University College London, BYU, Obama, &c.

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If the New York Times doesn't think a story is newsworthy, did it really happen?

You may recall that a few weeks ago the NYT ran a story about John McCain. None of their anonymous sources (who, mind you, didn't even meet their own rules on sourcing) said that McCain actually did anything, rather, it was a supposed to be a story about McCain's judgment and associations.

Along comes a story that is largely about Barack Obama's association and judgment. Where is the New York Times coverage? Buried. Journalistic double standard anyone?

Again, we don't think Obama personally espouses any of Reverend Wright's crazy ideas, but his 20 year relationship with Wright does raise questions (like the recent revelations about a deeper relationship with Rezko than previously thought) about his associations and judgment. Juan Williams, a liberal former Washington Post writer and current NPR and Fox News contributor, for whom we hold great respect, also agreed that this raises questions about Obama's judgment.

Barack Obama's Speech Transcript
Analysis: Obama Grabs Race Issue
Obama Rebukes Preacher, Urges Race Healing
Obama Confronts Racial Division In US

*UPDATE 6:15pm MST: Friend of Lybberty and Lost Boy writer, Morgan Habedank, weighs in on Reverend Wright's comments. We noted in the comments section of his post and repeat here: it is important for the less politically inclined, but no less intelligent among us, to sometimes hold forth on issues like this.

We believe that political pundits sometimes suffer from a myopia that afflicts all disciplines (this includes us). Thoughtful opinion from someone outside the political echo chamber can help us gain a greater understanding of issues and put them in proper perspective. Bravo, Mr. Habedank.

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We want to call attention and give credit to the fledgling BYU Ski Team. We have a couple of friends on the team who give us irregular reports about the team's performance. This article from the Daily Universe is the first we've seen on the team. They race and train without any official recognition from BYU and, all things considered, have done quite well. This year they narrowly missed qualifying for the National Championships. Good job, BYU ski team.

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From an otherwise unremarkable article about Provo development, the Daily Universe reported on a few interesting comments regarding Provo's student population:

Exclusiveness in Provo was an area of concern. Residents voiced their opinion that the city needs to market more to the student population as well as the non-LDS members of the community.

According to numbers from the city records for 2007, university students make up approximately 45 percent of Provo's population. Also, according to the city's Web site, more than 20 different religious groups are present in Provo.

"Students offer a very unique population that can really be capitalized upon," Simonson said. "Students don't usually have a large discretionary income, but they're always looking for something to do."

Melanie McCoard, an active member of the community who ran for city council three times, said some recent decisions made by the city council have caused some students to think Provo is anti-student.

"Opening up the downtown to students could help dissolve that perception," McCoard said.

As far as contentious relationships between longtime city residents and student populations go, BYU vs. Provo isn't breaking any records. That said, the Provo City Council and some residents resentful attitude towards students is irritating. Students don't vote here and supposedly pay little in taxes.

However, this superficial look at the benefit of BYU students in the Utah Valley does not tell the whole tale.

BYU employs thousands of people and provides innumerable (and, often, unknown) services to the greater Provo community. Students alone give hundreds of thousands of hours of services each year. They are helping out in schools, providing daycare for special needs kids so their parents can have a few hours to shop or whatever, they are cleaning up parks and neighborhoods and on and on. BYU students aren't simply entering to learn and going forth to serve once graduated, they are serving the entire time they are at BYU.

In exchange, they are ignored and patronized and sometimes demonized by Provo residents. The Provo City Council refuses to make student concerns a top priority when making parking policy.

Of course, they can get away with it because BYU students don't vote in local elections. But that doesn't make it or them, right.

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Finally, a bit o news from my grad school, UCL. Student politics are interesting in London. In a post last year, we wrote about our experience with the UCL Student Union--essentially, their debate club (click here for the link).

Undergraduate and graduate involvement in UCL student government is an interesting thing. In one sense, they have more say over more things, but in another sense, their interest in the University beyond their emphasis is less than BYU students.

Be that as it may, we were struck by a recent email we received from one of our sources at UCL regarding the latest tempest in a teapot at the UCL Union:

On Wednesday the 5th of March, UCL Union held an [sic] "Reconvened Annual General Meeting". Since then, the sabbaticals and Chief Executive have received a substantial number of complaints regarding the democratic procedure of the meeting and subsequently questioning its legitimacy.

After investigating these complaints, the sabbatical team took the decision on the 10th of March to initiate disciplinary proceedings examining the chair of the meeting, UCL Union's General Secretary. The General Secretary has therefore been suspended from office pending the results of this disciplinary, which will hopefully be taking place in the first week of the third term. The disciplinary panel will be composed of senior members of College and sabbatical officers from other London students' unions.

Following this decision, a March 12th meeting of UCL Union Governance Committee resolved to temporarily suspend the decisions made at the "Reconvened Annual General Meeting" pending the outcome of the disciplinary panel, and will report back to the Union's Executive by the 6th of May.

In one sense, we're relieved to see that BYU isn't the only university that blows procedural things out of proportion, in another sense we're dismayed at the suspension of democracy and lack of transparency. This is all the information we could get about the actions of the General Secretary.

But stay tuned, if we can find it, we'll give you the rest of the story.


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BYUSA Election Follow-Up, Michael Steele, &c.

Today at lunch we spoke with a friend of ours, one of the 5 BYUSA Executive Directors who serve under the BYUSA President and Executive Vice President. Our conversation with him confirmed what we concluded in our last post: it's unfair to expect BYUSA to be something it is not. It is not a student representative organization, it's a student service organization. And in that, they are extremely successful.

He agreed with us (and pointed out that Adam Ruri and Chance Basinger had Provo parking as part of their platform) that there is an opportunity for BYUSA President Adam Ruri to lead the way in parking negotiations with Provo City Council on behalf of BYU students.

We'll follow their progress, if any, again, so you don't have to.

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On Fox news, Michael Steele, former candidate for the Senate from the state of Maryland, weighed in on the Geraldine Ferraro kerffufle (which we first wrote about here).

He pointed out that in advance of his run for the Senate, his campaign polled Marylanders about race and politics. They asked two questions: first, "would you vote for an African-American for senate?" and second, "would your neighbor vote for an African-American?"

These polls were anonymous, so people had no apparent reason to lie. 78% said yes to the first question. 40% said yes to the second question. Steele and the Crash-crowd draw the wrong conclusion from polls like these--that racism is a big problem in America.

Sure, there's racism, but what this poll shows is that the problem is hugely overblown. What it shows is that a vast majority--78%, in this instance--are not racist, but that an almost equally large majority--60%--think their neighbors are racist.

The only disconnect is between public perception of racism and the reality.

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At FreedomsWatch.org, guest blogger Mark Mix writes about union's attempts to move away from unionization by secret ballot to unionization by peer pressure and intimidation. Unions have steadily lost membership for the last 30 years as their usefulness declined. This latest legislation is a last ditch attempt to maintain political clout.

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Our friends at the RNC are running a Blog Madness competition to name their official blog. Cue rabid netroots.

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The BYU Student Alumni Association is sponsoring a personal finance course on 22 March @ 10:00am in the Hinkcley Center. With subprime loans, inflation, the falling dollar and stock market all the rage, this is a valuable opportunity to learn how to navigate the financial storm.

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Steve Sweet, associate of recruiting and marketing, asked me to pass along information about the Koch Associate Program. After limited research into this program, it seems worth passing along:

"The Koch Associate Program is a year-long, paid program designed to develop promising leaders and entrepreneurs interested in liberty and the non-profit arena. During the program Associates work in non-profit roles four days a week, then spend one day a week at the Foundation learning Market-Based Management® in a classroom setting. You can learn more about the Associate Program, as well as the Koch Internship Program and the Koch Foundation at www.cgkfoundation.org. The deadline to apply is April 1, 2008."

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If you're looking for a cheap, stimulating intellectual experience this summer, we recommend applying for one of the free summer seminars sponsored by The Institute for Humane Studies at George Mason University. They take place at universities all over the US with different topics at each. Housing, food, books, and lecture costs are all covered by IHS, you just have to figure out how to get there.

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BYU/Provo Parking Addendum

Last Friday we let loose with a post about the Provo parking debacle. Debacle. Seems to be everyone's fav word to describe the situation. We explained how we thought the parking thing fit into a greater debate about property rights--not only in the city of Provo, but nationwide.

In conversation with a number of different friends, we found that maybe we didn't make it as clear as we thought we did or should.

For a number of years, the Provo City Council has done whatever it could to limit occupancy in new construction--a clear violation of property rights. It--they, whatever--has tried to do the same thing with existing structures bylimiting, for example, the number of students who could live in a given house. Unfortunately for them, these houses were constructed before the enactment of these new rules and by and large they have been able to avoid the Provo City Council's tyrannical, property-right violatin' ways.

But finally, they hit upon a solution. In parking they trust. By limiting the number of "street parking permits" for each house, etc., they could essentially limit the number of occupants. If a given house only had 3 parking spots, how could they reasonably expect to rent to 4, 5, or even 6 students? They couldn't. And the Provo City Council is aware of this.

So who loses? Students, any new owner/renter, and owners of properties that currently rent to students. By limiting the number of parking spots and thus, students per habitation, they in effect limit the sources of income for the owner. Rather than renting 1 house X 6 rooms to 6 students at $200 per = $1200 per month, the property owner has to generate $1200 from 3 student-renters. But this probably wont happen either, because the market wont bear a 2x increase in the cost of rent. The students will go elsewhere. Or the owner will buck the law.

It doesn't help that BYU has limited student housing to a 2 mile radius around campus. This makes it more difficult for students to avoid the ridiculous, property rights violating, rent price escalating, car parking limiting ways of the Provo City Council. It's as though the two groups got together to come up with the best way to raise the cost of living for students.

Mind you, the neighborhoods they are trying to protect/maintain the ambience, etc., are overwhelmingly dominated by the student population. The student to regular-joe-citizen rate exceeds 10-to-1. And it's not as though parking problems just cropped up in the last couple years or so, screaming for the legislative attention of the all powerful Provo City Council. Nor are these issues any different to the problems faced in any other college town across the country. What is different is the complete disregard for the student population shown by the Provo City Council. They absolutely could not care less.


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Provo City Council vs. BYU Students - The Parking Kerfuffle

Lots of news and events this week for our BYU readership.

Our friends organizing the "resistance" to the Provo City Council's ignorant parking program sent us the following email. Read it and attend the upcoming meeting to register your distaste for their new plan.

Most of the city council is now ready to vote to implement the new parking program south of campus (University Ave to 900 E and Campus to Center St). It is important that as many people come as can to voice their opinions. Please read the information found at http://parking.provo.org so you have an idea what is going on.

There are required to hold a public hearing and to allow the community to speak. Please come and speak. Please come prepared. I will have voter registration books on hand for those ready to register to vote in Provo. YOUR VOTE MATTERS.

If they pass this law, I will get a referendum set up for people to sign to put it on the ballot in November. Only locally registered voters signatures are counted. Provo City is pushing us around and trying to run out the little guys. Help us stop them. My landlord is already selling his house because of all the legislation the council has passed that is asinine. They don't want families to stay they want developers. They want to regulate student life so that we don't interfere with their lives.

Please come and support those that will speak out even if you don't want to say anything.

Provo City Council has consistently acted without regard to the student population. We understand why they do it--students aren't registered as voters in Provo so they have nothing to fear when they cross them.

But this parking proposal--regulating parking in areas dominated by students--goes way beyond anything they have done before. The areas they propose to regulate have more students than permanent residents by more than 10-1. They propose to punish, really, a huge student population--several thousand--for the benefit of a few hundred residents.

This follows their recent theme of limiting the student population in the name of protecting permanent resident property rights. This blog consistently argues in favor of protecting property rights. Provo City Council's proposals are not that--they are not simply protecting property rights. They are abusive and dictatorial and violate the property rights of non-resident owners who want to rent their properties to students.

The result? Housing/rent costs for students and other non-permanent residents far above what they should be. The Provo City Council is doing what Thomas Sowell has criticized Bay Area residents for doing for years--making property decisions that punish new and poor residents by causing property prices to rise. These people wont buy the property themselves, so they pass legislation to limit the property rights of those who do want to buy it.

From "Property Rites" by Thomas Sowell:

Many restrictive land use laws in effect turn a chance that someone paid for into a guarantee that they did not pay for, such as a guarantee that a given community would retain its existing character.

In the normal course of events, things change. Land that is not nearly as valuable as farmland as it would be for housing would be sold to people who would build housing. But restrictive laws prevent this from happening.

Such laws help preserve the existing character of the community, at the expense of farmers and others who would gladly sell their land to builders if they had a chance to do so. Because they can't, their value of their land is reduced drastically.

The biggest losers are those families who are deprived of housing and those families who are deprived of the standard of living they could have if they did not have to pay for sky-high rents or home prices due to an artificial scarcity of housing.

The biggest winners are existing homeowners, who see the value of their property go up by leaps and bounds. Also benefitting are environmentalist groups who are able to buy up farmland at a fraction of its value because there are so few alternatives for the farmers.

When long-time Provo residents purchased their property, they didn't purchase a guarantee that any future building would be limited to certain area or certain types of residents (read: not students). They only purchased the right to their own property. Their continued insistence to limit the rights of anyone who came after them through the legislative authority of the Provo City Council is abusive and ignorant of property rights.

Provo City residents have a pretty sweet deal with students. They receive sales tax and rent tax far above what they would otherwise plus all the tax benefits of BYU itself to say nothing of the jobs provided by the presence of BYU or the students. Unlike many other college towns, they don't have to deal with the usual negative aspects of having a large student population--rowdy drinking and riots. Instead, BYU students provide a cheap, educated workforce and literally hundreds of thousands of hours of community service.

In return, Provo residents through the Provo City Council reward BYU students with greater and greater restrictions on how and where they can live (BYU hasn't helped out much there) and how and where they can park. And their reach extends even to areas overwhelmingly dominated by students. We cannot come up with enough adjectives to describe our outrage and many of the ones we'd like to use are not appropriate for this family-friendly blog.

One last appeal: go to the Provo City Council meeting and register your disgust with the council members. Do not be apathetic or lazy and leave the fight to others. Take the fight to them yourself.


Time and Place

Date: Tuesday, 5 February 2008
Time: 7-9:00pm
Location: City Office Building
Street: 351 W Center St.
City: Provo, UT


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