Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie.

Christie’s pension gambit:Making it worse to make it better?

No one should be surprised by the report released today on the state pension funds. Observers have been saying for years that the people who handle the state’s money have bailed on their fiduciary responsibility, preferring instead to push problems off into the future.

We could recount the devises used to avoid paying into the pension fund since Christie Whitman took office in 1994, but that would be foolish.

And we could blame Jon Corzine — not because he created the mess, but because it is convenient to go after an unpopular governor. Of course, he avoided fixing the problem, as well.

This brings me to our current governor, who with much fanfare is withholding the small payment the state was slated to make on the grounds that nothing should go into the pension fund until reforms are passed. This is the height of foolishness. The money we are talking about is money promised to former workers, money they are due and that we have a moral obligation to pay.

I don’t disagree that there are problems with the pension system as it now stands and that changes need to be made. Waiting to make changes in future pensions to pay into today’s fund will only result in a larger unfunded liability as we go forward. Foolish, foolish, foolish.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

A plug from our sponsor (Me)

My book, Certainties and Uncertainties, is going to be published by Finishing Line Press in the near future. FLP has asked that I provide them with a pre-sale mailing list — people who might be interested in purchasing the book in advance. I need a minimum number of presales to get the process rolling.

If you’re interested in being on the list, e-mail me at otherhalf@comcast.net with your mailing address. And thanks in advance.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

Political hypocrisy, or why doesn’t this surprise me?

Here is an interesting letter from the North Jersey Tea Party group that cuts to the chase on the filibuster issue.

Pointing out Democratic politicians’ hypocrisy remains easy sport. Today, the Democrats threaten to use the nuclear option in order to enact a move toward much more socialized medicine. But in 2005, when the Democrats were out of power, they hated the nuclear option. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called the use of this power a “constitutional crisis,” and wailed against its “evaporation” of the government’s “checks and balances.” Then-Senator (and current Vice President) Joe Biden (D-DE) considered using the nuclear option “a naked power grab” and “an example of the arrogance of power.” Then-Senator (and current President) Barack Obama (D-IL) worried against the “absolute power” involved in such a move, noting that it was “not what the Founders intended.” Funny how these supposedly strident concerns completely disappear now that those who voiced them are in power.

Mark Kalinowski
Clifton, N.J.

As I’ve been writing since 2005, when I had my filibuster epiphany, the supermajority requirement in the (already unrepresentative) Senate cuts against the one-man-one-vote concept that is supposed to be at the heart of our democracy. I said at the time that the Democrats’ opposition to the so-called “nuclear option” would come back to haunt them. And now it has.

Of course, the very same Republicans who were ready to pull the plug on the filibuster back then are now its most ardent supporters.

The level of hypocrisy on the issue is not surprising, of course. We are talking about politicians and political power.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

Nuclear reality

The Vermont legislature hasn’t ended our growing national obsession with nuclear power, but it may toss some sand in the engine.

Consider this story in The New York Times:

In an unusual state foray into nuclear regulation, the Vermont Senate voted 26 to 4 Wednesday to block operation of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant after 2012, citing radioactive leaks, misstatements in testimony by plant officials and other problems.

Unless the chamber reverses itself, it will be the first time in more than 20 years that the public or its representatives has decided to close a reactor.

The vote came just more than a week after President Obama declared a new era of rebirth for the nation’s nuclear industry, announcing federal loan guarantees of $8.3 billion to assure the construction of a twin-reactor plant near Augusta, Ga.

While it is unclear how Vermont Yankee’s fate could influence the future of nuclear power nationally, the reactor’s recent troubles are viewed by some as a challenge to arguments that such plants are clean, well run and worth building.

The Vermont decision is unlikely to be duplicated elsewhere because of the specifics of this situation — as the Times points out, Vermont had power at the state level to deal with the plant because of some unusual circumstances — but it offers a more blemished view, if you will, of the nuclear industry than what we have been getting lately.

Nuke plants are not the sleek and clean providers of power that the industry wants us to believe they are. There are security issues, waste disposal issues and the reality that should a plant fail the consequences will be massive. And the Vermont plant, with its slew of troubles, should remind us of this.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.