I had previously been pleasantly surprised that Fox Business gave airtime to libertarian leaning programming like Freedom Watch.

Lew Rockwell asserts that the cancellation is not due to a failure to achieve adequate ratings, although I see no justification for this assertion.

Apparently the programming was a bit too honest and encroached too much onto the anything-but-libertarian agenda of Roger Ailes.

John Stossel will be next.  I do hope that Warren Meyer, my colleague at Coyote Blog, will continue to have opportunities to contribute to Fox Business.

This is further evidence that the mainstream media is at war with liberty, positive change, and any message that might threaten their powerful stranglehold on public opinion in the US.

[Edit 2/9/2012 16:45: Reason has a nice eulogy for the show.]

[Edit #2 2/10/2012 02:00:  Courtesy of Tom Woods post on Facebook, a petition to the VP for Advertising at Fox Business sprang up rather quickly to save Freedom Watch.]

While this sort of alleged abuse is disturbing, it is a tiny glimpse of the abuse and corruption taking place within Arizona state and local government offices.

Keeping with the education theme, consider my first installment here covering the situation at the Arizona Department of Education Information Technology (ADEIT) office.

In defense of ADEIT, a culture of corruption and waste has existed for many years, so perhaps we cannot expect them to escape their history quickly and become an example of ethical behavior and fiduciary responsibility.

Donald Houde, former Chief Information Officer for ADEIT from August 2005 to January 2011, when he was replaced by Mark Masterson, was a convicted felon. To be fair, Houde was only convicted of white collar felony embezzlement from his former employer, Mile Hi Cablevision in Denver Colorado.

It’s not like he touched little boys. On the other hand, the guy stole money from his employer, and after serving his time, ran a division of an Arizona state agency with a massive budget and frequent, large contractual awards to vendors.

If he did touch little boys, then Arizona taxpayers rewarded him with a job as a little league coach. The very presence of Houde at the helm casts ADEIT in a shadow of corruption.

Even without stooping to the example of criminal activity set by its former leader, ADEIT is able to continue cleverly living up to his legacy of wrong-doing, with the taxpayers footing the bill.

Many projects carried out by ADEIT can be put out to bid by private firms with the specialized expertise required to carry out the projects. This is common in both the public and private sectors.

State of Arizona procurement rules require a bid process for project contracts in excess of a particular dollar amount. This allows state agencies to outsource projects requiring specialized expertise and experience to appropriate firms rather than attempting to carry them out internally — a practice that saves taxpayer dollars and prevents government agencies from competing with the private sector.

In addition to project-based contracts, ADEIT requires the services of a large number of outside contractors in addition to its full time employees to carry out its day-to-day information technology responsibilities, a practice not uncommon in both public and private IT shops. This process of relying on outside contractors rather than full time employees to carry out day-to-day functions is called staff augmentation. Procurement rules for staff augmentation are significantly different than those for project bids.

Also common is for IT consulting firms to offer services via both project bids and staff augmentation. ADEIT can hire a consultancy to carry out a project with contracted deliverable products and rates, and it can contract with the same consulting firm to provide individuals to fulfill certain responsibilities as individual contributors, managed by ADEIT.

Project-based contracts go out to bid and follow specific procurement rules. Staff augmentation from an approved vendor is not subject to bid.

Suppose ADEIT powers-that-be want to award a $2M project contract to their buddies. Suppose they further want to avoid all those messy procurement rules designed to protect taxpayers by awarding the project contract to the most qualified firm with the most competitive rates. The wise bureaucratic powers-that-be simply need to skip the bid process altogether, and instead of awarding their buddies with a project contract, they hire a team of staff augmentation contractors from their buddies’ consultancy to coincidentally work on the project they hoped to award to their buddies as a contract

End result: no messy bid process, but the same crony reach-around .

The additional beauty of this scam is that the staff aug contractors need not be qualified or competent. ADEIT can bring in high paid consultants from vendors like Microsoft under pre-approved support contracts to actually execute the project.

Everyone wins, except for the taxpayers.

Does this happen regularly at the Arizona Department of Education Information Technology group? Yes. Simply look at the number of projects put out to bid for computers, software, supplies and services by ADEIT on the ProcureAZ web site (summary: there are none for 2011).

Does this happen elsewhere within state government? I cannot claim that it does; however, I cannot imagine such a simple crony scam being unique to a single group within a single department of state government. I can imagine far more elaborate and lucrative scams running rampant throughout our state government departments.

The pipeline, proposed by Canadian company TransCanada, will carry oil from the shale fields in Alberta, Canada to refineries in the US Gulf Coast.  Recently nixed by the US State Department (due to inadequate time for proper evaluation based on a deadline set by Congress), the pipeline has been the subject of a myriad of political maneuvering by special interests, the Obama administration, the GOP, the Democratic Party, foreign corporations, domestic corporations, labor unions, and state governments (and this is an incomplete list).

In addition to GOP presidential candidates adopting the Keystone issue, a bill has been introduced in the US Senate to approve the pipeline.  It is worth noting that this bill may be the first time in decades that the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution has been applied as intended — exercising the authority of Congress to regulate commerce with foreign nations.  Perhaps someone should make a plaque to commemorate the event.

Coyote Blog has done a fantastic job addressing the environmental and energy policy issues surrounding the Keystone pipeline.  In the comments on these posts, some commentators raised the issue of eminent domain being used to secure easements for the pipeline across private property.

The New York Times outlines the eminent domain issues here.  In summary, TransCanada, the Canadian corporate owner of the pipeline, is suing property owners who refuse to allow the pipeline to cross their private land.

You read that correctly.  A foreign corporation is asking the courts to exercise eminent domain to grant it ownership or easement of private property.

I am not an attorney (although I sometimes claim to be one for fun), but isn’t eminent domain usually exercised by local executive and legislative branches to seize private property for the public good?  Can the courts even exercise eminent domain?

As we learned from the Kelo decision, apparently local governments can transfer property from one private owner to another when the transfer is construed as serving the public good.  Does this apply to foreign corporations?

While the GOP may make Keystone a cornerstone of its current agenda, the issues surrounding the pipeline are not going to disappear regardless of any fast track they can implement.  Property owners in multiple states are going to fight the eminent domain aspects of this, and they’re going to be well-funded by special interests who have no actual concern for property rights.

I predict this one is going to land in the Supreme Court.

(Suggestion to TransCanada:  offer more money for the easements.)

“Finding it cheaper to use human labor than to automate, the factory assigns workers to shifts that has them performing the same repetitive tasks, sometimes for up to 35 hours straight, often resulting in debilitating and irreversible carpal tunnel syndrome.”

This sort of concern for his fellows is laudable although a bit naive, and demonstrates an ignorance of the economic and social reality in nations beginning a process of industrialization.

The factory workers for which Takei expresses concern are certainly working crazy hours for small compensation.  It’s easy to feel sympathy for them.  However, a short few years ago, these same workers were likely working communal agricultural jobs, earning far less money, doing much harder labor, and laboring longer hours to do so.  They have taken a step up in life.  When their current contracts expire, they will have gathered skills and money that allow them to move past their current jobs to better jobs.  New workers will take their place, advancing from their agricultural existence to an industrial one.  Wages will increase as more workers gain this new income, since this new capital will create new jobs and competition for skilled workers.  At some point, wages will increase to the point where it is not economical to use cheap labor instead of automation.  This is how industrialization and the economics of emerging nations work.  The capital that Apple injects into this market is uplifting.

At least, that’s the way it works in a free(-ish) market.  I do have concerns with industry in China, where the value of human life is so low that potential for a slave economy is real.  Apple’s concern should not be with the working conditions of laborers voluntarily assembling their devices.  Their concern should be to insure that these workers enter are employed voluntarily.  That is, do not let their concern for low-wage workers prevent these workers from earning any wages — a case of good intentions having hurtful results.  If Apple chooses to take its money elsewhere, where laborers are paid better, does this really help the laborers who lose their  jobs?  How?

View Thomas Olmsted’s Letter

Olmsted plainly states that Catholics “will not … comply with this unjust law.” I applaud Olmsted for his opposition and refusal to comply. Noncompliance with unconstitutional laws has a rich history of precedents and forms, among them the traditions of civil disobedience and nullification. Mechanisms to combat and overturn this sort of intrusive law exist within the courts, and belong within the purvey of the courts.

However, I disagree with Olmsted’s justification for opposition and noncompliance with this law. Olmsted writes, “the Administration has cast aside the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, denying to Catholics our Nation’s first and most fundamental freedom, that of religious liberty.”

This issue has nothing to do with the First Amendment. Rather, it is a simple overstepping of constitutional authority granted to the federal government. The arguments against this law are identical to those against the individual mandate contained within Obamacare — to claim constitutionality for this sort of law at the federal level requires a (all too common) broadening of the Commerce Clause, General Welfare Clause, or Necessary and Proper Clause. But, that’s not my point.

Suppose a valid argument against this law exists under the concept of religious freedom in the First Amendment. What would that argument be? In its simplest form, it would claim an exemption to federal law for any religious group with doctrine that contradicts federal law. For instance, those of Islamic faith would claim that in situations where Sharia Law conflicts with federal law, Sharia Law would be supreme. Does Olmsted intend to justify and legalize honor killings? His argument does just that. I wonder, will Olmsted defend the litany of otherwise illegal atrocities that can be justified by religious doctrine, or perhaps he views the law as something to be selectively applied and interpreted based on his desired outcome.

Catholics (and others of religious faith) tend to look toward their church leaders for guidance in matters of politics and law. Olmsted and other religious leaders must more carefully consider the guidance they provide to their flock.