MISUSING THE CONSERVATIVE LABEL

With the words "double-dip inflation" and "super recession" swirling around every news report, I guess it is typical of people politicking to use the current economic woes to try and sell the voters in this town on their vision of the future. The word "conservative" is popular among most taxpayers as the nation elected a President who is acting like an unsupervised teenager with a credit card at Christmas time. I guess that is how "WE" - the people who live here and have lived here all of our lives - are left watching as our schools and our current school leaders have no money for needed in our district.

Without any sales pitch by either side, it would be interesting to have a poll that included all of our residents and learn how many citizens here in Liberty favor paying for a full service hospital or would rather have more of a triage-like emergency clinic. With several fine hospitals less than a thirty minute ambulance ride away and the addition of excellent urgent care clinics in this area, it seems to many of us that a fully staffed and equipped hospital is an unneeded expense and a poor use of tax money. We would like to use that magic word "conservative" here and would more than enjoy a practical discussion about having a facility nearby for emergencies. We would love to settle that issue because we believe common sense would prevail. Conservatives would prevail. Deciding whether or not an emergency clinic should be privately owned or not may not be as easy to predict - conservatives may not win this argument wth voters. But as it stands now, our hopital district tax and the "benefits" to the community are typical of a very liberal wasteful tax and spend community and an honest conversation and an elecion where everyone votes would kill the hospital district..

The politicking by many of the same people that have us pumping money into a dead-on-arrival hospital has resulted in misusing the word and the ideas behind conservatism. The success these big spenders have had in stopping our school leaders from having any funds to repair and improve our schools can not be looked at as "conservative". It would however have been "conservative" if some of these same people when they were younger would have used their power, position, and influence to have budgeted for school maintenance and repairs and improvements (and to have been responsible enough to monitor the funding). That kind of planning and oversight would ave been nice!

But what is "conservative" NOW ? And if all residents were polled and they all saw the conditions of the administration building and other items listed as school district needs in the recent bond issue - would they opt to keep dumping money and continue to salvage the old or finance what the district needs are.

Let's put this on a personal level to decide what we think is "conservative" - or better than that, what we think is wise. For the sake of an example, let's consider what we would advise a man that has decided to marry someone and after the wedding move into her house. Let's say she has several young children. Their father is out of the picture now but the decisions he made for years have continued to effect the well being of the children. He slowly fell behind in house repairs. And he made some improvements, but didn't keep up with the needs of a growing family in this area either. What should the newlywed do? It is his responsibility now. Should the three children all continue o live in one small room intended for babies? Should he keep patching the roof and repairing the damage the leaks cause?

A "conservative" is not simply someone who says "no" to spending money. A "conservative" approach to this situation would involve a cost/benefit analysis. If the man can refinance at an interest rate that allows him to provide a house for these children that is more functional and if the cost of this is ultimately less in a year to year analysis than repeatedly paying for expensive repairs... then a "conservative" solution to this problem is borrowing money and fixing the house.

It is pure unadulterated politics to label this new Superintendent or her school board as if they are tax and spend liberals. Cynthia Lusignola, like the man in the example, has children she is responsible for. She was not here and did not create the current circumstances. Who cares about her politics. She assembled a group of people to begin discussion on how to approach our current problems. She invited the pubic to weigh in. They had no known opposition and proceeded to the ballot.

The only question we are left with after a low turn out rejection of the bond issue is what do we do now? True conservatives may not appreciate what we have to deal with now, but we shouldn't want to sink money into a building that will cost more to continue (over time)to repair than to build a new one. Conservatives should help Dr. Lusignola solve this problem by fixing the problem by spending money as wisely as possible.

The young people in a community with wonderful hospitals nearby in all directions, should still be concerned that emergency facilities are available for the elderly and those who are involved in an emergency. And our elderly should be concerned we have great schools.