Oregon Magazine

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Oregon: Eradicating opportunity
by Rob Kremer

(OrMag: Rob ran this on his blog a short while back. With the mainstream media promoting the agenda of every liberal from Kulongoski to Obama, these days, it seemed an appropriate response. You'll find more common sense at Rob Kremer's blog )

Unemployment has doubled in six months. We sit at 12.1%, and the political class in Oregon has no clue. No clue at all that its policies are the CAUSE of Oregon's #1 national rank in the one statistic no one wants to lead. It's not as if this is the first time. Oregon was tops in unemployment in the last recession, and was the last state to recover. For almost 20 years, from the early 1980s to 2000, the Intel-led boom in Oregon's silicon forest papered over the fact that Oregon government policies have made us uncompetitive.

We destroyed tens of thousands of jobs in natural resource industry. We drove up the cost of energy, one of Oregon's few competitive advantages. We turned a functioning transportation system into a congested nightmare. We taxed business success at the highest rate in the nation. We put in place a land use planning system that put the private sector at the mercy of planning bureaucrats. We grew the least efficient public education system in the country. And we burdened the taxpayer with an unsustainable public pension system that allows 52 year old gym teachers to retire with guaranteed $75,000 a year payments.

And now our economy is in meltdown. Color me shocked.

The government's response? Create the "next big industry" through government-directed subsidies and taxes on energy. Oppose new sources of energy such as LNG. Spend billions on 19th century rail transportation systems. Allow the education establishment to attack the most innovative, efficient new approach to schooling yet devised. (OrMag: he's probably talking about charter schools, here.) Raise taxes on health insurance and hospitals to grow the government-directed health plan. Demand a gross-receipts tax on business that would tax the private sector whether it was profitable or not. (OrMag: And the Obama/Reid/Pelosi junta is talking about a VAT, or Value Added Tax, a national sales tax, plus a "carbon caps" greenie global warming tax on private companies. All that's missing is a tax on air. )

You know what pisses me off more than anything about all this? They have DESTROYED this great state, and my children are not going to have opportunity here. When they are both graduated from college in four years, living here will simply not be an option.

The government class has eradicated opportunity.

Thanks for nothing.
Rob Kremer