Friday, January 18, 2008
A Message of Hope for 2008
Happy New Year everyone! I hope 2008 is a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year for all of us in Maryland, especially in District 12.
However, we start this new year and a new legislative assembly having just come off an ill-advised Special Session.
While we await final Court ruling on the constitutional challenge to the Special Assembly, even the liberal media is admitting that the addition of computer services industry to the tax base was completely ill-advised, not adequately debated or well thought out. Let me go on record as saying that I do not think that violations of the Constitution are mere technicalities. We should not allow Governor O’Malley a free pass here as he has been given in the past (e.g. BGE rate hikes, etc.) – as his allies would like –that he never proposed to extend the tax hike to the computer services industry – we must remember that he was the one who called the unnecessary Special Assembly in the first place, created the atmosphere of fear over a projected budget deficit, and thinks all of us should be “comforted” to know that we are paying more taxes!
First of all, everyone should be clear on the facts. We do not have a deficit. Our budget is balanced through June 30, 2008. If we would require our government leaders to be fiscally responsible, to seek cuts in the areas of bloated and wasteful government and unessential services, and limit the increase of spending for our next fiscal year, 2008-2009, to 3.5 to 5%, instead of proposing an 8 to 9.5% increase, then there would be no such projected $1.7 billion deficit.
Also, everyone in District 12 should be aware that Senator Kasemeyer put forward on the Senate floor every single Senate motion to close debate on the issue at the Special Session. However, we needed to have more debate on the proposed tax hikes and those it would cover – and if they had done so, at least the Computer Services Industry could have been afforded proper notice and mounted an appropriate lobbying effort. However, it was the hushed, hurried, late night, almost clandestine actions of the legislation that has put us in this worrisome situation.
It is undemocratic and even un-American to curtain debate prematurely and act in an evasive, non-transparent manner. Marylanders, and particularly residents in District 12, deserve better.
As it is, the regressive 20% sales tax, the $1.00 per pack tobacco tax, the additional corporate taxes, and other tax hikes enacted are causing Marylanders to leave their beloved state, relocating their business operations to other States. An ever-increasing number of Marylanders are now doing their consumer shopping in very proximate neighbor states. Any law that causes citizens to leave or do business and consumer purchasing elsewhere is bad law.
Also, our local elected officials should not be allowed (without consequences at the ballot box) to vote against favorable amendments or vote for bad legislation in committee only and then vote against bad legislation when on the floor knowing full well that enough liberal votes exist to pass the desired tax hikes.
We now stand at the start of a new legislative session and need to be active. We must contact our elected officials. They were amazed at how many negative e-mails they received during the Special Session! Let them know we do care what they do in Annapolis, we are watching, we will be down there at some point to see them or take part in government as is our precious Constitutional right, and we will hold them accountable for passing bad laws.
It is high time for our government to take notice that it is the law-abiding, working people of Maryland who own property, pay more than our fair share of taxes, are educating our children and building better lives for ourselves and our neighbors, who need to be fairly treated by our elected officials.
We need to get involved in our communities, continue educating ourselves about the many serious issues that face us, listen to open talk radio, and send letters and e-mails to the editors in our local papers or to talk radio to express our views. Our State and our freedoms are worth fighting for.
May God bless us, protect us, provide for us, and reinvigorate us in our private and public lives in the New Year, 2008.
Rick Martel
Catonsville 01/10/08