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Party at Bob’s - Excellent City Paper Column

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nickshepDEM Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jan-19-06 11:25 AM
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Party at Bob’s - Excellent City Paper Column
Read the entire article, you'll enjoy it.

Any politician worth his salt learns to stick his constituents with bad news early in his term. This does a couple of things: It allows him to blame any and everything on his predecessor’s bad choices, and then later on, when the crisis is averted, he can take advantage of the public’s short memory and claim credit for saving the day.
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Well, the next election is coming up, and Ehrlich is on to the second section of the playbook—cry “Victory” and let slip the cash of war. If the last governor was Parris Spendening, then we’re seeing the dawning of Bobby Ur-Loot, and it’s loot that he certainly wants to spread around. Three years ago, Ehrlich jacked up property taxes in a big way; now he wants to give them back, and he wants the counties to do the same. But there’s a big difference here: If the governor makes his tax cut, knocking back the property tax rate from 13.2 cents to 11.2 cents per $100 worth of property, and the cities and counties do something similar, then those localities are going to get hit hard again—and only Ehrlich gets to look good because of it. Who the hell would sign on to do that?
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In the meantime, it’s time to bring out the party hats on the second floor of the statehouse, because Bobby’s opening the wallet and letting the money flow. Tax relief? Sure! Tuition money? Bring it on! Land preservation? He’s all for it!

This last one is particularly rich. Ehrlich is now pushing for a full commitment to preserving Maryland’s open spaces, tripling what the state currently spends on land preservation. But it was Ehrlich’s attempt to sneakily sell off state land to developer Willard Hackerman that got him in trouble in the first place.

But who cares? It’s election season, and drinks are on Bobby! Just don’t look too close at whose wallet is providing the cash. You might recognize your own money from three years ago.
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