O'Malley's job approval lower than president's; Marylanders favor enforcement of immigration law & death penalty

(Posted 8 Jan 2007)

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O'Malley's job approval lower than president's.
Times, 8 Jan 2008 (LoBianco & McLaughlin).

Maryland residents say Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, is doing a worse job than President Bush, according to a new poll released yesterday.

Marylanders gave Mr. Bush, a Republican, a 36 percent job-approval rating, just slightly more than the 33 percent they gave Mr. O'Malley, according to the Fox 5/The Washington Times/Rasmussen Reports poll.
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Two-thirds of Marylanders, 66 percent, support giving police officers the right to check the immigration status of drivers when they are pulled over for a traffic violation, but only 55 percent think illegal aliens should be deported if they're discovered.


More than three-quarters of Marylanders, 76 percent, said illegals should be barred from obtaining driver's licenses.

Maryland is one of eight states that provides licenses to illegals.

More than half of Marylanders — 62 percent — did not think the General Assembly's special session in the fall was the appropriate way to close the state's budget deficit, estimated at the time to be at least $1.5 billion.

Maryland House Speaker Michael E. Busch dismissed the negative response. "I think you can find a poll in every corner, and everybody's going to have a different opinion," said Mr. Busch, Anne Arundel Democrat.

Marylanders largely support the death penalty — 51 percent to 35 percent who want to repeal it. And a greater majority, 71 percent, want the opportunity to vote on the issue.

Efforts in Maryland to repeal the death penalty have failed frequently and are unlikely to pass again this year, though Mr. O'Malley has imposed a de facto moratorium.
[More]

Will O'Malley's health spending proposal be like Tennessee's with even more uncontrolled spending and eventual health care rationing?

(Posted 26 Oct 2007)

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TennCare: What Happened.
Outside the Beltway, 23 Oct 2007 (Steve Verdon).

Part of the story those who favor some sort of government run health care repeat is that private health care is very costly. . . .

The problem I have with this . . . is the idea that government is suddenly going to be more efficient than the private sector. Government’s primary job is the creation of “red tape”. The idea that we can actually switch to the government and get less costs strains credulity past the breaking point.

Case in point: TennCare. TennCare is Tennessee’s attempt to expand health care to people who did not have health care. . . . for a few years it seemed to work. Costs declined, and more people were covered. Then costs started rising…and rising quickly . . . unless something was done the program would consume up to 90% of the State’s budget. . . .

The solution to this was to…limit access. Gee, where ever have I heard this before? Limits were put on the number of doctor’s visits, the number of prescriptions, and 160,000 people were moved out of TennCare (what happened to them, beats me).

So what happened? Government stepped in and costs spiraled out of control so much that it threatened to consume nearly the entire budget for the State. Benefits had to be rationed and/or reduced and no new enrollment. . . .
[Full report]

Slots & Taxes: What our legislators are saying (part 4)

(Posted 24 Oct 2007)

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Special session starts Monday.
Sentinel, 23 Oct 2007 (Samuel).

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"I think the strongest part of this package is that we going to be closing corporate loopholes," said Del. Benjamin Barnes (D-Dist. 21).

County legislators praised the governor's plans to reform the income tax. Barnes said that reforming income taxes would levy more taxes to individuals and families earning $200,000 or more while those earning $40,000 or less would receive a break.

"That will help them deal with an increase in the sales tax," he said. The sales tax is another tax that the governor hopes to reform with the special session.

County legislators are also pleased that O'Malley wants to protect education funding and increase health care access with a $1 tax increase on tobacco produces.

While any county legislators are favor of the plan's tax cuts, there is some skepticism to other issues in plan.

Del. Jolene Ivey (D-Dist. 47) said the governor's plan to cuts property taxes, a fund long used to pay off the state's debts, would not help the state get out of debt.

"The cuts will bring us back where we are now," Ivey said. Del. Tawanna Gaines (D-Dist. 22) said keeping the property tax the same may is providing the state some additional padding.

"As long as we have a lot of money to pay that debt, there's nothing wrong with extra money," she said.

There is also still strong dissent surrounding the governor's proposal to bring slots to Maryland.

"I think it's a stretch if it's going to happen at all," Sen. Paul Pinskey (D-Dist. 22) said. "If the governor wants it, he's going to have to find the votes. I'm not going to help." Del. Justin Ross (D-Dist. 22) is also opposed to helping the governor on slots.

"I certainly will never vote for it," Ross said.

While many of the county legislation said they are opposed to the slots, some believe the passage of legislation was possible. Barnes said he too is opposed to slots, but felt it was "highly likely" that there would be a slots legislation of some kind.

"I don't want to be naïve," he said. Ivey, also a slots opponent, said she would not rule out the possibility of slots. Ivey said she would consider them, "if it's not in Prince George's County."

The answer, county delegates say, is to put the issue before state county residents. "The proposal of a referendum makes sense," Sen. James Rosapepe (D-Dist. 21) said. "Let the people have a voice in what is best. That will settle it once and for all."

There's not telling what will come out of the special session. In his haste to take action, Pinskey said he hopes that O'Malley will seek compromise.

"You're not going to please everybody," he said.

O'Malley's scary surveillance plans

From the Baltimore Sun, 9 Jan 2007

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O'Malley's scary surveillance plans

By Chet Dembeck

January 9, 2007

I wonder how many of those who voted for Gov.-elect Martin O'Malley realized they were also voting for an open-ended, statewide expansion of citizen surveillance that includes "watch centers" and "watch lists"?

You may think this sounds Orwellian, but it's no joke.

Mr. O'Malley never hid his strong intention to expand the use of technology and police resources to fight crime and terrorism; he simply failed to outline any safeguards that would ensure such increased surveillance wouldn't be abused to spy on law-abiding citizens for political or any other reasons.

Mr. O'Malley plans to establish a new Homeland Security Office in Prince George's County that would link surveillance operations among Baltimore, Annapolis and the Washington suburbs, according to his position paper on homeland security.

"The Homeland Security Office will have law enforcement staff and will be able to monitor critical infrastructure and high-crime zones," the paper explains.

Many more closed-circuit television networks, like those deployed in Baltimore, would also be installed throughout the state under Mr. O'Malley's "watch centers" strategy.

In a recent speech to the National Press Club, Mr. O'Malley explained, "For starters, if each of our metropolitan areas had 'watch centers' to monitor hundreds of cameras protecting our critical infrastructure like mass transit, those same cameras could be used as a tremendous force multiplier to improve public safety."

Mr. O'Malley also envisions integrating this centralized intelligence within all levels of government.

"Every major metropolitan area should have a more highly developed intelligence-sharing capacity: All law enforcement officers - city, county, state and federal - should share meaningful information from watch lists, like photos, not just obsolete aliases," Mr. O'Malley said during the same speech.

These proposals raise a host of questions. Who will be watching the watchers? If watch lists are being created, how will it be determined who gets on one? What if the information is wrong? And when information is gathered that is found not to be pertinent to a crime or an investigation, will it be destroyed?

At the very least, these policies should include some sort of independent monitoring of such secretive activities - preferably, by a civilian board - to curb the potential for abuse.

But nowhere in Mr. O'Malley's speech did he outline what specific oversight would be put in place to ensure such enhanced surveillance capabilities would not be abused.

In addition to centralizing such information, Mr. O'Malley also called for a major expansion of the latest surveillance technology.

What Mr. O'Malley failed to point out and address is that these same enhanced capabilities could invade the privacy of countless Maryland citizens and eventually turn the Free State into a police state.

Chet Dembeck has been a writer and reporter in Baltimore for more than a decade. He blogs at www.lastreporter.typepad.com.

Copyright © 2007, The Baltimore Sun

Link to the article: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.omalley09jan09,0,6058349.story?coll=bal-pe-opinion