Ethics fight shows poor governance of those who govern Georgia
After Nathan Deal was elected governor last year, his team was understandably eager to change the conversation from the ethics allegations that dogged his campaign to how he would govern.
Months later, the talk surrounding Deal has come full circle. The state ethics agency’s director, Stacey Kalberman, claims her salary was slashed and her deputy’s job eliminated not because of budget constraints, but because they had just prepared subpoenas for their inquiry into Deal’s campaign spending.
Absent any new revelations, the story is a matter of he said, she said, with obvious motivations for each side. The benefit of the doubt for many Georgians will lie with Kalberman, given the curious timing of the budget concerns and the sheer number of complaints against Deal dating back to his tenure in Congress.
The best argument in Deal’s favor may be that going after Kalberman — and turning an under-the-radar investigation into a full-blown media frenzy — would be an awfully dumb way for the agency’s board to try to protect the governor.
But whatever this episode says about Deal, it says far more about how this state is governed. Or, perhaps more precisely, how this state’s government governs itself.
Forget Deal for a moment. A proximate cause of the ethics agency’s budget problems was a new law requiring it to send notices by certified mail to candidates and office holders delinquent in their campaign filings. The notices are now 17 times as expensive to send as before, an increased cost of thousands of dollars for which the Legislature did not fully account when setting the ethics agency’s budget.
Not only did legislators fail to account fully for the cost of the new law, but they cut the ethics agency’s budget.
The fact that many state agencies faced budget cuts might be some solace, had legislators not voted to increase their own budgets by a cumulative $3.2 million over fiscal 2011 — a 9 percent increase that’s triple the entire budget for the ethics agency.
As with the flap over Kalberman’s salary cut-turned-resignation, one need not look too far for motivation. Forty-seven legislators — more than one in five members of the General Assembly — are among the thousands of delinquent filers across Georgia whom the agency tries to track. Those 47 owed a collective $11,000 in fines as recently as early May, just weeks after they finalized the budget.
Our legislators have staked their ethics reputations on a system that relies more heavily on transparency than on limitations (on, for example, gifts from lobbyists). There’s a good argument to be made for that tack: Better to disclose everything and let the voters decide what’s important.
The problem is that those charged with enforcing the transparency are quite transparently being undermined — by the very people they’re supposed to monitor.
When the ethics agency’s board decides to fire its No. 2 staffer and slash its No. 1’s salary because the agency’s budget for mailings was too small, there’s a problem — regardless of whom those staffers were investigating.
I’ll put my desire to cut public spending up against anyone’s, but governing those who govern us is an essential part of our representative system.
I’ve often wondered how our government, both federal and state, might operate if legislators and regulators scrutinized their colleagues’ dealings the way they do the rest of ours. My hunch is we’d finally end up with the smaller government many of those same legislators have been promising us for so long.
In the meantime, I’d settle for simply ensuring they’re subjected to what scrutiny they are supposed to face.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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81 comments Add your comment
khc
June 23rd, 2011
12:51 pm
the ethics commission should be increased especially in these times of major league corruption by all parties
Hillbilly D
June 23rd, 2011
12:51 pm
Trying to turn this into partisan gamesmanship is pointless. State government has been this way all my life. Whether they have a D or an R after their name is irrelevant. They’re out for themselves.
captguitarman
June 23rd, 2011
12:51 pm
Excellent column, Kyle. Yes, the timing of all this was ham-handed, but keep in mind that hiding in plain sight can sometimes be a successful ruse. Would we be so crazy or stupid as to kick this Ethics Commission hornet’s nest just before the subpoenas were to be issued? Yes – crazy like a fox. Consider this. If there is something explosive that those subpoenas would have unearthed, this was the only way for the already ethically-challenged Deal to go. Key to this will be for the watch dog groups like Common Cause to stay focused and informed on the ongoing status of the investigation. If it gets back-burnered by Millsaps, or indefinitely delayed, or re-scheduled due to lack of resources or “budgetary constraints,” the game will be obvious, and these groups and the AJC should again send up the flares. It is interesting to read the partisan comments, and reading them helps to explain why the citizens of the declining State of Georgia and City of Atlanta have the the governments they deserve. The legislators did not eliminate their perqs and legislative lifestyles provided to them by the people who buy their influence, and Democrat or Republican, they never will. They create a phony transparency law and then gut the Ethics Commission and give it a new dumb name thinking that the goobers who elect them won’t be able to figure that one out. And then, they gut its resources, while padding their own budgets while all other state agencies take a cut. Right there, what does that tell you. It’s not like we have this super great legislative body that deserves more resources for the work it does. My God, just look at what they leave on the table every session They prioritize nonsense, leave every tough issue to the last five minutes, and then important issues wait until next time. Does anyone see a decades long pattern here? Five minutes after taking office, the new Speaker and family and friends take an all expenses paid vacation to Europe. Who is he working for? It’s not a partisan issue – it’s been with us since King Roy and the Dems in power, and through What Me Worry? Sonny Perdue, and now the Shady Deal and the Pubs in power. It’s the Georgia political culture of jes good ol’ boys doin’ bidness, and looking out first for themselves and their sponsors. And in this economy, Georgia is paying a heavy price for it. All you can do is what you are doing. But, if the Don’t Come Any Closer or I’ll Shoot Glen Richardson fiasco, and attempted cover up, didn’t create enough heat for real ethics reform, I doubt anything will get any action, despite what might be lurking in Deal’s campaign files. Sad but true.
Churchill's MOM.....Ron Paul for President
June 23rd, 2011
12:51 pm
We had a choice.. Honest Woman or Dishonest Deal, the voters chose the Dishonest Deal. I did not understand it then and understand it less now.
yuzeyurbrane
June 23rd, 2011
1:11 pm
I can’t believe it. I agree with Kyle on this one 100%.
Good Grief
June 23rd, 2011
1:12 pm
Kyle, sorry for trying to clear up a misunderstanding. I’ve always been of the opinion that the moment one side of the debate gets to declare what language is offensive and what isn’t, then they’ve pretty much won.
Road Scholar
June 23rd, 2011
1:21 pm
Kyle, good editorial! Right on!
Notices must be sent by registered letter? How about e-mail….with a copy to their local newspapers? The ethics board should not answer to the Governor or to any party. Can’t we find some intelligent educated honest people to work there? And th legislators should not get a raise until all others in state govrnment gets one based on merit.
MrLiberty
June 23rd, 2011
1:32 pm
ByteMe – You do the research (and not on the Fed’s site either).
In a system of sound money there is a generally limited amount of the resource being used as money (generally gold, silver, etc.). In order for money to be available for lending purposes there must be savings. In order to encourage savings there must be interest paid and obviously there must be a deferral of spending. In our current system of both fiat money (not backed by anything but faith and trust), and fractional reserve banking (fraud, essentially – the lending of money one doesn’t have combined with the promises of money one has lent) we have a system in which the banks can lend out up to 90% of the deposits they hold while the FDIC (another government agency) backs the deposits ultimately with taxpayer money (though they do get some premiums from the banks). The Fed also creates money out of thin air or through the mechanism of treasury bonds that are sold to investors. This same system exists in Spain, Ireland, and virtually every country on earth because none of them have currencies backed by anything sound. Additionally the US dollar is generally the reserve currency for these other countries as well so they hold tons of them.
Whoever gets the money first benefits the most when it is created. That is because they can use it before the inevitable price inflation devalues them. Bernanke actively promoted the creation and inflation of the housing bubble after the DotCom bubble burst. When there is a greater supply of money than goods the money will run to where the profits can be made through investing. In the 90;s it was the dotcoms. After 9-11 the push was to real estate. Of course we all know the role Fannie and Freddie and the CRA and other legislation played in that. All over the globe various bubbles happened based on local laws, regulations, incentives, etc. that “pushed” people in those directions.
The reality of folks like AIG, etc. is that many of the loans being written were toxic. Many knew that. Folks came up with creative ways of hiding this and “insuring” against their potential losses. Yes, AIG is a scum organization. I am not saying anything they did was right. And ultimately YES they did use Fed money. Where do you think all the profits for all these companies came from in the first place??? Banks borrowed from the Fed to loan money. They loaned to losers and then packaged their bad loans with good loans and sold them. Tons of people were making tons of money off these CDS’s, etc. and so they bought some too. Then along comes AIG who gets the brilliant idea to sell insurance against this crap just in case. Since the banks have some of this crap they buy insurance. The whole house of cards was built by the Fed and greed and the government. When it threatened all of their rich lifestyles and fortunes, the Fed and Treasury (headed by Goldman Sachs, etc,) lied to and scared the criminals in our congress to steal more money from the taxpayers to bail everyone out. It all comes back to government power.
But the bottom line that Ron Paul and the Austrian economists have been trying to point out is that NONE of this would have been possible if it were not for the government through the agency of the Federal Reserve printing money, going into debt, making money available for nothing, etc.
Greed exists. Corruption exists. Wasn’t that the point of this posting in the first place.
But there is a limit to what someone alone or even a business alone can do without the assistance of the power of government. Even Hitler would have just been a pissed off guy without the power of government behind him.
Grasshopper
June 23rd, 2011
1:49 pm
’suck the fetus’
Too bad your mom didn’t make that choice.
jsinton
June 23rd, 2011
1:53 pm
It’s really nice to see so many comments. I hope all of you will join Common Cause Georgia, the non-partisan, non-profit good government watchdog on whose board I sit. Join us. There is strength in numbers! Facebook or Internet: http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4847583
Carlosgvv
June 23rd, 2011
2:49 pm
The “Real” Truth
I lived in Atlanta in the early 60’s. I could and did walk downtown at night and never had any problems with crime. All that started to change in the 70’s as Atlanta began to become a majority black city. Now, Atlanta is ruined, crime is everywhere and it’s no secret why. While you “African-Americans” have been enjoying your civil rights and rubbing them in our faces, you have done little or nothing to fulfill your civil responsibilities. Cowardly politicians have been falling all over themselves for years now trying to get your vote and you have taken full advantage of your opportunites to ignore these civil responsibilities while demanding more and more rights. The net result of all this is a halt in any further progress in race relations and you have no one but yourselves to blame.
catlady
June 23rd, 2011
4:58 pm
I have a theory that the Rs in Georgia are trying to see how far they can go. How much bad faith can they show? How much degredation and duplicity? How much graft? How skewed the “Christian virtues?” They keep pushing and pushing, trying to see how far they can take it before their faithful push back and plead for a halt. Think back over the last 7-8 years and tell me it isn’t so!
THE "REAL" TRUTH
June 23rd, 2011
5:20 pm
My apologies, Kyle. The comments from TruthBe was a bit much.
Jerry Eads
June 23rd, 2011
5:24 pm
So much fun to post with my real name. It also begets temperance.
Kyle, looks like you’ve got EVERYbody on this one. How is it we elect these crooks when it seems we all want honest government? @catlady (one of my favorite posters), Ds do the same thing, let’s be honest, but Rs have done a MUCH better job lately of “If you tell lies often enough, the voters are stupid enough to believe it.” Therein apparently lies the foundation of democracy. Rove and Cheney practiced this for the scarecrow (brainless) puppet’s entire administration with enormous effect. It’s pretty clear from what’s been printed here that we have elected a total slate of crooks and con artists from top to bottom, and it is CLEARLY in their best interest to make sure there are no watchdogs so they can continue to personally profit from your and my tax dollars (the immediate past gov seems to have done a very nice job of this too). And, I bet you’re right – we voters will continue to keep them in office so they can keep doing it. Guess I better listen to the Common Cause guy. My guess is that Georgia is not the absolutely worst state, but it’s by far the worst of the five states I’ve lived in this life. Keeping us at the bottom of the SAT pile makes it easy for ‘em. (That used to be the game for the Ds!)
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 23rd, 2011
5:27 pm
I’m guessing that approximately 0% of the libtards here have any idea of what the politically motivated ethics charges against Governor Deal consist of.
GT
June 23rd, 2011
5:32 pm
What I don’t think state righters understand is as long as local government is so corrupt how can there be smaller federal government. If you truly believed all the things you rant about as conservatives or even as religious men and women you would think the first thing you would do is elect and keep an honest local and state government. One of the reasons you don’t is because that corruption in one form or another fills your pockets too. It has been that way as long as most of us Georgians can remember. Talmalge was one step ahead of the mob. We probably don’t even know the names of the people that really get rich off the system. Throw the Baptist Church in that mix and you have a lot of why junior can’t read and the rest of us are so poor. How can you invest in a state when you can’t trust its leaders or its citizens?
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 23rd, 2011
5:33 pm
Jerry Eads: Rs have done a MUCH better job lately of “If you tell lies often enough, the voters are stupid enough to believe it.”
———————–
I bet Jerry Eads believes that our President Bush squandered a budget surplus left to him by his predecessor.
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 23rd, 2011
5:40 pm
GT makes a fair point about corruption being a deterrent to economic growth. Businesses are not going to invest if they can’t rely on the rule of law or if they think their investment will be stolen from them. However, the evidence seems to indicate that this is not a problem in the South, since net business migration in going North to South.
As for the effect of corruption and lack of respect for the law, how do you think the Idiot Messiah’s confiscation of GM and Chrysler from their secured creditors and giving it to his union thug supporters affects investment?
Idiot Messiah: Business-hating fascist.
kevin
June 23rd, 2011
5:51 pm
Lil Larry Bailout,
Bush did inherit a surplus of 230 billion dollars and left with a record 480 billion dollar deficit. Bush also inherited a 5.6 trillion dollar national deficit. You’re conflating national debt and budget. There’s a difference.
“Libtards”–wow, that’s clever (if you’re 6).
kevin
June 23rd, 2011
5:53 pm
Lil Barry Bailout,
Here is a website that you might find helpful after removing your foot from you mouth.
http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa101500b.htm
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 23rd, 2011
5:54 pm
kevin: Wrong. The federal debt increased every year of Clinton’s administration. The libtards and the lamestream media keep repeating the lie though, and you just keep lapping it up. The budget was “balanced” by stealing the SS surplus and spending most of it. Now taxpayers are on the hook for that debt.
kevin
June 23rd, 2011
6:00 pm
really? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms
“the libtards and lamestream” media…really?
I suppose your advice would be to listen to the fair and balanced team over at Fox News where loudmouthed morons speak to ordinary morons.
GT
June 23rd, 2011
6:06 pm
Governor Don Siegelman brought six auto plants to Alabama and now sits in jail. Corruption is the short term fix. 11 people in Alabama as part of a 39-count indictment alleging corruption related to the state legislature. One of those 11 was an aid for the Speaker of the Georgia House. You think the guys learned corruption in Alabama or maybe he was teaching it. My point is a lot of industry is moving to the south and a lot of money is staying up north or in the pockets of a few locals. As long as most of us stay thin on brains the state is ripe for corruption and cheap labor. Some of the light weight information people in this state call fact is planted misinformation from people with an agenda. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is a movie base very much on this kind of control. There is an agenda going on with the illegal immigrate laws too.
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 23rd, 2011
6:10 pm
kevin believes things that are told to him often enough.
Taxpayers are on the hook for the cash Clinton stole from the SS trust fund, just like they’re on the hook for all the other borrowed money.
Clinton: Never balanced a budget.
Jerry Eads
June 23rd, 2011
7:38 pm
Wow, Kyle, you do attract the dregs of the right wing, don’t ya. Too bad they have not a remote clue what conservatism is. Does not bode well for the future of the country, exept as a scenario akin to the Mad Max movies.
TruthBe
June 23rd, 2011
7:56 pm
The”Real Truth” What part of Africa are you from? How about that crime rate in Atlanta over the last 38 years? How much of that crime rate was caused by blacks? How come when you go downtown to City Hall to do business and almost all of the employees are black? What race is the Mayor, CEO,CFO, Most of the Department Heads in Atlanta City Government? How come during the Mayor’s election that the Clark University Profressors said” Vote for Reed and don’t let Whitey win”. What about affirmative action, minority hiring policies, etc? How about those facts my friend. No my friend I’m not a bigot just tried of the reverse racism. As for calling you a African American why don’t we just call us all Americans? Our Nation cannot heal with this one sided racism from Blacks. If we want equality than it should be for all us.
Jefferson
June 23rd, 2011
10:54 pm
Where is the outrage and calls for Deal to step down?
Lil' Barry Bailout
June 24th, 2011
6:37 am
Geithner: Taxes on ‘Small Business’ Must Rise So Government Doesn’t ‘Shrink’
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told the House Small Business Committee on Wednesday that the Obama administration believes taxes on small business must increase so the administration does not have to “shrink the overall size of government programs.”
——————
No, we can’t have that. The parasites (those who choose not to work, and civilian government employees) wouldn’t get their handouts.
GTP
June 24th, 2011
7:05 am
Well said, Kyle! However, the lack of ethics in our state government goes far beyond the walls of the Governor and General Assembly. Attorney General, Sam Olens, is on record pledging to “strengthen Sunshine Laws” to enable open and transparent government; but he failed to mention that his pledge does not include the documents in the increasing number of Whistleblower cases regarding ethics violations in our state’s higher education (the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia) by top officials that he and his office defend. We cannot even get a member of the General Assembly’s Higher Education Committees to ask Olens why the contradiction. Since you are now on a roll, Kyle, why don’t you ask him? His office number is 404.656.3393. Many of us will be anxiously waiting to read how Olens responds to that one.
Harvey Schock
June 24th, 2011
12:56 pm
Truth be, when was the last time that Georgia had a white governor? Why were all of Perdue’s people white? Why is it still a predominately white run state outside of Atlanta?
David Green
June 24th, 2011
8:43 pm
About time you decided to take the repubucrats to task for their lack of ethics yet you still haven’t called out Dishonest Deal and insist that he resign.