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PAGE 4A - THE COMMERCE (GA) NEWS. WEDNESDAY. TANUARY 30. 2008 mion Editorial Views Voters: Tuesday Is Your Chance To Be Heard Voters, this is your chance to be heard. You can determine whether Jackson County restau rants can serve cocktails Sundays and whether new recreational facilities are built. Those are the items on two local referenda scheduled next Tuesday. You can also have a say in who receives the nomi nations for Democratic and Republican parties in the fall presidential elections, as Georgia's Presidential Preference Primaries will be on the ballot Tuesday as well. Opinions are varied, widespread and passionate about all of the issues on the ballots, but if you don't participate, you won't get to express your view where it counts the most. The Commerce News offers the following recom mendations for voters who have yet to make up their minds: • On Sunday sales of alcohol in restaurants: Yes •On the $15 million recreation bond: Yes • For president, Democrat: Barak Obama • For president, Republican: John McCain The sun will rise and set no matter how you vote or who wins, but the more people who cast a ballot, the more likely it is that Jackson County and Georgia will come to consensus on these issues. When people give up on voting, whether due to disappointment in the system, laziness or because they think their vote is irrelevant, democracy doesn't work. Too many times, the "winner" is merely the candidate who got a simple majority of votes in an election where the great majority of people did not participate. Good government requires the participation of the governed. You are called upon to decide whether restaurants can serve mixed drinks seven days a week, whether children will get improved recreation facilities and who Georgia's representatives at the Democratic National Convention and Republican National Convention will support this summer. Vote for whatever and whomever seems best, but please vote. State Of The Union A Result Of Failed Policies President Bush's last State of the Union address acknowledged unease about the economy and gen eral "uncertainty" about the way things are going, but offered little hope that the situation will soon improve. We got where we are through failed policies, from our deficit spending to the war in Iraq, and no super ficial political Band-aid will do more than provide a brief boost in confidence. In an election year, there is hope for change, but the inability of Congress and the executive branch to deal with serious problems seems beyond the grasp of leadership. America's great needs are getting little more than lip service: • The war in Iraq is making little progress, and few believe there is any hope for a stable Iraqi govern ment in the near future. It is draining resources, wasting lives, encouraging terrorism and destroying our prestige abroad. • The war in Afghanistan is suffering because our resources and manpower are tied up in Iraq. • The deficit is growing unabated. •The immigration issue is unresolved. • The cost of health care and health insurance are putting both out of reach of many citizens. The economy is just one issue. Like the others, it is a result of failed policies and a lack of political — and public — discipline. America will face "uncertainty" as long as our leaders and our citizens lack the cour age to face the most pressing issues. Editorials, unless otherwise noted, are written by Mark Beardsley. He can be reached by e-mail at mark@main- streetnews.com. The Commerce News ESTABLISHED IN 1875 USPS 125-320 1672 South Broad Street Commerce, Georgia 30529 MIKE BUFFINGTON Co-Publisher SCOTT BUFFINGTON Co-Publisher MARK BEARDSFEY Editor/General Manager BRANDON REED Sports Editor TERESA MARSHALL Office Manager MERRILL BAGWELL Cartoonist THE COMMERCE NEWS is the legal organ of the city of Commerce and is published every Wednesday by MainStreet Newspapers Inc. Periodical postage paid at Commerce, Georgia 30529. Subscription Rates Per Year: Jackson, Banks and Madison counties, $19.75; State of Georgia, $38.85; out-of-state, $44.50. Most rates dis counted $2 for senior citizens. POSTMASTER send address changes to THE COMMERCE NEWS, P.O. Box 908, Jefferson, GA 30549. this time next year, we’ll have a new set of elected officials to complain about. I Have A Few Questions ... Have you ever looked up the national debt? It's a scary thing to do. There's a U.S. National Debt Clock on the Internet that runs like a taxi meter, and gives the total amount of "outstanding public debt" in Greenwich Mean Time (always four or five hours later than our time, depending on wheth er or not we're on Daylight Savings Time). I probably don't need to point out that the word "out standing," in this context, does not mean wonderful. But it's not entirely awful, either. "Public debt" includes treasury certificates and savings bonds, not just the money we're bor rowing from China. However, if all of our creditors called in their chips, every U.S. citizen, down to the smallest infant, would owe more than $30,000. But that number is a little dated. By the time you read this, it will be higher, I expect. I looked up the national debt Jan. 21 and it was $9,191,936,161,363.86. (Don't you love that 86 cents on the end there? It's such a homey detail. It says that even when we're into the trillions, we count every single penny.) When I looked at the Debt Clock again five days later, we were another five and a quarter billion dollars (and seventy- three cents) in the red. So the debt had gone up at the rate of A Few Facts, A Lot Of Gossip 2 BY SUSAN HARPER about a billion dollars a day. These are the kinds of num bers that make my eyes roll back in my head, as when astronomers talk about how old the starlight is by the time we see it. Take Orion, for exam ple: it's about 427 light years away (with each light year representing nearly 6 trillion miles; my calculator won't go this high, which makes me feel a bit better about my brain). So the light that sparkles before your eyes when you gaze up on a winter night has been travel ing toward you for four and a quarter centuries. You're not only looking up; you're look ing back in time. Those stars you're seeing might not even still be there! With the national debt, though, we can't help look ing forward, knowing that it's not going away, and that the bill will come due one of these days. Our biggest credi tor, interestingly, is not China. As Pogo used to say, "We have seen the enemy, and he is us!" Forty percent of our indebt edness is to various parts of the government: the Federal Reserve Bank, for example. And Social Security, of course. We've been borrowing from Peter to pay — well, whoever we're paying. Gee, I can't even remem ber what my questions were, this is all so confusing (although it has made me feel so much better about those few thousand dollars I owe MasterCard!). Let's try something easier: Why do so many pencils have lousy eras ers these days? I mean, why put an eraser up there at all, if it's just going to add black streaks and smudges and then tear a hole in the paper? Or here's another one: Why does the IRS keep inventing new forms? First it was the voucher form. Now the scannable 1099s have to be accompanied by scannable 1096s. The state form has become so com plex they can't seem to get it printed it all. Anybody think they're complicating them selves right out of a job? On the other hand, do you think the so-called "fair tax" would really be fair? Hmmm — now there's a question! Susan Harper is director of the Commerce Public Library. Give Us Details — Or Shut Up! The presidential election is still months away, and I'm not sure I can bear to hear even one more political speech, debate or comment. I have wanted to scream at the televi sion to silence the speakers or supports of any party. I want to send any and all of the people involved in this political chaos primers in the fundamentals of logic. My brain is weary from hearing generalizations being made without speakers first having established sound premises. My ego is bruised from hearing patronizing feel good messages that might be given to children. Stop trying to manipulate my emotions, I say. I am discouraged by what I am hearing and reading. Just this week a worker for one of the political parties called me to ask which of the candidates of that party I would be most likely to vote for. I told her in a few short sentences how discouraged I was with all the candidates in Views In Rotation ■=-* BY CLAIRE GAUS all parties, and before I could really tell her how I really felt, she hung up on me. Can you imagine? I was not reasoned, cajoled or sympathized with, just hung up on (forgive the preposition at the end of the sentence, but there is no other way to say it). That rude action led me to believe that the worker was not dedicated to the party, just employed. It was just another example of a means to an end — that end being non-binding information without commitment on either end. The idea of means to an end brought up thoughts of Niccolo Machiavelli (1469- 1527) who advocated political principles of any methods of craftiness and duplicity to achieve an end. It is from his philosophy that we inherit the slogan "The end justifies the means." To lie, cheat or equivocate is accepted if the desired end is achieved. The public has been subjected to as much equivocation as the poli ticians can get away with. The "debates" have consisted, for the most part, with one speak er trying to catch the other in an equivocation rather than attacking the lack of a plan or policy. Every speaker has told us what he or she would do as president, each has told us how much better off we'd be if we were to elect him (or her). What I have not heard is what specific beneficial end each Please Turn To Page 5A It's Gospel According To Mark BY MARK BEARDSLEY How To Vote In The Presidential Primaries Tuesday Who to vote for next Tuesday ... I scarcely know where to turn in the Presidential Preference Primary. First of all, for those of you who've never read this before, my leanings are strongly not Republican. I'm not wild about the Democrats either, but since all of the Republicans seem to want to invade Iran, stay in Iraq and since the current bozo of the past seven years is Republican, well, you get the picture. So, I should ask for a Democratic ballot. What then? I'll admit it. A big part of me wants to vote for Hillary Clinton because the very idea of her being president sends so many Republicans — who've been gloating about their hero, the "warrior president," for years — into cardiac arrest. All those Boy George supporters have it coming, I keep thinking. Still, as amusing as it would be to watch the trembling and slobbering of the local die-hard Republicans upon the election of another Clinton, that's not a very good reason to cast a vote. Also, while Clinton is no less qualified than any of the people run ning against her, I dread the ugliness of a six-month campaign with her as a nominee. But that's not a good rea son to not vote for her either. Then, there's Barak Obama. He's the most charismatic and thought ful candidate of them all. I don't like his lack of experience, but if George Bush is an example of what experi ence can do for you, I'm open to a neophyte. Obama is an exciting candidate, and his articulate speech makes him the polar opposite of the current resident of the White House who can barely complete a sentence. Then again, Bush is not running for re-election, so why do I keep bring ing him up? What about John Edwards? I could live with him as a nominee (truth be told, I can live with anyone as a nominee because anyone on the ballot — and that includes the Green candidates and the Libertarians. C'mon, who else, when attacked by a bunch of Saudis, would invade Iraq?). He's a trial lawyer, and I'm supposed to dislike trial lawyers, but with the free hand that government has given corporations to run over the citizens, I'm thinking we'll need more good lawyers. So, let him keep lawyering. I liked Joe Biden a little bit, but he's out of the race. Probably just as well. Though I'm prone to vote Democratic, participating in the Republican primary is not totally out of the question. Do I help some favored Democrat win Georgia's del egates to the national convention, or do I use my vote to help John McCain beat Rudi Giuliani in the Republican primary? That Georgia, after all, is going to vote GOP in the fall somehow makes me think I might should participate in the pro cess of selecting the candidate this state will back in November. Could I vote for a Huckabee? Not in this lifetime. The good news is that I do know how I'm going to vote on the local issues: Sunday sales of mixed drinks in Jackson County and the $15 mil lion recreation bond issue. I'm for both. The presidential campaign will drive a lot of us to drink, and we'll need some more recreational diver sions no matter who's elected. Mark Beardsley is editor of The Commerce News. He can be reached at mark@mainstreetnews. com.