By Richard Larsen

Published – Idaho State Journal, 12/11/11

Liberals can find absolutely nothing positive about the remaining slate of Republican candidates for president. That shouldn’t surprise us; after all they have their messianic figure. I have a neighbor who still has a picture of him in their living room like most of us have a picture of Christ. I guess once you’ve been duped it’s hard to admit it.

What is surprising is the abject hatred displayed by some over the Republican candidates. Playing into the most predictable stereotyping, they’re portrayed as not just wrong, but evil. To one local columnist, Republicans are insultingly portrayed as either a Frankenstein-like amalgam that only people who “can’t think for themselves” would vote for, or as “kooks” in a reality cooking show, claiming none of them have any substance except a “Mormon waffle.” The attempt at humor does nothing to shroud the obvious disdain, which leaves all objectively thinking people wondering what precipitates such hate and anger!

While few Republicans may be totally enthralled with the available choices, any of the candidates would be far better than what we currently have in the Oval Office. I’ve heard it said that the only way to have a candidate that you agree with 100% of the time, is for you, yourself, to run. There’s a lot of truth to that aphorism.

Sometimes we have to take a little different perspective on candidates for public office, and this is a perfect time to employ such a paradigm shift. Let’s look at what none of the remaining Republican or even third party candidates have done, or any of the people that work for those candidates.

None of them have brought the nation to the brink of insolvency by nearly doubling federal spending in three years creating a “national security risk,” according to Hillary Clinton, by racking up so much debt that we’re left little wiggle room for dealing with any other threats to the republic.

None of them ramrodded an ideologically motivated health care takeover bill through Congress, virtually eliminating Medicare to make the CBO scoring look better, and got away with it.

None of them have taken over entire sectors of the national private sector economy, like the financial services sector and the auto industry. None of them have not run anything before. Yes, I know, it’s a double negative. Think it through.

None of them have proven for the past three years that they know absolutely nothing about basic economics. None of them have egregiously expanded government regulatory control over all components of the economy stymying economic growth and job creation.

None of them have presided over an economy that has lost 7.5 million jobs and has had 6.5 million people just stop looking for work. None of them have bailed out Wall Street firm after Wall Street firm, and bank after bank, claiming they’re doing right for the American people for doing so. 

None of them have presided over an economy with runaway inflation, with gas 115% higher, corn up 78%, sugar up 164%, unemployment up 25%, food stamp recipients up 35%, long-term unemployed up 146%, poverty rate up 8.3%, and the highest misery index since Jimmy Carter.

None of them have claimed to be constitutional law experts while displaying complete ignorance of that document’s contents. None of them have hired a cadre of known socialists to run important components of the government and called them czars.

None of them shut down oil production in the gulf or prohibited domestic drilling and oil exploration contributing to record high gas prices nor did any of them ignore court orders to lift that ban. None of them have been using some guy’s social security number from Vermont. None of them have hoodwinked the mainstream media into portraying everything they do as successful.

None have run illegal gun operations over the Mexican border only to have the same contraband weaponry show up at the murder scenes of U.S. law enforcement agents.

None of them have jetted around the world apologizing for America. None of them showed up ostentatiously at G8 meetings in Europe during austerity talks due to excessive government spending, with an entourage of 500 people. 

Not one of them promised to “bring everybody together,” and then violated that promise by engaging in the most divisive rhetoric of class warfare ever employed by a national leader. Not one of them have been implicated in making shady half-a-billion dollar loans to questionable “green energy” companies which went broke, and connived with them on layoffs to manipulate unemployment numbers.

See how a paradigm shift improves ones perspective? All of those “accomplishments” by the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue make any and all of those remaining Republican candidates look awfully appealing. Unless you’re an ostrich.

By Richard Larsen

Published - Idaho State Journal, 12/3/11

Parents in Nashville, Tennessee were concerned about their minor son’s health condition, including the possibility that the doctor was over-medicating him. The doctor recommended administration of drug tests to see if there were other factors contributing to his discomfort. The doctor made it clear, however, that he would not be able to release the drug test results to the parents, but only to the child. After all, as the doctor erroneously explained, the child had a right to privacy based on federal law that trumped the parental rights to care for, nurture, and protect their child.

Parents of a kindergarten age child in Massachusetts were shocked to find some of the books and materials being sent home with their 5-year-old were sex education materials and books that normalize and promote homosexual activity. After visiting with the teacher and getting nowhere on an “opt out” agreement for their child, the parents met with the principal, who in turn sent the parents to a “diversity” workshop to increase their acceptance of the indoctrination of their child.

After their disturbing experience at the workshop, the parents met again with the principal, begging for prior notification of sexual content instruction and for an opt out for their child. The principal responded to their request by having a police officer handcuff and forcibly remove the concerned parents for trespassing. Parental rights to protect, teach, nurture, and inculcate fundamental values were trampled by the education establishment intently motivated by an ideological agenda.

A child in Washington state complained to a school counselor about his parents making him go to church too much. Without notifying the parents, the counselor contacted a state social worker who took the 13-year-old boy directly from school and placed him in a foster home until a judicial hearing could be set for the parents to argue their case before a judge.

These are not isolated cases. Through legislative and judicial overreach, an increasing amount of power is given to the state over our children. As with the examples provided, all parents who fail to comply with a certain ideology are assumed to be bad parents, and the state’s intentions pristine. These efforts are methodically replacing parental discretion in all areas of child rearing and development with governmental and bureaucratic dominion over our minor children.

Karl Marx, in chapter 2 of The Communist Manifesto, said that in order to establish a perfect social state you have to destroy the family. You have to substitute the government for parental authority in the rearing of children. Whether intentional or not, the current trend of erosion of parental rights and refusal to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act are perfectly facilitating the socialist agenda.

In 1989 the United Nations adopted the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), a human rights treaty that delineates the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. Nearly all UN member nations have adopted the protocol, and are subject to review, sanction, and enforcement by the UN. The U.S. is one of two that have not.

While ostensibly appealing in its protection of children, the document codifies the supremacy of government over parental rights in the rearing of children. This grants government bureaucrats the ability to prosecute parents or remove children from homes where parents are suspected of being out of compliance with the UN’s objectives. In short, rather than being a proactive protection for the rights of children, it is an instrument to strip the rights of parents in child rearing.

A website dedicated to this issue, ParentalRights.org says of the UNCRC, “Despite the claims of its supporters, the Convention on the Rights of the Child is more than an international ‘wish list’ – it is an instrument of societal action.  The evidence is clear in the nations that have ratified it, like France, Canada, Brazil and the United Kingdom.  Member-states are expected to incorporate its provisions into their own laws, and failure to do so is met with intense international censure and pressure to conform.  The United Nations, and its Committee on the Rights of the Child, tolerate nothing less.”

Even without adopting the UNCRC, the threat is real for American parents. Federal judges, who take an oath to defend and uphold the Constitution and our laws, increasingly rule on cases relying on customary international law. International precedence and code often align more closely with those judges ideology, and drawing from international rather than U.S. law grants them the justification necessary for “legislating from the bench.” This is facilitating a judicial creep of the tenets of the UNCRC and laws from other nations that have adopted it en toto.

All parents need to be aware of this insidious process that is slowly yet methodically subverting the rights of parents, and granting increasing authority to government to control and govern the rearing of our children. All parents should be prepared and knowledgeable about this stealthy trend, and ParentalRights.org is a superb starting point.

By Richard Larsen

Published – Idaho State Journal, 11/27/11

Black Friday occurs the day after Thanksgiving, and signifies the day when most retailers go into the “black,” or profitability, for the year. For understandable reasons, it’s a day highly anticipated by retailers, and by consumers, for there are typically “killer deals” offered to draw traffic into the stores.

If national governments weren’t so dysfunctional, every nation would have a Black Friday equivalent, when revenue would catch up with expenditures, and there would be no budgetary deficit. European countries right now have to be wishing they could celebrate such a day, as several European countries are currently undergoing the equivalent of a fiscal colonoscopy being by exogenous institutions, the European Union and the European Central Bank, because they cannot get a handle on government spending. Many European nations have expenditures far outpacing their tax revenue, but the most pressing to the EU now are Greece and Italy. Their appetite for spending has pressed the EU to the verge of collapse.

Here at home, we find our own country sprinting toward the precipice of fiscal collapse with yearly spending at $3.7 trillion exceeding tax receipts of $2.2 trillion by 60%. We’re just $500 billion short of spending twice as much as we receive in tax revenues. In July, congress infamously raised the debt ceiling from $14 trillion, and in just four months, we’ve already surpassed $15 trillion. Anyone with any cognitive capacity can clearly see this is unsustainable. At what point such debt causes financial implosion is unclear.

But we may be getting the signals that we’re not that far away. China is the number one buyer of U.S. debt, in the form of bonds, notes, and bills. This week, after the “Super Committee” of twelve congressmen and senators was unable to reach any compromise on reducing spending, Xinhua, the official state news source had some unusually harsh words for our lawmakers. "Washington's political elites ... are obligated to muster the courage to defuse the ticking debt bomb and start to show the world they have the wisdom and determination not to further jeopardize the fragile global economic recovery," Xinhua said.  I’m inclined to think they chose their words carefully, especially in reference to “the ticking debt bomb.” Implosion could well occur when the Chinese are no longer willing to take the risk associated with buying our debt.

And no wonder they’re so concerned. Just four years ago our total debt (not counting unfunded entitlements) was at $7.2 trillion, with a budget of $2.5 trillion and a deficit of $252 billion. Even while fighting two wars, the projections indicated the deficit would be erased by 2011. Now, at $15 trillion of debt, a yearly budget of $3.7, and a deficit of $1.4 trillion, our “leaders” have dug a fiscal hole so deep it is questionable if we can ever climb out of it.

Just since 2008, the five largest growth areas in spending have added significantly to the total debt and the yearly deficit. Spending has increased by 30% in federal pensions; 50% in health care; 30% in national defense; 60% in federal welfare; and 50% in discretionary spending. And we should not forget that former Speaker Nancy Pelosi failed to even pass a budget for two years, as required by law. That's like giving a spend-thrift spouse a no-limit credit card and telling her or him to go buy all the influence and power a limitless credit line can buy!

Yet with all that spending, the super committee couldn’t come up with $1.2 trillion savings over the next ten years. The Congressional Budget Office projects from 2012-2021 government spending will total $46.05 trillion. That means they couldn’t agree on a nickels worth of spending cuts!

Tax increases are economically unviable in our present condition. Peer reviewed research by former head of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisors, Christina Romer, illustrates how an exogenous tax increase of 1% of GDP reduces real GDP by 2-3%. With our real GDP at under 3%, we can’t afford tax increases to reduce economic growth any more. We need jobs more than anything, and a contracting economy is decimating to job growth.

According to IRS data, 1.93% of Americans make over $250K per year. If we taxed 100% of their income, we could generate $1.41 trillion, which would be enough to cover the deficit. But that would be fiscal suicide, for that revenue would be nonexistent for all future years.

It wasn't lack of revenue that got us into the problem we're now in, it was a lack of discipline on spending. If the country is fiscally salvageable, it will come from a serious attempt to unwind some of the recent spending increases, and then look at potential revenue "enhancements" to make up some of the difference if necessary. We cannot tax our way out of the problem without destroying job growth, but we can, with discipline and some backbone, cut our way out of it.

By Richard Larsen

Published – Idaho State Journal, 11/20/11

Much of the space dedicated to this section of the paper is spent in analyzing, opining, and criticizing elements of the body politic and problems with the world, our nation, and our community. In spite of all that we find that needs fixing around us, one of the worst things we could do is to be ungrateful for all that we should be thankful for.

It’s sometimes difficult to think in those terms. We are often overwhelmed at the daunting challenges and vicissitudes of life that we face on a daily basis. Problems with health, the loss of a loved one, financial woes, the loss of a job, problems with a marriage or with children, often consume us emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually. Yet somehow we find ways to deal with our personal crucibles, to surmount our challenges, and crest our Everests.

The human spirit, if not doused with loss of hope, can be indomitable. We find ways to deal with, overcome, and survive our ordeals. We find solutions to our woes and answers to life’s tough questions. Often such resolution comes from insights, counsel, and wisdom from a loved one. Other times they come from unseen founts of wisdom and loving arms of solace after earnest and heartfelt pleadings to our Maker.

But as arduous and challenging as life can be, for all of us in one way or another, there is always much to be grateful for. Come Thanksgiving Day, we may have naught for a family dinner, but kind, generous friends or members of the community will bid you join their community feast.

We may be of bad health, but hopefully some things are still working fine. We may be struggling financially, but we’re still together as a family. We may have a child struggling with his or her own inner demons, yet as long as there is love, there is hope. To everything there is a silver lining. It may be obscured by our preoccupation with our trials, but it’s there. Sometimes we just have to look a little harder to find it.

I’m convinced that many of the social and cultural problems we face today are the result of a loss of a collective sense of gratitude. Rather than being grateful for what we have and the blessings that we enjoy, although sparse they may sometimes seem to us, we focus on what we don’t have, or what we think we deserve or we’re entitled to. This lack of gratitude is concomitant with a narcissism and egoism, and reveals a deep character flaw of absence of humility.

In my estimation, no one has captured this sentiment better than a former president of the LDS Church. Gordon Hinkley said some years ago, “Our society is afflicted by a spirit of thoughtless arrogance unbecoming those who have been so magnificently blessed. How grateful we should be for the bounties we enjoy. Absence of gratitude is the mark of the narrow, uneducated mind. It bespeaks a lack of knowledge and the ignorance of self-sufficiency. It expresses itself in ugly egotism and frequently in wanton mischief....

"Where there is appreciation, there is courtesy, there is concern for the rights and property of others. Without appreciation, there is arrogance and evil. Where there is gratitude, there is humility, as opposed to pride.”

In a rather simplistic fashion, we have the proverbial conundrum of whether the glass is half full, or half empty. In our individual lives, it all depends on how we choose to look at things, and whether we choose to focus on the deficiencies in our lives or on the bounties that we enjoy. And that’s all a matter of attitude.

The evangelical author and pastor, Chuck Swindoll, made a statement years ago that has profoundly shaped my perspective about life, and about gratitude itself. He said, “The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, the education, the money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company... a church... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes.”

May we all choose an attitude of gratitude, looking for the light at the end of the tunnel, and the silver lining to the dark and ominous clouds in our lives. May we express our gratitude to one another, manifest by acts of courtesy and respect. And most importantly, may we express daily our immense dependence upon, and gratitude to God. Not just for this Thanksgiving season, but for everyday of our lives.

By Richard Larsen

Published – Idaho State Journal, 11/13/11

 “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” There is no more humbling a realization than that there are others who are willing to sacrifice their comforts, and even their lives, for the preservation of mine. Nothing trumps the acknowledgement that the Lamb of God laid his down for me. But the sense of awe that results from knowing there are mere mortal men and women willing to do that for me on a daily basis comes awfully close.

Veteran’s Day morning I saw a touching picture of my nephew kissing his newborn daughter Molly goodbye as he headed off to “work.” Jim’s “work” is training Marines who have volunteered to protect us and preserve us a nation, and he was dressed in his “work clothes,” Marine greens. For one moment in time, the essence of the humanity, the love, the decency, and the compassion of our military personnel were all captured for me in a single still photo of a noble young man who served two tours in Iraq.

Thinking of him heading off to work to train those fellow Marines reminded me of a statement made once by John Stuart Mill, the English philosopher. He said, "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse. A man who has nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance at being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

What an insight, We frequently see bumper stickers affixed to cars ahead of us that naively proclaim, “War is not the answer.” Actually it depends on what the question is. If the question is, “Should we sacrifice our liberty and our freedom for the sake of peace?” the answer is indeed war, unequivocally.

The United States through its military strength has freed more people worldwide from oppression and tyranny than any other nation in the history of the world. And unlike previous world powers, or what some among us would have us believe, we don’t do it for empire building or colonial purposes. The only ground we retain after a war is enough to bury our fallen soldiers. It seems that it’s beneficial for a nation to be a battle zone for America, for not only do we extirpate the nefarious and bellicose elements in a country, but we rebuild the country and attempt to leave it in better shape than what we found it in.

There is nothing glorious in war. Would to God that it would never be necessary. However, as long as there are evil men in the world who tyrannically seek unrighteous dominion over others, war will necessarily be a part of the human experience. Regrettably, sometimes war is the answer. And we should be ever grateful for those who through the years, whether willingly or unwillingly, sacrificed for us.

We have a corps of one and a half million men and women who serve actively in our volunteer military, with an additional million or so in the reserves, many of whom have been activated over the past decade. We have an additional 23 million still living who have proudly worn our nation’s uniform in both wartime and peacetime, while fighting for our liberties, our interests, and the safety and security of countless others around the globe.

Among all who have served, the most heartrending of all, to me, is those who were conscripted or voluntarily served during the 60s and 70s in the most unpopular of our wars, and returned not to a heroes welcome, but to ignominy. It’s demoralizing to think that many of those who spat upon and hurled discreditable epithets at our returning Vietnam veterans now are politicians, academicians, Hollywood celebrities, and “respected” members of society.

Those who served in Vietnam deserve even more of our collective gratitude, since many served not of their own volition, but because of duty and a love of country. This they did rather than flee the country to escape conscription. Even more amazing is the fact that many who served in Vietnam did so voluntarily.

We have hundreds of our friends and neighbors who have answered the call to serve, to whom we are all deeply indebted. They would all say that the only real heroes are the ones who never returned home. But to us, you’re all heroes.

America and all who love freedom thank each of you who served, you and your families, for your sacrifices in our behalf. May we be worthy of your service, and do our part to protect and defend the constitution against enemies foreign and domestic, as you have done.

“All politics is local,” as former Speaker “Tip” O’Neill oftentimes repeated the wisdom and insights of his father. And no politics get more local than our municipal and county government. On Tuesday, voters in Pocatello and Chubbuck have the opportunity to go to the polls to select city councilmen. And while the local races usually lack the draw to the polls that national or even statewide elections do, they are in many ways more important. For the government that is closest to us has the most immediate impact on our quality of life by serving many of our basic needs.

We need men and woman in all levels of government who can balance our needs from government against the costs of those services. We need city councilmen who know how to balance a checkbook, are sensitive to those in the area who are on a fixed income, have core constitutionally based values, and place the interests and needs of the citizens collectively ahead of special interests or their own. In short, now is not a time to engage in identity politics, or vote for someone because we like them, like the way they talk, like the way they look, or because they belong to a certain political party.

When we cast votes for elected officials, it should not be a popularity contest, but should be based on their ideology, their character, their perception of the role of government, and what they plan to do once elected. Now is a time when bedrock principles should bear more sway with our votes. We don’t need councilmen whose egos are bent when they don’t get their way, who are willing to vote for every “good idea” that comes along, or have loyalties to unions or other special interests that may trump the need to do what’s right for the citizens. And all of our local candidates, without exception, are in the broad sense, good people.

With that as a backdrop, I’d like to explain who I think exemplify the qualities, traits, and values that are sorely needed in our councilmen for the next few years in Pocatello and Chubbuck.

Rarely on a local level do we have an opportunity to vote for someone with as well grounded a constitutional foundation as well as practical knowledge of the workings of government as Mark Balzer. In fact, I felt so strongly about Mark’s candidacy that I served for a short time as his campaign treasurer. I resigned that post because of possible conflict of interest as a Journal columnist. Mark is fiscally practical and is steeped in prudential money management. He has the courage to question everything and with his wisdom and values as a steward of the public trust, will ensure tax dollars are spent wisely and with propriety.

Paul Gagliardi is a transplant to Idaho from Massachusetts and brings with him a breadth of understanding of what can happen when government goes too far in subjugating individual rights. He loves Pocatello and has immense optimism for the region economically and comes to the council with the perspicacity that results from running his own business. His insights and values will contribute much to the future economic growth and job growth of the area, and his commitment to transparency will increase the openness and integrity of our city governance.

Jim Johnston is my nominee for Mr. Pocatello. Whenever there is a worthy cause, Jim is in the middle of it, volunteering, contributing, and often leading it. A man of sound judgment and business acumen, Jim has already brought a new depth of wisdom and insight to the council in his short tenure since being appointed last year. His grasp of real estate issues and his fiscal judgment are sorely needed on the council. His optimism and positivism are contagious, and we sorely need it.

Sean Mottishaw, running for Chubbuck city council. would be a veritable breath of fresh air wherever he has an opportunity to serve. Never have I known a man who has such vision and understanding of the environmental realities of the Pocatello and Chubbuck area, and has such viable and valuable insights into improvement of shared land use to the benefit of all. His expertise, if heeded, could significantly enhance the quality of life for the region, and his business acumen would bring much needed fiscal prudence to the Chubbuck council.

Local and state political races, though less prestigious than those on the national level, will likely affect our lives much more intimately and personally than the larger elections. Learn about the issues at stake and go to the polls prepared to vote for those you feel will do the best job for our community. Every vote counts, and it counts even more in local races whose outcome can be determined by how a few households participate.

Our economy continues to struggle, with unemployment staggeringly high, inflation eating away at the purchasing power of our dollar, and the Misery Index (unemployment plus inflation) at a 28 year high. It’s critical that we understand how important job creation is to our economic stability, as well some of the greatest obstacles preventing the kind of job growth that our economy is capable of.

The total U.S. population is about 312 million people, with a labor force of about 154 million. Of those, 139 million have jobs, leaving 15 million unemployed, with current unemployment rate at 9.1% per the Department of Labor September Jobs Report. The Wall Street Journal estimates that the total unemployment figure is closer to 17% when counting those who have simply given up looking for work, which takes the unemployed count closer to 28 million. High unemployment is not only catastrophic for those unable to find work that want to, but for an economy like ours where 70% of the total GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is based on consumption, from gas, food and housing, to services and products.

According to the Labor Department, over 80% of the jobs in the U.S. are in the private sector, with state, local, and federal government employees making up the remaining 20%. And that’s even with public sector employment increasing 7% since 2000, and the private sector losing 1% during the same period. Economists estimate that 150,000 new jobs need to be created every month just to keep pace with our population growth and the number of new entrants into the job market.

Most critical to the employment landscape are small businesses that employee 500 or fewer employees. According to the Small Business Administration, small businesses represent 99% of all employer firms, employ half of all private sector employees, pay 45% of total U.S. private payroll, generate 80% of new jobs annually, create more than 50% of nonfarm private GDP, comprise 97% of all identified exporters, and produce 26% of the known export value to our GDP.

Since employee costs, which include wages, employer-paid taxes on those wages, and employee benefits including health care, are typically the largest expense item of a small business, businesses are reluctant to add new employees until or unless warranted by market conditions.

Government regulation adds significantly to the costs associated with running a business. Earlier this year the Small Business Administration reported that regulation costs American business $1.75 trillion per year, and costs small businesses as much as $10,585 per employee.

Some regulation is needful to protect consumers, the environment, and workers. But much of it adds needlessly to business costs. According to the Federal Register there are more than 4,200 new regulations in the pipeline. Most of these are being implemented by the federal bureaucracy, and not tied to legislation coming out of congress, and that doesn’t include the 2,000 pages of new regulations imposed by Obamacare. Some of the more inane regulations are coming from the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) like regulating farm dust as a pollutant, imposing illogically demanding requirements on energy producers, and regulating the manufacturing sector like never before with extreme emission demands. Obama did warn that his policies would make “energy prices skyrocket.” That’s one promise he’s keeping, but regrettably, they are destroying jobs and livelihoods as well.

The Hill reports that new regulations imposed by an out-of-control EPA will “cause economic activity in much of the country would grind to a halt. Construction would slow. Energy prices would rise. Businesses would be unable to expand. Large parts of the country would be off-limits to new industry.” These extreme regulations put our energy producers and small businesses, including farms, at risk of going out of business, or raising costs so much that consumer and producer inflation will go out of sight.

The Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI has estimated the cost could be as high as 7.3 million jobs by 2020 and add $1 trillion in new regulatory costs per year between 2020 and 2030 for just one of those new regulations.

Senator John Barasso of Wyoming said recently, "Our economy is continuing to sink and it's being weighed down by regulations coming out of this administration."

The President’s proposed jobs bill is simply an attempt to throw more money at the unemployment problem. If he was serious about job creation, he would call off the dogs at the EPA and the rest of the alphabet soup of government agencies and start reducing regulation rather than illogically increasing it. Reduction in regulation would cost less and have far more positive affect in job creation than throwing more of our tax money at the problem.

Jobs by small businesses are the backbone to our economic system, and as such, are the key to our economic stability and growth. Government encroachment through increased regulation stymies economic and job growth. If the president was truly interested in creating new jobs, he should first stop his bureaucracy from killing them.

Robert Birnbuum authored a piece for the Chronicle of Higher Education in 1989 titled “The Latent Organization Functions of the Academic Senate: Why Senates Do Not Work but Will Not Go Away.” Birnbuum documented the political role that faculty senates have had over the years. “In this model, the senate is seen as a forum for the articulation of interests and as the setting in which decisions on institutional policies and goals are reached through compromise, negotiation, and the formation of coalitions” and that “at best that they can provide a forum for the resolution of a wide range of issues involving the mission and operation of the institution.”

ISU’s shared governance system attempted to expand the role of the faculty senate to a bureaucratic entity. With this revised model, according to Birnbuum, “the faculty senate is either explicitly or metaphorically identified in bureaucratic terms, as they would ‘deal with the full range of academic and administrative matters (Camegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, 1983), and their purpose ‘approximates that of the college‘s management.’ (Keller, 1983).”

Birnbuum cites the academic research validating the fact that the faculty senate “exists at the pleasure of the administration and board of trustees,” and that because of this fact, their very existence is “tenuous.” He further explicates that the very existence of a faculty senate is acknowledgement by faculty members that they “recognize and accept the ultimate legal authority of the administration and board.” When faculty politics prevent cooperation with the ultimate authorities of a university, the faculty senate can, and should, be dissolved, as happened earlier this year.

Over the past few years we have witnessed the inevitable outcome when the administration and the faculty senate’s vision of a university and its governance diverge. Especially in light of recent challenges, it’s critical for all of us, especially ISU faculty and students, to acknowledge where the ultimate accountability for the university resides. The president is accountable to the State Board of Education, which is accountable to the state legislative and executive branches, which are in turn accountable to the citizens and taxpayers of the state. While it may be appealing to think of a democratic process governing our university, the reality is that it is a top-down management structure, and he who is most accountable in a public institution is who makes decisions at the top.

The transition to a research institution has obviously been painful and somewhat challenging to some faculty. But it is arguably the most logical move for the university since we are neither the Land Grant school for the state (University of Idaho) nor the most visible school nestled in the state capital (Boise State University). The efforts by the faculty with Vailas’ leadership have earned the university the designation of a Research High university by the prestigious Carnegie Foundation for The Advancement of Education. This designation places ISU in an elite group of fewer than 100 of the nation’s 4,400 institutions of higher education.

With public resources continuing to decline, a review of the role and mission of the university was critical not only for continued excellence at the university, but for its very survival. The transition to a research school by President Vailas is a brilliant means to increase the diversification of revenue streams to the university, as exemplified by the $100 million partnership announced last week with Scan Tech. Such partnerships become increasingly critical to not only replace lost state funding but to prevent the cost of attending the university from rising to levels which would preclude many from attending. As state revenue has declined, the proportionate share of the costs of operations have been shifted primarily to students in the form of fees and tuition. With higher education inflation at over 7%, the cost of attending a university in the future will become increasingly limited to those who have the means. This is totally contrary to the role of a public university.

I am not privy to all the internal machinations and politics between the administration and the faculty senate. But as an alumnus, a product of, and a zealous supporter of ISU, the conflict between the faculty and the administration appears very self-serving on the part of the senate to retain more governing authority than is perhaps logical or warranted and resistant to the mission change. The vision of President Vailas, while disconcerting to faculty preferring to maintain the status quo, is critical to the future survival and growth of the most important component of the Pocatello economy, and one of the most significant in the state.

To validate that claim, the university employs over 2,100 of our friends and neighbors, has over 14,000 students enrolled, and has a direct impact of over $300 million on the local economy. And based on a 2010 study by candidates in the MBA program at ISU, the “productivity” effect on payrolls and economic impact is over $873 million annually. Clearly the university is critical to the state and Eastern Idaho in particular.

While I find myself sympathetic to the faculty senate and find merit in some of their publicly stated grievances, it seems apparent to me that at the root is an obdurate and unyielding adherence to the status quo, rather than a willingness to make the necessary adjustments and compromises to be “on board” with the new research focus and restructuring of the university. Have there been missteps by the administration in this transition? Undoubtedly. Have there been missteps by the faculty senate? Obviously, as the State Board of Education disbanded them for their recalcitrance.

In the context of these growth pains, one of Abraham Lincoln’s bold statements, a reference to the synoptic gospels, has perfect applicability. “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” he declared. One of those aphoristic truths, the message seems clear as it relates to the future of Idaho State University. For the sake of the internal climate on campus, and the public perception, which has been tarnished, it behooves all parties to embrace the new research mission and governance structure. Unified, there is virtually no limit to the future greatness and impact, economically and culturally, that ISU can have on the state.