Albuquerque-based doctor Torre Near, MD. Dr. Near recently wrote a great opinion piece on health care that appeared in the Albuquerque Journal.

Tune in to the show and feel free to give us a call at 505-265-1550. It is sure to be an interesting discussion.

I just got around to reading last Sunday’s Albuquerque Journal opinion section. There I saw a piece by Nick Mandel’s piece “Pension Envy Won’t Fix State Budget, Policy Woes.” As far as I could tell, the organization does not have a website, but the essence of Mandel’s argument is:

1) Yes, government pensions are far more generous than those offered by the private sector because government can always extract money from the private sector and they don’t have any profit pressures (but please don’t hold it against us);
2) Cuts can be made to the Governor’s exempt employee hires, double-dipping should be stopped, and taxes should be raised on corporations in order to bring in more money. Well, two out of three ain’t bad. Certainly, Richardson’s has hired great numbers of exempt employees and double-dipping should be stopped (of course, the problem is that public employees are able to get pensions far too early, thus they can retire and get back to work for the government again).

I took a different take in a recent article on the pension situation. Sure, government pensions have been reduced by $80 million, but this is a drop in the bucket. As we’ve discussed in the past, the number and overall compensation levels of government employment are out of line with the private sector. Mandel prefers to ignore that.

So, Mandel offers a few good options for cost savings (and one bad tax hike), but that doesn’t mean that an inflated government bureaucracy is not a problem.

Those who advocate for government-run health care reform love to talk about how “simple” their plans are and how they are the ones restoring the patient-doctor relationship. The problem is that anytime government is involved in managing the economy, things get complicated…and fast.

Here is a flow-chart illustrating how the House Democrats’ health care plan would work in practice:

Unfortunately, the flow chart does not adequately illustrate how the $1.5 trillion extra needed to run the plan will have to be obtained.

This article more fully explains the flow chart and how it will be used.

Last week I wrote about my appearance on Channel 4’s News on the topic of “high-speed rail.” Of course, when government officials discuss rail in a “high-speed” context, some inevitably get stars in their eyes and believe that this means 150 mph or more.

Blogger Heath Haussamen makes this mistake in his weekly blog roundup when he writes that 2 hours to Denver would be “cool.” He’s actually citing a post by the Santa Fe Reeper blog which fantasizes about actual high speed rail to Denver which is being advocated by a special interest, but is not even remotely on the table policy-wise because it would be ridiculously expensive.

The reality is that Denver and Albuquerque are 450 miles apart. Even running at the Reeper’s fantasy speed of 200 mph, trains won’t go from ABQ to Denver in 2 hours. At 110 mph, the speed proposed by President Obama, Governor Richardson, and Sen. Udall, a train trip from Albuquerque to Denver would take at least 5 or 6 hours.

Rail advocates can dream about 200 mph rail in New Mexico if they want to, but if Obama had any brains at all, he’d focus resources on increasing speeds on Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor, an area with far greater population density than New Mexico and Colorado, yet the Acela only gets up to 150 mph, it’s top speed, for a few miles of its trip between Washington, DC and Boston.

The RailRunner is already enough of a boondoggle. Can’t we stop wasting our money with that?

You can listen to the podcast of this and other episodes of “Speaking Freely” here.

On Saturday’s episode, Jim and Paul discussed Diane Denish’s recent pronouncements on government transparency and whether her ties to the corruption of the Richardson Administration and silence regarding ongoing scandals detracts from her forward-looking stance on the issue. Then, Jim and Paul discuss plans for “high speed rail” being put forth by President Obama, Governor Richardson, and Sen. Udall and whether the plans make sense for New Mexico.

Brian Colón, the Chairman of the Democratic Party of New Mexico, and I took part in an online health care debate for the Albuquerque Journal last week. He essentially re-stated his opening remarks in an opinion piece on health care that appeared yesterday in the Journal.

Unfortunately, while Colón is good at providing talking points as to why we need health care reform, he does a lot of writing without actually suggesting any specific ways in which Americans in general and New Mexicans in general can obtain less costly, better health care. This is not a surprise since Colón is not a policy expert, rather he is a party builder, and he may not want to step on any toes. After all, not all elected Democrats support “universal,” let alone single-payer, health care.

Unlike Brian, I have actually proposed some specific health care reforms that will, if adopted, reduce costs and lead to better health care. The problem I have with most advocates of so-called “reform” is that they are working under the assumption that the politicians can get together and Washington and come up with a government system that will please everyone. Unfortunately (for them), as Obama and Congressional leadership have been forced to come up with specifics, the various interest groups have started fighting and the plan seems to be stalling.

The simple fact is that we live in a world of limited resources. While everyone thinks they can get their way when they sit down at the lobbying table, the fact is that someone ultimately loses in a zero-sum game.

While New Mexicans have been led to believe that their economic futures are tied to the New Mexico Spaceport now being built near Truth or Consequences, the truth is that spaceports are already under development across the nation.

With an already-crowded spaceport field, I read over the weekend in the Albuquerque Journal that Hawaii is the next state that may be entering the fray. According to the report:

If the plan goes forward, tourists would pay $200,000 for a weeklong package including spaceflight training, resort accommodations and short test flights to simulate weightlessness.

At the vacation’s finale, five voyagers would embark on a horizontal takeoff aboard a special rocket plane, climb to 40,000 feet before rockets fire, accelerate to 3,500 mph, coast for a few minutes of weightlessness 62 miles above the Earth, flip over and then return to ground.

While New Mexico’s spaceport will undoubtedly be an early entrant into , it seems highly unlikely that the space industry will be very lucrative for the Land of Enchantment given the ever-increasing number of competitors. Perhaps Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle will give Hawaii taxpayers a break by not releasing funding for that State’s spaceport. Unfortunately, spaceport fever seems to be spreading among elected officials nationwide.

In case you missed it, as I blogged earlier this week, I took part in an online debate on health care that was sponsored by the Albuquerque Journal. Day four of the debate postings and comments are available here.

If you enjoyed this, please let the Journal know and ask them to continue to invite the Rio Grande Foundation to take part in these discussions.

Lt. Governor Diane Denish is running for the state’s top office in 2010. She will be a formidable candidate, there is no doubt about it. Her biggest hurdle is most likely to be the time she has spent closely associated with current Gov. Bill Richardson. And, while it is true that they did not run as a ticket, there is no doubt that voters and the public will wonder why she didn’t do more to stop corruption and ethics violations that have run rampant in Santa Fe.

That said, Denish is due some credit for her recent public pledge to make transparency a centerpiece of her campaign. According to this story in Forbes, Denish has proposed creating a Web-based “sunshine portal” that would allow New Mexicans to track state expenditures, check on scheduled meetings, learn more about high-level state employees and their salaries, check out laws and regulations and offer opinions.

While I’m not sure what to make of one of her other proposals, that being for a powerful statewide ethics commission that “could investigate ethics complaints, launch its own probes, impose fines, refer cases for criminal prosecution, and establish a code of ethics and training for state workers and appointees,” the sunshine portal really is newsworthy and I think the Rio Grande Foundation can take some credit for this. In fact, we introduced Denish (and many other legislators in Santa Fe) this session to Robert Wood of the Texas Comptroller’s office. Texas’s comptroller Susan Combs has been a national leader in promoting government transparency and would be a great model for Denish and/or others who want to improve government transparency to follow.

The Rio Grande Foundation actually maintains a “Sunshine Page.” We call it Sunshine Review. Check out various transparency-related legislation here.

As I wrote yesterday, I was going to be on Channel 4 to discuss a high speed rail proposal that Governor Richardson and Sen. Tom Udall are eying. The story led off the 6pm news and my interview was the bulk of the story.

Check it out here.

Governor Richardson and Sen. Tom Udall held a press conference today to discuss efforts to bring “high speed rail” to New Mexico. According to the two of them, “New Mexico, Colorado and Texas could receive up to $5 million from the Federal Railroad Administration under the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008 to study the viability of the El Paso to Denver High-Speed Rail Corridor.” Watch the 6pm news on Channel 4 as I was interviewed on the high speed rail issue earlier today.

While using taxpayer money to study these issues is minor in the scope of the overall federal budget, the Rio Grande Foundation has produced a study on the issue that throws cold water on the idea of high speed rail. The release is available here and the full paper can be found here.

As author Randal O’Toole points out in the study:

The administration’s proposed high-speed rail plan will cost $1,000 for every federal income taxpayer, yet the average American will ride high-speed trains less than 60 miles a year, says a new report from the Rio Grande Foundation. The report says that the average New Mexico resident will rarely use high-speed trains.

The federal government is proposing to build true high-speed rail lines—with trains going faster than 120 miles per hour—only in California and Florida. In most of the rest of the country, it is merely proposing to upgrade existing freight tracks to boost top Amtrak speeds from 79 to 110 mph.

Trains with a top speed of 110 mph will have average speeds of just 55 to 75 mph. Not only will that attract few people out of their cars, says the report, such trains will actually be less energy efficient and more polluting than driving.

The federal government left New Mexico out of its plans entirely. But New Mexico’s share of local proposals for moderate-speed trains Albuquerque to Denver are likely to cost $400 for every New Mexico resident—and true high-speed trains would cost at least $7,500 for every New Mexican.

Seems like we could save that $5 million and use it for something a bit more useful than another study, but if the study is done honestly, it will likely show that the costs of moderately high speed rail far outweigh the benefits.

My apologies for not getting last week’s episode up more quickly, but the show from July 27 is now up as is the July 4 show.

On the 27th, Jim and I interview Tina with the Albuquerque Tea Party about the 4th of July Tea Party (video of event here), then Jim and Paul discuss the difficulties of doing business in the oil and gas industries in New Mexico with the author of a new international study on the topic. Lastly, Jim and Paul interview 1st district (Albuquerque-area) Republican Congressional candidate Jon Barela.

On the 4th of July show Jim Scarantino revisited the Declaration of Independence and it’s world-changing proclamations of fundamental human rights. Jim also discussed political corruption in New Mexico with Harvey Yates, the GOP’s new chairman, who has a personal story to tell of how he stood up to a shake down by the Valencia County attorney.

All speaking freely podcasts are available here.

If you have ever been to this blog before, it should be readily apparent that the site has been changed quite dramatically. We have shifted from MoveAble Type to WordPress which I’m told is better and more modern. I certainly think the site’s appearance has been improved dramatically. I’d be interested in your thoughts, so please feel free to leave a comment.

Thanks to our intern Jason Foral and to Pat Riley at Ovationsolutions, our internet provider and technological advisors.