We love the arts in South Dakota! We also love Federal Pork!

It seems our culturally retarded governor had a change of heart;

“I have directed my staff to work with legislators on a plan to try and reinstate funding for the arts office, based upon the fact that the stimulus package has been signed by the president, and it may free up some state funds for the arts,” Rounds said during the Governor’s Awards for the Arts event in Pierre.

“Because I just couldn’t bare to take money from no-bid tourism contracts that actually lost the state $3 million last year, I mean, gee whiz, these are my campaign contributors.”

“The revised budget that would eliminate all state funding for the state arts agency stunned South Dakota’s arts community,” Boyd said Wednesday.

Trust me, this has nothing to do with King Rounds having a change of heart. He saw Washington cutting checks for stuff and saw an opportunity – plain and simple. If the FEDS would not have put arts funding into the stimulus, Mikey would have still cut the arts.

Once again Mike Rounds refuses to cut his do nothing-big government programs in Pierre to help fund education;

Democrats have said they want to cut elsewhere in state government to find money for aid to schools. Senate Democratic Leader Scott Heidepriem of Sioux Falls said state government in previous years has forced agencies to cut spending by a certain percentage, and that approach could work again.

“It’s so simple it’s amazing to me,” Heidepriem said, adding that he doesn’t believe the Republican governor is willing to control the size of state government.

It doesn’t surprise me one bit. Even when the economy was good, Rounds refused to properly fund education, now he has an excuse and he is going to run with it.

While more than 90 percent of Democrats said they wanted to boost state aid to schools by more than the 3 percent recommended by Rounds, only about a quarter of Republicans said they believed state aid should increase by more than that.

Even if the legislature gets a super-majority to be veto proof on an education bill (which I don’t see) Rounds will still find a way to overstep the legislators, just like he did with the blender pump tax and laptops (how did that work out for yah, Mike). He simply doesn’t like to be told what to do. This will be a true test for the legislators. Will the typical Republican cheerleaders like Krebs cave to their favorite state Republican? Will the Dems do more then mouth off to the media and internets about how much of a brat Mike is? (seriously, that’s my job, not yours.)

It’s time to show Rounds that he has been extremely ineffective as a governor and quite possibly, unethical (another thing legislators are too chicken-shit to do something about).

POVERTY HAS AN EFFECT ON EDUCATION FUNDING

One has to wonder though, maybe education funding is sufficient in South Dakota. Student test scores are always pretty decent, but high school dropout rates are high. One reason may be the growing problem of poverty in our state.

A couple weeks back a SF School district representative gave a presentation to the city council about poverty in Sioux Falls. Some scary stuff, here are a few highlights.

- 40% of caucasion children in the SF school district are on FREE or reduced lunches, and that number is as high as 75% in minority community.

- Supt. Dr. Homan doesn’t like to have late starts with bad weather because she wants to make sure these kids get something to eat for breakfast.

Some of the other numbers are hard to swallow to. A lot of these kids also have little winter clothing to wear, and often go hungry on the weekends. The amazing part about it is, it is not discussed much by our local or statewide politicians, it is kind of a ’silent problem’. After the presentation, one councilor even had this to say, “Thank you for the presentation, but what is this council supposed to do with this information?” And maybe this is the problem. I think politicians think if at least 51% of people in the community are doing OKAY, we can ignore the minority. I find it ironic that Sioux Falls spends more per year on mowing an acre of parkland then they do educating a child. Who knew grass was more important than a decent education? Nice priorities, Huh? I also wonder how much money in education funding is going towards feeding, counseling and healthcare for some of these kids? Something that parents should be responsible for, that is, if they can afford it. The problem isn’t just funding education properly, it is also about creating a business atmosphere in SD that creates more living wage jobs. Government can’t create higher paying jobs, but they can help attract those kinds of businesses. Just imagine if we spent half the money we do on tourism for business development, what kind of impact that would have on the state? (of course than Lawrence and Schiller would have to go out and find real clients).

It’s time for our legislators (it’s too late for the governor) to realize the root problem of education funding – Poverty and low wages.

Mayhem Mike Rounds warns us again about the economy;

Revenues to the state treasury are sinking faster than officials estimated even a few weeks ago, forcing Gov. Mike Rounds to revise the budget he proposed in December.

All of a sudden Mike is paying attention.

While vowing to do the job as painlessly as possible, Rounds indicted that funding for some programs could be in jeopardy, and he refused to rule out additional tax and fee increases.

“I wish I could tell you today we have the answers,” he said. “As of today, we don’t have the answers.”

“There is nothing, in my opinion, that will be considered sacred.”

It’s like what John Stewart said about Shrub, running a country (state) isn’t like going to college. You can’t just dick around all semester then make up for it in the finals.

eth⋅ics

–plural noun

1.	(used with a singular or plural verb ) a system of moral principles: the ethics of a culture.

 

2.	the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture, etc.: medical ethics; Christian ethics.

 

3.	moral principles, as of an individual: His ethics forbade betrayal of a confidence.

 

 

Did the Rounds administration do anything illegal in reference to the pay-to-play no-bid contract controversy? I don’t see that, and neither did anyone in the RCJ columns. But just because something is legal doesn’t make it ethical.

Do some of us do unethical things, whether it’s in our personal or professional lives? Sure we do. But I also think there are different levels of it.

Besides government other organizations provide a code ethics. Though subject to interpretation (as I found out when I asked for an ethics opinion about a couple Sioux Falls city councilors) for the most part they keep members on the up and up.

Last year the Washington Pavilion of Arts and Sciences (finally) changed their code of ethics barring board members from participating in exhibits or providing professional services to the Pavilion for payment. This didn’t happen overnight. It was a long drawn out process after years of complaints about a certain board member by not just me but several other artists and advocates in our community. In my opinion it took to damn long and I think the only reason it happened was this board member no longer serves (but I could be mistaken).

The irony of all this was that this person was one of the founders of the ad agency that got the lucrative no-bid tourism contracts from the state. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

In one attack on me in a letter to the editor he vehemently opposed openness at taxpayer funded institutions like the Pavilion. No surprise looking back now, huh?

Bill Clinton cheated on his wife in the White House. Over $40 million was spent trying to impeach him for lying about it. It was unethical (the cheating part) and probably cost Al Gore a lot of votes (even though he still won).

Last year we had to endure the Sutton hearings because the legislature thought it was unethical for an adult male to climb into bed with another adult male. Maybe it was, even though the DCI could not find proof a crime was committed. Sutton was censured.

Mike Rounds gives not just a handful of no-bid contracts to campaign contributors, but hundreds and hundreds of them and there isn’t an ethics investigation?

There should be.

Maybe Rounds will be cleared of any unethical practices, maybe an investigation will find something illegal was done. Who knows, but it’s worth the effort.

No one should defend cronyism, whether you are a Rep, Dem or Indy, even if it is being practiced legally.

Even if you don’t have a problem with the ethics of what Mike did, I would think fiscal conservatives would take issue with the irresponsibility of no-bid contracts. And if the State Legislature is truly made up of mostly conservatives the law would have been changed years ago.

I don’t think it is. We have become a Big Government state, and that is why most politicians just turn away from this issue.

So is Rounds a criminal? No way. Is he a sneak? I think so, but an ethics investigation would be the only true measure.

I hope some legislators have the guts to pursue one. It’s way past due.

SD could be getting a new logo

Another ignorant bigot writes a letter to the editor. Don’t get me wrong, I think the Zionists in the mideast cause just as many problems as the extremist muslims do. But I don’t think we need to worry about the Jews taking over SD anytime soon. Mike Rounds must of had a couple campaign contributors who were Jewish he had to appease.

I read that Gov. Mike Rounds lighted Menorah candles on the Capitol step during Hanukkah. The Menorah has been the symbol of the Jewish religion for 3,000 years. South Dakota is a Christian state.

But then at the end of the letter she contradicts herself.

Gov. Rounds has violated the separation of church and state and turned his back on the Christian traditions of South Dakota.

So which is it? Do you believe SD is a Christian Theocracy or a Secular state? You can’t have both.

This is especially repugnant to me in light of the fact that Jews reject the divinity of Christ.

Wasn’t Jesus a Jew?

You are gonna need a bigger shovel

Mikey the Great denies Pay-to-play;

“I don’t worry about the political accusations like that,” Rounds said. “They’re bogus as far as I’m concerned.”

There’s stretching the truth, but that statement is just plain ridiculous.

Lawrence & Schiller has received million of dollars in no-bid state contracts during Gov. Mike Round’s time in office, while also donating thousands to the governor’s campaign.

But the Sioux Falls advertising agency isn’t alone in a system that the governor calls simply good business and critics label as a hazy pay-to-play process likely to benefit the politically connected.

Hazy?! The only thing that is hazy is our vision after all the Bullshit that has been dumped in our faces by this governor.