The Heartlander: March 2004

SAVE THESE DATES!

On Sunday, April 25, Heartland will cosponsor--as it has for the past several years--the Chicago Conservative Conference. The day-long event will take place at the Renaissance Chicago Hotel, 1 West Wacker Drive, Chicago. As this issue of the Heartlander went to press, details (program, pricing) were being finalized among the cosponsors; we expect to mail invitations in March. To make certain you’re on the invitation list or for further details, contact Heartland’s new Vice President - Public Affairs, Allen Fore, at 312/377-4000, email fore@heartland.org, or visit the Heartland Web site at http://www.heartland.org.

Heartland will kick off a year-long celebration of its 20th birthday on Thursday, April 29 at an evening “birthday bash” also at the Renaissance Chicago Hotel. The party will run from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. in the Riviere Ballroom Foyer, featuring free drinks and desserts.

Heartland’s party is being held in conjunction with a series of meetings taking place at the Renaissance that weekend. The Heritage Foundation’s 27th annual Resource Bank meeting will take place April 27-29, culminating in a gala dinner the evening of the 29th. That morning, State Policy Network will host its annual Leadership Breakfast, featuring James Piereson of the Olin Foundation (introduced by Heartland’s Joseph Bast). On April 28 and 29, the Atlas Economic Research Foundation is holding its Fourth Annual Liberty Forum. And from April 30 - May 2, The Philadelphia Society will hold its 40th national meeting.

The quickest link to more information on these events is through TownHall’s conservative calendar at http://www.townhall.com/calendar/#April.

JOHN STOSSEL ENTERTAINS, INFORMS HEARTLAND LUNCH AUDIENCE

More than 220 high school teachers, Loyola University professors, and Heartland donors, members, and friends attended Heartland’s February 4 luncheon event featuring John Stossel, author of Give Me a Break! How I Exposed
Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the LiberalMedia. Stossel regaled the audience with strange-but-true stories of how his media colleagues reacted to his conversion from award-winning consumer reporter to anti-government, pro-individual responsibility libertarian.

Stossel’s appearance was covered by C-Span, which aired the event on C-Span 2 Book TV on February 22. Stossel and Heartland also were featured in Chicago Sun-Times (circ. 477,354) columnist Terry Savage’s column on February 15.

SRN REPORTS SCHOOL CHOICE PROGRESS, PROMISE

The March issue of School Reform News reports the passage of a school voucher program for 1,700 of Washington, DC’s neediest schoolchildren--plus a leading Democrat’s voucher proposal for New Mexico and Vermont Governor James Douglas’s push for public school choice. Offsetting that good news, Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle vetoed a series of bills that would have allowed continued growth in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.

The issue’s featured interview is with J.E. Stone, a professor of educational psychology at East Tennessee State University and founder of the Education Consumers’ ClearingHouse. Stone supports school choice as a way to shift “the balance of power” away from providers and toward consumers. “[M]arket competition is the only practical way to restrain [the] overwhelming ability [of public schools, teacher training institutions, and stakeholder groups like the National Education Association] to pursue their self-interests,” Stone notes.

This issue also reprints a homeschooled students’ winning essay in a Bill of Rights Day contest and reports on safety issues that plague public schools, special education, the cost of higher education, public school construction, the No Child Left Behind Act, and the war on excellence in middle school classrooms.

Clowes in Vermont

SRN Managing Editor George Clowes traveled to Vermont in mid-January for a series of meetings. He distributed 150 copies of the January 2004 issue of School Reform News and another 150 copies of the Milton & Rose D. Friedman Foundation’s updated booklet, The ABCs of School Choice.

On January 15, Clowes met with Martin Harris of Citizens for Property Rights, John McClaughry of the Ethan Allen Institute (EAI), and David Awbrey, editorial page editor at the Burlington Free Press. That evening, he spoke to about 15 people at an EAI meeting on the topic “Choice and Competition in American Education.”

On January 16, Clowes and McClaughry drove to Montpelier, where they met with Lt. Governor Brian Dubie and (briefly) House Education Committee Chairman Howard Crawford and Senator Hull Maynard, a member of the Senate Education Committee. Clowes reports all appeared familiar with School Reform News. Clowes testified for about an hour before the House Education Committee, talking about the advance of school choice and evidence showing how the threat of vouchers improves the quality of public education. That point was disputed by Rep. George Cross, a former school superintendent, and he and Clowes “had a lively dialogue.” After the hearing, Clowes and McClaughry met with Jason Gibbs, the governor’s press secretary.

That evening, Clowes hooked up with Mike Audet, an adjunct professor of psychology who homeschools his children and tutors local children to read. Audet arranged for Clowes to speak at a meeting of about 20 people, including a member of the State Board of Education, Susan Schill, another homeschooler. Clowes talked about smaller class sizes vs. improving teacher quality as “the answer to a better education.”

On January 17, Clowes spoke to Citizens for Property Rights, a libertarian organization trying to decide whether to extend its interest in property rights beyond real property to money. Clowes recommended they do so--“because whether the government takes your real property or your money property, if you don’t get the just compensation demanded by the Fifth Amendment, the government is just stealing your money, not taxing you.” Clowes addressed class size reduction before this group, as well.

Outreach

The University of North Carolina School of Law distributed copies of two School Reform News articles at a February 7 Annual Conference on Race, Class, Gender, and Ethnicity. The conference theme was “Tracking Educational Success: Derailment, Wreckage, and Rescue.” Three hundred copies of Don Soifer’s article, “Almost 1 in 8 Students Labeled Disabled” (SRN April 2002) and Kelly Amis Stewart’s “Despite 50-Year Effort, Schools Become More Segregated” (SRN March 2002) were distributed.

Heartland Chairman Herb Walberg was the guest of Lowman S. Henry, president of the Lincoln Institute of Public Opinion Research, on his Lincoln Radio Journal radio talk show. The program, during which Walberg discussed Let’s Put Parents Back in Charge! aired January 24 - 30, 2004 and was carried by nearly 90 radio stations across Pennsylvania.

HCN EXPOSES HEALTH CARE MELTDOWN IN VERMONT

In the second of an eight-part series, the March issue of Health Care News reports how Vermont has destroyed its health insurance market with guaranteed issue and community rating mandates. While former Governor Howard Dean considers his state a model for health care reform, the facts disagree. Reports HCN Managing Editor Conrad F. Meier: “The percentage of the state’s population that is uninsured has increased, not fallen, since the mandates were imposed; premium rates have increased; and more Vermonters than ever are having to settle for government-run Medicare in order to get insurance.”

Also in this issue:

• Campaign 2004: the health care positions of President George W. Bush and five candidates for the Democratic Party’s Presidential nomination.

• Medicare reform: the critical importance of Health Savings Accounts; plummeting premiums for Medicare HMOs.

• Prescription drugs: the folly of liberals’ latest proposal to allow the federal government to directly negotiate drug prices with private drug companies; evidence prescription drug buying clubs aren’t always cheaper.

• In the states: what Minnesotans think of government-run health care; Colorado proposals for requiring evidence-based medicine; and ballot status for a referendum that would repeal California’s play or pay mandate.

• Plus: $30 million for high-risk pools; what’s behind America’s obesity epidemic; and how patients suffer when bureaucrats take aim at doctors.

Outreach

On January 21, HCN Managing Editor Conrad Meier was interviewed by Business Insurance Magazine on health care reform issues at the state level.

On January 27, Heartland President Joseph Bast debated the pros and cons of importing drugs from Canada with the president of Common Cause on a National Public Radio program called “Justice Talking.” The one-hour program (edited down from a two-hour debate before a live audience) can be heard on the program’s Web site at http://www.justicetalking.org. It aired in late February on some, but not all, public radio stations across the country.

Meier addressed the Penn Ohio Regional Health Care Alliance at its Annual Membership Meeting and Luncheon on February 12. The audience of 70--twice as many as the group had last year, Meier’s host reported--heard Meier address the topic, “New Era Of Health Care: Medicare and Health Savings Accounts.”

On January 25-27, Heartland’s Director of Operations, Latreece Vankinscott, staffed the Heartland exhibit at the annual meeting of the American Association of Preferred Provider Organizations on Amelia Island, Florida. Roughly 350 people attended the event, and 103 of them (Latreece counted) visited the Heartland booth. Twenty-five signed up for free subscriptions to Health Care News, which had been placed in the tote bags of material distributed to every conference attendee.

The Heritage Foundation distributed 600 copies of the February issues of Budget & Tax News and Health Care News to its members.

Coming Up

Meier will address the topic “The New Era of Health Insurance Consumerism” at the June 26-30 annual meeting of the National Association of Health Underwriters (NAHU) in Baltimore, Maryland. Meier writes a regular column for the group’s monthly magazine, Health Insurance Underwriter, which reaches 30,000 subscribers. For more information on the meeting, contact Farren Ross, the group’s vice president of education, at fross@nahu.org, or visit the NAHU Web site at http://www.nahu.org.

ECN COVERS ENDANGERED SPECIES AND MORE

The March issue of Environment & Climate News offers several articles addressing endangered species issues. Rep. Richard Pombo (R-California), chairman of the House Resources Committee, has pledged he will mark the 30th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act by recommending changes to the act designed to encourage cooperation between citizen-landowners and the federal government.

ECN also covers two studies, in Nature and New Scientist magazines, that consider the potential effect of global warming on species, and we report on the ongoing battle between the federal government and Wyoming state officials over delisting of the gray wolf.

Heartland Science Director Jay Lehr reviews Gregg Easterbrook’s new book, The Progress Paradox--which Lehr calls “among the 10 most important books I have read in the past 20 years.”

Among other stories: the on-again, off-again ban on snowmobiles in Yellowstone National Park; New Jersey’s adoption of California’s vehicle emissions standard; the impact of hog farming on water quality in North Carolina; a Supreme Court decision giving EPA clean air authority over states; a federal appeals court ruling requiring a 30 percent increase in energy efficiency for central air conditioners and heat pumps; California’s attempt to implement a 2002 law mandating reductions in greenhouse gas emissions; hype over mercury contamination in lakes; and a lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity against the Altamont Pass, California wind farm.

Outreach

A position paper distributed by the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce to every member of the state legislature included comments from Heartland President Joseph Bast on the New Jersey Clean Cars Act. The measure, which imposes California’s clean air standards on new cars and trucks sold in New Jersey, passed despite the Chamber’s opposition. The full text of Bast’s letter to the Chamber is available on Heartland’s Web site at http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=14194.

ECN Managing Editor James Taylor commented on EPA’s particulate matter standards for “Just the Facts,” a 30-second radio spot distributed by the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) to more than 300 radio stations nationwide.

On January 17, Taylor discussed the economic costs of carbon rationing at the American Legislative Exchange Council’s Energy Sustainability Academy.

Also on January 17, Heartland Science Director Jay Lehr spoke at the National Cleaners Association’s “Brainstorming with the Best” conference ... in the Bahamas!

On February 9, Bast testified on global warming before the Iowa House Environmental Protection Committee. The Committee, chaired by Rep. Sandra Greiner, was taking testimony about carbon sequestration and global warming. While in Des Moines, Bast met with the Des Moines Register and several allies and potential allies, among them representatives of the Iowa Farm Bureau, Libertarian Party of Iowa, National Federation of Independent Business, MidAmerican Energy, Alliant Energy, and Truth about Trade and Technology.

On February 11, Lehr addressed the Wheaton Morning Rotary Club in Wheaton, Illinois. The engagement was arranged by Heartland donor and member Elden Brauer. Lehr then joined Heartland staff, Board members, and donors for an informal lunch at the Heartland office.

On February 2-6, Heartland Senior Fellow Wendell Cox addressed audiences on four college campuses--in Minneapolis and Duluth, Minnesota, and in Milwaukee and Madison, Wisconsin--on light rail and urban transit issues. The events were organized by Collegians for a Constructive Tomorrow. Most successful of the events was Cox’s appearance at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which attracted a standing-room-only audience of more than 75 people and a news story in the campus newspaper, the Badger Herald. (See “Cox Discusses Possibility of Madison Commuter Rail” on page 2 of this Heartlander.)

Coming Up

Lehr will address the Southwest Missouri State University Economics Club on March 4, and the National Animal Interest Alliance on March 28. Cox is scheduled to conduct seminars for the South Carolina Landowners Association on June 3 and 4, and he will speak to the Housing Education and Research Association on October 21.

For more information on these events, or to schedule a Heartland speaker for your organization’s next big meeting, contact Allen Fore, Heartland’s vice president - public affairs, at 312/377-4000, email fore@heartland.org.

BTN OFFERS SOME GOOD NEWS ON TAX AND BUDGET ISSUES

As legislatures returned to session and governors delivered their “state of the state” addresses, tax and budget matters remained at the top of most political agendas ... and a top priority for Budget & Tax News as well.

On the “good news” side of the ledger, the March issue leads with Oregon voters’ dramatic rejection of an $800 million tax hike passed by the state legislature in August 2003. The issue also covers Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue’s annual address, in which he touted spending restraint and no new taxes; President George W. Bush’s ongoing commitment to permanent tax cuts; California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s plan to review outsourcing to the private sector as a budget-cutting tool; Kansas State Sen. Kay O’Connor’s effort to block a billion-dollar tax increase called for by a District Court judge; and efforts in Illinois to impose property tax caps.

This issue carries the final installment in our three-part series on tax and expenditure limitation (TELs) and also covers key state tax issues that will be taken up by Congress; how Democratic Presidential candidates would increase federal budget deficits, and how the Democrats are wrong about corporate income taxes in the U.S.; mixed results from Nevada “sin” taxes; Cook County, Illinois’ 450 percent cigarette tax increase; movement toward high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes in seven states; tax fairness versus tax morality; and more.

Outreach

On January 5, BTN Managing Editor John Skorburg was interviewed by two reporters for Farm Week, one asking about the economics of BSE (“mad cow” disease) and the other about packer ownership of livestock.

Associate Publisher Nikki Saret staffed the Heartland exhibit at the annual meeting of the American Farm Bureau Federation in January ... in Hawaii. Heartland hosted an exhibitors’ seminar that attracted 75 people; Tom Wright, executive director of FairTax.org, addressed the group. As reported in the March issue of BTN, the Farm Bureau voted to put the FairTax--a national retail sales tax--high on its lobbying agenda. Saret reports 38 people signed up for free BTN subscriptions and one paid for a $49 membership.

IT UPDATE HIGHLIGHTS VOICE OVER INTERNET

The March issue of IT Update highlights the newest front in the ongoing battle over telecom regulation: voice over Internet protocol (VoIP). Cato Institute analysts Adam Thierer and Wayne Crews explain how this up-and-coming technology, by allowing consumers to largely bypass traditional wireline phone networks, provides another reason to abandon the “forced access” regulatory regime established under the 1996 Telecommunications Deregulation Act.

Other articles in this issue address the possibility of a free-market “national broadband policy,” the high cost of anti-spam legislation, why the U.S. Department of Justice is preparing to file an antitrust investigation into Oracle’s bid for PeopleSoft, a new Mackinac Center analysis of the economic impact of telecom regulations, and a new Cato Policy Analysis explaining the continued relevance of property rights, contracts, and markets in today’s digital economy.

HEARTLAND LAUNCHES STUDENT OUTREACH EFFORT

The Arlington, Virginia-based Leadership Institute has provided Heartland with contact information for more than 200 “active, independent, conservative student organizations on campuses in 40 states and Washington DC,” allowing Heartland to launch its first-ever effort targeted at that audience.

Among our first efforts with the students will be to send a letter introducing them to Heartland and adding them to a permanent complimentary mailing list of Heartland publications. They will be offered complimentary tickets to Heartland events, including the annual benefit, and we hope to work with them to arrange campus appearances by Heartland Senior Fellows and managing editors. We also hope to identify potential interns, develop a cadre of letter-to-the-editor and oped writers, and otherwise work with them to grow their interest in free-market ideas and take advantage of their enthusiasm to help spread Heartland’s message to the next generation.

WELCOME ABOARD!

Heartland is delighted to welcome Allen Fore as its new Vice President - Public Affairs. Allen has an extensive background in government, politics, public affairs, and law. He previously served as executive director of the Illinois Republican Party, chief counsel to the Illinois Lt. Governor, and deputy to the Mayor of Peoria. He has managed numerous state political campaigns in Illinois and has worked for the Illinois House and Senate Republicans. Allen is also an attorney, having served as an assistant Illinois Attorney General and lawyer in private practice.

Allen is a graduate of Eureka College (Ronald W. Reagan Scholar) and received his law degree from Valparaiso University. He enjoys golf (with a name like Fore, what choice did he have?), tennis, college basketball, and the Chicago White Sox.

Allen’s principal responsibilities at Heartland will be media and legislator relations and management of the senior fellows program. Don’t hesitate to contact him at 312/377-4000, email fore@heartland.org, if you’d like to introduce yourself, find out more about him and his role at Heartland, or offer advice, speaking engagements, talk radio show gigs, or lunch.